Family memory as fine history

By Alfred Yuson

If there’s one book that has impressed me overmuch with its conceptualization and execution, read ambition and fine writing, it’s Revolutionary Routes: Five Stories of Incarceration, Exile, Murder and Betrayal in Tayabas Province, 1891-1980 by Angela Stuart-Santiago.

The exemplary work is based on the memoirs in Spanish of Concepcion Herrera Vda. De Umali, as translated into English by Concepcion Umali Stuart.

That it’s a history book should not intimidate our usual readers, for there are lessons to be learned here: basically how an author can transmute extant material that may have only been originally of interest to family, clan, tribe or province into a nation’s pure gold.

I’d be very disappointed if it doesn’t grab a book award next year for its category, or even when ranged against all other titles produced this past year.

The foreword alone by the eminent Reynaldo C. Ileto attests to its importance:

“Revolutionary Routes is more than a family history across three generations. Author Angela Stuart Santiago has deftly woven together the memoirs, clippings, correspondence and other traces of her family’s past into a micro-history that spans the late 19th century up to the 1950s. While this book is rooted in the specific experiences of a family that lived in Tiaong and its adjoining towns in southwestern Tayabas (now Quezon) province, it also tells us much, from the ground up, about everyday life in the countryside under the shadow of successive imperial and national regimes. This book can also be read as a modern history of the Philippines.”

Indeed, deft has been the handling of material that turns precious only through projection and extension into what it may also or all mean, like poetry. And no, it isn’t simply interpretation or “deconstruction” at work here, but a loving, inspired, and often brilliant retelling that gathers both kinds of force — centripetal and centrifugal — to whip up the fervor of candor, imagination, personal mythos, narrative construct — yes, that very telling tapestry of all things cerebrated and celebrated — often accompanied by a Cheshire cat’s grin.

Fast takes:

“Señor (Rafael) Palma continued to relay to Conchita’s maestras the course that the revolution was taking, such as the attacks and advances in some provinces, towns, and the outskirts of the capital. By then the action was in Cavite where Emilio Aguinaldo was proving to be a knight in shining armor. And Jose Rizal was back in Fort Santiago, accused of treason and complicity in the evolution.”

Follow an excerpt from a young Palma’s recollection, then the author’s interspersed dialogue with this voice, as it does with other voices, such as that of the child Conchita:

“We did not hear the shots but we did wake up when we heard drums and shouting. We ran to the windows and saw a town crier flanked by two soldiers. He was striking a drum hanging from his neck, announcing at the top of his voice: ‘Ngayong umaga babarilin si Dr. Jose Rizal!’ (Dr. Jose Rizal will be executed this morning!) This was repeated every 10 minutes all over the streets of Tondo, probably in all the streets of Manila.”

Forward to the Spanish-American-Filipino contretemps of triangulation, with the home turf of Tayabas as scene, and the author providing a compressed picture show:

“Life was organized so that anytime the war’s wounded, sick, and hungry walked in, there would be food and medical treatment available. Every night, six men came to pound two sacks of palay and six women to air and clean the one cavan of rice produced for consumption the next day. Adjacent to the corral where the carabaos rested at night was another enclosure where farmers stacked the hay and grass for feed and also where the cooks broiled meats. Sometimes, as many as two hundred barbecue sticks with five pieces of meat on each stick would be cooking at one time.”

Conchita is made to “weigh in”:

“Several times we gave refuge and food to our soldiers who with courage and fervor sustained the war against the Americans bent on forcibly taking over the Republic. The Battalion Banahaw had its quarters here, and a company led by Captain Norberto Mayo of Lipa, and two other battalions.”

Why, this is fascinating storytelling, with many voices, of past and present, immersed in conversation, and the reader simply eavesdropping in sustained delight. And what we’ve quoted is only from the third chapter, on “Isidro, the Revolutionary,” which follows “Family Secrets” and “Paula, the Peasant.” Characters are introduced and allowed entry, if peripherally for some, into the dialogue.

