The Tao of Helmut

THE TAOof

HELMUT

AUTHOR OF THIS IS YOUR KUNG-FU: 17 MINDSETS FOR NON-HERMITS

RODOLFO AZANZA

Illustrations by

Christine Ayn Rand Azanza

Contents Acknowledgements ................................................3 About the Author .......................................................5 Introduction ..................................................................6 The Crash .......................................................................9 Enter the Minot ..........................................................11 I, the Nose ....................................................................14 Down in Mississippi .................................................17 What's in a Name?..................................................19 Chronicler & Validator ..........................................21 Games People Play ...............................................24 Protect Zi Base ...........................................................26 Alexander D. ..............................................................28 Protrusions ....................................................................30 Kuznets ..........................................................................32 The Tao of Helmut ....................................................39 The End ..........................................................................49

THE TAO OF HELMUT Rodolfo Azanza

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NOTES


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Acknowledgements

I believe that the Big Boss up there has the last say on everything, so I thank Him foremost for allowing this project to come to fruition.

In a different light, I would also like to thank my non-fair weather friends in the Manila Poeticons e-group: Glenn De Guzman, Gina Ledesma, Lardy Caparas, Raymund Addun, Nonoy Oplas, Joey Sescon, Adora Navarro, Che Santos, Joy Castro and Kat Firmeza. Thanks to Monching Romano as well, who never cease to amaze me with his gift of gab. When I am with this bunch, my cup runneth over.

I also thank my wife, Christy, for all the great decaf coffee and Korean black noodles that sustained me through long evenings in front of the computer, my eldest daughter Christine Ayn Rand who fueled my imagination and gave Helmut a face through her beautiful drawings, my youngest daughter, Maria Zinia, for taking the position in my life as My Weakness, to my dad, Rudi,


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who once said, “Don’t do anything unless at the least it will improve your complexion”, and to my mom, Nene, who can really weave the scariest bedtime stories in the whole planet.

Finally I would like to thank some people I’ve fortuitously met in my journey; people who turned out to be gemstones in their own right: Renato Azanza, Cesar Sarmiento, Sam Aherrera, Cathy Bascos, Arlene Macaranas, Jannicke Steen, Ponly Pena, Bong Verzosa, John Mayang, JCI Sen. Levi Cabeliza, Obet Evangelio, Ferdie Vasquez, Bong Dimafelix, Jon Puma, Kenneth Tanate, Susan and Gerry Gerardo, Carlo and Pam Borlaza, Boss Benny Reinoso, Boss Budoy Quitoriano, Erik Knive, Torbjorn Kirkeby-Garstad, Manny Rubio, Anne Margrethe Platou, Suman Basnet, Sunny Malimit, Erick Planta, Evelyne Santiago, Anne Orquiza, Rommel Regacho, Czar Lapuz, RV De Guzman, Alberto Canlas, Nestor Aliman, Andy Estrellado, Nomer Reynaldo, Celso Caballero III, Carol Ballesteros, Theresa Gonzales, Biyen Paul, Mike Hosillos, Ferdie Blanco and Darvin & Kathy Yambao. If I took a sip of Aquavit for every good stuff I absorbed by interacting with all of you, by now I would be an irredeemable alcoholic.


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About the Author

Rodolfo Azanza grew up in a barrio in the

small island-province of Catanduanes, Philippines, daydreaming about comic book superheroes and wondering about what lies beyond the clouds. His mom primarily influenced his literary inclination.

Rodolfo Azanza’s academic background is in Economics. He went to the University of the Philippines for his Bachelor’s degree. He also holds a Master’s degree in Urban & Regional Planning from the University of South Australia.

Today, he works as Country Representative for a global power company based in Norway. In his free time he writes blogs and keeps in touch with friends and family through Facebook.


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Introduction

Helmut is of course just a figment of my

imagination. The main inspiration for the character of Helmut is a little ninja called Ninjai. It is a flash animation project by a group called the Ninjai Gang. Their work can be found in www.ninjai.com. I watched the adventures of Ninjai one chapter at a time because that was how the developers posted the flash movies in their internet site. After posting a chapter or two, there would be a lull of a few weeks, sometimes even months. I remember anticipating the posting of the next chapter right after finishing the last one. Between Chapter 4 and 5, a character of my own sprang to life in my head. I guess it was my way of coping with the waiting that I had to contend with.

