Crossbeak's Journal

Backdrops

The following are earlier postings which I arranged here in chronological order. It touches a bit on my roots, my earliest memories which I weaved with bits of contemporary history if only to serve as milestones of time.

Peace Time
First Published on July 30, 2007
My parents were married during that period in the Philippines referred to as “peace time.” Both of them grew up in the industrial district of Pandacan where the oil companies pitched their depots in Manila along the banks of the Pasig River.Japan had already been at war in Manchuria in 1931 and China in 1937 before the Second World War started in Europe when Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939. In 1940 no one knew that Roosevelt and his Army Chief of Staff George Marshall recognized war in Asia was inevitable. Marshall drew up plans to create a professional army out of a civilian population that was not militarily minded.
By 1941, Japanese military expansion in the Asia-Pacific region had made confrontation and war with the United States increasingly certain. MacArthur did not believe that a Japanese attack was imminent. On November 20, 1941 at a Thanksgiving dinner at the Manila Polo Club MacArthur assured guests that although the conflict was inevitable, “the time and place will be our choosing.”

World War II
First Published on July 31, 2007
My father ran a barber shop at Labores Street fronting the church. They were renting the place and an extension to the shop served as their residence. My mother was the cashier. She studied piano under Prof. Serafin Magracia and graduated with a degree in pianoforte from the UP Conservatory of Music so they bought on installment, a piano from the Yupangco Music Store at Echague. She would eventually pay this all up with Mickey Mouse Money during the Japanese occupation.In early December, Japanese bomber formations were observed flying within 20 miles of Lingayen Gulf beaches and returning to Formosa, presumably making trial runs in preparation for the attack. The actual attack came several hours after the Pearl Harbor attack, when Japanese air strikes destroyed half of MacArthur's air force on the ground.

General MacArthur and Major General Brereton would later fault each other for the loss of half of the Far East Air Force. While Brereton claims it was MacArthur who took no significant action between 3.00 a.m. and 12.20 p.m., a birthday party at the Manila Hotel in honor of General Brereton on Sunday night, December 7, 1941 is said to have caused the airmen to delay implementing an order to fly B-17s at Clark Field to Mindanao where they would be out of range of Formosa-based Japanese bombers. In the final analysis, the Japanese war planes from Formosa practically wiped out American air presence.

Manila Open City
First Published on August 1, 2007
The Japanese army disembarked in three landing sites. Seventy-six transport ships landed the 48th Division at Lingayen and the 16th Division at Lamon Bay, while the third landing was at Mindanao. The primary objectives of the land troops were to take airstrips so that they could continuously extend air superiority as they moved south. Three airstrips at Luzon were taken very quickly, while the Lingayen Gulf region fell on the 22nd of December.
Manila showed all the signs of a modern city under attack. Shop windows were covered with adhesive tape and entrances barricaded with sandbags. Improvised bomb shelters appeared in shops and public buildings. Those fortunate enough to have cellars in their homes spent their nights there. Transportation was commandeered by the Army and gasoline was rationed. Those who drove cars had to shade headlights in the approved fashion.
On December 25, 1941 General MacArthur declared Manila an open city to spare it from Japanese bombings. Late on the night of 26 December Radio Tokyo acknowledged receipt of the Manila broadcasts declaring the capital an open city. Either the Japanese in the Philippines were unaware of the open city declaration or they chose to ignore it, for enemy aircraft were over the Manila area on 27 December.

Pandacan Oil Depot
First Published on August 3, 2007
The staff of the Commanding General ordered the Pandacan oil depots "requisitioned by the U.S. Army." The orders stated: "Any action deemed necessary for the destruction of this property will be handled by the U.S. Army." An engineer in the employ of one of the companies was commissioned a first lieutenant in the Army Corps of Engineers to facilitate this design. On December 26, he received orders to prepare the facilities for demolition. Orders directing the destruction of all remaining petroleum products and the vital parts of the plants were carried out.

At 5:40 p. m., December 31, 1941, while Japanese troops were entering Manila, Army personnel completed a successful demolition. All unused petroleum products were destroyed, and the facilities were rendered useless to the enemy.
Much of the petroleum products found its way to a tributary leading to the Pasig River and eventually burned putting much of Pandacan in flames. The citizens evacuated the area and my mother felt sorry as she left her piano while the town was burning.

A legend among the residents of Pandacan puts the blame on a boatman who supposedly lit a cigarette while all the petrol was pouring from the depot. I believe otherwise: the army engineers wouldn’t leave all that fuel to the hands of the enemy.

The Japanese Occupation.
First Published on August 9, 2007
The Japanese took control of Manila on January 2, 1942. This malady turned to an opportunity for my mother to be reconciled with my grandmother. When she eloped with my father before the war, my grandmother did not welcome her back. A standard joke at the barber shop was to greet my father with “When are you going to visit your mother-in-law?”
Wittingly, my father would give his standard repartee. “She says not to bother. She will be the one to visit us.”

