Chapter 8- My Grand Parents on My Mother’s Side

My grandmother’s name was Aurea Bartolome Carvajal. She had four children, two girls and two boys. My mother, Estrella was the eldest. There was rumors going on of the coming war between the United States and Japan in Asia. The 2nd World War in Europe was about to end.

My mother Estrella cared for me with my grandmother. They cared for me when I was still a baby. My grandmother who was the youngest among her 9 brothers and sisters had a share of land, about 5 hectares, two hectares of low land, suitable for rice farming and 3 hectares upland. The farm sustained our foods during the war and after.

Grandmother with her four children planted rice in the lowland. Corn, bananas, root crops, such as camote, cassava, oraro, gabi, ubi and vegetables were planted on the upland. She also had several mango trees.

In the morning we ate camote, cassava, gabi and vegetables. We always have cocoa drinks in the morning and evening. Grandmother and mother planted cocoa vines near our house. It grew with big vines and bore lots of fruits. Mother planted cocoa July or August every year. She kept the dried beans whole year. She also encouraged her neighbors and relatives to plant cocoa. She gave seeds for them to plant.

When cocoa fruit matured my mother with my 2 uncles harvested them and dried them under the sun. They dried the fruits for several days until quite dried . They get the seeds from the shell and dried them further under the sun. Dried cocoa seeds were preserved the whole year.

My two uncles, Ernesto and Ricardo pounded cocoa seeds with mortar and pestle until grounded fully. They mixed ground cocoa seeds with boiled water and sugar an d served for breakfast and snack.

Cocoa for drinks and boiled bananas were our breakfast in the morning. Some other days, we have cocoa with boiled camote and cassava roots. Our snack in the afternoon were boiled cocoa with sugar and camote or cassava, oraro and ube. Those were very nutritious. I think, this was the reason, why we are healthy even then.

Often, we had fishes with seashells and vegetables for lunch. Almost daily grandmother got sheshells from the seashores. There were plenty of “big living stones” in the shore called “kabatuan”. There small edible shells were plenty, hiding under the stones. Grandmother selected the bigger shells and brought them home. She brought fish sometimes. She mixed the shells with vegetable for lunch. Fish with vegetables were often our supper.

Mother would not allow me to eat cassava during the nights. She told me, that was on instruction of my father when he left and joined the army. Cassava was eaten only during days. Never during the night.

My grandfather, Esperidion Carvajal left my grandmother and his 4 children before I was born. He had practical training on health care and earned income by caring for those who were sick. He went to Negros Occidental and stayed there for many years. He returned to Cawayan, Carles, Iloilo when I was about 6 years old. I first met my grandfather when he arrived the first time after many years of his sojourn in Negros Occidental.

It was about 4:00 pm when my grandfather arrived. He talked to me. I answered him. And soon we're talking to each other. He stayed with my parents. My father and mother took care of him. He could not work anymore. His eyes were growing blind. My grandmother did not live with my grandfather any more.

My parents, uncles and aunts helped take care of my grandfather. They cared for him. when he was completely blind. His children took turns caring for him. They respected him. But think there was little love,

Grandfather died 10 years after he returned home. There was 9- day wake for my grandfather. He died under the care of Untie Aurea Alvaro ’and her husband Eldefonso in their home. All of his children joined his wake. No one among his children cried when he died. Uncle Ricardo said he will get an old woman to cry during my grandfather’s wake.

My grandmother was a woman with a strong and courageous heart. She was soft--spoken but decisive. She guided her children, 2 boys and 2 girls in their lives. She worked providing us our needs. When his sons and daughters got married, she gave them her blessings and gave them share of the land. Each of them had a one hectare farm.

Grandmother live with each of her children every six months. That was her way to help each of her grandchildren to feel her love. He stayed with each of us and all her children and grandchildren every six months. While she lived with his sons and daughters, he took care of her grandchildren, including getting fresh shells in the seashore every morning to help provide the family food.

To have strong and loving relations with her grandchildren, every night after supper, the mats were readied on the bamboo floor in the homes where ever she was staying. She told stories to her grandchildren. Grandmother was a good storyteller.

All of us grandchildren love to hear her nightly stories. She had seven stories. One story every night. These were the same stories, which she told over and over again with some little revisions to make it a bit new and fresh. The same story, told several times the year over by grandmother. We love to hear her telling us stories, at nights until we slept.

Uncle Ernesto was in Iloilo City studying in high school and later in the College of Theology. When he was already pastor of Dumangas Baptist Church, my grandmother visited them in Dumangas during the months of October to December. This was harvest time and grandmother took me with her to Dumangas. She joined other women and men to harvest rice. It was one of our ways to earn money for some of her needs.