Helmut turned out to be a smash hit to my eldest daughter. She was then about 3 years old.

http://www.ninjai.com/


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I would read to her the usual fairy tale books but she would insist that I tell her another story about Helmut. So I started concocting story lines around the little fellow. In time Helmut became part of our day-to-day lives. For instance, as we would eat dinner, my daughter would insist she sees Helmut also gobbling up his meal while seated at the edge of the microwave oven.

I guess Helmut, by and large, is an extension of me. Things I cannot do, or afraid of doing, I let Helmut do it. I think he has become a tool for me to expand my universe. I am afraid of skating, so I let him skate. He became a way for me to meet the interesting people I have dreamed of clasping hands with.

I discovered about two years ago that that When I would think out things in my head, Helmut would pop up and start taking the other side of whatever is the position I am gravitating towards or biased about. In short, Helmut has become an analytical tool, almost like a built-in shrink, if you like.

I hope he does not end up controlling me, because two month ago, he asked me if I could write a book about him. Of course I said no.


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THE TAO of

Helmut

By Rodolfo Azanza


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The Crash

It was night when I first met Helmut. Dark as

usual, it was pretty much an ordinary night. Only

that night, I met Helmut. I guess that made it a

little less ordinary. I was already tucked under the

sheets, my eyes were already closed for two

seconds, and I was at the brink of singing myself

to sleep with my favorite song. I was softly going,

"Love, is a many splendored...” and then I was

rudely interrupted by a loud, "THING!"

As I later found out, it was the sound of

Helmut crashing through my smoked-glass

windowpane. He landed right inside my

Starbucks coffee mug. By the sound of it, no

Minot could have survived that crash. The impact

shattered the aircraft's protective


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electromagnetic cloak, and had it not been that

coffee mugs are typically made round, Helmut

would have died before one can say “Arnold

Schwarzenegger”. The starboard of his spaceship

caught the arc of the rim near the handle, and

sent the ship going in a smooth circular motion all

the way to the bottom of the green Starbucks

mug. The vessel smashed right into an ort of

Skyflakes semi-dissolved in a pool of leftover

coffee.

I heard the last drowning gasps of the

spaceship's engine before it died down and

slipped into utter stillness. As I peeked inside the

mug, Helmut was already disembarking. I saw a

little fellow walking down the tiny plank of a small

spaceship in such a majestic stride. Only, he

tripped on some fine wires hanging out by the

exit door, and fell straight into the pool that was a

fusion of disintegrated crackers and leftover

coffee.


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"Xyz", he said as he picked himself up.

The voice was rather clear and

resoundingly loud coming from a fellow whose

spaceship can fit in a coffee mug.

Enter the Minot

Helmut is a Minot. He came from a planet

unknown to Earth people. He tried too many

times to tell me the name of the solar system he

came from but I just could not get myself to say it

correctly.


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Well, just to give you an idea, it sounds a

little bit like French. Something like, “Les goûts et

les couleurs ne se discutent pas".

Helmut tried pointing me to his planet out

there in the wide expanse of the evening sky that

same night he landed in my coffee mug. He said

that if I look right into the belly of a constellation

called Scorpio and adjust my line of sight about

10 degrees to the left, then I will be looking

exactly where "Les goûts et les couleurs ne se

discutent pas" is supposed to be.

I must have stared and squinted a hundred

times but I could not see any slight indication of

that thing, so eventually I decided to just pretend

to see a shimmering light from where he was

pointing at.


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It was night when I first met Helmut…


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I, the Nose

Helmut can speak many Earth languages.

He told me that he had been to Earth seven times

already; the seventh being the night we met. He

tried communicating with me at first in what I

would realize later to be a mix of German,

Vietnamese and Spanish. Right after he was fully

recovered from the close acquaintance with the

leftover coffee in my mug, Helmut looked up to

me and mumbled a mouthful of gibberish, but

my ears could not make a recognizable word out

of it. It was all Greek to me, or Germanic, as it

turned out. I thought I picked up some words like,

"Spraken, spraken, slazen, oten!", or something

close to that.


