We napped when bored, though this was difficult to do in the crowded room. We were prohibited from discussing controversial subjects under the rules set for us by our military captors, so we tended towards small talk. But it was sometimes unavoidable that “hot topic” conversations ensued, like when Marcos denied that there were still political detainees incarcerated. In these instances, we shot each other nervous glances and then more quick looks were directed towards the door to see if anyone outside had been listening. A pall would fall over the room and this momentary lapse reminded everyone where we were and, more important, what was at stake. We wondered how long we would be there, or worse, if we would soon be transferred to Camp Olivas or to the more horrendous Camp Crame in Manila. Quickly, those with enough cheerfulness and confidence would rally the others.
But it wasn’t just these controversial topics that kept us on edge. One afternoon, a group of soldiers came trouncing in still wearing their muddied combat uniforms, boots, helmets, and guns. They looked exhausted and ready to sit just wherever they could. Soon another truck pulled up and two men got out. From the back of the truck they took out a stretcher with a body on it. They laid the stretcher down at the entrance of the building so that we could see the bloodied corpse of a man through the window. It sat there for hours. We took turns gawking at the scene before us; I was almost certain what everyone in the room was wondering: who was this man? No one seemed to know at first. The soldiers went into the building, not seeming to care that the corpse was going to lie there in plain view of everyone coming and going from the building.
“I am sure they want us to see that,” Annabel said. “Yes, probably,” I replied with a tentativeness that she now began to expect from me, signaling that I didn’t want to talk. My legs were beginning to shake; my hands were sweating. I looked away. I did not have anything more to say, but I knew she was right. They wanted us to see the example he had been made of.
“Let’s just go back to where the rest are,” I said quickly.
From down the hall, I heard whispers, other people wondering what had happened. I heard the word, ‘Olalia’ mentioned a few times. Who is Olalia? Was that the man’s name?
It was getting close to dinner. Cesar arrived. As with other days, I barely touched what he brought. Tonight, food was the farthest thing from my mind. I thought of giving the food away, as I always did. Back in the conference room, we continued to talk in hushed tones about the most ghastly event to occur since I’d been at the camp. By now, it was common knowledge that a skirmish had taken place in the jungles of Pampanga and Zambales. Or as the military preferred to describe such events, they had an “encounter,” as if using a more neutral word would strip away the event’s brutality and violence. We heard later that the battle had lasted for hours. The Philippine Constabulary or the ‘PCs’ as they were commonly called, were intent on capturing the man they had just killed because he, Olalia, was considered to be an important member of the underground.
A few months later, I inadvertently found out more about the corpse of the man I had seen in the camp’s front yard that day in December. I found out about it in the place where I least expected to: my mother’s kitchen. I was upstairs in my room one afternoon when I decided to go down to the kitchen to get a snack. I found Ima and an older woman, both their heads hung, peeling the skin off boiled tomatoes from a pot sitting atop the tiled counter, and delicately squeezing the skinned tomatoes into pickling jars. Another pot of water was boiling on top of the stove. The woman was explaining to mother when the proper time was for dipping the sealed pickling jars into the boiling water in order to safely preserve them. They were both engrossed in what they were doing, and did not hear me enter the kitchen. When Ima finally looked up, she gave me a smile and said, “This is my daughter, Vicky.”
The woman, her graying hair in a bun and spectacles propped down on the bridge of her nose, looked up and smiled.
“This is Mrs. Olalia, Vicky.” The two women nodded knowingly at each other. Mrs. Olalia spoke in a soft voice, sympathetic but not overbearing. She chatted with me about this and that, and the more she talked the more I like her. She was mild-mannered and had an unassuming dignity about her that I appreciated. At some point she looked at me, sizing me up as if she wanted to hug me. Why do I feel that they are keeping something from me? Not wishing to dwell on the thought, I concentrated instead on Mrs. Olalia being kind and solicitous of me. They finished what they were doing and sometime later, she left. Over the next several weeks, she and Ima would see each other, mostly at the house, over coffee or tea, while nibbling at some merienda that Ima had prepared. They had become fast friends. It was rather strange to me that Mrs. Olalia seemed to have showed up in Ima’s life so suddenly. Then after some time, she also disappeared just as quickly.
