Online newsletter for the citizens of Sagunto, Sison, Pangasinan, Philippines
The Man I call “Uncle Felimon”
A Reflective Narrative
By Emily Benosa-Homma
When I was five years old, I was introduced to one of my two uncles named “Felimon”. I could not easily memorize the names of my three aunts who came to visit us occasionally in Makati, but the uncle my Nanay presented to me had a greater impact on my young mind for I could easily compare his character to the ones I often saw on black and white TV. Oh yes, he looked like Sampaguita’s Eddie Gutierrez or Eddie Mesa, no kidding! Uncle Felimon’s image was an epitome of a young man in those times, what with his well sculptured hair shimmering with sweet scented pomade and his matching pointed shoes that seemed to have gotten a million times of brushing. They were like little mirrors. Why, I could even see my big teeth’s reflection on the shiny tip of his shoes. And as he told us stories while sitting in his favorite “de quatro” position, he would speak with eagerness and punctuate his every sentence with a giggle. His vibrant personality would mean he was the happiest 25-year-old bachelor among my relatives.
I was right. The root of his infectious giggles and excitement could have been caused by the woman he fancied. He interestingly spoke about her between his job stories working as a security guard. One weekend, my Uncle Felimon invited us to visit the beautiful woman he wanted to marry. Her name was “Teresita Agustin”. Their house was surrounded by several guava trees, that when my uncle asked me to come inside the house to greet my future auntie, I whispered to him to marry her right away. I was thinking about the guava trees and their sweet fruits I could often visit if he married her. I was five years old, remember. Her family was so hospitable. I took home some jars of guava jelly and a canister of guava candies. I was so fond of my new Aunt Teresita. But that was the last time I saw them in Manila before we moved to Sagunto. My father changed jobs, and so we had to give up our apartment in Makati to move to Pangasinan. Uncle Felimon and his new family settled somewhere else, and we stayed a bit more in Makati before I started my first grade in Artacho.
Living for some years in Sagunto, I finally got reunited with uncle’s growing family, now with their three little children: my cousins Hector (Bobong), Maybell and Camilo. We became the noisiest children in the neighborhood as we often danced to the tunes of My Sharona. My Lolo Ricardo was so proud to see his grandchildren showing off their many talents with their non-stop dancing as long as there were candies that came out of Lolo’s tin canister. Those years were the start of Uncle Felimon’s life as a farmer after working as a security guard for several years in Manila. Eventually, he would take over Lolo Cardo’s plow and carabao, and would begin every day’s toil with a five o’clock march to Macoco.
Uncle Felimon was a hardworking and silent worker. If Lolo Cardo often called his carabao numerous names and curses depending on his mood and task for the day, Uncle Felimon would work silently but whistle a tune while plowing; you would hear his loud voice only when he calls for Spot, his dog companion. But as days turned years, and farming became a lot harder in Sagunto, Uncle Felimon gradually lost his grins and giggles. We finally moved back to Manila and would spend the rest of our schooling there. We lived for two years in San Pedro, Laguna while the apartment we’d occupy in Pasay was being renovated. At last, Uncle Felimon and my grandfather could regularly visit us when we moved to Pasay City. On their visits, it was evident Uncle Felimon had regained his gentle image. The usual giggles punctuating his short sentences were such a spectacle to me, I could sit in the background for hours just listening to uncle’s and grandpa’s jokes and bragging. As if run by genetics, boastfulness is an innate talent. I could have inherited some nasty sense of humor from these two big men of the Castillos while constantly listening to their exchanges. At every news story they could read from newspapers or watch from our TV, Uncle and Lolo would exchange witty remarks and analysis of the events in politics, moving from one topic to another with ease. I hated it when each time they concluded a conversation, they were the heroes. I realized that Uncle Felimon may have acquired that same interest in politics Lolo had, and could have been equally eloquent as Lolo Cardo had he finished his education. That regret, eventually, would drag him to his future habit of drinking. Both father and son smoked a lot, and although drinking for them was already a part of after office hours and improved their social skills, it could be worrying to some especially to my little mind.
On summer vacations in high school, we’d always visit the province and enjoy the company of our cousins, uncles and aunts. Uncle Felimon would boast of his crops, and we’d always tour his farm catching frogs, picking “birabid” and climbing at guava and “duhat” trees. The old and small “bahay kubo” my grandfather occupied in his farming years became as big as a normal barrio house where my cousins would go home to, and surprisingly, even my grandmother, Lola Peling would often spend the night in. Uncle Felimon’ crops yielded very good vegetables that my grandmother, a market vendor would often get her supply from. The “upo” climbers became a lot wider and taller too. It looked like a palace of giant icicles where the longest and biggest “upo” fruits I had ever seen were hanging, and the most delicious rice and “iruban” you could ever taste would come from. If there were wise investors around and they spotted Uncle’s ability, Uncle Felimon could have been one of our best agricultural entrepreneurs. Husband and wife’s work partnership seemed to be one of the ideal families in Sagunto, until Aunt Teresita left for Hongkong to work as a domestic helper. That was the start of the years of uncle’s uneasiness and very challenging life.