The fire burned much of Pandacan to the ground including my grandfather’s ancestral home which was located beside the oil depot. The barber shop was spared of the conflagration and so was the connecting studio where my parents lived. My father invited my grandparents and their three daughters to stay with them. Grandfather accepted the offer.
The piano was wet, probably from the fire hoses of the fire fighters but after heating it up to dry with incandescent lamps, she was able to play Chopin again.

Life went on.

I was born the following year, while Manila was still occupied by the Japanese, but I have no recollection of what was going on until after the liberation. Much of these things were told to me by my mother.

Japanese Pork Barrel
First Published on August 18, 2007
My father continued the operation of the barber shop during the occupation. Many of the Japanese soldiers became his customers. MacArthur’s “I Shall Return” propaganda must have been so effective that the barbers make fun of saying should there be “any Japanese on the chair when the Americans come, rather than a clean shave, he will get a razor on his throat.”
There was a Japanese soldier who went to the shop, gave us mongo beans and was amused of the baby that was me. There was also a sergeant who sold my father the heads of butchered hogs. The Japanese troops did not eat the head part and the sergeant would fill up a barrel of pork heads and bring it to the shop. My parents sold the pork and made a pretty profit during those hard times.
Like all business opportunities, they come and go. Perhaps the sergeant found someone else who paid a better price for the hog heads as he stopped coming to the shop. One day, my father asked a Japanese Lieutenant whom he was giving a haircut why the sergeant no longer delivers the pork heads.
It turns out that the sergeant was ordered to dispose the heads by throwing them at the river and so, he was reprimanded when the officer learned of his enterprise. The sergeant came fuming mad the next day. My mother was really scared when he pulled out his saber but father kept his cool. Perhaps the sergeant got back to his senses as he returned the saber to its sheath and left.

The Resistance
First Published on August 25, 2007
The great majority of Filipinos mounted a remarkably effective resistance to the Japanese occupation. More than 260,000 Filipinos had been actively engaged in guerrilla organizations and an even larger number operated covertly in the anti-Japanese underground so much so that the Japanese had effective control in only twelve of the country's forty-eight provinces.I recently found family documents, which my mother has a propensity for keeping that my father served as a sergeant in the resistance during the occupation. The papers state that his involvement was in intelligence and reconnaissance activities of the Fil-American Irregular Troops (FAIT) under the command of Col. Hugh Straughn.Col. Straughn was a retired Spanish-American War veteran authorized by MacArthur to organize the Fil-American Irregular Troops in the southern mountains near Antipolo, Rizal. As MacArthur left the Philippines and Bataan fell, Straughn extended his command to cover all of the area south and east of Manila but was captured in August 1943.
Portions of FAIT remained in tact under General Vincente Lim until he was likewise captured. Straughn and Lim were both executed by the Japanese and consequently, the guerilla organizations within the FAIT became independent under their respective leaders.My father never discussed his involvement in the resistance. Mother tells me that he was injured by a shrapnel during the American bombing of Manila. He was missing for days and nowhere to be found until someone adviced my mother to look for him among the injured. She located him at the San Lazaro Hospital suffering from gangrene, a complication due to an infected shrapnel wound that has not been treated properly. Because of the lack of supplies, my mother had to provide the sulfanilamide.

He had a brother who was a captain in the Philippine Army and enjoyed benefits as a veteran but my father never filed for any benefits nor for recognition as a guerilla. Perhaps he considered whatever participation to the resistance as superficial. I know that my father had a radio at the back of the shop during the Japanese occupation from where he was able to get news and other particulars from the United States Office of War Information thru the Voice of America.

Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere
First Published on September 4, 2007
My family had to evacuate from Manila at one point in time or another. I don’t know if this was during the start of the war, during the evacuation or when the Americans came. My father had friends who lived in the nearby provinces, like Laguna and Cavite and we had to camp there for a while. Perhaps it was because life in Manila was difficult while in the province, farm products were aplenty. When I received the sacraments of baptism and confirmation, both my godfathers were farmers, the same people who kept us during those uncertain times.

While most Filipinos were supportive of the resistance, not all were in favor of the Americans. Some were even advocates of Japanese intervention such as the Makapili (Malayang Katipunan ng mga Pilipino), a pro-japanese group organized by the Japanese to assist in anti-guerilla operations. The paramilitary Bisig-Bakal ng Tagala numbered some 500 and said to have closely cooperated with the Japanese in defending Manila. There were many others, collaborators who were accused of giving aid to the invaders. The loyalty of these pro-Japanese units were not very reliable and some may actually engaged in counter espionage and giving aid to the guerillas.

