I killed a bird yesterday. It crossed our windshield in a blur and struck the left A-pillar. It spun and plopped on my left leg. The suddenness of it startled me; I thought we met an accident. Only when I saw downy feathers flying around inside the van did I realize I killed Tweety’s cousin.
Vincent, who was seated behind me, got to examine the poor thing. He said it was still young, with still undeveloped flight feathers. Perhaps I made its first flight its last. I felt bad.
Good thing, there were several Feli-Citas resto along the way. With a “super-jumbo” Pancit Cabagan before me, the bird was soon forgotten.
I was driving my parents home to the province. Tomorrow, I drive back to Manila. This means a thousand kilometers for me and my father’s van. Pom and Vincent, our employee, were with us. My niece Chloe was also with us. She’s staying with her lolo and lola for the meantime, as her mother tries to arrange her papers to hopefully work in the US, just like 80 percent of all medical professionals in this country. Thankfully the precocious kid was asleep half the trip—she made the van her playground and her fellow passengers her playmates. My mother’s very old dog, the most driven mutt in the world, was also with us. He perfumed the van with his special musty smell that prompted us to deploy several Vaporin packets on the aircon vents. (One time, he did his thing inside Batik while we were driving on Balete Pass, Maharlika Highway’s highest point. Good thing Sta. Fe roadside restaurants had free flowing water to wash his shit off the upholstery. Bad dog!)
My decision to swap my father’s bus for this gas guzzler again proved to be a good deal for us, especially in times like this when I have to drive my parents around. Batik is still more fun to drive though. Rickety body and manual steering aside, its small body is more road responsive. But the van has got more engine grunt, effortlessly cresting hills and mountains even in the upper gears. And it’s got power steering, which is kind to my arms and shoulders.
And you should have seen our luggage. Even with the last seat folded up, Chloe’s toys and clothes ensured that we rode low. Add my father’s wheelchair and oxygen tanks, our trip sure was blissfully understeer free.
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Auitan, our barangay, is cold at this time of the year. But it’s November, so it’s expected. Cagayan and Isabela provinces suffer the most extreme weather conditions in the country. During the cooler months, it’s cold. In summer, it’s cooking! This explains why Ybanags are so dark skinned. We suffer Arab then Eskimo weathers year in and year out.
We caught Typhoon Queenie’s (my second girlfriend’s namesake) tail end and it was rainy. Perfect for the somber mood our barangay is in at the moment.
Corazon Mallillin suffered a stroke and died the other day. Tinay de la Cruz, my mother’s cousin, suffered a stroke yesterday and expired before midnight last night. We are holding two wakes at the same time.
My beloved barrio is changing. The strong people I knew while growing up are dying one by one. I now see youngsters whose names I don’t know, gallivanting and waiting for their chance to leave this place, like the tens of thousands did before them. Like I did.
But Auitan remains essentially the same. When we arrived, a gaggle of neighbors welcomed us warmly. Despite the two recent floods, they kept our house spotlessly clean. The floor was waxed, the furniture all shiny, our bantam chicken still alive, the plants all abloom. And there were newly cooked rice and tinolang manok (with native chicken) with malunggay steaming hot, cooked from our firewood stove, waiting for us.
Kind neighbors make communities. And full stomachs.
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Three people are kindest to my family.
There’s Iring Dabo and her children. Her husband is in jail for killing her brother. But he sure was forced into it by the drunken and abusive victim. This left Auntie Iring to raise their many children alone while struggling to let her husband freed after so many years in the slammer already. The older children have families already. Some work on six-month shifts for contractual-hiring capitalist bastards and are on a constant search for permanent work. Some are still studying. Under Auntie Iring’s care are grandchildren. But whenever Mama needs her, she’s there. She cooks (deliciously), washes clothes, cleans the big house, waters plants, runs to the store and performs a myriad of other errands. Her two fingers were nearly cut off while preparing food for my parents. They are nearly useless now, severely hampering her work. I had them acupunctured in Manila but she discontinued after only a single session because she had to go back to the province.
Uncle Sator Aquino has slurred speech; a stroke gave him that. He takes care of our yard, planting, cleaning and takes care of our chicken. He fetches our drinking water from a nearby deep well. He fixes things inside the house. For all these, he is happy as long as there is coffee.
Auntie Toning Bernaga's family is our land tenant. In her case, we benefit from the feudal relationship of landowners and tenants as her family provides help to us beyond taking care of our farm. She does what Auntie Iring does. Sometimes, too, she sleeps over when we are all in the city.
