My (Once) Small World
By Pon Rodil

MY MEMORIES of childhood are tied to the small two-storey apartment we lived in for fifteen years.

Our address was #2 Bagongon Apts, Purok Laya, Mahayahay, Iligan City. I don't remember the name of our street, or if it even had one. Come to think of it, I don't even remember the names of our city streets, except a few major ones. People didn't use them much, they just said 'the crossing near the post office,' or 'in front of the store beside the church' or 'where the jeepney route ends'.

I do have a mental map of the place I grew up in that served me well: to the east were the mountains, and our city hall on top of a hill; the west the sea, and the old public market, and to the north and south the highway which went into the adjacent towns and cities. My center was our green apartment with a maroon gate.

It was the smallest of four unequally sized units. My father said that the owner probably wanted to build just one house, but then later decided to subdivide it. Entering our apartment, one could see the whole of the first floor in just one glance. There was one big bookshelf on one side, containing the books my father brought back whenever he traveled, his dusty folders keeping numerous files, and the students' papers my mother had to check.

One compartment in the center of the shelf had my Popular Science and Arthur Mees' encyclopedias. Above that was my own corner, where I could keep my school books, artworks, and notepads. In the other sections of the bookshelf was scattered an assortment of photo albums, letters, picture frames, and little bits like pens and coins and wedding souvenirs.

When I look at home magazines today, I wonder why they always look so clean - our house always had clutter, whether it was my mother's bag dumped on the bamboo sofa, my father's folders accumulating on top of a chair, or the various combs and bottles of lotion and powder below the mirror nailed to the side of the stairs. It didn't really bother me, then, until I saw other houses which had flower arrangements in their living room tables, instead of leftover things. I think our concept of storage space then was any available surface.

Despite the small space, it seemed the visitors (who were sometimes large foreigners) didn't mind when we had to move the living room sofa so they could sit on one side of the dining table, which we also had to move away from the wall to make way for one more person.

During my birthdays, the relatives, neighbors and family friends who didn't need formal invitations would make do by standing around the kitchen, placing their plates on the counter, sitting on the stairs, or bringing out the chairs to our semi-front yard/ garage. It was always fun, because you felt like there was so many visitors, and it was easier to trade stories because most people were within hearing distance.

We didn't have a proper matching "sala set." Aside from the bamboo sofa, there was a rattan lounge and arm chair in the living area. After dinner, my father would sit in the arm chair and my mother would lie down in the lounge. As they talked about their day I would usually go upstairs to watch TV or do my homework. If there was a good movie showing, or if we rented some tapes, they'd join me in my bed to watch it.

My grandmother and the yayas, who came and went, slept with me in my bedroom. It was on the second floor and it faced west, making it constantly hot and bright in the afternoons. But I had a good view. It also faced the street, or as it was then, a dirt road. The neighboring commercial bank had cemented one end, but stopped where their property ended. It was fine with me, because I could still have a steady supply of stones for sagudsod or rain puddles where I could sail paper boats. I didn't want the whole road to be cemented. When that finally happened, it was the slow death of the neighborhood, because it became a public vehicle route.

When I was still about 3 feet high (and one of the 'seven dwarfs' in my grade school class) my father built a mini-stair I could climb on so I could comfortably look out the bedroom window onto the street. From this vantage point I would know when my playmates started coming out of their houses. I could also see this large, open, grassy space on the other side of the street, where sometimes breeders would come and bring their cows to graze. Sometimes our game of tag would lead us there, and it was a challenge to wade through the makahiya and amorseco and the 'land mines' the cows left.

This lot was the size of about four Olympic size swimming pools--but then again I don't trust my judgment when it comes to childhood memory. Beyond that grassy lot, there was a house which to my mind then was almost a mansion, but when I returned to the neighborhood when I was in college, it was not as big and beautiful as I imagined it to be.

The bathroom was my second favorite place in the house, next to the bedroom. I stayed in the bathroom when I was angry or when I cried. It was better than locking myself in my bedroom where it would have been more obvious I was upset. Besides, my bedroom was also the entertainment room (containing the black and white TV and betamax), ironing area, my lola's sewing room and my mother's home office. In the cool refuge of the bathroom, no one bothered me; I had a legitimate excuse to be there. I spent my time looking for dwarfs and fairies in the fern patterns on the dull yellow tiles, or the ants crawling up the shower pipe.

