How to cook ube and the back story of a comfort food

STEP 1: Dig for Ube.  If none available, source from the palengke.

No food reminds me more of the happy times of my youth than ube, specifically the ube jam that my Tia Lulu makes when we visit or take vacations in Pangasinan. 

I came across a mound of this root crop in our backyard the other day.  When I began digging for it, little did I know that it would be huge, or that it would send me on a sentimental journey as I try to recreate this favorite treat from my youth, using Tia Lulu's old school recipe.

STEP 2: Wash dirt away and boil in a vat till flesh is soft and flaky.

In the olden days, we would begin loitering around Tia Lulu as soon as she sets the wok filled with grated ube, milk and sugar over the blistering wood fire that would turn the goo into spoonfuls of heaven.  She would promptly shoo us away, admonishing us to instead do something worthwhile.  And by this she meant  go play, climb a tree or swing yourself to a stupor in the duyan.

STEP 3: Peel the skin then grate

Tia Lulu is my Nanay’s elder sister and she is, in many ways, our second mother.  She has no children of her own.  In fact, she didn’t marry, nor did she finish or even step into college unlike most of her siblings who became professionals and played the important role of providing for the food that we ate and the general upkeep of the house where we stayed, which, by Amagbagan, Pozorrubio standard was comfortably well-off.  For some reason, and certainly not lack of intellect or the willingness to immerse in learning for she is a very intelligent and perceptive woman, my grandparents decided that Tia Lulu was not higher education material. 

 

STEP 4: Mix in milk (Condensed and Evaporated) and sugar.  Sorry, the proportion is a closely guarded secret.

Whatever income Tia Lulu generates for herself she gets from making and selling tsokolate tablea, and bamboo poles and other products and fruits that grow in abundance in the land that she and her siblings inherited from their parents.  Because she does not have the financial means to bestow generous gifts, let alone buy simple ones, she often thinks that she has little of value to offer.  I don’t see it that way.  When I think of Pangasinan, I think of her and her selflessness.  And that’s more than anything that money can buy. And it is through her example, and that of my Nanay, that I try to live a life for others not with the material things that I may or may not have, but through the innate resources that I may have in abundance.

In my youth, I can climb trees because if I fall, she will be there to soothe the pain away.  I can roam around the fields all day, chase grasshoppers and hop on a carabao's back knowing that when I get home, a warm meal is guaranteed to be waiting.  I don’t mind getting sick because she will be there to take care of me.  I don’t care about prickly heat and the summer humidity of Pangasinan because she will scratch my back till I say, Sarap!  I don’t lose sleep about not knowing things I could use in school because she teaches me skills I can use in real life: How to skin a live frog, How to fry fish without the oil scalding your skin, How to crack roasted cocoa bean shells, How to hold a piglet while its baby teeth are being pruned.  And when I do sleep, I’m not afraid of getting nightmares because I sleep on the floor, on a banig in Tia Lulu’s room who, in her bed just an arm’s reach away, always prays at night that all will be well so that she can wake up early the next day so that when I open my eyes, breakfast is already served on the table.

STEP 5: Cook over wood fire while continuously stirring.  This make take more than 3 hours.

We would hover around Tia Lulu from time to time and she readily knows that we have a spoon in our hands.  She would allow us to scoop a little of the unfinished ube, which is by all means already good, then tell us to go away and do something worthwhile.

When the ube has thickened to the right consistency, she would call on us because she knows we are eager to scrape out the last of the congealed goo on the wooden ladle she just used to mix the ube as well as around the rim of the still hot wok.  These would be the best tasting morsel ever.

STEP 6: When mixture begins to thicken, add margarine then continue stiring.

There are several dishes that I consider comforting to my soul.  One is a vegetable stew of assorted leaves from the garden which my Tatay handpicked and liked to cook when he was sober.  Another is the macaroni salad with home-made mayonnaise that Nanay used to prepare, hand-mixing it for hours on end, during special occasions. Unfortunately, I don’t know how to replicate these recipes.  But this ube, I can.  And it reminds me of those blissful summers in Pangasinan and of my Tia Lulu.  And my heart sighs a deep, contented smile.

STEP 7: Happy eating!

Jogging sucks!

I hate jogging.  It is dangerous and I think the most pointless way to get from point A to point B. It ranks way up there with sitting through an entire Lito Lapid film, volunteering for board work for an algebra class, and fighting with a neighbor’s short-legged dog who always threaten me, and only me, with harm in my list of least liked activities; I may be forced to do it if my life depended on it but I won’t promise to do the act well or do it without grumbling or moping.  

