Tampoy Tales

January 16, 2012

Chapter 1: Who Was Ingkong Tasio?

by Nunilo M. de Leon

This happened when I was once in Dada’s bedroom where there were two large color portraits hanging on the wall; one of a pretty young lady and the other of a more mature lady who looked like Dada. “Ako iyan”, she said, pointing at the younger lady’s picture. “Ako” was my grandaunt Dada Ninay, Catalina Gonzales de Leon. “At iyan ang ina ko, ang Impong Biyang mo”, waving towards the other picture, which was that of her mother, my great-grandmother, the late Maria Gonzales de Leon, Inkong Tasio’s wife. Then she took me to the adjoining bedroom, indicated another portrait on the wall, that of another young lady, and said “Siya naman ang Lola Juli mo, asawa ng Lolo Ramon mo”. “Lola Juli”, Juliana Santos Pantangco de Leon, was my late grandmother, the first wife of “Lolo Ramon” Gonzales de Leon, my grandfather and Dada Ninay’s elder brother.

“Hindi ko alam kung saang lupalop siya nakatira. Doon yata sa Hagunoy.” That was how “Dada Ninay” replied when I first asked about her father, my “Inkong” whose name, I later learned, was Anastacio de Leon or “Inkong Tasio”, Dada’s father and my great-grandfather. Then she began to talk about other things, which was her way of saying “Subject closed! Period!”

Of course I had to ask where Inkong was. That was when she gave me her curt reply about “kung saang lupalop . . . sa Hagunoy”. I also wanted to ask her about the other portraits and the diplomas on the walls of the sala, but I knew it was not the time for more questions. Her inborn initial reticence, however, did not stop me from trying to learn more about Inkong later. Revelations would only come little by little, from many other sources, including Dada herself, and over a long time.

Chapter 2: Earliest Years in Tampoy

by Nunilo M. de Leon

I was born in Manila, at the Mary Johnston Hospital on Quesada St., overlooking Manila Bay. The North Harbor area was still under the sea then and Calle Bangkusay, which is now some distance from the sea, was then the shoreline of Tondo. I was actually my mother’s second pregnancy. She had a miscarriage in her first one.

My parents were schoolmates at the Bulacan Provincial High School in Malolos and my father had been wooing my mother since high school. Father was a senior Bachelor of Science in Commerce student at the University of the Philippines while Mother was in fourth year of her Bachelor of Science in Pharmacy course at the University of Santo Tomas when they were wed, and “Tatang” had to find a job. Having to mix work and studies, he only got his diploma the year after their marriage. When they were married, “Inang” had stopped her studies, as it later turned out, for keeps. We lived in a rented accessoria, as budget-priced apartments were then called, on Calle Ilaya, very near the Tondo parish church. The UP was then on Padre Faura St. in Ermita district, Manila while the UST was where it continues to be, along España Blvd.

“Tatang” was Roque Pantangco de Leon, the ninth and youngest child of Lolo Ramon and Lola Juli, who died soon after giving birth to Tatang. “Inang” was Anita Mendoza Macapugay de Leon, the third child and only daughter of Lolo Luis Macapugay and Lola “Celang”, Marcela Mendoza y Macapugay. The Macapugays originated in the towns of Bulacan and Hagunoy, which are neighbor towns of Malolos, in the province of Bulacan.

Chapter 3: Paracale, soon back in Tampoy

by Nunilo M. de Leon
After a few years with the Chong’s, Tatang found a new job as an accountant at the United Paracale Mines, a gold-mining firm in the town of Paracale, province of Camarines Norte. Not knowing what was waiting in his new job, Tatang went on alone (Inang was again on the way, with her third) to sort of survey the place. Traveling to that part of the country then was quite arduous although the rail network was quite good and extensively used, extending from Damortis, La Union in the north to Lucena, Tayabas in the south. The railroad was then being extended to Legaspi, Albay. To speed things up, the extension was being built from either end, from Lucena and from Legaspi. However, at that time, there was still a gap in the railways, some mountains and rivers in Tayabas province, between the towns of Lopez and Tagkawayan.

