By ARIEL PONCE ©
(Editor’s note: This essay won first place (three-way tie) in the 2006 Commission on Filipinos Overseas (CFO) Literary Contest (Essay Division) from over 300 entries. The theme of the contest was, “100 years of Filipino Migration to Hawaii.” Names of the winners can be viewed at http://www.cfo.gov.ph/filtiesfebjuly.pdf.)
Our plane left for the “Big Island” on a Sunday afternoon, only to arrive there right smack on an afternoon of? the same day! Nothing can be more confusing to a 13-year-old than figuring out how one can travel for more than 10 hours only to arrive hours earlier than the time one left and on the same day at that. Somehow the perennial questions of a bored kid like, “Are we there yet?” asked for the umpteenth time to now nearly deaf parents seem totally irrelevant and all at once unnecessary. My studies in a local science school never even prepared me for the outright confusion that a simple thing called “international dateline” can do to one’s system. Shades of Phileas Fogg! But for a kid totally unfamiliar with Einstein’s linearity or Hawking’s singularities, no explanation could remove the confusion I felt that day.
In September of 1973, I was fortunate enough to have been sent to Hawaii on an all-expense paid trip, in the guise of a cultural mission, by being part of the very first team assembled by the then post-Martial Law government to woo our countrymen back to the Philippines and, of course, have them spend their hard-earned dollars on our beautiful shores. Fittingly dubbed the “Balikbayan Project,” the program’s name has since become historically synonymous with any Filipino coming back to the Philippines (not to mention the humongous 70-pound brown boxes that our homecoming countrymen seem unable to do without) whether they be OCWs or former citizens. By being a part of the world-famous “Pangkat Kawayan” (Bamboo Orchestra) and blowing on a simple bamboo tube that could only produce one note, I was able to tour Hawaii and California, states known to have the most number of Filipinos enmeshed in their respective communities. Our group, through a series of variety-show performances designed to create a strong sense of nostalgia among our countrymen (now bearing American passports), showed scenes and montages of what they had been missing the entire time they had been away from home. Since we deliberately picked the right amount of nostalgic pressure to put on our audiences, they never had a chance to remain unmoved. Indeed, they cried buckets of tears through heartbreaking scenes of a kid hopelessly waiting for his pamasko (Christmas gift) from a ninong (godfather) and ninang (godmother) who’ve been away in the States for so long, while totally missing the taste and aroma of the Noche Buena feast set before him. And if we did not have them crying, we had them clapping through folk songs sung in their respective dialects. Or had them singing all-too familiar tunes or desperately remembering lines from long forgotten songs.
Other “Balikbayan Projects” would get to tour other parts of the States seeking to bring in more of our prodigal countrymen back home, but the record set for the most number of balikbayans to arrive at our shores following that glorious September tour would be unequaled! So I heard.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. For what really transpired in the mind of a 13-year-old during that fateful trip is what this essay is all about after all. I only remember in a haze the mad rush to have our uniforms fitted, or the proper table etiquette lessons hastily given (to this day I still cant figure out which was the salad fork in what looked to me like more than 50 pieces of silverware set with the same number of plates, bowls and glasses). I remember, too, using a shoehorn to hastily pack 50-pound suitcases with 70 pounds of clothes, or the lessons on what an ambassador of his country is supposed to represent. My parents only added to my dread by informing me that I should never stray from the group and if ever I got separated from them I would be lost forever. Gee, thanks Mom and Dad, you really made a 13-year-old stain his pants with that great advice.
Hawaii! The name alone was already alien to my young ears. Lets see now, was it pronounced “hah-why” or “hah-wah-yeeh”? Would the natives there be wearing grass skirts or sarongs, or, worse, would they be wearing anything at all? So many questions, so many questions… Was it true that they made necklaces out of flowers but instead of the familiar sampaguita they used calachuchi, a flower strongly linked to funerals in the Philippines? Let’s see now, its one of the states of the United States of America, but why is it a group of islands? These and more questions, I finally said to myself would have to be answered when I got there!
