Aswang

Well, I’ve not posted awhile now, a long while, work has kept me busy.. busy.. and when I’m not at work my new son has been eating up most of whatever other time I have. BUT when I have gotten a minute or two to myself I’m been busy writing a book.The book started out as yet another one of my true to life, personal adventures like so many I have written herein before. The story started out as one of my adventures in Bohol when one night I decided to walk to the graveyard and look for Aswang. You see, night in Bohol can get very boring and I thought that searching for Aswang would spice it up a bit.
Like I said, it started out as non-fiction and for some reason I decided that it would be fun to write a fictional story. So I wrote and I wrote, a little time here, a little time there and soon wala! I was finished… so I thought, hardly… You see… I let a few people read it and the story was so well received that the readers wanted more, one reader wanted me to kill off my uncle for laughing at me in the book, right kill my uncle? “are you crazy?”
So now I’m off writing more, not modifying the existing story, but writing what amounts to a whole new story. It’s going to be kind of cool because when I’m done I will join the two stories into one book. They are two stories that tell a story of Aswang the first a story (the first story I wrote) as viewed by a person being stalked and attacked by Aswang. The second a story of the life of an Aswang, told by an Aswang.
I finished the artwork for the cover as well. Even after all these years I still love Photoshop. On nice Sunday I took my wife on a drive around cemeteries here in San Diego where a took a bunch of photos, then filtered pictures of the moon in a blood red.. well here see for yourself…
Besides that I was finely able to make contact with the “Sons of Calape” a Boholano group I’m been trying to make contact with to join for a long time. But that's pretty much what I’ve been up to.

Mga palaka (Frogs)

Things so common in the Philippines seems such a rare treat when you happen upon them here in Amerika. The frogs that are in our garden, who’s croaking can be heard in the quite of the night are one of those treats. Although frogs, indigenous most places in the world where the environment can support them, my memories are of frogs found in the rice fields of the Philippines.
Memories now important, that were then simply another warm evening in our darkened second story bedroom. The squatter’s karaoke and drunken voices singing an obscure Barry Manilow song have finally fallen silent, at first the only sounds in the room is that of my wife sleeping and the tic tic tic of the electric fan rotating too and fro pushing air to keep us cool. With the days events and those of tomorrow processing in my mind a gentle solitaire croak of a frog in the rice field interrupts my thoughts, buurrum it calls.
buurrum, where are you my love the frog repeats. Soon the stillness of the night, the sounds of my wife sleeping and the tic tic tic of the fan are replaced by the sounds of hundreds of frogs forming a chorus chirping, buurrum, buurrum, buurrum, buurrum, each I imagine calling; where are you my love, I am here my darling …. -*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*
One of the frogs in our garden.

The Power of Money

Uncle Macario (Uyoan Cayong) was of all my grand uncles my favorite. When others would pay me no mind, Uncle Cayong would take the time to spoil me in ways others never would. How excited I would get when I would see Uncle Cayong.
“Billy, how are you? Do you want to buy ice cream?” Uncle would say as he rubbed my head with his warm hand, Oh YES uncle! I would respond with a giant smile on my face. “Okay, you go to the car” he would say motioning with his hand toward his car parked at the curb.
Uncle drove what then seemed like huge shiny black car that had big heavy doors and windows I was to shortto see out of. I would have to stretch my tiny body upward pushing on the seat with my hands to look out the window. "Here we go" uncle would say as he started the car, jetting the gas just a bit. Vroom, the engine would roar and off we would go driving down the street to the local ice cream shop.
It was he, my Uncle Cayong, who would be the one to teach me;
“The Power of Money.”
I was playing outside my Lola’s house on 11th avenue in the San Francisco Richmond District when it happened again, as often it did, and like so many times before I would run crying and holding my nose thinking I was going to die. But unlike time before Uncle Cayong was visiting.
I ran up the star case, opened the front door and ran in the house. I ran to the bathroom pushing a bathroom door open with a thump as it hit the wall. waahhhhhh I cried as I pulled toilet paper from the roll. "Hoi! What’s wrong! "Uncle Cayong said. Blubbering with tearing eyes I turned toward him and lean my head back to show him. My nose is bleeding uncle, am I going to bleed to death? I asked.
"Huh!" he said as he inspected my bleeding nose, "no you will not die". He laughed, "Come with me, I will show you some magic uncle said". He led me to the living room. "Here you lay down to the couch" uncle instructed. As I laid there sniffling back the blood that was still streaming from my nose, Uncle Cayong reached into his pocket and produced a shiny liberty silver dollar. "You see this coin?" Yes uncle I responded, " This is a magic, okay, I will put this coin to you forehead and in awhile your nose will stop to bleeding". Uncle placed the coin on my forehead, smiled and said; "when your nose stops to bleeding you can have the coin".
Uncle walked back to the kitchen where my Lola was and there I laid trying to roll my eye up attempting to see the silver dollar on my forehead. Soon I had forgotten about my nose bleed and was thinking about all the candy I would buy with that shiny silver dollar.
And just like magic, my nose bleed stopped and off to the store I ran with my shiny silver dollar. The power of money, a lesson I have never forgotten.
Uncle if you can hear me I love you and miss you, see you in heaven when I get there.