At home, we had young coconuts and drunk fresh coconut water. Father and mother knew that fruits were good for our bodies. They made sure we have fruits always at home. They took care of guavas growing around our house. We had 2 duhat trees (lomboy) which provided us with fruits every year.

We have several santol trees with big fruits. We had several coconut trees providing us with young fruits anytime we needed. We had some old coconuts for coconut milk, we often used to mis with for our vegetables.

We took care of wild trees that provide us with fruits like inyam, kaimoto, on-on, and other wild trees that grew around. These wild trees, together with what our parents planted, provided us with fruits needed for the development of our bodies, bones and minds.

During our younger days we seldom got sick. I had never gone to a clinic or hospital when I was young. In college, I got once a stomach problem. I went to Iloilo Mission Hospital for just a day and night of medication and rest.

In 2010, I got a stroke that landed me in a hospital. I got a stroke two times in two years. That was in 2010 and 2012. I accepted a hard kind of works, very heavy and hectic for the heart and mind. It was tedious reaching to different towns and villages where we have churches all over the country. I made a wrong kind of work that caused my stroke..

We lived simple lives in the village of Dayhagan, Pilar, Capiz and Cawayan, Carles, Iloilo when were young. The people of our village were healthy. Very few ever got sick. I never heard of people sick of diabetes, high blood pressures and other diseases like the deadly kidney stones and liver troubles during those times.

Men and women in our village died of old age at their homes. In my primary and elementary school days, I had not seen a physician caring for the sick. I have not seen a hospital until I was in college. I only saw “herbolarios”, men and women who practiced herbal medicine. They care for the sick. They visited people in homes who were sick, gave them medicine from concoctions of plant’s barks, leaves, roots and fruits. The sick get well and soon were working in their farms.

During those times the old people were healthy. They die of old age. My grandmother died when she was 108 years old. And more, there were no women and young girls with false teeth during those times!

Edited….Finalizing editing…,

1Rex Celeste

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Rudy Bernal

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Chapter 7- My Grand Parents on My Father’s Side

My grandparents by father’s side were Simplicio Bernal and “Am” Apolinario. I cannot remember the first name of my grandmother. But I called her “Am”. I was the first who called her “Am”. I was the only grandchild until I was 4 years old. “Am” was short and inverted for “mama” That was how I called her for endearment.

My brothers and sisters followed me in calling our grandmother, “Am”. All my cousins also called my grandmother “Am”. They lived in Guinticgan, Carles, Iloilo, about 3 kilometers away from our home in Cawayan, Carles and 2 kilometers from Poblacion Carles.

Guinticgan, Carles is one of the 16 villages in mainland Carles. Twenty-four other villages were island villages on the eastern side, separated by sea from the mainland. Carles has a fishing grounds covering thousands and thousand miles on the northwest, north and northeastern seas. It had very wide swamplands, much of it was now developed into fishponds.

The fishpond areas of Carles were 3rd in size in the whole province of Iloilo. Carles was considered before the coming of strongest Typhoon Yolanda in 2014, as the 3rd biggest producer of coconuts and copra. Typhoon Yolanda destroyed much of the coconut plants. Then, I was followed by Typhoon Ursula last year that destroyed many coconuts, mangoes and other fruit-bearing plants.

My grandfather earned his living by fishing. When I was very young, he had a kind of “fish pond” in the stony seashore of Guinticgan, His’ “fish pond” was about 100 meters wide and 200 meters long. He gathered big stones and made it a kind of a “fish pond”. Stones were stocked about a waist-high and a meter wide at the base. Here the fish during high tides entered grandpa’s “fish pond”.

In Guinticgan, it was called “Atog”. During high tides, the "fish pond" of my grandfather was submerged in deep water, which was about 2 meters high. Different fishes from the sea entered grandfather’s “fish pond”. During low tides, when seawater subsided and shallow, just about half-foot deep and lower, I could see the different fishes stranded in the “fish pond”. He just entered the fishpond and caught the fishes, some already lying on the sand but alive.

Grandfather caught the fish still swimming in the deeper side of the fish pond with his small fishnet. He got a lot of fishes in the morning to bring home to my grandmother. The fish was more than enough for the family's needs. Some fish he sold to neighbors and friends.

Grandfather had also a rented small rice farm, about a hectare. He developed it to a rice field during the rainy season from June to September. Then from October to November he planted corn, different kinds of vegetables and peanuts. This was how grandfather earns income for his 4 children, 3 boys and a girl.

