My grandfather recently died and we found his journals and essays. This one is about his mother and gives a peek into life in Mla when Lolo was young.
March 24, 2007
Today is the birthday of my mother. She was born in the year 1898, meaning if she were still living, she would be 109 years old. But she died in 1975 at the age of 77. And I have missed her sorely since then. I guess I always will. I don not think I will miss anyone as much as I do my mother this day.
Simeona Calalay was born to Don Juan Calalay and Dona Sixta dela Rosa. He was from Intramuros and she was from San Miguel, Bulacan. Sixta was the second of three daughters and was tall and beatiful, according to Mr. Juan Nhello Reyes, a friend of the family who used to write poems in Spanish. Don Juan was a lieutenant in the Spanish Army with three ribbons or medal decorations. His sword and medals were lost during the Japanese occupation.
In the latter years, the family stayed in a big house on San Marcelino, where the Meralco building stands today. This is where Sixta and Don Juan died. Whatever happened to this property and others reportedly owned by the couple is a mystery.
When they were orphaned, Simeona and her two sisters were taken in by the sister of Sixta, Teodorica Medel. who had a large family of her own. As normally happens, the orphaned sisters had to work around the house and serve their cousins who were all studying, until Simeona and Josefina got married. The youngest, Felicissima remained with the aunt until claimed by Simeona.
My oldest memories of my mother are vivid. Mama took a bath everyday. I remember her in her bata de bano and her sitting and drying her long hair in a white towel and massaging her hair and scalp for what seemed to me an inordinate length of time. Maybe about 15 minutes and then massage her hair tonic of choice, TRICOFERO into her scalp for another 15. Which may perhaps explain why my mother had a healthy and lustrous head of hair without any dandruff and any white hairs until he was in her 60's.
She also went to the wet market (Quinta market on Azcarraga) everyday. In those days, food was cooked for the day.We had a large eight compartment icebox made of wood, lined with some insulating material and then covered with a thin metal sheet. This was cooled by the two large slabs of ice which was delivered daily arrived covered with palay husks and wrapped in a brown jute sack. These were then icepicked by the maid or the houseboy into smaller chunks which were distributed into the eight compartments. The icebox was used mainly for cold water, which was an absolute necessity during the hot humid summer months, and to preserve food which would otherwise spoil in that weather.
Mama would bring me to the market with her at times and we would ride a horsedrawn vehicle called a calesa, For the short 5 or 6 block trip to Quinta market, she would pay the cochero ten centimos.
Mama had her coterie of "suki", a Chinese coined term to denote a regular and special customer which term also applied to the regular supplier or vendor. She had a suki in the fish section. others for the meat section, which had different vendors for pork, chicken and vaca (cow meat).
Mama would pick the freshest of the fish of choice available, really actually breathing specimens. These maybe of course bangus for sinigang or paksiw or fried and the vendors would clean the innards and the hasang and cut the fish according to instructions-- butterfly cut for daings; five piece postas for frying or stomach cut for rellenos. Her favorite or really Papa's favorite fish,were of course, Dagupan or Bonoan bangus, pampanos, sapsap, spada or swordfish, dapa or , lapulapu, dalag or codfish, hito or catfish, banak. Her favorites which her suki would reserve for her, was apahap, something similar to a striped sea bass, without the stripes. These were seasonal or rarely available, therefore commanded a higher price.
Chicken then were sold alive and in wooden cages. After making her choice, the chicken's feet would be tied up and put into a bayong. The maids at home would kill the chicken by slitting their throats. The blood spilled would be collected in a bowl for cooking. The carcass would then be dipped in boiling water, supposedly to make it easier to pluck the feathers off. When properly denuded, it was then cut up, depending on the intended use. Can you imagine anyone doing this today, with all the chicken available whole and cleaned and packaged or cut into parts such as thighs, drumsticks etc.
The ones Mama bought were all range grown, i.e. loose, not caged and fed bagged feed fortified with all sorts of vitamins and antibiotics. They tasted much better, specially since they were cooked in low fire over a long period of time.
Mama ran a tight ship. She made sure that the house was squeaky clean and food was properly cooked and served, laundry was washed and dyed and starched and ironed properly for her family of seven girls and two boys, by a work force before the war of as many as five maids plus a couple of houseboys. Laundry was normally farmed out, counted out and paid for by piece. We did not have that long a clothesline to hang all the school uniforms of the girls, for one thing.
She did find time though to play "panggingue" , a card game similar to rummy with my godmother and some other friends, once or twice a week in the late afternoons, when Papa and the family were away.