Among these, the ones who were very loyal to the Japanese were the much-hated Makapili, graphically represented as having a "bayong" over their heads to avoid being identified. When the japanese round up the townspeople to arrest guerillas they usually bring one or two makapilis along to identify those involved in the resistance.
In fact, it is ironic for a country that has succeeded in its own anti-colonial revolution against Britain interfered with the first successful liberation of an Asian country from a European colonizer.
But on January 4, 1899 President William Mckinley announced the “Benevolent Assimilation Proclamation” keeping the Philippines as an American colonial possession, thus betraying the lofty goals of the Spanish–American War. On the other hand, the Japanese envisioned an autarkic bloc of Asian nations led by the them and free of Western powers in what was later called Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.
Japanese Prime Minister Matsuoka Yôsuke announced the idea of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere in August 1940. However, the roots of the Co-Prosperity Sphere go back many years prior to its formal announcement. The Japanese envisioned the Co-Prosperity Sphere to be an autarkic bloc of Asian nations led by the Japanese and free of Western powers.
Japan sought to end Western dominance of Asia and build a self-sufficient economy by integrating these lands into its own bloc, isolating the United States and Great Britain from their primary sources of these products. The Americans reacted "It is to the interest of the United States to check a Japanese advance into southeastern Asia."
Because the colonies in South East Asia were "prime sources of raw materials very important to the United States in peace and war," a major council study of American Far Eastern Policy in January 1941 declared "control of these lands by a potentially hostile power would greatly limit our freedom of action."

I Shall Return
First Published on September 9, 2007
“I shall return”…is a legendary line attributed to General Douglas MacArthur. It was used as a war propaganda slogan, the ultimate manifestation of which is the photos taken at Red Beach in Leyte with MacArthur’s entourage emerging from the sea. A musical score similar to James Sanderson’s “Hail to the Chief” should have accompanied the top brass seemingly pressing enemy bunkers ahead. Only Marlboro Country has so far surpassed the brilliance of this PR campaign. Larry Rhine, then Chief of the Philippine Division, Office of War Information who helped set up MacArthur's famous "I Shall Return" speech, must have been instrumental in the conceptualization of this promotion.
MacArthur’a propensity for grandstanding has been used by rivals to malign his reputation. The numerous takes of his "I shall return" speech until he got it just right for the cameras and accusations that the photo ops of the landing in Leyte were mostly -enactments, are among the favorite tirades against MacArthur.“Why walk through the sea when a boat could deliver you safe and sound onto the beach or a pontoon?” is another attack on him. Apologists for MacArthur say that the general’s landing craft hit a sand bar so the top brass decided to muddle through.

Even then, detractors say that MacArthur liked the photo opportunity at Red Beach so much he brought his entourage to the White Beach the next day for the whole press corps to take photos. What's more. there are claims that reenactments of the same shoot taken at Lingayen have been passed off as the original Leyte Landing.

Not even the use of the singular pronoun "I" instead of "We" has been spared to accuse him of being an self-centered. The Office of War Information wanted him to say “We shall return” but MacArthur stood firm. It General Carlos P. Romulo who defended the phrase saying “America has let us down and won't be trusted, but the people still have trust in MacArthur. If he says he is coming back, he will be believed.”

The Philippine Campaign
First Published on September 16, 2007
While Manila was waiting for the American liberation forces, my grandfather died. It was January 4, 1945, a little over two months after General Douglas MacArthur landed at Leyte, and three weeks after American troops landed at Mindoro which was to serve as a jump off point for planes for the invasion of Luzon. A few days grandfather’s burial, the Americans stormed ashore Lingayen with 68,000 troops and drove on towards Manila.

A month after Lolo died, the U.S. Sixth Army attacked the Japanese in Manila. My mother is sad to think that Lolo Ciano never saw the liberation of Manila. To many Filipinos, liberation was associated with corned neef, Milky Way chocolates, Chesterfield cigarettes and other goodies that the G.I.s brought with them. Lolo did not get to enjoy these.So many lives were lost during the war. Military war dead, anti-Japanese guerillas killed in action, POWs that died in captivity, victims of Japanese war crimes, civilians due to war related factors. The anxiety of the war and news of atrocities being committed by the retreating Japanese was too much for an old man. He suffered from a nervous breakdown which was the cause of his death.I have no recollection of Marciano Noble as I was only a year old when he passed away. His parents, my great grandparents, were Petronilo Noble and Barbara de Jesus; he had a sister named Isidra whom my mother called Kakang Sidra. Lolo worked for Don Mauro Prieto at the Herminal at Marquez de Comillas Street which I suspect was really Tabacalera. The war deprived me of the joys a young boy gets from a grandfather.