My grandfather told me that when he was still a young boy, the place where they have their home and farm was a jungle. There were many snakes. He said: “Rudy when I was still young, one time, I saw a big snake on the branch of the tree in this jungle. The big snake had caught a calf. The snake bit the calf on his back, holding it strongly. trying to bring it to the top of the tree. The snake’s tail and the body was around the big branch of the tree up.

"The snake’s teeth bit strongly the back of the calf. It was trying hard to lift the calf to the higher branch of the tree. The snake lifted the calf about a meter and a half high in the tree. It can swallow the whole calf when his saliva will be around the calf.”

The snake was called “Bitin”. It was called “Bitin” because it carried it’s captured victim up the branch of the tree. My grandfatfer and his friend killed the snake. They also killed the calf which was still alive but very weak. They slaughtered the calf and the meat distributed to the neighbors. However, the meat bitten by the snake was tasteless.

“Am”, my grandmother, helps earn their living by planting sweet corn and bananas for snacks. She planted “violet ubi”, a root crop and made it into some kind of cakes. She planted cacao, a tree whose fruits she dried and pulverized. She had a small grinder made of 2 flat and round stones at home. She grounded cacao grains on her grindstone. Then she mixed the grounded cacao cereals with water and sugar and made chocolates and bread for our breakfasts and snack. Some, she sold to neighbors.

Grandmother also planted a kind of an “oatmeal” that grows tall, about two meters high, which flowered and matured to grains. She called the grains “batad”. After harvesting, she dried her “batad” and made it into grains. She cleaned it. She ground it. She called the grounded “batad” an oatmeal. She cooked oat meals in morning for breakfast. She told me to eat this in the morning because oatmeals have many vitamins and minerals and good for my body and mind.

When I was about 8 years old my grandfather, Tatay Melik together with his three other brothers, Tay Gauden, Papa Pecto, Tay Amboy cut a huge tree, about 3 meters in circumference in Guinticgan. They made the big tree into a boat. They worked together building it. After several months, they have a big boat, 1 ½ meter wide, 1 meter deep and 25 meters long. They put 18 oars, nine on each side of the boat. Twenty-four people went fishing on that boat, either early morning, late afternoon, and sometimes during night time,

They bought big threads and made the fishing nets themselves. They inaugurated the boat. They burned an incense. They started a new venture in life, fishing with their newly built fishing boat and fishing nets. That was how enterprising my 4 grandparents on my father's side were. My four grandparents did not have any sister.

My grandparents went fishing with some 24 young people, including young boys helping them. They managed their fishing business together, each with special task. Tay Gauden stirs the boat. Tay Amboy was the manager. Tatay Milek was always at the front, looking for the swarms of fishes. Tay Gauden was in charged of selling the fish. They continued in their business for years, until some 20 years later, a strong typhoon came and destroyed their fishing boat.

My aunt Rosina visited me always when I was still a small boy of 3 to 4 years old in my mother’s house. Because I was the only nephew, I was loved and endeared by my uncles and aunties. Nene Rosing, came often every two weeks to my mother and borrowed me for 3 days. She brought me to my grandparents in Guinticgan and be with them. This was 3 kilometers away which we always walked slowly going there and back. When I got tired, she carried me on her waist or back. I walked on the beach and farms for the 3 kilometers way. It was always a good experience walking on a very clean seashore where fishermen caught fish by hooks, lines and sinkers about 10 meters away from the shorelines.

My uncle, Jose was very close to me. When I was 4 years old, uncle Jose made me a small boat which I used to play in the seashore and in the rice paddies when water was deep. When I was in Grade 1, Uncle Jose made me a pair of boxing gloves and taught me some boxing skills. When our glove became rotten, mother, a tailor made me another pair of boxing gloves for me, my brother and my friend’s use. But I did not make good in boxing, just a fad skills to parry and stop a possible opponent. I earn a little from my boxing gloves. I rented the gloves to children and young people for 10 centavos per 3 rounds of boxing.

My uncle Jose also made me a ukelele and taught me how to play. But I did not learn to play musical instruments. He also made me a banjo, another music instrument which he made from scraps and woods with dried goat skin. I tried to play both the ukeleli and banjo. I did not made good in playing musical instrument.

When we have children with Hesther, we bought musical instrument. We gave our 4 children some musical training from teachers we hired at Yamaha School of Music. We bought guitars for them and a drum set for them to learn. Our children, Rally, Noynoy, Toses and Dodo learned some skills in musical instruments and played music. Rally made good in playing guitars. He stayed long in Buracay Island playing guitar with his team of musicians singing to tourists in Boracay.

We bought also some weightlifting equiptment, dumb bells and assisted them to get trainers for self-defense. These were ways we did to develop their skills and self- confidence.

2Myrna Bernal and Wilson D Guanzon

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Rudy Bernal