Then, one day, my mother explained to me who Mrs. Olalia was. She wanted to explain and yet somehow could not do so fully. She was still holding back. But she did say that Mrs. Olalia had two sons who had joined the underground and one of them had been shot and killed during a battle with the army. And when she told me the name of the son, it rang a bell. Oh my gosh! That was the name of the man on the stretcher in the camp. But I could not tell my mother that I had seen his bloodied corpse. Spare her the damning details, please. I did not want her to know what I had witnessed back at the camp. My incarceration was a taboo subject as far as my mother was concerned. She had never asked me how it was for me at the camp; we had not talked about it once. I was not about to start giving her the information that would un-nerve her.
Right then, I realized what it was that these women were keeping from me on that day when I first met Mrs. Olalia. No wonder, knowing looks passed between her and mother. After Ima’s explanation, I started to get frightened for her. How could she risk associating with someone from that kind of a background? Did she know she could get arrested too? And where was Mrs. Olalia now? She does not come to the house anymore. Secrets, secrets. When could we all begin to be honest with one another?
I wonder to this day how Ima met Mrs. Olalia. Did she seek her out? Did my mother try to find out what it was like with other mothers whose sons and daughters were jailed, or worse, sent to their deaths? Did she look for a way to try to understand what she was going through, only to find that there were countless mothers out there in a similar position? Did it embolden my mother to invite one such woman to come to our house, spend time with her, pickling tomatoes, drinking tea as they shared each other’s pain? Knowing now that she did all these things lessens some of the guilt I felt about what I had put her through. The scene of Ima and Mrs. Olalia, working companionably in the kitchen, one teaching the other how to pickle tomatoes, a large pot of boiling water before them, talking in soft voices while drinking tea is a memory I treasure dearly. In my mind, it had become a symbol of hope amid the overwhelming sense of defeat I constantly felt during that period.
I had been at the camp for about a week when one morning, as I settled down on the dase, re-reading yet again the tattered copy of Tagumpay, Sgt. Magno came in and told me to follow him. My father was waiting outside. I was glad to see him and even though he looked tired, he greeted me with a smile.
“Listen,” he began, “I was able to arrange with the commander for you to come to my office after work so that you could use the shower and toilet there. I understand that there is really no bathroom here.” I nodded. “He said that as long as you are accompanied by a guard, you are permitted to walk over to my office. I probably won’t be there since the commander prefers that family visits be done here. I instructed the security guard to unlock my office when you arrive. I also told my secretary to leave shampoo, soap, towels, and anything else you might need. I hope you will have a chance to be comfortable, even if only for a bit.”
“Thank you, Tang,” I told him. “I’m really glad for that. Would it be possible for Annabel to come with me so she can tidy up as well?” I asked.
“I don’t know. You will have to ask them, inang,�
�� he said affectionately. He then asked me if there was anything more I needed. He was careful not to ask me how I was really doing, I noticed. I didn’t want him to ask me anyway. Better to leave things unsaid, I supposed.
After that, in the early evenings, I would walk over to Tatang’s office with a soldier escort to use the shower and restroom. Initially, I thought it was because of his position in government that the military accorded me this bit of indulgence, but later I doubted that assessment. I knew that even if Tang had a little more influence than others, things could still go wrong for him.
It was not until I had a conversation with my older sister, C., years later, that I found out why the commander allowed these short trips to Tang’s office. Apparently, my father had carefully negotiated with him, convincing him that his office was nearby and that I might as well use it when everyone else had gone for the day. He gave his word to the commander. He also sought the help of his cousin, who was a colonel in the military, and who outranked the commander. Rank and status are influential in the military and even more so in Filipino society where things work more fluidly through personal connections. This time was no exception, I gathered.