Our Philippine Airlines direct flight for Honolulu left on a wet, cloudy and gloomy Sunday afternoon. How fitting, I said to myself, since I didn’t want my group mates to see the tears of fear that were then slightly staining my cheeks. Boarding cramped quarters with windows pretending to be viewable, and seats that felt more like electric chairs welcoming a sentenced inmate rather than the padded comfort they were supposed to be, we set off towards the sunset and into the waiting arms of?
CONFUSION!
We stepped out of the plane and into a warm sunny afternoon which made me wonder back then, “Why on earth are we wearing thick business suits anyway?” “Wasn’t ‘the States’ supposed to be cold?” What made the whole thing bizarre was that I distinctly remembered that we experienced a night and an eventual daybreak in the cramped quarters of the plane, which meant that we should have arrived the following day, Monday, right? Wrong! We arrived on a Sunday! Not the week after but the same day that we left. By some H.G. Wellsian paradox (which I would later in life come to read and enjoy) our flight must have turned into a time machine, as I reflect on it now amusingly. Thank God for my much more learned partners, I was informed that our plane crossed the international dateline and we had but to merely set our watches accordingly. No, no, no… That can’t be right? No resetting of watches would ever make a day return. That’s just way too inconceivable.
But watch-resetting would have to make do for me that day as I boarded a shuttle that picked us up from the airplane steps and hastily deposited the crew and I to another big question mark and a much bigger horror awaiting me in the form of my FOSTER PARENTS! Now let us not forget that while the tour was indeed meant to be diplomatic and we were for all intents and purposes “ambassadors of our country,” the truth was we were a 60-member contingent. And funds for hotels and similar living conditions were allotted for the “stars” of the show, not for us kids. So by hitting two proverbial birds with one very cheap proverbial stone, it was decided that we would live with Filipino families willing to share their resources and their homes to us. We would get to experience life among our Filipino brethren and, at the same time, save up on allowances and that all too precious diplomatic funding. I’ll never forget that terrifying moment when our director said that one of the band members and I would be staying with a family named Palafox. “If it’s got a fox on it, then its an American name for sure!” I thought to myself. As my roomie and I were ushered on to meet our foster parents, a very strong feeling of fear suddenly hit me and every step I took was like dragging a ton of bricks. And suddenly there he was, a strangely built American bearing a sign that had our names on it, too small to even be called American and too dark to be one either. He had on his face this small impression of a mustache and a salt-and-pepper hair that made him look actually distinguished. But still you can never quite tell about these Americans. As he slowly approached us, he looked at my partner and I, and at that moment I could definitely feel his eyes peering into our souls and gauging us. That is, until he opened his mouth and said, “Kumain na ba kayo?” (Have you eaten yet?) in that all-too familiar Tagalog with an accent that seemed somehow to be hitting too close to home. With that simple question, all fears melted away and, suddenly, I wasn’t on an island hundreds of miles from home, but as if still in the Philippines safe and sound.
His car was huge! My partner and I could have easily played agawang base at the backseat alone. “This Mr. Palafox guy must be one rich Filipino-American!” I thought to myself on the drive to his home. But glancing out the window of the car made me think twice about that statement as more huge cars darted past us on an eight-lane road that seemed meant for landing aircrafts than accommodating vehicles. The big island was an amazing place! With blue skies, bluer seas and tropical weather all year round, is it any wonder that Hawaii easily becomes the first choice for any Filipino wanting to migrate. He was Dr. Palafox, not the medical kind he then told us, but the Ph.D. kind. Which in the mind of a thirteen year old didn’t really make much of a difference; it seemed that a doctor was a doctor to me back then. He then added that he also teaches at the University of Hawaii’s East-West Center, a place that my buddy and I would later remember as a box-like building too big to have any specific purpose but to house thousands of students.
His home was like any other home you can find in the Philippines. A three-bedroom bungalow that had a two-car garage, and just to make sure we would really feel at home, a Filipina mother was waiting for us at the front door. Mrs. Palafox was my mother, my roommate’s mother or like any other Filipino’s mother for that matter all rolled into one. She had a ready smile that was as genuine as the grey locks on her head. And a body-type that was capable of carrying babies, cook up a storm and wash clothes all at the same time. She was polite without the usual stiffness that accompanied it, and she greeted us with a hug fit for a long lost son. As she started the five-cent tour through her well-maintained house, we discovered that she had already raised two very athletic boys who were at that time out for college, which easily explained why she volunteered to be one of the foster parents for the program, the availability of a spare room.
