'Pan-Academic'

Nagluók na naman si Venancio! Siisay si kairiba?” hapot samò ni Mrs. Avila, si maestra mi kadto sa Grade 5.

“Ma’am, sa Carlito po, tapos si Sanchez, iyo man!” simbag mi.

Poon kadto sagkod ngonyan, ngalás ako kun saìn hálî an taramon na “lu-ók” sa Bikol, na an buot sabihon saná, “buradol” (sa Bikol man), na garo man sana “bulakbol” sa Tagalog, o “cutting class” sa Ingles. 

Dai daw ni hali man sana sa “lóko,” o “lokó” siring sa “lokólokó”? Na siertong hali sa Espanyol na “loco” (meaning “crazy”):

Kan magLU-OK si Venancio kaidto, dai na tinapos kaini si klase mi maghapon. Pagkapangudto niya daa nin prinitos na sira tapos malutô na pinatos sa linubluban na dahon-batag, mayô mi na siya nahiling pag Industrial Arts, sa klase ni Mr. Olarve sa balyong building.

“Ma’am, nagparapantirador po to nin gamgam”, sabi kan iba. O kawasa taga-Banase, tibaad man “pigsugo kan si magurang na mag-uli nin amay” ta “harayo pa an babaklayon patukad”, sabi pa ninda. 

Alagad si Carlito na taga-Iraya man sana, harani sa eskwelahan, tibaad “nagparararawraw sana kairiba sa Simon, nagpaturuyatoy daa sa Katangyanan. “Baad nagtirirador man.”

“Hilingon ta daw, kun siisay an pigloLOKO ninda. Pag naaraman kong nagruLU-ÓK man nanggad sinda, tapos nagparakaraluwág, mahihiling ninda!” hirit ni Ma’am na Avila.

(Mayo pang Child Protection Policy kadto sa DepEd kaya safe pa si Ma’am sa mga comment niyang ini. Mayo pang mareklamong magurang.)

Kun arog kaini an istorya, pwedeng sabihon na an “lu-ók” hali man sana sa Bikol o Tagalog na “lóko.” 

 Iyo gayod: an pag-LU-ÓK, daing kinaiba nanggad sa pag-”LOKÓ”.

 Na hali man sana sa Espanyol na loco (meaning “crazy”). In English, meanwhile, “loco” is an informal or slang term meaning insane, strange, eccentric or stupid. Sabi kan Kano: “Low-kow”.

 I first heard the term “lu-ók” as a pupil in a public elementary school which I attended for six years, from ‘82 to ‘88. “Nagluók” or “paralú-ok” referred to someone who went to school but not finished the entire day. 

 “Paglulu-ók” could happen during the morning recess when a pupil wouldn’t return anymore after taking snacks (An sabi ninda nagbakal saná nin chicheria, idto palan, nag-uli na!).

 It was also when the pupil wouldn’t be present in class before the start of the afternoon session, just after lunch (today, perhaps that would already be considered a half-day absence); and even toward the end of the last period in the afternoon, just before the Flag Retreat at around 4 p.m. 

 I wonder if the same thing happened in private schools during the time. Their (close and closed) monitoring wouldn’t have allowed the pupils to go out of the campus randomly or skip classes as they pleased.

 But even if they did so, why the term “lu-ók”? Where did the word come from? 

 Kun “buradol” para sa “cutting class”, OK lang: Madali sanang isipon kun pâno an buradol nagin cutting class:

 Siisay man bayâ an aking dai mamuyang magpalayog kan saiyang buradol (kite), orog na pag naaraman kaining nagduman si Ma’am ninda sa Principal’s Office ta igwa daang conference?

 Winalat ni Ma’am sinda sa sarong kaklase: tapos igwang pinapakopya sa blackboard. Kaya sabi kan aki, “O, ‘mos na kamo! Karawat kita sa luwas!” 

 Ito palan buminalik pa si Ma’am ninda ta halipot man sana an meeting kaini. Kaya pagsarabing yaon na si Ma’am, duminulág na sana siya. “Ano ko, mapa-rapado? Dai na ko mabalik!” 

 Dai na nag-Flag Retreat ta úto kaiba si kaklase niya sa likod kan eskwelahan harani na sa may kanipaan. Duman nagparaparaláyog kan saindang buradol. 

 Dai ta man masasabing nagkulang si strategy ni Ma’am na engganyaron su mga eskwela niya ta nganing mag-aradal. Kawasâ aki pa, mas magayon an magrawraw sa luwas, sa mahiwas na kawatan, lalo na sa luwas sana kan eskwelahan. Kaya imbis na magbasa kan pigsugong istorya sa librong Balarila, “nagbururadol” (saranggola) na sana. 