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Later on I was able to work out that his

name is Helmut, because he shouted it three

times as he repeatedly stabbed his chest with his

pointing finger. Then he said something like, "Y

tu? Y tu?”, while pointing right into the center of

my face.

I reluctantly said, “Nose?”

So he called me “Nose” from then on.


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Helmut and his grain of rice.


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Down in Mississippi

As not to complicate matters with Helmut, I

did not try to change his thinking that my name is

Nose. And it worked out quite well. Besides, I

leaned towards simplifying my life given the

initial language barrier.

Fortunately it turned out, Helmut can speak

English. Only it was awkwardly very much

Southern; much like this Forrest Gump character.

He said he learned it during his sixth trip to Earth,

from a friend who lived in a place called

Tennessee. He recalled that he saw from the sky

a long and winding river and thought he would

go “like a water lily” and let the river carry his

spaceship to wherever he is destined to be for

this trip. He ended up in a town called Memphis.


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From there he chased a bumblebee all the way

to a cool place called Nashville. There was a

young lady that he met in 1971who taught him to

speak English. She was a broadcaster in a local

radio station. Helmut testifies that the young lady

was incredibly talented but she was stuck as a

faceless voice in the radio. He talked her into

moving to television and pit her talent against the

challenges of TV anchoring. Five years after, she

moved to Baltimore to heed Helmut’s suggestion

and be a TV anchor. Helmut had to stay in

Nashville to continue searching for a good

transceiver location (whatever that is).

Many moons later, he saw her on TV, in a

show called “People Are Talking”.

“Ms. Winfrey, she really made a career out

of talking”, Helmut explained.


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What's in a Name?

Helmut told me about his harrowing

experience enroute to my coffee mug. He

explained how he lost control of his spacecraft.

As he was jettisoned from the Mothership towards

the general direction of the Earth, he did not

switch on the reverse thrusters as he entered the

Earth's atmosphere, on the expectation that as it

did before, the Ozone layer will slow down his

entry anyway. Unfortunately, he chanced on a

hole in the Ozone layer and down he plummeted.

He thought he was going to die as his life flashed

before his eyes.

“Maybe we should write Mr. Obama,”

Helmut suggested. “With our intercession, he


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might sign the Kyoto Protocol rather than play

around with the Copenhagen Accord."

"Don't worry", I jokingly told Helmut. “When

I become President of the Philippines I will patch

it up myself”.

Anyway, that was the start of a very good

friendship. At first I felt very awkward calling him

Helmut. To me it sounds like a name of a cartoon

character. Pretty much like Hagar the Horrible. I

told him that his name sounds very foreign to me,

and perhaps we can agree to a more familiar

name, like Ding-Dong, or Jing-Jing. Helmut did

not agree. He said the names I suggested sound

too much like doorbells. He counter-suggested

shifting to Arnold Schwarzenegger or

Nebuchadnezzar.

So we ended up agreeing to stick to

Helmut.


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Chronicler & Validator

Helmut is a Chronicler. All Minots are.

Helmut said that the Minot race was tasked by

the Supreme Being to travel the vastness of His

creation and record the events that take place

practically everywhere. The Minots are highly

technological and have actually constructed

transceivers in every galaxy to monitor all events

in every planet, moon and asteroid. Helmut said

that they have installed two of these transceivers

in the Solar System. One is on a rock that forms

part of one of the rings of Saturn, and the other, a

fairly new installation, is right here on Earth. I

recall Helmut mentioning a couple of times that

this transceiver is called "The Wall". Totally

discounting the possibility that he meant the


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album of Pink Floyd, I simply made the

conclusion that it is the one in China.

With the transceivers, the Minots can stay in

their home planet and observe the events in the

universe from the comforts of their living room (I

reckon all living bodies need a sofa, or

something of similar nature). However,

sometimes the transceivers need maintenance

works due to ordinary wear and tear, and they

would send their engineering teams to fix the

technical problems.

