sed libera nos a malo

“No nos dejes caer en la tentacion, y libranos del mal…”

“Do not lead us to the test, but deliver us from evil…”

My old sire has returned home after almost spending two weeks in the hospital for some prostate problems. He had a benign cellular growth common to his age which weakens the urinary system. He still has his catheter on, which according to the doctors, would take about two weeks before another test can be done in order to determine whether he can urinate normally.

He is also suffering incontinence, also due to his old age, and because of a pinched nerve in his lower spine which probably added up as a factor. My old sire is a baby once again. He’s wearing a diaper.

It ain’t life threatening, however, any person would find it difficult to muster the fact that one’s grand sire, a former military man for that matter, would eventually deteriorate in such state. I feel so much pity for the grand sire who pampered me in my youth with all material wealth that I desired… who in one of my baby pictures placed a cigarette in my mouth and laughed, who was called by many people in the years far gone as “Don” despite the fact that the title has been relinquished by the Family after the demise of my great grandparents.

He is the youngest of the seven children of the First House of Bernardo (there being three). He is a war veteran. He went to Mindanao in his teen years during the war and worked in Zamboanga building the airport for the Japanese until he escaped to Davao or some other part of Mindanao and hitched back to Manila, whence the Tranvia was still in existence from Manila to Malabon. He was an army reservist, a businessman, a politician. In his golden years he knew the powerful and mighty in Malabon, from Mayor Espiritu, Peng Oreta, Boy Vicencio, Tessie Aquino-Oreta, Msgr. Florentino, the now present Archbishop of Lingayen Oscar Cruz, Msgr. Antero Sarmiento, the members of the military during the Marcos and Cory years. He was both Catholic and Aglipayan. He is my grandfather… my grand sire.

It is quite difficult for me to see him in such state, somehow, he reminds me of the plot in “Autumn of the Patriarch” by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, but not quite really. In stark contrast, my grandmother is strong, although diabetic, and has clarity of thought. My grandfather is somehow slowing down, but not senile.

He will live a long life. That I will proclaim will a prophetic tongue. He will receive the love from his most favored grandson for that matter. It is I who will inherit most of his affection. I shall own his legacy. All of his grandchildren (and a great grandchild) are in the United States, except for me and my brother, his name sake. Perhaps, fate, despite circumstance, planned something else. I was supposed to be one named “Tirso II”, however, due to my parents’ excitement, they forgot the pact and named me as a metamorphosis of Romulo.

For me though, this event in our life as a family is a challenge, as always. I am supposed to concentrate on my life and studies for now as I near the Bar Exams. But recent events prove otherwise. What I have learned two years ago when we were in the brink of insolvency is that family matters, no matter what. You must always fight for them. You must have patience, you must have strength, you must have courage, you must have faith above all.

For us, this is just a test, and we will be delivered…

Reading the Signs

I do not know if this is common to all, or a gift which I have, or just plain and simple circumstance at work, but I have this ability of some sort of reading the signs, which herald something most likely of something wrong which can happen. It happened several times to me in my short existence here on earth. Premonition maybe, I do not know…

My grandpa was rushed to the hospital last Wednesday. But the night before, while on the way home from badminton with my young cousins who lives nearby but rarely visits the house, we were talking about my lolo, telling me how strong he is still despite his age, and talking about the other siblings of his who have passed on, including their own grandma, who is my grandpa’s sister. My lolo is the last surviving son of seven siblings. During that conversation while walking towards our house, I had this eerie if not awkward feeling, short of being blank. It was like… “Why the hell are we talking about this?” Certain emotions of mine were stirred a bit that night, and it was kinda strange.

