The Flag Pole

This is a picture that I grabbed from the LGUTiwi FB page of the ongoing redesign and enhancement of the Plaza in front of the municipal building.

What caught my attention amid the chaos of construction and what have you was the concrete base of the flagpole. I can still vividly remember the story behind said structure.

One day in the late 70s or early 80s, while supervising the construction of the koi (Japanese carp) ponds & water fountains in front of the old 'municipio', my father, Aki Shimizu, was asked by mayor Oriel Clutario if he could improve the old flagpole in the plaza.

He immediately asked his workers to gather the materials needed for the simple design that he sketched on a paper bond in haste: bricks made at the Tiwi Ceramic Plant and corals that were brought from Corangon earlier; they finished the job by late afternoon of the same day.

Of course, as with many of his public landscape projects and works in Tiwi, my father did it for free.

The koi ponds and the fountains are long gone, and judging from the current design of the plaza, the flagpole will eventually be condemned to oblivion, too. I am sharing this backstory here for posterity.

On a side note: Can anyone tell me the proper name of the Tiwi Municipal Plaza?

Yes, it has a name that not too many people, especially the newer generations of Tiwinhons, are aware of. But if you read the book "TIWI Molding the Pots of Prosperity from the Springs of History" -- authored by eminent historian Danilo Madrid Gerona, you probably already know the answer to the question above.

Memories of my Father

My father would have been 60 years old today but he died young at age 43 from complications of his excesses in life.

I remember my Dad mostly as a beer-drinking, chain-smoking, black-coffee drinking, temperamental man who spoke English, which he learned from my mother, mixed with the vernacular he learned from the Istambays in our town.

He was a young man of 21 when he first set foot in our remote town in the Philippines as an eager member of the Japanese Overseas Cooperation Volunteer (JOCV), Japan’s version of the US Peace Corps in trying to make amends for the war that devastated his neighbors years back.

It was in Tiwi, Albay, famous for its Hot Springs and Pottery, among others, where he first made his mark in the Philippines. He was assigned as a Ceramic Technician and had a hand in the rehabilitation of the Ceramic Plant of the town.

And with the cooperation of some local folks, he was instrumental in making maybe the first and probably the only Japanese Garden in the Philippines made by a “genuine Japanese” at that time.

The Japanese Garden in Tiwi was once upon a time one of the most visited places in Albay by both foreign and local tourists alike. It even landed in both the Japanese and Philippine Tourist Guidebooks, although the information on the latter was erroneously credited to a group of Japanese JOCVs, which I think only shows how irresponsible they were in handling facts and put premium more on hearsays rather than do some research on the subject.

Sad to say, the said Japanese Garden of today is a mere shadow of its old self having fallen victim to neglect due to political intramurals of the local leaders. I hope that one day, I could raise the money to rehabilitate it if only the town’s local officials would allow it.

My father was a handsome man which was probably why he was able to win the hands of the only daughter of the former Mayor and convinced her in the end to elope with him when my Grand Pa did not approve of the relationship because of what he deemed as cultural differences and the thought of losing his precious daughter to a complete stranger and a "former enemy" at that, what with the painful reminder of the Second World War still fresh in the late 60s.

My Grandfather, in his attempt to stop their blooming relationship, even asked the Japanese Embassy to pull him out of Tiwi and had him recalled to Japan thus ending abruptly the stint and career of the youngest member of the 1968 batch of the JOCVs in the Philippines. But my father wrote to my mother almost everyday until he finally came back and the rest was history.

EARLY YEARS

I will always remember his ritual each morning, sitting in his chair with a cigarette wedged in his fingers, reading a book in between sips of his very strong sugar-less black coffee.

He was a wide and voracious reader. He had a vast collection of books from the animes to history and the sciences, all in Japanese of course, which was maybe his way of getting in touch with his roots while moored in a land far different from where he grew up.

I will always remember the packages from Japan that my Lola Riki, his mother sent to us. I will always remember the excitement on his face as he took out the toys, clothes and boxes of food out of the box and gave them to us one by one.

Long before Voltes V and other Japanese Anime's invasion of the Philippines, I already had my share of those battery-operated robots, transformers and anime-designed sneakers, school supplies and clothing. Funny, but I even refused to wear those sneakers to school and use the knapsack, since I felt that I was out of place, for in the mid and late 70’s I think those things were uncommon in the Philippines.