On one vacation, I began to see how a superman worked. Uncle Felimon could be seen as hustling between housework, farm work, and child rearing. I was sad, that the image of my tv idols had left him, and he had lost his usual captivating smile too. Sometimes, he could not easily recognize us nephews and nieces of his anymore, and he seemed to have lost friendly communication with his children as well. It was when his children had reached their teenage life, and molding the minds of adolescent children was a mammoth job since he was the lone parent facing all the hurdles in their home. Daily tensions rose, and his friendly attitude would just naturally come out at drinking sessions with his friends. At some instances, I could hear his drunk lamentations of his unfinished schooling, and his guilt for not going back to school and try his best to graduate at least in high school. His frustration to be a good example to motivate his children to finish a college degree, and his dream to raise educated children was a usual predicament, this I could feel in his wailings. He toiled to send some of his children to school while his wife continued to add more support for their education. Uncle Felimon was trying to be an ideal parent those times…but what a good life in the decades that followed; his children would then take him abroad and would open another life path for their father.
“I have never earned this much in my life!”, he would often boast of his wages after a few years of work in Canada. As if telling his fellow farmers and friends in Sagunto that being an agriculturist in our town was a hopeless case with farmers always overwhelmed with tons of problems, pests, lack of water and scarce resources, working in an overseas land like Canada is a dream solution. Doing almost the same task as a farmer back home, although this time, he was growing ornamental plants and gardening at wide lawns and backyards in the beautiful communities of Vancouver, uncle beamed with his usual grins. It was good to see his jolly self back. Thank God for His kindness; uncle felt great joys towards the last years of his life. He would recall his first few years in Canada and would narrate how he was “reborn” as a better man, now a member of a Baptist Church.
Maybell showed me one of uncle’s garden projects during my visit in 2000. Seeing one of his landscaping ideas, I could sense his renewed love for earth and plants, as if he found those big gardens as his playground. Although we never met often after that, we could sometimes chance upon each on family gatherings back home for Christmas, weddings, or funerals, after a few years or a decade.
Towards the last decade of his life, his favorite topics changed, and now he’d have time to chat with me about history and WWII, as well as about caves, treasures and secret dwelling places. He would tell stories of his childhood when he experienced being treated as a son of the Japanese soldier stationed in Sagunto during the Japanese Occupation. The soldier would often feed him and play with him imagining he was the son he left with his wife in Japan. At some point, uncle made me promise to him to find the family of that soldier he believed was killed in the battle in “turod”. This same story and promise somewhat reminded me of uncle just a few week’s ago, on the very same day of his death in Canada. While no one in uncle’s family ever mentioned to me that he was already in the hospital for two weeks due to an advanced lung cancer, thoughts of him and stories of WWII flashed in my mind instantly as I was telling to my Japanese students about my uncle and my mother’s experiences during the war. A few hours after my class, Gijet emailed me the bad news about uncle’s death.
Had I decided to call him again several hours earlier, I could have heard at least his groans and whispers, and I could have chatted with him back about our favorite topics. He was the most eager of the treasure hunters I have ever heard of. Like inspired by Raiders of the Lost Ark, or National Treasure, Uncle Felimon was a true lover of adventure, and I am just a beginner. Now, wherever he is, he could venture freely and without limitations. In the afterlife though, he will not need any adventure anymore.
Uncle Felimon died while letting sweet melodies play in his ears, the songs his grandchildren sang to him in the last hours of his life. Maybel and Arlene recounted the last days of their father as wonderful moments of listening to children’s voices, while pressing the telephone receiver hard on his ears to savor the melody the chorus back home in Sagunto gleefully sent to him long distance. While listening deeply to Gilbert’s children’s songs, he would move his mouth and lips as if singing with the young ones the tunes of yesteryears, like the times of his innocence, or while playing in his playground, or when whistling tunes while plowing in his farm, or singing to his child a lullaby….At last, he was back to the same uncle I first met him in my childhood; his sweet smile…his peaceful face…But no longer to life; it’s now to face his maker. Now he is gone, but his dreams of good life, wishes of good future for his family, and vision for a wonderful adventure for everyone is something to keep and remember. We love you Uncle Felimon! We bid you travel with the Lord in Peace.
The Castillo Clan:
Join other Sagunto STARS on facebook!
Sagunto Star
Promote Your Page Too
While reading the short reflective and narrative story about late-uncle Felimon by the author mng.Emz, it was like, I’m watching a 3D film as I read between the lines it bring back memories to recall.. Rest in Peace Uncle Felimon..
This is a nice one, cousin. Thanks for sharing your memories of Uncle. May he rest in peace.
I know Ipe, you lived in Macoco too. You must have seen those “kabatiti ken tabungaw” in your neighborhood. Your “duhat” was sweeter, and easier to climb, but it’s ok. We had fun too using poles to catch the fruits. Weren’t those days of childhood great to reminisce? Write your own story of childhood before you forget them, hehehe. Thanks for your kind thoughts and sympathy. We’ll really miss him.
Thanks, Bot. Hey, our wonder picture is down below
…I’m saying, you could see for sure Uncle Felimon had that shiny Eddie Gutierrez hair in Sampaguita days.
Thanks ems I love it! as if I was in the vigil or viewing time …
Janet and Giget Thanks for the stories on the last days of uncle Felimon… God Loves you all and help you plan a life ahead of you now your love one gone ahead.