 But to me the term was always “lu-ók,” or “nagluók,” which eventually became “cutting class” when I stepped into high school. 

Halagwat si lumpat kan terminolohiya, hali sa Mother Tongue sa barrio school na (lu-ók), pasiring sa English idiom sa Jesuit school sa Bagumbayan na (cutting-class).

 In Ateneo, I hardly remember “buradol” being used to refer to cutting class. Back then, besides “cutting class,” there was another, more familiar term: “O.B.”, or “Over the Bakod.”  

This was when Ateneo boys, avoiding the guard house in front of the Four Pillars, were caught (skipping school by) climbing over the fence bordering barangay Sta. Cruz at the back of the Gym or the one in barangay Queborac on the other side, ironically near the old Jesuit Residence. Hidden best from the keen watch of the guards or even some school officials, these were the most strategic spots for O.B. 

 But I wonder if it were called “Over the Kudal,” it must have made it certainly “O.K.” 

 But since it was O.B., surely it became a problem, an “OBstruction,” especially if you were caught by Mr. Chancoco or Sir Gene Segarra of the OPD (Office of the Prefect of Discipline). 

 If you were caught on O.B., be prepared to do Jug and Post. Jug was when you were assigned to write a particular text on an unspecified amount of paper until you finished. Or until the day finished. Or until Mr. Chancoco or Mr. Segarra “closed shop.” Post was when you were tasked to do a community service of sorts inside the campus, like clean some office or help the Buildings and Grounds staff in their work.

Had done jug; had done post, (penalties for other misdemeanors) , but modesty aside: never done O.B. 

 Even now, I wouldn’t feel proud if I had done otherwise. There was simply no way I could have cut class in those days. “Tano man ta ma-LU-ÓK ako? O ma-buradol? O ma-O.B.? Pinapaadal na kong libre, madulag pa ko?” Saboot ko sana, “Siisay man an lúgi?”

 I mean: why leave the school, why go over the fence, when there was much to do then inside; when there was “everything to be” there, inside the fences (or more poetic: walls? portals?) of the Ateneo? 

 Well, those were the days before it became Ar’neo. Now I certainly wouldn’t know.

 Dangan, pag-abot sa college sa parehong eskwelahan, “cutting class” became an unacceptable term, almost non-existent, a misnomer, as it were. Especially when young adults, (but still teenagers: 17, eighTEEN, nineTEEN?) like us pursuing ‘higher’ learning became so engaged in studies, excited and can’t hardly wait for “life  to happen”. 

 In college, freedom from school (read: classroom instruction) was so enormous because the free cuts or three or four sessions per subject allowed us to attend to other non-academic interests like clubs, organizations, and...

 And of course, Batibot, the (octagon-shaped or circular) gazebo where student clubs, organizations and yes, fraternities and sororities converged. This was where we went when we felt we needed to take a break whenever we classmates or org-mates felt ‘stifled’ by the academic workload. This was also where we were invited to pursue all other sorts of (“bottled up”) interests outside the walls of the school.

 If we really had to cut class, it was more concealed subtly as “org meeting; may meeting kita sa org”. Or “research,” that ubiquitous, overrated word in college: “Sain kamo hali?” “Nag-research sa lib.” “Kamo?”  “Ma-research man.” 

 “Research.” What a word.

 “Research” or not, cutting class was not the term used. It was: Meeting, Practice, Tryouts. Or mobi. Or Rally. These were the other reasons for cutting class. Or availing ourselves of the three or four cuts allowed per subject. Of course, we were allowed all these; yet sometimes depending on the teacher, we squeezed them hard for allowances so that we ended up haggling with them.

 Well, “research” or not, it was easy to cut class in college.  Though as freshmen we belonged to a certain block section and had the same subjects and schedules, we could already choose what to attend and what not to attend.

 “Research” or not, it was rather really easier to cut class in college. Especially when we hadn’t done the assigned reading (which was simply Homework or Assignment or Takdang Aralin in kindergarten, grade school or high school). 

 Even if we chose not to attend a certain class or cut it short, it was needed because we were swamped by both academic and non-academic commitments we never knew we’d gotten ourselves into.

 “Research” or not, it was simply impossible to not cut class when you’re in college. To some, it was simply not cool, to have a perfect attendance in one class. But for others who vied for top honors, it was also unacceptable.