And long before Japanese foods were in vogue, I already had my fill of sushi, sashimi and the like. My father would regale us with stories about his early years in Post-War Japan where food were scarce and the sacrifices they made.

He once shared to us a story about how his Mom would prepare and arrange his packed lunch for school with nothing but rice and a single pickled red cherry at the center fashioning out a Japanese flag from the meager supply that they had to remind him not to be choosy about food.

And he was a funny man too. Maybe taking from his mother, he in turn tricked me and my younger sister into believing that the Nori paper that he just ran over the flames of a lone candle is actually carbon paper that he turned into something edible and other hilarious stories about the brown Miso paste, the pickled radish, the sesame seeds and the Kikkoman soy sauce.

I will always remember how he gave birth to a lot of animals through the magic of Origami as well as colored pencil sketches on the drawing books putting to good use his talent that once upon a time won him a place in a UNESCO-sponsored art contest in Japan.

I will always remember how he made our Christmases more bright and fun with his artworks and fancy decorations of Santa, Rudolph and such.

And of course, how he made my school projects better than anyone else with his wide knowledge and imagination.

He was our resident artist, comedian, designer and father rolled into one.

(To be Continued)

Let there be LIGHT

I’ve been so busy the past week that I hardly had time to update my blogs, although I was able to spare a bit of time to take a peek on some of the blogs in my blogroll on some nights that I was home.

Anyway, I read in the March 15, 2007 issue of the Philippine Daily Inquirer the news about the National Power Corporation’s cutting off supply to the entire province of Albay because of the Albay Electric Cooperative’s unpaid debt in the amount of a whopping P981.3 million.

At first, my mind tried to brush it off but my heart begged me to say my piece after I realized that Aleco was so in the red and could accumulate a debt that would reach a billion pesos in the next few years or so, which would have a very negative effect on the lives of the people of Albay.

It used to be a profitable cooperative run by honest and hardworking people in Albay, where the welfare of its constituents was paramount and service excellence its battle cry.

In fact, my Grandfather, Jose C. Templado used to be its Secretary of the Board and then President during its pioneering days in the early 70s to its heydays in the 80s while at the same time being Vice-President of the Association of Bicol Cooperatives (ABECO) which he served with unquestioned integrity and genuine public service.

He saw the writings on the wall early when crooked politicians entered the cooperative's domain, invaded its board room and started to twist the cooperative’s policies and decisions to suit their needs and interests which I think influenced his decision not to seek re-election and retired quietly when his final term ended.

Afterwards, the cooperative’s fate and fortune all went downhill as more competent and honest people left Aleco disillusioned, and replaced with blood-suckers who bled the cooperative’s coffer dry and drove the company into financial ruins from which it couldn't recover.

At one time, Aleco was divided into 3 independent services that served the 3 Congressional Districts of Albay with--

Aleco 1: Tiwi, Malinao, Tabaco, Malilipot, Bacacay and Sto. Domingo.

Aleco 2: Legaspi City, Daraga, Camalig, Rapu-Rapo, and Manito.

Aleco 3: Guinobatan, Oas, Libon, Ligao, Polangui, Jovellar and Pio Duran.

Each one was independent from each other, policy and budget-wise. Each had its own member-elected Board of Directors and run by an autonomous management team.

This was done to save the consumers of the other districts from the inconvenience of their power and electricity being cut-off because of one particular district’s failure to deliver its payment to Napocor.

Actually, this was done to save the “less progressive” districts, which were the First and Third Districts, from the “urban” Second District, where big business reigned supreme and huge debt to the cooperative was tops.

But the experiment did not last long due to pressures from “unseen hands” and so-called concerned consumers that were supported by lobbyists to the “higher ups” in the national government.

In the course of its history, you can trace Aleco’s woes to its delinquent consumers; not the common Albayano though but mostly from the big businesses operating in Legaspi City owned by prominent people of Albay with ties to powerful politicians and other powers-that-be in the province, as well as to the plethora of inept managers that the National Electrification Administration installed to “mis”-manage the company.

The moral of the story here is that the dirty hands of politics corrupt the people they touch and destroy everything in their path.

