We once had an orchard – a five-hectare property planted with mangoes, tamarind,guavas and pomelo trees. I loved that place, its leafy canopy shaded the contours of the area, and where the smell is the smell of life, and the earth. The gently rolling hill was a cradle that held childhood memories o f Christmas parties, games and idyllic frolic. I have loved the gently leaning shack of the tenants who lived there. The scent of ripening mangoes would perfume my recollection of this place.
I remember hiking on weekends with childhood friends. My friends and myself would have barbeque and would spend the day there – losing ourselves in boyhood games, and imagination. It was a place of childhood frolic and fun. I would point out to them our carabaos – Assemblyman and Doktora (named after my dad and mom) and their daughter, Gangga (named after my eldest sister). My mom got the scare of her life when our tenant reported that Gangga was bitten by a snake (thinking that our tenant was talking about my sister. She then realized that the actual Gangga was at school in Cebu).
My father began to construct a rest house there. I always thought that it would be perfect to live there. In my young boy’s mind, I was already envisioning days spent in bliss, the silence of the hills broken by the gentle rustle of leaves, and the soft calls of the carabaos. Once I fancied myself an artist, and this farm could be where my studio would be – finding inspiration here, and creating things of beauty, very much like the place where all these will be created. Childhood was filled with grand plans for a precarious future.
Somehow, the intervening events prevented these plans. We were sent to Cebu to go to school. I only rarely got to see this farm. Soon caught up in the turmoil of teenage angst, and preoccupation, the farm, while rarely visited, became a backdrop to our lives. It was a place in the distance; a primeval place abandoned but always longed for.
And then my mother got sick. The farm became a place of comfort for her. She would go to this farm and find whatever solace she could in its peaceful refuge. The cool breeze and the silence would comfort her. The flowering mango trees, and the slowly ripening pomelos seem to hold a promise of continuity and time – extravagance that my mother realized were no longer hers. When she passed away, we had her buried in a spot that overlooks the gently rolling hills. It was her favourite place. From that vantage point, you can see the rice field. In his grief, my father built a chapel to house my mother’s tomb. He would spend many days there, finding consolation in the rich atmosphere of the farm.
We have lost this farm in a series of uncalculated moves and as a result of naive dash of optimism, a casualty of poor financial planning perhaps. But the circumstances went so fast we did not have time to mourn the loss of this place. I was already here in Baguio when it finally happened. But distance was not too far as the news reached me with surprising ache. I can only imagine the pain my father felt as the thought of losing that precious place would mean. My elder sister, filled with nameless hurts, suffered at the idea that we cannot hold on to that place. While my younger siblings were too busy to making a career for themselves on another island, I am sure they too felt the loss of an important place – a place of mythical and iconic significance for all of us – marking the end of an era, an end to a life we once had. I have not estimated the amount of loss we have incurred – not just financially, but more importantly, emotionally, but I am sure, it is a loss whose significance will haunt us in unexpected moments.
There will no longer a place to visit whenever the fevers of life become too much. At some future day, I will no longer be able to bring my children to a place, and say, “This is where I have spent my days as a boy,” or point them to the spot where my mother is buried, and say, “That’s where your lola is buried. She was a great woman, and I am sad you did not meet her or got to know her.”
There was a tinge of sadness in my father’s voice when he told me that someone has already bought the property, and that we have to move my mother’s bones to the family plot in Davao. On other days, or in my previous life, I would have railed and ranted at the misfortune – but there was a quiet resignation in me that day. I felt sad. I will mourn the loss of this place for I don't know how long – but life must go on.
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