The rest of the chapters are titled “Tomas, the Lawyer”; “Crisostomo, the Guerilla”; “Narciso, the Congressman”; and “Family & Country.” Thus do the five stories of incarceration, exile, murder, and betrayal (and then some: the back stories involving romance, gossip, farming rice and coconut, generational torch-passing, etc.) unfold and provoke an ear to be better pressed against memory’s “dear filial roar” of nation-building.

This is how history ought to be shared, or okay, dispensed or taught, in schools and hearths and homes. Not just by applying the now over-trendy “out of the box” mode, but by throwing out the box altogether. And allowing all of the gift items that come prancing through the family door equal, individual entry. And have them dance together in the moveable feast of a ballroom, enclosed or rustic, that spells clan party.

These convergent narratives aren’t just an airing of skeletons in aparadors and tocadors, but an orchestrated jangling of memory as of those nights of street caroling, from house to house, provincial boundaries go hang (as a mobile that could fascinate and bode well for the occupant of a rocking baby’s crib.) And we are all taught how a nation we’ve become, or are becoming, in more ways than one.

The book is published independently, that is, by StuartSantiago Publishing, Mandaluyong City and Pulang Lupa Foundation, Brgy. Lumingon, Tiaong, Quezon. And for the most part, made available through direct purchase. Check out www.revolutionaryroutesbook.com. You’d do well to curl up with this book through cloudy Christmas.

Author, author! Bravo, Angela Stuart-Santiago!

Reflections on Christmas

By Elmer Ordonez

THE season readily evokes thoughts of family, of being together, sharing food on the table, and most important of all love for each other expressed with gifts, hugs and other ways. Yuletide is indeed meant for the family. Hence, the President declares a truce from fighting (though called a “sham” by the NDF) to enable both soldier and rebel to be with family. During the First World War, guns were silenced on Christmas Eve, and in some instances soldiers sang carols answered by those in the opposite trench with their own versions, or they would meet across no man’s land, greet each other and share drink or food. British and German soldiers even played a game of football during the lull in fighting. Would that our brothers on both sides, if the powers that be will it, reach the stage of a permanent ceasefire and peace agreement.

During Yuletide, thoughts turn to family or loved ones. It was thus on Christmas 1943 that we wondered about Father who had not been heard from since he was arrested by the Kempeitai early that year. To escape capture ourselves, the rest of the family hid in Sisa, Sampaloc, in the home of my mother’s sister —anxiously waiting for any news about Father and an older brother with the guerrillas in Laguna. On Christmas Eve, with a simple noche buena, Aunt Pilar mused that she missed “peacetime” celebrations but somehow she felt it, the spirit of Christmas, under enemy occupation in 1943. We prayed for the missing ones and the safety of both families, ours and Aunt Pilar’s family who sheltered us.

In early 1944 we learned somehow that Father was in Muntinlupa, sentenced to 20 years imprisonment by a Japanese military court for “terrorism.” From a dungeon in Fort Santiago where he spent Christmas 1943, he was moved (before Muntinlupa) to Bilibid in Manila where he shared cells with General Vicente Lim, Fr. (later Cardinal) Rufino Santos, and Raul Manglapus who were also involved in underground activity. My brother in Laguna survived and continued soldiering until he was killed in battle in 1953. He was 29. Father was liberated by ROTC guerrillas in February 1945, mustered in the army as major (retaining is guerrilla rank), and after his discharge, he resumed teaching till he passed away in 1963.

This Christmas, with my own family (complete with the arrival of the youngest son from Montreal), we pray for a painless and serene passage of our beloved who has accepted her fate. Brought up as a theosophist by her father, she has remained firm in her Buddhist beliefs.

***

Christmas is for remembering, of stock-taking before the onset of the New Year, and for looking into the future.

Sunday last began the series of reunions of the expanded family (including many balikbayans), this time marking birthdays of three members of the immediate family. After the potluck lunch, photos and albums were passed around for remembering things past. A photo taken in 1969 showing six pretty sisters in their early prime and hair done as of the period, was retaken with all six, now with grey/white hair, still good-looking after 42 years, posing again for posterity. Courtships and weddings were recalled, with much hilarity and laughter.