If we can only rid our country of these crooked politicians and their minions, maybe we can really, really say that the Philippines can be a really, really nice place to live in.

If that time comes, then I can say that there really is a light at the end of the tunnel. Otherwise, we will continue to be stuck in the dark age of our own making.

3.25.07

1986 People Power Recollections

“Where were you in ‘86 EDSA Revolution?”

This caught my eye while on a jeepney cruising along the Quezon Bridge near Quiapo a long, long time ago. It was written on a wall of an old dilapidated building along the Pasig River. The handwriting was crude using a black paint, and who put it there and for whatever reason we will never really know.

But it was a good question come to think of it for this year's 21st Anniversary of the People Power Revolution, an event that changed not only the history of the Filipino nation and its people but also proved to the world that change could be achieved peacefully. The people in the Communist world soon followed thereafter as they emulated and learned the lessons of our unique form of ending a tyrannical regime without bloodshed.

Thus, we Filipinos could lay a claim that we had a hand in the collapse of the Soviet Union and the communist bloc in the late 80s to the early 90s and in the process changed the lives of millions of people all over the world. But while other nations have progressed since, our country remains in a quagmire of our own making, but that is another story that would merit a deeper analysis and another post in the future. Suffice it to say that for now, we will not stray away from the topic.

Back to the question, I was neither at home in Tiwi, Albay nor protesting in EDSA at that time. I was in the Visayas, Barotac Nuevo in Iloilo to be exact during the National Secondary Schools Press Conference (NSSPC) held in that rustic but charming town and if I remembered it correctly, some 30-plus kilometers away from the City of Iloilo.


I was in third year high school in 1986, when I was chosen as one of the representatives of the Bicol Region (by virtue of me landing in 5th place in the News Writing Category in the Regional Secondary Schools Press Conference (RSSPC) held at the Camarines Sur National High School in Naga City of the same year) to the NSSPC where lady luck smiled on me in Barotac Nuevo for I placed 9th (only the top 10 were announced and awarded certificates onstage) out of 150-plus contestants nationwide and was the highest placed Bicolano in the News Writing Category.

 

My recollections of the events that led to the 1986 People Power Revolution began on the day when Benigno “Ninoy” S. Aquino was murdered on the hot tarmac of the then Manila International Airport on August 21, 1983.

My grandfather, who was the head of the Bicol Saro in our town, the leading opposition party in the Bicol Region during the dark years of the Marcos dictatorship, was keenly awaiting on radio the news of the opposition senator’s arrival, and what he heard from sketchy reports was that Ninoy was shot dead by an assassin despite the presence of the Avsecom personnel in the heavily guarded airport.

I remember my Lolo in shock, and he could only mutter in a barely audible voice that, “this is the beginning of the end for Marcos. He is finished and sooner or later he will be deposed by the people.”

It never occurred to me then that his words would prove providential years later, but then I am not surprised now for my grandfather was a serious student and practitioner of politics, having been elected vice-mayor and then mayor of Tiwi, Albay in his younger days, but of a different kind, back when politics was really “for the people, by the people and of the people”; where the elected leaders did not enrich themselves while in office as opposed to the battle cry of our present crop of shameless politicians as told to me by a descendant of Filosofong Tasyo years ago -- ”poor the people, buy the people and off the people.”

So, when the dictator called a snap presidential election and the Cory-Doy bandwagon rolled into Bicolandia, I was there with Old Grandpa. I saw up close and personal the two opposition candidates at the house of then Assemblyman and later Senator Victor S. Ziga when they held their Miting de Avance in Tabaco, Albay and became a certified member of the Yellow Army by playing the recordings of protest songs (Freddie Aguilar's Bayan Ko) in all the anti-Marcos rallies in our town as well as leading my friends in putting up campaign posters in all the available spaces and places that we could find, and most of our forays were done in nighttime.

I remember listening on the radio with Lolo of course, the fiery interpellation and filibustering of the loquacious Assemblyman from Mindanao, Homobono Adaza during the canvassing of the election returns in the Batasan Pambansa, as then Speaker Nicanor Yniguez of Leyte and other Kilusang Bagong Lipunan (KBL) stalwarts railroaded the process and proclaimed Marcos as the winner of the snap polls, contrary to the beliefs of the people and the National Movement for Free Elections (NAMFREL) count which showed the opposition as the runaway winner.

