Father's Day

I know it’s Father’s Day today because Auntie Morena had called me up yesterday to ask if the church could use my electric vehicle’s battery as power source for the congregation’s sound system. Some parts of Marbel will experience a scheduled brownout this Sunday. I got the call as I was buying breakfast at Cafe Leticia at the General Santos City International Airport, while waiting for Auntie Netnet to pick me up on a fine, earthquake-free morning.
 

This day inevitably turns my recollection to my own father. Tatay passed away eight years ago. He remains alive in our memories. My faith tells me he is alive with the saints and angels, singing and laughing and worshiping the God he had lived for. We talk about him still. I encounter random people who have fond memories of him. He could be serious and silly, irritating but charming, and, despite his imperfections, he enjoyed being a father. He enjoyed our company, and we enjoyed his.
 

Because he had been around our lives so much, it is impossible to detach himself from our childhood and adulthood memories—and why should we do that? Tatay lived to see Manong, Sean and me graduate and become full grown adults. He would say, "You're getting taller than me!" He was deeply proud of us. He talked about us with his friends, who knew the landmarks in our careers and personal lives.

A deep regret I have is that I wasn’t able to lavish him with gifts and travels—things he would have loved. I was barely starting my career, was still in subspecialty training, and didn’t have much extra money. But he couldn't care less: what mattered to him was that we were around, safe and well.  

 

My brothers and I acknowledge that Tatay was the more fun parent. I remember dining with him in a Vietnamese restaurant where he ordered items in the menu he couldn’t pronounce. Nanay, on the other hand, is a kill joy; she knows that, especially when we make her try new food or experiences, which she refuses. She would say, “If your Tatay were alive, he would love this.” This—pertaining to food, trips, family occasions, and every day surprises and novelties that God lavishes upon our imperfect but blessed lives on earth. We live with a subterranean acceptance that we have lost him on this earthly coil but with the expectation that we will meet again soon.

It was hard to make me cry before 2018. But something moved the switch in my lacrimal glands after my experience with loss. For instance, an episode of Everwood, an American drama series in Netflix, can easily bring tears to my eyes these days. In that series, a world-famous neurosurgeon from New York leaves the city after his wife dies from a car crash, and brings his son and daughter to start a new life in Everwood, Colorado. I turn Everwood if I need a good cry. When I rewatch Kramer versus Kramer, the last film I saw with my father, I turn into a puddle.

But Father’s day inevitably turns my eyes to the ultimate father—God Himself. Tatay was but an imperfect version. God is infinitely good, merciful, and loving, and He dwells in and among us. I'm grateful for those precious years with my father.  

I need to stop writing because Paul is waiting for me to walk him around the neighborhood. Tatay would have loved Paul, as he once loved his dogs Jill and Rocky and Eve and Rocky II. He would have enjoyed being with us. But he is in a far more happier place with the Lord Jesus Christ. 

I can imagine him saying to us, as in the moments when he had wanted us to try something new, “Dali na kamo diri.”  

 If you're a father and if you have a father, Happy Father's Day! 

Putting my scanner to good use

The technicians told me my printer-scanner-copier is broken and is beyond repair. I tried printing some pages: an error 44 appeared on the screen. I had ordered another printer — an HP Laserjet, this time —and I was certain I was going to throw the three-in-one Brother device away when, of course, it proved itself somehow useful, still, It can copy and scan— both wirelessly and with an actual physical wire connected.

This led me to a resolution l am almost sure l will break sooner or later: I will put the scanner to good use.

I remembered the work of Jason Polan who died in 2020. I followed his blog, “Every Person In New York," where he posted drawings of people he met in the city. He aimed to draw every single person in New York — a quixotic quest that was also heartwarming. On the side bar of his unpretentious Blogspot is a note: "When the project is completed, we will all have a get together.”

I dreamt of using a scanner when I could not afford it yet. Part of that desire was to create something like Jason Polan’s website. But my scanner has largely been unused: instead of using the flatbed screen, I would simply take a picture with my phone and convert the file to a PDF.

Jason did not live to see his dream come true. Six years later, I am still reading his website, his small blog, written during the days when the World Wide Web was a much happier place.