 “Cut class?” Hardly rings a bell. “O.B.”? Can’t relate; so, not applicable. How about college: we had “research,” “meetings,” and “more meetings” instead? So they were not “cutting classes”, as mentioned. They were rather more productive pursuits. 

 But to me, the first term I knew is always the most emphatic: “lu-ók”, or “naglu-ók”. It’s the first word I knew on this; but up till now it puzzles me where the word came from. 

 Saìn daw hálî an “lu-ók’?

 Makangirit tâ an mga teacher dai ta pwedeng sabihan na: “Naglu-ók si Ma’am kansuudma (Our teacher cut class yesterday)” o “Nagburadol baga si Sir (Our teacher went out, somewhere, probably to his ‘House by the Prairie’)”. 

Truth be told, kun mayo man maestrang “nagluluók”, ano an apod ta sa mga teacher na nagka-”cut class” man? (Nagpa-Naga kaya si Ma’am kansubâgo  ta nag-file nin salary loan sa Castea, o Camarines Sur Teachers Association. Palibhasa kulang an suweldo: anong magiginibo mo?) 

 So, ano an apod ta sa mga teacher na dai na tinapos si saindang klase?

 “Mayô daa si Ma’am.”

 “Yeheeey! Mayô si Ma’am! Uruliaaan!”

 

#BikolBeautiful

 

 

Purísaw

Uni na naman an banggi. Alas tres pa sana gayod nin maaga, pero ako giraray mata na. Pinukaw mo na naman ako kan saimong kahâditan— kadto ika an handal sa satong kaaabtan, ngonyan, ako solo na man.

Hilinga, Manuel, an anom tang kabuhán— tururog, tuninong, nakatarampad ngonyan. Si Emmanuel, an satuyang matua, kadto baga garong lapsag pa sana, ngonyan, halabaon na. Si Romano, satong panduwa, hararom an hukragong; iyo, ta grabeng higos sa eskwela sagkod sa harong.

Si Alex, kan sadit pa baga, nagpupurong- pusong; ngonyan, pirming daing girong, garo bagang nagpaparaisip nin hararom. Yaon si Mente, satong pang-apat, ngonyan an angog iyong gayo na si Lolo niya— si Papá—na arog ko, saimo pûngaw na.

An duwa tang saradit—si Nene bako nang daragián. Dai tulos naghihibî pag nadadapla, mawîwî sana an nguso dangan mapasurog na sako; Dai ko man tulos maatendiran ta si Nonoy naghihibî na man; kaya duwa-duwa an kulkol ko minsan.

Kinakarga ni Romano an saro nganing maumayan. Pinahálî ko na itong huring katabang; garo kaya mayo na akong masarigan. Antabayi man ko, Doy, ngonyan. Tabangi ako sa anom tang kabuhan. Sa ara-aldaw na ginibo nin Diyos, dai ko aram an gibohon kun pâno an kada saro sainda mahipnuan.

Suroga ako sa samong mga katikapuhan. Alalayi kami sa aga, sa otro aga, asin sa mga aldaw na masurunod pa. Ihadóy mo ako sa Kagurangnan— na an kada aldaw sakong malampasan. Ngonyan na mga ngonyan, Siya na sana an sakong kusog asin paalawan.

An Harong Mi

I remember our house. It was a two-floor house that stood tall in an open yard, by the side of the hill, perhaps some 20 meters away from the highway. Going there, one had to pass a rice field lined by trees of palo maria, madre de cacao, and green shrubs. There were days when the house—seen from the national road—was almost covered by lush green vegetation that all you could see was the second storey.

If it pleases you, simply picture a typical Philippine postcard: green farm on the foreground, a two-storey house in the middleground, and a hill of trees and vegetation on the background, where the sun rises.

If one enters the main door in the first floor, there was our living room, where we had a wooden sala set: a sofa good for three average-size visitors, four arm chairs and a rectangle center-table—all draped in red and orange florals. (Let it be added that the sala set was made of a very hard wood—I was too small to ask my mother where she bought it, or what kind of wood it was made of. But certainly, not one of the furniture was broken until all of us could really grow up.)

The living room then lead the visitor to our dining space where a long wooden rectangle table was flanked by two long benches for the diners. Each of the benches could seat three children. There was only one chair or silya which served as the kabisera—yes, indeed, for Mama, the head of our family.

Going further, one was greeted by the kitchen, where cooking was done on stove and later, dapog, and also the lavabo. Further to the left going to the back, the visitor could relieve himself in either of the two comfort rooms—one was the toilet and the other was the shower room.

