Castle of Memory

Castle of Memory

 

 

I’ve lived in the United States country for 40 of my 55 years. I was born here, and left when I was four. We moved back to the US in 1966, boomeranged back to the Philippines in 1968. I stayed for ten years and left in 1978. There’s a funny thing about a place where one grows up. It never leaves you. Images daily come into my mind while I am engaged in 21^st century pursuits. I will hear the rooster’s crow at Cresta Ola, the resort my grandparents built in Bauang, La Union. I will return to the task at hand. While I open up the fridge to get a piece of cheese, something will change the pictures in my head. I will remember walking into my house in Baguio, on a sunny day.

I remember Casa Blanca, the house my grandparents built before World War II. I remember the smell of floor wax and adobo, a heady concoction, and how my leather shoes clicked on the mahogany floor into the red tiled dining room.

While cooking dinner in 2012, I will remember the sight of sunlight on the ocean at Cresta Ola, the way it sparkled on the waves. A band would be playing “Somewhere Beyond the Sea” or “Yellow Bird”. Around the pool guests sat at tables and Efren and Luis, the intrepid waiters, would hustle the trays of food.  I never thought it would end.

Coming back to the U.S. was always an option, but I didn’t think of it back in the 1970’s.  Life was new every day and what better thing was there than to be young and in this unknown corner of the world, anchored by two outposts of the American Empire, Camp John Hay and Wallace Air Station?

When I was a little girl perhaps eight years old, we lived at Clark Air Base. There were buses than ran up to Camp John Hay every day. My grandmother was sick. One day my mother asked me to go with her up to Baguio. I gladly went. I remember looking out of the blue bus going past neat rice fields and villages. How was life in those homes? I wondered about everything I saw.

Up Kennon Road we went and the magic started. A little while later, the atmosphere had changed completely. We were in the pine forests. The ground turned to red clay. Then we took a turn at Military Cut-Off Road and the bus stopped just in front of the Main Gate of Camp John Hay. My mother and I stepped off the bus, and crossed the small street – all of five steps. Down a little moss covered set of stairs we went- I remember three. We were in front of the Pavia’s house. Then down the driveway of our house, Casa Blanca.

In the small front yard was the statue of the child with “Give Us This Day, Our Daily Bread” embossed and moss covered. Up the stairs we went – under the iron scroll work that bore my grandfather’s initials- FGJ. The door opened, “Ay Senora Pat! Nandito po si Senora Pat!”. My mother, shed her officer’s wife identity and stepped into her childhood home.

I stepped into my grandmother’s bedroom to greet her, and was surprised at how thin she was. She was still smiling. My grandfather asked me what I wanted to do. I told him I wanted to go to the market and buy rings. He looked slightly amused and said we would go later.

But first, I ran through the house, opening doors and looking in drawers. I looked at the magazine rack in the living room, then went into my mother’s childhood bedroom, where we would sleep in twin beds that night. There was a mural across the top of the wall, Mickey Mouse on one side, the Three Little Pigs on the other. It had survived World War II

That afternoon I went with my grandfather to the market  and we walked to the part that had all the jewelry in the world. For me, I may as well have been in the souks of the Middle East. I chose a silver ring with a blue glass stone. It made me very happy.

We went to mass at the cathedral that afternoon, to pray for Lola’s health, and I was bothered by the intensity of the praying – it was then that I knew things were seriously wrong.

That evening, Lolo and I stood on the steps of Casa Blanca and Igorots (members of the indigenous mountain tribes) came into the yard next door. There was a small bonfire, and the dancing began. With  arms outstretched, they danced  with graceful steps and swayed to the music of the gongs.The firelight casts shadows on the ground and turned the dancers bronze.I Although I was small, I knew I had to remember that moment. It was going to be over very soon. My grandmother would die, my grandfather would become interminably sad, everything would be lost.

But in my heart, the images, sounds, and impressions seem to grow stronger every year. What I loved does not exist, yet I cannot escape it. It shaped me and sends me chasing sunsets and fogs, old houses full of books and trees.

When I was very sick in 2005, I had something like a vision. It was a very clear dream. I was coming off of sedation drugs. I’ve never had a dream like that. In the dream I was with all my children and Bud at Casa Blanca. I remember walking up the stairs and going into the old house. Everyone was there, all the aunties and uncles and cousins and brothers and sisters and grandparents and my parents. We were all there. There was a feeling of delight and beauty and it was so real I was surprised when my mind corrected itself. Many of the people are dead, and the house is long gone, finally felled by a terrible earthquake. Ruins sit overlooking the mountains, still  full of memories .