The next day, my grandpa was generally weak during the morning, apparently the day before, he overdosed on laxatives, which according to him, he did quite often in the past, but never did he experience such weakness and shortness of breathe. Since I had nothing to do, I thought of going out that day to the mall or something, but something held me back, I decided not to leave the house and just stay there and let boredom kill me instead. However during lunch time, my grandpa couldn’t eat, he had hard time breathing and lay on his bed coughing. I talked to him and assessed him physically. He was burning hot and a bit reddish. I decided to take him to the hospital for emergency treatment. So me, our driver, my lola, and manang Julie, our house help, rushed to Manila Medical where he can have medical attention. A few hours after he was admitted, I had to go home to get some clothes and stuff for my overnight stay at the hospital.

Our rather large altar most of the time have three candles burning at the same time. I’ve noticed one candle went out, despite the fact that it did not get wet, nor could have been blown by the wind because the candles are in glass lamps. I thought probably that it is the particular brand of that candle (we got it from the home decorations section of SM, while most of our candles are ‘Liwanag’ brand). So I re-lit the candle, said a prayer or two while offering some incense sticks.

During that night, we had such a hard time, because of my grandpa’s weakness, his arthritic knees and his weight. He wanted to urinate all the time, but cannot, so we had to assist him all night long, to and fro the bathroom, literally carrying him back and from the bed to the toilet. I was so exhausted the whole night.

When I returned home that morning to rest, I found the candle which I relit the previous night, unconsumed. Instead, the glass cup which held it was broken. Nobody touched it because it was still in the glass lamp, therefore, it could have burst due to the heat of the flame. In our household, we have this believe that any glass or ceramic ware which breaks accidentally averts evil. It may be weird, if not cinematic, but I find that such belief a bit true, since glasses or plates usually break accidentally not only during birthdays and special occasions, but during times when a member of the family flies in or out of the country or locally.

After resting my weary body for a few hours, I had to return to the hospital for the night duty again. Upon return, I saw these two doctors doing some medical stuff and a catheter was inserted into my grandpa to extract and collect the urine. At that night, they collected about 2.5 liters of urine which cannot pass through his body naturally. I had a hard time looking at my grandfather at that state. I’m not much of a ‘hospital’ person you see.

Then my tita cely called by phone my grandma… they talked for a very long time, and in my eavesdropping, since it was such a small room, I’ve heard them talking about Tita Cely or my other Tita dreaming of our Lola Asyang, their mother, and another sister of my lolo who is already in the life beyond. As of what I overheard, they concluded that probably Lola Asyang was telling them that something happened, which, according to my Tita, Lola Asyang usually does during certain events. Since we never told anybody in the extended family that my lolo was in the hospital, she could not have known.

Then my lola told me afterwards that if I hadn’t insisted on bringing him to the hospital, his overflowing bladder would have burst, thus would result in deeper sorrow for us. I cried outside the room because of the mixed feeling of sadness and relief.

This is how I see it…

Magical Reality we call it in the literati world. Reminds me of several story plots of the likes of Nick Joaquin and Gabriel Garcia Marquez. I am not a religious person in the Catholic sense, since my personal belief system is universal, and I am more spiritual, rather than religious. I belief in karma, dharma, fate, certain unseen beings, the ancestors and divine intervention, and somehow, this made event attests that our world is not a single plane, but an intricate woven fabric of time, space, matter and spirit.

Now, my grandpa is doing fine, he’d probably go under the knife within the week to scrape of his swollen prostate gland, which is the main cause of his current sickness.

Thank God and the ancestors…

Alessandra Ambrosio: my newest celebrity/model crush...