Our house was cool. It did not have much stuff inside. It was airy inside the house. We had few but very functional fixtures. We had jalousie windows in all corners of the house. In the first floor, there were windows in front by the sala and in the dining area; and a very big window by the kitchen.

To reach the second floor, one ascended the wooden stairs, going to the second living room, where a former platera now stored old books from the school library. There, in the second floor, we had glass jalousie windows fronting the road. At the back, or inside the two bedrooms, we also had wooden jalousie windows. Air from the farm and the mountain entered all corners and sides of the house.

Not just that. From the living room in the second floor, one could see the open view of the highway where the barangay folks passed from the Triangle or visita to Banat, a sitio near the barangay elementary school where our parents served and yes, indeed, made their own marks as teachers and leaders.

But through all those years, I wonder why we had a house in a place that was almost idyllic like the one in Wuthering Heights. It was far from other people or even our own folks in libod (meaning backyard), the compound where the rest of our uncles and cousins lived.

Did our parents see the need to raise six kids even before all of us were born so they sought to establish their own family in  a bigger, wider space, away from the neighborhood of the growing clan—which we call libod, where our grandparents began their own?

Around the house, we made our own toys, we planned our own games, and relished our place in the sun, especially during summer vacations, when we played in the hay in the morning and toward sundown. The house was one of solitude where we children were rather drawn to fend for themselves, or find leisure and life for ourselves.

Then & Now & Then

Back then, what you had was padalan or pasali, Bikol words for the more familiar Filipino term palabas. This referred to any film showing in the small barangay where you grew up.

This included the comedy flick Max & Jess featuring Panchito and Dolphy shown one summer afternoon in your grade school’s Industrial Arts building. It was probably led by your mother, who was then in charge of raising funds for the school’s non-formal education.

The movie was shown using a projector which flashed the film reel to a very big white mantel probably borrowed from your grandmother’s kitchen collection locked in the platera of the dakulang harong in the libod. The tickets were probably sold at P1.50 each for two features that provided some three hours of quality entertainment to your barrio folk.

There was also the health documentary sponsored by the Ministry of Health top-biled by then Minister Alfredo Bengzon, who gave out health advisories for the barangays. This was in the early 80s before Marcos stepped out of Malacañang. When it was shown in the Triangle, the open barangay hall, it rained heavily, much to the chagrin of some barangay folks who just went home disappointed. The others who did not leave the show made do with umbrellas and raincoats. But back then, the big telon was enough for them to get hooked: talk of being able to watch something on a big screen once in a blue moon. The documentary featured practices that can be adopted by the barangay folk to avoid diarrhea and dysentery, diseases that can be acquired from unsanitary and unhygienic toilet practices.

Then, there were the nightly treats of Betamax showing on black and white and later colored TV monitors in three key areas in the barangay.

There was one in the house of the Molata family which catered to the Baybay and Iraya residents. There, movies were shown inside the cramped sala of the Molatas, which was just inside their big retail store.

Bruce Lee

There was also the one owned by Tiyo Magno San Andres, a distant relative of your parents, who would clear his own bodega of grains and household supplies to make space for the nightly flicks of Bruce Lee, Dante Varona or Ramon Revilla, among many others. But you hardly had the chance to get in there, probably because you already enjoyed the free entry in your relatives’ “bigger movie house.”

This was your Auntie Felia’s bodega movie house where mostly new tapes were shown nightly for the entertainment of the barangay. Used as warehouse for copra transported in your Uncle Harben’s 10-wheeler truck from Tinambac to Naga, that place was in fact the biggest movie house because it could house 75 moviegoers or more at one time, particularly when it had no copra.

Yet, from time to time, moviegoers also sat on top of copra sacks even piled 10 times high while they revelled in Redford White’s antics or Cachupoy’s capers, or while they were kept alive and awake till midnight, enjoying the burugbugan or suruntukan in the movies of Fernando Poe, Jr., Rudy Fernandez, Rey Malonzo or George Estregan and a host of many other action stars. Talk of orchestra and balcony seating at the time.

Aside from the word-of-mouth shared by folks in the barangay, the nightly flicks were announced having their titles written  in chalk on your cousin’s green Alphabet Board displayed in front of their two-storey house just in front of Triangle, which for a long time served as the barangay market.

There was a time when the Acuñas’ bodega served as the official theater for the barangay, catering to the nightly entertainment of the folks—sometimes families (parents and children)—from Baybay to Pantalan and from Tigman and Banat, two bigger sitios situated at the two opposite ends from the Triangle.