The first leg of the trip was an hour-long train ride from Malolos to Tutuban in Manila followed by eight hours on another train to Lopez, Tayabas. The railroad stopped at that point. Following was a six-hour ferryboat ride to reach the town of Calauag on the other side of the gap. Then came another two-hour bus ride to Tagkawayan where the railway resumed and continued all the way to Legaspi in Albay. To reach Paracale, one had to get off the train at the town of Sipocot, Camarines Sur, take the bus to Daet, Camarines Norte and take a smaller vehicle to Paracale. The 400-kilometer trip took more than a whole day.

Some months after Tatang departed, Nestor or “Istong” came, also born in Tampoy with Tio Toniong as attending physician, again.

A few weeks later Tatang sent for us. He had found a suitable house in the middle of town, a short ride from his office in the mines. By then fully recovered from giving birth, Inang bailed me out of kindergarten and we left (Inang, the 3 kids and an Ilokana maid named Marta) not long after. I do not remember much about our trip to Paracale nor of our life there but it must have been quite difficult for Inang, a new household with three small kids, in a strange place. What I clearly recall were the many huge smoke-breathing, hot and noisy coal-fired iron monsters called locomotives inside the Manila Railroad’s cavernous Tutuban terminal, my nostrils sooty from the thick black smoke inhaled during the long train ride, the particles of cinder in my hair, the cool sea breeze during the nighttime ferry crossing, the bumpy bus ride to Tagkawayan, another train and . . . I fell asleep at that point.

Chapter 4: Daet and Manguisok

by Nunilo M. de Leon
Our house in Daet was located along the Sipocot-Daet provincial highway, between the Daet Central Elementary School and the town plaza and a short walk away from either one. The town plaza or park was by the Daet River. The municipal building was on one side of the plaza and the town church on the opposite side, both overlooking the river. The town’s business center and town market were just across the river, which was spanned by a two-lane vehicle bridge, with walkways for pedestrians on either side. The walkways were made of widely-spaced wooden slats and I always felt I was going to fall through the slats every time I crossed the bridge.

The highway between Daet and Sipocot was then considered quite “busy”. This meant that a horse-drawn calesa or carretela would clip-clop along the asphalt highway every couple of minutes and an Alatco bus or another motor vehicle would roar by every quarter hour or so. This highway ran past the town plaza, crossed the river at the bridge and wound up at a crossroad a short distance from the bridge. Beyond the crossroad was a barrio dirt road leading to and ending at the Pacific Ocean in Bagasbas, a barrio of Daet. The left fork led to the northern towns of the province, such as Indan, Labo, Talisay, Paracale and Capalonga, where the road ran out. The right fork led to another dead-end at the seaport barrio of Mercedes.

Our house, like most houses then, was a single elevated level chalet, with a low silong, surrounded by a small fenced-in yard, with an area of perhaps two hundred square meters. A silong was essential because when in rained, the surrounding area would always be under a few inches of water. It had two bedrooms, a sala, a dining room, a kitchen, toilet/bathroom, a batalan, where the backstairs were, and a small entry porch. We had 24-hour electricity and piped-in running water, clay stoves using firewood, no refrigerator but with a paminggalan for keeping cooked food, very much like what we had in Tampoy. Inang had to go every day to the market to buy fresh food which had to be cooked the same day. For furniture, we had wooden double-deckers for the kids, a large rattan bed for Tatang and Inang, wooden aparadors for clothes, and furniture sets for the sala and comedor. There was very little entertainment to speak of, but much reading with so many materials available, and some story-telling. We had one radio, a small shortwave radio, which only Tatang could operate, and which was used only for listening to the news. Commercial radio stations in Manila were too weak-powered to reach Daet. The house was newly constructed and we were the first tenant. The furnishings were also brand new, recently purchased by Inang and Tatang, who obviously intended to live there for some time.

