RE/PRESENTATIONS OF WOMEN IN SELECTED SHORT FICTION IN ENGLISH OF FILIPINO-AMERICAN WRITERS: A FEMINIST STYLISTIC ANALYSIS

POLYT ECHNIC UN IVERSIT Y OF T HE PHIL IPPINES

RE/PRESENTATIONS OF WOMEN IN SELECTED SHORT FICTION IN ENGLISH OF FILIPINO-AMERICAN WRITERS: A FEMINIST STYLISTIC ANALYSIS

A Thesis Presented to the Faculty of the Department of English and Foreign Languages College of Arts and Letters Polytechnic University of the Philippines Sta. Mesa, Manila

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirement of the course Thesis Writing

By Mary Anne Mae E. Baladjay Rhegilyn F. Nisay Shairah P. Rio Joanna Patricia F. Tigas

October 2016

POLYT EC HNIC UN IVERSIT Y OF T HE PHIL IPPINES

Philippine Copyright 2017

By: Mary Anne Mae E. Baladjay Rhegilyn F. Nisay Shairah P. Rio Joanna Patricia F. Tigas from the Polytechnic University of the Philippines

All rights reserved. Portions of this manuscript maybe reproduced with proper referencing and due acknowledgment of the authors.

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CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY

This is to certify that the research work presented in this thesis entitled “Re/presentations of Women in Selected Short Fiction in English of FilipinoAmerican Writers: A Feminist Stylistic Analysis” for the award of Bachelor of Arts in English from the Polytechnic University of the Philippines, Manila embodies the result of original and scholarly work carried out by the undersigned. This thesis does not contain words or ideas taken from published sources or written works by other persons which have been accepted as basis for the award of any degree from other higher education institutions, except where proper referencing and acknowledgment were made.

Mary Anne Mae E. Baladjay Rhegilyn F. Nisay Shairah P. Rio Joanna Patricia F. Tigas Researchers

Date: OCTOBER 2016

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ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This thesis would not be possible without the help, support, and inspiration of many people. In the first place, we would like to express our sincere appreciation to our thesis adviser, Ms. Marie Claire Duque-Cruz for her wisdom, support, and patience in guiding us with our thesis from the very beginning until now.

We are very thankful to our panelists, Mr. Rafael Michael Paz, Mr. Jose V. Clutario, and Ms. Ma. Cecilia Angeles for sharing us their knowledge in order to improve this thesis. Our heartfelt gratitude to Mr. John Philip D. Cainoy and Mr. Rolando P. Quiñones for their encouraging words and meaningful conversations throughout the writing process of the study.

We would also like to express our gratefulness to our beloved families especially to our parents for the unceasing and unconditional love and support. None of this could have happened without their support financially, mentally, and emotionally. They have served as an inspiration in doing this study.

We owe special gratitude to ourselves for not giving up and for doing this thesis with each other’s help, concern, love, and effort. Also, we would like to thank our dear friends for their inspiring words when it seemed nothing was going right.

Lastly, we offer our ever thanks to the Lord Jesus Christ, our Strong Tower, our Fortress and Light, our source of Wisdom and Knowledge, without whom nothing was possible. M.A.M.E.B. R.F.N. S.P.R. J.P.F.T.

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ABSTRACT

Title

:

Re/presentations of Women in Selected Short Fiction in English of Filipino-American Writers: A Feminist Stylistic Analysis

Researchers

:

Baladjay, Mary Anne Mae E. Nisay, Rhegilyn F. Rio, Shairah P. Tigas, Joanna Patricia F.

Degree

:

Bachelor of Arts in English

Institution

:

Polytechnic University of the Philippines

Year

:

2016

Adviser

:

Marie Claire Duque-Cruz, M.A.E.L.T.

The Problem This study was conducted to identify and analyze the re/presentations of women in selected short fiction of Filipino-American writers in the United States using feminist stylistics. Specially, this study sought to answer the following: (1)What are the presuppositions and implications of the words used by the Filipino-American

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POLYT EC HNIC UN IVERSIT Y OF T HE PHIL IPPINES authors in describing

the

women

characters in

the

texts;

and

(2)what

re/presentations of power towards, among, and from women were revealed from the selected texts? Research Methodology The researchers selected short stories written by Filipino-American writers that were published in the Unites States. The selected short stories were analyzed using Mills’ Feminist Stylistic Analysis on Discourse Level. By using Mills’ Feminist Stylistic Analysis on Discourse Level, the researchers determined categories that were used by the writers to re/present the woman protagonist in their stories. By doing so, the researchers were able to identify the re/presentations of women in selected literary pieces. These re/presentations were arrived at and then refined upon closer analysis.

Findings Based on the interpretation and analysis of the data gathered, the findings are: (1) Women writers illustrated women as amazing, wonderful, and full of purpose when they are young while men authors have seen women as deteriorating when they are old. (2) The works of female authors present that women are weak, hopeless and subordinate; women are shy and self-declined to changes; and women are loud and silent while male authors represented women as helpless and alone. (3) In the works by male authors, most of the events in the life of women have

vii

POLYT EC HNIC UN IVERSIT Y OF T HE PHIL IPPINES roles of men. It has shown that a woman always needs a man to overcome every struggle. While in the short stories of female authors, a woman can resolve her own problems with her relationship with a man. (4) Women, in the minds of male authors are domestic, mostly from the Philippines, and belong to a poor family while men characters are always rich. On the contrary, female authors lift the social status of the women characters by placing them in the working class similar to men. (5) Except one male author, all other authors have re/presented Filipino women in their stories. Bienvenido Santos described the two different ethnicities as being dominant while the other one is submissive and vice versa. (6) All Filipino-American writers presented an arena where women have creative, cross- cultural and contemporary identities. Conclusions Based on the findings, the researchers arrived at these conclusions: (1) Female writers beautify themselves through texts, firmly locking in the experience in the stories that once they are supreme. (2) Female authors presented women’s struggles in a way of exploring themselves and discovering life thus improving and helping themselves to live and survive. While on the other hand, male authors revealed that as women struggle, men were empowered for it is illustrated that the resolution for women’s weaknesses are in their hands. (3) Male authors used the struggles and weaknesses of women to show that men still dominate women while they are weak because their strengths depend on men. Female authors, contrary to male authors, used relationship challenges that

viii

POLYT EC HNIC UN IVERSIT Y OF T HE PHIL IPPINES portrayed women as independent because they handle their own decisions when it comes to dealing with their relationship over men.

(4) Women have seen by

the male authors as domestic. With these, like other conclusion, men authors seen women as dominant to men while at the same time, they are submissive. Consequently, women according to female authors are strong and able to do what men can do. (5) The results have shown that mostly, Filipino women are being empowered and suppressed. Aside from this, one male author presented that even in the same gender, inequality also happens and it is likely because of their ethnicity. The juxtaposition of two women ethnicities showing what Filipino women can do what other foreign women can do and vice versa uphold that all women are equal. (6) Male authors presented men characters as dominant types and women characters as submissive types whereas female authors aspired in presenting women characters in which women are on the same level with men thus upholding equality. (7) The authors have the power to establish dominance and inequality. Filipino-American writers present Filipino men and women images. They should be responsible for the ideologies they serve in their works as these can shape the image and re/presentation of Filipino men and women in the eyes of the foreigners and Filipinos who are born outside the country. (8) Class and location primarily affect identity creation which led to a re-articulation of the nature of Filipino women’s diasporic identity.

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Recommendations Based on the findings and conclusions, the researchers arrived at the following recommendations: Language and literature majors should engage more in bridging the gap between linguistics and literature and not only analyze texts by its context but go beyond it and relate it to history, politics, philosophy, sociology and other related studies. Moreover, future researchers are encouraged to delve on to the following studies: (1)A Feminist stylistic analysis of other forms of media such as advertisement taglines, movies and teleseryes in the Philippines using other analytical categories such as rhetorical devices, style, and tone; (2)a feminist stylistic analysis on texts written by Filipino men and women using sociolinguistic lens; and (3) a discourse analysis of the literary pieces written by Filipino diasporic writers.

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POLYT EC HNIC UN IVERSIT Y OF T HE PHIL IPPINES TABLE OF CONTENTS Page TITLE PAGE …………………………………………………………………………… CERTIFICATION AND APPROVAL SHEET……………………………………….. COPYRIGHT PAGE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ………………………………………. CERTIFICATE OF ORIGINALITY……………………………………………………. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS………………………………………………………………... ABSTRACT……………………………………………………………………………... TABLE OF CONTENTS……………………………………………………………….. LIST OF FIGURES……………………………………………………………………… LIST OF TABLES……………………………………………………………………….. CHAPTER 1 THE PROBLEM AND ITS BACKGROUND Introduction……………………………………………………… 1 Background of the Study…………………………………………3 Theoretical Framework………………………………………….. 5 Conceptual Framework…………………………………………..10 Statement of the Problem……………………………………….. 11 Significance of the Study…………………………………………12 Scope and Limitations…………………………………………….13 Definition of Terms………………………………………………...14

CHAPTER 2 REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE AND STUDIES Foreign Literature…………………………………………………17 Local Literature……………………………………………………23 Foreign Studies…………………………………………………... 27 Local Studies……………………………………………………... 32 Synthesis and Relevance of the Reviewed…………………… 40

CHAPTER 3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY Research Design…………………………………………………. 45 Data of the Study ……………………………………………... 47 Data-gathering Procedures……………………………………... 49

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i ii iii iv v vi xi xiii xiv

POLYT EC HNIC UN IVERSIT Y OF T HE PHIL IPPINES CHAPTER 4 PRESENTATION, ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION OF DATA Presentation, Analysis and Interpretation of Data……………52

CHAPTER 5 SUMMARY OF FINDINGS, CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS Summary of Findings……………………………………………. 70 Conclusions………………………….…………………………… 71 Recommendations……………………………………………….. 73 WORKS CITED………………………………………………………………….. 74 APPENDICES APPENDIX A……………………………………………………... 81 APPENDIX B…………………………………………….............. 154 APPENDIX C…………………………………………………….. 155

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LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1

Page Research Paradigm…………………………………………..

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LIST OF TABLES Table

Page

1 Excerpts, pressupositions and implications for physical appearances of women characters……………………………………………………….. 53 2 Excerpts, pressupositions and implications for character traits and struggles of women characters………………………………………………………...55 3 Excerpts, pressupositions and implications for class of women characters…………………………………………………………60 4 Excerpts, pressupositions and implications for ethnicity of women characters…………………………………………………………62

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES

CHAPTER 1 THE PROBLEM AND ITS BACKGROUND Introduction Throughout history, women have always been dismissed as weak and inferior and belonging to the position of ‘Other.’ Filipino women, having been born and raised in a patriarchal country, are viewed in a stereotype manner in relation to men. These stereotypes and archetypes of women are apparent in history and literature. According to de Borja (1995), the negativeness or positiveness of the women’s image depends on how well they play their roles. This manifests that Filipino women are denied the freedom to define themselves since in history, men had “the power of the pen,” yet through the course of time, women have found their way to recast themselves through literature also. According to Jocson (2011), contemporary Filipino writers present “jouissance” or their subconscious desire to show an image of women in their literary pieces. To the society which looks at them, they are weak, diminished, and unassuming; however in their silence and hushed questioning, they more than make up to what society never gives them. Outside the Philippine boundaries, these Filipino women images are perceived most likely to be in the literature produced by writers who are also outside the country. Due to

1

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES migration of many Filipinos, literature produced abroad has emerged and it has created along with it a various representations of Filipino women. At present, 70% of OFWs or Overseas Filipino Workers are women. Because they have greater number in the phenomenon of migration especially in the United States, the “land of opportunity,” they are commonly the characters in the literary pieces. In line with this, Sabanpan-Yu (2001) stated that this literature reflects the need to recontextualize the feminine to cope with the cultural displacement of living in diaspora. Diaspora can be defined as people who are living outside their homeland or the place where these people live. The Philippine cultural construction of "woman" needs to be addressed and resisted in diaspora in order to deconstruct the binary of "Philippine" and "American" because it is through the dislocation of migration, with respect to their material living conditions, that women recast themselves. The researchers aim to investigate the representations of Filipino women through the written literary pieces such as short stories by Filipino-American authors living in diaspora. This study will explore on the works of both men and women diasporic writers in the Unites States of America. This will serve as a medium to find out the representation of women in the literature produced outside the context of Philippines. The researchers suppose this study will help familiarize Filipino people to the renowned Philippine literature in the United States and on how these writers have represented women in terms of power

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES abuse, dominance, and inequality from, among, and towards other women in the texts. Background of the Study The year 2006 marks the centennial year of Filipino labor export in Hawaii that served as the first wave of the Philippine migration. While the first wave was based on skills needed in farms, factories, military facilities, the second wave that started in 1960’s was composed of professionals—doctors, nurses, and engineers. A third wave of migration happened in early 1970s when the Philippine began to actively encourage migration under Marcos administration (Garchitorena, 2007). According to statistics, in the year 2015, the number of Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) has increased to 2.3 million. At present, over 12 million Filipinos are deployed to work abroad. This Philippine migration phenomenon becomes the undercurrent of the experience of contemporary nation. What this entails is a rethinking of recent history along the impetus of this major yet subalternized current of Philippine development (Tolentino, 2006).

In 1980s, there has been a shift in patterns of migration

that was termed as “feminization migration.” Filipino women began to migrate to work as nurses, midwives, domestic helpers, entertainers, and some, teachers. At present, the statistics shows that women account for 70% overseas Filipinos (Garchitorena, 2007). This migration necessitates the reconceptualization of the feminine to cope with the cultural displacement of living in diaspora (SabanpanYu, 2001).

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES According to Banerjee (2011), migration discourses are not usually approached through a female gaze. On the other hand, studies such as this contribute towards scholarship on female narratives of migration by exploring how traditional (male) immigrant discourses of alienation and loss can be positively subverted by women, liberating them from familiar norms and allowing them the space to interrogate their roles and create new, individual identities. Philippine diaspora has created literature out of Filipino’s adversities and it has been common to see in films and television operas. In line with this, the researchers aim to analyze how women are re/presented in Philippine diasporic literature, specifically those that are produced in United States of America. The researchers opted to study diasporic literature for it already has contributed largely in the mode of production of Philippine literature yet few researches are embedded to it. They have selected short stories as form of literary pieces because it entered Philippine literature through the agency of English writers. It was this group of university-based writers who established the short story as the literary form par excellence for Filipino writers (Lumbera, 1997). In selecting literary works, the researchers regarded Campomanes’ (1997) idea of clustering the authors according to the era they were known which he called (a) pioneering generation consisting of Bienvenido Santos, N.V.M. Gonzalez, Jose Garcia Villa, and Carlos Bulosan for the period of the 1930s to the 1950s; (b) settled generations that matured and emerged by the 1960s who, after Peñaranda, Tagatac, and Syquia, may be called the "Flips;"

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES and (c) politically expatriated generation of Epifanio San Juan, Linda TyCasper, Ninotchka Rosca, and Michelle Skinner from the 1970s to present. Therefore, this study aims to analyze how women are re/presented in the works of selected Filipino diasporic writers in the United States namely Carlos Bulosan, Bienvenido Santos, Ninotchka Rosca and Michelle Skinner. The researchers believe that the works of authors mentioned above presented women in different angles, reflecting power abuse, dominance, and inequality. Theoretical Framework This study analyzes literary pieces obtaining the basis from the Feminist Stylistics. It aims to find out how women are re/presented in Philippine diasporic literature.Feminist Stylistics is a recent development under stylistics. Traditional stylistics, according to Mills (1995), is the analysis of the language of literary texts, usually taking its theoretical models from linguistics, in order to undertake this analysis. For Carter and Simpson (1989 cited Mills, 1995), there are two types of stylistics: linguistic stylistics and literary stylistics. According to them, linguistic stylistics is where ‘practitioners attempt to derive from the study of style and language a refinement of models for the analysis of language and thus to contribute to the development of linguistic theory’ while literary stylistics is more concerned with providing ‘the basis for fuller understanding, appreciation and interpretation of avowedly literary and author-centered texts. The general impulse will be to draw eclectically on linguistic insights and to use them in the service of what is generally claimed to be fuller interpretation of

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES language effects than is possible without the benefit of linguistics.’ Both forms of stylistic analysis draw on a range of linguistic models; the difference lies on the objective for undertaking the analysis. According to Sunderland (2006), feminism has inspired gender and language study since the late 1960s. What different feminisms have in common is not just an interest in women and men, girls and boys, and gender relations, but also a critical interest. This extends to social arrangements and power relations. The study of language and gender from feminist critical perspectives involves the investigation of whether certain discourses within specific contexts have been or are being gendered. The study also has to do with the production of gender (women) stereotypes and all the other aspects of gender (women) inequalities in discourse. But what differentiates the feminist stylistics from many feminist approaches is that it aims to draw attention to and change the way that gender is represented, since it is clear that a great many of these representational practices are not in the interests of either women or men. Thus, feminist stylistic analysis is concerned not only to describe sexism in a text, but also to analyze the way that point of view, agency, metaphor, or transitivity are unexpectedly closely related to matters of gender, to discover whether women’s writing practices can be described, and so on (Mills, 1995). By close reading, using techniques from a range of linguistic and literary backgrounds, feminist stylistics aim to present what is going on in texts. Some texts bear messages which work on us in a way of which we are not