While the daily protests against the dictator and the boycott of all the crony companies were in full-circle, the Bicol delegation to the annual secondary schools press conference was on its way to Iloilo. We were billeted at the classrooms of Saint Paul School in Barotac Nuevo and during the parade of delegates the next day I could see the local people’s faces light up whenever they saw the Bicol Banner and exclaimed, “Bicol, panalo sainyo si Cory at Doy!” and enthusiastically flashed the Laban sign as we passed by.

After the News writing contest, my mom and I decided to go shopping in SM-Iloilo and there in the sidewalks, on the frontpages of the Inquirer and Malaya newspapers were the pictures of Defense Minister Juan Ponce Enrile and Lieutenant General Fidel V. Ramos barricading themselves in the military camps along Epifanio De Los Santos Avenue (EDSA) as they announced their withdrawal of support from their erstwhile leader.

We could tell the tension in the air as even the local leaders, policemen, parish priests and the Ilonggos were monitoring the events unfolding in Manila on radio in every nook and cranny of the city.

Even the delegates and speakers could not remain apolitical as news updates continued to pour in with the majority cheering for the reformists. Only the delegates from Region I (Ilocos) were rooting for the status quo.

When the late Joe Quirino who was then the speaker for Feature Writing made a remark about the yellow garland that he was wearing and showed his true colors in his lecture, the entire auditorium cheered him with the exception of the Region I delegates for obvious reasons.

When news came that there were more than a million people in EDSA and that Channel 4 had been taken by the reformist soldiers from the loyalist soldiers, the audience applauded while the Ilocanos just kept mum in their seats.

When the church bells finally tolled on the night the Marcoses left Malacanang, the entire auditorium went wild as the delegates from Regions II to XII and NCR whooped it up while the delegates from the Ilocos region just kept quiet.

Despite the celebration of the moment, many were still apprehensive about the news regarding the dictator's plight; their alleged flight from Malacanang since reports were sketchy and it was the then Ministry of Education Culture and Sports Minister Jaime C. Laya himself, who confirmed to the delegates the real situation regarding the country’s leadership when he declared in his opening speech--

“This will be my first and last speech to you as your Minister of Education, Culture and Sports” or words to that effect.

Surprisingly, his pronouncement was greeted with silence but not for long as the place was rocked by a thunderous explosion of joy and happiness.

Amid the wild celebration, I saw the Ilocos delegation quietly shedding tears for their beloved Apo.



Let us not desecrate the memory of the original People Power Revolution and the heroes who shed their lives so that the Filipino people could be free again.

Let us preserve and honor their sacrifices by becoming good and responsible citizens.

Quo vadis, Gringo, Butz, et al?





Note: Manuel L. Quezon III described this particular blog entry as "touching" in his article EDSA AT 21.

Albay is in the Heart

I was about to punch in to start my day at the Emergency Room of Henry Ford Wyandotte Hospital in Michigan when my cell phone buzzed. I could feel the heat of my blood rushing under my skin when I heard what the person on the other line had to say. It took me a moment or two before I summoned the courage to ask the Clinical Coordinator for the day off to allow me to go home and check the news online myself --

And there it was on the Philippine Daily Inquirer, Philippine Star, ABS- CBN News and other news websites the grim reality and horrific pictures of the devastation brought by the super typhoon Reming (International codename: Durian) to Albay Province and Legaspi City, places that I am very familiar with and known like the palms of my hands.

I scanned the pages and my eyes caught the heart-rending, gut-wrenching stories of tragedy and despair of the people; my people, of whom I am very much familiar with their way of life and customs, but you could only take a deep breath to relieve the heaviness in your chest and grieve alone in silence half a world away.

I grew up in Tiwi, a rustic and sleepy town almost 50 kilometers from Legaspi City, the capital of Albay Province, where I went to college for four years to earn my Bachelor’s Degree for my Pre-Medical course years ago from the College of Arts and Sciences in the Dominican-run Aquinas University, a university on the heavily silted Yawa river that made our school look like Venice minus the gondolas in those days, usually right after a heavy downpour, especially during the monsoon season, that has earned the university a derisive name albeit jokingly of being the only “floating university in the Philippines” among its students.