At this time, I have realized how much I have to put in order. The children, seeing my chaotic library room, decided they would hire a librarian to classify the books. Thus I am reassured that my literary holdings would not be sold by lot to some heritage or antiquarian bookshop. My wife’s formidable library of art books (separately kept in shelves in the large bedroom) and her visual arts collection are not to leave the house under any circumstances. What to do with things I have accumulated over the years is another matter. I also need to move stuff to the UP library archives.

Early on, my wife and I had thought of leaving a last will and testament, and recently, instructions on what to do on the last day.

This Monday morning, my wife walked by herself to the porch outside the bedroom, and sat on an armchair sunning herself. I joined her bringing with me The Norton Anthology of Poetry. She turned the pages to her two favorites, Emily Dickinson and Christina Rossetti. She was pensive after rereading their poems, and then commented, smiling, that the poets were obsessed with departure. She knew by heart some of the poems.

Fictionist Greg Brillantes, speaking at the wake years ago of Raven SV Epistola, said in effect that the usual way of expressing departure was to ride into the sunset whereas a religious that he knew said, actually it was riding into the sunrise.

From Elenita and myself, seasons greetings and best wishes to all.

sendong & the president

finally read the looong statement of the president in tagalog, then too the english version, and i’ve been sitting here since, trying to figure out why it doesn’t work for me, why it’s too much and too little at the same time.  i suppose because not all the carefully worded promises and reminders, not the most efficient task force looking into the why’s and who’s and how’s, will better equip us (not soon enough, anyway) in this age of climate change to prevent a sendong or an ondoy from again and again wreaking wanton disaster and death anywhere on these our widely populated but environmentally degraded and deforested islands.

“hearing” the president wondering why illegal logging hasn’t stopped despite his order, why people won’t evacuate despite warnings, why people even build and live in risky areas, why rescuers have to risk their own lives to save people who refused to heed warnings — these do not inspire confidence that the president despite his super-powers is anywhere near to coming up with ways of mitigating the devastating effects of future sendongs.

the 70 percent who approve of his presidency are quick to make excuses for him, of course.  it’s a humongous problem, the roots of which go back to previous presidencies and policies before his time.  he cannot be blamed for the sorry state of the environment, much less of the messed up values that govern our lives.  and, yeah, he should not be criticized for christmas-partying with the psg that provides security for him and his sisters.

and totoo naman, okay lang mag-party ang presidente nuong sunday, if only on saturday, the moment he was informed of the magnitude of the disaster, he had come out on nationwide tv with a simple presidential message, of grief and mourning, assuring us of his concern and exhorting us all to work with government in addressing the needs of the victims.  as it turned out, we didn’t need exhorting to help out, but we did need to see, to know, that our president was with us.

And Just Like That…

By Joel Santiago

I practically exhorted my Mom into writing in fairness to the president. “This is a show of force, a fierce display of political will,” I said. This is how he’ll get things done in Philippines politics — with change happening so fast it’ll make the trapos’ heads spin. And isn’t this how you’d want it? The only possible way it can happen? The only way to dig out of our entrenchment in the status quo? (Yeah, I was on something of a roll.)

And just like that — the party, the defensive sisters, deleted tweets — he shows you why he doesn’t deserve the benefit of the doubt. That, on top of flatfooted government response so sorely in need of leadership and, you know, something that gives the impression of actual conviction — never mind love for countryman.

Sure, partying with the “troops” is just good management. And inviting their families a nice touch. But these guys would have been the first to understand if he couldn’t make it. And if they didn’t, it was his job to make these civil servants understand. That’s just better management.

A large part of my defense of his show of force was that the nay-sayers were mistaken and unfair, short-sighted and clouded by political bias. But there’s no denying the impression this gives, of an uncaring, unfocused president-who-can’t-prioritize, especially to the victims for whom this is no mere impression, but something — someone — they have to live with.