Warm memories of Baguio

It was time once more to close my wooden shutters and keep the house from dust, dew and mold until summertime. All the while I wondered what it might have been like in Baguio had the heater not functioned, if I didn’t buy the adobo and turkey to save us from doing the marketing in a crowded downtown, if Victory Liner wasn’t efficient I wouldn’t have gotten my shoes which I forgot to pack, if fewer friends had accompanied me, would I have been able to count the silver, glasses, plates, canned goods from last October? No. Not without George who helped me inventory utensils while Erlie posted the list on the cabinet doors. Thank God I’ve got friends in high and low times that are willing to climb up two hills to reach two cottages and down again to clean up more cottages. This time to check that sheets and pillow cases are ironed and the towels not seared from washing.

Could we be slaves of our homes? This question enters my mind. Many women may at some point have had the same thoughts – "We wouldn’t be worrisome if we had fewer times."

Closing another shutter I say to myself: Goodbye to my yellow sunflowers, the purple and orange bouganvillas and tall green twigs picked from a jungle like garden all in the usual crystal pitcher I’ve used as my flower vase for years. The sunflowers and orange suntan are now turning color black-gray as they begin to droop. Goodbye to my beautiful view of the mighty mountains that seem almost reachable. It’s so beautiful, it makes me sad and brings flashbacks. I recall the PMA ’83 mommies sitting on my flower-printed cushions. Agnes, Arlene and Jane asking their teen daughters, "Where do you want to go?" and threatening their sons "Eat or no pasyal." Am I glad my children are all grown up.

On the landing steps I can actually hear Lulu, my friend and secretary, "Pang laundry ba ito?" On another evening, I remember Atty. Ruben fanning himself in the living room perspiring that cold evening saying, "It’s hot in the room." Because he’d been sleeping by the wall behind the brick fireplace. Then I can see Baby Antonio holding her dryer, "Is this plug 220 or 110?" "Don’t," Lito Juliano says, "our cell phones are still plugged," coming in from the outside after smoking a cigarette. No one is allowed to smoke inside the house.

But the serene days can produce some naggings. "Robert! The fireplace is stuck. The sala is full of black smoke." "Bakit pundido itong ilaw?" "Hiramin natin ang hagdanan ng kapitbahay." We even get to use the ladder to trim the tall intertwining plants.

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So many recollections. Do you remember when the PNR trains dropped off their passengers in Damortis, La Union where they were met by waiting cars or buses that ferried them to Baguio?

As children we’d drive to the last lap of the zigzag where my grandma Lucia’s sister Tita Moning made us wait with her to welcome her husband Tito Mandy as he ascended upward into view from the zigzag. Always with his camera on hand he’d record another safe trip up.

For many, Baguio is their parents’ very special mountain resort, where they first met as teens during summertime and became a couple spending their honeymoon there. My brain is overflowing with memories interrupted by the aircrafts that shutter my thoughts with their roaring sounds. You see, I live beside the airport.

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Iam writing this at Seranilla’s Canteen on Barangay Camp 1, Rosario, La Union. It’s one of those carinderias along the strip on the first lap before ascending to Baguio or the last lap going down. Unusual place? Not for an adventurer like me. Where would you find an eatery where they serve the seasonal freshwater fish just a little larger than a needle called biya... Where a scooter crosses your path driven by the waiter on an errand to the drugstore for you... Where can you freely enter the kitchen to make sure it’s clean and organized and dunk your utensils in scalding water... Where a little girl named Elizabeth grabs toothpicks from every table and hides them on the earthen sidewalk.

This tiny eatery is where the waitresses are excused from all sophistication and are allowed to shout across the main highway at Jeazel’s Eatery "bagong sangin nga." This whole row of canteens is owned by relatives who have became competitors. Any canteen here is a very far cry from the cafes where the Fitzgeralds or the Hemingways wrote their own pieces, but it’s very Filipino.

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After the hectic activities of Christmas time, Baguio was the ideal place to breath, relax and reminisce. I found in Baguio the chance to appreciate too of the many things we take for granted because we can get caught like spiders in our many webs. I noticed the "indispensable ones," people who were "on duty" to serve everyone during the Christmas season.

By the side of Baguio’s Loakan Airport, on an early morning stroll, I saw soldiers vigilant around the airport area. President Gloria was in the city and security was tight. Some soldiers were lying in hammocks tied to pine trees. Yes, more pine trees are finally growing, but Baguio still doesn’t smell the way it used to. Some hammocks with soldiers on them were tied between two tanks. That’s the way the soldiers slept under the dark night instead of sleeping on the ground sprinkled with dew. I saw another bunch chatting around a bonfire to keep them warm from the biting Baguio air. A group of these soldiers was either tasked to guard the presidential plane or augment security measures for our President, away from their families during the holiday season – just like they have always been.

Doctors and nurses are always dear to us. I do not have the statistics but I would not be surprised if emergency cases were higher during this holiday season. From the stress alone, instances of hypertension attacks could have risen! We met relatives and friends and everybody seemed to have a cold, a cough, a sore throat or an asthma attack – candidates for a doctor’s visit.

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At the Baguio Country Club, which was teeming with three thousand people a day and where guests had to wait for about an hour to be able to eat at the Japanese Hamada Room, waiters memorized guest’s orders. Instead of the number of guests intimidating the waiters they became more lithe and limber, attending to table after table to ensure the fluidity of service. These waiters, janitors, telephone operators, receptionists, cashiers, etc. kept the club functioning and they lived up to the Philippines’ reputation as the most caring of the Asian countries.

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Our President, Gloria and her husband Mike, played hosts at a dinner at the Mansion House for Nueva Ecijanos who drove only three hours compared to the six hours one has to drive from Tarlac to reach Baguio. Gloria was in a joyful mood talking about her golf score at the same time ordering her men to pursue a foreign investment for the Philippines. The casual Atty. Mike added to the congeniality of the evening. Leni Bautista and the others of the PMS staff from Manila were there, the caterers ever present, the Manong serving the red wine.

Tricie and Louie Sison’s cook went up to Baguio with them to bake the turkey for their traditional December 29th lunch. Their guests for the past years have been Zita Feliciano, Lorna Laurel, Ronnie Concepcion, Lourdes Montinola, Rico Agcaoili, Maxi and Cristy Ilusorio, Helen Small, Adrian and Millette Ocampo, Ben Cabrera and Annie, OV and Marilen Espiritu, Tatti Licuanan, Ambassador Isabel Wilson and more wonderful friends of many years ago.

I know my maids stayed home to wrap more gifts and pick up crumpled gift wrappers on the floor. Two drivers, Mang Ben and Frank (I have to mention their names, they’re going to read this), remained delivering the gifts, from Quezon City to Alabang and it seemed like they weren’t going to come home until midnight. That required patience amid the Christmas traffic.

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Such cooperation was heartwarming and added to the Christmas spirit. The household staff, probably as stressed as their bosses, even ended up covering for duties that didn’t belong to them because of the shifting schedules of household helpers.

It is in the nature of some people’s jobs to be away from their families during the holiday season by force of circumstances or by choice. Resigned to their fate? Well, if they have complaints, they don’t show it. Or in sweet revenge, they don’t show up ever again after the holiday season!