Magnitude 7.8

I overheard over DZBB the news about the earthquake in GenSan. I was personal assistant to my mother, who periodically goes to Manila for medical reasons. I dismissed the news as just another earthquake. Intensity fives are common occurrences in Mindanao; they happen so frequently and quickly that people carry on with daily life indoors, the moving ground treated as a brief digression. When the ground movement stops, we’d say, “Kusog ang linog.” The comment on its strength may occasionally be replaced with a note about its duration. But this earthquake, which family and friends described as the worst in their lifetime, would be different.

When our Uber brought us back to the hotel, the family chat group was full of unread messages, mostly inquiries about everyone’s well being. Uncle Boboy’s fish were dizzy. Auntie Net’s bookshelves were toppled over. Auntie Bebet and Bicbic, who worked in Maasim, were looking for higher ground; a tsunami threat had been issued in Maasim, where they were based. Auntie Cecil called me to ask if I had news about Auntie Nene, my mother’s cousin staying in our house while we were away. She wasn’t picking her phone, Auntie Cecil said. She was worried that Auntie Nene could have tripped and fallen. I shared that minutes before, Neneng, who was also staying at home to accompany Auntie Nene at night, shared that some pots in the porch were broken, that one bookshelf fell, but that they were okay. And what about Paul? Our dog was so shaken he wouldn’t want to go for a walk. The thread of messages brought out a proverbial silver lining: at least, everyone in our immediate and extended family was safe.

One of my patients was scheduled to have her surgery that morning in GenSan. My patient was sent home, her surgery deferred. At least the earthquake happened before my patient was cut open. I learned that patients were evacuated out of the building. Tents were put up. The parking lot became temporary hospital wards. 

My Viber was awash with similar messages from hospital- and professional affiliations, asking me and my Region 12-based colleagues if we were safe and well. Pictures of damaged buildings and roads were shared. What struck me most was the actual video of Jollibee collapsing, the person taking the video  shaken as she held on to her phone, crying to God for help. The moving images gripped me: was someone inside when the building collapsed? Soon, the chat groups—our version of town hall meetings, really—would mobilize medical missions and financial aid. It amazes me, as I write this, that many quiet people's first impulse is to ask what they can do to help. Mister Rogers once said, “When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, 'Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.” They were “helpers.”

News reports would later show the devastation of the magnitude 7.8 earthquake in Socsksargen Region. A number of people are missing as I write this. I read a news report about a mother waiting for the authorities to recover her son’s body at SaveMore. The MSU College of Medicine building was badly hit; it might take a while for us to be able to use it. I wonder where we will hold classes now, or if we will shift to virtual lectures, as in the COVID era. Some coastal towns, like Glan, where we often vacation, struggle with water and electricity. The roads are impassable.

I rebooked our return flights to Davao. The GenSan airport was still closed yesterday. We didn’t bother asking Uncle Glen to pick us up from the Davao airport. Nanay and I took the Yellow Bus. We slept through the entire three-hour trip. We reached Lagao at 11:30 in the morning. We got our bags. Uncle Glen had an umbrella for us; it was raining. We dropped by their house in GenSan. Uncle showed me the plates and cups that survived the earthquake. A newly built wall in the neighborhood crashed. When I drove downtown, I could see the damage to infrastructure in the city, but life is returning to normal. In the background, the song, “This Is My Father’s World,” played in the car, a sobering and comforting reminder.

 

After an hour, we reached home—Marbel—and as soon as the gate was opened, Paul ran to welcome us. 

Reading

As I drive from home to my places of work, I wonder what the day has in store for me, what shape the next 24 hours will assume. The unpredictability of life, in whatever increments you measure it with, is simply a fact. You can start off with a benign, relaxed morning, then you face an exhausting afternoon. The reverse is true.

It’s pointless to meticulously plan a regular day—that much I have learned. But I find it a helpful exercise to imagine what my day is going to be like before I get up from bed. I list my tasks, obligations, responsibilities, and I plan for how I will book a full-body massage or finish a book chapter.

Few earthly things give me more joy than books. 

After I got home from an exhausting day at the clinic, I saw a pile of unopened back issues of the New Yorker, London Review of Books, and The Paris Review. I was so happy.

I'm currently reading Muriel Barbery's The Lives of Elves, a book I bought pre-pandemic with my meager fellowship allowance. This was in the Robinsons Forum alwong EDSA. The last time I checked the mall is no longer standing. I have fond memories of that mall. Barbery's prose captivates. It's a story of Maria and Clara, two girls with magical powers. Sheer, excellent storytelling.

