Songs of Ourselves

If music is wine for the soul, I suppose I have had my satisfying share of this liquor of life, one that has sustained me all these years.

All this time I have savored the timeless ballads of Matt Monro and Carpenters, have drunk much rock of say, Queen and Juan de la Cruz Band, which I have grown to love, or sometimes sipped from the modern R&B and acoustic alchemy concocted by younger songwriters and singers like Ogie Alcasid  and Ne-yo. My favorites range from chanteuse Grace Nono to Paul Potts to Patsy Cline to Rico J. Puno, and the alternative Labuyo to Richard Clayderman.



Such sense of music has been influenced by people around me and people whom I grew up with—my mother, sister and brothers—my family, or better yet, our clan who sang and danced our way through life, now and then drinking from own cups.



I

How and why I have grown to like music—like every human being perhaps—I owe first to my mother, who must have adlibbed the best melodies only for me to sleep the cold nights of being left without a father. After my father’s demise, my mother’s melodies must have sounded more like elegies being sung by a widow who now as a single parent, had to fend for six growing children.

 


One evening, Mother told me a story of how she had to sing Victor Wood’s “Teenage Señorita” when she was being recruited for a sorority in college. I could only imagine she sang it in the corridors of Burns Hall where I first saw my very own teenage señorita Cecile Naldo, a bubbly DevCom major from Iriga who would sing the melodies of Celine Dion like an LP after our Biology class. The Celine Dion connection did not materialize much—just when my Cecilia’s singing of “If You Asked Me, Too” ended.


Mother loved Nat King Cole that whenever Manoy played “Stardust” and the rest of his collection nights after supper in Bagacay, the Banat household would be filled with her voice that sounded like it’s tiptoeing the corners of the house.


Her singing voice would delicately hit the right notes but contained “a certain sadness” that perhaps even Astrud Gilberto must have never known. Manoy recorded Cole’s collection on tapes—along with those of Carpenters and Pet Shop Boys—through our cousin Manoy Ynos’s stuff in Manila during his engineering board review in 1991.



One cool Sunday afternoon in 1993, Mother introduced me to Jerry Vale, when we were enjoying the coolness of the folding bed in our sala at siesta time. We listened to Vale’s “If You Go Away” being played on an AM radio program on the Sharp radio which Manoy bought upon her request.


She was perhaps singing away the moment thinking how to sustain in the following week her four sons studying in Naga—or perhaps she was humming away her gratitude that she was supporting only four students in the city. I and my sister stopped schooling that year.



Some seventeen years later, Mother’s swan song would be one graceful and heavenly melody, inspiring everyone in her last rites about how one single parent had weathered all odds through the years to make the best of all her six children.



II

In our brood of six, Manoy has biggest share of influence in each of us, younger siblings. While Ano and Alex also strutted their way to get our nerves equally break-dancing to the tunes of Michael Jackson and his local copycats towards the mid-1980s, Manoy’s influence in the rest of us has been indispensable.


Being the eldest, Manoy held the possession of the phonograph like the Two Stone Tablets, where the songs being played later became the sibling’s anthems. From the phonograph, everyone came to love Mother’s favorite trio the acoustic “Trio Los Panchos” whose pieces did not sound different from her aunt Lola Charing’s “La Tumba” number which she would sing during clan reunions. While Yoyoy Villame’s rpms would be played alternately with Baby Jane and Tarzan’s yellow plaka, it would be the “Santa Maria” chorus which would ring more in my memory. 

Yet, the phonograph music would last only until the time when there would be no way to fix it anymore after Manoy dropped it one day when he was retrieving or returning it from the cabinet which should have been out of our reach.

Everything else in the family’s long-playing collection had escaped my memory—I would be too young to even know how to operate the phonograph. We chanced to retrieve some of LP discs in the 90s after a long list of typhoons; I could only help my brother Ano in placing them on the walls as decoration. And they certainly looked classic there—like memories pasted on the wall for anyone’s immediate recollection.


Not long after, Manoy would be addicted to tapes that he would bring in a new recorded record of many artists in the eighties. The eighties was a prolific era--with almost anything for everyone.  On his  boombox and other sound gadgets, Manoy played Pink Floyd, Depeche Mode, Heart, Sade, America and Tears for Fears, among a million others.


He recorded songs while they were played on FM stations on the radio. It was his way of doing things. It was his way of cheering the household up--he played music when he would cook our food--his perennial assignment at home was to cook our food. He played music on the radio anytime, everytime that Mother would usually tell him to lower down the volume.



III

Creativity or art has never escaped my second eldest brother Ano’s keen senses. In the eighties, Ano did not only have a record of break-dance tunes in their high school days in BCAT—he also made an unforgettably cool tape jacket which became a bestseller among the siblings. While Ano and Alex break-danced to their hearts’ content, we younger siblings could only look at them in amazement, later adopting their moves to our own sense of enjoyment and thrill—wherever and whenever we found avenues for it.


This time, our anthems were now being played over the Sanyo radio, the family phonograph’s successor. Mother must have acquired it through a loan presented by lending businessmen whose special offers lured a number of public school teachers in Bagacay.

Ano loved the popular music, collecting pinups from song hits of say, Gerard Joling and mounting them as frames in our sala, as if he were a familiar cousin of ours. Of course, he maintained a collection of his tapes perhaps apart from Manoy's growing collection of recorded stuffs and original albums.

 

 

IV

Then, there was a time in our lives when music would not ever be sung for a long time. Nothing demoralized us more than being poor that music must have been forgotten as pastime—as growing young adults, our needs were more of corporeal rather than spiritual—"survival," not "theatrical."


I believe when someone in a movie said that nothing impoverishes the spirit more than poverty itself. Who would not be crushed by the fact that there was not just enough to sustain ourselves? Mother’s income had never been enough so that each of us had to hum our own melodies to sing our way through our days.


But just like wine, music’s soothing properties worked wonders. While the rest of us must have found avenues to continue singing their lives, brother Alex’s quiet and restraint was music itself. In him, we would not find so much loud melodies or even singing—because such countenance solicited friendship in cousin Bong, Auntie Felia’s eldest son who played and paraded the music of the eighties like soul food. With Bong, Alex’s sense of music has been sharpened—finding their voice in the groovy and still danceable and angst-ridden mid-eighties.