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES necessarily aware. According to Mills (1995), it is important to analyze texts carefully in terms of the systematic language choices which have been made. Close analysis may help the reader to become aware of the way that language choices may serve the interests of some people to the detriment of others. Gender is a very important component in the way people perceive the world. It is also salient in the way people produce, understand, and interpret texts. Gender, in feminist stylistics, is a useful term since it foregrounds the fact that men and women and femininity and masculinity are produced as different, even though there are elements which women and men share. It also foregrounds the fact that the grouping ‘women’ makes sense only in relation to and in contradistinction from the grouping ‘men.’ The term ‘gender’ in feminist stylistics is used to mean difference between women and men in a relational and not an oppositional way (Mills, 1995). Although it is clear that women are systematically discriminated against as a group in a variety of ways, feminism, according to Mills (1995), implies commitment to changing the social structure to make it less oppressive to women, and, for that matter, to men. In this study, the researchers used Mills’ (1995) Analysis on Discourse Level. This analysis do not focus on content as if it were a self-evident given, but to see content, the substance of texts, as something which is the negotiation of textual elements and codes and forces outside the text which influence both the way that the text is constructed and the way that we decipher what is written. The analysis links the word and the phrase with a larger notion

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES of ideology through these textual patterns and structures. Additionally, through this analysis, it is necessary to add the notion of gender in discourses since Mills (1995) argues that discourses are profoundly gendered. According to Mills (1995), Feminist Stylistics has suggested ways in which those concerned with the representation of gender relations might draw on linguistic and language analysis to develop a set of tools which could expose the workings of gender at a range of different levels in texts. Because of the nature of feminist analysis, it has been necessary to question the seemingly self-evident boundaries of the text itself, arguing that the text is permeated by discourses and ideologies, and that the distinction between textual and extra textual cannot really be held to. That is not to say like Derrida ‘Il n’y a pas d’hors texte,’ there is nothing but textuality — there is nothing but text — there is nothing outside the text; but rather to say almost the opposite. Texts are invaded by sociocultural norms, by ideologies, by history, by economic forces, by fashions, by gender and racial stereotyping, and so on. That is not to say that authors have no control whatsoever about what they write, but that authors themselves are also subject to interpellation and interaction with these discursive forces (Mills, 1995). This definition of text is adopted by the researchers working within the framework of feminist stylistics. They believe that the study and analysis of texts can offer a huge amount of information about certain social realities. Texts can reveal how many versions of these realities are constructed by the dominant forces in a society to protect their interests. Therefore, this study will

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES explore on version and realities of women in the selected texts, on how the authors presented them and how they are re/presented throughout the discourse using feminist stylistics.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Conceptual Framework INPUT Selected diasporic literary pieces to be analyzed: Bienvenido Santos - Scent of Apples - Immigration Blues - The Door

PROCESS Analytical device used by the researchers: -

Classification

of words that describes the woman protagonist

Carlos Bulosan - Sometimes It’s Not Funny - The Faith of My Mother - The Odyssey of Constancia Drake Ninotchka Rosca - The Goddess - Generations - A Party for Mrs MacArthur Michelle Skinner - Scent of Flowers - Natural Selection - Beautiful

FEEDBACK Figure 1. Research Paradigm

OUTPUT Expected outcome:

- Representation of women in selected literary pieces in accordance to power abuse, dominance, and inequality from, among, and towards women in selected FilipinoAmerican short fiction in English.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES The input box contains the selected diasporic literary pieces to be analyzed by the researchers. The selected short stories have men and women characters subjective for analyzing. The process box indicates the analytical device used in this study which is the classification of words that describes the woman protagonist. This study uses feminist stylistics to discern the women empowerment and/or oppression through language used by the authors. In connection with this, the expected outcome that is in the output box is the re/presentations of women in the selected texts. In addition, it will also present the reflection of power abuse, dominance, and inequality from, among, and towards women in the re/presentations of women in the selected texts. Statement of the Problem This study aims to analyze how women are re/presented in the short stories of Philippine Diasporic Literature in the United States. The study specifically aims to answer the following questions: 1. What are the presuppositions and implications of the words used by the Filipino-American authors in describing the women characters in the texts? 2. What re/presentations of power towards, among, and from women were revealed from the selected texts?

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Significance of the Study In analyzing selected short fictions in English of selected FilipinoAmerican writers, the following are expected to benefit from the study: English Majors. This study can be used as a source of learning for English Majors who are dealing with the topics regarding with the literature of Filipino-American

writers

through

an

in-depth

analysis

of

hidden

representations in literary texts. English Language and Literature Teachers. This study aims to help English language and literature teachers escalating their students’ knowledge about Filipino-American Literature presenting an in-depth approach of teaching analysis of hidden representations in literary texts. This will also encourage faculty researchers to probe on studies that deal with Filipino-American Literature. English Department. This study aims to contribute in the department’s collection of studies especially in the field of linguistics and literature. PUP Administrators. This study can be of help in promoting women diaspora studies in the university. It may result in creating deeper and wider research about the topic that can be used for reference purposes, thus, helping to promote the university.

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Filipino-American Writers. This study will help Filipino-American writers to further experiment on their characters through acquiring the information gathered. Filipino-American Literature Readers. This study will serve as an eye opener to be aware of having a deeper analysis in reading Filipino-American literature. Future Researchers. This study aims to contribute in the field of linguistics and literary analysis. It hopes to inspire future researchers to delve into Feminist Stylistics Analysis by analyzing novels, poems, songs, journals, speeches, and other forms of discourse that can be analyze through its language. Scope and Limitations This study focused on using Feminist Stylistics Analysis on analyzing selected works of Carlos Bulosan, Bienvenido Santos, Ninotchka Rosca, and Michelle Skinner. These are Filipino-American writers in the United States and the researchers believe that having them represents the Philippine Literature in the said country. The researchers limited the selection of short stories to four authors in accordance to Camponanes’ cohorts of Philippine diasporic writers (Campomanes, 1997). The researchers limited the interpretation of word association pertaining to women characters according to their categories. Actual texts substantiate the categories that are prominent in the literary pieces.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES The researchers believe that presenting the common denominator of the categories will lay emphasis on demystifying women characters part from the way authors have presented it. The researchers excluded presenting the images and re/presentation of men in the selected short stories although they have used gender as a discourse. The researchers believe opting this out will give more valid and solid analyses on their original aims without any thoughts of oppressing the other gender stated. Definition of Terms The following terms were operationally defined and/or explained by the researchers and/or conceptually defined by other researchers. Diaspora. This refers to group of people who live outside the area in which they had lived for a long time or in which their ancestors lived (MerriamWebster Dictionary). Character Traits. This refers to the quality that makes a character different or same with other woman in selected short fiction. Class. This refers to the social cluster in which a particular group of people belong to. Ethnicity. This refers to particular group of people coming from the same race, origin and/or country.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Feminist Stylistics Analysis. This refers to the stylistics analysis of the language of literary texts that the researchers used in conducting this study. Feminism. This refers to the ideology of the equality of (a) men to women and (b) women to women. Filipino Diasporic Writers. This refers to the people who have Filipino blood in them which are either born or lived in the Philippines and decided to settle outside the Philippines which continue to write contributing to the Philippine literature. Filipino-American short fiction in English. This refers to the short stories selected by the researchers and were written by Filipino diasporic writers which are the materials for this study. Gender. This refers to the socially-constructed roles, behaviors, and attitudes that a society considers appropriate to men and women (Galvez et.al 2015). Implications. This refers to the analyses from the presuppositions present in the selected short fiction that are used in the study. Physical Appearances. This refers to the external and physical qualities of a character in the selected short fiction.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Presuppositions. This refers to the words used in describing women characters in the selected short fiction of the selected Filipino-American writers to which the researchers rely on. Post-colonial Literature. This refers to literature produced under imperial license by natives (Ashcroft et. al 1989) Re/presentation. This refers to the way women are presented by the diasporic writers and through the analyses of the researchers.

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CHAPTER 2 REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE AND STUDIES A number of related literature and studies were reviewed by the researchers in an effort to gain information that is relevant and similar to the present study. Foreign Literature As James Procter (ctd. in Shackleton, 2008) writes, “‘diaspora’ can appear both as naming a geographical phenomenon – the traversal of physical terrain by an individual or a group – as well as a theoretical concept: a way of thinking, or of representing the world.” It is this latter epistemological sense of the

term which

demands that

issues of

diasporic imagination

and

representation are germane to everyone, rather than exclusively migrant descended or ‘minority’ communities. As Avtar Brah (1996) has written, both the material and the imaginative spaces of diaspora demand the attention and participation of those who “are constructed and represented as indigenous.” Such imaginative possibilities can be fed back into the social and material environments of community and society as tentative utopian designs for progressive social transformation in which the border logic of race and illiberal nationalism is superseded by the common recognition of political and ethical equality.

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES In an online news article "Filipino Poet Actualized the 'American Dream'" by Francesca Mustacchia (ctd. in Sabanpan-Yu, 2001), Lim-Wilson speaks of how most Filipinas come to America: "Many of us who grew up knowing that this was the land of opportunity" have "experienced the prejudice and particular sense of isolation that flavors minorities' piece of the great American apple pie." Such a notion of migrancy points to the complex relationship between gender, culture, nation and memory in the diasporic context. According to Mills (1993) in “Discourses of Difference: An Analysis of Women’s Travel Writing and Colonialism,” the writing of those women who travel are often treated as expressions of personal endeavour and individualism rather than as part of a larger enterprise. They are simply seen as a personal escape from boredom and repression. This shows how a society can be very patriarchal. Women’s travel writing is dismissed as autobiographical and that they are straightforward transcriptions of the lives of the women travellers. Similarly, many male critics assume that all women travellers write in the same way. Mills (1993) attempted to debunk this idea through her book and stated that she does not take the position of biological determinism, that is, if someone is born biologically female, then she will necessarily write in a particular way. She believes that women’s writing is judged and processed and all are different from one another. Mills (1993) also tackled the idea of “self.” According to her, the “self” is presumed to be the writer’s “self” which is translated into persona or narrative voice of the text. It is presumed that the reader can discover the “self”

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of the woman travel writer in the narrator position in the text. Moreover, Mills (1998) in her article entitled “Post Feminist Text Analysis” claimed that there are still sexist statements in many texts where women are stll treated as sex objects but what has changed is the form that this expression takes and the possibilities of the responses to sexism because feminist knowledge has become

‘common

sense’

and

feminist

ideas

have

filled

through.

Correspondingly, there are also texts which appear to be non-sexist and positively anti-sexist: they address men and women as if they’re equal, and sometimes there is no difference between men and women. However, Mills (1998) stated that whilst this is the surface message, the underlying workings of the text and the meanings which readers negotiate with the text are quite different because of limited range of options available to readers. Because of the background knowledge needed to make sense of this text, there is clearly a form of indirect sexism at work here and what it needs is a conceptualized form of analysis that is trying to develop a more concept rather than assuming that texts simply represent women in sexist ways. The analysis will therefore be attempting to deal with a more subtle form of sexism hence analyzing the context of words rather than analysing words out of context. Mills (1998) asserted that it must analyse words at the level of discourse as well as the local level of occurrence; thus, its use of straightforward linguistic description will conventionally regard the different levels of sexism within the text, and it must analyse gender in relation to race, class and other variables rather than isolation.

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Ferguson (1986), in her book entitled “Images of Women in Literature”, stated that the images of women in life and in literature are still undergoing both analysis and change. The only common factor description is that they all use the same standard of measurement: the characteristics of men are the norm, those of women subsidiary. In addition, according to Ferguson (1986), women are thought to be more passive than men who initiate a sexual act. Men succeed in business and politics because they are more assertive and confident compared to women who are submissive. However, if a woman succeeds in male spheres, she, then, is considered aggressive and unfeminine. When a woman is considered intelligent, their kind of intelligence is just flightiness and fuzz thinking. On the other side, the kind of men’s intelligence is a logical thinking and is natural in men. Another characteristic is that the norm is a happy woman reached by men. When a man is being possessive, it is associated with protectiveness and responsibility. But in women, it is narrowness and selfishness. Because of these stereotypes of women, they are confused about their own identity (Ferguson, 1986). The book “Images of Women in Fiction Feminist Perspectives” by Cornillon (1973) laid down the roles of women that are commonly depicted in literature and often called as stereotypes. Cornillon (1973) argues that the most desiccated and lifeless traditional stereotype of women is being a heroine. In literature, a heroine is considered as that woman who is “sugar ‘n spice and everything nice,” or that woman who complies with her duties and

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES responsibilities. In another section of Cornillon’s (1973) book, she discussed the idea of “The Invisible Woman” wherein the women’s experience are said to be always excluded in literature, and if there is any, it is found to be distorted. Instead, women in literature are regarded as the ‘Other,’ the ‘thing.’ On the other side, there are still few fictions that depicted women as hero, and these fictions started when women began to attempt to challenge patriarchy. Women are portrayed as whole people or as people in the process of creating or discovering their wholeness, of women seeking and finding other metaphors for existence than men, or martyrdom, or selflessness, or intrinsic worthlessness. Women are revealed as working, being political, creating, of living in relationships with other women, of being alive, adventuresome, selfdetermining, growing, making significant choices, questioning and finding viable answers and solutions—of being, in other words, human beings (Cornillon, 1973). Bradford (1997) in his book “Stylistics” affirmed that there is a common thread running between gender and genre which confirms the bizarre and paradoxical relation between poetry and the ‘real world’ reflected and enacted in non-literary discourses. The part played by the woman in the seventeenthcentury amatory lyric is straightforward: she might feature as a physical correlative for the deictic features of the text or as the inspiration for some of its metaphoric excursions. Inevitably she will remain silent. In drama, where the female addressee can answer back, her function is usually marginalized by an

21

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES imposing complex of contextual elements. Bradford (1997) added that that a woman writer is obliged to negotiate two elements of the double pattern—the literary and nonliterary registers of the texts—by causing an imbalance between them. Modernism caused a far more radical imbalance and it should be noted that women writers played a significant and often pioneering role in these developments. Milton (ctd. in Bradford, 1997) suggests, capable of exposing and foregrounding the anarchic relationship between truth and fabrication, between the signified and its referent and the ungrounded signifier; capable of showing that the notions of moral, philosophic and religious certainty that underlie social structure are friable constructions of language. Mitchell et. al (qtd. in Carballo 1994) stated that the basic concept of representation is essentially articulated and actualized in a very, triangular relationship. The relationship goes like this: representation is always something or someone, by something or someone, to someone. Although the first two aspects may range from a plethora of inanimate objects to other people as well, the beholder of the representation can only be a person. With this in mind, the representation intended is subject to misunderstanding, error, or even total falsehood. Emmott and Alexander (2014) claimed in their paper entitled “Schemata” that readers use schemata to make sense of events and descriptions by providing default background information for comprehension, as it is rare and

22


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often unnecessary for texts to contain all the detail required for them to be fully understood. These are cognitive structures representing generic knowledge, i.e. structures which do not contain information about particular entities, instances or events, but rather about their general form. Likewise, Emmott and Alexander (2014) added that schemata represent the knowledge base of individuals, they are often culturally and temporally specific, and are ordinarily discussed as collective stores of knowledge shared by prototypical members of a given or assumed community and nowadays, linguists, psychologists and narrative scholars employ schema theory to account for the interpretation of a text where the discourse itself does not provide all the information necessary for the discourse to be processed. The researchers will make use of the information to provide presuppositions and implications for the analyses of the study. Local Literature Legasto (1993) suggested that there is a need to broaden the domain of literary

studies

in

the

Philippines

rather

than

accepting

the

neat

compartmentalization of disciplines and their academic foci. Rather than asserting aesthetic judgements in literary studies and in the hope of reconstructing scattered fragments of our identities, Legasto (1993) promoted to bare the social inequalities that the hegemonic structures have produced and continue to reproduce, inequalities arising from people positioned on the


24

margins of the dominant class, the dominant ethnic/ regional/ religious groups, and/or the dominant gender. According to Garcia (2014), the language in fiction serves as a communication and is representational. It encodes knowledge that is thereby conveyed by senders to receivers. We can speak of two representational modes, then: realistic and nonrealistic, which we may also call mimetic and nonmimetic. The latter term can apply to all abstract, surreal, fantastical, and “non-quotidian” art. The former term can refer to either of two senses of mimetic art. The first or general sense is the realistic representation by art of reality, by which the former captures, encodes, or conveys the image or meaning of the latter. We may also call this mimetic mode “extratextual reference,” and its presence across all the genres is what makes it possible to speak of both poetry and fiction as “realist.” In the second sense, however, mimetic can also refer to verbal forms in which the words in and of themselves—their sounds, shapes,

sequence,

etc.—resemble

or

reproduce

(through

analogy)

characteristics or features of that to which they refer. In poetry, mimetic language may be said to be “imitative,” “expressive” or even “iconic” in this sense, with onomatopoeia being one of the more common examples (Brogan cited in Garcia 2014). According to Tolentino-Yu (2011), literature’s stable position in the social construction of childhood from the perspective of these literary and critical approaches has already been established. The examination of social