I remember that visit now. The guard on duty called me to go to the commander’s office one morning. Waiting in the room were my father and an unfamiliar man. He was not wearing a military uniform, so I had no inkling about who he was. Father then introduced him as Col. Gomez, adding that he was an uncle. Hearing that he was a relative, I took his hand and kissed it in a traditional sign of respect we gave to elders. I was not surprised that I had not met my uncle before, as I knew from my parents about countless relatives we had never met because they lived in Manila or in other provinces. The two asked me to leave them a few minutes after our brief meeting. I was not privy to whatever they discussed afterwards.
At first, it was a relief that I could now take sufficient care of my personal hygiene when I ventured out in the late afternoon. As the days dragged on, I began feeling uncomfortable and then guilty about this privilege. I felt sorry for the men who stayed behind and ashamed that the commander allowed me this time away from the camp. My escort changed daily depending on who was on duty. Sometimes the guard was pleasant and talked to me while we walked. But, at times, the guard would be silent, refusing to even look at me. Because I never knew what would please or set them off, I became painfully cautious. I developed rules to go by:
Do not talk to them unless you have to.
Only answer what was asked. Never volunteer information.
Be polite but do not let them see how you feel about things.
I practiced these rules because even when these people seemed pleasant enough, I knew I could not trust them.
Every afternoon, when I walked back to the camp following a brief interlude at Tang’s office, I would hesitantly enter the conference room where the men were. My cheeks always threatened to redden as I approached them. Then once inside, I kept quiet. I did not want to join in the conversations, preferring to listen patiently in the background, always trying to sense how others felt about me. I would be attentive to what was being discussed and only talked when addressed directly. If they did not address me for a long time, my uncertainty would only grow, reinforcing my worry that they did not trust me. Then it would quickly turn into embarrassment, making me wish I could cover my face like a purdah-covered Muslim woman. They were not long visits, usually lasting about half an hour, but still my guilt persisted. I would turn it over again and again in my mind: How did the other political detainees really feel about me? Did they hate me? Were they suspicious of me? Did they think I was a spy being afforded a chance to be out even for just a bit when they couldn’t? I had no way of knowing and I was too afraid to ask.
“Stop, stop, don’t go there,” I would plead with myself while sitting on the dase. To the men, I was a young girl who attended an exclusive private school, where the rich sent their children. But inside me, I was a piece of rag, one that had outlived its usefulness, torn and ready to be tossed into the garbage bin. I tried to keep my mind blank, tried to stop the thinking so that the terrors afflicting me would relent, even for a bit. I was not always successful. As the dark unknown, so incomprehensible and mysterious, swallowed me, I imagined myself in worn, wet clothes clinging to my shaking body, exposed to the elements, all alone, and shivering in the cold.
My shaking and shivering became unremitting, even merciless, and it reminded me of something that happened long ago. It was Apu Pa’s birthday. A big party was underway at the foot of Mount Arayat National Park. The park was a hilly, lush green open space, with a couple of waterfalls and a number of natural pools. It was a bumpy ride from my grandmother’s house where we had all congregated to the town of Arayat. The children all sat excitedly, not caring that they were bouncing off each other on the dirt road leading up to the mountain.
It happened like this: A group of cousins and I were swimming at one of the pools when we felt hungry. We began walking towards the grass huts where the adults were laying the tables with food and where a few of the men were roasting a whole pig on a bamboo pole over a pit of red hot charcoals. Along the way, we passed by a small pool filled with green algae, and someone said, “Anyone interested in finding out how deep this pool is?” The boys among us dared the girls, but no one wanted to do it since it was difficult to see how deep the pool really was. Then my cousin, P., said, “I will do it.” The boys all cheered. What she forgot was that she did not know how to swim and as soon as she jumped in, she started screaming, waving her hands frantically, and soon the adults heard the ruckus and came to rescue her. When she came out, she was shaking, at once frightened and embarrassed. I will never forget the way she looked. We were all scared for her, but what she had felt must have been worse. It was how I felt when I joined the men in the room after the trip to my father’s office. That long-ago image of my shivering, shaking cousin was not much different from me in the conference room.