March to Manila
First Published on September 23, 2007
Some sixty miles south of Manila is Nasugbu, Batangas where the Central Azucarera de Don Pedro is to be found. Don Emilio Gonzalez worked at the sugar central and his grand-daughters from Manila would spend their summer vacations with him. I met one of these girls on board an army truck going north from Manila to Pangasinan; in due course, , I took her home as my wife. But that’s long after the war, and that’s another story.Going back to 1945, it was at Pangasinan where the Americans established a 20-mile beachhead on January 9, from Lingayen and Dagupan to the west, and to San Fabian in to the east. And it was at Nasugbu on January 31 where the 11th Airborne made an amphibious landing.
From the north, the 1st Cavalry was committed to march to Manila, reinforced with armor and motorized artillery and support units. With the Cavalry at the left the 37th Division mopped up operations at the right. The Japanese destroyed many of the bridges to impede the progress of the invaders. The 556th Heavy Ponton Division built a treadway bridge to carry heavy equipment while the 530th Light Ponton Company installed seven bridges for the 37th Division.The 1st Cavalry reached the outer edges of Manila on February 3 while the Japanese moved south of the Pasig River to defend the government buildings and the walls of Intramuros.
From the south, the 11th Airborne Division landed unopposed at Nasugbu, seized a nearby bridge before the surprised Japanese had a chance to demolish it, and turned toward Manila. The division's third regiment, the 511th Parachute, dropped in by air at Tagaytay to join the advance. The convoy sped north along the paved highway to Manila with civilians cheering them along the way.The 511th met some resistance at Imus, five miles south of Manila. By dawn on February 4 the paratroopers ran into increasingly heavy and harassing fire from Japanese riflemen and machine gunners. At the Paranaque River, just south of the Manila city limits, the battalion halted at a badly damaged bridge only to be battered by Japanese artillery fire from Nichols Field. The 11th Airborne Division had reached the main Japanese defenses south of Manila and could go no further.

The Battle for Manila
First Published on October 2, 2007

We are from that part of Manila south of the Pasig River where the Japs took their last stand. Many lives have been lost as the retreating Japanese took their ire at civilians. The church at San Marcelino and the De La Salle College at Taft Avenue are some landmarks where atrocities have been committed. My father was hit by a shrapnel, presumably from friendly fire.

The 8th Cavalry Brigade north of the river successfully liberated the internment camp at the University of Santo Tomas after which they headed to cross the River but the Japanese destroyed all the bridges except one. Quezon Bridge spanned across the Pasig from Quiapo at the north to Plaza Lawton at the southern part of
Manila. The 2nd Squadron of the 5th Cavalry tried to seize that bridge but were stopped at a roadblock at Quezon Boulevard. Japanese heavy machine guns from Far Eastern University stopped the Americans. The bridge was eventually blown up by the enemy impeding the deliverance of Manila.
While the troops from the north had the Pasig River to cross, at the south was the 11th Airborne coming from Batangas which encountered firmly entrenched Japanese naval troops at Nichols Air Base.The Americans used heavy artillery to flush out Japanese hold outs and the continuous shelling was a threat not only to the Japanese but to us civilians as well. We joined other residents to safer places with my mother holding me close to her all the while.

Some of the troops eventually crossed the river. The most bitter fighting for Manila was at the Isla de Provisor at the center of the Pasig River. The Japanese garrison there managed to hold off the American infantry until 11 February. The Paco Railroad Station was another site where the enemy held out. Manila was the most devastated city Asia during World War II, next only to Warsaw. Government buildings, universities

Manila was the most devastated city Asia during World War II, next only to Warsaw. Government buildings, universities and colleges, convents, monasteries and churches were destroyed. Our cultural heritage (including art, literature, and especially architecture) a mixing of Spanish, American and Asian was gone.Was it the reckless bombardment by the Americans or the uncompromising Japanese who could have declared Manila an open city that is to blame? Manileňos will keep on asking this question without ever getting satisfied to any rationalization of the Americans or the Japanese.

Liberation
First Published on October 10, 2007

The Battle for Manila from February to March 1945 was fought by American, Filipino and Japanese forces, part of the Philippines' 1945 campaign. The one-month battle, which culminated in a terrible bloodbath and total devastation of the city, was the scene of the worst urban fighting in the Pacific theater.A ponton bridge built by Army engineers at Nagtahan enabled American troops and their heavy equipment started to cross the river. One of my father’s friends, Jacinto Ciria Cruz of the basketball team that made the fifth place in the 1936 Berlin Olympic Games (all time record of highest finish for Philippine basketball), came with the liberation forces in his army uniform.

My mother tells me of so many dead soldiers lining up the banks of one of the tributaries leading to the Pasig. I wonder what ever happened to the Japanese that were customers of the barber shop, particularly that one who gave us mongo beans.
Japanese money became known as Mickey Mouse money and peso bills marked Victory became the legal tender.

Victory Joe
First Published on October 19, 2007

“Joe” gestured with Winston Churchill's victory sign, became a common banter among Filipinos when dealing with American soldiers. Kids yelled “Hey Joe“, “Chocolate Joe“ and “Victory Joe“ when an American serviceman passes by. Jose Hernandez, rode on the popularity of the phrase “Victory Joe” and named his enterprise Victory Liner.
Filipinas who went around with American G.I.s were considered “hanggang pier” which inspired the movie “Victory Joe” where two military officers, an American (Art Cantrell), and a Filipino (Rogelio De la Rosa) vie for the love of a pretty provincial girl (Norma Blancaflor).My father bought a big drum of petroleum jelly pilfered from military supplies by some enterprising G.I. Joe. My parents repacked the stuff in small, added a drop of fragrance, placed a sign “Pomade – 50 centavos” outside the shop and made good business from civilians commuting to and from the north of the river.
This was the time of rebuilding, not only the ruins left by the indiscriminate bombardment, but of lives that the war interrupted. Milky Way chocolates, Chesterfield cigarettes and Corned Beef overflowed and Filipinos took this as the start of the good life. White Label and White Horse were plentiful and so were other merchandise available from the PX. Father made good in trading surplus materials and was able to buy a lot from Mr. Tuazon, his friend from Sampaloc who shared his passion for automobiles

I really have no recollection of all these things except the empty drum of petrolatum at our backyard. The image is still clear to me: my father frugally scraping the dregs from the sides of that drum. He sold so many jars of pomade from that drum.