I feel desperate in wanting to repay these people’s kindness to us. I want to find work for their children. I want to give them some of the things they need. But we can only do so much with our humble finances. Someday, maybe. We just hope to be there for them when they need us the most. It is the least we can do.
I know it’s wrong for me to write this. But we love them more than some relations.
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Auntie Toning’s daughter is suffering from some mysterious illness. She can’t sleep.
Michelle had been taken to doctors, confined to hospitals, been given sleeping pills and all sorts of medication. Still, sleep is elusive. She is just a shadow of her active and bright ways when I knew her as a child.
Auntie Toning took her home from Binangonan. Michelle’s husband has more than enough on his plate working and taking care of their children. It was best this way, Auntie Toning says.
What science can’t explain, superstition can. Everyone in our barangay believes she’s a victim of dark witchcraft. The quacks they’ve brought her to claim they’ve recovered pieces of steel wire from her torso. Only articles of clothing are left on her lower extremities, they say. But the witch who did it is too powerful, they report.
Since I’ve been schooled in dialectical materialism, I’ve stopped believing in these things.
What I believe is that quacks want the family to shell out more “gifts” so they can “extract” the articles of clothing from inside her body. I believe that her illness has not been diagnosed enough and treated because of their poverty. I believe a society that forces its people to believe in superstitions because of poverty needs to be changed and changed quickly.
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Cagimungan president Joey Javier was shot to death in his home town Baggao the other day. I heard the news on the radio while driving home. I knew Joey, like many of the 780 victims of extra judicial killings under arroyo.
Three years ago, Philippine Army’s 5th Infantry Division hacked him and nearly severed his left arm. Several months ago, soldiers from the same unit torched radio station dzRC. Cagimungan is Cagayan Province’s peasant alliance that put up the station. They were our partners.
Under Joey’s leadership, the townsfolk of Baggao chopped down trees, hauled gravel and built the radio station exclusively with manual labor. The people we trained to become community broadcasters were his friends and colleagues. How proud and happy they were when the station finally hit the airwaves.
Joey was shot a short distance from the burned down radio station and the spot where he was attacked earlier. It was less than a hundred meters away from an army detachment.
Guess who I think martyred Joey.
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Earlier today, I talked to Joey’s comrade and a human rights worker based in Cagayan. I asked them to give us copies of the police and arson reports on dzRC’s torching. I also asked them to send us copies of their medical certificates.
First quarter of next year, we will bring Radio Cagayano’s case before the Permanent People’s Tribunal in The Hague, The Netherlands. They will have their Second Session on the Philippines.
The first session convicted the dictator Marcos of human rights violations. The court’s judgements may not be enforceable but it would mean a lot if the rest of the world knows the state crimes happening here.
Many are confident that gma will be convicted as well. After all, they are essentially and practically the same “president.”
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I would have wanted to stay longer. I missed waking up to the familiar sounds and smells of my hometown.
But I had to go back to Manila. So I dragged myself out of our old bed, went down and outside to our still dark backyard. There, with fog mingling with smoke from our old earthenware stove, I took out the family jewels and peed like I never did in the city. My urine jet cleaved the cold air and landed on top of pandan and gabi leaves wet with dew.
After the deed and the customary kilig and pagpag, I fixed myself a steaming cup of not-Nestle coffee. Around the kitchen, my mother was already busy packing food items and things we are bringing back to the city.
Soon, we were ready. Unlike yesterday, we were considerably lighter. With us are knick-knacks for our ongoing home makeover. The heaviest item was a driftwood which we will be turning into a table base.
Before taking off, I had more obligations to make. I visited Auntie Tinay’s wake—at four o’clock in the morning. There were no other people there except for family and Uncle Ancio. On our way to the highway, I would again stop by Corazon’s wake. Again, I was the only one there.
I hugged and kissed my father before driving off. I told him I don’t want to be summoned home by bad news and that we will be spending Christmas with him.
I kissed my still sleeping niece, too. I will miss her.
The drive back was touristy. We stopped by Feli-Citas in Cordon Town for breakfast. We bought and ate tupig at Solano. Ascending Balete Pass, we bought some grass sticks to be made to curtain rods for our office. Pom and I took a bath at the crystal clear, swift-flowing and cold river at Caranglan, surrounded by fields of wild sunflowers and huge boulders. My wife can’t help but pick sunflowers by the roadside. The van smelled herby the rest of the way. In Cabanatuan City, we had a rather late lunch.
By five o’clock, Metro Manila’s smog and evil drivers welcomed us back.
I love long drives. I don’t mind being tired and sore after. My only wish is doing it for happier reasons.
Because I am being needled for a testi and about my testes, I’m forced to write this.
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