 

I read Elena Ferrante's Frantumaglia and The Lying Life of Adults while I was in Naples. A surreal experience I highly recommend: reading a book set in a city while you are in the city. 

I also read the book while I was in Capri, waiting for the ferry to take Manong and me to Naples. 

The city was fascinating. The people were happy. The dogs were noisy and perpetually smiling. 

From the Castel Sant'Elmo, the islands of Ischia and Capri could be seen. 

I drank as much coffee as I could. 

I don't know what shape the days will take on, but at least I'm awake and palpitating. 

Opera and dinner

I’m told: write while it’s fresh—“it” referring to a memory of a person, place, or thing. The person who told that statement to me was referring particularly about travel. If you allow your memories to linger for longer than what is necessary, they can latch on to new meanings. Or you’ll find that writing becomes stale, bland, unable to capture the anxieties and excitement of the moment in question.

But there’s wisdom in waiting before writing things down. Certainly some impressions of a person, a place, or a time ripen to a greater level of wisdom, when one waits for the right time when the correct insight can be had, when a new sense or understanding descends from where these things come from. The cloud of memories, ripened by time, like fine wine.

I navigate both approaches to writing. But these days I need to force myself to put words onto the blank page. Writing is essentially a muscle that must be exercised—and often.

A week has gone by since I had returned to the real world: the endless daily tropical sunshine of my hometown, the patients and their cancers, and the household errands I’m obligated to perform because I am the only one left at home to become my mother’s personal assistant. But a week is not a very long time. There’s a certain freshness to the memories, of course, but unhurried insights have emerged, too.

So I’ll tell you about the food in Rome—a mere sampling—which I thoroughly enjoyed. Enjoy might be a narrow term, but as with most words, it is limited but sufficient to convey what I did feel. I eat for nourishment and also for pleasure: that much is clear. But what I don’t particularly understand is how people can both eat for nourishment, pleasure, and research. For such is the case with my brothers and friends, whose passion is to cook meals, discover ingredients, and spend time in the kitchen. The very essence of creation in the most gustatory of terms excites them.

I realize now that many of my close friends who are dear to me are passionate about eating. I can’t imagine traveling with someone who is indifferent to food. The food table allows conversations to flow, cultures to be experienced, and so on.

So Jef takes me and Manong to Romanè, and tells me all about the food we should try. The restaurant is unassuming, and you’d probably miss it if you passed Via Cipro without paying much attention. (I will return to it after three days in Naples; it's that good.) There are some places he had previously discovered, some he’s trying out for the first time. Google Maps offers a good starting point. It’s imperfect, certainly biased, but it’s a good place to start. Usually, he reads reviews, a summary of positive reactions of people who have experienced eating in those places. Then we trace the way to the restaurants or cafés, and order what feels right at the moment. It could be a dish that Jef had previously tried and wants to try again, or something he is curious about. With Jef and Manong, I don’t have to think about what I should order. I get overwhelmed with the plethora of options, up to the point of paralysis.

Jef tells me Italians typically only have a pastry and coffee for breakfast, but they indulge in a four-course meal for lunch and dinner.

We watch opera at the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma. Our course we are underdressed, a fact we can’t possibly hide because the seats we’re given are in the armchairs of the theater: the first row, to the left of the stage. I struggle to understand what La Piccola Cubana is all about. Sure, it’s a vaudeville in five scenes by Hans Magnus Enzensberger, but it’s not the typical classical opera I’d previously seen. I should have done my reading in advance. I crane my neck to see the libretto, displayed on the wide LCD screen on top of the stage, while I struggle to understand the play. During intermission, I ask Jef what he thinks the play is about. His statement echoes my understanding about it: I have no clue. But I’m surprised that there are young people in the theater who pay attention. There are the elegant Italians, likely intellectuals or simply plain opera fans, who discuss the show in the lobby. 

We head out to a much subdued city at around 9 in the evening and look for a place for dinner.

We find the restaurant: Trattoria Vecchia-Roma. Jef orders antipasti — starters. There’s carciofi fritti — fried artichokes; fiori di zucca — friend zucchini flowers stuffed with mozzarella and anchovies; and melanzane alla parmigiana — along with tomato sauce and cheese. Then that should have been followed by a pasta. And then the segundo, and then dessert. But we are full, and it's getting late. 