Helmut however does not belong to an

engineering team. He is a field operative called

a "validator". Sometimes, signals from a

transceiver encounter anomalies in space.

Therefore, the signals that reach the Minots in

their living rooms are corrupted. Afraid that they

might make some mistakes in recording the

works of the Supreme Being, the Minots send field


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operatives like Helmut to chronicle events in

certain locations via the empirical method.

Helmut fixing his spacecraft with

epoxy.


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Games People Play

Helmut, he was funny. One instance he

caught me playing Starcraft on my PC. I thought

he was already asleep as it was already 2:05

ante meridian. I was in the act of merging my two

High Templars in order to create an Archon when

I heard him. He was sitting at the edge of the

coffee mug and his head was thrown backwards,

laughing his heart out. I asked him why he is so

wildly amused, and he told me he was so wildly

amused because I was so wildly amused with the

game. By the way, he thought the Zergs are an

ugly lot.

He explained to me that Minots do not play

games. Even as Minuettes (little Minots that is)

they do not play games. Every day in the life of a


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Minot is spent in preparation for becoming a full-

pledged chronicler. He said that in all the planets

he chronicled, it is only on Earth that beings play

games: sometimes for money, sometimes for love,

and sometimes just for the sheer entertainment

value.

I explained to him the mechanics of

playing a game. First, that the rules must be set

and all the rules must be followed all the time

come hell or high water, just like how the Minots

follow all the orders of the Supreme Being.

Otherwise, the game will not be a good one.

It was tempting to also explain the Game

Theory in general, and the Prisoner's Dilemma in

particular, but I held back. I told him that a game

should be enjoyed, and that's all about the

essence of it.


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Protect Zi Base

Later on, after we repaired his space craft

using a bit of synthetic thermosetting resin (which

is actually just Epoxy I bought from the Wilcon

Depot) and a few hours of recharging from a

triple-A battery, Helmut figured out a game with

mosquitoes called, "Protect Zi Base". I would be

the base and Helmut would buzz around me in

his spacecraft (the fuel for which we figured to be

just a good mixture of Russian Vodka and a tinge

of olive oil) and would not let a mosquito touch

me. Sometimes I would put the pressure on him

by announcing that three more are approaching

from 6 o'clock while he is busy driving a couple

of "enemies" under my chair. But Helmut, he

would always manage. That I was sure about,


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because I never got ill of Dengue Fever. He was

always flying around me like a Mormon casing

the house of a prospective recruit.

It was mostly like that with Helmut. From the

office I would go straight home and have a chat

with him about life. While I am away he would

spend most of his time watching TV and then go

inside his spacecraft to record human events. He

also fancied giving technical names to places

inside the house. He calls my work station as the

Captain's Bridge, my bed as the Sick Bay, the

kitchen is the Engineering Bay, the car is the

Teleportation Device, and the toilet is the Warp

Zone. Indeed, it was all so amusing with

Helmut. Eventually I got used to referring to my

PC as the Captain's Log, and the curtains as the

Electromagnetic Shield. He would laugh because

instead of raising the Shield for protection, we

had to bring it down when the sun is up.


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Alexander D.

Helmut likes rice. He also said he tried

caviar about a hundred and fifty years ago

during his fifth visit to Earth. There was this fellow

he met somewhere in France. He was then

scouting for a good site for a transceiver in case

"The Wall" gets demolished by the tides of world

history. Apparently, this fellow whom he became

friends with did nothing but write. So they would

chat for long hours weaving one storyline after

another.

One of those stories, Helmut told me, was

about three soldiers who were supposed to be

good in using muskets, but were way a lot better

with their swords.


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Another story was about a sailor who was

framed and was thrown behind bars. While in jail,

the guy met another prisoner who happens to

have information about a hidden fortune.

Eventually he was able to escape, and using the

discovered wealth, exacted his sweet revenge

against those who perpetrated his imprisonment.

It was during these long chats with

Alexander D. that Helmut tried caviar. Apparently,

this writer lives a lavish lifestyle and was a big

spender; always living beyond his means.

"But rice is so much better", Helmut said.

