In mixed company

MANILA, Philippines -

With the small exception of going to middle school in another country, I spent most of my younger years in a gender exclusive institution. When I got to high school, the one thing my classmates and I were arguably excited about was finally being age appropriate enough to hold a soirée (even if we all acted so coy about it). It was something we looked forward to, because as much as we believed in girl power, it was also nice to interact with people from the opposite sex.

It was simple enough: gather your girl friends and potential guy friends for an event of awkward interactions, ‘How heavy is a polar bear? Heavy enough to break the ice. Hi I’m (insert name here)’ one-liners and waiting for potential friendships to start blooming or possible sparks to fly. But like a good episode of Awkward, not all parties go as planned. Think sweaty palms, automatic gender segregation at the start of a party, a couple of nervous laughs from the boys and an exaggerated shrill from the girls at a mediocre joke. It was understandably awkward. It was high school.

I’ve personally never suffered a scarring experience from a boy interaction night. The worst was probably when I slipped and fell into the lap of my friend’s now ex-boyfriend, but my accidental slip barely counts as traumatic. Although these next 10 people, who experienced alcohol induced soirée nightmares to creepy Facebook stalkers, have a lot more reason to cringe involuntarily.

Asher Dimaculangan, 21

Soirée year: 2007, 3rd year

We were having the seven minutes in heaven game and part of the game was to get to know the person that was sitting right next to us. I just really couldn’t remember what we were talking about but we ended up talking about math and how complicated it is. Then, we started computing numbers which was really awkward. The funny part was, for the last ‘computation’ we did, my answer was wrong but I kept insisting that my answer was the correct one, until I realized that I really was really wrong. From then on, they would tease me about being the ‘Best in Math’ girl. Even until now, they would still often ask me, “1+1?”

Brian Martinez, 21

Soirée year: 2008, 4th year

My worst soirée moment was when I was in senior year back in 2008. Everyone was having a good time until a classmate of mine got really drunk. A drunk deadweight, my friends and I had to carry him all the way from the bathroom on the first floor to the bedroom on the second floor. When we were able to finally lay him down, he stared vomiting everywhere and of course, we ended up cleaning his mess. When everything was finally settled and we were about to go home, my car then didn’t want start so we all had to walk home.

Jazmin Reyes, 20

Soirée year: 2006, 1st year

Back in freshman year, the girls and I met some boy around the neighborhood and we decided that it would be interesting to have a soirée with boys we don’t usually get to hang around with. So the girls got all dressed up as then we got at the event on time. Twenty minutes and a couple of texts to the boys, we decided to just order food and entertain ourselves. After an hour later, the boy texted me saying that they can’t make it because of the weather (it was just raining). Nonetheless, the girls and I ended up still having a good time — with or without the boys.

Zikki Montalan, 18

Soirée year: 2010, 3rd year

My worst soirée experience back in high school was in 2010 when i was in 3rd year. My class and I went to this soirée. At first it was really awkward — girls on one side and boys on the other. But when we brought in alcohol and everyone started drinking, everyone started getting loose. Suddenly, everyone was talking and dancing to the point where we had a mini party inside the venue! The soirée was so wild that we broke a lot of stuff, people were puking everywhere and we ended up getting banned from the place.

Retty Contreras, 19

Soirée Year: 2008, 3rd year

Everyone was excited come junior year when we were about to have our boy-girl interaction. As a host, my fellow co-host and I somehow decided to do pick-up lines to stall for a presentaion. While he was on a roll delivering joke after joke, I just stood there, frozen not able to say anything. Nerves probably got to me because mind went blank and I could feel my cheeks burn with embarrassment. It was horrifying to be standing in front of everyone unable to speak.

Steph Arnaldo, 18

Soirée year: 2010, 3rd year

I was third year high school when my friend decided to throw a Japanese character-themed party. My other friend and I went as Mario and Luigi. As I walked around feeling pretty pleased, thanks to the amused reactions of the guests to my ‘cool costume’ I started jumping up and down in the middle of the garden (because this one guy told me he was ‘pressing the A button of the Game Boy). Then, my right leg cramped then my left leg decided to cramp as well. So I ended up sitting/howling in the middle of the party on the ground, surrounded by confused guests and as red as my Mario costume.

Arisse de Santos, 18

Soirée year: 2009, 2nd year

Back when I was a sophomore in high school, I experienced the worst and one of the most awkward soirées I’ve ever been to. One of my girl friends arranged this get together thing with a group of guys and I didn’t really know them. When I got there, my friends apparently sort of set me up on a blind date with this guy. My friends then left us by the pool and he started singing love songs to me. He told me he felt like he’s known me for a long time through my Facebook updates. To make it creepier, he kept saying I was his soulmate. I still get so awkward whenever the guy is around.

Sam Lichuaco, 20

Soirée year: 2007, 1st year

Back in first year high school, we had a soirée with a class from an all-boys school. When my friends and I saw the boy who owned the house for the soirée, one of the other boys came and my friends dared me to go up to him and start a conversation. I tried to be as friendly as possible and I asked him to sit with my friends. He kept shaking his head and mumbling, “No”. So I eventually got pissed off at his rudeness and left him alone. I forgot about that incident right after but even until today, his classmates still tease him about it and he would always defend himself.

Andoy Lagman, 21

Soirée year: 2008, 4th year

There was this one soirée back in fourth year that started off well, but then my childish tendency to show off came out. I wanted to impress my friends by walking on the side of the pool, trying to balance like a monkey. And after a few feet of walking, I slipped and fell. Half of my left leg dipped in the pool and was drenched in cold water. I tried to pretend that nothing happened but most of people saw. I tried to ignore it, but my foot was soaking wet and felt so mushy and uncomfortable, so i tried to be okay with it and ended up going home.

Charles Villadelgado, 22

Soirée year: 2006, 2nd year

I was a sophomore in the when I experienced the worst soir´e ever. Our counterpart was a mixture of students from two different sections of the same school who were the same batch as us. Upon arrival at the venue, we were surprised to see other boys whom we didn’t know. I asked the organizer of our counterpart who those other boys were. She then told me that she invited another section from another all-boys school. It was a very awkward soirée. We didn’t have fun and so it didn’t end well.