Later, Alex's tight-lipped restraint significantly found its voice in the sociopath Kurt Cobain and icons of the grunge era, among others. This was the time when Bong studied medicine in Manila, while Alex pursued engineering in UNC. Nothing better could have captured his sense of isolation than the pieces of Metallica, Guns and Roses, Bon Jovi and other intimacies which he now shared with new found frat brother Nanding, our landlady’s son in Diaz Subdivision.



After 1996, reverting back to the jukebox pieces was necessary for Alex to mingle with the crowd of fellow boarders working in the busy economic zone in Laguna. After all, Michael Learns to Rock, Rockstar and Renz Verano, for instance, could certainly help bring him back to the old Bagacay, which he sorely missed.  Alex would romance rock ballads even after he has established his own family in Laguna.

Flores de Mayo

Susog sa Obra Ni Clemente S. Manaog,
Mio Hermano Intimo
Agosto 2007


Bagacay, 1942

Kan si Rafael San Andres mga pitong taon pa sana, dahil naman gayod sa kahisdulan, igwang nakalaog na crayola sa saiyang dungo. Mga pirang aldaw an nag-agi, mala ta maski ano an gibohon kan ina niyang si Visitacion, dai nanggad mahali-hali an crayola sa dungo kan aki.

Kan bulan na iyan, Mayo, igwa nin pa-Flores si Visitacion sa saindang harong sa Iraya. Dawa na ngani gayod makulugon ang dungo, nin huli ta igwa baya nin tandan na sopas na tanggo saka galleta an mga  aki, nagbale sa Flores si Rafael.

Sa saday na harong ni Visitacion, an mga aki minadarara nin mga sampaguita, gumamela, dahlia, dahon nin cypres na ginurunting na saradit. Maparangadie muna an mga gurang mantang an mga aki nakaturukaw sa salog. Dangan maabot sa cantada an pagpangadie ninda sa Espaniol. Dangan maabot sa parte na an mga aki masarabwag kan mga dara nindang burak sa altar ni Inang Maria. Magkapirang beses masabwag an mga aki nin mga burak segun sa cantada.

Sa mga pagsabwag ni Rafael kan saiyang mga burak sa altar, basang na sanang tuminubrag hali sa dungo niya an crayola. Nagparaomaw si Visitacion asin daing untok na nagpasalamat sa nangyari. Nin huli man sa nangyari, nangayo-ngayo si Visitacion na gigibohon kan pamilya an Flores de Mayo sa masurunod pang taon bilang pasasalamat sa pagkahali kan crayola sa dungo ni Rafael.

Poon kaidto sagkod ngonyan, pinapadagos kan pamilya ni Visitacion San Andres an saiyang panata na dae mababakli ni isay man. Hasta ngonyan, tinutungkusan kan pamilya San Andres an pasasalamat kan saindang mga apoon, patunay na binibisto kan tawo an karahayan kan Mas Nakakaorog.

Songs of Ourselves

Words and Music through Love and Life

Part 4 of Series

Besides my other brothers, Mentz has influenced my penchant for music, even as he has wonderfully sung and danced his way through love and life. 

Though he was not much of a child performer himself, he later has taken to the family program stage like a natural, class act as he has done to presiding matters for (the rest of) our family.

Years ago, I called him to be the Speaker of the House—i.e. our household—because he has hosted and also literally presided our family (gatherings) since 1996. One with a quiet and unassuming disposition, Mentz has always taken to the microphone as if it’s public performance.

Through the years, Mentz has been trained to become a very good public performer. At the Ateneo high school, he led the Citizens Army Training (CAT) Unit’s Alpha Company, a well-respected group finely chosen to parade to give glory to Ina (Our Lady of Peñafrancia) in September in Naga City.

Then in college, Mentz did not only win a Rotary-sponsored oratorical contest; he also served as junior representative in the college student council. And before graduating in 1994, he won a graduate scholarship at the University of the Philippines where he would later obtain his graduate degree. And because he went to Manila all ahead of us, I always thought he has been exposed to the world way before his time.  

In the late 80s and early 90s when he was making the transition from being a high school achiever to a college heartthrob at the Ateneo, Mentz played Kenny Rogers and Tom Jones on Manoy’s cassette tape. Sweet sister Nene and I would always joke at how he covered a singer's song better than the singer himself.

In those days, he deftly worded the first lines of “Ruby, Don’t Take Your Love to Town” as he cleverly impersonated the speaker in “The Gambler”—sounding more Kenny Rogers than the bearded country singer himself: "on a warm summer's evenin, on a train bound for nowhere..." For us, his siblings, no one did it better than Mentz. Not even Kenny Rogers.

Perhaps because I listened to him passionately crooning away Tom Jones’ “Without Love” that I also heard the lyrics of that song after the overnight vigil of the Knights of the Altar inside Room 311 of Santos Hall. I thought I was dreaming but it was in fact Mentz’s tape playing on my classmate Alfredo Asence’s cassette player. Truth be told, I could not do away with the passionate singing that I had carted away Mentz’s tape for that one sleepover in the Ateneo campus.

In 1995, Mentz brought Enya’s “The Celts” and Nina Simone’s collection to our new household in Mayon Avenue. He bought these tapes to fill in the new Sony component secured from Mama’s retirement funds. Most songs of these women sounded morbid but I loved them. Because I so much liked the voice that came and went in Enya’s “Boadicea,” I played it the whole day on my Walkman (which Mentz kindly lent to me) while writing my thesis on F. Sionil Jose’s Rosales saga.  

In early January of 1996, Mother would pass away.

When I played Nina Simone’s “Black is the Color of My True Love’s Hair” one night during mother’s wake, one of my brothers asked me to turn it off. Perhaps it was too much for him to take. That black woman’s voice was too much to bear. But away from people, listening to these women’s songs did not only help me finish my paper; it also helped me grieve. 

Among others, Mentz adored Paul Simon’s “Graceland.” Because this was the time before Google could give all the lyrics of all songs in the world, Mentz knew the words to the song by listening to cousin Maida’s tape many times through the day. While every piece in the collection is a gem, “Homeless” struck a chord in me that years later, I would use it to motivate my high school juniors to learn about African culture and literature. Talk of how the South African Joseph Shabalala's soulful voice struck a (spinal) chord in both of us.

