Redoble Family

Days ago, I received a text message from Benjie Boy, the eldest of our family telling me about the many piglets he has in the farm at the moment, somewhere in Titay, Zamboanga Sibugay.  One phrase amused me: “… dre, daghan ko ug baktin karon, duna na ko gilaan para ihawon sa pyesta puhon sa Senyor” (Padre [he calls me father even he is our eldest], i have plenty of piglets, I have reserved some for the Fiesta of the Child Jesus on January).  My brain was then filled with activity: synapses and transmitters, electrical impulses traveling back in time … my memory came alive and I was in  Moalboal 34 years ago… I was Fourth Year at San Juan High School.  The month should have been September, because the air was cool then.  The time was somewhere between 12AM and 2AM.  Lola Iyang was there … tiya Shirley .. Primo, the 7th son, my brother was there (he was first year high school).  We were quiet busy .. I was holding an old cotton T shirt and before us was the mother pig, about to give birth to her little pigs.  She was laying down .. her breathing was heavy … and painful, I suppose.  We were play acting a veterinarian thing or a midwife assisting a birthing! We became voyeurs of the birth pangs, it was an event of welcoming to the world the piglets …  And finally, a piglet came out, slimy, and yet catched by Lola Iyang .. she checked the gender … seeing that it was a female, she said: she will become a mother pig!  Thereby signing its fate, by divine providence, este Iyang’s providence!  She then passed it to me, so I can clean it with the rug and place it in a box.  She would do the same to all six, checked the gender and signing the fate: for the Birthdayof tio Abon, for sale, for motherhood (hahaha) and the most awaited: for the fiesta!  How many were there for the fiesta? Three piglets just came out from the dark cavern of their mother pig’s belly were already sentenced “by guillotine” to be carried out Nine months after: May 15, Fiesta of Moalboal, Cebu!  Days ahead were frenetic, I and Primo would come home on time, rush to the shoreline, harvest some seaweeds, to be fed to the pigs, mixed with pig’s meal.  Lola was contented with the little pigs .. I and primo were bored doing the same thing every afternoon .. hahaha.  But then again, heavens o heavens, whose prayers were heard? The pigs began to get sick one by one, there was no veterinarian yet in town, and so, they  died one after another .. until even the mother was sick .. and so we have to butcher it.  Fiesta came too soon for us in November!  We had humba, adobo, deep fried belly, dinuguan, etc …  I also had to take some of humba to the city for tiyo Abon and family …  It was fun.  I and primo were contented! No more frolicking the ebb tide every afternoon!  As for Lola, she took it by stride with dignity and wisdom:  “I should not have reserved them for this or for that; maybe San Juan did not like it”, she said.  She learned a lot by experience … but it meant another burden for us, having to look for a pig to be butchered days before the fiesta … and it was not easy .. when everyone in town would be butchering a pig or two on the same date!  Poor Pigs!  Poor me having to go as far as Mantalongon, Barili with an uncle to find one!

Anyway, the sentence Benjie Boy had given on his little pigs may prove good for them, and live until January’s Fiesta of the Child Jesus, or good for the tenants as they might have early fiesta, too, just as we had thirty-four years ago.  Memories come always with fun.

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