The welcome meal which was served to us looked very familiar to me. We had rice, meat and that weird concoction my own mother prepared in our kitchen back home… dinengdeng, a potpourri of local vegetables that was cooked in boiling water and for taste a pungent fermented fish-sauce was strained and mixed in. The smell was so reminiscent of home that I couldn’t help but ask, “Excuse me, sir, ma’am, but by any chance are you Ilocanos?” The reply was a string of Ilocano words spoken with such gusto that my young ears strained from over-translation. It seemed that they had migrated straight from Ilocos and that Ilocano was their cradle language with Tagalog coming in at a distant second. How glad they were to have an Ilocano for a ward, so they said, while continually pouring more of the green broth into my plate. And until my partner and I were herded into our rooms, I could still hear Dr. Palafox excitedly talking to the missus about their guests and how they wished we could stay longer.
Looking back at that experience of more than 30 years ago still brings a smile to my lips. I wonder what ever happened to the Palafoxes? The last letter I got from them was a reply to my own short letter as well. And as time, busy- ness, and the mad rush to grow up eventually took its toll, I slowly bundled all my memories about them and my great experiences in that faraway land of blue skies and white beaches and traded it all in for newer ones. But as I write about this now, nostalgia, it seems has a way of creeping in and grabbing you by the seat of your pants when you least expect it. We spent two weeks in Hawaii before leaving for the mainland, but they were two weeks well spent. And while I even got to know more Fil-American families in other cities in California, like the Nobles (pronounced in the dignified Anglo Saxon manner rather than the Filipino nob-leh) of San Francisco, the Cortezes of San Diego, and other kind-hearted families, heck, we even got to meet Mickey Mouse in Disneyland, it would be in Hawaii that I would get to know two very special Filipinos who gave me a home away from home and prepared me for a bigger United States of America than I ever even dreamed of in their own small three-bedroom bungalow. And not unlike the early Filipino settlers who became part of the culture we now all know as Hawaii, they left their country to take a chance on a dream, to dive head first into that great unknown and try their luck at a chance to better themselves and their children. Whether through pineapple-picking or as professors in various universities, Filipinos have shown amazing resiliency and unwavering strength. And through it all they have held on to their own identities with passion while being passionately true to the old red-white-and-blue at the same time. They’ve chowed down to McDonald’s as well as dinengeng and kare-kare and not once felt a wee bit of difference. They’ve managed to become contributing members of their own little communities while keeping track of what’s happening to their own Filipino communities back home as well. They’ve gotten used to unfamiliar sports like football and baseball while retaining their enjoyment of their own homegrown activities. They’ve managed to raise responsible children with eyes looking towards the future while at the same time deeply rooted in their past.
As to that all too familiar question that I asked one of my foster parents as we headed towards their home, “Are we there yet, sir?” The answer is simple: we had always been there because for them they never really left home. They grew roots in their respective homes and touched branches with their motherland. Sharing their dreams with other kababayans (countrymen)with similar dreams, they proudly called themselves Americans with every Star Spangled Banner sung or every allegiance pledged to the flag of the United States, while never forgetting the lessons of the past or their own very familiar dialects. The old and slightly overused Tagalog quotation that loosely translates as “Those who do not bother to look where they came from will never get to where they want to go,” can never be more applicable than in this case of American-accented migrants (because if they speak with a thick accent, they would not be understood in those parts) who switch from one language to another with ease. And as I now fondly recall the smiles on my foster-parents lips which kept spouting a stream of unending Ilocano words with ease, that old famous saying that goes “Home is where the heart is,” comes to mind and I tell myself that that very familiar saying may not be too far off. For in that land hundreds of miles away from anything familiar, where days come in late, swaying coconut trees abound, blue skies, white sandy beaches, blue seas and year-round perfect weather they decided to build their homes… close to their dreams and closer still to their hearts. ©
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