Years later, when we were all working in Manila, I heard him singing Annie Lennox’s “Why” and miming Jaya singing “Laging Naroon Ka.” At the time, I could only surmise that he was humming away his true love and affection which he found with his beloved Amelia, a barangay captain’s daughter whom he married in 2001.

With my sister Nene, the household of Mentz and Amy in Barangay San Vicente in Diliman would become our refuge in the big city. Though Nene and I worked and lived separately from them, it was where we gathered in the evening as a family. Even as Mentz and Amy gradually built their own family, their growing household has become our own family. Through years, it has not only become the fulcrum of our solidarity; it has also become the core of our own sensibility.

Many times, I would be told how Amy and Mentz would go gaga over live musical performances by their favourite local and foreign singers. Once they told me how they enjoyed the concert of Michael Bolton, whom the couple both loved. I would later learn that Amy had a very good collection of Bolton’s albums from “Soul Provider” to the greatest hits collection. I wouldn’t wonder about it even as I have always liked the white man’s soulful rendition of Roy Orbison’s “A Love So Beautiful” since the first time I heard it. (But I think I wouldn’t trade off the Roy Orbison original.)

Years have gone by fast, and three children have come as blessings to Mentz and Amy. Once I heard him singing with his firstborn Ymanuel Clemence singing Creed’s “With Arms Wide Open,” indeed their anthem to themselves. Yman, now a graduating high school senior, has likewise taken to performing arts as a guitarist and an avid singer of alternative rock and pop. Mentz’s firstborn is one soul conceived by his father’s love for lyrics and heartfelt melodies and his mother’s love for Michael Bolton and a host of many other soulful sensibilities.

With Yman, and now Yzaak and Yzabelle, their vivo grade-schoolers (like the rest of today’s youth who can hardly wait to grow up) singing the words of Daft Punk and Pharell Williams from the viral downloads on YouTube, this tradition of song and sense and soul is subtly being passed on, with each of us now and then singing our own ways through joy, through love and through life.

Songs of Ourselves

Words and Music through Love and Life

Part 2 of Series

Manoy Awel, our eldest brother, has had the biggest influence in each of us, his younger siblings. 

While brothers Ano and Alex strutted their way to get us equally break-dancing to Michael Jackson and his local copycats in the 1980s, Manoy’s influence in the rest of us, his siblings, is indispensable. Being the eldest, Manoy held the “official” possession of Mother’s pono (turntable) like the two Stone Tablets, where the songs being played later became the anthems among the siblings. 

On this portable vinyl record player, every one of us came to love the acoustic Trio Los Panchos, Mother’s favorite whose pieces did not sound different from her aunt, Lola Charing’s La Tumba number which she would sing during family reunions. 

In those days, Manoy would play Yoyoy Villame’s rpms alternately with (Tarzan at) Baby Jane’s orange-labeled “Ang Mabait Na Bata.” But it was the chorus from Neoton Familia’s “Santa Maria” which registered in my memory, one which chased me up to my high school years. 

Manoy’s pono music would last for a while until the time when there would be no way to fix it anymore. A story has been repeatedly told of how Manoy dropped the whole box when he was returning (or maybe retrieving) it from the tall cabinet where it was kept out of our reach. Here it is best to say that I remember these things only vaguely, having been too young to even know how to operate the turntable. 

Since then, we had forgotten already about the pono, as each of us, through the years, has gone one by one to Naga City to pursue high school and college studies.  

One day in November of 1987, Supertyphoon Sisang came and swept over Bicol. At the time, I was still in Grade 6 staying with Mother and brother Ano in our house in Banat; while my brothers and my sister were all studying in Naga.

The whole night, Sisang swooped over our house like a slavering monster, and in the words of our grandmother Lola Eta, garo kalag na dai namisahan (one condemned soul). The day before, we secured our house by closing our doors and windows. But the following morning, the jalousies were almost pulverized; the walls made of hardwood were split open; and the roofs taken out. But our house still stood among the felled kaimito, sampalok and santol trees across the yard.

Among other things, I remember brother Ano retrieving our thick collection of LP vinyl records. Most if not all of them were scratched, chipped and cracked. In a matter of one day, our vinyl records had been soaked and were rendered unusable. Ano, who knew art well ever since I could remember, cleaned them up one by one, salvaged whatever was left intact, and placed those on walls as decors. 

The 45 rpms and the LP circles looked classic like elements fresh out of a 1950s art deco. On the walls of our living room now were memories skillfully mounted for everyone’s recollection. And there they remained for a long time.

By this time, Mother had already bought a Sanyo radio cassette player which later became everyone’s favorite pastime.

Soon, Manoy would be glued to cassette tapes that he would regularly bring in the records of the 1980s for the rest of us. The eighties was a prolific era—it almost had everything for everyone. Perhaps because we did not have much diversion then, we listened to whatever Manoy listened to. On his boombox, Manoy played Pink Floyd, Depeche Mode, Heart, Sade, America and Tears for Fears, among a million others. Of course, this “million others” would attest to how prolific the 80s was.

In those days, Manoy recorded songs while they were played on FM radio stations. It was his way of securing new records; or producing his own music. Then he would play it for the rest of us. Music was Manoy’s way of cheering the household up—he played music when he would cook food—his perennial assignment at home was to cook the dishes for the family. 

Manoy loved to play music loud anytime and every time so that Mother would always tell him to turn the volume down. Most of the time, Manoy played it loud—so that we, his siblings, his captured audience in the household, could clearly hear the words and the melodies, cool and crisp.

While Mother and Manoy would always have to discuss about what to do about his loud records playing, we, the younger ones, would learn new sensibilities from the new sounds which we heard from the sound-box. We did not only sing along with the songs being played; we also paraded nuances from them which we made for and among ourselves. Out of the tunes being played and heard, we made a lot of fun; and even cherished some of them.

When we were very young, I remember hearing a cricket when Manoy played America’s “Inspector Mills” every night, which lulled my sister Nene and me to sleep. Nene and I asked him to play it all over again because we would like to hear the cricket again and again in the said song. (Later, I would be aware that it’s not only a cricket but also a police officer reporting over the radio.)

During those nights, Mama was expected to arrive late because she worked overtime at her father’s house that hosted Cursillo de Cristianidad classes, a three-day retreat seminar which the family committed to sponsor for the barangay Bagacay through the years.