Perhaps in heaven, we can be given the glorified version of things we loved most. Perhaps.

 

When I finally meet my great-great grandparents

All my life in the Philippines, I would listen to the stories my Daddy told me about Georgia. He left the South as a young man with my mother, two babies and one on the way. He moved his young family to California  where the discriminatory marriage laws had faded into history. A few years later we were in the Philippines, and as soon as I could sit and listen, he started talking.

I think talking about the South was a way that he could process the incredible bond and incredible conflicts he had about his birthplace.

Against the first backdrop of those mountains in the Philippines, he told me about Sherman’s March to the sea, and the wake of utter destruction left behind.

Mary Elisabeth was strong. John Michael died in a skirmish on the South Newport River at the end of the war. A little more time, just a little more, and the war would have been over.

They were yeoman farmers, not slave holders. They farmed the same land that came to them after the American Revolution a little  inland from Savannah. John Michael left a handprint on the wall of his log cabin.

Mary Elisabeth won in a war of will against Sherman’s soldiers.

The dialog was one I heard more times than I can count.

Mary Elisabeth’s brothers were the bane of the Union Army. They were known for beheading enemy soldiers while riding at full gallop on mules, not horses.  They were wanted men.

The Union soldiers came to the farm. John Michael had been killed just days before this. He was shot while on picket duty on the river. His body was brought home in an ox cart and buried under an old oak tree.

“Tell us where your brother is,” they said. Mary Elisabeth said nothing. I suppose she glared at them.

One solder took a step closer to her. He pointed at a tree with an overhanging branch. “We’re going to catch your brothers and hang them from that tree.”

“I hear it’s catchin’ before hangin’”, said Mary Elisabeth.

“We’re going to take your boy,” said the Union soldier.

My great-grandfather, George Vernon, only seven years old,  froze.

“Go ahead,” said Mary Elisabeth calmly, “you haven’t left me anything to feed him with.”

The Union soldiers picked up George Vernon and put him on the back of a horse. They rode to the end of the lane and set him down. Forever after, he had a fear of guns. His son, my grandfather, Dr. John Felton Burkhalter, didn’t.

They all survived the war, and the family came back, with scars and stories. The old farm was bought by the government and became part of Fort Stewart. When the time came to move, they dug up the bones of John Michael and moved them to their present resting place, Antioch Cemetery, where the family awaits the Second Coming of the Lord.

There was another family story, of a portrait Mary Elisabeth and John Michael and visitors who came to see family members. There was excitement in the air, back in the 1950′s, the picture had never been seen by our branch of the family.

There was an argument, (my family is not known for self-control)  and the guests packed up and left and the breach was never fixed.

On visits to Georgia, I would sit with my dear aunt and wish out loud for the picture. She would soothe me and tell me that it was a pity the argument sent the relatives with the picture packing. There had been accusations of altered headstones in the cemetery.

I had my children and the stories were passed down to my children.

Then there was the internet, and Ancestry.com.  Time passed and anger died, and people died and the picture  was uploaded a year and a day ago. It took us moments to find it.

What a wonderful full circle moment, to see their faces, and see the resemblance. The story is still being told. My Daddy used to tell me when I would say that I couldn’t take the stress of a tribulation, “Remember who you come from. Remember Mary Elisabeth.”

And so, dear Mary Elisabeth, we finally meet. I see your face and see John Michael’s face and feel the years compress and fall away. My son and my daughter bear your names and now I can show them your faces. This is a great day.

Save the Pine Grove in Baguio

Anyone who grew up in Baguio will remember the ride up either Kennon or Naguilian Road from the lowlands. From the tropics up the mountain we would go, passing waterfalls and hair pin turns. And then, suddenly the terrain would change and that first freshness of pine scented air would fill the lungs. The temperature would be twenty degrees less than the steamy base of the mountains.

Up in Baguio, things were different. If you were so lucky to be a Baguio native, you had a rarified tropical childhood. Baguio is in a geographical area called  a cloud forest. Sunsets were magical. Fog would be tinted green, pink, lavender.

As a teenager, my Baguio was safe. I could walk from my home, in front of the main gate of Camp John Hay, past Quezon Elementary School, past the grand Pines Hotel to the top of Session Road. I’d walk past the Post Office, the cathedral stairs, down the street with friends to go to the movies. Afterwards we’d have a snack at Tesoro’s Bakery and continue our walk. We’d pop into the Indian bazaars, Pohumull’s, Bheromull’s, Bombay, our friend Richie Cardenas’ gift shop  and look at the latest sweaters and purses and all the little things that sweetened an afternoon with friends. On the way back up we’d pass Ompong Tan’s family hardware store.

