‘We’ll miss you daddy"

TANZA, Cavite — While most Filipinos celebrate Father’s Day today, two-year-old Ahl-Khane Bernal sends off his seaman-father to his final journey.

But instead of ships, Ahl-Khane’s father is in a box destined for the ground.

Twenty-seven-year-old Ramil Bernal will be buried today at the Sta. Cruz Memorial Cemetery here. He is one of six Filipino sailors killed in the boiler room accident aboard luxury ship S/S Norway in Florida last May 26.

"We will miss you daddy," Bernal’s wife Marilen said when asked for her last message to him this Father’s Day. Speechless on her arms was Ahl-Khane, still innocent from it all.

Ramil, Marilen revealed, was about to be promoted this month from stoker to a 4th engineer, a promotion he had been longing for since he started working as a seaman eight years ago.

"Marami siyang pangarap para sa amin at isa na nga ang maging opisyal ng barko. Malaking hirap ang dinanas niya. Walong taon bago niya narating ang posisyon na yan (He had so many dreams for us and one of them was to become a ship officer. He suffered many hardships. It took him eight years to reach that position)," she said.

"Because of his dreams for us, he worked hard and was later promoted as an oiler, then a stoker and supposedly an engineer," she added.

However, she admitted that despite her husband’s eight years of hard work as a seaman, he could hardly set aside money for them because of his commitment to send one of his step-siblings to school.

"Wala pa kaming naiipon para sa aming sarili kasi pinag-aaral pa niya yung stepsister niya. Ito ay bilang ganti sa utang na loob niya sa kanyang stepfather na nagpaaral din sa kanya (We have not saved any money yet because he was still paying for his stepsister’s education. He was doing this in gratitude to his stepfather who sent him to school)," Marilen said.

"Len, gusto kong maihandog sa iyo lahat (Len, I want to offer you everything)," Marilen recalled her husband as saying during their last conversation.

But all she has this Father’s Day is Ahl-Khane in her arms. — Arnell Ozaeta