I believed him because often he would

sneak away carrying on his shoulders a grain of

rice and would haul it into his spacecraft. Then he

would not come out for long hours.


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Protrusions

I never saw the inside of Helmut's ship. Well,

foremost it was too small for the naked eye. I

never tried to anyway, in the same way that

Helmut never tried to look inside my cabinet.

Privacy, I explained, is something that humans

value a lot. Helmut kind of liked it too as it

amused him tremendously when he would walk

out of his spaceship (my mug became his regular

parking bay) and "Nose" will be there staring at

him with huge question marks in his eyes. It was

not really that I did not know he just spent two

hours devouring a grain of rice because I would

always note his belly protruding out of proportion;

like Italy sticking out into the Mediterranean. It

was more like I did not know if he eats rice with


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something else. Later on he was to tell me that he

never ate rice with something else. But he always

drank something afterwards: the fuel.

Playing “dodge the claw”.


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Kuznets

Helmut once asked me when it would snow,

because he was looking forward to skiing.

Apparently, in the 1890’s, Helmut came to Earth

for his fourth mission, in a land where people are

called Originals. These people do some kind of a

cultural journey that Helmut called a

“walkabout”. The Originals travel on foot to a

place full of “sand and dry stuff”, and after days

and days of walking they would reach a place

where a huge, huge orange rock stands.

In this place, Helmut met a white stranger

that looks pretty much different from the Originals.


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This one does its own walking, but always into

forests and bushes and never into the sands. He

likes to put words into lines and arrange them in

such a way that it would be nice to listen to when

recited. I told Helmut that his friend was most

likely a poet, because that is what poets do.

Helmut’s friend apparently carried with him

all his stuff. He rolls everything with a blanket and

ties a rope from end to end so that he is able to

sling it around his body. Helmut laughed about it

while he was describing it to me. He said that his

mate looked like he was waltzing with a girl when

he carries his stuff this way.

“Clancy, he was a funny swagman you

know!” Helmut exclaimed.

“So his name was Clancy?” I asked.

“For a while it was Clancy but I later

convince him to change his name to Banjo,”

Helmut replied.


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Helmut said he once went with Clancy (or

Banjo) bush-walking, and they kept climbing up

and up and up the mountains until they found

themselves in this place where there is white stuff

all around.

“Apparently it is also called snow, but it

looks whiter than what can be found in

Alexander’s town.” Helmut explained.

This is where Helmut learned how to ski.

I explained to him that it does not snow in

Manila at all, or the Philippines for that matter.

"Sometimes we get hail in Baguio, but never

snow". I told him.

It made him sad. For like a week he did not

play with the mosquitos, and likewise he was not

interested in playing "Dodge the Claw" with my

cat, Kuznets.


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And here I digress. Kuznets is a tomcat. I

found him in a Sketchers shoebox in a back alley

at the U.P. Diliman Shopping Center; just outside

the stall of Diliman Republic (they sell nice shirts

and jackets there!) about six months before

Helmut came falling down from the sky. At first I

thought of naming the cat “Paul Krugman” just for

the heck of it. But later I decided it should be

Kuznets, because it is a shorter name. You do not

want to have to yell more than three syllables

when you want to call the cat, I figured. It could

be very tiring, not to mention that the cat might

feel too important.

Black as coal, Kuznets is the nicest cat I

have seen in my waking life; perhaps also the

laziest. Helmut learned about "Pavlov's

Conditioning" with Kuznets. The feline would not

play "Dodge the claw" with him unless he would

first levitate a piece of Oreo in front of his

spacecraft as the reward. But I digress.


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After a week of silence (kind of a

melancholic stupor, as Helmut would later say) I

became concerned that Helmut will give me the

cold shoulder treatment for the longest time. I

decided to bring him to the mall to cheer him up.

“Would you want to go to Megamall or the

Mall of Asia?” I asked Helmut.

He picked Megamall because he thought

that to go to the Mall of Asia we will have to book

a flight. He figured his spacecraft still needs a few

more flight tests before declaring it in good order.

