A few days ago, I became both the daughter and the sister of board exam topnotchers. My brother found out that he got 4th place in the recent ECE board exams. He somehow bettered the 9th palce finish of our own father in the Chemical Engineering booard exams several decades ago.

Just as the results were about to be released, our phone lines and internet access died. We had to rely on text messages from an aunt for news.

My youngest sister (forever at odds with the brother, the place I held before I "matured" and stopped quarreling him myself ) couldn't care less. She couldn't understand our concern about not being able to get to the news first. We were all going to find out about the news the following day anyway.

A little past midnight, my mother woke me up with the news that my brother had passed the exams and was in the top ten placers. He learned about it from the text messages of classmates. One of his classmates also gave him a call which woke him up. The rest of the family was already awake and celebrating: Mama, Papa, my brother and my other younger sister.

We decided to let the youngest in the family sleep it out in the couch.

The next day, when I asked if she had congratulated her brother, she said nothing.

I still owe my brother a tub of ice cream though.

Congratz, Joven!