I LIVE a 30-minute walk from Loyola Memorial Park in Marikina, where my father, two brothers and maternal grandparents are buried.
Every Oct. 31 for the last 10 years or so (except 2013, when I was sick), I have packed candles, matches, an umbrella and cap, water, a towel and some music in a backpack, and joined the people entering the memorial park on foot around lunchtime, a slow-moving stream which extends the walk to about 45 minutes.
Unlike obvious once-a-year visitors—those wandering about with puzzled looks on their faces, peering at every gravestone, wondering where their dead had gone—I know where the family graves are, although it’s easy to get lost amid the living.
I light the candles, sit for a while, say a prayer, then walk back home.
The rest of the family, including my 91-year-old mother, waits for the crowd to dissipate, and prefers to visit on Nov. 2.
Hey, give us a break. For many years, the entire family practically camped out in Loyola—rain, mud, stinky toilets and all. That is, until things started getting stolen from inside our tent, and pockets started getting picked (thankfully, just once on my part).
Sometime after we stopped our vigils, a pregnant woman was gunned down and two children wounded in that very cemetery on All Saints’ Day of 1998, in an altercation over a parking space. (The killer was given a 14-year sentence and fined P3.8 million. I suppose he’s out now, so that’s another reason to avoid the park on that day.)
Yes, next time you see those poor folks huddled on banig, mattresses, blankets or folding beds atop their loved ones’ graves and wonder how they do it—well, that was me for many years.
After the first traumatic death in the family in 1976—my brother Mel, whom we lost to a fraternity hazing at age 19—my mother insisted we spend that one night by his side at the campo santo, as she called it. My brother Bert’s motorcycle buddies would block off the parking spaces nights before, and in lieu of a tent, my kuya Greg would pitch a used military parachute.
Mahjong table
On sunny days, it would be a warm picnic, complete with sleeping toddlers, a mahjong table, my mother’s rocking chair and lots and lots of food. Indeed, it would take a big truck, on loan from the cement company my brother Don worked for, to cart all the stuff.
But it inevitably rained, and the parachute would leak in a million places, leaving us stomping about in mud—so Mama eventually prevailed upon Greg to buy a real tent.
I was only 12 when Mel died, so I had a lot of good times at the cemetery.
Nighttime was fun, and gave us excuses to stay up late and wander, in search of celebrities, interesting sights or cute boys. Cousins would come over to bike, skateboard or run around the park and buy snacks from the many stalls.
In later years, I would do a lot of reading, or bring a portable radio or cassette/CD player, which, of course, would be overpowered by the loud music and constant drone of a public service announcer’s voice looking for the parents of the day’s 60th missing child, driver or friend. (“Diony, Diony, kanina pa daw nasa Shakey’s booth si Mama, asan daw si Junior?”)
Then in 1983, my father joined Mel in the cemetery. I took that death more to heart, so the vigil became sadder for me. Also, my brothers and their families had decided they would opt for the post-Nov. 1 visit, so I kept Mama company in the cemetery.
Then, one night, as the two of us slept in our tent (which only had three walls, incidentally), our valuables supposedly safe between our folding beds, I thought I heard small footsteps.
True enough, when I woke up, our water jug and food containers were missing; fortunately, the small thief (kids, security later confirmed) couldn’t get close to our bags and wallets.
That was when we all prevailed upon Mama that the overnighters were no longer a good idea. By the time Don died and was buried in 1999, we no longer had the stamina to spend the long night.
A week after
The visits became daylong affairs, then afternoons spent in a wonderfully deserted (albeit filthy) park after the crowds had left.
Today, we usually bring Mama there a week after, when the tents and rubbish are all gone and Loyola Memorial Park is mostly green again.
The small food stalls of my younger days have been replaced by more efficient operations; pizza houses now have big buses camped in the park, with sales staff doing the rounds of grave sites to take orders. Ice cream, fishballs, even toys and cell phone holders and load—they’re all peddled here now.
Security and a-hole behavior remain problems, unfortunately, as they probably do wherever big crowds gather. Three years ago, when my hands were full of flowers, a light-handed thief unzipped my backpack pocket and filched my iPod.
I’ve heard of women’s bags getting snatched, and there’s my pet peeve—flower vases appropriated and candleholders stolen even before the flowers wilt and the candles burn out. There have been exchanges over parking spaces still, as well as for space over adjacent graves.
There was even this fellow who was “wang-wanging” his car through a pedestrian area at the park entrance; in a great show of civic unity, three people (yours truly included) actually whacked the back of his car at the same time with our umbrellas. The a-hole stepped out and yelled, “Sino yon?” Guess if any of us said anything.
I almost always arrive at my loved ones’ graves nowadays to find strangers sprawled over them, probably assuming nobody would show up. I don’t begrudge them the space, though; in fact, I bring extra matches and ask them to please light the candles again if the flames die. They usually do, because I return the next day to find the candles still burning, renewing my faith in humanity a bit.
I don’t see myself joining my relatives underground, as I’ve bought a cremation plan and will have my ashes thrown into the sea. (I’ve sworn to haunt my nephew if he leaves me to rot slowly.)
My mother used to agonize over no longer “doing time” at the cemetery, but I don’t.
On quiet, lazy afternoons, especially when the weather is cooler, I like to visit with my dog and sit on the graves, looking out at the vast expanse of green.
In that mere hour or so, I am able to spend more time reveling in my memories of my father, brothers and grandparents, without having to race for parking or squeeze through crowds. It’s not really how many hours, I’ve learned, but what we make each hour mean.
Then I leave the cemetery—but I take Daddy, Mel, Don, my lolos and lolas, and all my beloved departed family members with me, always, wherever I go, and whatever the time of year.