The trip back home is marred by a hellish 12-hour delay in the "newly opened, better than the old airport Terminal 3." Irate passengers, personnels bumbling and bumping into each other as there were yelling and cursing as flights were canceled arbitrarily, unexplained delays and irritations. Fun.I. Davao
The familiar faces of old friends – somewhat older, somewhat , the easy laughter, and camaraderie make you feel a pang of regret. Why have you left at all? But you quickly get over this because things are the way things are, and it would not have been this way if you haven’t left. You find in them the genuine feelings of gladness. You soon revert back to the old banter, the fun and the sad memories relived, and there are moments when silence envelopes the group, and you don’t feel uncomfortable knowing that you are all lost in some collective recollection, and you heave a collective sigh. For you know you are in a company of friends, people that make up and reside in the deepest part of who you are, and what you have become.
Old friends. Good friends. And the places – the places that have taken on mythic dimensions as they became the very backdrop of your embarkation, bringing with them recollections of the past, but also the promise of the future. These were places you knew – that were familiar and so commonplace before. They now take on new significance. They are imbued with meanings too deep and too complex to ever unravel, no matter how ordinary or usual they are: your old room, a forgotten favorite corner, the sight of a tree, the scents and flavors that once shrouded your days. They all come flooding back- memories, meanings, significance. But you find yourself not only in the spectacular places, but you find that there is greater attraction, deeper nuance in the ordinary scenes and corners you use to frequent: Pidok’s where you use to get the best beef steak, Dunkin Donuts along Duterte Street – where you can get good coffee 24 hours a day, before the advent of designer coffee places, the tucked-away second hand bookstore where you use to find dirt cheap but classic books, the best dimsum place where you use to indulge with your meager allowance, the movie theaters where you get lost in, caught up in a celluloid world that sometimes make more sense than your own life. None of these have greater significance than what you have attached to them, and yet all these lend a certain enchantment, allowing you to return, even for a moment to what was.
II. Tacurong
Tacurong is my geography. It is the land that shapes my heart, and its contours become the landscape of my lucid dreams, its dust and features forever etched in me. It is the primeval place I return to, and no matter how far I have traveled, no matter what accomplishments I may have achieved, I revert back to a self I thought I have long lost. Although it has been so long ago that I have been here for a significant amount of time, it is still home. But if you ask me what makes this place unique, what is it that has caught hold of me, I would be hard pressed to come up with a definite answer. All I can tell you are random events, vaguely recollected memories, and fuzzy feelings that are like swaths of clothing that can only make sense seen in a patch-work quilt. Ultimately, it is nothing more than what has gathered in my heart, a treasure locked and protected, peered and visited at odd times and when comfort can not be found anywhere else. This is where home is, and home is a collection of odds and ends, leftover from childhood, relics and remnants from a life no longer existing, a gallery that evoke powerful imagery, and ultimately where your roots are deeply planted.
Home is a ramshackle testimony of our family’s various enterprises: a renovation here, an addition there during bursts of exuberance and optimism long overtaken by the realities of tragedies and broken hearts. It has taken on the patina of past decades; the rough and unfinished places became charming features that lent character and history. The moss on the concrete fence softened the harsh lines and coarse veneer. The heavy pieces of furniture are testimonies to my dad's creativity and workmanship. They are mute and ponderous witnesses to the saga of this family's triumph, loss and re-emergence. It smells, it feels, and it certainly looks like home to me. That night, I sleep in my old room, in the bed that has been mine since I was 10 years old. I dreamed of dreams that was the scenery of my childhood, and I wake up feeling like I have just been hugged.
One of my earliest memories of my dad is him driving somewhereMy dad is always a busy man, and I discover if I didn’t make an effort, I would not see him the whole day. He would be off somewhere - somewhere I have always thought fascinating, interesting. His world can never be my world, and so I have always felt alike a stranger whenever I tag along with him. His world is far too exotic for me. I remember as a young boy going with him to whatever project he was involved in. I would listen to his conversation with others, the raucous laughter, the witty repartee, the grown-up world. I remember having a conversation with my siblings as what would be our equivalent of a grown-up world, and we came up with a far less exotic world than our parent’s. Anyway, that day, I purposely said I will go with my dad and spend the day with him. It was a flurry of activities: he went to see a mayor, a governor, a congressman, and several pastors came to find him – and that was only in the morning. It was a dizzying day, but my dad was in his element and he does what he does best. Older now, more fragile since his last health scare, my dad continues to devote himself to pursuits we have so long ago gotten used to.
For lunch, I dared ask him to bring me to a place we have never seen for 21 or more years. It was nearby I told him, forgetting childhood sense of time and geography aren’t necessarily the same as a grown up. But he said yes. It is a place of implication, for whenever my parents, in the old days, felt they want to splurge, or enjoy a day out, we would go to a very simple place unassumingly called “Chicken Hauz.” It was quite a distance – we make a day out of it usually, and we usually have a good time. And during the years my mother fell sick, in the rare days she would have an appetite, she would ask to be taken there. And there, my dad would nurse her, feeding her with comfort food, a momentary relief from the pains and the horrors of her sickness. My dad has not returned to this place since my mother passed away in 1987. And so it was a surprise for me, and felt a sense of poignancy when he said we would have lunch there.
The food, like the name of the restaurant was unassuming: Tinola, Fried chicken, done the old fashion way. The first sip of the broth brought back memories of careless fun in the sun, of simpler, less complicated days. Simmered to perfection, the chicken is tender and tasty, the papaya is soft, and the sili leaves subtly pungent. No sophisticated techniques here, no complicated ingredients. It was just hearty, simple meal that reflects best the people that made and imbibe them. A moment of strange significance, and yet so mundane: while eating the decidedly delicious meal, an old man comes striding in, bringing with him a bunch of chickens tied up together. He is making a delivery. Talk about the food being fresh. Within hours these live chickens will be served as dishes that made this venerable place famous and well-loved. It is a bizarre juxtaposition of the ordinary and the out of the ordinary.
To be continued…