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES construction in literature using categories such as class, gender, and power employ practices in reading cultural texts. For an instance, using children literature, Tolentino-Yu (2011) stated that social construction through literature is likewise undergoing changes that reflect the complexity of this world. In an article entitled “Lost in History: Women Texts in Filipino and Canon-Formation” by Reyes (2005), it is stated between 1930s and 1970s, ninety percent of literary works were represented by men while the rest, if it all done, was reserved for women. In this great act of exclusion, women’s texts were naturally banished from the “canon” or the body of writing which corresponded to some assumptions about the nature. Barring women’s entry into the literary canon mirrored their predicament in society – constantly being taken for granted for their “natural” inferiority and consequent subordination. Moreover, Reyes (2005) affirmed that in the case of the marginalization of women’s texts, it is simplistic to resort to the “conspiracy theory” which poses that the silencing of women had been perpetrated by powerful men intent on preventing women’s voices from being heard. Tolentino (2006) stated that an analysis of diaspora as historical/political trope in Philippine literature locates new forms and struggles in the grand schema of older histories and geographies of both local oppression, poverty and corruption on the one hand, and on the other hand, imperialist globalization. Diaspora in social reality intensifies even as literary criticism and history have not yet too keenly focused on this undercurrent of Philippine

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES national development and its cultural ethos. Philippine literature and society are moving into a new transition, as Raymond Williams says about transitions in literature, “What can be seen as happening, in each transition, is a historical development of social language itself: finding new means, new forms and new definitions of a changing practical consciousness. Many of the active values of ‘literature’ have been to be seen, not as tied to the concept, which came to limit as well as to summarize them, but as elements of a continuing and changing practice which already substantially, and now at the level of theoretical redefinition, is moving beyond its old forms.” With these old forms, it is only when “the dead bury their dead” that there can be meaning to Philippine diasporization, and its ensuing deaths and dying. Santiago (1996), in “Roots of Feminist Thought in the Philippines” points out that first; it is possible that the concept of womanhood changed with the change in the history of women after the coming of Spanish colonizers. Because of the imposition of a foreign culture, the formerly high status of woman as cultural leader of an ancient society was overlain. Nevertheless, something remained of the original strength, firmness and creativity of women that became the basis of their resistance to the concept of woman imposed by conquerors. Second is that although women were able to win equal political rights by means of the right to vote, the subordinate position of women in many aspects of national life continued to prevail. This was further reinforced by the idealization of motherhood and virginity and the stereotyped images of women

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES remained until the first half of this country and lastly, in popular culture, the old concept of woman and womanhood remain entrenched and the common images of women as fit only for her bedroom, the kitchen and the home prevail, although the women’s movement and the other movements for change are starting to dismantle these. And this may be discerned in the construction of women in Philippine society. Foreign Studies In the study of Ufot (2012), which was entitled “Feminist Stylistics: A Lexico-grammatical Study of the Female Sentence in Austen’s Pride and Prejudice and Hume-Sotomi’s The General’s Wife,” he used the Feminist Stylistic approach that is supported by Sara Mills and Deirde Burton, the intervention of Virginia Woolf, and the French feminists such as Jacques Lacan, Helen Cixous and Lure Irigaray. According to Ufot, this kind of approach will look for the dependable counter-images of women through their writings. It will search for the ways in how a decidedly female consciousness was expressed in literature. This approach has a medium of literary art to foreground the experiences of female and women stereotypes assigned by men. In this study, it is believed that there are distinctions between male and female writings. It can be seen in the thematic, lexical and grammatical and graphological features of the works. Women writers and characters are more likely to court admiration and approval. This view is expressed by Hiatt as cited in Mills (1995). In Ufot’s analysis between the differences of sentence of male and

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES female, he observed that sentences written by female authors lacks rationality and authority which means being emotive and pouring-out to her writings – her feelings and her soul as writer – plan less and structured less. The women writers are apologetic and describe female experiences more often than not are about relationships. On the other hand, sentences written by male authors are clear and have elements of control – clear and rational. Also, sentences written by male authors depict male experience and are seen assertive and authoritative. Sabanpan-Yu (2001) states the works of Filipino women diasporic writers depict the female protagonists as a redefinition of themselves in the context of America. Significantly, such a reformulation happens at the nexus of Philippine and 104 American cultures. The treatment of their protagonists also discloses the author's location in diaspora. According to her, Hagedorn establishes a radical, anti-bourgeois feminist politics in a novel that advocates community and coalition building with ethnicities. In contrast, Romero's novel does not articulate any diasporic community-grounded politics. Oppositions are deconstructed and the feminine vis-a-vis Maria Clara ideology in Always Hiding but Viola and Lourdes do not engage with America outside the workplace situation. Romero does not try to articulate her politics of location in the US. Also, SabanpanYu’s study of migrant Philippine women writers is an attempt to comprehend the "tremendous spiritual and physical ordeals that people of color are forced to undergo", specifically Filipino women. Her analysis shows that

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES gender positions affect Filipina migrants and this study has investigated the mutually constitutive politics of nationalism and gender. These women's narratives show that they can easily be co-opted by nationalist agendas, even as their presence destabilizes national literatures. On the other hand, their narratives can contribute to the rearticulation of theories when existing critical frameworks are not sufficient to address the complexity of the migrant construction of Filipino nationality and gender. The study of Pooja and Aditya Raj (2015) with the title “Representation of Indian Women in Selected Indian Diasporic Narratives” aimed, in a way, to conduct “emancipatory research” to create awareness for diasporic lives. The study focused on the female protagonists’ experience in the host land and the process of “conscientization” they have undergone. Conscientization, according to Freire (1996), is the way a certain group learns to perceive the social, political, and economic contradictions and to take action against the oppressive elements of reality. According to Pooja and Aditya Raj (2015), there might be an assumption that women in the diaspora may be less oppressed. However, by the virtue of being a woman, an individual becomes vulnerable for various oppressions at home or abroad. In the short stories analyzed, the two women protagonists voiced their experience, realized their existence, and resisted. They are the symbols of alienated lives in silence and agony, while at the same time undergoing continuous change. In the process of change, the female characters achieve self-apprehension and self-expression. Furthermore, Pooja

29

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES and Aditya Raj’s (2015) study attempted to justify that studies in the diasporic milieu are imperative to generate a complete picture of any nation’s reality. They believed that it can make a comparison between lived and represented condition of a woman in her homeland and diaspora. The study of Rashidi et. al (2014) entitled “The Critical Discourse Analysis of the Representation of Women and Men in Bozorg Alavi’s Short stories” aimed to study men and women’s use of language to investigate whether their languages imply their social status and each short story is studied for discursive structure in the texts, reflecting special linguistic features. This results that men and women have different social status. For if an actional is used for the man while a relational for the women, this shows that the man has higher status than the woman does since he is the actor while the woman has a static and fixed position. Also the analysis of the stories has seen that the men are most of the times the actors of the actionals especially in the transactives, men are the actors and women are the affected. While woman are the actors in fewer non-transactive sentences which show that they are actors who cannot affect men but the action affect themselves. This shows women’s lower status in comparison with men who are actors in more sentences and even when they are actors, they affect women. In the similar vein, in the study conducted by Jia (2002) entitled; “Women’s Voices: The Representation of Women in the Contemporary Fiction of South Asian women” first briefly obverses the history and influences that

30

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES post-colonialism has had on language and literature, particularly with regard to south Asia, that turns its attention to the effects of post-colonialism has had on the early literature written in English by south Asians and that leads the study to a consideration of the inheritance of contemporary South Asian women writers in historical, social, and literary terms. And most importantly the section, outlining as it does some of weighty problems and obstacles that confront the South Asian women authors of this age, writing and publishing locally and globally in the first century. Jia (2002) stated that, “Today, a woman writing is a woman fighting. For truth, for honesty, freedom, even if not for equality." South Asian women writers have contributed significantly to the evolution of English in South Asian Literature. Though the male pioneers of South Asian Literature have also made huge contributions to the development of this young branch of literature, South Asian women writers made a unique position of having been “doubly colonized”. Their contributions are particularly valuable as contributions from those who have twice been forced into the role of “the other”, first as colonized, and then as women. Having been “doubly Othered’, South Asian women writers are therefore inclined to avail themselves of the literary strategies of subversion, destruction, and reconstruction in order to break their silence, retell tales, and recount their point of view. In light of feminism, Pevec (2011) viewed that power relations are embedded between the dynamic relationship like art and criticism. Analyzing literary pieces from Croatia, Pevec (2011) concluded that together with the

31

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES author’s thematization of textual representation of identity, it casts a new light on the dominant modes of critical writing in Croatia. Lastly, a study by Banerjee (2011) examining women on diasporic South Asian literature concludes that narratives have relevance in constructing their own identities through circumstances of migration. The experience of migration may liberate them from the known and familiar boundaries and enables them to create new, contemporary, and cross-cultural identities, shaped by their gender and location. In addition, it argues that works of diasporic literature, written by women who are living in the diaspora, open up a space where once can view women’s identity withing the diaspora as a realm of dynamic dialogue. The energy created by the dialogue propels a re-interprentation of gender roles and promotes a gendered vision of diasporic identity.

Local Studies Carballo (1994) stated that in all literary works language is utilized in a certain way in order to conjure up images, events, places, and characters that represent something concrete and something apparent in today's reality. These different elements all tie up to present the reader with a theme which places in a nutshell all the various representations, merging them into one or two sentences which will not only provide the reader with a general overview but will also endure as a manifestation of the author's beliefs and convictions about

32

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES certain events that have occurred in the past. Moreover, in these creations, literature, he manipulates and creates signs which "stand for" and "represent perhaps his mere thoughts, his political ideologies, his pent-up emotions or even just little bits and pieces of his imagination. However, the whole point lies in the fact that being a representational animal's nature calls for him by the very simple means of representation. This concept, manifested in literary works of fiction such as those of Ninotchka Rosca's, plays a major role in the analysis of literature on the whole. Therefore, representation can mean different things to different people just as they may mean the same thing to a great majority of people. So far, the representation discussed in the above paragraphs refers only to very simple, atomistic representation. It must be that "representation is an extremely elastic notion which extends all the way from a stoner representing a man to a novel representing a day in the life of several Dubliners." Before delving deeper into this so-called elastic notion, representation must first be broken down into its barest elements in order that the whole skeleton upon which this particular framework rests may be revealed, helping the readers to understand certain terms which may be helpful later on while reading this paper. Two very important aspects of representation are how the representational elements differ from one another and how the representational material is connected to what it stands for. Aristotle, in his book, Poetics, states that there are three ways by which representations differ from one another: the object, the manner,

33

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES and the means. The object is that which is being represented, the manner is the way in which the object is represented, and the means, sometimes called code, is the material that is used to make the representation. In literature, the means or the code is basically l, language. Yet the language is utilized in many various ways such as through simple narration, dramatic recitation, poems, or the like in order to elicit a varied array of responses such as anger, pity, love, remorse, etc. In the case of Rosca's novels, Rosca use the manner of almost fable-like storytelling, using the English language in order to represent her beliefs, ideologies and grievances about life doing specific epoch in Philippine history which is the Marcos era. At this point, the whole framework functions in a way similar to what was just written down. The second important consideration which regard to representation is the relationship between the representational materials and what which it represent. One may ask: How can stone stand for man? By what agreement is the representation deemed valid and by whose or by what approval may the representation actually take place? Semioticians, working under semiotics which is the theory of signs, venture that there are three representational relationships which exist under the names icon, symbol, and index. An iconic account of the relation stresses resemblance. In the example, stone-represents-man, that stone might stand for man because it is rigid and hard just as the man's body is hard, rippling with muscles, because the man and the stone are shaped in a similar way. Iconic representation is best manifested in theater with its concrete forms found in "mimesis" and "imitation."

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Symbolic representation, on the other hand, is based on arbitrary stipulation meaning the stone stands for man because there is an agreement among people in society that the stone is what man should stand for. In the case of language the representation is symbolic in that letters, words, and the whole texts and plots represent emotions, beliefs, events, or state of affairs without the list bit resembling a stone. Lastly, indexical representation explains "standing-for" in terms of cause and effect such as the stone represents man because man placed it there. In literature, all three types of relationship s may be employed in one text. Such as Rosca's stories in the monsoon collection represent the abuse and brutality she suffered in the detention center and may use then President Ferdinand Marcos as the cause for this particular effect. At this point, it is important to take note that the researcher is merely giving simple examples to back up certain statements. These examples are to be taken as examples for the moment and not as classified statements. Now, in literary representation, even purely "aesthetic" representation of fictional persons, events can never be completely separated from political and ideological questions. These, in fact, is the point where these questions will enter into the literary work because if literature is a "representation of life," the representation is exactly the point where "life," in all its social and subjective complexity. According to Chua (2001), patriarchy is so powerful that it manipulates even the making of history. Women are not honoured that they are rarely mentioned in recounting a country’s past. Hence, Chua conducted a study

35

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES entitled “The Subjectivity of Filipina: Through the Years” to investigate the status of Filipino women in the history, specifically in the decades of 1940, 1950, 1960, and 1990. To do this, Chua used postructuralism feminism to analyze the selected 12 short stories of Gloria Villaraza Guzman’s “Damdamin ni Corazon At Iba Pang Mga Kuwento”, being three for each decade. Chua’s (2001) analysis lies upon the female characters while pointing out the different roles that they portray and how their society constructs them. In the short stories dated in 1940s and 1950s, all stories are supportive to patriarchy as the women characters have succumbed to the dictates of their society. The women protagonists know that they are being subordinates but they do not question their subordination. In the 1960s and 1990s stories, some women characters try to be critical about patriarchy but others remained to be trivialized. There finally came a woman character that works and supports her family all by herself, and another female character who ignores the expectation of society by going out with other men. However, the ending of these short stories showed death and the question of the female protagonists’ happiness, which only means they are not successful in the stories. Furthermore, in another study conducted by De Borja (1995) with the title “The Images of Women in Selected Short Stories of Paz Marquez-Benitez”, the results are similar to that of Chua (2001). De Borja stated that the images of women in literature are stereotypes, representing a world view. The study discussed those prevalent stereotypes corresponding women, starting from

36

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES women’s biological function such as being a female child, motherhood, and the bearer of child. These facets of stereotypes hold the ideals of society—what women should be and should not be. Out of the four stories analyzed by De Borja (1995), the stereotypes inferred are: the woman as martyr, the woman as a victim, the woman on pedestal, the fallen woman, and the woman as a dutiful daughter. The images of the Virgin Mary and Eve served as the archetypal models behind the stereotypes. The research results revealed that most of the female characters are martyr. Others are depicted as domineering women like a mother or wife figure, making men respect their character. However, when a woman becomes overbearing, she gets ridiculed. This shows that the character a woman plays is judged whether or not it benefits men. In the research entitled “The Woman in the Mirror: Imaging the Filipino Woman in English by Filipino Women Authors,” Tarrayo (2015) attempted to look at Filipino women by studying selected works of several Filipino women writers. The research made use of a literary tool called characterization. It is used to describe a person’s physical, moral, social, mental, and emotional characteristics. Tarrayo, borrowing from Galda and Cullinan’s concept, classified the characteristics into virtues possessed, vices shown, passions displayed, and struggles undergone by the women protagonists. Through analyses, the author came to conclusion that a virtue displayed by most female characters is having a sense of responsibility whether the character played is a mother or a child. Many female characters are seen passionate in preserving

37

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES their relationship with their loved ones or keeping the peace among the family members, even if she gets hurt in the process. According to Tarrayo (2015), the Filipino woman is a composite character who exhibits both desirable and undesirable traits and is a product of her time and milieu—heterogeneous in looks, psyche, and roles in the society. In addition, the Filipino women are now said to be daring and committed to her endeavors, making them the “modern Filipina.” A research conducted by Denopra (2012) entitled “A Feminist Stylistic Analysis of Selected Short Stories by Kerima Polotan-Tuvera” revealed that women characters differ from men characters through their respective character descriptions. Women character descriptions pertain to their thoughts, emotions,

experiences,

vulnerability

towards men,

and

their physical

characteristics. On the other hand, men characters are described according to their physical strength, personalities, attitudes that dominate women. Most of the metaphors and euphemisms were used to describe women characters. It was concluded that out that one noticeable difference between the men and women characters, women are always described as emotional and reflective beings while men are always logical, restrained, and somewhat detached. The study of Kalaw (1994) with the title “Images of Women in the Short Stories of Paz Latorena” aimed to show images of women constructed by the Filipino writers living during the American Colonial Period in the Philippines. Since American government brought a new social order, women were facing a

38

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES problem of finding and creating their own identities as women. American Occupation brought positive changes in the social conditions of Filipino women in the Philippines—the most visible of which occurred in education and employment. Many schools are starting to admit women in some male-oriented professions and open opportunities for them to pursue higher education. In addition, women also got the trends from abroad through mass media that raise women’s political consciousness that results in many reformist groups and later on won the right of suffrage. Paz Latorena had written many stories that reflected the different images of women. Hence, Kalaw (1994) conducted a study to analyze all of Latorena’s stories. The research results indicated that a woman could be a traditional woman, an image derived from the Catholic beliefs brought by Spanish Era. It is believed that woman has a natural destiny called “marriage.” A traditional woman is a wife and a mother that takes care of her husband and children and a woman who fights for her family. Also, another image of women is the modern image: a woman without man. This is a woman who strongly chooses another destiny which is not marriage, or those who forgo marriage for one reason. These type of women are those who sacrifice love and marriage in favor of a higher calling, usually a religious vocation, or those who are faced by circumstances, usually not of their own making, e.g., poverty, illness, lack of opportunity, rejection by a lover, to remain unmarried, in time becoming "old maids” (Kalaw, 1994).

