I write this after the University of the Philippines’ Fighting Maroons clinched the UAAP men’s basketball championship, and after a UP Law graduate (Kyle Christian Tutor) topped the Bar exams.
Revisiting my first year in UP amid this euphoria is a joyful walk down UP’s acacia tree-shaded memory lane.
After 13 years in a convent school, I was a wide-eyed freshman at the University of the Philippines Diliman, which I considered a whole new world, uncharted territory even. The eldest of four girls, I had never before lived with boys under the same roof. Then suddenly! Here I was in a UP co-ed dorm, the Kalayaan Residence Hall (KRH), that I like to describe as akin to the Peninsula Manila. The dorm has two wings connected by a central lobby. The girls stayed on the left wing (if you were facing the building), and the boys on the right. There was a pay phone in the residence, and each call cost 30 centavos.
Kalayaan was really freedom though it was 1979, and the Philippines was still under martial law. I remember joining some rallies at the Batasan, but they were tame compared to the Mendiola rallies of the ‘70s.
Staying in a dormitory away from home meant the freedom to make daily decisions — from studies to socials. I didn’t know anyone (except for Pauline Bonnevie) when I stepped into the Kalayaan lobby. My roommate was a lissome lass from Ormoc, Geraldine, now Associate Justice of the Court of Appeals Geraldine Fiel Macaraig. We were on the first floor of the girls’ wing, and the hall intercom was right outside our room, sometimes I felt like a phone operator answering it — unless the call was for me.
Our dorm “mother” was Miss Bernardo, and the lady in charge of our floor was “Ate Mae,” who I believe was then a graduate student.
“I was a promdi, and you were sosyal,” Geraldine recalled during our recent Kalayaan reunion at the Perfect Pint in Estancia mall, organized by acclaimed developmental and behavioral pediatrician Dr. Francis Dimalanta, whom we called “Danny” during our college days.
It was the first time I had seen most of my dorm mates, now dorm friends, in 45 years. It was my first time to see Geraldine — and we recalled we never fought during the nine months we shared a room.
Kalayaan then was only four years old — reportedly the first co-ed dorm in campus. It was in the Forbes Park area of the Diliman campus in terms of location (not affluence) — only around seven minutes’ walk to the College of Arts and Sciences (which we called “AS”) where most of us had classes, five minutes to the College of Engineering, and just a few meters away from the Catholic and Protestant chapels, the UP Infirmary, the UP Shopping Center, and the UP Consumers’ Cooperative Store (Co-op). It was also along the ikot route and the fare then was 25 centavos.
Supreme Court Associate Justice Marvic Leonen was our batchmate, as well as another Court of Appeals associate justice, Angelene Mary Quimpo-Sale. Former Vice President Leni Robredo was in a younger batch at Kalayaan.
As in many groups there are movers and shakers. One of them is actually my neighbor (whom I had never bumped into before the reunion) Allan Refuerzo, the Kalayaan Batch ’79 chronicler.
Reunions are not easy to plan — especially if they involve UP alumni from all over the Philippines. You see, the Kalayaan dorm was primarily intended for students from out of town. I lived in Las Piñas, and was fortunate to get a slot in the dorm (Imagine travelling all the way from Las Piñas to Diliman had I not gotten a slot!)
“Planning for our 45th reunion started as early as July 2023, with another batch T-shirt project. This was followed a few months later by a batch jacket project in November 2023,” Allan says.
During one of many get togethers in the Perfect Pint bar, owned by Jett Loleng Tempongko, dorm mates, led by Louie Agnir, voted on July 20, 2024 as the date for the next reunion. Mike Francisco and Allan made the necessary arrangements with the University Hotel, including contracting ice cream and taho vendors. With donations (some anonymous) coming in from various dorm mates, everything fell into place for the big 45th. And the rest, as they always say, is Kalayaan history.
Some, like myself and Danny, were unable to attend the grand reunion, which was attended by close to 100 former KRH residents.
So, last Dec. 14, a spin-off reunion took place at the Perfect Pint in Estancia. It was a blast from the past.
Christmas is being grateful for ties that bind, and the Kalayaan bond has stood the test of time. Freedom (Kalayaan) and “bond” may mean opposite things, but for us former dorm mates that night, those two words were two peas in a pod.
Merry Christmas to the girls and boys I once lived with!
You may e-mail me at joanneraeramirez@yahoo.com. Follow me on Instagram @joanneraeramirez.