I know, I know, hate is rather a strong word to describe my dislike for a pursuit that a lot of people, including many I know, find leisurely and uplifting, but I have to be honest -- I don’t like it with a passion. But before you forsake me or curse me as a clueless biker, allow me to share my back story which I will now, after bouts of inner conflict, declassify from my confidential information folder.

When I was in Grade Six my Kuya Bambi, who was about to enter the Philippine Military Academy, would invite me to go with him on his jog around the Fernando Air Base perimeter to help him prepare for the rigors of becoming a plebe in the prestigious military school.  I was not training or preparing for anything but since I was young and did not know any better, I thought it was a good idea to go with him. After all, my Kuya, who always kept to himself, had never asked me to do anything with him before.

So mindlessly I said, let’s go!

The jog, at first, was fun because it was over a stretch of backroads that featured grass, dirt, and cow and goat dung, which meant that I had an excuse not to run in a straight line, or to insert a hop here and a long jump there. I would stop occasionally, not because I was running out of breathe, but because I would notice a strand of spider thread criss-crossing some withered shrubs, and the urge to search for the arachnid that spun that yarn would be simply too strong to resist.

When Kuya and I had covered around 5 kilometers of the base’s perimeter, we would proceed to the paved roads so that he could do a few more laps around the pine tree lined oval.  By then, my interest in jogging would have waned for there were no more animal droppings to leap over nor spiders to play hide and seek with.  Instead, the oval offered more of the same thing over and over – trees, paved roads, and joggers running around in circles.

When we have reached this point, I would tell my Kuya that I had enough and would just see him at home.  But the house will wait.  I would take one last detour inside the barbed wire enclosed training camp for candidate soldiers where I would encounter more animal shit, dried grass and exciting opportunities to look for spiders.

One time as I was exploring the camp, I noticed from the corner of one eye a cow that was showing interest in my presence.  I initially thought that it was simply warning me not to touch some sacred poop it dropped some place.  But when I saw that it was moving toward me at an alarming pace, I began to pay attention to my life.  I didn’t know what the animal’s issue was against me but the way it was frantically charging meant only one thing: I should run as fast as my feet would carry me.  I bolted like a boy possessed.  I ran without a care for spiders and dung; my entire twelve years of existence flashing before me and it was nothing particularly exciting or memorable.   I knew then that I had to live longer so that I don’t die having lived a pretty unremarkable life.  What’s worse, when people would ask how I died, my family would half-cryingly, half-jokingly reply:  He got trampled on by a cow that got offended over the way he hopped over its shit. That would mean I also died unremarkably and uselessly.  I had to live. I don’t recall how I scaled the barbed fence that was almost twice as high as me, but I did.   I lived.  And one thing was etched in my young mind that day: jogging was dangerous.

But even with that realization, jogging, and running wouldn’t leave me alone.  In grade school, I was widely regarded as an athlete.  I was good at sports be it pencil fights, teks, holen, luksong baka, putbol (our version was kickball married to the concept of baseball), habulan, or – yes – basketball, where I was considered a young Allan Caidic, lefty and dangerous from the outside.  But since there was no elementary basketball varsity in my time, my PE teachers assumed that my long legs would make me a good runner.  And so every afternoon after class I would change into a running outfit (which was anything that was not my school uniform) and do laps around the school oval, which was not much of an oval, but more like a swathe of grassland with a beaten footpath that formed the shape of a weird square.  For some reason, I could not do as many laps as other runners.  Maybe the absence of cow manure and spiders had something to do with my underwhelming performance.  When we were told to do sprints, I was a distant third to Robin who was a head shorter than me, and Rene who was about my size but had far bigger teeth.  These two, by the way, also jumped higher.  The only reason why I was better at basketball was because I was much taller than Robin and Rene could only jump but not dribble, or pass the ball with purpose, or shoot the ball with acceptable accuracy.

Yeah, yeah… you could always say that if you work hard enough then you could always improve.  I worked hard, but so did Robin and Rene, so we all improved at the same time.  Status quo:  I remained a distant third, maybe even farther than when we first started training.  It was demoralizing.  It was clear that I was not durable enough to be a long distance runner or quick enough to be a great sprinter, let alone a decent one.  So early in my life I realized that jogging, and running for that matter, was pointless.

But I loved basketball.

My problem was basketball involved a lot of running.  But just when I thought that it could get no worse, my loathing for running intensified when girls watching me play basketball began calling me sexy when I ran.  I didn't know why they would call me that but I considered it an affront to my masculinity.  So while I could not avoid running in a basketball game, I made sure that I generously littered it with tricks and antics that diverted attention away from my sexy way of running and into my silly bag of tricks and antics.