Lola's Donuts

One of the family recipes that I never was able to get was that of my lolas donuts. The donuts were round, the size of golf ball the exterior of the donut was dark drown and was covered with sugar. Breaking open the donut exposed an off-white almost yellow dough, a wonderful smell and I slight puff of steam would emanate from the donut if they had just come from the deep fryer. I have fond memories of these donuts, as they were an integral part of my childhood memories.
More often than not, I would be outside my lolo and lola’s house on 11th avenue. Most time playing with Hines and Deter, the German kids across the street or secretly looking at the Playboy magazine that my cousin Mark and I hid, something we were more curious about then stimulated by after all we were kids and girls were still somewhat icky and believe me I know icky I had five sisters well, four at that time.
It would be then I would hear my Lola’s voice call… Billlllll—lee, in the long drawn out manner I had accustomed my ears in hearing…. Billll-lee Doughhhh-Nuts… that’s all that I would need to here and I would stop doing whatever I was doing, even stop mid-stream in a sentence and run full bore as if I were Flash Gorden, for the house.
I’d climb the granite stairway to the house open and fly though the door and closing it all in the same motion, I’d run down the hall way and into the kitchen and there, yes there, on the square kitchen table a hot steaming batch of donuts would be stacked in a large bowl.
How excited I would be, feeling as though I could jump out of my own skin! DoNUTS!... donuts donuts donuts my brain would be screaming… I would grab one and bite it then while holding the rest between my teeth I would fill my pants pocket with as many as they could hold. You could see the grease from the donuts oozing though my jeans and the tell tale bumps of donuts within. I would run sort of stiff legged, so as not to crush the donuts I had stuffed into my pockets, down the hallway to the front door to go outside and enjoy. As I left the kitchen I can remember hearing my Lola laugh..

The Closet

In my grandparents house on 10th Avenue in the San Francisco Richmond District there was a closet located at the top of the stairs that led from the entrance way. The room was no larger then 5 foot by 8 foot and was used to store miscellaneous house cleaning tools such as brooms and vacuums. It also contained 100 pound bags of rice which my Lolo and Lola sell, but the most interesting thing is the closet was an alter which in which the Virgin Mary and a crucifix were displayed.
It was here as children we would receive our discipline. We would on occasion for an indiscretion that would upset our grandparents be exiled to “The Closet.” It was here we were to kneel and ask for forgiveness for whatever it was we had done, depending on our transgression, sometimes we would remain in the “The Closet” for hours, sometimes so long we would fall asleep on the bags of rice.
For me visits to “The Closet” seemed a monthly or at vary lest an bi-weekly ordeal as often when I thought I was being smart or slick, I was not and would end up getting caught by an adult in the house. It never occurred to at that time these highly intelligent, mind reading adults knew EXACTLY what I was doing almost all the time and getting caught doing, whatever I was doing, was inevitable.
For most people spending time in “The Closet” would be a time to reflect on what they had done wrong, that is MOST PEOPLE. For me this was a test to see what I could do to amuse myself in a small space. Once I was so bold as to hide a book within the closet because I knew it was only a matter of time before, “I was blamed” for something [it was never my fault at that age] and ended up in the closet yet again.
There was a window in the closet and if memory servers me right I think it was of stained glass. Outside the window was nothing but a space where you could look down one story and up one story, seemingly escape proof. It was one summer day when put into the closet I discovered that a large pipe ran up and down the entire height of the house. The pipe started at the bottom or what was the top of the garage, which was below the grade of the house and ran all the way to the roof.
It was not long that before I squeezed out of the window and scurried up the pipe to the roof to explore the outside world. I had found a refuge an escape from my punishment! The trick was timing, knowing how long I could stay on the roof before someone came to the closet to release me. The time in the closet was proportional to the indiscretion made or INDISCRETION + SEVERITY = TIME TO BE SERVED. Time after time I would journey to the roof when I was suppose to be asking for forgiveness. I would play with the small pebbles on the roof as if they were sand on a beach, I would sneak to the edge of the roof and look over tossing one or two pebbles on cars and people passing by. It was during one of these adventures I herd the yells, that horrible sound a child hears when he is found doing something so bad that he knows his punishment is going to be painful, a fear so great you cry because you know and there is nothing you can do about it.
My punishment was walking on my tip toes while my ear was being forcibly twisted and torn-off or so it seemed and the shear delight of kneeling on mongo beans till I fell asleep with forehead on the wall from crying.
Future visits to “The Closet” found the window locked so I could not escape for another adventure.
And now; my 9 year old son Jon, is a living testament of who I was at his age and I am the highly intelligent, mind reading adult who knows EXACTLY what he is doing almost all the time and getting is inevitable.

Siling labuyo

In Americka the Sili you buy at the Asian market is labeled as Sili but are not my beloved Sili, at least not Philippine Sili. Back in the Pinas, one Sili measuring ½ in length contained enough fire to cause not only your forehead to bead sweat but also the parietal area of your head to seep large droplet of sweat too.
Here in Americka, Siling labuyo is just not the same, it was routine for me to eat spoonfuls of this “imported” Sili. I would line both sides of my hotdog with them, I would eat five or six to a spoonful of rice and adobo. I would in essence eat a whole 12oz. jar in less then one month and my acid reflux would hardly notice.
Janet, my loving wife, remembering her husband (me, who else) while back home in Bicol picked and pickled 2 quarts of Sili (see picture) that her mama and papa grow in their garden. While picking them papa was shocked that I ate the Sili like it was candy. When Janet told me this I laughed and said “those are not even hot.”
When Janet returned home and I was able to sample them I found that these Sili were INCREDIBLY HOT. I found that the green, light green and red were hot right off the bat. The yellow or beige ones were mild and white ones sneak up on you; at first you think they are bland and then all of a sudden your mouth is on fire, your face will flush and your whole head will seep droplet of sweat.
Last night, I don’t know what I was thinking. I ate an assortment of these Sili on two ham sandwiches made from left over from thanksgiving. I had placed 8 Sili on each sandwich for a total of 16 Sili
Today my stomach is rumbling and my lower exit hole is burning so bad that if not for the fear of getting frost bite I would shove a whole tray of ice cube up my personal lower orifice………… I am in trouble……. For lack of a better description my ass is on fire.