We would walk up Session Road in the fog, arms linked, and go into CID Educational Supply to see the latest books, and on up to D & S Fine Foods, to get something to bring home. The second floor of D & S was a stationery heaven, full of diaries and papers and pretty pens and folders.

Across the street was the Old Pagoda, Madame Chang’s gift shop where if she liked you she might read your palm and tell you things you knew about yourself but perhaps needed to hear from her wise face. Her shop had jade and dishes and curious carvings and her stories. Madame Chang would transport you via storytelling to pre-communist China and the Hague, where her daughter was in graduate school.

At the top of Session Road, you could stop for either ice cream at Magnolia’s – choosing the Flavor of the Month, or on special occasions go into Mario’s – still a wonderful restaurant run by the Benitez family.

When I was a child, Baguio was all I wanted and all I needed. I never knew we would lose our house, that an earthquake would flatten it, that Camp John Hay would close, or that pell mell urbanization would turn it into something that looked like the favelas of Rio de Janeiro than the tidy American city it was built to be.

This is only my own personal small routine on a weekend in Baguio. There are many other stores and places to visit, bakeries, a comic book store, the Baguio Market, Tiongsan Bazaar, Session Cafe – so many places that were owned by people we knew.

At six in the evening, the cathedral bells would ring the Angelus. Everyone would stop for a moment, while the bells were ringing. Then, we would turn to each other and say, “Good Evening.” and carry on.

The sunsets, oh! The sunsets! The clouds would be blowing around us, tinged with gold and green and purple and pink. The sky would be like a kaleidescope. This light show would darken to a Maxfield Parrish blue.

Sunny days in Baguio were bright and crisp. The branches would catch the sun. On walks in the forest we would come upon flowers and mushrooms peeking through the canopy of pine needles. Nature was everywhere, and unlike the hot provinces, nature was relatively safe to walk in. There weren’t dangerous snakes or wild beasts to contend with.

People from Baguio knew each other. Many of my childhood friends growing up were classmates of my mother, their grandparents knew my grandparents. They had survived World War II together. We were FROM Baguio. Little did we know that the winds of change would blow us all over the world.

Through Facebook, I’ve found out that Shoe Mart, the humongous chain that dominates the Google Earth map of Baguio (bigger than the cathedral’s footprint), is planning to cut down the pine trees facing Governor Pack Road. (Go to Google Earth and put in Baguio, Cordillera Administrative Region, Philippines, and search for SM Baguio). The plan, according to news and Facebook group posts, is to put up a parking lot.

In Baguio, pine trees should be protected.

What has happened to Baguio is a horrible ecological tragedy.

There are valiant  people who are actively trying to make Baguio the beautiful place it was meant to be. There are thousands and thousands of us abroad who love Baguio and want to do something.

At this time, we can sign this petition, and pray that the pine trees keep standing. Join ecological expert and Baguio native, Dr. Michael Bengwayan in this important civil action.  Here’s the petition link. Please sign and forward. http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/stop-the-cutting-uprooting-of-trees-at-sm-baguio.html

This is all in the wake of the horrible deforestation tragedy in Cagayan de Oro that took hundreds of lives in a flash flood. Baguio has had its share of landslides caused by illegal logging, stupid building, and lack of respect for the importance of trees.

Baguio was the Philippines’ first green heaven, a place built for respite,  renewal and happy family memories. During the American era, it was a legendary place, a Shangri-la.  Alas, the bonfires of change have obliterated most memories of the way it used to be.

Mayor Halsema, who died in the bombing of Baguio at the end of World War II, lies in a nearly forgotten grave in the city cemetery.

To Shoe Mart, (whoever makes the decisions there) the trees are expendable. Perhaps if they see the uproar they will change their mind. For me, it’s bad enough that I don’t have a place to call home in my hometown. I would camp on the ruins of Casa Blanca if only to see the sunset (I know the view still isn’t blocked).

I’m going back this year, either alone or with my tribe. I have heard from many people that it is not the same. Some people say it isn’t worth going back. Some people tell me to brace myself.  One of my dear cousins said, “There are still corners of Baguio that feel like old Baguio.” I hope so. Please join me in speaking out. Sign the petition. Stand on that hillside with Dr. Bengwayan. Do something.