A season of wakes and funerals

BENCHWARMER

By Ramon Dacawi

We were just into a spate of mourning, losing quite a few of the newsworthy and the ordinary among us.  For quite sometime now, the news now is found in the obituary pages, sending us to prayer and hope that  this season of wakes and funerals would break, as we do deserve a respite from it all.

The season began last March, when former city administrator and fellow ex-activist Jose Taguba kicked the bucket. Absent-mindedly and  out of  duty and love, especially during the months Manong Joe was disabled by illness, his wife Remedios, the former regional education director, would wake up mornings during the wake and call out his name while preparing his breakfast.

Benguet then buried Jimmy Panganiban,  its former governor who passed on last April 20. Manong Jimmy, a contemporary student leader of my brother Joe at the former Baguio Tech,  failed in his re-election bid for governor in 1995. Still, he did a class act by personally proclaiming his successor, now former governor Raul Molintas. Manong Jimmy went on to earn his wage decently, as manager of the printing press of Norlu, a cooperative movement based here in Baguio.

Baguio residents interred their beloved city vice-mayor Daniel Farinas the other Saturday morning, ending a six-night wake that saw a continuous stream of mourners catching a last glimpse of a leader some called the best vice-mayor Baguio ever had.

Among the thousands who came to the wake  was Herminia Bolla, a mother of two whose husband  is on twice-a-week hemodialysis for kidney failure.

“My husband told me to come and thank the vice-mayor for his intercession that enabled our two daughters to take their final exams in their senior years with the promise that their school fees would be eventually settled,” she explained.  “We had to use what money we had  then for his hemodialysis.”

While he was presiding over the city council last March, the vice-mayor signed, almost without reading, a letter hastily explained to him was asking a university for a “test-now, pay-later” arrangement for the two girls who eventually graduated degrees in accounting and education.

Anecdotes about VM Farinas’ were endless  as was the stream of mourners during the wake. One of the best city councilor Peter Fianza retold to me after he heard if from legal prosecutor Willy Dominguez of Mt. Province.

Dominguez was then a police officer assigned to Baguio’s Finest. He and Farinas were classmates in law school and took the bar exams together. Dominguez was on his beat along Abanao St. when he saw his classmate rushing to a newsstand to see whether his name was among the list of new lawyers published in the dailies.

“Nakitak, naka-pass ka,” Dominguez told him outright.

Like a child in tantrums, Farinas dropped to the pavement and convulsed in joy over the news. Passersby thought he had a heart attack or an epileptic seizure and came for the rescue, only to be told by officer and brand new lawyer Dominguez he was acting strangely as he just learned he had just passed the bar.

Danny, who,  I learned during the wake, was two years my junior, was my classmate and buddy in college at the University of Baguio. We were in history class together, under the late Hermonico Guanzon and Victoria de los Reyes. He ventured into student politics while I joined the student paper – The UB Forum. He finished Bachelor of Science in Education in four years while I memorized the first two letters of the alphabet (AB) in five years. He became a teacher and I joined the ranks of provincial journalists. He became a lawyer, master’s and doctorate degree holder  and I was still a journalist. He became city councilor and city vice-mayor and I became an apologist (information officer) under the mayor’s office.

Reason enough for me to rib him when he stood as godfather during the church wedding in Camp Crame of broadcast journalist Francis “Kiko” Calado of DZRH who, I was told, is now a fireman in Vallejo, Baguio’s sister-city in Northern California.

Kiko, who married Midol, the daughter of the late Baguio newsman Reuben Cacdac and the former Elvira Aromin, the sister of Danny’s wife Lilia, had for their godparents then Defense Secretary and presidential candidate Renato de Villa, Susan Roces, Inday Badiday, Gina de Venecia (wife of House Speaker and presidential candidate  Jose de Venecia) among other celebrity sponsors, and vice-mayor Farinas.

“Danny,” I whispered to the vice-mayor before the wedding march, “sika ti kababaan kadagiti ninong ken ninang ditoy.” “Wen ngarud,” he replied with the humility that had endeared him to his constituency.

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Itogon, Benguet lost late last month  Belen LubuaTongalog Palangdan, the mother of town mayor Vic Palangdan. Baguio lost retired police officer Jaime Dereje and Ramon Ilagan, son of the late public school teacher Colasita Ilagan and the younger brother of the late fellow Baguio journalist and activist Jose “Peppot” Ilagan, and University of Baguio Prof. Ruben Yapyap.

I was with Manong Jimmy in some Cordillera athletic meets and several editions of the “Palarong Pambansa” which I covered as pool reporter and which he served as security officer for the local delegation. While at the regional games in Ifugao, he misplaced, without his knowledge and consent, his wallet while on board a tricycle bound for the Baguio quarters in Kiangan town.

The tricycle driver found the wallet on the cab floor and was soon on his way to the owner in Kiangan. Manong Jimmy told me the story, praising the young and honest Ifugao. Ihonestly  wrote the story about honesty and told Manong Jimmy. Instead of noting my sensitivity, he frowned, expressing worry his wife, then education supervisor ZenaidaSantamaria-Dereje, would read the item and, true to a wife’s instincts, demand for his wad.

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The Wright Park pony boys just lost one of their pioneers, Nick Molintas, younger brother of Johnny “Taimong” who started the horse-for-hire business at Burnham Park and then at Wright Park. The boys will bury this Saturday Nick’s nephew, Jules Byron, third of four sons of the late Mike Molintas and widow Maria Paz “Datsu” Infante. In her teens, Datsu, a scion of the sugar magnates of Bacolod, turned her back on a life of wealth and ease and married Mike, scion of the once-landed Ibaloy clan of Gibraltar Barangay here. Their made-for-the movies love story came to the fore when Datsu was struggling to save the life of their eldest son Nino Joshua who was born with a hole in his heart.

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Mourning is more often for the over 180 kidney patients undergoing twice- or thrice-a-week dialysis treatment at the Baguio General Hospital and Medical Center. They just  lost former postman  Russel Solinto of Camp 6, Tuba, Benguet and Kalinga; John Tiyad of Asin Road, Baguio; Belinda Allosa of Pinsao Proper, Baguio;  Leah Lyn Talangan  of Talubin, Bontoc, Mt. Province and, last Monday, 28-year old Victoria Cresencia Cadater Brioso of Baguio and Lubuagan, Kalinga. (e-mail: mondaxbench@yahoo.com for comments.)