G.I.s
First Published on October 29, 2007

My mother paid all the installments on her piano with Japanese Occupation currency which eventually had no value except as a collector’s item. In place of the Japanese customers, the American G.I.s patronized the barber shop paying in Victory Money.
One of these soldiers was Herman Kesting from Bellingham, Minnesota who became a friend of my parents and after the war, sent me letters and Christmas gifts from the states. He was my childhood champion My personal impression of Americans has been favorably influenced by the gracious manifestation of this fine gentleman, an image similar to what Audie Murphy portrayed in “To Hell and Back.”Perhaps my father was jealous to see his son hero worship somebody else when he said “That G. I. has always been on the tail end of the war.” This did not dent my adulation of Herman Kesting. Many of my father’s friends were Americans, but the words stuck.G.I. is a term that has been identified with members of the U.S. armed forces. People believe that this came from the term "Government Issue" which labeled many military provisions but in fact the origin is from the term “galvanized iron”.Eventually, I came to realize that G.I.s came in different sizes, shapes and characters. My father made the acquaintance of Harry Stonehill at the Polo Club. This one was a U.S. Army Lieutenant who decided to stay in the Philippines after the war. He went into business from army surplus to cigarettes and put up the US Tobacco Corporation. Stonehill brought tobacco seeds from America and began growing Virginia tobacco, built flue-curing barns in La Union and Pangasinan, and became the most successful American businessman in the Philippines. He was later accused of illegal importation of cigarette paper into the country, declaring the shipments as "school supplies," and manufacturing cigarettes illegally.

Another G.I. who made good was William Bird who organized Philippine Rock Products which was engaged in transit mixed concrete and construction. He started making driveways for residences and pavements for gasoline stations, using a “one bagger” concrete mixer. He made good when Philrock started getting contracts in the American bases, presumably owing his military connections. Bird started to build up on construction equipment and transit mixed concrete trucks which he got from the bases. Bird built a reputation of having the cleanest mixers on the road, a tradition that his company kept even after he sold the company and moved to Thailand where he organized Bird & Sons.

The Quonset Hut
First Published on November 5, 2007

My earliest recollection of my childhood was lying on a banig with my parents in theit bedroom which had no bed. We were staying in one of those Quonset huts the G.I.s left as their troops moved on. This Quonset stood at the property of my grandmother so we all moved out of the barber shop and lived in this military innovation.
Next to the Quonset hut was a vacant lot owned by the parish. It became the stockyard of my father’s surplus G.I. sheets. Although he continued to ran the barber shop, There was an extension to the hut which was rented out to a Chinese named Vicente who ran a sari-sari store. One of my aunts raised orchids and some florist bought her mariposas and cattleyas. Another aunt sold rice while the eldest worked in Chinatown for a big hardware store.Outside, right beside the door was a guava tree. It must have been just after liberation as I recall we would have family get togethers at the living room and it seems to me that my aunts and their guests were all sitting on the floor. I can’t recall whether the piano stayed at barber shop extension or brought to the Quonset.
The time must have been after the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945 and I must have been at least three years old. One evening, a rocket flew of the sky and ended with a loud bang. It turned out that some scavengers found this bomb by the river and accidentally detonated it. A few blocks away, there was a big yard filled with surplus war materials, mostly jeeps and trucks.While Manila was putting away the remnants of war, the "Noble and Ever Loyal City". will never be the same. A certain sadness lingers in my heart.

Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters
First Published on November 18, 2007
Elpidio Quirino succeeded Manuel Roxas as president upon the latter’s death on April of 1948. My aunt tells me of flowers dropping from an airplane during the president’s funeral and I am not sure if it was a child’s imagination playing on me, but such a scenario persists in my memory as if I actually saw it. I guess every kid has a kaleidoscope of one’s earliest insights. This must have started my awareness of nation building and curiosity about politics.I recall the day when my mother took me for a walk some two corners away from the quonset hut. She showed me a house that was being built. I suppose she had to explain what it was as that was the first time I ever saw something being built. I recall seeing the wooden structures and the carpenters working on the trusses of the roofing. Mother said we were building a new house. “We” turned out to be just her, my father and me. I never gave it a thought why my grandmother and aunts did not move would us then.When playing with the alphabet blocks Herman sent me from the U.S. I would see the workmen working on the trusses. Much later, when I came across J.D. Salinger’s story which was first published in The New Yorker on November 1955“ the same backdrop of my early childhood flashed back in my mind. To this time and age, “Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters” still does.And so we moved to our new home, me and my parents, even if some of the finishing work remains to be done. One of the windows did not have shutters and for a while, we covered it with a canvass to keep the rain out. We had no door locks so my father improvised using a metal oar, one of those the military used to paddle inflated rafts, to bar the door. A very humble house indeed, but it was our own and my parents were proud of it.

