The chapel bell rang ferociously. It was Sunday morning and a beautiful day.
The barrio folks were summoned to the church. This mass was special.
They had a priest this time. They usually had their local church 'kagawad'
leading the service in lieu of a priest.
Father Nene was already in the chapel. He arrived early from the main
church. He had forty-seven barrios to serve. His presence in the barrio was
scarcely scheduled. He was the only priest in his parish.
It didn't take long to fill up the kapilya. The crowd overflowed into
the main road. Parishioners standing outside were distracted occasionally
from their prayers when tricycle traffic squeezed its way through them.
The choir sang excellently well. I was informed before the mass started
that most hymnal pieces were composed locally. This was evident, as it
did not only illustrate heavenly devotion. It also portrayed their
rural lifestyle and livelihood. I was impressed.
The mass ended and people converged in an area fronting the church.
There were vendors selling mostly home cooked delicacies. The solemn
religious ritual only a minute ago suddenly became an organized chaos.
This was where they greeted each other. It was gleeful social interaction
where friends met friends and gossips made its glory.
The center of talks was the twin sisters. They were daughters of a once
poor land tenant who recently climbed up the ladder of affluence so quick.
The twins left the barrio in pursuit for good life and fortune and found
it in the land of the rising sun. They became japayukies in Tokyo.
They visited back their parents in the barrio when one of the sisters
gave birth to a fatherless Japanese baby. As old rural folks still
harbored with unforgiving hatred against Japanese because of the war,
they condemned the woman who brought them a little enemy boy.
Most eyes were on the twins as they walked away from the chapel.
They wore high-heeled shoes and though they tried to maintain grace
and appealing posture, the rough gravel road made it impossible to
preserve elegance in their strides.
I looked around and perceived how the barrio changed. I was born and
raised there and got out during my late youth upon knowing t
hat my life had nowhere to go. I was also in search for excitement and
good fortune. Had I've got the right gender, I would have become a japayuki too.
Time really changed the barrio. It was no longer the place I knew. It
did not only alter the attitude of people but also on the topography of
the land. The river where my father taught me to swim was no longer
around. I was told that a big flood many years ago diverted the river
upstream. I felt nostalgic knowing the sad story of our river, which
sheltered many exciting experiences during my childhood and into my
youth. I nearly drowned in that river. Had it not on my older sister,
Felina, I would have faced my Maker so early in life.
I remembered my boyhood pal. His name was Nonoy. I could not find him in
the church crowd. Nobody knew where he went. My brother told me that he
just disappeared from the barrio without a trace. I shared a lot of
silliness with that fellow.
Nonoy was a heavy-set person. In one occasion, he was on nature's call
in a barrio latrine-type toilet. I waited outside. The wooden plank he
was squatting on suddenly broke and down fell the fat man into the pit.
After a number of futile attempts to climb back up, he yelled for help.
I rushed inside and there he was in a messy and most defiled situation.
My first reaction was to run away. I can't bear the smell. But I changed
my mind and decided to help my friend instead. I extended my hand.
He grabbed it and with tremendous difficulty, I pulled him out from his misery.
The village artesian well was a hundred yards away. There was a big
concrete tub and a continued flow of underground water from a pipe into
it. There were women around the tub washing clothes. There was also a
line of people with containers waiting their turn to fetch water.
The moment Nonoy was out of the pit, he ran full speed ahead to the
artesian well. I followed him. When we reached the well, we jumped into
the tub to clean ourselves. The people around the artesian well were
like being hit by a lightning bolt. They scampered away in different
directions, leaving their laundry and some water containers behind.
They kept a fair distance and watched us in disdain as we bathed.
There were people in the chapel that still knew me. They shook my hand
and though their names mostly eluded my recollection, I returned their
politeness with warm gesture in courtesy. However, I met a man that I
can not forget. Although his appearance was altered by wrinkles on his
face and gray hair, I still recognized him as Melencio. How could I
forget? I was one of his disciples.
Melencio once locked himself alone in the room and read the Holy Bible
continuously. After two weeks of intensely perusing the Holy Scripture,
he went out the room tossing in the air his trouser belt and in futility
tried hard converting it into a snake. Melencio's sanity was distorted.