It was in this city by the sea where I spent some of my formative years; my rude awakenings to the real world; my youthful fire and enthusiasm for things that were once forbidden. It was also in this city where I spent some of the happiest times of my young life.

It was in the streets of Legaspi City and the neighboring town of Daraga where together with some childhood friends, we had our baptisms of fire about the joys of friendship and the sad realities of life. Barangays Bonot, Rawis, Arimbay, Pag-Asa, Padang, Victory Village, Baybay and San Roque in Legaspi City used to be our playground as well as dark sections and alleys of Daraga.

There we were -- young, care-free, wet behind the ears teenagers tasting “freedom” for the first time in a city far from home doing crazy unimaginable stuff like watching four movies in succession until our eyes were bloodshot and dry in those dingy and rickety downtown movie houses; making countless pranks in school and not being caught; bloody street fights and numerous fisticuffs with other gangs that left some of us with busted beaks or two and broken bones on the side; darting in and out in those seedy smoke-filled beerhouses near the Legaspi Police Station with names like Mark Anthony, Vejors, Melon Patch, etc.; chain smoking Marlboros like there was no tomorrow; heavy drinking sessions with the stainless Ginebra from dusk until dawn; sleeping along the shores and on the sands of the beach of Lagunoy Gulf while fighting a nasty hang-over and of course, chasing girls while living in the fast lane. Those were the days and they were really damn good days.

All these things occurred under the watchful eyes of the tempest and temperamental volcano that is Mayon, towering over the city and the province of Albay with its nearly perfect cone that makes her natural beauty beyond compare, a Daragang Magayon in our midst and like the dusky beautiful Bicolana maiden, she is not only a beauty in her peaceful slumber but a fiery and deadly one in her wrath and anger.

Circa 1910

Mount Mayon is legendary for her volatile temperament and Bicolanos are so accustomed to her fickle-mindedness and constant grumblings. In fact, it was only months ago where I had written about her in this blog (see Daragang Magayon) when she had shown once again her legendary temper and spewed ashes into Albay’s azure sky and red-hot lava flowed on her belly that left a lot of people, locals and tourists alike, awed and captivated by her beauty and splendor, especially in the night time where the spectacle is far more grand and colorful.

After some fireworks here and there, she was back to her quiet self or so we thought until…

Reming entered the picture and conspired with her to change the landscape of the city that I was so fond of and the province of my roots. The once peaceful, happy and lively place that I knew of has been obliterated from the face of the earth, and death, devastation and despair replaced it. When disaster struck so close to home, a piece of ourselves is also lost no matter where we are.

The people never had a chance. They never knew it coming. It was sudden and deadly, and in one stroke, their lives and property were gone and washed by the strong current into the vast Pacific Ocean. We may never know the total number of casualties in the tragedy but I know that I have lots of friends, classmates and acquaintances who lived in those places. And I know for a fact that some of them never made it back alive after the deluge. Their lives and property were now buried under the mud, the place is deserted and now a wasteland but their memories will forever live in my heart.

How come something like this happened in this day and age? How come nobody of our so-called “experts” have predicted this to happen? After all, the build-up of lava in the slopes of Mt. Mayon does not happen overnight, it has been months before this thing happened!

As usual, the inept and incompetent local politicians have no idea and the national leadership was blind as a bat as well. Finger-pointing on who was to blame for the disaster is the name of the game. Some even blame the people who were living there whose only fault was trying to earn an honest living, which cannot be said though of our political leaders who were busy amassing ill-gotten wealths and playing political intramurals rather than attending to the basic needs of their constituents.

As long as the Philippine political system is corrupt and our so-called leaders are indifferent to the plight and sufferings of the people, tragedies like this will always occur. It will be just a vicious cycle of death and destruction. It’s not too late for our “leaders” to change, but change has to come first within ourselves. I know this is just another pipe dream but hope springs eternal they say. Hopefully, it will be for the better of our country.

Now, I grieve for those who perished and pray for those who survive for life, and it will be a long struggle for them to get back on their feet again.

But I believe in the human courage, the Bicolano spirit and the resiliency of the Albayanos in particular. Mga Oragon baga kita!