 I employed different versions of running.  I did it sideward, backward and forward with a bit of diagonal movements.  I realized also that girls looked at facial expressions when I ran so I made sure that I also had a wide repertoire of facials.  I smiled a lot.  But sometimes when you are losing, smiling gives the idea that you don’t care or are not competitive enough.  So I adapted the scowl, with crunched brows and glaring eyes to communicate that I was not happy with how the game was turning out.  When I did something awesome like make a kalawit rebound, or block a shot, or in the few occasions that I have dunked the ball, I wore the lower lip-jutting-out look combined with the mean stare to suggest that I was badass.  Of course, I did all those either running sideward, backward, and forward with a bit of diagonal movements.

In fairness to myself, I did try to make peace with jogging.  When I was already working and my only time to play my favorite game was during weekends when I had to hurry home to Lipa to catch the 4pm pickup basketball games at the plaza, there were many instances when I would arrive too late to get any action on the court, or if I did, not enough to shed off the stress of work and the extra lethargy that one gets from too much sitting in front of the computer, pretending to be doing something productive.

Now, when you find the energy to burn when just a few hours ago you were complaining about being too tired because of too much work, you had to find away to release that overflowing zest  one way or another.  Jogging was the most available option.

The oval of my youth was still the same oval for joggers -- paved, scenic and with that sweet pine-scented breeze that invited going around in circles.  But the jogging of my youth was also the jogging of my yuppies years – pointless.  Maybe because jogging sucks when you are dressed to play basketball; high cut shoes and basketball jersey did not respond well with the rigors of running around in circles.  It’s like you are dressed for a wedding inside an elegant church when the event was really to be held on a beach, in the middle of summer.  I felt that the only reason my foot kept on moving forward in front of the other was to keep my body from falling forward.  There was no joy involved, no peace, no rush, not even goat poop to hop over or spider threads to distract my attention.  And I can’t vary my running style either; no backward, sideward or any wayward movement that I normally spiced my locomotion with.   I couldn’t even smile, scowl or protrude my lower lip to project an imagined badass attitude.  I’ve been exposed too much to Makati ways that I knew that joggers would find me silly or, worse, call the police to pick up a crazy man smiling, scowling and protruding his lower lip while running sideward, backward and diagonal, knocking down joggers who knew nothing but moving forward in a straight line.  Jogging was pointless.  And if I kept at it some more, I’m sure it was going to be dangerous because I had to explain to the police why I did what I did, and they wouldn’t understand, and I would explain some more, this time with more passion and vigor, and next thing you know I will be in an asylum, strapped to a straightjacket yelling “All I wanted was to play basketball!”

When I try to pass away time while waiting for my MA classes, I often find myself perched on some bench or protruding tree root around the UP oval where, you guessed right, joggers abound.  I’m no expert at jogging as you may have surmised by now, but I do have an expert eye on what’s going on in a jogger’s mind simply by looking at their faces, or the way their body parts are moving.

There are joggers that you know are meant, even born to jog.  They, with the graceful strides, taut postures and coordinated movements look perfect doing what they do.  Heck, even the way their body would glisten with sweat, or the way they look at their G-shocks without breaking stride, or how their ponytailed hair (I’m talking about girl joggers) would bounce and swish here and there as the soles of their feet make delightful taps on the pavement; these would be exactly how it would be described in a jogging guidebook for dummies.

And then there are those who jog for an assortment of odd reasons: everyone’s doing it so I might as well do it, I need a way to relieve stress, it’s a nice way to disguise being a stalker, the doctor says I should be doing something, I bought a complete wardrobe of running wear and what would I do with them if I didn’t run, etc., etc., blah-blah-blah.

So how do you spot them?  Simple.  Look at them.  You can identify them from afar.  They put one foot forward over the other because if they did not, they would fall forward.  Their body movements are not coordinated; they’re knees either don’t bend enough or bend too much; their arms flair out or move in such a robotic way that would indicate that they are thinking too much of getting the right posture; they don’t look right.  Even how they sweat do not look right – they soak, not glisten with it.

When they are near, you could see it in their eyes; they would look as if they are about to pop out of their sockets. They are either looking down to see if their feet are still there because they are slowly losing sensation of their toes and their gastrocnemius are about to tighten on them.  Or their eyes would squint, an indication that they are only running because of pride (I can’t stop now, I would look stupid) or they are trying to be heroic  (Si Ninoy nga hindi tumigil bumaba ng hagdan, ako pa kaya titigil sa paghakbang?).  If you observe that their nostrils are flaring halfway the entire width of their face, you know they are simply forcing it; willing themselves to like something that their body was obviously revolting against.  They think that the more they keep at it, the more likely that they will actually like it.  Some succeed.