He was ecstatic about going to Megamall

but it took some convincing for him to leave the

spacecraft behind “for a short test flight”. With a

grain of rice for snack and a piece of

marshmallow for cushion, I place Helmut inside a

film canister (with a window cut out so he can

peek outside). It was a short drive from

KaimitoVille to Megamall but Helmut's constant

chattering made it even shorter.


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Every time I would overtake another car,

Helmut would go, "Captain! Evasive maneuver!"

And Helmut constantly egged me to shift to

higher gear and drive faster, hollering, "C’mon

Nose, Warp Speed Ten! Warp Speed Ten!

It was mostly like that with him along the

way. He was in high heavens when we entered

the mall and saw the skating rink in Building A. I

bought a gallon of Rocky Road ice cream, paid

the entrance to the rink and sat down at the far

end, near the dressing room.

Helmut skated on ice cream for almost two

hours. I had to promise him we would do it again

before he acceded to my plea that we should go

home. He said we should try a different flavor

next time.


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Helmut’s self-portrait (he used my

laptop).


The Tao of Helmut

But we did not get to do it again. Just last

week, when I came home from watching the

Pacquiao-De La Hoya dream match at Silver

City-Tiendesitas, I found a note on my desk. It

was from Helmut. I knew he did not use the anti-

gravity machine of his spacecraft to lift the pen in

writing the note. He must have scribbled the

whole thing painstakingly because I noticed a

good number of smallish footprints on the paper.

The note read:

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********

-Please insert Earth Date here-

Dear Friend Nose,

First of all, I think you should change

your name. Nose is quite funny, but you deserve

a more decent name, perhaps something like,

Ronald Reagan, since you like him a lot.

I received a signal from my beacon this

morning while you were asleep. I decided not to

tell you I have to leave. Twenty-five Minots before

take-off from the Genki Deska galaxy

encountered an anomaly. Uh, I have to explain,

Genki Deska is 10 degrees north of the Belt of

Orion from the Earth's point-of-view. Somebody

has to shoot a spacecraft into a basket of

rotating energy to free the twenty-five Minots,

and I am one of the last 2 Minots in this Region


41 | P a g e

that must make that shot. In Minot, we call this

act a free throw.

I thank you for the data and information

I was able to gather and send back to my

principals. The Supreme Being will now be very

happy to know that he can now retract his

previous order to annihilate planet Earth from the

face of the universe. Many moons ago, our

transceiver in your planet sent a signal to us that

Earthlings have been terribly destructive. They

have found ways to destroy the things they love

for reasons unexplainable and unknown to us,

Minots. And the Supreme Being's explanation

was only that humans have become too self-

centered.

First there was nuclear testing in an atoll

that killed a lot of flora and fauna. Then there

were planes smashing into buildings, killing a lot

of people. War ensues in many fronts, as if war is

as easy as eggs for breakfast.


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Earthlings take life for granted. For many

years they have killed whales for their fat. They

kill sharks for their fins too, so that their dumplings

would taste better even while just with a little slice

of mushroom it would taste better nonetheless.

They kill rhinos and elephants for ivory, as if ivory

would cure hunger. They kill tigers, otters and

crocodiles for their skin. I do not understand this

because I think earthling skin is great already.

Why put on something else’s skin over one’s own.

They kill turtles for their shell, to adorn houses and

furniture. Destroying somebody else’s house to

make your look better?

Loggers kill trees. Consumers kill trees

too under the pretext of wealth by refusing to use

the other side of a bond paper. Others kill

vegetation for the sake of business, but what is

worse is that some businesses kill vegetation just

for the heck of it.


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What has become scary is the

propensity of humans to kill each other, as if it is

just like stepping on ants. People shoot other

people both in times of war and in times of

peace. Business rivals, or even partners, kill each

other over profit. Kinsmen kill each other over

inheritance, and motorists kill each other over

parking space.

But what we shared in the last few

weeks point to a different direction. Humans,

other than they tend to invent plenty of fun

games, are capable of friendship. The Supreme

Being will not want to erase a race capable of

such loftiness.

Hurry up and be President of your

country so you can plug the hole in the Ozone

Layer.

