Where are you going home to?
In life, we travel a lot. There are places that we call home for sometime but we need to move somewhere just when we thought we have settled. In times like these, I remember the song “Constant Change” that goes: “We're on the road, we move from place to place. And oftentimes when I'm about to call it home, we've had to move along. Life is a constant change”.
I have made several homes in different places that sometimes, I wake up feeling disoriented: where am I?
San Luis, Capul N. Samar
I spent the first 16 years of my life in San Luis where I was born. I grow up in the house built by my father near the chapel and the plaza that shaped my young mind. We also had a farmhouse in a place called Baquiw where we stayed during farming seasons.
Our house was made of wood and nipa, which, eventually gave up during the typhoon “Dinang” in December 25, 1981, only 25 days after our youngest sibling was born. The roof of our house was blown off by the strong winds while I and the other young children together with Nanay were covered with mats in one room while Tatay and my older brothers where tying the posts and fixing the roof. When the winds slowed down, we transferred to the big house owned by the family of my friends, where other families have also taken refuge. After the storm, we picked up whatever pieces we could but only two rooms, the living room and kitchen were retained.
This house was witness to my first triumphs as a child as well as my family's struggle to make a better life. We eventually rebuild the same house when I was in high school. Until now, we are improving this house. This house is where my older siblings who have not been home for several years came home to during our homecoming every fiesta.
I know, wherever life may lead me, I will always go back to this house.
Tacloban, Leyte
The first time I left home was when I enrolled in college in UP Tacloban in June 1991. For nine years, I lived in different boarding houses, which became my home while studying at the State University. My first ever boarding house was located in Esperas Avenue, where I shared the room with four other Capuleño students. We transferred to Villa Aurora in Gomez St. during the second semester because the house will be renovated. By summer, I transferred again to another boarding house at the back of UP Tacloban together with some Capuleño friends but by first semester of my sophomore year, I transferred again to an apartment along Gomez St., near the previous boarding house that I lived in. Some of my most memorable college memories happen in this house where I lived for one year. I returned again to this house after briefly renting with my brother on another apartment along Burgos St. On my third year, we moved again to another apartment located in Barangay Marasbaras where I stayed with all the former boarders in that house in Gomez St.
After some housemates leave for other places due to personal reasons, I rented a bed space on a boarding house along M.H. Del Pilar St., near St. Paul Hospital where I stayed until I graduated in 1995. I stayed in this house for 4 years until I had my first job as researcher in Leyte-Samar Heritage Center, the research arm of UP Tacloban. However, the new owner renovated this house in 2001 so I stayed with my friend Igning who was renting a house in another part of Marasbaras. After a brief stay, I rented a room in Barangay Sagkahan but because of frequent flooding in the area; I went back to Igning's house in Marasbaras until I decided to teach at the Visayas State College of Agriculture (ViSCA) in Baybay, Leyte, and 3 hours west of Tacloban.
For nine years, I always thought that Tacloban would become my mooring place for a long time. I have been very familiar with the place that I could not stand being away for even a week from the place. I always miss Tacloban whenever I have out of town research assignments that require me to be away for a week or more so leaving Tacloban for Baybay was a painful decision for me.
Baybay, Leyte
I went to Baybay in June 2001 to join the faculty of the Arts and Letters Department of ViSCA, which was later named as Leyte State University. These days, the school, which is the biggest school in Region 8, is known as Visayas State University.
I taught Humanities, Rizal and Philippine History subjects for four semesters until I felt that it was time to go again. I could not stand the internal politics in the school so I said goodbye to my students at the end of classes in March 2003. These students who came from mostly poor families from Visayas and Mindanao become close to me and I enjoyed interacting with them. These two years of teaching were two of the most fulfilling years of my adult life. When I first came to ViSCA, I only knew Weng, a former schoolmate and my co-member of the theater arts group in UP Tacloban who was teaching in the same department. After two years, I left behind my co-teachers who also become my good friends.
I only stayed in one place while in ViSCA which I shared with my co-teacher Baying who becomes one of my closest friends. Thanks to the wonders of new technology, we update each other regularly and most importantly, giggled together on each other's misadventures.
For a time after I left ViSCA, I went back to Tacloban to finish my masters but I could not find a regular job in the city. This time, I was staying in the new house bought by Igning in the outskirts of Palo, Leyte.
Metro Manila
Unfortunate events and a broken heart and spirit forced me to leave Tacloban for good in September 2003. Although I dreaded the thought of working and living in Manila, I have nowhere to go. When I came in November 2003, I lived with my brother in Las Piñas and later, I rented a room with cousins in Pasig. I transferred to Marikina to relative's house in Marikina briefly but I returned to Pasig again, which is nearer to my place of work where I am staying to date.
I have been contemplating of trying my luck of working abroad for quite sometime time now. If that happens, I know I still have a lot of places and houses to live in before I could decide to retire in my permanent mooring place.