Oh, and there are the special type of runners: those that talk and chatter with themselves, cajoling themselves that they could do it.  Heck, they can even talk themselves into thinking that jogging was the best thing to happen since they discovered that they could talk.  Yeah, I know.  This is UP and people at UP talk to themselves all the time, regardless if they are walking, jogging, or with other people they know.  I even had a professor who talked with himself during class.

So there.  Jogging is pointless.  At times, dangerous.

Cheers! Happy New Year!

The eyes have it: Emergency Trauma Treatment for Child Victims of Yolanda

The calm came first.  It made the warnings of a most terrible phenomenon seem like an alarmist’s tale.  By battening down their homes and securing their belongings, Visayans have managed to survive storm after storm to look forward to a new day.

Then the rain fell, soft and rhythmic at first, like a drummer trying to stir a crowd into anticipation.  Then the wind came, with a hint of malice, like a shark circling a drowning prey.  Then the wind became blasts of malevolent screams, bringing rain that traveled with such velocity that they pierced the skin like nails.  Then the sea rose, higher than any human structure in the area, higher than any tree.  It came with such ferocity and impunity that it took away everything in its path.  There was no time to react.  It was instant chaos; earth was inundated, whatever was left underneath was rendered useless, and whatever life that floated above was left defenseless – at the mercy of a force that recognized no status in society.  Everyone is losing everything.  And life -- the one thing hanging in the balance – was fast shriveling into mere flesh and bones, its spirit violently being swept away.

That’s what I imagined happened to many people as typhoon Yolanda ravaged Visayas.

As I look at the faces of a group of young children brought over to Ortigas from the tent city in Roxas Boulevard for post-trauma intervention, I saw confusion layering a canvas of fear, numbness and distress.  Some merely stared blankly, moving as they are told, often not before a slight nudge of encouragement; others were smiling, but happiness never reached their glam eyes.  They are still in shock and now they are in some strange place, with strange people looking over at them, smiling and nodding, which I suppose intensified their bewilderment even more.

Then volunteers, led by our mostly German trainors, began to grab one child by the hand, linking one volunteer to a child to form a circle of singing unit that gently pranced around the room.  We stopped and another trainor led a eurythmic activity which involved gestures of acknowledgment of one another’s presence, and of connection and warmth.  Most of the children quickly got into the motion and smiles visited some of the faces; they can sense that they were with people who care.  Soon, the group linked hands once more and the circle began to move, still singing, to an adjacent room where balls of clay awaited to be molded.

We ushered them to their seats, but as soon as they saw the clay not too far away, half of the kids instantaneously grabbed their share as if that was the most logical thing to do.  This is indicative of the situation that they have left in their ravaged place.

When order was restored, the kids were still listless.  Nina, our art therapy trainor began giving out the instruction for the child closest to the clay blocks to pick up one and pass it to the next person beside him, which then will pass it to the next, who will also do the same until everyone, including all the volunteers had a clay in their hands – all these while a song about good mornings and smiling and sharing was being sung. Not every kid got the idea at once, but when they realized that there would be enough for everyone, they stopped collecting clay and started passing them around.

However, when Nina said that everyone must cut in half the clay block, a lot of the kids hesitated.  Nina did not pause and simply continued as she began to tell a story about an egg, kneading the clay into an ovate as she narrates.  The clay changed shape as the story unfolded, from an egg to a chick, to a bird that wants to spread its wings and fly.  At this point, Nina took her clay bird and started a conga line of kids and birds, and adult volunteers and birds.  The room was full of chirping sound and song about malinis na batis and masayang kapaligiran as the birds exchanged kisses in mid-air.  For the first time, every child was smiling, and this time their eyes shared in the mirth.

Nina then asked the child to find an adult partner and so the bird story continued.  Because the bird had found a partner, they were now ready to start a family, and this required making a nest out of clay.  The kids, having experienced what total destruction meant, made sure the clay twigs they made wove into a sturdy abode; strong enough to accommodate the small eggs that materialized out of their busy small hands, for then the bird story became a family lore.

It is interesting how the children’s individual stories and aspirations reflected in the nests that they built.  One child made his bird’s wings spread out so wide so that it covers in security the entire nest and the eggs within.  I wonder if that’s what his parents did when Yolanda struck.  I wonder if the parents survived.

Another placed a worm into a parent bird’s beak and made it appear as if it is feeding the chicks inside the nest.  I wonder if she is depicting the sacrifices of her parents, or the aspiration that their parents, in their present situation, can still do the same.

Another was not content with having a bird, a nest and some eggs that he had to add a towering tree.  I wonder if a tree was instrumental in saving their lives.

When the story was over, each child was asked to point to his/her masterpiece, to the applause of those in the room.  There was a hint of accomplishment in their demeanor.  But the smiles were not fixed.  Like the tormented sea, it rose, fell and sometimes disappeared.  But there were instances when happiness reached their eyes.  And during these brief moments, they have cleared in their mind the devastation that they have gone through.  But they won’t forget.  Not ever.  But they can recover.  And they can’t do that on their own.