When new tapes were brought in for the same movie house, you could expect a Standing Room Only; therefore, you could expect to be uncomfortable being seated or haggling for an inch of space with children your age, some of them even smelling rich of kasag (crabs).

Baad taga-Baybay ta parong-parong pang marhay an pinamanggihan. Linabunan na kasag tapos dai palan nagdamoy. (Probably from Sitio Baybay who had boiled crabs for supper and forgot to wash their hands afterwards.) Nom!

Among others, the Acuña movie house had the most strategic location, serving as the hub where most of the residents converged.

But that movie house would serve the barangay but only up to the time when your folks decided to settle and stay more permanently in the city. The kids, you and your cousins, were all growing up or had to grow up—so some things had to go. Besides, the place had only gotten smaller. (But certainly it was you who had grown bigger.) 

You had been initiated to the world of the movies at a very young age.

Growing up in that small barangay with all these movies you saw, you readily recall the pictures in your head: The loud and bright colors of the characters in Max & Jess, inspired from a komiks cartoon, only complemented the loud mouths of Dolphy and Panchito who raved and ranted against each other all throughout the movie.

There was also the sepia appearance of the Ministry of Health’s documentary flashed on the barangay telon, which only made it look like a news reel further back from the 1960s. You realize now that it was rather a mockumentary because at the time people were being taught on health practices under the rain, which had only ironically endangered their health.

And of course, the many varied colors in the smaller screen of your relatives where you probably saw—through the movies—all the worlds possible.

Now what readily comes to mind? You had the medieval heroine Hundra, which featured axing and butchering of warriors and amazons for most of the film; and the sharp colors of the characters in the animation Pete’s Dragon, which you must have watched with your cousins a hundred times only because unlike the rented copies used for the nightly showing, this was an original Betamax tape sent by the Acuña relatives from the United States.

There was also the flying dog in the Never-Ending Story; and the cyborgs in Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Terminator.

And of course there was the wave of melodramas favored by the women in your household probably because most of them were tearjerkers—from Dina Bonnevie’s Magdusa Ka to Maricel Soriano’s Pinulot Ka Lang sa Lupa to Jaypee de Guzman’s Mga Batang Yagit to Helen Gamboa’s Mundo Man Ay Magunaw, and a hundred other (melo)dramas.

These were the movies peopled by characters you would remember; characters whom you would, every now and then, find or seek in others; characters whom you would, in later years, see yourself become.

Back then, you got to enjoy a movie and even memorize the scenes in it only because it came once in a blue moon, as it were.

You always looked forward to one weekend when your parents would bring you all to watch the latest release in Bichara Theater in downtown Naga.

The whole week you looked forward to that Saturday or Sunday they promised because it surely would come with a date at the Naga Restaurant where you would be treated to bowls of steaming asado mami and toasted or steamed siopao—not to mention a probable new pair of shoes or a cool shirt from Zenco Footstep or Sampaguita Department Store.

But now, you have already brought home an audio-visual entertainment. You will watch a movie from your USB to your LCD TV, full HD, complete with the frills of the latest technology. Now the movie is only yours to play—and play back again and again and again, as many times as you like.

Back then, if you liked some scene in the film which you’d liked to watch again, you’d have to wait till the next feature so you would wait until you spend some three more hours inside the theater. But now, you won’t worry anymore. With your latest downloaded movie flashing on your 40” LCD screen, you can freeze that scene and relish the drama or action—complete with subtitles—to your heart’s content.

Back then, watching a movie was something to talk about with your siblings or cousins when you got back from the city. Now, watching a Torrentzed film from your USB drive is what you can only do because it would be so hard for you to talk to them who are thousands of cities away from where you are.

Past Blessed the Child

It was great to be a child in those days.

On lazy afternoons, my brother Mente, my sister Nene and I made horses out of Mother’s pillows and played the Zimatar or Diego Bandido episodes which we heard over DZGE, the local radio station.

We played in the rooms upstairs, riding our pillow horses, facing our enemies and pursuing our adventures, until our Manoy Ano scolded and told us to bring the beddings—blankets, sheets and all—back to order or else Mother would call it a day when she returned. But we would play to our hearts’ content; after all, we thought Mother would be pleased because we were only playing inside the house. That way she would not really be bothered.

Some other days, in my grandparents house which we call Libod (literally, backyard), my cousins and I would play taraguan (hide and seek) and be thrilled by not easily finding all the playmates. After a while, one would give up not “seeking” the last one hidden; and find out he already left because his mother asked him to run an errand. And so we’d stop and think of other games which would thrill us.