What I do with pictures

I’m not so sure what to do with most photos I’ve taken from a trip, but I store them in a private folder in Flickr. I forward the link privately to friends who might be interested in them. Otherwise, they stay in the safe Flickr cloud, that marvelous repository of photographs that I subscribe to yearly. I remember, more often than not, the general circumstances of when they’d been created.

Photographs therefore function as timestamps for me. If you asked me when I’d last been to, say, Boracay, I won’t be able to answer you right away. But I have memories of the white sand, and how warm the water was, and how, at the mere sight of clear waters at the pier, I had wanted to jump and swim already, despite my bags being hauled to the small boat that would take me to the resort. My photographs, timestamped and geotagged, provide me the details of the trip. I could give you an answer after I’d scrolled through my album.

There are days when I want to head to the shop to get them printed and framed. But those intentions are ephemeral, overtaken by more pressing needs of the day—work, errands, and, sometimes, rest.

But why take pictures anyway? Behind each photo is a creative act, I suppose. For me, photography is a way to remember, to enjoy the present, and to capture that enjoyment for future reminiscence, in the same vein as writing about an experience or a trip. I’m certain that taking pictures can sometimes distract me from the actual moment. The distraction largely comes from my personal impulse to perform—in other words, to show off, when the intention should be to show. I take measures to keep myself from that, but I’m a work in progress. Such measures include distancing myself from social media—a great step towards a healthy mental and spiritual state—and using a single-function device. I love my Olympus OM-D Mark IV and the two lenses of my choice—the pancake 14-42 mm and the 45 mm. It’s a small and powerful mirrorless camera I bring with me when I travel.

Consider these time-tested suggestions: get a Flickr subscription, and get an actual camera that's not in a phone. 

Breakfast

Travel days are not normal days. While I’m in Italy I have breakfast in a pistacceria, where people, dressed in their work clothes, say “Buongiorno,” then: “Un caffè, per favor.” Caffè typically means an espresso, a small volume of concentrated coffee which takes some getting used to. But I've liked it. Weeks earlier, a barista in Marbel—my hometown—cautiously warned me, “Gamay lang na siya, Sir, ha.” She apparently got a lot of flak for the small coffee sizes.

I noticed that nothing savory is eaten; heavy meals are reserved for lunch. In Italy, breakfast means coffee and pastry. People stand in a bar, sip their coffee, and off they go to wherever they need to be. There are tables around if you have time: people in Milan, Rome, and Naples seem to have a lot of time to kill. Adding cream or milk to coffee is acceptable around this time, but not after lunch—a story told to me by my friend Luther who received curious looks in Milan when he ordered a cappuccino in the afternoon.

I normally skip breakfast. My physiology allows me to get through the morning with a cup of coffee—a pour-over, a French press, or an espresso. I drink coffee for the taste and for the stimulation. This is providential. I’m not passionate about toasting bread, frying longganisa, or cooking rice while the sun is rising and people are still emerging from sleep. Mornings don’t find me particularly hungry. If I must eat—a morning workout or some tedious physical activity for work or a future arrangement that does not allow for a later meal—I will have brunch or a heavy lunch.

Before heading out to the pasticceria, my friend Jef shows me how to make a proper moka pot—an Italian friend had taught him. Prior to my lessons with Jef, I’d seen videos on YouTube, but they add too many specific details, making the instructions more complicated than an analytical chemistry laboratory manual. So Jef keeps things simple for me: fill the bottom chamber with water just below the safety valve, add medium-fine grounds of coffee to the basket, and close the pot, but not too tightly. I ask, “Do I have to tamp the grounds?” to which he says, “I don’t.” The water must boil under low heat; you’ll know it’s ready if you can smell the coffee, beckoning you to taste and see that it is good.

 


We walk to La Siciliana Roma, along Via Cipro. It’s a perfect day—the sun shines on this spring day, a light cool wind pushes us along. In Rome, even the dogs are always smiling.

 

I have caffè con panna (coffee with whipped cream), Manong has caffè pistacchioso (pistachio coffee), Jef has marocchino. Jef orders these on our behalf: he is fluent in Italian. It’s the first time I’d ever seen a marrochino. There’s a dusting of unsweetened cocoa powder at the bottom, a strong shot of espresso, a layer of frothed milk foam, and a final dusting of cocoa powder on top. We share farcito pistacchio (pistachio-stuffed pastry) and breccia miele e noci (honey and walnut “breccia”). White powder is all over my clothes and mouth. The food is so good. 

What a blessing to be alive, with a hearty breakfast and good company!