The task now is to help their young minds process what they went through and guide them to a life of structure and stability, which Yolanda totally wiped out of their psyche.  On its own, the art therapy is not going to do it for them but it deeply helps them to be in touch with the beauty, innocence and potential inherent in every child.  It allows them to release the trauma that may hinder their development.

If the eyes that have seen destruction that many of us will never see in our lifetimes can flash, however fleeting, a twinkle of happiness, then all is not lost.

The seminar “Stimulating Self-Healing from Trauma in Children and Youth” was conducted by The Freunde, a group of mostly German child trauma specialists who have, over the years, visited disaster areas (man-made and natural) all over the world.  It was attended by members of NGOs, and groups and individuals with ongoing or planned intervention programs in Yolanda affected areas.

How to save the world

This is a swarm of bees.  It is composed of several thousand worker bees, a handful of drones and a queen.  When the weather becomes cooler toward the last quarter of the year, a bee colony, in its instinct to ensure its specie’s survival, will produce several queen cells.  When a queen bee is about to emerge from her cell, the old queen will exit the hive, bringing along with her half of the colony in search for a new home.  This is what is called a swarm, a buzzing cloud of insects that looks threatening but is actually quite docile.

Let me explain that. 

You see bees only become aggressive when they sense that their home is in danger.  Hence, you can actually sit beside a hive for hours in a non-threatening way (meaning you are relaxed), observe their comings and goings, and not get stung at all.  But since a swarm is still looking for a home, it has nothing to protect – meaning they are not prone to sting.  Of course, you don’t approach a swarm recklessly then take a swing at it just because they are at their tamest.  Do that to a stranger (a person this time) and it is logical to expect retaliation.

However, before the swarm can find a new home, it will usually gather first under a tree branch where it will stay for as short as an hour to as long as a day.  The length of its stopover depends on how quickly or slowly the scout bees (worker bees assigned to find a new home, usually a hole in the wall or a tree, or a box, or an abandoned house) can search for a relocation site.  When a scout bee had assessed that she (yes, a female) has found a suitable home, she will go back to the swarm, announce to everyone that they are ready to move, then guide the swarm – worker bees, drones and queen – to their new abode.  But until that happens, the beekeeper can capture the swarm and then place it inside a new box that is prepared with a few frames taken from the box where the particular swarm came from.

But I don’t think getting a swarm would make it to anyone’s wish list this Christmas, after all, you can’t wear it, play games on it, use it to call friends, or start a fun conversation with it unless you consider stings, swelling and throbbing pain as topics you’d like to swap stories with friends.  That would be so uncool.

I have been receiving these gifts since early October.  By the time the swarming season ends in around February next year, I would have increased my number of colonies to around 30.  Cool, right?

Well, when you romanticize about the uniqueness of this pursuit and that one can actually earn a little on the side while you’re at it, then yes, I guess it is cool.

But being a beekeeper is not cool, especially when I am in my bee suit, sweating like a boxer who overshot the weight limit by two pounds and trying to go under the limit in an hour’s time, or when I am inspecting a hive unprotected and some bees decide that my presence is not welcome and begin giving up their lives (bees die soon after stinging) to shoo me away (I have experienced getting stung 20 to 30 in one go on several occasions), or when I find myself some fifteen feet up a tree trying to capture a swarm, which sometimes makes me question the sanity of what I am doing, or the safety of it.  After all, at 6’1” and 180 pounds, I am a fairly large and heavy man by any tree branch standard.

So why do I do it?

First, it was fascination.  Then I realized it could be a hobby that can also be an alternative source of income.  Now, it is all those, plus it has grown into some sort of advocacy – one that is bigger than what I do.  Now more than ever, call me a suffering idealist, I believe that what I do will help save the world, a mission that is nice to hear but difficult to substantiate with action because it usually means either having to give up something or doing something that may be inconvenient, bothersome, or uncool.

According to scientists, bees are central to the survival of humans because it comes in contact with two-thirds of the food that we and land animals eat, or the foods that animals that we eat, eat.   They say that should bees go because of a combination of global warming, heavy use of insecticides and decimation of land dedicated to planting, so will humans, not long after.

So are bees really important?  I don’t know.  Maybe.  Scientists are positive that they are.  But then again, scientists do say a lot.

They say that global warming is now in play and that its effects – drier dry seasons characterized by extreme heat spells and wetter wet seasons with stronger typhoons and storms unlike any experienced before – will be catastrophic, and that the Philippines will be one of the most at risk of these global climatic upheavals.

Maybe they are onto something.

