In line with April Fools and the 1st World Freeze Day we decided to do a freeze mission right here in Metro Manila. On a hot but rainy day, 8 agents would freeze on spot for about 4 minutes. It happened exactly 8:05pm at the Mall of Asia, 1st Floor Benches, Pasay City. SM Mall of Asia.

One of the busiest hallways in the busiest mall in the country would suddenly come to a freezing halt.

Planning: Agent Toshio
Emergency Planning: Agents PJ & Pao
Featuring: Agents PJ, Pandabear, Minari and Friends
Digital Video: Agent Pao, Ian, Minari’s Friends
Digital Photography: Agent Pao
Editing: Agent Pao

MISSION REPORTS

Agent PJ

If you trace the thread history in IEManila, the freeze isn’t really supposed to happen “it’s such a short notice”, “there’s no time to plan”, “there’s to few members”, “we haven’t registered yet”, “we’re so young”…developments only came when Agent Toshio was able to get us registered in time, the plan was set.

April 1, 2008. Mission briefing: 5:00 at the SM Mall of Asia baystrip [para sa tanga, yung sidewalk sa gilid mismo ng Manila Bay](For the ignorant bafoons, the sidewalk at the side of Manila Bay), immediately facing the Music Hall. Hindi raw po tayo pwede sa Music Hall mismo, kelangan daw naka-sked. Ang landi. 5:45, everyone assume places, wag magpapahalatang magfi-freeze kayo. 6:00 will commence the freeze.Please sync your CELLPHONE clocks at the time here: http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/city.html?n=145 Set the vibrating alert on 6:00, make sure it’s in silent mode para kayo lang makahalata, and set it on a 5-minute snooze mode. Para after 5 minutes, magva-vibrate ulet, then unfreeze.After countless messages and YM conferences, all was set. hours before world freeze day, we counted 19 agents and non-agents attending. but despite these numbers we decided to push through.

At around 5PM, I was the first to arrive. the meeting was near the fountain outside, but it was raining. and worse – I was clueless as to who he’s going to meet and exactly where. At 6pm, after much window shopping and several text messages, Agent Pao arrived. and to his surprise, agent pj was actually the only agent present.TBC

Agent Pandabear

It was raining that day and traffic was heavy. I was under the impression that the freeze mission was already over. I only tried to go to meet fellow agents. But lo and behold as I texted Agent Minari I found out – the mission hasn’t started. I was bit surprised and confused – shouldn’t it have ended by now? It was already 7:00 by that time.

So I rushed to the Music Hall to meet my fellow agents. Agent Pao, Agent Pj, Agent Minari and his barkada(friends) was there. They already started briefing. I just joined the fray. We started the freeze after an hour of planning. I was paired with Agent PJ.

We hanged out in the shops nearby while we waited for 8:05pm. The alarms started and we walked towards the scene of the mission – the benches in the 1st Floor of Mall of Asia. I followed Agent PJ not knowing when really to freeze since I took my cue from him. When we went out I already saw the other agents frozen – we didn’t hit the exact synch but we immediately improvised.

Agent PJ then stopped as he was about to bite into his sandwich. I then followed, stopping while checking my cellphone. I noticed Agent Minari was standing nearby. And his friend has different poses.

2 Minutes into the Freeze, people started reacting. One of the people watching kept on chiding “Gagalaw na yan, gagalaw na yan” (Look, they’ll move, they’ll move). I also noticed a child who approached Agent Pj and tried to look him in the eye. There were other reactions but it was hard to hear since the sounds from the mall kept banging on my ears.

Originally planned, it was 3 minutes but the freeze seemed to extend to 4 minutes. At cue from Minari we started to move again. We went on our separate ways, as if we don’t know each other. We met back to the Music Hall to meet and quietly dispersed as the guards were slowly watching our moves.

Fun mission, on a rainy night – though it was poorly planned it was still a success in itself.