We would then gather and tell stories we would just invent. Once, I wove a story about the pictures from a book I read until my cousins pestered me to finish it perhaps because it did not make sense perhaps because I only jumbled them.

At the time, we made our toys out of materials just available to us. We made our own toys and games and we enjoyed them. Perhaps they were cruder but we and our imaginations, not our toys, not other things, were responsible for our own enjoyment.

Our parents—aunts and uncles—did not mind especially if we were all playing in Libod. Here, left to our own devices, we devised our own games, things and stuff and in the long run, made memories which we can only consider ours. In the open yard of our grandparents’ compound, my parents ancestral house—we were free to play. The space, the time, the freedom given to us by our ginikanan (parents) allowed our imagination to create things that pleased us. And when we played our games, we did not only kill our boredom; we also made some things worth remembering.

In those days, a child’s play was also his passion, if not his “profession.” If my nephews Yman and Yzaak play their Ragnarok or Pokemon cards today, I also collected my own set of tex cards and lastiko (goma or rubber bands). In those days, to have your own box of tex cards or a string of lastiko was like to have invested well in stock market. In our time and place, these were the child’s prized possessions.

The game of tex and lastiko went side by side. For each player’s turn, we flicked three cards—my own and those of two other opponents and added up the numbers of the cards facing up. He whose cards faced up with the highest sum won. For the bets, we piled tens or twenties or even hundreds of rubber bands of grouped colors. The winner took all these wagers.

We would do this routine until someone among us knew he’s collecting the cards of all the rest. Anyone who refused to continue playing after he’d won big was called saklit. Having gained such reputation, he would be avoided by others. In my case if I began to win big, I just felt lucky if my playmates parents summoned them to run an errand or already asked them to go home. That formally excused me from gaining the “ill repute.”

In our sixth grade, my classmate Michael Arimado from Triangulo was the “official” King of Tex and lastiko, having won over every other classmate from Baybay, Iraya and even Tigman. He was undisputed. Like a small-time Mafia, Michael would hang his long string of lastiko on his neck, while he swung his sinampalok (tamarind-shape bolo) during our hawan (weeding) sessions in Mr. Olarve’s Industrial Arts class.

At recess, he would invite Edgar Bayola or Sulpicio Purcia to challenge him at the back of the Marcos Type Building. Talk of the early days of UFC. In these Days of Pre-Physical matches, Michael would win big and reclaimed his “title” now and again.

It came to me that I could be like Michael. So gradually I went to start “collecting” my own set, by playing other classmates and betting my own sets of cards and lastiko. When I became fond of tex, it wouldn’t be long till I had won my own box and some 500 pieces of lastikong sinaralapid (braided rubber bands of various colors) which I now hung like the two snakes of Zuma’s, the Aztec-inspired character I read on Aliwan Komiks.

Like my classmate Michael, I had become a self-declared King of Tex in my own right, through my own tex, sweat and cheers. But this glory would be short-lived; I would soon declare “bankruptcy” of this investment after Mother discovered my necklace-length collection of lastiko. She must have thought I was already distracted in my studies so she asked Manoy Awel to burn this “investment” one evening when he was cooking our kinusidong abo for supper. No questions asked. Barely having arrived from an errand, I tried to save them from the stove but it was too late. That night I cried the hardest and the loudest.

In those days it was great to be a child.

Sarong Bánggi

Kan sarong bánggi, pinunasan akó

ni Tátay tapos sinabihan, dai daa

‘ko magparabatad o mágparakáwat

maski sain.Piglabaran niya man

si Dódoy; tapos pinainóm kami

kan gina’ga niyang lákad-búlan.

Itong sunod na bánggi, 

matanga na nag-abot si Nánay.

Nagimata kami kan nagriribok; 

nag-iiriwal sinda ni Tátay.

Dai kaya dáa pigmamarángno 

an mgá áki nindá. Kayá dáa 

kamí kinákaralintúra na saná.

Baad mayong gibohon si Nanay 

para kami marahay. Sa aga, 

baad matanga na naman siya 

mag-uli hali sa madyongan. 

Baad apudon na naman ako 

ni Tatay sa papag, tapos kuguson, 

tapos hadukan, tapos babawan. 

Kun maghibi ako, baad kásturan 

naman ako ni Tátay. Baad sa aga, 

garó na naman ako may hílang.

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 they sounded so real, so 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 again 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.

In June of that year.