Alessandra Ambrosio (born April 11, 1981), is a Brazilian supermodel. She was described as "The future of the modeling world", by retired supermodel Tyra Banks. Her last name is spelled Ambrósio, but the diacritic mark is omitted in her modeling work. She's the eldest of two children. Ambrosio is a prominent model for Guess?, Victoria's Secret and the UK company Next.[1]
Alessandra Ambrosio is one of several Brazilian models that became known in the late 1990s along with Gisele Bündchen, Adriana Lima and Ana Beatriz Barros. Born in Erexim, a small town in southern Brazil, Ambrosio enrolled in a modeling class as a teen. She subsequently entered the Elite modeling agency's 1996 "Look of the Year" modeling competition. Though she did not win, one year later she was offered an Elite modeling contract.[1]
Her first big modeling job was the cover of the Brazilian Elle magazine, and then Ambrosio followed with other "editorial" work. It was not long after that the Guess? company signed her for their fall 2000 campaign. Ambrosio's print career began as a Guess? model and continued with Revlon and Victoria's Secret. She modeled on the Victoria's Secret runway for the first time in 2000, and she continued to be a participant in the subsequent shows. In 2004 Ambrosio was selected as the first spokesmodel for Victoria's Secret Pink line.[1]
Alessandra Ambrosio is currently part of Elite plus in NYC. (source: Wikipedia)

A Year After...

I've revisited some of my old entries, and I read an entry of mine which suddenly stirred either my heart or my groins... anyhow, there ain't much difference...

NOT!!!

See my Archives, March 2006... The 'Texting Scenarios' Entry.

My japanese name... allegedly. (from an online name generator.)

My japanese name is 黒田 Kuroda (black field) 雄大 Masahiro (big hero).


Well... all that I can relate to with this is that basic political law case of Kuroda vs. Jalandoni. hahaha!

If all things go well... I'll be having my new roofdeck bachelor's pad right across our house. Yay! Sweeeettttt!

It’s probably obvious that my blog nowadays is more of a photo album rather than a journal. Well, I’d like to share most of my visual memories with you guys in vivid color, aside from the fact that I’m not into mood most of the time to write some drama or nostalgic moment in my life, because of the happy hormones produced by consistent badminton.

Anyhow, last night, after suddenly deciding to join the east wood gimik and after foiling the scheduled bowling game, we had a blast at Jack’s Loft and Teriyaki Boy. I did make the right decision to come because Rhea was also coming, and surprisingly, Athan too.

Rhea was with her chick cousin Leslie, who btw, and after getting so much amount of alcohol in our system, they began to converse with me in Fookien, fragments of which I understood only. I on the other hand, mumbled Spanish words short of a cuss and a polite reply. Hahaha! The last time I saw Ri was about two years ago probably. I missed her so much, we were very tight friends in college, and we were each others cuddle bunnies. Rhea was sexy hot because apparently she’s now a gym goer.

Jonathan was here for the holidays. He, on the other hand, I saw on Christmas 2005. He came back to Manila from Mindanao for the Holidays. He just flew in around 9am that morning.

It was nice seeing old college people again. Not much of reminiscing though, more of planning an attempt to go to a resort in San Pablo City, which I doubt (and intent not to) I could attend. Considerations being, first, I have no budget (three of us are on a student’s allowance, since all three of us are in law school) second, I have to prepare for the Review, thirdly, I’d rather go to CJL Farm and spend only a few hundred bucks for booze and chicha, whilst the food, lodging, sports facilities, and ‘swimming pool’ are free, fourthly, I’d rather spend time with my law school friends, if ever we execute the plan to go to Pagsanjan, since going out of town is rarely heard of in law school circles.

Today is April 1, tomorrow, I’ll be marching down the aisle (pun intended) together with 120 more candidates for the solemn investiture ceremonies. FYI: In the Thomasian and Dominican Tradition, instead of merely going on stage and shaking hands with the Dean, there was this ritual where the candidate kneels in front of the Regent, or the Rector, who then prays over the candidate before the actual investiture. That was in the ancient days. Now, only the first person (in the alphabetical order) is granted the privilege of this ritual. It’s much like an academic ordination of somesort.

Tomorrow is the big day for us. After four or five years of hard work, it finally pays off. We’re finally getting our BACHELOR OF LAWS degree.

Eastwood March 31, '07

Leslie, Ri, Me
Me and Carmi @ T-Boy
With Ri, my old cuddle pillow in college.
At Jack's Loft
Dinner at Teriyaki Boy