Christmas Presents
First Published on November 14, 2007

When Herman Kesting went back home to Bellingham, Minnesota, he continued to write and send me Christmas presents. The one I remember most was a toy gun, one of those cowboy cap pistols complete with a holster.It was my aunt who claimed the parcel from the post office and I asked her where the other pistol was. She said there was only one but I couldn’t be fooled because the box had a picture showing two pistols with two holsters. But no, she insisted there was only one and I missed the fun of packing two pistols and be contented with one. In any case, the single pistol with holster was a source of pride as it was different from those available locally. All the other kids would sport a “Bang-O” but mine was different; my indoctrination to a state-side bias.After a few years, the gun broke down. Lo and behold, she comes out with the other pistol and the left handed holster. I guess Aunts will never understand the difference between being a cowboy sporting two guns and a bandit having one pistol tucked in his pants. But things have changed much since after the war. Today, my daughter would not think of me giving her son any gun for a christmas present. I wonder if Santa would ever give him one when he writes him for a toy gun.

Herman Kesting
First Published on December 16, 2007

There was one other present I received from Herman that to this date, I still cherish. It was a child’s reading book complete with all the illustrations with the poem “Twas the night before Christmas” by Clement Clarke Moore.

I liked reading the book every year as the holidays came. I don’t know if that made me believe in Santa Claus or not. I just liked the picture of the stockings hanging on the chimney and the last stanza which reads…

"He sprang to his sleigh,
to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew
like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim,
‘ere he drove out of sight,
"Happy Christmas to all,
and to all a good-night!"

General Atomics
First Published on December 27, 2007

I recently found out that my childhood friend died on March 7. 2005. The County Obituaries of the San Diego Union Tribune of March 20, 2005 read:
HERMAN LAURENCE KESTING
Jan. 13, 1924-March 7, 2005
Herman Laurence Kesting, 81, of San Diego died March 7. He was born in Bellingham, Minn., and was a health physicist at General Atomics. He served in the Army during World War II.
Survivors include his wife, Margaret Kesting; and sister, Dolores Huckle of Appleton, Minn.
Inurnment: Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery, Point Loma.
Donations: Kaiser Hospice, 10992 San Diego Mission Road, San Diego, CA 92108.
The same information later appeared at the G.A. Retirees Association web page.
He wrote me letters and signed them Herman and Margaret, I was also introduced to his nephew Tommy Huckle who must have been the son of Dolores. Tom and I became pen pals and exchanged a few letters. He studied to be a dentist, methinks at St. Olaf College since he sent me a beautiful mug with the college’s name and seal.
Herman did write about moving to San Diego to work with a company dealing with atomic energy; for “peaceful uses” he emphasized probably because the devastation of Hiroshima and Nagasaki was still fresh in the minds of people. He never told me much about the work and it’s only now that I find out it was at General Atomics which was founded in 1955 to explore peaceful uses of atomic energy. Leading scientists came to GA, forming the nucleus of a staff and Herman Kesting must have been one of the pioneers.There goes one good man and I have lost a good friend.

My First Brawl
First Published on June 16, 2006

At four years of age, I went to nursery school at the parish convent. My first teacher was Mrs. Lucina Alday who lives in the same street where my father built a new house for us. My favorite school mate was a curly haired kid named Hector. He was very talkative and always had a running nose. I envied kids with running noses and wondered why I didn’t suffer the same privilege. One day, during the customary recess, I noticed a group of four or five boys at the church patio. Hector was one of them and he seemed to have a nice discussion going on with another boy named Jimmy. I approached hoping to take part in their small convention. As I drew near, I heard Hector tell Jimmy “How about this one, will you fight him?”Whatever dispute they had then, I did not have any idea. To this day, I still wonder what made Hector do what we did. Before I knew what was happening, Jimmy and I were throwing fists at each other. Goodness, I never had any idea what fighting was all about. There was no television then and any form of physical combat was not in my vocabulary. But I did lock his neck in one arm and pummeled his head with the other. Blood gushed out of his nose. No, I was not surprised even if that was the first time in my life that I saw blood. I must’ve thought it was just another case of a running nose. I don’t know if I was even delighted but I don’t think I had any intention of stopping the fight. I never thought that I should go to my corner. No, I had no intention of allowing my opponent a chance to get his second wind. Thank heavens, some of the other boys had the sense to stop the fight. I was not mean. I was just a four year old who didn’t know what was going on.