Sometimes, it was just fine even if Mother was not there when we slept. At times, we knew she wouldn’t be able to return home for that weekend, so we were lulled to sleep in Manoy’s bed listening to America and his other easy-listening music. Because he played these songs for us, the lonely nights without Mother in our house were made bearable by Manoy Awel. 

When Manoy was not around or when I was left alone in the house, I would go to his room and play his records to my heart’s content. Because he would leave his other records at home, I equally devoured them without his knowledge. None of his mixed tapes escaped my scrutiny.

Through the years, Manoy would later be collecting boxes of recorded songs and later even sorting them according to artists and genres. 

 One day, I saw these recorded tapes labeled “Emmanuel” on one side and “Mary Ann” on the other. It wouldn’t be long when I learned that Manoy had found his better half, his own B side—in the person of Manay Meann, his future wife. 

Kristo sa Daghan

Igwang mga Kristo sa daghan an mga tugang mo.

Enot na enot, nagpoon sa magurang nindo an ining Kristo sa daghan—ki Manuel dangan ki Emma. Sa Kagurangnan, idinusay nindang duwa an saindong mga pangaran—bagay na nariparo kan saindong lolohon na si Ramon bago siya nagpaaram. Saysay ni Lolo Amon mo, mayo sa saindong anom na magturugang na an pangaran harayo sa istorya kan Kagurangnan sa Banal na Kasuratan.

Yaon ini malinaw sa matua nindong si Emmanuel, na an gustong sabihon, “Kagurangnan yaon satuya.” Sa panduwang pangaran na Neil Romano yaon an pundasyon kan saindong pagtubod asin kan saindong mga ginikanan. An panduwang kangaranan sa Alex Apolinario na iyo an saindong pantolo gikan sa búhay kan sarong santo. Dangan kangaranan kan sarong bayaning nagin panalmingan kan mga Pilipino.

An Clemente, kangaranan kan mga banal na lideres sa simbahan kaidto. Siring ki Rosario, an bugtong na tugang nindong babaye, pinangaran an saindang pagtuo kag pagsarig sa kapangyarihan kan pangadie sa paagi ni Santa Maria, an Iloy ni Hesu Kristo.

Dangan man an ngaran mo.

Sa saindo pa sanang mga pangaran, yaon na an krus sa daghan, an Kristo sa buhay nindo. Yaon an pagma’wot kan mga magurang mong gibohon kamong mga panalmingan kan kabo’tan kan Kagurangnan. Dinidekar kan duwa nindong magurang—sindá Manuel sagkod Emma—kamong mga aki ninda sa saindang dakulang pagtubod sa Kaglalang.

Dios mabalos ta saimong nariparo—na mismong an saindang mga pangaran, “Emma” kag “Manuel”—iyong gayo an duwang bahin kan “Immanuel,” an mismong pangaran kan Kagurangnan sa Hebreong pagtaram.

Tibaad nahiling kan duwa mong magurang na an pagsaro ninda asin kan saindang pangaran iyo an paggibo kan katungdan kan Diyos na Kaglalang. Dangan biniyayaan sindá kan saindong anom na búhay, na magpoon kadto sagkod na sinda man magtaliwan, idinusay sa pag-omaw sa Kagurangnan.

Ngonyan na sindang duwa mayo na digdí sa daga, yaon rinirimpos nindo sa búhay kan kada saro an saindang katukduan na mamoot sa kapwa asin magsarig sa Diyos na iyo an poon asin kasagkuran kan gabos na ginigibo digdí sa dagâ.

Sa siring na biyaya kan Diyos saindo, kag ngapit sa mga dalan kan búhay na saindong inaagihan, dai kamo maglihis o mawarâ.

Asin ngonyan na mga panahon, hinahangaan mo an mga tugang mo sa saindang mga nagkagirinibo, sa saindang mga ginigibo. Nin huli ta sinda nagigin panalmingan mo sa kadaklan na bagay sa saimong buhay. Nagpapadiosmabalos kang marhay. Sa búhay kan mga utod mo, yaon nahihiling mo an krus sa daghan kan kada saro sainda, an biyaya kan Diyos na Bathala sa duwa nindong magurang na ipadayon an saindang napu’nan sa tabang nin Kagurangnan.

Emmanuel. Yaon ki Manoy Awel mo an pagiging tiso, an kapas na magkulibat sa estado kan ispiritu mo; iyong gayo, enot niyang konsiderasyon an nasa saboot mo. Sarong bagay na an dakulang kahulugan, sa kapwa asin orog na saimong tugang niya, an pagrespeto.

Sa dakulon nang inagihan si Manoy mo, nahihiling mo saiya an sarong marhay na tawo. Sa dakulang harong kadto duman sa Libod, siya pinapaluhod sa asin o monggo kan saindong Lolo Emiliano ta ngani sana daang magtiso—kaibahan kan ibang mga tugang—na iyo, saiya nag-idolo.

Poon kaidto, nakanood sa pagpadakula kan Lolo nindo; natukduan magtaong-galang sa darakulang tawo, nakanood magpahunod sa saradit na tawo. Dahil kaiyan, yaon saiya an paggalang; an pagtao nin kusog sa kalag kan saiyang kapwa, orog nang gayo kadtong kamo entiro nang magkairilo.

Yaon sa saiyang daghan an ipadagos an pagsarang sa estadong pigdumanan. Saiyang tutungkusan asin susustineran an kapakanan kan kadaklan na saiyang pinu’nan.

Sa simpleng búhay kan maogmahon niyang agom asin mga kabuhan, yaon ki Manoy mo an kaogmahan.

Neil Romano. Nahihiling mo ki Ano an higos kan sarong tawo—yaon saiya an abilidad na magtabang dangan makapauswag bako lang kan mga mahal niya sa buhay kundi kan kadaklan. Siring ki Manoy mo, yaon saiya an pagma’wot na mataparan ano man na bagay na saiyang napu’nan.

Dangan yaon ki Ano an dai pagsagin-sagin na rimposon sana an mga namamatean kun an mga ini makakakulog sa kalag kan saiyang mga mahal sa buhay asin mga tugang. An pagpadangat niya sa mga nguhod na tugang, orog na sana man. Kan mga aki pa kamo, an turno kan Ina nindo saiya binabayaan. Araki pa kamo, siya na man an dakulang sarigan kan saindong magurang—nagmamanehar kan kapakanan kan kadaklan. Kaya sa saiyang mga aki, ipinapagiromdom, ipinapaarog an siring na kamalayan. Yaon, iyo ini, an biyaya kan Diyos na saiyang tinutubudan. Kaya na sana man yaon saiya an kaogmahan.