And just like the mythical Phoenix, the people of Albay will rise from the ashes and will crawl out from the rubble and rebuild whatever is left of their shattered lives.

I know that we will succeed for that’s how we Bicolanos are; we are a hardened and determined lot and at the end of the day we will always have those beautiful smiles on our faces, those glowing sparks in our eyes and the inherent kindness in our hearts to live by.


Note:

The official death toll of Typhoon Reming (International Codename: Durian) is currently pegged at 1,266 people dead or missing based on body counts and survivor accounts and is growing day by day. It was believed that nobody could really tell the exact number of casualties due to the lack of official data or census of the number of people living in a particular area during that particular time.

Hardest hit were Barangay Padang in Legaspi City and Barangay Maipon in Guinobatan, Albay where entire families were buried alive.

The boarding houses that dotted the banks of the Yawa River near Aquinas University were swept by the rampaging waters into the sea taking with them the students who were sleeping at that time in the process.

The loss of human lives and damages to properties in the province of Albay is enormous and can never be quantified. Power and communication lines were cut, roads were damaged and rendered inaccessible. Food, gas, and water shortages are a sad reality and the probability of a disease outbreak is a given.

The whole province is in a State of Calamity. 

12.5.06

Daragang Magayon

 

The Philippines’ Mt. Mayon, the most active volcano in the archipelago, has once again shown the world her legendary beauty albeit dangerously during the past few days. But I could only watch the colorful but deadly spectacle on the videos available on the Internet, having left the Bicol region a couple of years ago and now living half a world away from my hometown of Tiwi in Albay.

Mayon, rising to 2463 feet above sea level, is one of several active volcanoes in the Philippines (a country lying on the Pacific Ring of Fire) and one of the most destructive, wherein in 1814 it buried the town of Cagsawa, killing an estimated 1,000 residents, where the only reminder of that fateful day is the famous Church ruins and its Belfry, which is now a National Park attracting thousands of tourists year round.

The volcano, which is famous for its almost perfect cone, was named after the tragic maiden in the Bicolano legend of Daragang Magayon (Beautiful Maiden in the local Bicol dialect), and is always a beauty to watch from near or afar; its near perfect cone always elicited aahs and oohs from natives and tourists alike whether in her peaceful slumber or fiery grumblings. Her towering splendor, whether in her moment of silence or in her intense outbursts, is beyond compare.

Bicolanos, especially Albayanos, take pride in Mayon’s unique place in Albay’s landscape and their daily lives; her predilection of erupting every now and then has only added to her mystique and people have grown accustomed either by choice or necessity to her legendary fickleness.

She is a beauty -- a tempest like no other. A wonderful work of nature and God’s miracle and gift to the pliant spirit of the Albayanos hardened by their daily struggle, battered by typhoons and other elements that came their way year-in and year-out, but always having a ready smile for everyone. The Mayon and the Bicolanos have co-existed for thousand of years and their lives and fate will forever be intertwined in happy times and tragedies.

I remember when I was growing up in the sleepy town of Tiwi, we were fortunate enough to have seen and watched her dazzling show of ferocious pyroclastic explosions from afar, the unique spectacle you can appreciate more after dark and far away from the dangers of lava flows and sufferings of some of our fellow Albayanos, as Tiwi is far enough for her destructive powers to reach. The worst we got were showers of ash falls once in a while that were usually evident in the leaves of every plant and tree in backyards in the morning, which also usually depends on the direction of where the wind blows.

I also remember being asked by our teachers in school to bring whatever we could give in the form of food and used clothing to our less fortunate brothers and sisters who were evacuated to school buildings and other evacuation centers to escape Mayon’s wrath and fury that has left countless lives lost and destructions in livelihood through the many years of her unexplained destructive behavior.

It is always bittersweet whenever the beautiful Mayon erupts -- it is always a delight to watch her magical fireworks, especially at night time, and at the same time be in awe at nature's power, but you can also feel sadness deep inside your heart just thinking of the people who were displaced from their homes as well as the peril that she brought to your fellowmen in her moment of anger.

photo credit: keisukejapon

Such is the drama in the age-old relationship between the native Albayanos and the beautiful but dangerous Daragang Magayon.