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Souling


There is this song that plays in my mind  every Undas. It was taught when we were third graders. It was timely;that year, I with a friend sang it on an uncle's wake. That was the time I saw a family mourning. My mom's shoulder shook real hard sobbing. It was also that time  I observed ub-ubbo evident with the villagers contributing material or non-material. I met relatives I had not seen before. An uncle said, "Han kuma nga kastoy nga panagladingit santu tayo agkikita  nu di ket nu ragragsak met (It should not be these hard times we see each other but on happy days, too)." Filipinos are indeed an embodiment  of what does being close-knit mean.

On the night of every Halloween, we visit graves of friends now unseen... The following lines got blur to my memory so I substituted singing to humming.

Catholic Online makes clear that Halloween is a secular holiday on the night before November 1. It adds that All Saints' Day fall on November 1 and is a holy day of obligation while All Souls' Day on November 2 and is not a holy day of obligation. The song that I have been attuned to was wrong all along?

A priest friend said not to engage with Halloween because it is pagan. For my kid, I want her to be a kid.

So have you gone home to your province yet to repaint your departed loved ones' resting place?

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World Teacher's Day

   For today’s sake of celebrating teachers, let me get down my memory lane circa 1994.  Ms. Florida Dao-ines was my grade 1 teacher in the then Kayan Community School. I thanked that I was bit of a reader so I was spared from her famed stick. Of course, my hearing wasn’t excused of her voice harping on the day’s if not yesterday’s lesson. Oh, I could see her small figure with her short curly hairdo passing by my grandparents’ place because she used to visit her brother on the next house. Ms. Dao-ines taught us room maintenance the organic way— scrub off graffiti on wooden desks with sandpaper tree leaves, sweep off dirt, whip the floor with banana leaves and finish it off with coconut husk. On my second year with my grandparents going as second grader, I had Teacher Jeaneth Juan. She was my first troop leader in GSP and Agadangan became a vivid memory of the Scout Movement. Enamored with her not-so-strict classroom bearing, my classmates and I were saddened when on...
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WOMAN-ified ME

I was born a woman but ended up acting the opposite. Clumsiness and its cousins in the thesaurus is what I am. Finesse goes unsaid and unheard in my world. I preferred oversized tees over fitting blouses. I refused figure-flaterring dresses for loose pants. I would choose a paintless face even being merged with a bin of all-made-up pretties. But I knew I am a woman inside. So are the secret feelings that have silently died. It was only me who knows everything of what-really-is. It was hard shifting to finer moves. Oh graceful me in sweat! I hate being with someone who I cannot see myself. Because to me, gaudiness is parallel to fun. Not long after, I’ve been to stores of pallets. So the smudged me emerged. Little by little, I’ve added garments I thought I can never wear. These changes of seeing ourselves that can improve us.   
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Another Day Lived

Thursday morning. I woke up with a mental list of to-do’s. $*|?**$ visit to deliver IV fluids. Get back to do the laundry. With my second to the last PUJ jibe, the open doors of the church invited me in so the last two hours were spent hearing the mass. At the middle of the Eucharistic celebration, the heavy downpour added darkness to the dusk creeping in. Having waited for ten minutes more, I decided to wade waters to get to the last jitney back to the doctor’s quarter. (So this is Manila and its famous flood.) My feet getting cold with the pooling of rainwater inside my shoes reminded me of laundry powder so I dropped by in a mart for some. Finally with the nighttime shower done, I hanged the last piece of the three-day soiled uniforms for air drying by the washroom. After hungry tummy pacified… Oh zzz’s, come to thee… 
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