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Synthesis The review of foreign and local literature in this chapter shared the same idea that there is a need in representing the diasporic communities with the participation of those ‘who are constructed and represented as indigenous’ (Brah, 1997). To Raj & Raj (2015), studies in diasporic milieu are imperative to generate a complete picture of any nation’s reality. As the imaginative diasporic spaces begin to grow, it points to the complex relationship between gender, culture, nation, and memory in the diasporic context and most significantly, the representations it holds. According to Banerjee (2011), narratives in South Asian literature have relevance in constructing own identities through circumstances of migration. The experience of migration may liberate the women in the diaspora from the known and familiar boundaries and enables them to create new, contemporary, and cross-cultural identities, shaped by their gender and location. For Carballo (1994), in all literary works language is utilized in a certain way to conjure up images, events, places and character that represent something concrete and something apparent in today’s reality. This shows that representations in literature are the mere thoughts, political ideologies, pent-up emotions or even just little bits and pieces of the imagination of an author. Also, that called schemata according to Emmott (2014), represent the knowledge base of individuals. These show that many representations are formed according to a person’s own schema. It may be culturally or temporally specific

40

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES but commonly shared by prototypical members of the given community. The schema theory also takes an account for the interpretation of a text where the discourse itself does not provide all information. The researchers will make use of the information to provide presuppositions and implications for the analyses of the study. Moreover, according to Mills (1998), there are many texts that are too sexist and claims women as sex objects. However, this expression has changed because of the feminist knowledge. Mills stated that in the underlying workings of the texts, the meanings that negotiate with the text are different because of limited range of options available to readers. Mills assumed that there is an indirect form of sexism and texts need to be not simply representing especially women that are why there is a need of a deeper and conceptualized form of analysis. More subtle form of sexism should be done and analyze the context of words rather than words out of context. Milton (ctd. In Bradford, 1997) also suggests to expose the foregrounding anarchic relationship between truth and fabrication in texts. Between signified and its referent and the ungrounded signifier. Bradford (1997) affirmed that there is a common thread running between gender and genre which also confirms the connection between poetry and ‘real world’ that are reflected in non-literary discourses. A part played by a woman is straightforward but inevitably will remain silent. Furthermore, he said that a

41

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES woman writer should negotiate the elements of literary and non-literary registers to the texts which mean women writers played a significant role in this. From the foreign literature in this chapter, Ferguson (1981) and Cornillon (1993) both presented the women images prevalent in literature. Through the stereotypes and archetypes generated in their books “Images of Women in Literature” and “Images of Women in Fiction Feminist Perspectives,” local studies in this chapter have been produced. In the study of Chua (2001), Borja (1995), and Kalaw (1994), patriarchal influences are ubiquitous in the literary pieces written by Filipino women such as Paz Marquez-Benitez, Gloria Villaraza Guzman, and Paz Latorena. Women images still follow the stereotypes. While the local studies focused on the aesthetic judgments in literary pieces to determine women representations, foreign studies in this chapter used Feminist Stylistic approach to bare the underlying meaning of the texts within the context that provides the literary art to be examined to sprout representations of women. In Ufot (2012) study, he showed how this approach which was based to Sara Mills and other French feminists helped uncover reliable images of women. By scrutinizing the thematic, lexical and grammatical and graphological features of the works, he concluded that women writings are mostly emotive while men works are rational. Similar to Ufot (2012), women were also given the descriptions of being focused on their thoughts, emotions

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES and experiences and their vulnerability towards men, while men described according to their physical strength and personalities which dominates women. Besides, the foreign studies included in this chapter focused on the women representation in the context of diaspora. According to Yu’s (2011) study, the Filipino women diasporic writers depict female protagonists as redefining themselves in the diaspora. The study of Pooja and Aditya Raj (2015) served as an emancipatory research to create awareness for diasporic lives lived by Indian women. Though women are still oppressed in the host land, they still managed to achieve self-apprehension and self-expression. Moreover, in the study of Rashidi et al (2014), it explored whether the men and women’s languages imply their social status. The literary pieces are studied for discursive structure in the texts, reflecting special linguistic features. The results are men and women have different social status. From the review of related literature and studies above, this paper argues that diasporic literature written by women creates a prospect in which one can view the women’s identity within the diaspora. It generates a need for re-interpretation of gender roles and promotes a gendered vision of diasporic identity. According to Lau (2002), South Asian women writers are inclined to avail themselves of the literary strategies of subversion, destruction, and reconstruction in order to break their silence, retell tales, and recount their point of view. From this, it is clear that feminist thought has the right to prevail and to flourish in Philippine society. There are women writers in the country and

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES abroad who contribute greatly in Philippine Literature. The stand of women regarding their representation in this society is best understood in their own writing. The literary works in the diasporic setting can be used as a comparison to the lived and represented oppressions experienced by women. The studies and literature mentioned above helped the researchers to analyze and support the present study. This paper study used Feminist Stylistic Approach by Sara Mills to examine the selected literary texts.

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CHAPTER 3 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY This chapter presents the research design, description of the data, datagathering procedure and the analytical categories utilized in this study. Research Design Polit and Hungler (1999) describe research design as the overall plan for collecting and analyzing data, including specifications for enhancing the trustworthiness of the data. The researchers used descriptive method in this study. Descriptive methods attempts to interpret explain and describe conditions of the present. It is concerned with practices, conditions, opinions held, structures, differences and/or relationship that exists. Applying this to the study using feminist stylistics, the topic of the researchers falls under the analytical method. This means that it identifies and interprets information that is already present, a form of research in which events, ideas and concepts are examined through analysis of documents record, recording and other media. In this case, the researchers identify and interpret information in the form of published short stories of Filipino-American writers in the United States. Contextual information is very important in this type of research to form an accurate interpretation.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Qualitative approach was also used by the researchers in conducting this study. Careful planning was done for the actual collection of data. According to Wilson (2006), qualitative research methods and qualitative analysis aspire to capture what people and their lives are about. In qualitative research, preconceived ideas are put aside. The subjectivity of qualitative research methods is consistent with the philosophy in which, shared experience, interrelatedness and human interpretation of reality are considered (Moody 1990). It is contended that the fundamental belief of qualitative research is that, to create meaning for individuals studied, multiple realities exist (Streubert and Carpenter ctd. in Donalek, 2004). According to Holloway and Wheeler (ctd. in Morse et. al. 2001), the qualitative researcher seeks understanding of human thought and behavior and its interpretation in the same shade of light that Morse et. al. (2001) asserts that in qualitative research a holistic perspective to the phenomena of interest is considered by including the underlying values and the context as part of the phenomena. Therefore, instead of searching for one reality, the researcher in qualitative research believes that informants of the study actively participate in social actions and thus understand the phenomena under study in different ways. The researcher supports the notion of multiple realities and this study is aimed at describing the re/presentations of women in the Philippine literature produced outside the country itself.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Data of the Study The researchers used three different short stories from four different Filipino-American writers in the United States. The selected authors and short stories were: Bienvenido Santos 1. Scent of Apples 2. Immigration Blues 3. The Door Carlos Bulosan 4. The Faith of My Mother 5. Sometimes It’s Not Funny 6. The Odyssey of Constancia Drake Ninotchka Rosca 7. The Goddess 8. Generations 9. A Party for Mrs MacArthur Michelle Skinner 10. Scent of Flowers 11. Natural Selection 12. Beautiful

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Sampling Technique The following are the paramount basis of the researchers in selecting the above mentioned short stories: 

The short story as a literary form entered Philippine literature by the group of English writers who served as educators and university-based writers who traditionalized short story as the literary form par excellence for Filipino writers (Lumbera 1997).



The continuous growth of migration of Filipinos to the United States has created literature that reflects the need to recontextualize the feminine to cope with the cultural displacement of the Filipinos living in the United States.



The short stories were selected from authors who are from the “Pioneering Generation” and “Present Generation” as clustered by Oscar V. Campomanes in his paper “Filipinos in the United States and Their Literature of Exile.” The researchers believe that the works of these authors have already reached a certain consolidation of people enough to provide orientations and observations which the study may revolve around.



The researchers selected three short stories from each authors considering the accessibility and availabity of the materials in the country since they are published in the United States.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES 

The short stories that were selected were first published in the United States even though there are certain circumstances that they have been republished here in the Philippines.

The researchers selected short stories which will provide the construction of “woman” in the diaspora that will be analyzed in this study. Data-Gathering Procedure The data gathering procedure shows the process the researchers underwent to gather information that they require for the study. Initial Stage The researchers ascertained analytical categories that will be used for to analyze short stories through the lens of feminist stylistics. Data-Gathering Stage The researchers selected short stories they will use for the study and established a list of categories afterwards. Categories The researchers will gather specific data using the categories from the selected texts. The researchers limited the categories that were used to present their analyses into (1) presuppositions and (2) implications which are

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES subcategorized into (a) physical appearances, (b) character traits, (c) class, and (d) ethnicity. Presuppositions. This refers to the words used in describing women characters in the selected short fiction of the selected Filipino-American writers to which the researchers rely on. Implications. This refers to the analyses from the presuppositions present in the selected short fiction that are used in the study. Physical Appearances. This refers to the external and physical qualities of a character in the selected short fiction. Character Traits. This refers to the quality that makes a character different or same with other woman in selected short fiction. Class. This refers to the social cluster in which a particular group of people belong to. Ethnicity. This refers to particular group of people coming from the same race, origin and/or country.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Data Analysis Analyses of texts were based on words that were used to modify the women protagonist in texts (presuppositions and implications). Data Interpretation The interpretations of the short stories were based on qualitative inquiry and results of the analyses of texts which were based on the results of analytical categories used by the researchers in conducting the study.

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CHAPTER 4 PRESENTATION, ANALYSIS, AND INTERPRETATION OF DATA This chapter presents how the selected short stories of Bienvenido Santos, Carlos Bulosan, Ninotchka Rosca, and Michelle Skinner were analyzed to define the re/presentations of women from, among and towards women by coming out with presuppositions and implications of the women characters used in the text. Presuppositions and implications in describing women characters The interpretation of word association pertaining to women characters includes actual texts from the selected short stories. Actual texts substantiate the categories that are prominent in the literary pieces. The categories are rooted out by examining the background information of the women characters in the selected short fiction for the linguistic description may conventionally regard the different levels of sexism within the texts as stated by Mills (1998). The researchers believe that presenting the common denominator of the categories will lay emphasis on demystifying women characters part from the way authors have presented it.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Physical appearances of women characters Table 1 Excerpts, pressupositions and implications for physical appearances of women characters Title of Short Story and Author The Odyssey of Constancia Drake by Carlos Bulosan

Excerpts

Pressupositions

Implications

“One look at her grey hair, all white and wiry now, and at the thick wrinkles in the face and hands, and she knew the answer right away. That was why she had given up the idea of pretending to be younger than she actually was.”

 The texts reveal that when a woman is young, she is lovely.

 Filipino-American writers in the United States depicted women in different ages and social roles: woman as a caring mother, submissive and faithful wife, rebellious daughter, a young woman, and an independent woman. A woman is either young and lovely or a woman with grey hair and wrinkles.

The Door by Bienvenido “She’s beautiful.” Santos Immigration Blues by “… the fat one said as Bienvenido Santos she plunked herself down on the nearest chair, which sagged the floor under her weight.” A Party For Mrs. “Her toes were so tiny; MacArthur by Ninotchka he said her kneecaps Rosca were gorgeous. How beautiful she was, with her eyes, her impeccable, arrogant mouth” The Goddess by Ninotchka Rosca “In a strange sort of way, he said, she was very beautiful. He said it again after Martha’s third drink. She was beautiful.” Scent of Flowers by Michelle Skinner

Beautiful by Michelle Skinner

“He is cruising, looking out his window at pretty women.” “Finally, her mother, dazed and shocked like a child and a very old woman, looks up at nothing particular. “The cover featured a curvaceous woman in a bikini, curled on a beach chair, sipping

 Given the scenario that young women are beautiful, there is a notion whrein an old woman in the text has been pretending to be young until she had given up that idea.

 Women are commonly described as beautiful in her physical look. A curvaceous woman is a beautiful woman.

 The authors accentuated women’s physical appearances in the text. These include mostly how women dress, their facial attributes and the picture of their body. They presented women as young, lovely and sexy or women as old sick, and lousy.

 The

texts revealed how women are eyecatching and attractive to the eyes of men. The women here are usually being described in every detail of their physical looks and illustrated as beautiful.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES drink that was the same pink as her bikini.”

As can be seen from Table 1, women are presented as amazing, wonderful and full of purpose when they are young, and deteriorating when they are old. Most of the texts from male authors are likely to have old women characters while female authors have women characters at their golden ages. It can be observed that female authors intricately described their women characters, focusing on describing specifically – different from male authors employing describing words generally. From this it can be implied that female authors beautify women through texts, firmly locking in the experience in the stories that once, they are supreme. Female authors beautifying women in their texts were mostly told from a male perspective. Mills (1993) stated that the writing of women is often treated as expressions of endeavour and individualism. Analyzing the notion of beauty from this point of view, men equating the beauty of women to exterior qualities will only promote the reduction of women as mere objects of wordly desires which proves that there are still existing texts that appear to be non-sexist and/or positively anti-sexist. They address men and women as if they’re equal, and sometimes there is no difference between men and women but whilst this is the surface message, the underlying workings of the text and the meanings which readers must negotiate with the text as noted by Mills (1998).

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Character traits and struggles of women characters Table 1.2 Excerpts, pressupositions and implications for character traits and struggles of women characters Title of Short Story and Author The Odyssey of Constancia Drake by Carlos Bulosan

Excerpts Pressupositions Implications “And when she  The woman shows  Women in the thought that it was that there is hope stories are depicted about time, Robert remaining in an as hopeful or Reskam asked her to unhappy life, and hopeless, religious marry him. It was a that can only be women, women dream come true. It fulfilled through a who are faithful was worth the long man’s love. housewives, and years of waiting. It women who ran was worth the  A man character around with other sacrifice and the boys. asking if women prolonged denial. It twenty years ago was the fulfillment of are the same with  Also, authors all she had longed for the women in their characterize down the unhappy present time shows women as weak, span of her life.” how women should hopeless and be characterized submissive. “So at long last, after according to the Women as shy and more than five man protagonist of self-declined to decades of great the story. changes, and sacrifice and soulwomen as loud and wrecking denial, silent. Constancia Drake sat  There is a text happily with her which shows the broken old man in the woman protagonist  In addition, having sunny yard of the Old as strong and wild: no friends, trying to People’s Home.” the woman live alone, lack of smokes, one of the confidence, being “And when she vices that are violated, trying to thought that it was commonly seen in boost her social about time, Robert men. status are some of Reskam asked her to the struggles seen marry him. It was a in the short stories. dream come true. It A text shows was worth the long woman walks  The writer years of waiting. It without being shy demonstrates was worth the and conservative in women as sacrifice and the her daring shirt. In insecure. prolonged denial. It the context of the was the fulfillment of story, it means that  The women in the all she had longed for she wants to get stories down the unhappy

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES span of her life.” Scent of Apples by Bienvenido Santos

“Twenty years ago our women were nice, they were modest, they wore their hair long, and they dressed proper and went for no monkey business. They were natural, they went to church regular, and they were faithful.”

the attention of the people in the bar, especially men, using her outfit that makes her often favorable in having clients.

encountered numerous struggles and they have succeeded it all marking their life events: the woman, who was looking for company after five decades, has found a man whom she can call a family; the woman who was sick and suddenly healed; the woman who found a US citizen husband; and the woman who remained faithful to her husband.