Chapter 5: The Second World War, the Beginning

by Nunilo M. de Leon
It was the morning of December 8, 1941, a Sunday. We were walking home from the church when Inang noticed a visibly-agitated crowd in front of the Daet Municipio and learned that the worst we had feared had happened. The Japanese had bombed Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Hurrying home, we told Tatang who switched on the shortwave radio. He found out that the news was for real and war had already been declared. As a US commonwealth, the Philippines was at war too. That same afternoon, we packed, entrusted our pet dog to a neighbor, closed our house, gave the keys to the landlord and rushed to Manguisok. There, Tatang’s superiors, Alexander Morris, a Scotsman, and Giorgi Skribikin, a Czarist Russian, were getting ready to leave, hiring Alatco cars to take them to the railroad in Sipocot and on to Manila. They were in a rush. Morris was with his wife Dorothy, and daughter Margaret, and wanted to catch a ship in Manila to return to England, or proceed to any British colony. Giorgi, who claimed to be a bachelor and who had fled Russia after World War I, just wanted to join his compatriots in Manila. He was a stateless refugee. Morris told Tatang to stay behind, close down the company’s operations, safeguard the company assets and wait for further instructions from the head office in Manila. He was to retain essential personnel but pay off the rest. Tatang accepted the responsibility. Everyone believed that the war would not last very long. The Americans were believed to be too mighty for the Japanese.

Lolo Luis was still in Manguisok and so were Tio Joaquin and his family. Over Tatang’s shortwave radio, we tried to keep abreast of things. Japanese planes had raided Nichols Field and Fort McKinley in Pasay and Makati, the Port Area in Manila, and Clark Field in Pampanga. After a few more days, the Japanese landed near Legaspi in Albay province, only a hundred or so kilometers away. Then came other landings in Aparri, in La Union, in Lingayen, but these were far away in the north and did not bother us too much. Then we heard of the landing in Atimonan, in Tayabas province, which linked the Bicol region to Manila. That cut off the land route from the Bicol Peninsula to Manila. Tatang got a radio message from Manila, which authorized him to abandon the facilities and allow the employees to ransack the place once the Japanese came near enough.

Chapter 6: The Second World War, in Tampoy at Last

by Nunilo M. de Leon
Tampoy was almost deserted. Lolo Ramon and Tia Monang were there, together with Abong, Eya and Nina. The other Tampoy residents, including Dada Ninay and Turina were in the rice farm in Sukol, Hagunoy. Many residents of Malolos had fled to the surrounding farms even before the Japanese reached Malolos. Lolo Ramon was already very ill and did not evacuate. He had been confined at the Doctors’ Clinic in Manila and was brought home to Tampoy only because of the war. Tia Monang and a few others stayed in Tampoy to take care of him.

The Japanese soldiers were well-disciplined when they first entered the town which was almost empty. They met no resistance and behaved quite well. Eya told us that the first Japanese soldiers who entered the Tampoy house had tried to make advances on Tia Monang, a pretty young lady, but an officer appeared and ordered the soldiers to leave. The officer then bowed to Tia Monang, in apology, and also left. No mention of this was ever made by Tia Monang. Like most others of her generation, she kept things to herself.
The Japanese set up a garrison at the provincial capitol, two kilometers from the middle of town, and appeared very rarely in the town proper. In fact, the only Japanese soldiers we saw in our long trip from Manguisok to Malolos were the four who guarded the “batel” in Pasacao and one sentry standing in front of their garrison at the Far Eastern University along Quezon Blvd. in Manila. They must have been very busy with Bataan and were stretched out very thinly.

There were other members of the clan in Sukol, aside from Dada Ninay and Turina. Tio Aurel, Aurelio Lularga Peña, and Tia Epang, Josefa Pantangco de Leon y Peña, were there with their four children; Josefina “Josie”, Rogelio “Boying”, Fiorello “Pio” and the baby, Aurelio, Jr. “Rely”. The family of Tio Aurel’s younger brother, Rafael, had also evacuated there. “Tia Pacita”, Paz Pantangco de Leon y Crisostomo, the eldest of the siblings, was with “Tio Amado”, Armando Crisostomo in their family home in Barihan, a barrio of Malolos. With them were their three living children; Lydia, Jesus “Bebot” and Mercia “Meya”. No word had as yet been received on the whereabouts of two other De Leon siblings. Tio Carlos was caught by the war with his family in Lingayen. Tio Toniong was in Iloilo when war broke out. He was with Tia Lily and Lourdes, their recently born baby daughter. Four of the De Leon – Pantangco siblings had been accounted for. Two were still missing.

January 16, 2012

Chapter 1: Who Was Ingkong Tasio?

Chapter 2: Earliest Years in Tampoy

Chapter 3: Paracale, soon back in Tampoy

Chapter 4: Daet and Manguisok

Chapter 5: The Second World War, the Beginning

Chapter 6: The Second World War, in Tampoy at Last

Chapter 7: The Second World War, and on to Sukol

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