Finding home in San Francisco

Every second Sunday of October, we Angeleños (natives of Angeles City, Pampanga) celebrate the La Naval town fiesta. Last month’s celebration was no different in terms of our family’s traditional handa or feast, except that we sorely miss our mother Imang During’s physical presence around the big round table. She passed on more than two years ago, yet her presence was strongly felt in the potluck lunch we 11 siblings (the 12th lives in the US) prepared of the usual dishes she did for us all our lives, for her sons, daughters-in-law, 30 grandchildren and 26 great grandchildren.

There was lechon and nilagang manok (our Christmas-day lunch, inherited from our Tayag grandfather); adobong pugo, fried hito with burong hipon and mustasa, lumpiang hubad and bringhe, all typical Pampango everyday fare that my Manila-based siblings miss; and roast turkey, a carryover from neighboring former Clark Air Base, which our mother introduced to us more than 40 years ago. 

Some 20 hours after having my fill of my mother’s food, I found myself in Hayward, California, with my 12th sibling Ina, who has been living there since 1989, with hubby Noel Cortez, a kabalen or fellow Pampangan also from our hometown, and their two kids Alyssa and Anjo. Amazingly enough, both US-born kids speak Pampango fluently, more so 21-year-old Alyssa, who loves the buro that my sister makes from scratch. Alyssa’s love of her mother’s buro and her fluency in Pampango is a microcosm of a lot of Filipino-Americans pretty much connected with their roots, so that, no matter how far removed they are geographically from their parents’ homeland, the generational and cultural chain remains linked with the language and food that their parents brought them up with.  It gives new meaning to “mother tongue” — not only do they speak the language that their mother spoke to them, but they’ve also acquired the panlasa or taste buds that their mother developed in them. I’m quite proud of how my sister brought them up, in spite of their seeming so American in their twang and appearance, yet remaining so Pinoy in their family values. 

I arrived at San Francisco International Airport at around 8 p.m. of the same day I left Manila, Sunday. After about two hours passing through immigration and customs (yes, Virginia, they also have very long queues in the US of A airports), I was famished, having passed up most of the unmemorable airline meals.

Fortunately, my sister Ina and hubby Noel were already outside waiting for me. From there, we headed straight to Patio Filipino in nearby San Bruno, where owners Tito and Tess Gonzales were awaiting us for dinner, and to discuss the details of a fundraising dinner I was to prepare in a few days’ time. But that’s another story.

While in the car on the way to Patio Filipino, Ina excitedly reported that they had attended the bisperás (eve before an event) of our La Naval fiesta in San Leandro just the previous night. “It was a potluck dinner held at Our Lady of Good Counsel Church hall in San Leandro,” she said. “About 300 Angeleños came. There was lots of Pinoy food and desserts, home-cooked or store-bought. Tita Leny Roque Ricafort and I both cooked tidtad babi (a soupy pork dinuguan or blood stew), and there was plenty of sisig, chicken barbecue, pancit palabok and bihon guisado, embutido, menudo, asadong manok, fried chicken, callos, ginataan bilo-bilo, ginataan mais, turron saba, and lots of pastries. Oh, by the way, the La Naval is also celebrated in San Diego and LA. I heard that their turnout was also good,” she added.

Two days later, we were back in San Bruno for an early dinner at the newly opened Cabalen Restaurant. Its original founder, Maritel Nievera, teamed up with a former high school classmate and long-time San Francisco Bay Area resident, Teta Dychioco (and six other kababayan local residents), also an Angeleño like us, to open a Cabalen branch in the San Francisco East Bay Area, where there’s a big Filipino community, especially Kapampangans, as attested to by my sister’s La Naval story. Upon hearing of my impending visit with my sister, Maritel lost no time arranging a book signing and dinner at this first overseas Cabalen branch, which opened May of this year.

Cabalen San Bruno has all the trappings of a homey, familiar setting that makes you feel at home as you enter its door. Most of its furnishings were brought in from Manila, including the cutout lacework on its façade, solihiyá chairs (rattan woven seats), buffet counter, paintings and black and white photographs of Maritel with famous Filipino personalities and politicians, having graced one of the many Cabalen branches over its 26 years in business in Pampanga and Metro Manila. There’s also a large flat TV on which The Filipino Channel (TFC) continuously plays.  Over a bowl of excellent chicharon (more like our Kapampangan pititian or bite-size chicharon with laman) and San Miguel beer while watching the latest teleserye or ANC news, one is transported back home.  And that’s just for starters.

Within minutes of our arrival, several tables were filled with my kabalens. It’s like attending a town fiesta cum reunion, with a lot of familiar faces, several I hadn’t seen since high school. We shared stories and partook of the 32–dish or so buffet spread. I zeroed in on the tinolang manok, fried hito and buro, kare-kare, crispy pata, and to cap my dinner, tibuk-tibok for dessert. Though not made from carabao milk, it was just as creamy and silky smooth and had a subtle scent of dayap zest. It is the scent of our mother’s cooking. I found home in San Francisco.