I wished so desperately for something that would take my mind off the unthinkable. Close your eyes. Never mind who is in the room. Be still, be still. Maybe if I keep still, immobile, I can stop this from happening. Maybe this isn’t really happening to me.
More than anything, it was fear that consumed me. Being exposed relentlessly to it filled the better part of my day. It competed for my attention, fighting its way in, demanding space inside my poor aching brain. When will it end? There, it remained like an unwanted houseguest, refusing to leave. Eventually, I resigned myself to it.
On some days, Annabel was allowed to join me on my trip. I felt relieved on these occasions; walking there wasn’t too lonely and plagued by guilt. Those few hundred feet from the camp into the office building seemed like a chance at normalcy for just a bit. It was also an opportunity to rationalize that I was not the only special one on that cool December evening. I could, for a brief time, blur the faces of the men I left behind. Arriving at father’s office, we showered and changed. We chatted like old friends, and in the interim it seemed as though we had returned to the ordinary, to the mundane, all of which had fallen out of reach since all this began.
One morning, after breakfast, when we had settled into our daily routine, I noticed that some of the men were whispering to one another.
“Go on,” one of the men said to the young man while they gestured in my direction. “Go on, go on, she’s not going to bite, you know,” he continued.
Several of the men agreed. “Yeah, that’s right,” they all said.
They kept coaxing him to do something. Finally, he got up the nerve and stood slowly and started walking tentatively toward me. When he was finally standing in front of me, his expression became a mixture of shyness and resolve. He was a rather tall, thin man of about 20 or so years. His dark brown olive skin looked like he was used to being in the sun. He had doleful eyes that seemed like that of a deer finding itself on a road and not knowing what to do. As he handed me a piece of paper, he said, “I made this for you,” and
his hands started to shake.
“What is it?”
I looked at the paper he had handed me. Unfolding it, I saw it had tiny pink flowers and red little hearts dotting the edges of the stationery. The light pink color of the paper alerted me immediately to its meaning. Back in those days, young men interested in young women wrote them love notes on pink paper to signal their romantic intentions. I felt my face quickly turning red. I looked down at the paper and read what was written at the top of the page. I saw the words, “SOMETIMES WHEN WE TOUCH” beautifully scripted by a hand that relished strong, artistic flourishes and accents. Below the words were the lyrics to a song, that I found out later, was sung by singer Dan Hill. It was a very popular song at the time and a romantic one, far too romantic and mushy for my musical taste as a teenager. Seeing the words on the paper paralyzed me even more. I felt myself go cold, then I trembled, disquieted at the thought that someone was already interested in me in that way. At a place like this? Now? What was he thinking?
I did not know what to say. He stood in front of me waiting for me to respond. I tried to look away but the place was too crowded, too small for me to turn my attention to anything other than the male faces staring at me. I looked again at the paper and my hand began to shake.
“Thank you,” I muttered, saying it in a voice so weak that even I had difficulty hearing it.
We stood there for some brief and uneasy seconds, both of us uncertain about what to do next. Then he turned and walked back to the group of older men. They started clapping, some high-fiving each other. There were broad smiles and deep laughter in the room of men and one fifteen-year-old girl. I felt myself shrink. I wanted to disappear. Where was Annabel when I needed her? The red warm heat of embarrassment continued crawling under my skin and felt hot on my ears. Then my knees began to crumble from under me. I quickly sat down before anyone noticed. I stared at the paper for a long time, not really seeing it, focused on suppressing the tears that I knew would totally undo me. I was not prepared for this. I vowed then that I would not cry in front of these men. Never. Not in this place. Unthinkable.
A Thousand Little Deaths Page 4