During Papa's busiest business season, July to October, Mama would man the front office and attended to "indoor" sales, i.e. of Lapidas for cemetery tombstones. Sales became more brisk as Todos Los Santos neared and I think their quoted prices also increased commensurately, since work would pile up and the workers started to work overtime and weekends too to keep up with the orders.
During this season, I made it a habit of going to the office after class at the Ateneo for Mama would send me across the street to Ang Tibay's Soda Fountain for my merienda of chicken sandwich and chocolate milkshake and did my homework. Then at the end of the day, she would have me count the cash from her voluminous pocket from the day's sales. I would segregate the bills according to denomination, count and write the totals on a sheet of paper which I would turn over to her and she turned over to Papa, I guess. Invariably, she would ask me how much I filched. I would answer, not much. and that was that. I would pocket enough for the next day's expense for then we would eat lunch outside campus at various restuarants in the Ermita area. I remembered that she trusted me not to take too much as this would queer. What was really a very nice deal and maybe treated it as commission due for counting the money. Papa never noticed or cared as he was making a lot more money with the construction side of the business and the office sales were probably considered Mama's bonus.
Mama was the spokesman for all the members of the family and the bridge through which all goodies were coursed. Anything we needed, we went to Mama and she would bring the request over to Papa.
She was an accomplished advocate and would always catch Papa at his most vulnerable and generous mood, normally after a sumptuous dinner of his favorite food and much laughter and stories in after dinner banter. She knew when to tap Papa for her children 's needs and would argue and fight with him even until she got her way. But always for her children, never for herself.
As such, she was always in the middle of the joys and the pain involved in these transactions. Papa, being a man of few words, would express his displeasure and even anger over anything involving the house and mostly the children to Mama and it was up to her to handle the complaint with the erring child. And minister the penalty which sometimes included in my case a severe case of spanking on the behind while she lectured the offending party on the reason for the punishment. In extreme cases, when she noted a less than contrite attitude, she would instruct Liloy, the family's general factotum, to pack the clothes of whoever was prostrate on the floor and to carry him/her off to the "Hospicio de San Jose" an orphanage run by the nuns located on an island in the middle of the Pasig River. The howling becomes louder at this point accompanied by all sorts of promises and oaths of repentance, contrition and changes etc. etc., Which was all grand drama, of course, because to my knowledge, not a single case of eviction to the Hospicio ever happened. I can imagine how she would regale my father with the story with chuckles and laughter about who cried and shouted the loudest among the culprits spread out on the floor.
March 24, 2007
Today is the birthday of my mother. She was born in the year 1898, meaning if she were still living, she would be 109 years old. But she died in 1975 at the age of 77. And I have missed her sorely since then. I guess I always will. I don not think I will miss anyone as much as I do my mother this day.
Simeona Calalay was born to Don Juan Calalay and Dona Sixta dela Rosa. He was from Intramuros and she was from San Miguel, Bulacan. Sixta was the second of three daughters and was tall and beatiful, according to Mr. Juan Nhello Reyes, a friend of the family who used to write poems in Spanish. Don Juan was a lieutenant in the Spanish Army with three ribbons or medal decorations. His sword and medals were lost during the Japanese occupation.
In the latter years, the family stayed in a big house on San Marcelino, where the Meralco building stands today. This is where Sixta and Don Juan died. Whatever happened to this property and others reportedly owned by the couple is a mystery.
When they were orphaned, Simeona and her two sisters were taken in by the sister of Sixta, Teodorica Medel. who had a large family of her own. As normally happens, the orphaned sisters had to work around the house and serve their cousins who were all studying, until Simeona and Josefina got married. The youngest, Felicissima remained with the aunt until claimed by Simeona.
My oldest memories of my mother are vivid. Mama took a bath everyday. I remember her in her bata de bano and her sitting and drying her long hair in a white towel and massaging her hair and scalp for what seemed to me an inordinate length of time. Maybe about 15 minutes and then massage her hair tonic of choice, TRICOFERO into her scalp for another 15. Which may perhaps explain why my mother had a healthy and lustrous head of hair without any dandruff and any white hairs until he was in her 60's.
She also went to the wet market (Quinta market on Azcarraga) everyday. In those days, food was cooked for the day.We had a large eight compartment icebox made of wood, lined with some insulating material and then covered with a thin metal sheet. This was cooled by the two large slabs of ice which was delivered daily arrived covered with palay husks and wrapped in a brown jute sack. These were then icepicked by the maid or the houseboy into smaller chunks which were distributed into the eight compartments. The icebox was used mainly for cold water, which was an absolute necessity during the hot humid summer months, and to preserve food which would otherwise spoil in that weather.
Mama would bring me to the market with her at times and we would ride a horsedrawn vehicle called a calesa, For the short 5 or 6 block trip to Quinta market, she would pay the cochero ten centimos.