Yolanda happens and its devastation is unparalleled in Philippine history that is already long in cataclysmic weather and geological spasms, from earthquakes to volcanic eruptions to torrential monsoons and destructive typhoons. 

They say Yolanda sets the record for raw power.  What’s more terrifying is that records, just like political promises, are meant to be broken; it’s just a matter of when, how frequent, and at what cost.

We, those that are not directly or as severely affected by Yolanda, especially those of us here in Luzon, are lucky, extremely lucky.  Luck involves probability.  And we may soon run out of luck.

In 2012, also nearing Christmas, typhoon Pablo literally leveled a large swath of Mindanao, leaving thousands dead in its wake.  And this year, Yolanda violently drops by on a slightly higher trajectory – leveling Visayas.  Next year, it is probable that a new monster will form and it will be out to get us this time.

So while the nation, with the help of the global community, is desperately trying to resuscitate Visayas, with donations and rebuilding strategies, it is also imperative that Yolanda should not be treated as an isolated case – a fluke of nature.  It is not.  We, you and I, had a hand in its making.  And the probability is high that it is going to happen again, unless we desperately act as if our lives and everything that we deem important depended on it.

It is time to do the uncool things.  Now that you have read this far, I ask you – for all our sake – to do something uncool: sweat it by walking or biking instead of riding your own car, eschew gadgets and devices that consume disproportionately large amounts of energy, avoid foods that take a lot of resources to produce such as animal meats, plant a tree, or even a flowering plant in a pot, give to World Wide Fund, dispose garbage properly, call out someone who unmindfully litter, recycle, share what you don’t need, spread the word, tell your kids, encourage the youth to be mindful of what they do.  Whatever it is, do something. Anything. Doing nothing is not an option.  I hope you realize that Yolanda has made that very clear.

I’ll be doing all of the above, including climbing trees to catch swarms.

Everyday Nanay, Everyday

The last time I saw my Nanay alive she was about to die.  I knew it the moment I saw her slumped on her favorite chair, her eyes wide open, glassy and blank.  I tried talking to her, encouraging her to communicate.  All I heard were moans, perhaps she was saying something.  Then tears fell from her eyes.  She was saying goodbye.

I know she’s gone but I can’t seem to do the same.

Ok, Tnx.  That was the last conscious communication I got from Nanay as a response to a text query whether she wanted photo albums to go with the pictures of her Europe Marian Pilgrimage, which she asked to be printed at the mall.  She said that her adventures would be better told if she had the pictures to guide her where she went, who she was with, and what she did. 

She arrived a little over a week before that fateful day.  She was extremely exhausted from the non-stop walking and moving from one pilgrimage site to another, and desperately missing rice, which she had only twice in the entire three weeks or so that she was away.  But she was very happy and serene, as if she knew something we did not.

I don’t recall much about how I brought her to the hospital.  I don’t know if I was driving fast or reckless, all I knew was that I was frantic, hoping against hope that my effort will result into the opposite of what I knew was the start of a chapter in my life that I had no interest having.

I spoke the word Nanay countless times, each instance with the earnestness of a young child searching for the one person in the crowd that would make everything alright – with merely her presence.   She was there, barely.

It was fast.  And it was slow, so slow that I still see everything happening now as I write because everything started around this time, with this same cold in the air, with this same silence.  All that is missing is the shriek from Nanay’s angel – Lyn – who pierced the unbecoming calm, “Kuya, si Nanay!”

It’s been a year.  Many things have changed, many things have happened – none is ever the same, yet everything is the same, everything happened without Nanay around.

I know she is gone for good.  But I’m not saying goodbye.  She is always with me, and not a day that passes by that I don’t expect to see her, by the garden, inside the house, anywhere – just to see her.

So if by chance one day we meet and she asks me if ever I thought of her, I’d say Everyday Nanay, everyday.

Here are posts about my Nanay which you may have missed:

My Nanay is not important

Accidentally Jessica

My Nanay loves to play with fire

My memories are being uprooted

A date with my Nanay at Graceland

Classroom detour and biking soundtrack

After what seemed like forever, I finally booked 3 hours or so for myself and my bike.  In over a month, the only time I spent on my saddle was a few trips to town for some errands, which do not count as legit rides (Unless paying bills or buying small stuff from the hardware are considered adventures).

My Fuji had been a picture of neglect.  Nightly, I could almost hear it implore me “Ride me, please! I’m useless without you.”  With so many things to do and so many concerns to think about, I couldn’t do anything but deaden my heart and be strong.  I silently ignored it.  But from time to time, I can’t help but peek at its black body, its sheen already masked by the dirt it had attracted from its last adventure, and the thin veil of dust that has settled over it during the course of its stagnation.  In my mind, I reassure it:  Our time would come.