He thought that he was Jesus.
His parents asked us to play along with him. Maybe he would go back to
his normal senses after a while. So we did. It was summer vacation anyway
and there was not much to do in the barrio. We may as well have fun.
It was in the corner store one afternoon when Melencio chose his disciples.
I was Judas. I complained about it because I wanted to be Peter. But
his younger brother already took the position and won't let go the role
of the fisherman. I finally agreed on my appointment with an understanding
that I would not hang myself as Judas did.
Melencio had this nasty habit of performing miracles. He attempted to walk
on water by jumping off a creek bridge. His disciples pulled him out after
as he was stuck in the mud. We feared that a herd of water buffaloes cooling
off in the river would do him harm.
He instructed his disciples to look for a white donkey. There was no donkey
in the barrio. He however settled for a small white carabao. He wrapped
himself with a white bed-sheet and rode on the back of the carabao. He was
holding a bundle of coconut leaves and waved it to people. He looked
impressive that some old ladies even made a sign of the cross as we passed
by them. From the main road we entered the pergola gate to the plaza.
It was Sunday afternoon and barrio folks converged at the plaza. There
was a basketball game. They stopped playing when we entered. Our entrance
was dramatic. It was sensational. However, the humor of vendors reached
its limit, when Melencio jumped off the carabao and kicked their tables
shouting and accusing them as thieves in his father's house. The disciples
were startled. We were not expecting it. We dragged him out the plaza
sensing that vendors would beat him up.
It was kind of miracle that he wasn't hurt on the things he did. But not
until he tried on what he called as the Miracle of the Bees.
The disciples were drinking at the corner store late afternoon when
Melencio proposed to do it. With his size and temper, we surmised that
it wouldn't be healthy for us to go against. Besides, the amount of
alcohol we consumed could have prevented our logic to discourage him.
His disciples were drunk. We just obliged him to do what he wanted.
He brought us to an area near the river. There was a coconut tree where
thirty feet up from the ground was a big beehive on the trunk. The
miracle planned was for Melencio to climb up the coconut and to swipe
the beehive with his hand and climb back down unhurt.
Kanning, the village drunk was one of his apostles. He sang the
National Anthem and accompanied by his ukulele as Melencio slowly
gained height up the coconut. We were entertained watching Melencio
climbed the tree.
It was when Melencio was close to the beehive when pandemonium suddenly
broke loose. Swarm of bees fiercely attacked him. He was in big trouble.
But the predicament of Melencio was not his alone. Hundreds of bees also
swooped down and went berserk on his disciples below. We ran for our lives.
Our Jesus dropped. We left him flat on the ground. The bees stung us
savagely as we fled. We jumped into the river and held our breath under
water as long as we could. We sobered up quickly. It was not fun anymore.
It was big news in the barrio. The disciples again were gathered at the
corner store the next morning. We were talking and laughing about our
experience with the bees when Melencio's mother came in and angrily
confronted us. She was hysterical. She accused us of trying to kill her
son. Melencio didn't show up. His brother informed us that he was okay,
but decided to wander in the forest to be a hermit.
Maybe, divine intervention prevailed after all. After few days in the woods,
Melencio was accidentally caught in the wild pig-trap of his father. He
was treated in the hospital and was cured. He went back to the barrio
and later was converted as a Jehovah Witness.
I was awake at dawn listening to crowing of roosters. I wondered how a
rooster with a brain of a chicken knew the exact time of the night to
make his call. Their crowing made me realized that I was finally home. I
traveled far and wide ever searching for the good life. It was in that
moment when I acknowledged that I've found it in the very place where I
started.
Through my window I saw the marvel of nature's still untarnished creation.
The half-crescent moon and myriad of stars in heaven hazily brightened the
rice field and the outline of distant mountains. After seeing old familiar
faces in the chapel, I felt that my existence had gone a complete cycle.
It seemed that I was an ironic victim of my own freedom. I wanted to stay
and once again share the innocence and joviality of simple village living.
But the barrio is no longer my world. It changed and so did I.
It wasn't for me anymore.