The roof in our bathroom had a half meter change of level above our bathroom leaving a big open gap. It was the only ventilation for the space. If I looked up, I could see beyond the underwear hanging on the ropes my father strung across the space to a blue sky where I sometimes saw the streak of jets (or at least that's what I thought they were) going by. It was relaxing to look up at the sky in the bathroom; the only downside was we had to bring an umbrella in when it rained.

Unfortunately we weren't the only ones familiar with our bathroom. Every now and then especially during the wet season earthworms would find their way through the floor drain, which wasn't a proper floor drain with a p-trap; it was just a hole near the side of the door that led to a small canal.

The stray cats which my father liked to feed had also staked out one corner as their own territory. Using the bathroom then became a ritual of washing off their deposits first. My father said maybe it was their way of thanking us for the food. He was too kind to stop feeding them and said that at least they helped keep the area free of mice. The cats were only too proud of the deed, leaving the unfortunate headless little ones lying around - thankfully, not in the bathroom. The cats never exceeded a particular number - if they got too many, some would leave. Several generations passed through our house, such that I remember the first ones were orange, with blue eyes, and when I left for college, they were already black.

I'd often stay in my parents' bedroom because it was cooler to sleep in their bedroom in the afternoons. I also played Pacman or the mystery game "Where in the World is Carmen San Diego?" on the black and white monitor of our first "XT" computer installed in one corner. Later on the walls beside the computer would disappear behind posted paper containing instructions like keyboard shortcuts for Wordstar 4, or Lotus 123.

Actually I slept beside my parents until I was about Grade 1. My father carpentered their matrimonial bed. My fetishes then included sleeping on my favorite blue blanket (which my mother later said was actually taken from a ferry) and rubbing my feet on the yellow and orange mosquito net. I stopped using mosquito nets in high school; but until now I still catch myself moving my feet as if I could still feel its rough texture.

We didn't usually close our bedroom doors. There was a little string attached to each door which could be hooked in the door jamb. During the night, I'd know they were still awake if I could see a sliver of light coming through the gap. It also helped because they could hear me in the night if I had any bad dreams, or if my lola had her bangungot.

Smells from the kitchen could easily waft up to the bedrooms. In grade school my hazy mornings would start with coming down the narrow wooden stairs, where I could see my mother heating up water for my bath. I do not quite remember what I usually had for breakfast, but it was most probably fish, as my mother was averse to cooking "artificial" foods like hotdog and meatloaf or bacon. My grandmother didn't have any fancy recipes, but to my tongue her ginisang gulay, piniritong isda, bistek or tinola are still the best.

Our kitchen was L-shaped and had no windows. To compensate for its smallness, we had a large sink covered with tiles, which was actually not good for the Nescafe glasses we kept, because they easily broke when they fell on the slippery surface.

My role in the kitchen was mostly as dishwasher, since I was the only child and didn't cook. One thing I didn't like doing though was looking under the dark cabinets, which I presumed where most of the cockroaches that came out when the lights went out spent most of their time. My father used to squash them with his slipper, but at some point he stopped (it might have been when he started reading about eastern philosophy, and respect for all forms of life), and didn't even kill ants. My mother didn't like the smell of Baygon, so mostly we left the ipis alone, and just took precautions in not leaving food out uncovered. That is probably the reason I don't get bothered when my roommates are already screaming and running around when ipis make their appearance.

We've transferred now to a much more spacious place. My mother has bought a new, matching sala set with white cushions. We even have flower arrangements on the side tables, with bougainvilleas my mother picked. However, that happened when I had already gone off to college, so I only get to enjoy lying on the sofa during vacations.

Most of the year I live in this apartment with three other girls. It is even smaller than my childhood one. There is no sala set, only computers, drafting tables, and a dining set donated by my uncle. On top of the dining table is a bunch of handbags, notebooks, tissue paper, and leftover Mc Do meals. We still run out of chairs for the visitors. Some things haven't changed. (Tinig.com)