Alex Apolinario. Ki Irmanong Alex, mayo nin dakul na taram, kundi katiwasayan; bako man na pirming rarom, kundi baga kahulugan. Saiya, an magagayon na mga bagay sa kinaban igwang tamang kapanahunan, bako gabos na bagay tinataram ta nganing maintindihan. Bako na habo niya lang man nanggad magtaram, kundi na para siya tibaad yaon sa linong, yaon sa tuninong an hararom na kahulugan.

An simple niyang búhay ngonyan minapagamiaw saimo na tibaad bako gabos tinataram para maliwanagan. Yaon an katiwasayan—aram niyang an pagsakripisyo igwang balos na kasaganaan. An paglapigot, sa katapusan, nagiging kaogmahan.

Siempre sa tahaw kan ribok kan mga tawo, yaon an silencio kan tugang mong ini ho—bakong padalos-dalos kun siya magdesisyon sa saiyang ginigibo. Gabos na anggulo ririkasahon niya antes mag-abot sa pwedeng mapapangyari asin maginibo.

Tuninong, hipos na nagmamasid, dangan nakikidungan sa hulag kan banwaan, yaon sa saiyang daghan an biyaya kan Diyos na magtios dangan magpadagos magbaklay sa pinili niyang alagyan. Siya madagos-dagos asta makaantos sa saiyang papadumanan.

Clemente. Ki Mente, saboot mo, igwang orog na biyaya an magin nguhod na tugang kan nagkaerenot na tolo—yaon saiya an biyayang tiponon an gabos nindang ugali dangan isabuhay sa saiyang sadiring pakahulugan para sa saiyang kapakanan. Nagiging panalmingan niya an saindong mga matuang tugang.

Yaon ki Mente an pakikipag-ulian. Actualmente, minarhay niyang makauli dangan makapagpoon sa banwaan na saindong dinakulaan ta nganing maging harani sa pamilya asin mga tugang. Yaon saiya an paghadoy na kamong nagdadakulang pamilya pirming magkairibahan. Dawa kaidto pa, aktibo siya sa pag-urulian. Kun igwang tiempo haling Manila kaidto, siya mauli ta mauli ta ngani sanang kamo gabos magkanuruparan, magkairistoryahan. Mayo siyang panama sa pungaw sa siyudad—pirming an puso niya minabuwelta kun sain asin kiisay ini igwang lealtad.

Ki Mente yaon an pagkamatinao, an pagma’wot makatabang nang gayo sa siisay na nangangaipo. Iyong gayo an naiisip mo, sa ngonyan na mga tiempo, garong kandidato, nagpapanao nin kun ano-ano sa kada barrio—alagad pagmáte mo, an padangat mong tugang na ini ho, bakong pulitiko.

Sa eskwelahan sagkod sa barangay kaidto, natawan siya nin pagkakataon na magdalagan sa lokal na pwesto—alagad garo bagang dinehado. Duman siya nakanood na dai niya kaipuhan nin hagban na puwesto ta nganing matuod na magserbisyo—“to serve and not to count the cost,” nanu’dan niya sa sarong dating poderosong militar na an ngaran San Ignacio kan pagkaadal niya sa Ateneo. Garo nabasa na nindo an istoryang ini’ho. Iyo, tama an iniisip mo. Sa saiyang daghan, yaon si Kristo.

Yaon ki Mente an paggalang sa mga tawong nasa katungdan—an pagbisto sa kapasidad kan katungdan para sa kapakanan kan kadaklan; bako kan partikular na tawong yaon sa pwesto. Siring niya ngonyan na yaon sa gobyerno sa serbisyo publiko—siya ngonyan iyong tinutubudan, pighahagadan nin tabang, sinasarigan.

Rosario. Ki Nene mo, yaon an kaogmahan nindong magturugang. Yaon saiya an pakikipagsapalaran. Pagkaagom ni irmana mo dangan kan magpamilya na, nahiling mo saiya an isog kan sarong babaying igwang paninindugan. Sa sibot na siyudad na saiyang dinayo, nagpundar siya duman dangan nagpadakula nin pamilya—katuwang an saiyang mamomo’ton na bana. Nagdadakula an saindang pamilya dangan padagos na nagdadanay sa biyaya nin Diyos.

Yaon saiya an pagkamaginibo. Siring man nindo, sa ara-aldaw na ginibo nin Diyos, nagtatrabaho. Siring man saindo, nagseserbisyo-publiko, nakikiulay sa mga nangangaipo, sa maraming tao’y nakikitungo.

Dangan man an pagkamatinao. Dawa kadtong daraga pa sana siya—hugos nang entiro sa saiyang mga sobrena asin mga sobreno, napapaogma ining mga kaakian sa harong man o sa tinampo. An pagtabang sa tugang na natitikapo—yaon na gayo. An paghadoy sa arog mong nasasakitan garo niya na baga naging pangangaipo.

Siempre yaon saiya an pagkamainamigo. Sa dakul niyang naging amiga sagkod amigo—yaon an mga pinsan, mga kairiba sa kwarto, mga dating kabiristo—ngonyan siya asin an saiyang pamilya nakakapadayon, matiwasay na nakakadungan sa buhay sa siyudad na pano nin gamo.

Ngonyan sa saimong pagsosolosolo, nadumduman mo an mga tugang na kairi-iriba mo sa harong nindo kadtong nakaaging tiempo—alagad ngonyan yaon na sa saindang sadiring mga estado. Gabos na sainda pamilyado; dangan man saimo. Namamatean mo an siring na biyaya orog ngonyan na ika harayo na sainda, sindá na sa ining dalagan kan búhay, iyo an saimong mga parte-daryo.

Napagamiaw saimo kan saindang mga agi-agi—pagkatapos kamong magkairilo pagkagadan kan ama mo saradit pa sana kamo dangan pagtaliwan kan Iloy nindo kadtong darakula na kamo—na nungka kamo liningawan kan Diyos na saindong tinutubudan.

Dios mabalos sa mga Kristo sa daghan na iyo an mga tugang mo.

