“Ha ha ha…”

A sudden laughter followed by a frank remark made me uncomfortable.

We were in my room, drinking beer, being tossed in the wave of music when Jun (not John), a coworker from Philippines, laughed out suddenly.

His remark: “I know this song. It’s Matellica’s. Isn’t it? It’s a copied song.”

“Yes,” I answered. “And ya know, in this album, some songs are copied. But not all are,” was my excuse.

But my excuse was crushed under another blow of sharp and bluff comment. He showed no mercy.

“No, I know, from the first song to this one, they’re all copied. I didn’t tell ya ‘cause I don’t know the original artists of those songs. But this one, I definitely know, is Matellica’s.”

It was ‘Call of the sea’ (ပင္လယ္ေအာ္သံ), the second album of my favourite rock star, Lay Phyu.

“Oh, yes. I forget. Songs in this album are all copied,” I confessed in a half annoyed and half embarrassing tone. But he didn’t notice that. Probably he was drunk.

“Don’t you Filipino singers sing copied song?” I queried, after a couple of minutes’ silent.

“Of course,” he answered. “But, ya know, there’re very few copied songs in Philippines. Mostly we create own tune. Today, every artist, even very young Filipino artists, try to create their own tune and are very proud of it. We’re trying to compete with the international artists. We create our own tuned songs, our own style and wanna show our creativity to the world.”

He said these words in a proud and thrilled voice. I listen quietly, embarrassingly and awkwardly. It was one of the unforgettable moments in my life.