Nang Berta was our big neighbor with no front teeth. She, her husband and five kids lived right next door. Growing up in Bukidnon in the 1980s, inside a housing camp for employees provided by my father’s multinational employer, she was among the most fascinating characters in our part of the neighborhood. Her kids, Napie, Bam-bam and Jun-jun were my playmates.
Her style of raising her kids was out-of-the-ordinary, I’m telling you. She made them strip to the barebones and let them roam the streets in their full naked glory every time they offended and crossed her.
Her house was bigger than ours because her husband had a higher position in the company than my father’s. However, I always thought her hubby a doormat. Berta’s voice was like the voice of God. She had her way with everything. I always thought that she’d forced herself on him, and since he was too chicken to say no, they ended up getting married.
For some reason, the family was always short on cash. So she had to resort to creative ways to make ends meet. She’d sell the beef-and-pork provisions for employees at higher prices to expensive restaurants in the city, which were prohibited by the company. She also had this habit of buying expensive appliances on credit, only to be "embargoed", or returned after a few months, due to non-payment.
I was a frequent visitor at her house. She was always out trying to borrow money from some people, so I get to play with the kids. We’d play hide-and-seek in the cabinets and closets, crawl out of windows, and jump up-and-down non-stop in the huge mattress. In fact, that’s the only place where I successfully did a full ‘gymnastic’ tumble.
She had this weird idea of putting the king-sized mattress in the living room, so that the kids would go straight to sleep after watching TV. And for some reason, she converted one bedroom into the dining room.
She was also fond of listening to AM radio. Eddie Ilarde and Helen Vela created a craze in re-enacting letter-writers’ life stories on radio and dispensing advice afterwards. In Cagayan de Oro, Phil Yburan ruled the airwaves. With stirring orchestral music and the radio talent’s knack for using highly-poetic Bisaya, the show was highly-rated and popular, so much that Phil Yburan was considered a local celebrity.
Since Nang Berta felt her life story worthy of a radio re-enactment, she wrote Phil her life story and promptly got a reply, promising to meet her for lunch at her home. Berta prepared a sumptuous lunch. The whole neighborhood was abuzz with the news. Lunchtime came and no Phil. When Phil and his crew arrived, the food was already gone. Filled with shame, she ran out of the house into the backyard, and hid among the banana trees near the cornfield.
Phil returned to Cagayan de Oro, hungry as hell. He didn’t feature her life story.
Her style of raising her kids was out-of-the-ordinary, I’m telling you. She made them strip to the barebones and let them roam the streets in their full naked glory every time they offended and crossed her.
Her house was bigger than ours because her husband had a higher position in the company than my father’s. However, I always thought her hubby a doormat. Berta’s voice was like the voice of God. She had her way with everything. I always thought that she’d forced herself on him, and since he was too chicken to say no, they ended up getting married.
For some reason, the family was always short on cash. So she had to resort to creative ways to make ends meet. She’d sell the beef-and-pork provisions for employees at higher prices to expensive restaurants in the city, which were prohibited by the company. She also had this habit of buying expensive appliances on credit, only to be "embargoed", or returned after a few months, due to non-payment.
I was a frequent visitor at her house. She was always out trying to borrow money from some people, so I get to play with the kids. We’d play hide-and-seek in the cabinets and closets, crawl out of windows, and jump up-and-down non-stop in the huge mattress. In fact, that’s the only place where I successfully did a full ‘gymnastic’ tumble.
She had this weird idea of putting the king-sized mattress in the living room, so that the kids would go straight to sleep after watching TV. And for some reason, she converted one bedroom into the dining room.
She was also fond of listening to AM radio. Eddie Ilarde and Helen Vela created a craze in re-enacting letter-writers’ life stories on radio and dispensing advice afterwards. In Cagayan de Oro, Phil Yburan ruled the airwaves. With stirring orchestral music and the radio talent’s knack for using highly-poetic Bisaya, the show was highly-rated and popular, so much that Phil Yburan was considered a local celebrity.
Since Nang Berta felt her life story worthy of a radio re-enactment, she wrote Phil her life story and promptly got a reply, promising to meet her for lunch at her home. Berta prepared a sumptuous lunch. The whole neighborhood was abuzz with the news. Lunchtime came and no Phil. When Phil and his crew arrived, the food was already gone. Filled with shame, she ran out of the house into the backyard, and hid among the banana trees near the cornfield.
Phil returned to Cagayan de Oro, hungry as hell. He didn’t feature her life story.
1 comment:
Hey les! Zarah here. Remember? from the bumpkin bukidnon highlands? Stella gave me ur blogsite. im officially a fan. you're hilarious!
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