“But she clung to him wordlessly. Even as she scrubbed her arms and legs, her tears rolled down her cheeks. “I won’t leave you,” she repeated.” Beautiful by Michelle “Virgie reached for her  The persona Skinner pack of cigarette, took characterized all  In the texts, it can be inferred that the one of it and lit it.” the mentioned woman’s women in the story happiness is only “Lulu’s white blouse as to having the achieved when she dipped down in a low same struggle finds the one who V and was fringed with which is a woman will be her partner sequins in tan and who has an for life. The text white and brown. It expiring visa in the shows that looked like she’d United States and however hard a dusted her cleavage the last and only woman works; her with some sparkly resort would be happiness is powder. ’This is my marrying an old dependent on Sex in the City American citizen. having her man. blouse.’ she whispered to Virgie as  A text emphasizes they entered the a woman (his wife)  Correspondingly, the most common restaurant.” that cannot bear a deed to the women baby which characters on the indicates weakness Sometimes It’s Not “And there she was— stories depicts for women. Funny by Carlos a small strange women’s struggles Bulosan woman, shivering and about their looking at me with relationship status:  There are texts that pleading eyes.” a woman who show a woman is broke up with her sitting too close Immigration Blues “Nothing really but boyfriend who is beside a by Bienvenido their upbringing was trying to win her Frenchman. She Santos such that to place back; and a woman touches and leans themselves in a throwing her own to him an situation where they betrothal party indication of a wild had to tell a man that attended by a man woman who is all they wanted was a

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES marriage for convenience, was degrading, an unbearable shame. A form of selfdestruction. Mortal sin. Better repatriation. A thousand times better.” “…Oh, that Seniang. You see, we have no baby. If we have a baby…” “How she found Carlito Zafra was another story, a much longer story, more confused and confusing. It was a miracle, though. Her friend God could not have sent her to a better instrument to satisfy her need. That was not expressed well, but it amounted to that, a need.” Scent of Flowers by ““Slowly, like waking Michelle Skinner animals, they move across the light coming through the doorway. Linda moves toward them briskly to hide her weakness and lack of confidence.” ”And she knows he is not to be trusted even before she touches him. She knows she is hoping for too much.” “Linda looks into the black car and saw Mario. ‘Going home? You need a ride?’ She hesitates. She is not sure she wants to ride with him, her ex-

tempting and arousing the man. Moreover, a girl is being asked to use her body as a payment for her father to be sentenced – validations that women are seen as objects used by men.

A

text which indicated loneness reveals a woman who can make decisions for herself.

she liked who violated her before.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES boyfriend. ‘Yeah, I do.’” Beautiful by Michelle “Lulu laughed with Skinner Henri, a Frenchman leaning her hand on his knee, her newly cut and dyed hair swaying close to his face.” The Goddess by “She lived alone, Ninotchka Rosca made no friends, and reduced her conversation to what was necessary.” “Martha did not like being with sela. Her cousin made her aware of her thinness, her paleness, and all the other errors of her body.” “No? Maybe you can pay some other way. What do you think?" The sergeant turned to the other soldier. "Can she pay some other way?" The man laughed. His eyes glittered. "I should think so. She's old enough. And peasant girls are strong." “Martha was conscious of her image as the perfect bride-to-be. She greeted each stranger’s face that approached, handed out the drinks, drank to her fiance,” answered his parents with respect.” A Party For Mrs. “But I’m trying to MacArthur by apportion my time Ninotchka Rosca equitably, she said and followed that with with a confession that she hoped that the party would boost her

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES social status enough to convince the young man to resolve their status.”

From the selected texts it can be deduced that male authors presented women’s struggles in a way that the resolution is in the hands of men characters as presented in Table 1.2. They reveal women struggles as men empowerment. On the other side, female authors presented women’s struggles in a way of exploring themselves and discovering life thus improving and helping themselves to live and survive, to not allow the society to dictate what the women characters need and have to do in their lives. Mills (1993) stated that “self” is presumed to be the writers’s “self” which is translated into persona or narrative voice of the text. Male authors exhibited life events in women’s lives that made women dependent to men, making them dominant concurring with the analysis of Chua (2001) that patriarchy is so powerful, women are not honoured and that they are rarely mentioned in recounting a country’s past. There is always an instance in which the solution to a woman’s conflict belongs to men, giving them the power to rule over women’s lives. However, female authors discuss the rupture of relationship between women and men, about what happens next, showing that women develops and progresses raising the status of women thus empowering them being on the same argument with Cornillon (1973) when women began to attempt to challenge patriarchy which marks the start of the portrayal of women as people in the process of creating or discovering their wholeness, of women seeking

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES and finding other metaphors for existence rather than men, martyrdom, selflessness or intrinsic worthlessness. Class of women characters Table 1.3 Excerpts, pressupositions and implications for class of women characters `Title of Short Story Excerpts and Author The Faith of My “Mother was always Mother by Carlos working in the fields Bulosan and doing some chores in the house. Mother would only rest for a few hours, because when the dawn came, she was up again, cooking for my sister and preparing to go to work.”

Pressupositions

Implications

 Through the text, it  The women in the can be inferred that short stories are the family is poor. mostly depicted as Usually, the mother mother characters; stays at home but woman in the story, the protagonists who mother also works are in the for the family. Philippines working in the fields; and a woman in a host  In the text, the land who works for woman a family whom protagonist’s social remained poor until status is clearly The Odyssey of “Constancia Drake she has aged. stated. She was Constancia Drake by was born of a poor born from a poor  Furthermore, the Carlos Bulosan family in a little Ohio family and did not authors presented town. She was the last experience wealth women characters of three sisters who until the end of the in the working had long gone away story. class: a registered when she was old nurse, a bakery enough to question owner and a their family prostitute. These  A text implies that misfortune.” are women who are a woman independent and protagonist in the Scent of Apples by “Ruth stayed in the live for themselves short story is poor, Bienvenido Santos hospital with Fabia. and women who having been aliked She slept in a corridor are working for to a slave. outside the patients’ their family. ward and in the day time helped in scrubbing the floor and washing the dishes and cleaning men’s things. They didn’t have enough money and Ruth was willing to work like a slave.”

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES A Party For Mrs. MacArthur by Ninotchka Rosca

Scent of Flowers by Michelle Skinner

“Pearl’s busyness at what she called “preop organizing” (forgive her language; she was an RN) has scattered the idea of a party beyond Basilio’s circle.” “’Where are you working?’ ‘At a club’ ”

“Linda scans the page of the basketball scores and articles. She notices the ad for the Club Brazil, with beautiful, exotic girls and a picture of a woman who cannot be anyone but her sister.(Helen).” Beautiful by Michelle “Virgie looked up to Skinner find the youngest of the three French men, who’d just entered. His eyes were light brown and his dark hair curled at the ends, just above his shoulders. She was tempted, but, always practical, declined. Max was here for another week. He had money. He wanted to see her.”

Consequently, in Table 1.3 it can be observed that male authors sheltered the characters of women into what can be seen inside a house implying the idea of women as faithful and unfaithful housewives, passionate workers which are always submissive and dependent on men same as enunciated by Ferguson (1981) that the common factor description of presenting women is using the same standard of measurement implying that the characteristics of men are the norm and those of women are subsidiary. On

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES the other side, female authors exposed their women characters on a higher condition – as women who are experiencing and exploring life and its other facets which was revealed to be ‘human beings’ by Cornillion (1973) for these women are growing, making significant choices, questioning and finding viable answers and solutions. Ethnicity of women characters Table 1.4 Excerpts, pressupositions and implications for ethnicity of women characters `Title of Short Story Excerpts Pressupositions Implications and Author Immigration Blues by “…they looked like the  The selection  All of the authors Bienvenido Santos country girls he knew presents how the depicted Filipino back home in the persona in the women in their Philippines, who went short story sees short stories except around peddling rice the women for Bienvenido cakes.” protagonists Santos. He approaching to the presented foreign “Perhaps other foreign house of the male women and Filipino women in similar protagonist. women both the situations could do it – other way around. and have done it – but  The text reveals not Philippine girls.” how the persona in  The text above story compared illustrates how the The Door by “It seemed that it was and contrasted man protagonist in Bienvenido Santos common knowledge Filipino women to the story that Mildred [his other foreign characterized his blonde American wife] women in terms of wife based on his ran around with other resolving the prejudices about boys.” woman Filipino women. protagonist’s Scent of Apples by ““Ruth’s [American struggle which is to Bienvenido Santos wife] a nice girl,” said find an old Fabia. “Like our own American citizen to Filipino women.”” marry.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES In Table 1.4 the juxtaposition of American and Filipino women which are present in all of his short stories presented situations in which the other group of women is most likely to be dominant and the other group of women to be the submissive and vice versa. This happened in the Immigration Blues where a foreign woman can do what a Filipino woman does not basically do and in The Scent of Apples where a foreign woman is being liken to a Filipino woman. It is implied that notwithstanding the inequality between men and women, there is also an existing inequality of the same gender regarding their ethnicity as Banerjee (2011), analyzing literature from two different diasporas, concluded that experience of migration may affect their social construction, from the known and familiar boundaries and enables them to create new, contemporary, and cross-cultural identities, shaped by their gender and location. Women Re/presentations The importance of books as agents of short stories in the processes of socialization (Betzner and Moore n.d.; Weitzman Eifler, Hokada, Ross n.d. ctd. in Stephens, 2005) of the people, particularly the young, has established a standard that when someone reads about other people in a different land and context, he/she gets the opportunity to explore a part of that culture and identity. Books can be one of the primary sources that influence people’s values and attitudes. What the people may learn from other contexts through books will be reinforced and/or transformed with what is conveyed in books (Luk ctd. in Stephens, 2005). Thus books play a major role in the construction

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES of people’s gender identities. As McCabe et al (ctd. in Stephens, 2005) argue: “A consistently unequal pattern of males and females in books thus contributes to and reinforces gender schemas and identities. One representation of women re/presented is a wife. A female author had presented the women in one of her short stories as martyr person. All throughout the story, the protagonist was blinded by love. She serves her husband despite of being a battered wife. According to Ferguson (1981), an ideal housewife is a submissive wife. Given these points, the possibility of women to remain as submissive wives can be reinforced by authors acting as powerful element in implying the dominance of men. On the other hand, in two stories women are re/presented as housewife characters that must fulfill the duties inside the house, doing household chores and taking care of the family, and they are not subservient. They make and decide choices for the family, and also work for quite a time. In Tarrayo’s (2015) study, the virtue displayed by women characters, especially when they are either wife or daughter, is having a sense of responsibility. Women are passionate in keeping the balance and peace in the family. A woman, in one story written by a male author, is re/presented as “easy to get.” The woman protagonist was asked for marriage twice by different men and she agreed easily. It can be viewed as being “easy to get” or being wise. Wise because the woman has done it for she knew it would benefit her greatly. Contrary to the stereotype that the character of woman should benefit men as

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES concluded in Borja’s (1995) study, this story presented women as trying to benefit from men’s help although in the end, the woman failed and left. A story written by a female author was about a woman who was violated by a man when she was still young. This resulted to losing her hope and confidence for herself. It is shown here one of the stereotypes of women according to Borja (1995) – women as a victim of the deeds of a man. Because of this, woman belittles herself because of what the bad experience happened to her. There is also another story in which a woman is in great need of a US citizen husband for her to remain in the United States - to be exempted from the bash of the society why she did not attain to maintain the American Dream. In another story, a woman is re/presented as a person who wants to lift up her social status – a social climber. The woman protagonist hoped that a party would boost her social status to make the man she wants, love her. Inferring to this, the study of Tarrayo (2015), where a woman is a combination of desirable and undesirable traits and it is brought by her time and milieu, looks, psyche and roles in the society. In this story, because of the woman’s social status, she tried to be the one she is not in order for to get the man she wants. Thus, the man obviously, has the higher status that’s why the woman aims to be high, too. In these re/presentations, it can be inferred that women tend to use their beauty without necessarily giving up the essence of being a woman to gain help from men. In women’s struggles, they are likely to ask help from men, making them more reliant to men.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Another re/presentation of women is independent and hopeful at the same time. The woman protagonist who lived alone for a long time has survived the struggles she has encountered. Being in a foreign land and with no family and friends, she strived for a better life. Despite the hardship and solitude for years, she was hopeful to find the man she can call a family. When she found her man, she concluded that it was the ultimate fulfillment out of her unhappy span of life. With this, it can be inferred that the happiness and completeness of a woman’s life is only achieved when a man who loves her comes into her life. A woman can stand on her own but in order to be absolutely happy, she has to find a man who will compensate for the bad days on her life which reflects a patriarchal ideology practiced commonly, that a woman is complete if she has found her man – that a woman cannot live without a man. In one of the short stories written by a female author, objectifications of women are present. Women characters are usually involved in a relationship and not even some kind of relationship that only exist because of sex. According to Ferguson (1981), women are more passive than men who initiate sexual act. It was shown in this story when the two women protagonists work in the club and earn money when they go and make out with their clients – mostly foreigners. These women agreed to have sex when these men offered to. Ferguson also said that men always succeed because they are assertive and confident that’s why men has always the power to get what they want using

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES their money. With these, women can be seen also a distressed because they choose to do a job that doesn’t make them any good. In another story, a woman was used as a payment for her father to be released in prison. This implies that women are being submissive to their partner and that they will sacrifice everything for the sake of their family. A female author, re/presented women as rebellious daughter who gets away from her parents and lives on her own. In the sudy of Borja (1995), one of the stereotypes of women inferred is a dutiful daughter. This also support Tarrayo’s conclusion (2015) in his study that most of the time, women always plays having a sense of responsibility – it may be as a child or a mother. An ideal daughter, who always obeys to what her parents would say, brings joy, and laughter and pride to her parents not shame them. In other selected stories, a protagonist works in a club that is not agreed by her parents. She didn’t tell her parents where she lives and works. Until such time, her father called her a “bitch” and a disgrace to the family after seeing her picture in a bikini on an advertisement. Though her parents, asked her to go home, she still continues. Inferring to this, a woman according to Ferguson (1981), once succeed over men, are called aggressive and unfeminine – seen in the father who called her daughter a “bitch and disgrace”. But a woman in the story goes the other way around; she showed that she could also be an “independent” person when she chose to live on her own even if a father, who basically has the authority, was not able to dictate what she had to do.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Thus, class and location primarily affect identity creation. All FilipinoAmerican writers in the Uniteed States presented an arena where creative, cross- cultural and contemporary identities for diasporic women were created which led to a re-articulation of the nature of Filipino women’s diasporic identity in the same light of study with Banerjee’s (2011) study about the South Asian diasporic women. Therefore, it is very important how a writer presents a character in a work of art because it ascertains and influences people’s ideologies in presenting themselves. In like manner, it is re/presented that there are hierarchies of power, dominance and inequality established in the selected twelve (12) short stories published in the United States. Women are re/presented depending of the author that either suppress or empower them. Male authors accentuated men characters more in the same way female authors did to their own gender. This implies that authors are biased to their gender in providing representations. They have the authority to empower or suppress gender roles by their formulated representations. Aside from the dominance and inequality of one gender to another, the existence of suppression and dominance of the same gender (women to women) was also re/presented.

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CHAPTER 5 SUMMARY OF FINDINGS, CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS This research aims to determine the re/presentations of women exhibited through an analysis using feminist stylistics of the 12 short stories from Bienvenido Santos, Carlos Bulosan, Ninotchka Rosca, and Michelle Skinner which are published in the United States of America. The researchers categorized the presuppositions and implications that are present in the short stories that will help to provide analyses through the lens of feminist stylistics. The research started with the selection of the short stories and reading of related literature and studies through textual analysis. After the data of the study was identified (short Stories of Bienvenido Santos, Carlos Bulosan, Ninotchka Rosca and Michelle Skinner published in the United States of America), analytical methods were conventionalized based on what the research aimed to determine. The succeeding stages consisted of close analysis of the texts which included the interpretation of word association pertaining to women characters to come out with presuppositions and implications of the women characters that will define how women are re/presented from, among and towards other women in the selected short stories. These findings were observed from the analyses of the data grounded on the short stories; then, conclusions were derived from the findings and

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES subsequently,

recommendations

were

formulated

based

on

70 the

said

conclusions. Summary of Findings Major themes identified in the study are summarized below: 1. It is revealed that female writers illustrated women as amazing, wonderful, and full of purpose when they are young while male authors seen women as deteriorating when they are old. 2. It is seen in the works of female authors that women are weak, hopeless and subordinate; women are shy and self-declined to changes; and women are loud and silent while male authors represented women as helpless and alone. 3. In the works by male authors, most of the events in the life of women have roles of men. It has shown that a woman always needs a man to overcome every struggle. While in the short stories of female authors, women can resolve on her own problems with her relationship with men. 4. Women, in the minds of male authors are domestic and mostly came from the Philippines and belong to a poor family while men characters are always rich. On the contrary, female authors lift the social status of the women characters by placing them in the working class similar to men.

POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES 5. Except one male author, all other three have described Filipino women in their stories. Bienvenido Santos described the two different ethnicities as being dominant while the other one is submissive and vice versa. 6. All Filipino-American writers presented an arena where women have creative, cross- cultural and contemporary identities for diasporic women. Conclusions The researchers have concluded the following based on the findings: 1. Female writers beautify themselves through texts, firmly locking in the experience in the stories that once they are supreme. 2. Female authors presented women’s struggles in a way of exploring themselves and discovering life thus improving and helping themselves to live and survive. While on the other hand, male authors revealed that as women struggle, men were empowered for it is illustrated that the resolution for women’s weaknesses are in their hands. 3. Male authors used the struggles and weaknesses of women to show that men still dominate women while they are weak because their strengths depend on men. Female authors, contrary to men authors, used relationship challenges that portrayed women as an independent because they handle their own decisions when it comes to dealing with their relationship over men.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES 4. Women have seen by the male authors as domestic. With these, like other conclusion, men authors seen women as dominant to men while at the same time, they are submissive. Consequently, women according to female authors are strong and able to do what men can do. 5. The results have shown that mostly, Filipino women are being empowered and suppressed. Aside from this, one male author presented that even in the same gender, inequality also happens and it is likely because of their ethnicity. The juxtaposition of two women ethnicities showing that Filipino women can do what other foreign women can do and vice versa uphold that all women are equal. 6.

Male authors presented men characters as dominant types and women

characters as submissive types whereas female authors aspired in presenting women characters in which women are on the same level with men thus upholding equality. 7. The authors have the power to establish dominance and inequality. Filipino diasporic writers present Filipino men and women images. They should be responsible for the ideologies that they serve in their works as these can shape the image and re/presentation of Filipino men and women in the eyes of the foreigners and Filipinos who are born outside the country. 8. Class and location primarily affect identity creation which led to a rearticulation of the nature of Filipino women’s diasporic identity.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Recommendations The following recommendations are then presented based on the findings and conclusions of the study: 1. Language and literature majors should engage more in bridging the gap between linguistics and literature and not only analyze texts by its context but go beyond it and relate it to history, politics, philosophy, sociology and other related studies. 2. Future researchers are encouraged to delve on to the following studies: 

A feminist stylistic analysis of other forms of media such as advertisement taglines, movies and teleseryes in the Philippines using other analytical categories such as rhetorical devices, style, and tone.



A feminist stylistic analysis on texts written by Filipino men and women that may be studied using sociolinguistic lens.



A discourse analysis of the literary pieces written by Filipino diasporic writers.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Appendix A List of Short Stories Bienvenido Santos 1. Scent of Apples 1955. A Collection of Stories, pp. 21-29. University of Washington Press. When I arrived in Kalamazoo it was October and the war was still on. Gold and silver stars hung on pennants above silent windows of white and brick-red cottages. In a backyard, an old man burned leaves and twigs while a grey-haired woman sat on the porch, her red hands quiet on her lap, watching the smoke rising above the elms, both of them thinking of the same thought perhaps about a tall, grinning boy with blue eyes and flying hair, who went out to war, where could he be now this month when leaves were turning into gold and the fragrance of gathered apples was in the wind? It was a cold night when I left my room at the hotel for a usual speaking engagement. I walked but a little way. A heavy wind coming up from Lake Michigan was icy on the face. It felt like winter straying early in the northern woodlands. Under the lamp posts the leaves shone like bronze. And they rolled on the pavements like the ghost feet of a thousand autumns long dead, long before the boys left for faraway lands without great icy winds and promise of winter early in the air, lands without apply trees, the singing and the gold! It was the same night I met Celestino Fabia, “just a Filipino farmer” as he called himself, who had a farm about thirty miles of Kalamazoo. “You came all that way on a night like this just to hear me talk?” I asked. “I’ve seen no Filipino for so many years now,” he answered quickly. “So when I saw your name in the papers where it says you come from Islands and that you’re going to talk I come right away.” Earlier that night I has addressed a college crowd, mostly women. It appeared that they wanted me to talk about my country; they wanted me to tell the things about it because my country had become a lost country. Everywhere in the land the enemy stalked. Over it a great silence hung; and their boys were there, unheard from, or they were on their way to some little known island on the Pacific, young boys all, hardly men, thinking of harvest moons and smell of forest fire. It was not hard talking about our own people. I knew them well and I loved them. And they seemed so far away during those terrible years that I must have spoken of them with a little fervor, a little nostalgia. In the open forum that followed, the audience wanted to know whether there was much difference between our women and the American women. I tried to answer the questions as best as I could, saying among other things, that I did not know much about American women, except that they looked friendly, but differences or similarities in inner qualities such as naturally belonged to the heart or to the mind, I could only speak about vagueness. While I was trying to explain away the fact that it was not easy to make comparisons, a man rose from the rear of the hall, wanting to say something. In the distance, he looked slight and old and very brown. Even before he spoke, I knew that he was, like me, a Filipino. “I’m a Filipino,” he began, loud and clear in a voice that seemed used to wide open spaces, “I’m just a Filipino farmer out in the country.” He waved his hand towards the door. “I

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES left the Philippines more than twenty years ago and have never been back. Never will perhaps. I want to find out, sir, are our Filipino women the same like they were twenty years ago?” As he sat down, the hall filled with voices, hushed and intrigued. I weighed my answer carefully, did not want to tell a lie yet I did not want to say any thing that would seem platitudinous, insincere. But more important than these considerations, it seemed to me that moments as I looked towards my countryman, I must give him an answer that would not make him so unhappy. Surely, all these years, he must have held on to certain ideals, certain beliefs, even illusions peculiar to the exile. “First,” I said as the voices gradually died down and every eye seemed upon me, “First, tell me what our women were like twenty years ago.” The man stood to answer. “Yes,” he said, “you’re too young . . . twenty years ago our women were nice, they were modest, they wore their hair long, they dressed proper and went for no monkey business. They were natural, they went to church regular, and they were faithful.” He had spoken slowly, and now in what seemed like an afterthought, added. “It’s the men who ain’t.” Now I knew what I was going to say. “Well,” I began, “it will interest you to know that our women have changed—but definitely! The change, however, has been on the outside only. Inside, here,” pointing to the heart, “they are the same as they were twenty years ago, God-fearing, faithful, modest, and nice.” The man was visibly moved. “I’m very happy, sir,” he said in the manner of who, having stakes on the land, had found no cause to regret one’s sentimental investment. After this, everything that was said and done in the hall that night seemed like an anticlimax, and later as we walked outside, he gave me his name and told me of his farm thirty miles east of the city. We had stopped at the main entrance to the hotel lobby. We had not talked much on the way. As a matter of fact, we were never alone. Kindly American friends talked to us, asked us questions, said goodnight. So now I asked him whether he cared to step into the lobby with me and talk shop. “No, thank you,” he said, “you are tired. And I don’t want to stay out too late.” “Yes, you live very far.” “I got a car,” he said, “besides . . .” Now he smiled, he truly smiled. All night I had been watching his face and I wondered when he was going to smile. “Will you do me a favor, please,” he continued smiling almost sweetly. “I want you to have dinner with my family out in the country. I’d call for you tomorrow afternoon, then drive you back. Will that be all right?” “Of course,” I said, “I’d love to meet your family.” I was leaving Kalamazoo for Muncie, Indiana, in two days. There was plenty of time. “You will make my wife very happy,” he said. “You flatter me.” “Honest. She’ll be very happy. Ruth is a country girl and hasn’t met many Filipinos. I mean Filipinos younger than I, cleaner looking. We’re just poor farmer folk, you know, and we don’t get to town very often. Roger, that’s my boy, he goes to school in town. A bus takes him early in the morning and he’s back in the afternoon. “He’s a nice boy.” “I bet he is,” I agreed. “I’ve seen the children of some of the boys by their American wives and the boys are tall, taller than the father, and very good looking.” “Roger, he’d be tall. You’ll like him.” Then he said goodbye and I waved to him as he disappeared in the darkness.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES The next day he came, at about three in the afternoon. There was a mild, ineffectual sun shining and it was not too cold. He was wearing an old brown tweed jacket and worsted trousers to match. His shoes were polished, and although the green of his tie seemed faded, a colored shirt hardly accentuated it. He looked younger than he did the night before now that he was clean shaven and seemed ready to go to a party. He was grinning as we met. “Oh, Ruth can’t believe it. She can’t believe it,” he kept repeating as he led me to his car—a nondescript thing in faded black that had known better days and many hands. “I says to her, I’m bringing you a first class Filipino, and she says, aw, go away, quit kidding, there’s no such thing as first class Filipino. But Roger, that’s my boy, he believed me immediately. What’s he like, daddy, he asks. Oh, you will see, I says, he’s first class. Like you daddy? No, no, I laugh at him, your daddy ain’t first class. Aw, but you are, daddy, he says. So you can see what a nice boy he is, so innocent. Then Ruth starts griping about the house, but the house is a mess, she says. True, it’s a mess, it’s always a mess, but you don’t mind, do you? We’re poor folks, you know.” The trip seemed interminable. We passed through the narrow lanes and disappeared into thickets, and came out on barren land overgrown with weeds in places. All around were dead leaves and dry earth. In the distance were apple trees. “Aren’t those apple trees?” I asked, wanting to be sure. “Yes, those are apple trees.” He replied. “Do you like apples? I got lots of ‘em. I got an apple orchard, I’ll show you.” All the beauty of the afternoon seemed in the distance on the hills, in the dull soft sky. “Those trees are beautiful on the hills,” I said. “Autumn’s a lovely season. The trees are getting ready to die, and they show their colors, proud-like.” “No such thing in our own country,” I said. That remark seemed unkind, I realized later. It touched him off on a long deserted tangent, but ever there perhaps. How many times did the lonely mind take unpleasant detours away from familiar winding lanes towards home for fear of this, the remembered hurt, the long lost youth, the grim shadows of the years; how many times indeed only the exile knows. It was rugged road we were traveling and the car made so much noise that I could not hear everything he said, but I understood him. He was telling me his story for the first time in many years. He was remembering his own youth. He was thinking of home. In these, old moments there seemed no cause for fear, no cause at all, no pain. That would come later. In the night perhaps. Or lonely on the farm under the apple tree. In this old Visayan town, the streets are narrow and dirty and strewn with corral shells. You have been there? You could not have missed our house, it was the biggest town, one of the oldest, was a big family. The house stood right on the edge of the street. A door opened heavily and you enter a dark hall leading to the stairs. There is the smell of chickens roasting on the low-topped walls, there is the familiar sound they make and you grope your way up a massive staircase, the bannisters smooth upon the trembling hand. Such nights, they are no better than the days, windows are close against the sun; they close heavily. Mother sits in her corner looking very white and sick. This was her world, her domain. In all these years I cannot remember the sound of her voice. Father was different. He moved about. He shouted. He ranted. He lived in the past and talked of honor as though it were the only thing. I was born in that house. I grew up there into a pampered brat. I was mean. One day I broke their heart, I saw mother cry wordlessly as father heaped his curses upon me and drove me out of the house, the gate closing heavily after me. And my brothers and sisters took up my

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES father’s hate for me and multiplied it numberless times in their own broken hearts. I was no good. But sometimes, you know, I miss that house, the roasting chickens on the low-topped walls. I miss my brothers and sisters. Mother witting in her chair, looking like a pale ghost in a corner of the room. I would remember the great live posts, massive tree trunks from the forest. Leafy plants grew on the sides, buds pointing downwards, wilted and dies before they could become flowers. As they fell on the floor, father bent to pick them and throw them out into the corral streets. His hands were strong. I have kissed those hands . . . many times, many times. Finally we rounded a deep curve and suddenly came upon a shanty, all but ready to crumble in a heap on the ground, its plastered walls were rotting away, the floor was hardly a foot from the ground. I thought of the cottages if the poor colored folk in the south, the hovels of the poor everywhere in the land. This one stood by itself as though by common consent all the folk that used to live here had decided to stay away, despising it, ashamed of it. Even the lovely season could not color it with beauty. A dog barked loudly, as we approached. A fat blonde woman stood at the door with a little boy by her side. Roger seemed newly scrubbed. He hardly took his eyes off me. Ruth had a clean apron around her shapeless waist. Now as she shook my hands in sincere delight I noticed shamefacedly (that I should notice) how rough her hands, how coarse and red with labor, how ugly! She was no longer young and her smile was pathetic. As we stepped inside and the door closed behind us, immediately I was aware of the familiar scent of apples. The room was bare except for a few ancient pieces of second-hand furniture. In the middle of the room stood a stove to keep the family warm in witer. The walls were bare. Over th dining table hung a lamp yet unlighted. Ruth got busy with the drinks. She kept coming in and out of a rear room that must have been the kitchen and soon the table was heavy with food, fried chicken legs and rice. Even as we ate, Ruth kept standing and going the kitchen for more food. Roger ate like a little gentleman. “Isn’t he nice looking?” father asked. “You are a handsome boy, Roger,” I said. The boy smiled at me. “You look like Daddy,” he said. Afterwards I noticed an old picture leaning on the top of a dresser and stood to pick it up. It was yellow and soiled with many fingerings. The faded figure of a woman in Filipina dress could yet be distinguished although the face had become a blur. “Your . . .” I began. “I don’t know who she is,” Fabia hastened to say. “I picked that picture many years ago in a room on La Salle Street in Chicago. I have often wondered who she is.” “The face wasn’t blur in the beginning?” “Oh, no. it was a young face and good.” Ruth came with a plate full of apples. “Ah,” I cried picking out a ripe one, “I’ve been thinking where all the scent of apples came from. The room is full of it.” “I’ll show you,” said Fabia. He showed me a backroom, not very big. It was half-full of apples. “Every day,” he explained, “I take some of them to town to sell to the groceries. Prices have been low. I’ve been losing on the trips.” “These apples will spoil,” I said. “We’ll feed them to the pigs.”

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Then he showed me around the farm. It was twilight now and the apple trees stood bare against a glowing western sky. In apple blossom time it must be lovely here, I thought. But what about wintertime? One day, according to Fabia, a few years ago, before Roger was born, he had an attack of acute appendicitis. It was deep winter. Ruth was pregnant and none too well herself. At first she did not know what to do. She bundled him in warm clothing and put him on a cot near the stove. She shoveled the snow on their front door and practically carried the suffering man on her shoulders, dragging him through the newly made path towards the road where they waited for the U.S. Mail car to pass. Meanwhile snowflakes poured all over them and she kept rubbing the man’s arms and legs as she herself nearly froze to death. “Go back to the house, Ruth!” her husband cried, “you’ll freeze to death.” But she clung to him wordlessly. Even as she scrubbed her arms and legs, tears rolled down her cheeks. “I won’t leave you, I won’t leave you,” she repeated. Finally the U.S. Mail car arrived. The mailman, who knew them well, helped them board the car, and, without stopping on his usual route, took the sick man and his wife direct to the nearest hospital. Ruth stayed in the hospital with Fabia. She slept in a corridor outside the patients’ ward and in the day time helped in scrubbing the floor and washing the dished and cleaning the men’s things. They didn’t have enough money and Ruth was willing to work like a slave. “Ruth’s a nice girl,” said Fabia. “Like our won Filipino women,” Before nightfall, he took me back to the hotel. Ruth and Roger stood at the door holding hands and smiling at me. From inside the room of the shanty, a low light flickered. I had a last glimpse of the apple trees in the orchard under the darkened sky as we were on our way back to town. The dog had started barking. We could hear it for some tie, until finally we could not hear it anymore, and all was darkness around us, except where the head lamps revealed a stretch of road leading somewhere. Fabia did not talk this time. I didn’t seem to have anything to say myself. Nut when finally we came to the hotel and I got down, Fabia said, “Well, I guess I won’t be seeing you again.” It was dimly lighted in front of the hotel and I could hardly see Fabia’s face. He had not come down the car, but he had moved to my side, and I saw his hand, extended. I gripped it. “Tell Ruth and Roger,” I said, “I love them.” He dropped my hand quickly. “They’ll be waiting for me now,” he said. “Look,” I said, not knowing why I said it, “one of these days, very soon, I hope, I’ll be going home. I could go to your town.” “No,” he said softly, sounding very much defeated but brace. “Thanks a lot. But, you see, nobody would remember me now.” The he started the car, and as it moved away, he waved his hand. “Goodbye,” I said, waving back into the darkness. And suddenly the night was cold like winter straying early in these northern woodlands. I hurried inside. There was a train the next morning that left for Muncie, Indiana, at a quarter after eight.