The Boy Who Stole My Magnet
First Published on June 21, 2006

Like all young boys, I was proud with this little magnet that my father gave me. It was a horse shoe magnet, probably used in some electrical device. But it was powerful and I showed off its capability to my friend Freddie. My friend was awed by the magnet but being younger, he was satisfied just to watch. But he was such a nice kid and I allowed him to play with my toy magnet.
Freddie and I tried different materials to find out which ones would respond to the magnet’s powers.. I don’t know how we learned to put dirt on top of a sheet of paper and watch the filings form along the magnetic field. Some older boy may have taught us that trick.
One day, another kid took note of my magnet. He asked if he could borrow it but Freddie cautioned me that the fellow will not return it. While Freddie was younger than me, he was street smarter so I refused to lend my magnet but this kid was persistent. “I will only try it on some metals at home, then come back right away.”

“He will not come back,” Freddie warned.
He didn’t give up. “I will just try it on that nail on the fence at the other side of the street. Then I’ll return it to you.”
I should’ve just said, I’ll go with you but the problem was that my parents did not allow me to get out of the yard, and definitely not cross the street. I must really be naïve to think that my magnet will be within sight so no harm can come to pass.

So I lent him my magnet. He crosses the street, tests it on the fence nail, looks back at us, and runs away with my magnet. Freddie was right about that kid.

As P.T. Barnum says, “A sucker is born every minute.”

8/08/2008

Allied Medical Profession

My daughter is super patient with her son. She tries to talk values to him even when he was barely five years old. One day she asks "What would you want to be son?"

"A race car driver, Mom," says he, much to my daughter's disappointment. If I were there, I would have gone along with that early choice of a career; I wouldn't mind a Michael Schumacher Besides, what do kids know about careers at such an early age?

But there's no way my daughter who has the patience of Job and the persistence of Abraham negotiating for Sodom and Gomorrah would abandon the cause. "Wouldn't you rather be a doctor?"

"No Mom. I don't want to be a doctor; I want to be a race car driver," he maintains with resoluteness and the battle lines are drawn between mother and son.

"You know son," his mother says, still with her very persuasive ways, "you can help people if you become a doctor. You can cure the sick of their illness, help old people."

"Okay Mom. I'll drive an ambulance."

Photo: NEED A RIDE by Olivier Agustin

7/22/2008

Industrial Engineers at Singapore

Restie Nieva is an Industrial Engineer now based in Singapore. Restie is Senior Project Engineer at Infineon Technologies where his work involves developing new IC products for various computer and electronic applications.

After graduating in 1992, at the height of FVR’s presidential campaign, Restie’s first job involved day to day machine and manpower utilization in a small printing company that produces plastic bottles. He left the company when it encountered labor problems and moved to a company that manufactured gaskets for refrigerators and freezers as Planning and Production Supervisor. After three years, he moved to the semicon industry as Production Supervisor at EAI, a subsidiary of IMI (Integrated Micro-electronics Inc.) that assembles Iomega Zip Drives. The company sent him to the United States for training and later assigned to Inventory and Materials Control.

From EAI, he transferred to Amkor Anam at Sta Rosa Laguna as Production Supervisor for Chip Scale Package (CSP) a device installed on thin cell phones (that time Nokia and Alcatel). The environment at Amkor was dynamic and the pressure high. “I was expected to accomplish several tasks at a time, plan the production program, monitor outputs per process, meet delivery schedules, resolve quality issues, attend to grievances.” Says Restie. “We had endless meetings... but I enjoyed it. a lot of opportunity for professional growth.”

His Malaysian boss at Amkor Anam resigned and brought the process engineers with him to join STATS ChipPAC in Singapore leaving Restie alone to fill in the job of those who left. “I can't imagine an IE doing a job of ECE, EE, ME, ChE,” Restie says “but that’s what we IEs were trained for. It's a challenge, I tried my best, and I learned.”

Eventually, he was invited by his former boss to handle production in Singapore. Restie was unhappy with the working conditions at STATS ChipPAC so he went back to Amcor Anam, this time as Qualification Engineer, taking care of new products and device development for several types of IC's. He brought new business to Amkor from customers such as Intel, Philips, Xilinx and other computer and communication companies.

After three years, he received another offer to join STATS ChipPAC, this time under new management. He left the Philippines again in 2003 and seeing that working conditions has improved with Korean management, Restie brought his wife and family to live in Singapore. In 2005, Restie transferred to Infineon Technologies, a subsidiary of Siemens which spinned off in the 1980s.

“Singapore is a multiracial multicultural country and we never had a problem on any sort ot discrimination, “says Restie. “However, our children are challenged as they have to learn one of the 3 second languages (Tamil, Malay, or Chinese) as one of their subjects in school. They chose Chinese (Mandarin) which my wife and I are also trying to learn.”

“On Sunday our kids go to Catechism class in the morning and before lunch time, we all go to mass. Sometimes, we see Arlene Lazaro and Rod Costuna in church. Both were my Industrial Engineering classmates in Adamson and got married to each other. Rod works with IMFLASH which is a merger of Intel and Micron while Arlene is also with Avago, another semicon company.”

5/28/2008

Julius Gallego

Just wanted to keep record of this caretaker of the plot of my parents, grandparents and aunts. Julius Gallego went to ask for an advance of his fee for the year. Seven hundred fifty pesos is not bad for six months... someone told me that this guy is a sabungero..