Mama had her coterie of "suki", a Chinese coined term to denote a regular and special customer which term also applied to the regular supplier or vendor. She had a suki in the fish section. others for the meat section, which had different vendors for pork, chicken and vaca (cow meat).
Mama would pick the freshest of the fish of choice available, really actually breathing specimens. These maybe of course bangus for sinigang or paksiw or fried and the vendors would clean the innards and the hasang and cut the fish according to instructions-- butterfly cut for daings; five piece postas for frying or stomach cut for rellenos. Her favorite or really Papa's favorite fish,were of course, Dagupan or Bonoan bangus, pampanos, sapsap, spada or swordfish, dapa or , lapulapu, dalag or codfish, hito or catfish, banak. Her favorites which her suki would reserve for her, was apahap, something similar to a striped sea bass, without the stripes. These were seasonal or rarely available, therefore commanded a higher price.
Chicken then were sold alive and in wooden cages. After making her choice, the chicken's feet would be tied up and put into a bayong. The maids at home would kill the chicken by slitting their throats. The blood spilled would be collected in a bowl for cooking. The carcass would then be dipped in boiling water, supposedly to make it easier to pluck the feathers off. When properly denuded, it was then cut up, depending on the intended use. Can you imagine anyone doing this today, with all the chicken available whole and cleaned and packaged or cut into parts such as thighs, drumsticks etc.
The ones Mama bought were all range grown, i.e. loose, not caged and fed bagged feed fortified with all sorts of vitamins and antibiotics. They tasted much better, specially since they were cooked in low fire over a long period of time.
Mama ran a tight ship. She made sure that the house was squeaky clean and food was properly cooked and served, laundry was washed and dyed and starched and ironed properly for her family of seven girls and two boys, by a work force before the war of as many as five maids plus a couple of houseboys. Laundry was normally farmed out, counted out and paid for by piece. We did not have that long a clothesline to hang all the school uniforms of the girls, for one thing.
She did find time though to play "panggingue" , a card game similar to rummy with my godmother and some other friends, once or twice a week in the late afternoons, when Papa and the family were away.
During Papa's busiest business season, July to October, Mama would man the front office and attended to "indoor" sales, i.e. of Lapidas for cemetery tombstones. Sales became more brisk as Todos Los Santos neared and I think their quoted prices also increased commensurately, since work would pile up and the workers started to work overtime and weekends too to keep up with the orders.
During this season, I made it a habit of going to the office after class at the Ateneo for Mama would send me across the street to Ang Tibay's Soda Fountain for my merienda of chicken sandwich and chocolate milkshake and did my homework. Then at the end of the day, she would have me count the cash from her voluminous pocket from the day's sales. I would segregate the bills according to denomination, count and write the totals on a sheet of paper which I would turn over to her and she turned over to Papa, I guess. Invariably, she would ask me how much I filched. I would answer, not much. and that was that. I would pocket enough for the next day's expense for then we would eat lunch outside campus at various restuarants in the Ermita area. I remembered that she trusted me not to take too much as this would queer. What was really a very nice deal and maybe treated it as commission due for counting the money. Papa never noticed or cared as he was making a lot more money with the construction side of the business and the office sales were probably considered Mama's bonus.
Mama was the spokesman for all the members of the family and the bridge through which all goodies were coursed. Anything we needed, we went to Mama and she would bring the request over to Papa.
She was an accomplished advocate and would always catch Papa at his most vulnerable and generous mood, normally after a sumptuous dinner of his favorite food and much laughter and stories in after dinner banter. She knew when to tap Papa for her children 's needs and would argue and fight with him even until she got her way. But always for her children, never for herself.
As such, she was always in the middle of the joys and the pain involved in these transactions. Papa, being a man of few words, would express his displeasure and even anger over anything involving the house and mostly the children to Mama and it was up to her to handle the complaint with the erring child. And minister the penalty which sometimes included in my case a severe case of spanking on the behind while she lectured the offending party on the reason for the punishment. In extreme cases, when she noted a less than contrite attitude, she would instruct Liloy, the family's general factotum, to pack the clothes of whoever was prostrate on the floor and to carry him/her off to the "Hospicio de San Jose" an orphanage run by the nuns located on an island in the middle of the Pasig River. The howling becomes louder at this point accompanied by all sorts of promises and oaths of repentance, contrition and changes etc. etc., Which was all grand drama, of course, because to my knowledge, not a single case of eviction to the Hospicio ever happened. I can imagine how she would regale my father with the story with chuckles and laughter about who cried and shouted the loudest among the culprits spread out on the floor.