Biernes Santo

Calle Fatima, San Vicente

Diliman 

Saysay kan Paggirumdom

Sa nanok kan banggi mapapagimata ka, magios dangan tibaad dai na mapaturog pa. Sa kauntukan kan mga bagay, marurumduman mo an mga nakaagi. Sa daing girong na palibot, mapapanumdum mo an mga dai pa nangyayari. Tibaad dai ka winarasan kaidto nin grasya na masadiri an mga yaon sa palibot mo. Bisan ngonyan mayo ka nin kapas na sadirihon an mga bagay na dai pa naarabot. Ta nganing sa mga oras na arog kaini, magrumdum ka o panumdumon mo sinda dangan ihiras sa iba. An saimong pagrumdom, ining kanigoan na makapanumdom sarong balaog saimo na mayo nin kaagid. Nadudumanan mo an mga lugar na gustong kadtohan. Nabubuweltahan mo idtong mga tiempong inirokan. Nakakaulay mo an mga tawong marayo na, naiistorya mo an mga tinugang maarabot pa sana. Masasabat mo an gabat kan dai napapamugtak na kaisipan, dangan kun kun ini malampasan, kanigoan na gian sa daghan.

Where I lived, and what I lived for

I feel privileged to have lived with my grandparents when I was younger.

Pagbakasyon, saro sa samong magturugang an pinapatabang ni Mama sa Libod sa samong lolohon sagkod lolahon. During summer vacations, our mother Emma would send one of us to help our grandparents in their small house and farm.

Uminabot an sakong toka mga onse anyos ako. And so when my turn came sometime in the late 80s, I was eleven years old, barely in grade 6. Right after Holy Week, I stayed with Lolo Meling and Lola Eta and began helping them in the house and farm.

There were many things to do in that small house which stood in a bigger farm. Nagsasakdo ako nin tubig hali sa bombahan. I fetched water from the artesian well. Nagbabahog sagkod nagtutubig ako nin manok sa tolong poultry houses. I fed and placed water for chickens in three poultry houses.

Kada semana, naghahalo ako nin bahog para sa manok na binabakal pa ni Lolo Meling o siisay man na pinsan na nagpa-Naga sa Calabanga o kis-a sa Naga. At least every week, I would mix the chicken feeds bought from Calabanga. Some three sacks of ata plus growing mash, etc. would be enough for the week.

Tinatabangan ko si Lola pagtanom sa saiyang mahiwas na gulayan—magabi, maabono, matanom. Dakul an pigtatanom mi kaidto—igwang kamatis, talong, okra, sibuyas, laya sagkod ladâ. Igwang bubon na pigpakalot si Lola harani sana sa pigtatanoman mi.

Every morning, I helped Lola in her plots—we cleared the soil, put chicken manure and compost, and planted seedlings of tomatoes, eggplant, okra, spring onions, ginger and pepper. It helped that there was a well, an almost dry water source, near the plots.

In my grandparents’ farm, we would have breakfast twice. Kada aga, duwa an samuyang pamahaw. An enot na pamahaw, iyo an pamahaw ni Lola Eta mga alas 6—mainiton na kape hali sa tinutong na bagas o instant coffee plus kun ano man na gatas o Milo dangan mamon ukon sopas ukon tinapay kun may yara.

Pagkatapos kan inaapod na ‘yan na painit, maduman na kami sa libod para magtanom. Magtanim ay di biro man nanggad ta kadakul-dakul gigibohon pagtanom: In no particular order, madukag kan daga na tatanuman. Minsan malabtik, kun kaipuhan. Masakdo nin tubig gamit an sprinkler hali sa bubon, mga pirang beses iyan, depende sa kun pera kadakul an kaipuhan bunyagan, o kun gurano kahiwas an babasaon na daga. Mabubo. Mahakot kan gagamiton na ipot na pataba sa mga plot hali sa poultry—pasiring sa mga plot. Mabubo. Masaro-saro kan mga seedlings hali sa nursery bed. Mabubo pa. Iraralaag sa mga tatanuman na plot. Mahibon kan mga nagtuturubo nang pananom. Mabubo pa.

Magusi o maguno nin bunga—kun igwa nang kamatis, haralaba na an talong. An okra kaipuhan na dai magtagas ta kanugon ini kun dai na maipabakal. Maguno ako nin sili, ibaha na an kalunggay na yaon sana man sa gilid kan tanuman. Kun may tapayas na namumula na maaagihan, sakata, o tukdula, sabi ka’yan ni Lola.

Pabuwelta sa kamalig, kaipuhan maghanaw ako dangan mag-andam na para sa kusina. Kami mapamahaw na.

Saka sana an panduwang pamahaw—na puwede tang apodon na breakfast proper. Lolo would prepare the main dishes for breakfast—hot rice, unlimited yan; fried pasayan, o buyod, depende kun ano an pigtangro ni Tya Onding na taga-Baybay ki “Sir” (Meling); o minsan inun-on na balanak o remolyitis; dangan tapayas o batag o sangkaka.

“Le! Madya, karakan na kita,” masabi si Lola. Pag-panguros antes magkakan, matingkalag si Lolo Emiliano na nakatukaw sa kabisera, dangan mahipos na man si Lola. Sa pagtunkalag niyang iyan, mahihiling ko sa mata niya an saindang Kabisto sa itaas, nugayod pinapasalamatan kan duwang gurang an biyaya kan Kaglalang.

Pagkatapos kan pagkakan, iipuson ko na an samuyang kinakanan. Mahugas ako. Masaray kan mga tada. Malimpya nin kusina. Masakdo nin panghugas. Saboot ko, an aldaw para sako napoon pa sana.

Sa maghapon, igwang rinibong gigibohon sa oma sagkod sa harong. Mahalat sana ako kun ano an eenoton.

Mapunpon nin sogok mabahog nin manok matubig masakdo mahatod nin sugok o kagulayan sa mga paratinda sa talipapa ki Tiya Teray, sa Baybay ki Manoy Dikoy sa Triangulo ki Lola Mimay. Masingil na dipisil gibuhon ta nagpapalagyo an mga pinaurutang nagpapaliman-liman magbarayad sinda.

Sa sadit na harong na ito kaidtong panahon, si Lola Margarita nagtatanom, si Lolo Emiliano iyo an kagharong.