Finally, yesterday I found the courage to tell my wife, “Mahal, may gagawin ako bukas.”  And from the glint in my eyes, she knew what I meant.

I woke up with a to-do checklist so I could feel that I have done enough to deserve my date with my bike: prepare breakfast, go to the palengke, cook lunch, check on the bees.  After I have ticked off everything, I took out my Fuji and brushed the dirt and grime away with the help of Joy dishwashing liquid before hosing it down with water and drying it with chamois.  I let it sit awhile before giving all the moving parts a good dose of WD40.  We were ready.  I had already added 29 songs to my music list the night before so the soundtrack was simply waiting to be played as my ride unfolded.

I was off.  And the effect of clean and lubricated chain was apparent instantly as I pedaled with ease, or maybe I was just too giddy with excitement that my movement felt effortless.  Or maybe it was Ely Buendia’s almost lackadaisical singing style that mesmerized me into a flow.

I have planned my route – a 34 kilometer welcome-back-loop of uphills and downhills (what do you expect, it seems there’s no kilometer of road in Lipa that is flat and uneventful).  I was about to turn right to where the road leads to the mountains of Malarayat when Melissa Etheridge stopped yelling at me to come to her window to give way to a text message that says: Sir, nasa LaSalle ka ba?  Baka sakali lang naman.  Wala kasi si ____, kulang ng magpa-panel.

Shoot.  I haven’t been assigned to teach even a single unit the past 5 semesters, but every near-end of the semester, I already half-expect that my teacher/friends would call on me for panel duty, which I enjoy by the way because I get to ask and share at the same time.  But come on.  On my version of the selfie?

I pointed my bike to the opposite direction.  True Faith’s Medwin Marfil was crooning one of my most favorite OPM moving on songs:  Park is empty, beer’s already warm, shoppers have all gone home.  Duty calls.  And I’m not even a faculty member.

I had a vision of gliding downhill at a 35-42 kph clip when I reach the backroads of Santo Tomas with Blues Traveller asking me “Why you wanna give me the runaround?  Is it your sure fire way to speed things up, when all it does is slooo-ooo-oow me down.

And in this vision, General Public will be mocking me – Never you done that, yeeahh-ehhh-ohhhh – as I pedal like crazy as I try to use the momentum created by a very steep drop, where I frantically calculated in my head my freefall speed and the balance that I need to keep my front wheel from skidding into a pothole just before the concrete road gives way to a steel bridge over a densely vegetated stream below.  Every time I negotiate this part of Plaridel, it always comes with a Hail Mary, that I may carry enough momentum (after making it safely across the pothole and the steel bridge) to give me the needed pace to climb the cruel uphill aftermath, and that I would not be caught behind a struggling motor vehicle which would almost certainly force me to dismount because by then, I had lost momentum and I would be biking on wobbly wheels if I tried to stand on my pedals and power through the climb.  If the latter scenario happens, I would also utter a few choice inanities because the vehicle would also have spewed exhaust all over my face.

None of that happened.  Instead I found myself biking the ramps going to the third floor of the Noli building where my duty awaits.  Normally, I would leave my bike at the wall climbing facility that I operate.  But since I had no plans of dropping by, I did not bring the key to the gate.  I can’t leave my bike on the corridor, so I opened the door and entered the classroom together with my steed.  The students presenting were surprised.  It was their first time to see a mountain bike parked inside a classroom.

I always thought that I can go back to the classroom by earning my “credential” through graduate school.  I never realized that I could also do it while biking.  K.D. Lang sings Hallelujah!

Science, according to the Filipino

When I was young, I used to spend my summer vacations in Pangasinan, my mother’s birthplace, where I learned that the first rain of May, when caught and poured half full in a clear glass bottle (Tanduay lapad the preferred receptacle) will tell whether it would rain or not during the day, for the rest of the year, depending on the moisture that accumulates inside the bottle; that blowing air on the sides of a fish before frying it on steaming oil will prevent the hot oil from spraying searing liquid all over the pan and on someone’s skin, and; that the sap of a small plant when dropped on flesh splintered by tiny wood chips would magically force the wood out of the painful puncture.

These are only some of the amazing and highly effective local knowledge that I learned and experienced but have never read in any science book, nor encountered in any classroom or scientific discourse.  Western science, which is what is promoted in school, will be quick to dismiss such practices as outdated, or worse, a backward exercise that should have no place in a modern, science-based world.

That traditional practices are not found in any science book nor are explained by lab-based experiments does not mean that they are unscientific and, thus, worthless as western science would like us to believe; they are simply the Filipino’s common sense-based approach to everyday problems culled from keen observation leading to creative solutions.   Stopping short of romanticizing practice of local knowledge, Filipinos, especially those who are exposed more and more everyday to western technology and, consequently, way of life and thinking, should be wary about relegating traditional knowhow into the backburner, archiving them as if they no longer have use in the modern world.

