Tatay’s reaction was quick. Just days after Pearl Harbor and Manila were bombed in December 1941, Tia Julî, an almost three-year-old me, and Nanay’s treasured 10-piece Bilibid-made sala set, were dispatched to Barrio Dampól in Pláridel, Bulacán. We were evacuated to safety with Tia Pilar, her husband Tio Asiong, and their nine children, my cousins.

I don’t remember much except a rice field on a moonlit night with me being handed over to someone, and me, my cousin Boy, and Tia Julî being ejected from a dugout beneath a fallen mango tree. All 13 of us were hiding from marching Japanese, and two bawling toddlers could mean total clan massacre. Things must have settled down quickly because Tia Julî and I were soon back in Manila, back home to 115 Karapatán Street in Santa Cruz between Dímasaláng and San Lázaro race track.

Ours was one of two two-story houses lining Karapatán. To the left were relatives Tia Hilda and Tio Teriò, and to the right, Jockey Biason and his wife Aling Kayang. Relojero Mang Selo and Aling Nena lived directly across in a greenhouse with matching roll-up bamboo blinds.

In the narrow space on both sides of our house were what to me were thick and towering jungles of rosal, sampaguita, and sinamumo bushes. Outside stairs led up to a balcony that opened to the sala. The sala was empty save for a piano and a radio. All else was in Tio Asiong’s kamalig, which made it easier at night, because that was where we all slept, under mosquito nets and on mats spread on the floor. Thanks to that, I can still sleep anywhere, in any position, and almost instantly.

There were hardly any vehicles around, just calesas and carretelas, and few ever passed Karapatán, which made it a long, narrow children’s playground. Manila was not the congested place it is now. The population was less than a million, and Metro Manila had something like 1.2 million vs. today’s 20+ million. Skies were blue, the air pure, the nights starry. There were no electric fans, no air conditioners. Uwang and salagubang strayed into the sala, and I caught the occasional firefly from a window. I had an aquarium and scooped daphnia from the canal near the railroad tracks.

Lola Trining took care of inquisitive me, relating stories about her Bulacán childhood, our relatives, including family secrets, e.g., my great grandmother eloped and therefore inherited no jewelry, and the most distant riceland. It turns out the joke was on her irate father, the Gobernadorcillo Esteban Roxas, because highways later passed the unwanted fields.

She was the household manager and did the marketing and cooking. There were no refrigerators or freezers then, and everyone had just a paminggalan. Lola, therefore, went to Blumentritt market every morning. I tagged along, basket and bayong bearer.

Lola had a sheltered childhood. She tried, but her heart wasn’t really into cooking. I therefore grew up on fried bangus, fried chicken, tapa, and pork chops fried with toyò, fried Spam and Vienna sausage, what must have been a treasured recipe that yielded an omelet called Lutong Makaw, and the occasional alimasag. It’s a wonder my cholesterol level is okay. She made ginatán for special occasions, and making bilo-bilo was my job. I molded animals, nipa huts, and people, and was frustrated to no end that they all came out as blobs.

Nanay was suspicious of a lot of things, like bagoong that I therefore first tasted when already late in life (no kidding). She was also convinced that siopao had cat meat filling, and ever since, I eat siopao only when I have to be polite. I don’t know why, but we never had ketchup either, just patis. It was also no sale for any passing balut, sorbetes, and taho vendors.

Nanay tried to make sure no germ got near, so I was rarely allowed out of the house. Not that it made any difference—neighborhood kids were older, and no one paid me any attention. Just the same, when Nanay was away, I would sneak out and try to join them at patintero, tumbang preso, pikô, and jols. In fact, it wasn’t a total joy. I was perpetually kulelat and was accident-prone. I still have scars, mementos of repeatedly scraped knees.

My sister Eleanor was born when I was four, and twins Susana and Trinidad four years after. We ended up regular playmates, mainly at jackstones and pickup sticks.

(To be Continued)

Note: The old house still stands, the last survivor now forlorn among three and four-story apartments and looking much smaller than it was to a little boy’s eyes. It’s shorter now, just one and a half stories. Our esteemed public works authorities solve the flooding problem by periodically raising the street. We therefore had to raise the ground floor’s floor, too.

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