Dai ko malingawan sa kakanan an urulay-ulay kan duwa masiramon, minsan sa pagtubod o sa gobyerno igwang diskusyon. Alagad bago sinda mag-inom nin tubig, iyo nagkakauruyon. An pusngak na makuapo na nagdadangog nakakanood mayo nin dahilan para magpurusong-pusong.

Lawaan, Ciudad Roxas

08 October 2011

Me myself needs I

Katy Perry’s “Firework” video is worthy of note. 

 

If at all, the realities portrayed by the characters, though mostly Caucasian, cut across most races and sensibilities. The video begins with American recording artist Katy Perry singing from the porch of a building. Then as she sings, fireworks shoot from her chest to the sky.

 

Then the video cuts to scenes of young people throughout the city. There is an overweight girl who cannot join her friend swimming in a pool where a party is being held. Later in the video, she “finds the courage to shed her clothes and jump in the pool” filled with the party swimmers.

 

Then, there is a cancer-stricken child in a hospital who cannot show herself out on the street because she is balding. But she goes out just the same and sees a pregnant woman in the same hospital with fireworks coming out of the baby being born.

 

There is a young magician being mugged by hooligans in an alley but uses tricks to overcome them. A boy at home witnesses his quarreling parents and how their bickering distresses his little sister; he stands up to them and pushes them apart. Also, a young man in discotheque who takes interest in a guy approaches him and kisses him, igniting fireworks from both of them.

 

Later in the video, young people are shown converging into a castle’s courtyard. There, together with the singer, they dance and “light up the night,” with their own fireworks shooting from their chests into the sky.

 

On many levels, the song empowers the self—telling it to assert and let it shine in a time and place where others see it unfit—“You just got to ignite the light and let it shine/Just own the night, like the fourth of July.”

 

The video also reminds us of Christina Aguilera’s “Beautiful” whose lyrics read—“You are beautiful no matter what they say/Words can’t bring me down/I am beautiful in every single way/Words can’t bring me down.”

 

All characters portrayed in the video rather only exemplify the struggle of the self in a society that values apathy or indifference most probably because of diversity.  The video also seems to say that free will should be exercised by young people. Perhaps the video features self-empowerment only of the youth because the producers have considered only the Youthube audience.

 

But for all these, the video preaches tolerance for all races and sensibilities. Showing the various predicaments of young people, it asks audiences to be considerate and caring, or assertive of what the self desires—if love is too trite a word to use.

 

The song implies that no one but the self can empower himself or herself. In particular, no amount of external force can salvage the youth from their own dilemma. As another American, diplomat Eleanor Roosevelt said, “No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”

 

In many senses, the video allows for reflection of what the self can do what it really wants: to assert, to prevail, to shine. After all, at the end of the day, what really matters is the self soul heart [chest] making sparks in the dark.

 

Written by Katy Perry in collaboration with Mikkel S. Eriksen, Tor Erik Hermansen, Sandy Wilhelm and Ester Dean for Perry's second studio album, Teenage Dream, this sensible work won Video of the Year at the 2011 MTV Music Awards.

Realism and magic realism

Rating:	★★★
Category:	Movies
Genre:	Other

Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan surely catches our attention because Natalie Portman’s Nina Sayers grows feathers after she kills Mila Kunis’s Lily backstage to perform the Black Swan role in the final act. You cannot just forget the film because of that.

This psychological thriller—featuring Natalie Portman’s Nina Sayers, a ballerina haunted by some schizophrenic ambition—brims with magic realism, an aesthetic style in which “magical elements are blended into a realistic atmosphere in order to access a deeper understanding of reality.” The effects particularly in the final ballet scene where Nina grows more feathers than the previous times it appeared would surely remind us of the film.

Because of the device used, we are made to believe that “magical elements are explained like normal occurrences that are presented in a straightforward manner” allowing the “real” (Nina Sayers dream to be the Swan Queen) and the “fantastic” (she really becomes a Swan) to be accepted in the same stream of thought.

The obsession to become the Swan Queen later brings into the character graphic hallucinations that eventually cost Nina Sayers’ life.

Natalie’s facial features being transformed into a swan—rouged eyes, aquiline nose and elongated neck—all compliment to a dramatic flourish—where at the end of the performance, even we the audience could be convinced that she very well looks as the best Swan Queen for Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake.

While Nina Sayers’ obsession for the Swan Queen role is enough persuasion, the horrific undertones notwithstanding, we the audience get the eerie feeling in Aronofsky’s close-up shots of the lead character who dances her way to death as the ambition-obsessed ballerina who lived and was haunted by realities she herself created.

Anyone or anything from Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan will win an Oscar. Choreography, effects, actress. Let’s see.

Meanwhile.

The first time I watched Christian Bale’s Dicky Edlund in The Fighter, I already rooted for him to win a Best Supporting Actor citation.

A drama about boxer “Irish” Micky Ward’s unlikely road to the world light welterweight title, The Fighter features Ward’s Rocky-like rise as he is shepherded by half-brother Dicky, a boxer-turned-trainer who rebounded in life after nearly being knocked out by drugs and crime.

A far cry from Batman and his previous roles, Christian Bale’s Dicky Edlund exudes with stark realism, a has-been boxer backed up by his mother who hoped for a could have been contender, reminiscent of Marlon Brando’s Terry Malloy in Elia Kazan’s On the Waterfront (1954).

Not another boxing movie at the Oscars you might say. But there is more to this boxing movie which rather “depicts subjects as they appear in everyday life.”

In The Fighter, we see Dicky Eklund’s mere claim to fame is his 1978 boxing match with Sugar Ray Leonard, where Eklund knocked down Leonard, who eventually won the match.

Now a crack addict, Eklund is in front of HBO cameras making a documentary about him. Dicky has also acted as one of the two trainers for half-brother Micky Ward, a decade younger than him, first known as a brawler and used by other boxers as a stepping stone to better boxers.

Both boxers are managed by their overbearing mother Alice Ward (Melissa Leo) who believes it better to keep it all in the family. Now unreliable owing to his crack addiction, Dicky’s move with Alice at one of Micky’s bouts dawns on the latter that his boxing career is being stalled and even undermined by them, who are only looking out for themselves.

The situation allows Bale’s character to deliver an uncontrived performance that highlights a family drama and gives sibling rivalry a kind of high never before seen onscreen before.