In Paul Pertierra’s essay Is there a Culture of Science in the Philippines, he describes science as “an ultimate cultural value and its practice as an example of the pursuit of cognitive excellence (Pertierra, 2003).” Given the fact that a sizeable number Filipinos, especially those residing in the countryside and outside of urban locales where the seats of education and, therefore, science are, still practice and apply local knowledge in many of their daily activities from cooking food, to healing the body and even raising children, does it mean then that Filipinos who feel comfort and a measure of the familiar in such practices do not care about pursuing cognitive excellence?  This is rather an unfair indictment on a people’s practice that has worked for generations, centuries even, and an affront to the intelligence of the elders from long ago that labored tirelessly, perhaps over a period of several years, to understand how the world works and how to control it, which uncannily reflects how Pertierra characterizes what culture of science is all about – a culture of science consists of principles and practices whose aims are to explore the natural world in order to bring it under human control.

While I understand that modern science brings empirical evidences of its potency and can and will play a relevant role in the improvement of many Filipino’s lives, can’t there be a happy compromise where science benefits the people without victimizing, marginalizing and rendering cultures and traditions inutile?  This all or nothing stance by some scientists devalues the richness of our nation’s culture.

Pertierra’s essay further questions the seeming lack of traction of Filipinos toward modern science, and a culture of science in general, which underscores some scientists’ seeming disregard and lack of appreciation for cultural and traditional values:  “Why is this competence given little social or cultural value? Is this because scientific knowledge depends on objective and impersonal criteria rather than on the personalized networks Filipinos normally use for success? Is the lack of a scientific orientation partly cultural?”

Curiously, the fact that these questions were posed is a clear indication that scientists have a firm grasp of the Filipino’s psyche which they, in their determined pursuit to homogenize local science with the rest of the western world, are trying to demystify and, to a great extent, demolish to the point of negligibility. This attitude is not only rampant in academic circles but can also be observed even in mainstream media where big businesses backed by western science continue its battle to suppress local knowledge.  Over the last few years, traditional medicines including an assortment of polstices and concoctions have been finding currency and a measure of success in the mainstream.  An example is the Lagundi leaves via the ASCOF Lagundi product, which is claimed to be highly effective in treating coughs and colds and, apparently, in also making headways into the bottomlines of multinationals offering western medicines.  Solmux, a western formula, with the help of local superstar-of-the-masses endorser Vic Sotto exhorts the potency of its formula, with Sotto retorting “Kaya ba yan ng padahon-dahon lang?” referring to the simplicity (read: unsophisticated) of formulation of the lagundi product.

On a more positive note, certain quarters in the scientific community are looking toward traditional medicines in their quest to find remedies for difficult to cure diseases.  In fact, some are looking into the traditional medicinal practices of tribes living deep in the Amazon jungles of Brazil who, apart from the occasional forays of scientists and anthropologists into their realm, have had basically no contact with the western world.  These scientists believe that the most effective medicines for many of today’s lifestyle diseases, including cancer and even AIDS can be found in the jungles, and some of these are already being used by indigenous, supposedly unlearned and unscientific, peoples.  Closer to home, local doctors and scientists from UP-PGH are conducting experiments on traditional medicines like the Tawa-tawa and even Papaya leaves as treatment for dengue, a deadly virus.

It’s true that science only deals with facts – cold and unemotional facts that are the currency of intellectual and scientific pursuits.  However, scientists need not be cold and unemotional like the variables that they regularly deal with.  They must also be culturally-sensitive and open-minded to the truth that not all that is effective and beneficial is proven in a western-style laboratory, and that there is much more to science and living in particular than the hows and whys.  There must be a healthy margin for acceptance regardless of the questions asked.  It is about being human, and acknowledging that some things need no explanations.

When my father was in the hospital for Stage 4 cancer that has metastasized to various areas of his chest, causing him intense, excruciating pain, my immediate recourse was to do something that I have learned from my childhood to be effective in easing pain and bringing comfort to the soul – the puyok larak in Pangasinanse, or pahid ng langis ng niyog to the Tagalogs.  So while I was massaging my father’s body with larak, my father’s physician, a Filipino-Chinese lady doctor whose idea of pain-relief was injecting morphine, came in, saw what I was doing and smelled the burnt aroma of the coconut oil, which prompted her to stoically admonish me: Wala naman magagawa yang langis na ‘yan, eh.

She doesn’t know.  Western science has made her forget.

This is part of a series of essays for my Educational Anthropology class under Dr. Eufracio Abaya.