My cinematic encounter with Marie Jamora’s film Ang Nawawala (or What Isn’t There), got me thinking about the conversations I’ve been meaning to have with the people from my past, in particular, with my sister KC. She died in a fire accident that gutted my home over seven years ago. Seeing the film and being so affected by it, I realized that neither her absence nor the passage of time could change the fact that wounds and their resulting scars can never really fully heal.
I was reminded of a professor from my college, Father Ferriols and his “pilosopiya ng meron at wala” (the philosophy of something and nothing). He said that even with the existence of nothing (wala), there is something (meron). That the state of “nothingness” is still a state, occupying its own space whether in our consciousness or outside of it—and is thus, “something.” Ang Nawawala is an exposition on that—what is there and not there—a measure of the temporal, and the ethereal, the loss of modicum (Gibson’s voice), the channeling of medium (the humanities), and finding the message (forgiveness). It was the feeling of deeply rooted loss that struck me the most.
Faster Than A Cannonball
Truth be told, the conversation the film meant to carry on became stronger when nothing was said or spoken at all (most evident in the cemetery scene where the two brothers passed along a joint and, in several puffs, summed up all that needed to be said all those years since the tragedy). The film embodies the adage, “actions speak louder than words.” Whether it was through the deftness of sound, the monologues, the music of Tarsius or Pedicab, or flirtation via the use of LPs, one thing was for certain: the film had a unique voice that needed to be heard.
Very briefly, Ang Nawawala is a film about a boy (Gibson) who stopped speaking after his identical twin (Jaime) met with a tragic fate. It’s not that he was deaf or anything. It’s that he didn’t find rhyme or reason to speak anymore. Instead, he kept his conversations to his dead brother who he shared a kinship with.
Caught Beneath The Landslide
Watching them interact from beyond the grave, I couldn’t help but flashback to the conversations I’d have with my sister from inside my head. I’d ask her questions and then pretend as though I got the answers I wanted to hear. It happensed in the shower, or right before I slept, or when I visited her in the crypt. Was it schizophrenia or a murmur that stemmed from the depths of my heart?
The film made me think of questions I’ve been meaning to ask her all these years—ones that I can never seem to find the proper answers to. Like does she blame me for her death? For not answering the yaya’s calls on time when they all thought she was with me outside our burning house (she was sleeping soundly in my room). Was she sad that she was no longer here on earth? Did she miss me? Has she moved on? Is she happy now?
Gibson got his answers, sort of. His questions didn’t fall on deaf ears, though it muted him to the outside world. All I hear when I strike a similar conversation with my sister is silence. Maybe my answers weren’t something I’d find from beyond the grave. Ang Nawawala. What Isn’t There. The people from my past, like KC, who I have unfinished business with.
How Many Lives Are Living Strange?
If I could make one intro about myself, it would be that, as a person, I am very introspective. I reassess myself a lot with every situation and I’m the type who’d imagine how a conversation with a crush, or a nemesis, an idol would pan out, carry it as though it actually happened, and then get lost in the shuffle between reality and pretend.
I was beside Topher Grace once on a plane from New York to Los Angeles. True story. I wanted to get a picture with him. He being a Hollywood star and all. But I couldn’t. I was too scared. We rubbed elbows though, literally and that was all that I took away from the experience. Oh, the stories I could have told.
There’d also be situations where I’d bump into old friends and acquaintances but curl up, word vomit, and possibly turn them off. My self-diagnosed social anxiety disorder (or SAD) prevented me from being open and free. SAD was my three-letter word and three-pronged emotion. Ang Nawawala. What isn’t There. Courage
Wake Up The Dawn And Ask Her Why
And then there’s the ex (the one that got away)—the conversation we all mean to have at some point in our lives but always try to avoid. It’s one that I had imagined go down in so many ways possible, mostly cinematic, ála Love Actually or the moment right before a rom-com reaches its climax. Actors in teen shows seem to do this so seamlessly, swagger and all. But people like me? We’re less vocal about our true feelings; instead, we become privy to our showbiz feelings — ones that we are wont to share casually.
Recently, though, I found it within myself to say what I’d been meaning to say to a particular ex who held a special place in my heart. More than cinematic, it was very cathartic. Of course, the alcohol helped. But through our exchange of words, I had finally gotten the closure that I’d been meaning to get for so long. I wish I could’ve had that roofdeck moment with my sister too. Ang Nahanap. What I Found. Closure.
Someday You Will Find Me
Ang Nawawala was about finding peace within yourself, and then finding your “self” that had been lost in the process — whether it was on the part of Gibson, his mother Esme (Dawn Zulueta) who had lost her spirit and mojo since Jaime’s death, and other characters in the film like Enid who go through their own emotional journeys.
Mine had taken me to all sorts of places — from a plane ride from New York to LA, to an almost perfect relationship that ended more than five years ago to a rooftop moment that I won’t soon forget. From the longest trip I had ever taken (rushing from Greenbelt to my burning house in Dasma and hoping it had all been a bad dream), to being too late and feeling the weight of the world on my shoulders when my sister died, to getting back up on my feet and finding the courage to be my own bravest individual.
A Dreamer Dreams, She Never Dies
While Gibson’s brother “stuck” around, even after the latter had passed, to the outsider, it was really just a one-sided conversation, similar to ones I’d carry with KC. After all was said and done, Jamora’s camera panned out from that graveyard scene, revealing the “void,” the wala, and the nothingness that had been on the surface all along. “Where were you while we were getting high?” Ang Nawawala. What Isn’t There? His brother. My sister.
It’s tempting to end on that note — what isn’t there and just chalk it up to catharsis. God knows I had a good cry. Also, the movie made me appreciate “the film as an art form” again —something I hadn’t felt in years. But after crying my heart out to what wasn’t there, I had to ask myself: What is there? Well, art. Family. Music. Gibson. Me.
What is there is me and I am alive. I didn’t die in the fire. And I have the opportunity to live and do my best chasing after dreams that I, and even KC, had charted for ourselves. It’s an opportunity I shouldn’t take for granted. And maybe as I encounter KC again, in a dream, or in the act of dreaming, or living, maybe, like Jaime to Gibson, she’ll be there, waiting. Ang Meron. What is There. “The world’s still spinning around, we don’t know why. You and I, we will never die.”