Meanwhile, Amy Adams’ Charlene Fleming—Micky’s new girlfriend, a college dropout and now local bartender who inspires him—pulls out the fulcrum to the other side, opposite Micky’s family, when she salvages him from this predicament.

Much to Alice and Dick’s anger, Micky comes to choose between them and Charlene. The story’s rising action renders each character emotionally charged—each one wanting to claim what is good for the fighter, and each one being allowed to shine individually onscreen. Awesome story.

Bale’s character greatly evolved from the Batman lead role and other virile roles to one that exudes with so much life. Like Tom Hanks’ Andrew Beckett in Jonathan Demme’s Philadelphia (1993), Bale must have shed weight to fit the role of a has-been boxer who makes business out of his brother just like his mother.

Earning three Oscar nominations for Bale, Adams and Leo, The Fighter drives some of the best punches among other films I have seen in the past year.

The first time I watched it last year, I immediately thought it was essentially noteworthy of recognition. Christian Bale’s crack[ed] character is so real you will find him in your neighborhood.

With the larger-than-life performance of an underdog who wants to bounce back, Bale’s character transforms the movie about his brother to a movie about himself. If at all, he is the Fighter being referred to in the film.

Let’s see how some real practitioners of the craft consider these performances, which other people might call art.

In June of that year

In June of that year, you started tutoring Seth, a freshman and Zandro, a sophomore—both were newcomers in the school where you chose to teach.

Seth appeared cool and quiet, but there was much eagerness when he started talking about himself, his participation in class and school activities, and other things he does in school or at home. He was a growing young boy whose parents whom you chanced to meet desired much good for him. Composed, serene, you saw in him a promising young man who will make a name for himself.

Meanwhile, Zandro was the bubbly type, always wearing a smile, and always less serious and preferred to read ghost stories, not to mention that he was an avid online gamer himself. He wanted to be a nurse because he wanted much money—lots of it. He said he would have to work abroad so he could always provide for himself. Also, he always wanted to eat.

Every now and then you would excuse the two boys from their classes to chat with them. To you they always sounded hopeful—in anticipation of the chats with you. You would talk to them about how to help their parents do chores in the house, study harder so they would not flunk any class or be good sons to their parents. You also talked to them about how to gain friends in school. Seth said he had new friends—all of the freshmen were his friends. The playful Zandro confessed how he would participate in the sophomores’ horseplay in between class sessions or even during classes.

In your chats, you approached them like they were your younger brothers. At first you mentally prepared your questions for them. Later, you would just talk to them very casually. Through the days, they had become your friends, so to speak. The chats you had had with them had gone smooth and personal, like they were your younger brothers. Your words would usually end up as friendly pieces of advice for these young boys growing up. And how your words sounded real and convincing to them.

Every time you talked to them, you thought you saw yourself in them. You saw enthusiasm in the things they did or wanted to do. They were struggling to become themselves. Full of hope and anticipation, the boys had a lot to live and to learn. They always appeared as if they had to know a lot of things.

Continually you had told them how to be always good, and would always ask them about how they would fare up to virtues like charity and service, honesty and truthfulness, diligence and stuff. Talking about these virtues with these boys made you aware of your own shortcomings. It made you start to ask your own life question. It made you want to quantify your own sense of achievement.

Though you’d gone that far, you had not really gotten far enough to try to live sensibly—with a definite purpose. You thought you had to have a definite purpose. Just like them, then, you seemed to long to fling your arms wide open to the world and take on what life really had in store for you.

Suddenly, last summer

Back then, we had a hundred and one ways to spend summer, if only to while away the absence of friends in April or survive the heat of May.

Once we set up a table borrowed from the grade school library to serve as our table tennis court. Not long after, the table tennis table burned in the whole days with my brothers all bent on mastering the newfound skill of ramming down a small ball into the brown board so the opponent goes off the court with the ball clueless where the ball went or wherever he himself went.

Not long after, the table tennis pastime became an addiction that Mother saw there was problem with it—we were glued to each other’s “performance” as if all we had to do was to prepare for some “tournament”.

I wonder whether the table tennis “tournament” materialized. Perhaps Mother said the school library already needed the table sooner than the first enrolment week in June. So I think the table tennis table had to go as we also had to prepare to go back to school—but not our newfound acumen for precision or skill for timing which we learned from each other or together. Talk of quality time in those days.

"...I have felt for many years that if I had children and a television set I would insist on putting an empty box next to the set; for every hour my children watched television they would have to spend an hour creating their own play with the empty box…

We would go visit our cousins downtown to watch the nightly feature on our aunt’s Betamax movie (ware) house. But the nightly feature was more of a bore because we watched films with the rest of the barangay who paid for their nightly entertainment of Bruce Lee films and Ramon Revilla flicks. What I looked forward were the times we would rather spend time for ourselves after or before watching a film on their Betamax set.

Once, my younger cousins and I watched Gary Valenciano’s Di Bale Na Lang perhaps a hundred times in a short time, say, a week or a month. The elder cousins always watched the same tape, so watch the same single film we younger cousins did, too—twice, five times, ten times, perhaps indeed a hundred times, now and then telling the same story to ourselves, laughing at the same funny scenes for a number of times and memorizing the actors’ lines in the long run.

It was not that our cousins had no other tape to watch. But that was how we chose to entertain and please ourselves. Imagine watching the same show through the days of the week—or sometimes many times a day. We perhaps internalized some of the characters from the flick that we even eventually behaved like them in our own persons. Characters which we, through the years, would later become.

"…We need to take up activities that truly engage us with ourselves and others—music, painting, poetry, dance, massage, cooking, hiking in nature—not to pursue prizes or with a mentality of judgment but rather as we would approach prayer itself, for that is what these actions are—acts of meditation and art as meditation."

In the year, we would climb the kaimito and santol trees even before they started dropping fruits on our open yard. Or we would fly airplanes made from scratch papers after our studies were over. 

When it rained, we would make paper boats and roll them into the small river that flowed from the foot of the hill where our house stood. Or where today it still stands.

These days I find myself standing still, taken aback by days of old, helplessly enchanted by the empty spaces that these and other such memories always create in the mind. After so many years, the colors are as vivid, the air as fresh as with childhood. Everyone then, regardless of where we went or what we did, seemed uncomplicated. It was as if every single thing was in place. Then, we did not bother so much where and when and how we would want to be. If at all, then, we were always happy and free.