The only problem I have is the vaults are almost at ground level and the grass dries up during summer. Oh well, where have all the flowers gone.

5/18/2008

Red Palm

Today I bought two Red Palms and had them planted at my Grandmother's House at Old Balagtas. Noel who sells plants on a push cart gave them at 650 pesos including the soil which I believe is a fair price. My intention is to let the palms propagate and serve as a baffle to the neighboring house; my wife is just peeved at that neighbor and insists I put up a higher fence.

Noel works with this fellow who owns Amador Garden and he tells me their fleet of push carts are accomodated at barangay La Paz. I admire these people plying the streets of Manila with plants although some of them are really hustlers. I also had the fountain in place but the plumbing and the pump still has to be added.

4/06/2008

The Final Lap

Tony Mapa died on March 3, 2005. Initial reports said he met a tragic car accident on the South Luzon Expressway (SLEX). His nephew Dondi writes on his blog “My dear uncle and godfather, Antonio Ledesma Mapa, passed away…on his way from the Mapa-Ledesma farm in Tanjay, Negros Oriental to the Ledesma farm in San Carlos, Negros Occidental. The accident happened in the town of Guihulngan… Ninong Tony was 66 years old.”

On November 2007, Joe de Luna was diagnosed with cancer of the lungs. He requested for a priest whom he usually fetches to say mass at the funeral parlor. The priest, Fr. Choy of of the Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament, was due to leave for his new assignment in the United States, came to hear his confession and administer the anointing of the sick on Mang Joe. He eventually died after four months on the afternoon of March 23, 2008 Easter Sunday. He complained to his daughter that he had no sleep for the last four days coinciding with the passion of Our Lord.

Mang Joe's body lay at state at the same funeral parlor he was working for. He looked smart wearing his funeral attendant’s gala uniform. His sister gave the eulogy and expressed her family’s appreciation to the owners of the parlor for giving Joe the opportunity to live a decent life. The response was “It is our family who should give thanks to Mang Joe for having given half of his life in service. We were still children and when he worked with my father and this was still a struggling business.”

Both of these gentlemen were professional drivers in different lines, but they have lived life to the fullest.

Photos:
Phil. Motor Sports Festival 2003: by Regie Fernando
Superior Cadillac Statesman from Shields Southeast Sales

4/01/2008

Professional Drivers

Let me take a side trip to write about a professional driver I met. His name is Tony, drove for the Toyota Racing Team with Dante Silverio. I hitched with him from Baguio to Manila and he would smoothly overtake five or six cars at the mountain road. Somehow, it felt very safe the way he drove. Tony tells me that he stopped driving professionally because as a family man, he can no longer take the risks he used to during his younger days. But then, the passion for driving is difficult to break and perhaps for the sheer pleasure of it, the father and son team of “rally legend...Tony... and son Francis” join a good sampling of rally figures at The Dodo Ayuyao Memorial Sampaguita Rally.

Mang Joe’s career as a professional driver is different. He drove for a physician and his family. When the doctor migrated to the United States, he was recommended to a businessman who was putting up a funeral parlor, driving for him and his family and eventually the funeral coaches. He got married, raised a family and built a shanty in a private compound at New Manila.

Every now and then, Mang Joe would pass by his Lola’s house. Without being told, he would start doing house chores and clean the garage, chat with his Lola and the maids. If he still has time, he would buy a few bottles of beer at the sari-sari store. One day, he told his Lola he always dreams of coffins and that worried him. Lola amusingly repllied “What do you expect? You are working in a funeraria and see coffins the whole day.”

3/30/2008

Mang Joe

We should all live life well. Everyone would have different interpretations of that cliché. I know a gentleman (perhaps not many would refer to him as such) who lived life very well. Let me simply call him Mang Joe, as many people called him. I will intentionally miss out on many of the details as they will only clutter the simplicity of this gentleman.

His father, a carpenter from Marinduque, had more children than he could feed and he entrusted Joe to a lady whom the boy would call Lola. It amuses her to recall that when Mang Joe came to her home, he was wearing a rather short shirt exposing his belly. He was very young, around nine or ten years old, naive of the city and in many other things. His only treasure was a picture of a boat, one of those with a wooden hull, which he proudly declares that his father helped build.

His Lola taught him moral and spiritual values and while his Lolo, a stern disciplinarian, taught him the value of work. “It is not important what work one does,” his Lolo would say “As long as that is what God wants him to do and he does it to the best of his ability, he is a successful man.”

But like any growing boy, he was attracted to playing at the neighborhood billiard hall. He also went to school but he did not keep at it and he did his share of barkada which taught him to drink and smoke, but there was something good in the young Mang Joe that brought him close to good people.

A religious sister offered him a job as janitor for the parochial school. Again, it amused his Lola when he resigned after a year or so. He complained that he never got to finish his job cleaning the yard since leaves keep on falling from the acacia tree.

Because his Lolo suffered from a cataract operation and cannot drive, he returned to them, this time as the family driver. Thus Mang Joe started a profession as a driver.

Bonnet, Crossbeak & Bone

About Me

Blog Archive