I will try to send you some pictures from

Minot. Just bring your Blackberry close to The

Wall in Intramuros, and our gadget there will


44 | P a g e

activate your Bluetooth and then my photos will

automatically download. Just press “accept”.

And please, upload my photos to my Facebook

account so my friends see them too. My

password is [unprintable due to privacy

concerns].

Your friend,

Helmut, it means.

A long P.S.

I hope Earth would not mind that I

brought with me 7 mosquitos so we can play

"Protect Zi Base" on the way to Genki Deska.

I considered bringing Kuznets too but he

is awfully heavy so I dropped the idea. Besides

he won't play "Dodge the Claw" without Oreo

anyway.


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I heard that Mr. Pacquiao won over Mr.

De La Hoya. I am sure all the people in the

Philippines love watching Mr. Pacquiao’s fights,

perhaps with the exception of Christian Bautista.

Tell your neighbor to stop believing

about that stuff that apparently make you slim, or

make your skin whiter. They just airbrush those

models on TV.

And when Kuznets sleeps, don’t wake

him up. He is busy with his Avatar trying to tame

that dragon.

Finally, before I end, please go over the list

below. These are just 17 Minot reminders:

1. Big stuffs only look big when they are really

big. And also when you think small.

2. There will always be a mosquito to chase.

There is no room for boredom if you really

think hard about it.


46 | P a g e

3. Treat all coffee mugs the same. They are all

crafted for one purpose.

4. Keep your windows open. Fresh air is great

for your agility and hand-eye coordination

when you play Starcraft. You also avoid

having a broken window in case a Minot

comes to crash-land.

5. You can wear any hairstyle that you want.

Ask Ms. Winfrey.

6. Human events are recorded in small

fragments but stories are not. You have to

see the whole bit in order to understand the

whole story.

7. Like all Minots, be a Visualizer. What you can

visualize, you can make true.

8. Practice makes practice easier. Ask Kuznets.

9. You can't repair a spacecraft on an empty

belly.

10. Believe that planet Minot exists, even if you

can't see it.


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11. Social beings must choose Facebook over

Starcraft everyday of the week and twice on

the weekend.

12. After attaining perfection, brush your teeth.

13. You may name your kids Jupiter, Venus or

Mars, but never Uranus.

14. Charge your phone before leaving the

house.

15. Keep a Captain's Log, especially of your

dreams.

16. After using the Warp Zone, flush.

17. The Supreme Being will always know in the

end.

Oh, and one more thing, remember always

what I said about you living as part of a larger

society. You are not a hermit and you must try to

leave your house more often and interact with

people. You must strive to live as a non-hermit

and therefore you must know your KUNG-FU.


48 | P a g e

Your friend again,

Helmut, it means.

********

That was pretty much about Helmut, the

Chronicler from Minot.


49 | P a g e

The End


50 | P a g e

Aya Azanza is the author’s eldest daughter. She is now 9 years old. She drew Helmut based on how she imagined he looks like from daddy’s storytelling. The little one is Enya, who until now opens the window at night “in case Helmut comes home”.

Sometimes big lessons in life come in small packages.The Tao of Helmut packs a heavy punch for its size andsimplicity.

“It is a children’s story for grown-ups, and yet also agrown-ups’ story for children. It is a great source ofinsight and inspiration.”

What separates this book from the rest is the absence ofpretension. It employs the most basic storytellingtechnique: linear and colourful. The illustrations weredone by a 9-year old girl based on her owninterpretation of the characters and settings.

Email: [email protected] Blog: heybuhey.blogspot.com

Rodolfo Azanza lives in Quezon City, Philippines. He hasdone civic work for 9 years as member and officer of theJCI-Philippines-Mandaluyong City. He also handles thelocal Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) portfolio of aglobal power company. He is a bonafide member of thePublic Relations Society of the Philippines (PRSP) and aNational Book Development Board (NBDB) RegisteredAuthor since 2005. He is also the author of the renownedThis is Your Kung-Fu: 17 Mindsets for Non-Hermits. Heattends the Bible Study Fellowship (BSF) Men’s Class inMakati City.

Documents

The Tao of Helmut