2. Immigration Blues June 1977.Scent of Apples. Issue “New Letters” p. 3 -20. University of Washington Press. Through the window curtain, Alipio saw two women, one seemed twice as large as the other. In their summer dresses, they looked like a country girls he knew back home in the Philippines,

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES who went around peddling rice cakes. The slim one could have passed for his late wife Seniang’s sister whom he remembered only in the pictures because she never made it to the United States. Before seniang’s death, the couple had arranged papers to facilitate the approval of her visa. The sister was always “almost ready, all the papers have been signed,” but she never showed up. His wife had been ailing and when she died, he thought that hearing on her death would hasten her coming but the wire he had neither was returned nor acknowledge. The knocking on the door was gentle. A little hard of hearing, Alipio was not sure it was indeed a knocking on the door, but it souanother nded different from the little noises that sometimes hummed in his ears in the daytime. It was not yet noon, but it must be warm outside in all that sunshine, otherwise those two women would be wearing spring dresses all the least. There were summer days in San Francisco that were cold like winter in the Midwest. He limped painfully to the door. Until last month, he wore crutches. The entire year before that, he was bed-ridden, but he had to force himself to walk about in the house after coming from the hospital. After Seniang’s death, everything had gone to pieces. It was one bust after another, he complained to her few friends who came to visit him. “Seniang was my good luck. When God decided to take her, I had nothing but bad luck,” he said. Not long after Seniang’s death, he was in the car accident, for almost a year he was in the hospital. The doctors were not sure he was going to walk again. He told them it was God’s wish. As it was he was thankful he was still alive. It had been a horrible accident. The case dragged on in court. His lawyer didn’t seem too good about car accidents. He was an expert immigration lawyer, but he was a friend. As it turned out, Alipio lost the full privileges and benefits coming to him in another two years if he had not been hospitalized and had continued working until his official retirement. However, he was well provided. He didn’t spend a cent for doctor and medicine and hospitals bills. Now there was a prospect of a few thousand dollars compensation. After deducting his lawyer’s fees it would be something to live on. He had social security benefits and a partial retirement pension. Not too bad, really. Besides, now he could walk a little although he still limped and had to move about with extreme care. When he opened the door, the fat woman said, “Mr. Palma Alipio Palma?” her intonation sounded like the beginning of a familiar song. “Yes,” he said. “come in come on in.” he had not rung all that time, not even a wrong number, and there was nobody he wanted to talk to. The little noises in his ears had somehow kept him company. Radio and television sounds lulled him to sleep. The thin one was completely out of sight as she stood behind the big one who was doing the talking. “I’m sorry, I should have phoned you first, but we were in a hurry.” “the houses is a mess,” Alipio said truthfully. Had he been imagining things? He remembered seeing two women on the porch. There was another one, who looked like Seniang’s sister. The woman said ‘we,’ and just the the other one materialized, close behind the big one, who walked in with the assurance of a social worker, about to do him a favor. “Sit down. Sit down. Anywhere,” Alipio said as he led the two women through the dining room, past a huge rectangular table in the center. It was bare except for a vase of plastic flowers as centerpiece. He passed his hand over his face, a mannerism which Seniang hated. Like you have a hang-over, she chided him, and you can’t see straight. A TV set stood close to wall in the small living room crowded with an assortment of chairs and tables. An aquarium crowded the mantelpiece of a fake fireplace. A lighted bulb inside the tank showed many colored fish swimming about in a haze of fish stood. Some of it lay in scattered on the edge of the shelf. The carpet underneath was sodden black. Old magazines and tabloids lay just about everywhere.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES “Sorry to bother you like this,” the fat one said as she plunked herself down on the nearest chair, which sagged to the floor under her weight. The thin one choose the end of the sofa away from the TV set. “I was just preparing my lunch. I know it’s quite early, but I had nothing to do,” Alipio said, pushing down with both hands the seat of the cushioned chair near a movable partition, which separated the living room from the dining room. “It’s painful just trying to sit down. I’m not too well yet,” he added as he finally made it. “I hope we’re not really bothering you,” the fat one said. The other had not said a word. She looked pale and sick. Maybe she was hungry or cold. “How’s it outside?” Alipio asked. “I’ve not been out all day.” Whenever he felt like it, he dragged a chair to the porch and sat there, watching the construction going on across the street and smiling at the people passing by who happened to look his way. Some smiled back and mumbled something like a greeting or a comment on the beauty of the day. He stayed on until he got bored or it became colder than he could stand. “It’s fine. It’s fine outside. Just like Baguio,” the fat one said. “You know Baguio? I was born near there.” “We’re sisters” Alipio was thinking, wont the other one speak at all? “I’m Mrs. Antonieta Zafra, the wife of carlito. I believe you know him. He says you’re friends. In Salinas back in the thirties. He used to be a cook at the Marina.” “Carlito, yes, yes Carlito Zafra. We bummed together. We come from ilocos. Where you from? “Not much. Carlito and I talk in English. Except when he’s real mad, like when his cock don’t fight or when he lose, then he speaks Ilocano. Cuss words. I’ve learned them myself. Some, anyway” “Yes. Carlito. He love cockfighting. How’s he?” “Retired like you. We’re now in Fresno. On a farm. He raises chickens and hogs. I do some sewing in town when I can. My sister here is Monica. She’s older than me. Never been married.” Monica smiled at the old man, her face in anguish, as if near to tears. “Carlito. He got some fightin cocks, I bet.” “Not anymore. But he talks a lot about cockfighting. But nobody, not even the pinoys and the Chicanos are interested in it.” Mrs. Zafra appeared pleased at the state of things on her home front. “I remember. Carlito once promoted a cockfight . Everything was ready, but the roosters won’t fight. Poor man, he did everything to make them fight like having them peck on each other’s neck s and so forth. They were so tame, so friendly with each other. Only thing they didn’t do is embrace.” Alipio laughed, showing a set of perfectly white and even teeth, obviously dentures. “He hasn’t told me about that, I’ll remind him.” “Do that. Where’s he? Why isn’t he with you?” “We didn’t know we’d find you. While visiting some friends this morning, we learned you live here.” Mrs. Zafra was beaming on him. “I’ve always lived here, but oi got few friends now. So you’re Mrs. Carlito. I thought he’s dead already. I never hear from him. We’re old now. We’re old already when we got our citizenship papers right after Japanese surrender. So you and him. Good for Carlito.” “After Seniang died, she was not yet sixty, but she had this heart trouble. I took care of her.” Alipio seemed to have forgotten his visitors. He sat there staring at the fish in the aquarium, his ears perked as though waiting for some sound, like the breaking of the surf not far, or the TV

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES set suddenly turned on. The sisters looked at each other, Monica was fidgeting, her eyes seemed to say, let’s go, let’s get out of there. “Did you hear that?” the old man said. Monica turned to sister, her eyes wild panic. Mrs. Zafra leaned forward, her hand touching the edge of the chair where Alipio sat, and asked gently, “Hear what?” “The waves. Listen. They’re just outside you know. The breakers have a nice sound like at home in the Philippines. We lived in a coastal town. Like here, I always tell Seniang, across that ocean is the Philippines, we’re not far from home.” “But you’re alone now. It’s not good to be alone,” Mrs. Zafra said. “At night I hear better. I can see the Pacific Ocean from my bedroom. It sends me to sleep. I sleep soundly like I got no debts. I can sleep all day, too, but that’s bad. So I walk. I walk much before. I go out there. I let the breakers touch me. It’s nine the touch. Seniang always scold me, she says I’ll be catching cold, but I don’t catch cold, she catch the cold all the time.” “You must miss her,” Mrs. Zafra said. Monica was staring at her hands on her lap while the sister talked. Monica’s skin was transparent and the veins showed on the back of her hands like trapped eels. “I take care of Seniang. I work all day and leave her here alone. When I come home, she’s smiling. She’s wearing my jacket and slippers. You look funny, I says, why do you wear my things, you’re lost inside them. She chuckles, you keep me warm all day, she says like you’re here, I smell you. Oh, that Seniang. You see, we have no baby. If we have a baby . . . “ “I think you and Carlito have the same fate. We have no baby also.” “God dictates” Alipio said, making an effort to stand. In a miraculous surge of power, Monica rushed to him and helped him up. She seemed astonished and embarrassed at what she had done. “Thank you,” said Alipio. “I have crutches, but I don’t want no crutches. They tickle me, they hurt me, too.” He watched Monica go back to her seat. “You need help better than crutches,” Mrs. Zafra said. “God helps,” Alipio said, walking towards the kitchen as if expecting to find the Almighty there. Mrs. Zafra followed him. “What are you preparing?” she asked. “Let’s have lunch,” he said. “I’m hungry. I hope you are also.” “We’ll help you,” Mrs. Zafra said, turning back to where Monica sat staring at her hands again and listening perhaps for the sound of the sea. She had not noticed nor heard her sister when she called, “Monica!” The second time she heard her. Monica stood up and went to the kitchen. “There’s nothing to prepare,” Alipio was saying, as he opened the refrigerator. “What you want to eat? Me, I don’t eat bread so I got no bread. I eat rice. I was just opening a can of sardines when you come. I like sardines with lotsa tomato sauce, it’s great with hot rice.” “Don’t you cook the sardines?” Mrs. Zafra asked. “Monica will cook it for you if you want.” “No! if you cook sardines, it tastes bad. Better uncooked. Besides, it gets cook on tip of the hot rice. Mix with onions, chopped nice. Raw not cooked. You like it?” “Monica loves raw onions, don’t you, Sis?” “Yes,” Monica said in a low voice. “Your sister, she is well?” Alipio said, glancing towards Monica. Mrs. Zafra gave her sister an angry look. “I’m okay,” Monica said, a bit louder this time. “She’s not sick,” Mrs. Zafra said, “But she’s shy. Her own shadow frightens her. I tell you, this sister of mine, she got problms.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES “Oh?” Alipio exclaimed. He had been listening quite attentively. “I eat onions, raw,” Monica said. “Sardines, too, I like uncooked.” Her sister smiled. “What do you say, I run out for some groceries,” she said, going back to the living room to get her bag. “Thanks. But no need for you to do that. I got lotsa food canned food: corn beef, pork and beans, Vienna sausage, tuna crab meat, shrimp, chow mein, imitation noodles, and of course, sardines in green and yellow labels. “The yellow ones with mustard sauce, not tomato,” he explained. “All I need is a cup of coffee,” Mrs. Zafra said, throwing her handbag back on the chair in the living room. Alipio opened two drawers near the refrigerator. “Look he said as Mrs. Zafra came back running back to the kitchen. “I got more food to last me . . . . a long time.” The sister gaped at the bags of rice, macaroni, spaghetti sticks, sugar, dried shrimps wrapped in cellophane, bottles of soy sauce and fish sauce, vinegar, ketchup instant coffee, and more cans of sardines. The sight of all that foodstuff seemed to have enlivened the old man. After all, food meant life, continuing sustenance, source of energy and health. “Now look here.” He said, turning briskly now to the refrigerator, which he opened, the sudden light touching his face with a glow that erased years from his eyes. With a jerk he pulled open the large freezer, cramped full of meats. ”Mostly lamb chops,” he said, adding “I like lamb chops.” “Carlito, he hates lamb chops,” Mrs. Zafra said. “I like lamb chops,” Monica said, still wild eyed, but now a bit of color tinted her cheeks. “Why do you have so much food?” she asked. Alipio looked at her before answering. He thought she looked younger than Mrs. Zafra. “You see,” he said, closing the refrigerator. He was beginning to chill. “I watch the papers for brgain sales. I can still drive the car when I feed right. It’s only now my legs bothering me. So I buy all I can. Save me man trips. Money, too.” Later they sat around the enormous table in the table dining room. Monica shared half a plate of boiling rice topped with sardine with Alipio. He showed her how to place the sardines on top, pressing it a little and pouring spoonfuls of tomato juice over it. Mrs. Zafra had coffee and settled for a small can of Vienna sausage and a little rice. She sipped her coffee meditatively. “This is a good coffee,” she said. “I remember how we used to hoard Hills Bros. coffee at . . . at the convent. The sisters were quite selfish about it. “Antonieta was a nun, a sister of mercy,” Monica said. “What?” Alipio exclaimed, pointing a finger at her for no apparent reason, an involuntary gesture of surprise. “Yes, I was,” Mrs. Zafra admitted. “When I married, I had been out of the order for more than a year, yes, in California at St. Mary’s.” “You didn’t . . . “ Alipio began. “Of course not,” she interrupted him. “If you mean did I leave the order to marry Carlito. Oh no, He was already an old man when I met him.’ “I see. We used to joke him because he didn’t like the girls too much, he reared his head up as he laughed, covering his mouth hastily, but too late. Some of the tomato soaked grains had already spilled out on his plate and on the table in front of him. Monica looked pleased as she gathered carefully some of the grains on the table. “He hasn’t changed,” Mrs. Zafra said vaguely. “It was me who wanted to marry him. “You? After being a nun, you wanted to marry. . . Carlito? But why Carlito?” Alipio seemed to have forgotten for the moment that he was still eating. The steam from the rice touched his face

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES till it glistened darkly. He was staring at Mrs. Zafra as he breathed in the aroma without savoring it. “It’s a long story,” Mrs. Zafra said. She stabbed a chunky sausage and brought it to her mouth. She looked pensive as she chewed on it. “When did this happen?” “Five, six years ago. Six years ago, almost.” “That long?” “She had to marry him,” Monica said blandly. “What?” Alipio shouted, visibly disturbed. There was the sound of dentures granting in his mouth. He passed a hand over his face. “Carlito done that to you?” The coffee spilled a little as Mrs. Zafra put the cup down.” “Why no,” she said. “What are you thinking of?” Before he could answer, Monica spoke in the same tone of voice, low, unexcited, saying, “He thinks Carlito got you pregnant, that’s what.” “Carlito? ”She turned to Monica in disbelief. “Why, Alipio knows Carlito,” She said. Monica shrugged her shoulder. “Why don’t you tell him why?” she suggested. “As I said, It’s a long story, but I shall make it short,” Mrs. Zafra began. She took a sip from her cup and continued, “After leaving the order, I couldn’t find a job. I was interested in social work, but I didn’t know anybody who could help me.” As she paused, Alipio said, “What the heck does Carlito know about social work?” “Let me continue,” Mrs. Zafra said. She still had a little money, from home, and she was not too worried about being jobless. But there was the question of her status as an alien. Once out of the community, she was no longer entitled to stay in the United States, let alone secure employment. The immigration office began to hound her, as it did other Filipinos in similar predicaments. They were a pitiful lot. Some hid in the apartments of friends like criminals running away from the law. Of course, they were law breakers. Those with transportation money returned home, which they hated to do. At home they would force to invent stories, tell lies to explain away why they returned so soon. All their lives they had to learn how to cope with the stigma of failure in a foreign land. They were losers and no longer fit for anything useful. The more sensitive and weak lost their minds and had to be committed to insane asylums. Others became neurotic, antisocial, depressed in mind and spirit. Some turned to crime. Or just folded up, in a manner of speaking. It was a nightmare. Antonieta didn’t want to go back to the Philippines under those circumstances. She would have had to be very convincing to prove that she was not thrown out of the order for immoral reasons. Just when she seemed to have reached the breaking point, she recalled incidents in which women in her situation married American citizens and automatically, became entitled to permanent residency with an option to become U.S citizens after five years. At first she thought of the idea of such marriage was hideous unspeakable. Perhaps other foreign women in similar situations could do it- and have done it-but not Philippine girls. But what was so special about Philippine girls? Nothing really but their upbringing was such that to place themselves in a situation where they had to tell a man that all they wanted was a marriage for convenience, was degrading, an unbearable shame. A form of self-destruction. Mortal sin. Better repatriation. A thousand times better. When an immigration officer finally caught up with her, he proved to be very understanding and quite a gentleman. Yet he was firm. He was young, maybe of Italian descent, and looked like a salesman for a well-known company in the islands that dealt in farm equipment.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES “I’m giving you one week,” he said. “You have already overstayed by several months. If in one week’s time, you haven’t left yet. You might have to wait in jail for deportation proceedings.” She cried, oh, how she cried. She wished she had not let the order, no, not really. She had no regrets leaving up to this point. Life in the convent turned sour on her. She despised the sisters and the system, which she found, tyrannical, inhuman. In her way, she had a long series of talks with God and God had approved of the step she had taken. She was not going back to the order. Anyhow even if she did, she wouldn’t be taken back. To jail then? But why not marry an American citizen? In one week’s time? How? Accost the first likely man and say, “You look like an American citizen. If you are, indeed, and you have the necessary paper to prove it, will you marry me? I want to remain in this country. All week she talked to God. It was the same God she had worshipped and feared all her life. Now they were palsy walsy, on the best of terms. And she brooded over his misfortune, he brooded with her, sympathized with her, and finally advised her to go look for an elderly Filipino who was an American citizen, and tell the truth of the matter. Tell him that if he wished, it could be a marriage in name only. For his trouble, she would be willing to pay on the installment plan? If he wished . . . otherwise . . . Meanwhile he would look the other way. How she found Carlito Zafra was another story, more confused and confusing. It was like a miracle, though. Her friend God could not have sent her to a better instrument to satisfy her need. That was ot expressed well, but I amounted to that, a need. Carlito was an instrument necessary for her good. And, as it turns out, a not too unwilling instrument. “We were married the day before the week was over,” Mrs. Zafra said. “And I’ve been in this country ever since. And no regrets.” They lived well and simply, a country life. True, they were childless, but both of them were helping relatives in the Philippines, sending them money and goods marked made in U.S.A “Lately, however, some of the goods we’ve been sending do not arrive intact. Do you know that some of the good quality materials we send never reach our relatives? It’s frustrating.” “We got lotsa thieves between here and there,” Alipio said, but his mind seemed to be on something else. “And I was able to send for Monica. From the snapshots she sent ud seened to be getting thinner and more sickly, teaching in the barrio. And she wanted so much here.” “Seniang was like you also, hiding from immigration, thank God for her,” Alipio told Mrs. Zafra in such a low voice he could hardly be heard. The sisters pretended they didn’t know, but they knew practically everything about him. Alipio appeared tired perceive and eager to talk so they listened. “She went to my apartment and said, without any hesitation, marry me and I’ll take care of you. She was thin then I thought what she had said was funny, the others had been matching us, you know, but i was not really interested. I believe marriage means children. And if you cannot produce children, why get married? Besides, I had ugly experience moments. When I first arrived in the States, here in Frisco was young and there were lotsa blondies hanging around of Kearny Street. It was easy. But I wanted a family and they didn’t. None of ‘em. So what the heck, I said.” Alipio realized that seniang was not joking. She had to get married to an American citizen otherwise she would be deported. At the time, Alipio was beginning to feel the disadvantages of living alone. There was too much time in his hand. How he hated himself for some of the things he did. He believed that if he was married, he would be more sensible with his time and money. He would be happier and live long. So when Seniang showed that she was serious, he agreed to marry her. It was not to be in name only. He wanted the woman. He liked her so much he would have proposed hiself had he suspected that he had a chance. She was

