Friends remember Bambi

Message of condolences continues to pour in at the Del Castillo home in Stamford, Connecticut after the head of the family, Vicente "Bambi" del Castillo, husband of former top model-comedienne Bessie Badilla, passed away last May 28. He just went to sleep at 1:30 p.m. after Sunday lunch and never woke up. Bambi would have turned 56 on June 20.

Family members have also flown to Connecticut to pay their last respects to Bambi and keep Bessie and children company in their moment of grief. Unfortunately, Bambi’s parents, Lorenzo and Rosario – who are both in Canada – cannot fly to Connecticut anymore. Rosario is ill and her husband has opted to stay with her. Bambi’s siblings, however, were able to make the trip from Canada to the US: Tina, Socorro and Rafael. Even Pilar, Bambi’s only sibling here in Manila, is in Connecticut now. Pilar is actually still recovering from the painful loss of her young son who was stabbed dead last year by a cell phone snatcher. And now she also has to deal with the sudden death of her beloved brother Bambi.

From Bessie’s side of the family, her Pennsylvania-based sister Lynn immediately made the trip to Connecticut. Today, brothers Sonny and Bobby are leaving for the US to be with Bessie. Other siblings – like Bing Magsanoc (wife of cage star Ronnie) – also wanted to fly to the US to be with Bessie, except that all their visas have expired and they no longer have time to work on their papers.

Among friends, some of Bessie’s classmates from St. Scholastica’s College – Sony Jalandoni, Diane Gonzalez and Roxanne Kardouche – are all taking a leave from their daily activities here in Manila to be with their friend in Connecticut. Their flight is also today.

Monday night, Bibeth Orteza was on the phone with me because Nini Licaros, former producer of Eh Kasi, Babae (Bessie’s old sitcom with Gloria Diaz), was trying to get Bessie’s contact number. Nini is in New York and it’s only 45 minutes away from the Del Castillo Stamford home.

Here in Manila, I got a lot of phone calls and text messages last Tuesday when my story about Bambi’s sudden departure came out in this column. There are a lot of speculations about Bambi’s death. Some claim that he died of a massive heart attack. (The death certificate says: "He died in his sleep.") The truth is, the autopsy report will come out only today (Wednesday in the US). Bessie insisted on getting a full autopsy report so that they may find out the real cause of Bambi’s death. This makes a lot of sense. If it was from an ailment that had been undetected, Bessie wants to know so that this can be prevented – if possible – from happening to the children if it‘s something that runs in the family’s medical history.

But Bessie is "a lot better now" – so she claims – and wants everything back to normal as much as possible so that the impact of Bambi’s death won’t be that hard on the children. Their youngest daughter, Ines, 11, is back to school and Bessie herself drives the kid there every day. The two older ones, Isabel, 24, (Bambi’s daughter by Hilda Koronel) and Blanca, 19, are both in college and are already on a summer break.

On Friday, June 2, however, funeral services will be held at the Leo P. Gallagher & Son Funeral Home at 2900 Summer St., Stamford Connecticut. Viewing will be from 12 noon to 2:30 p.m. and from 3:30 to 6 p.m.

In lieu of flowers, Bessie and family request that donations be made to Gawad Kalinga (which builds homes for the poor), one of Bambi’s many civic involvements.

On June 3, a Mass will be held at the St. Agnes Roman Catholic Church on 247 Stanwich Road in Greenwhich. Cremation will follow at Ferncliff.

In July, Bessie and the children will make their annual trip to the Philippines as scheduled. In fact, it was Bambi himself who made their travel arrangements and bought the tickets. While here in the Philippines, Blanca, a student of art and history, will serve as intern at the National Museum. (It was art patron and book publisher Marlene Aguilar who made the arrangements.)

From the Philippines, they will return to the Us and later fly to France for their yearly pilgrimage to Lourdes. It was actually Bambi who was a devotee of the Our Lady of Lourdes.

Everything will run as per schedule. Come next semester, Isabel will continue her nursing course in Holy Cross in Massachusetts, while Blanca will fly to Paris next year to be an exchange student there. Only Ines, still in grades, will be left with Bessie at home.

During Bessie’s most recent visit to Manila last February, we had a serious talk about future plans. She was actually feeling sad at that point – about how the children are leaving home one by one to go to college. Oh, she cries with the departure of each one – starting with Isabel whom she raised like her own (a very nice girl, Isabel loved Bessie like her own mother and proved to be a very responsible big sister to the younger siblings).

In time, she knows that all three would get married and raise their own families – and she is preparing herself for that eventuality. However, she was looking forward to Bambi’s retirement – when they’d finally be able to spend more time together. Sadly, things didn’t work out as planned. No one would have guessed that Bambi would leave this soon.

But the devout Catholic and good Christian that Bessie is, I’m sure she’s not one to question His divine will. Even among us – family and friends – we all worry about her now that Bambi is gone. Right now, we can only take comfort in the fact that everything will happen in accordance with the Lord’s grand design.