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES hard working, decent, and in those days, rather slim. “Like Monica,” he said. “Oh, I’m thin,” Monica protested, blushing deeply, “I’m bones.” “Monica is my only sister. We have no brother,” Mrs. Zafra said, adding more items to her sister’s vita. “Look,” Monica said, “I finished everything on my plate. I’ve never tasted sardines this good. Especially the way you eat them. I’m afraid I’ve eaten up your lunch. This is my first full meal. And I thought I’ve lost my appetite already.” The words came out in rush. It seemed she didn’t want to stop and she paused only because she didn’t know what else to say. She moved about, gaily and at ease, perfectly at home. Alipio watched her with a bemused look in his face as she gathered the dishes and brought them to the kitchen sink. When Alipio heard the water running, he stood up, without much effort this time, and walked to her saying, “Don’t bother. I got all the time to do that. You got to leave me something to do. Come, perhaps your sister wants another cup of coffee.” Mrs. Zafra had not moved from her seat. She was watching the two argue about the dishes. When she heard Alipo mention coffee, she said, “No, no more, thanks. I.ve drunk enough to keep me awake all week.” “Well, I’m going to wash them myself later,” Monica was saying as she walked back to the table, Alipio close behind her. “You’re an excellent host, Alipio.” Mrs. Zafra spoke in tone like a reading from a citation on a certificate of merit or something.” And to two complete strangers at that. You’re a good man.” “But you’re not strangers Carlito is my friend. We were young together in this country. And it’s something, you know. There are lotsa guys like us here. Old-timers, o.t.’s , they call us. Permanent residents. U.S. citizens. We all gonna be buried here.” He appeared to be thinking deeply as he added, “But what’s wrong with that?” the sisters ignored the question. The old man was talking to himself. “What’s wrong is to be dishonest. Earn a living with both hands, not afraid of any kind of work, that’s the best good. No other way. Yes, everything for convenience, why not? That’s frankly honest. No pretend. Love comes in the afterwards. When it comes. If it cmes.” Mrs. Zafra chuckled, saying, “Ah, you’re a romantic, Alipio. I must ask Carlito about you. You seem to know so much about him. I bet you were quite a . . .” she paused because what she wanted to say was “rooster,” but she might give the impression of over-familiarity. Alipio interrupted her, saying “Ask him, he will say yes. I’m a romantic.” His voice held a vibrance that was surprised and a revelation to the visitors. He gestured as he talked puckering his mouth every now and then, obviously to keep his denture from slipping out. “What do you think? We we’re young, why not? We vowed ‘em with our gallantly, with our cooking. Boy those dames never seen anything like us. Also, we were fools, most of us, anyway. Fools on fire.” Mrs. Zafra clapped her hands. Monica was smiling. “Ah, but the fire’s gone. Only the fool’s left now,” Alipio said, weakly. HI voice was low and he looked tired as he passed both hands across his face. Then he raised his head. The listening look came back to his face. When he spoke, his voice shook a little. “Many times I wonder where are the others. Where are you. Speak to me. And I think they’re wondering the same, asking the same, so I say, I’m here, your friend, Alipio Palma my is broken, the wife she’s dead, but I’m okay. Are you okay also? The dead they can hear even if they don’t answer. The alive don’t answer. But I know. I feel. Some okay, some not. They old now, all of us who were very young. All over the United states of America. All over the world. . .” Abruptly, he turned to Mrs. Zafra, saying, “So. You are Carlito. But CArlito, he never had fire.”

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES “How true, how very very true,” Mrs. Zafra laughed. I would burn him. Can,t stand it. Not Carlito. But he’s a good man, I can tell you that.” “No question. Dabest,” Alipio conceded. Monica remained silent, but her eyes followed every move Alipio made, straying no further than the reach of his arms he gestured to help make clear the intensity of his feeling. “I’m sure you still got some of that fire,” Mrs. Zafra said. Monica gasped, but she recovered quickly. Again, a rushing words came from her lips as if they had been there all the time waiting for what her sister had said that touched off the rent of words. Her eyes shone as in a fever as she talked. “I don’t know Carlito very well. I’ve not been with the very long, but from what you say, from the way you talk, from what I see, the two of you are very different.” “Oh, maybe not,” Alipio said, trying to protest, but Monica went on. “You have strength, Mr. Palma. Strength of character. Strength in your belief in God. I admire that in a man, in a human being. Look at you. Alone. This huge table. Don’t you find it too big sometimes?” Monica paused perhaps to allow her meaning to sink into Alipio’s consciousness, as she fixed her eyes on him. “No. Not really. I don’t eat at this table. I eat in the kitchen,” Alipio said. Mrs. Zafra was going to say something, but she held back. Monica was talking again. “But it must be hard, that you cannot deny. Living from day to day. Alone. On what? Memories? Cabinets and the refrigerator full of food? I repeat, I admire you, sir. You’ve found your place. You’re home safe. And at peace.” She paused again this time to sweep back the strand of hair that had fallen on her brow. Alipio had a drugged look. He seemed to have lost the drift of her speech. What was she talking about? Groceries? Baseball? He was going to say, you like baseball also? You like tuna? I have all kinds of fish. Get them at bargain price. But, obviously, it was not the proper thing to say. “Well, I guess, one gets used to anything, even loneliness,” Monica said in a listless, dispirited tone, all the fever in her voice gone. “God dictates,” Alipio said, feeling he had found his way again and he was now on the right track. What a girl. If she had only a little more fish. And color. Monica leaned back on her chair, exhausted. Mrs. Zafra was staring at her in disbelief, in grievous disappointment. Her eyes seemed to say, what happened, you were going great, what suddenly hit you that you had stop, give up, and defeated? Monica shook her head in a gesture that quite clearly said, no, I can’t do it. I can’t anymore, I give up. Their eyes kept up a show, a deaf-mute dialogue. Mrs. Zafra: Just when everything was going on fine, you quit. We’ve reached this far and you quit. I could have done it my way, directly, honestly. Not that what you were doing was dishonest, you were great, and now look at the dumb expression in your eyes. Monica: I can’t. I can’t anymore. But I tried. It’s too much. “How long have you been in the States?” Alipio asked Monica “For almost a year now!” Mrs. Zafra screamed and Alipio was visibly sheken, but she didn’t care. This was the right moment. She would take it from here whether Monica went along with her or not. She was going to do it her way. “How long exactly, let’s see. Moni, when did you get your last extension?” “Extension?” Alipio repeated the word. It had such a familiar ring like “visa” or “social security,” it broke into his consciousness like a touch from Seniang’s fingers. It was quite intimate. “You mean. . .” “That’s right. She’s here as a temporary visitor. As a matter of matter, she came on a tourist visa. Carlitro and I sponsored her coming, field all the necessary papers, and everything would have been fine, but she couldn’t wait. She had to come here as tourist. Now she’s in trouble. “What trouble?” Alipio asked.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES “She has to go back to the Philippines. She can’t stay here any longer.” “I have only two days left” Monica said, her head in her hands. “And I don’t want to go back.”| Alipio glanced at the wall clock. It was past three. They had been talking for hours. It was visas right from the start. Marriages. The long years and the o.t’s Now it was visas again. Were his ears playing a game? They might as well as they did sometimes, but his eyes surely were not. He could see this woman very plainly, sobbing on the table. Boy, she was in big trouble. Visas. Immigration. Boy, oh, boy! He knew all about that. His gleaming dentures showed a crooked smile. He turned to Mrs. Zafra. “Did you come here,” he began, but Mrs. Zafra interrupted him. “Yes, Alipio. Forgive us. As soon as we arrived, I wanted to tell you without much talk, I wanted to say, I must tell you why we’re you here. I’ve heard about you. Not only from Carlito, but from other Filipinos who know you, how you’re living here in San Francisco alone, a widower, an we heard of the accident, your stay in the hospital, when you were released, everything. Here’s my sister, a teacher in the Philippines, never married, worried to death because she’s being deported unless something turned up like she could marry a U.S. citizen, like I did, like your late wife Seniang, like many others have done, are doing in this exact moment, who can say? Now look at her, she’s good, religious, any arrangement you wish, she’d accept it. But I didn’t have a chance to say it. You welcomed us like old friends, relatives. Later every time I began to say something about why we came, she interrupted me. I was afraid she had changed her mind and then she began to talk, then stopped without finishing what she really wanted to say, that is, why we came to see you, and so forth.” “No, no!” Monica cried, raising her head, her eyes red from weeping, and her face damp with tears. “You’re such a good man. We couldn’t do this to you. We’re wrong. We started wrong. We should’ve been more honest, but I was ashamed. I was afraid. Let’s go! Let’s go!” “Where you going?” Alipio asked. “Anywhere,” Monica answered. “Forgive us. Forgive me, Mister. Alipio, please.” “What’s to forgive? Don’t go. We have dinner. But first, let’s have merienda. I take merienda. You do also, don’t you? And I don’t mean snacks like the Americans.” The sisters exchanged glances, their eyes chattering away. Alipio chuckled. He wanted to say, talk of lightning striking same fellow twice, but thought better of it. A bad thing to say. Seniang was not lightning. At times only. Mostly his fault. And this girl Monica. . . Moni? Nice name also. How can this one be lightning? Mrs. Zafra picked up her purse and before anyone could stop her, she was opening the door. “Where’s the nearest grocery store around here?” she asked, but she didn’t wait for an answer. “Come back, come back here, we got lotsa food,” Alipio called after her, but he might just as well have been calling the Pacific Ocean.

3. The Door 1955. A Collection of Stories, pp. 86-97. University of Washington Press.

Oh, the stories I can tell you, if you but have the time to listen, but you are going away. Everybody is going some place. They are all in a hurry, they will not listen to me. And those who will tarry here forever, they have no ears for my stories, because they have seen them happen everywhere, and they don’t want them told, they are a commonplace, they say, they should be hushed and forgotten. We have had happy moments which, truly, had not quite lasted

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES but there will be other such moments. So my friends will not listen, because my tales are sad, because they do not have the heart. But you will listen to me, Ben, even if you, too, are going away. Because I saw the look in your eyes as you turned around to gaze at Nanoy’s grave; and I knew that you too could have loved Nanoy and shared his loneliness, you could have suffered. So I walked beside you and held your hand, and deep in my heart I felt, Ben will understand my stories, to him I shall tell them. i In our apartment, there were four of us. I was happy with my friends, because everybody spoke my language, our language, I feel so happy using now with you. We spoke in English only when we cursed, it came in so nicely. Or when another countryman dropped in for a chat, and he kept talking in English, then the other boys talked, too. They talked very well, and all I would say was, “Yes” or “Hell, that’s a fact,” in an attempt to cover up my terrible ignorance which my rough trembling hands so often exposed. There were other boys and Filipino families in the apartment building. I knew Delfin because I often met him near the stair landing. His room was just across the way, at the foot of the staircase. Here he lived with Mildred, his blonde American wife and her two little daughters, Anne and Esther, by a previous marriage. I was very fond of the two little girls because they were so pretty and little and they had such curly golden hair. Soon they were calling me Uncle. Often I brought them candy bars and they would rush to meet me near the main door of the apartment building. I put my arms round their wet sticky necks and gave them what I had remembered to buy. Mildred would scold them sometimes, saying nasty things. She would come out of the door wearing a silk negligee and she would run after them in the hall as they squealed and cried and ran away from her. “You spoil their appetites,” Mildred would tell me, and I would answer in English, of course, “It don’t matter none, really,” I said. Delfin would sometimes be around watching the chase. All he would do was smile stupidly and look on. He never invited me to his apartment. Often I would stand near the open door and talk with the little girls. That was all. One day I heard the boys in our apartment talking about Delfin. I was surprised at the things they said about him. Dick, Noli, and Sev seldom agreed on many things, but they were one in their condemnation of Delfin. It wouldn’t have been for meanness. My friends were not angels, but they led such busy lives that they had no time to sprout wings or grow horns. It must be true then, the things they said. “You don’t know him yet, Ambo,” said Dick, “but wait till you do, and then you would be saying the same things that you hear us saying now.” Dick had finished law school, working days and studying at night. He was very gentle by nature, and wouldn’t be talking of another man this way if it was not a fact that Delfin was everything they said about him. “He’s a disgrace to our people,” said loud-mouthed Noli, for whom everything was country and politics. He had a shrill voice and wanted to be a Senator in the Philippines. He was intensely nationalistic. Everything a Filipino did in America was a reflection on our country and our people. “Delfin’s a damn fool,” was Sev’s private opinion. Sev drove a taxi. He was neat and effeminate in his ways. His taxi was adorned with pictures of the Lady of Lourdes, of all sizes. There were also pictures of MacArthur and the American and Filipino flags intertwined as if in lovingness. It seemed that it was common knowledge that Mildred ran around with other boys. She would take them to her apartment, and Delfin would leave quietly and walk the streets. If he was not home and came later, and he would find the door locked from the inside, he knew that he had come at the wrong time again. He would wait outside the apartment building, till a

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES strange man came out, and he would try the door again with his key. Often he slept elsewhere, especially on winter nights when walking up and down the streets or loafing in badly heated hamburger joints made him sick—a shooting pain through the meat of his legs or through the stoop of his back. He would knock at our door at the most unholy hours of the night and say, “May I sleep here tonight?” The boys would let him in the living room, show him the couch and throw him a blanket. Dick and Sev would pretend to be very sleepy, for they hated to see him that way, as though the thing where happening to them, too. But if Noli was awake, he would shout from his room, “Is that you again, Del? God, you’re not a man. You must have been castrated in childhood. Why don’t you leave that woman? Why do you make a goddamn fool of yourself? She’s beautiful. All right. Aren’t there others as willing, less shameless? Man, where’s your sense of honor? We’re ashamed of you! If you don’t listen to us, why come here at all? You insult us with your presence. You contaminate us with your . . . with your . . . filth!” Delfin would pull the blanket over him, as if to shut off the words a little and the light from the street lamp below. Then he would be quiet as though fast asleep. Once when Delfin came to our apartment, the boys told him stories of men who defended their honor. Sev said, “Have you heard of the Filipino in St. Louis who caught his wife sleeping with another man? He chased the man through the streets. The man was naked and held a pillow close to his breast as if that protected him. He was so scared. Then the Filipino went back to his wife and slashed her throat.” Sev made a slashing motion with his hands across his throat, then a choking sound. It was picturesque. It was gruesome. “And after he had slashed her throat,” Sev continued “he cut off her nipples. The he gave himself up, carrying the nipples in his hands, staining the sergeant’s blotter with blood. He’s now in an insane asylum.” Dick had the kindness of heart to change the subject. Meanwhile Delfin hadn’t said a word in his defense, but he clung to every word of the storyteller, and he swallowed a little near the end. Then when everybody was quiet, he said, “I don’t think I can kill Mildred. I don’t think I can live without her.” His sincerity touched us all. For the first time I saw Noli look at him without contempt, but with pity, with a little kindness. I was coming home late after midnight in October when I found Delfin sitting on the stone steps of our apartment building, his head against the stone pillar. “You frightened me,” I said as soon as I was sure that it was he. He was tall and very dark. His teeth sparkled whitely when he smiled. And he was smiling now. “Did you have a good time?” he asked, and without waiting for a reply, he added, “Sit down a while with me. It’s too warm inside.” “You’re not staying here all night, are you?” I asked sitting down on the cold stone steps. “Oh, no,” he said, looking in the direction of their apartment. “You got a visitor?” I tried with difficulty to make my question sound matter-of-fact. His answer was a slight nod of the head. “Man,” I said, “You’re crazy.” “I know,” he said softly. This would go on. I would be saying a lot of things that wouldn’t mean anything to him. So I asked after Anne and Esther. Were they all right? Of course, they were all right. What did the little ones know? God, why did they have to know? God, why did I stay, there, sitting down on the cold stone steps, sharing these crazy hours of waiting with a man like Delfin? A terrible anger was welling up inside me; all I wanted was try to understand. “Let’s go upstairs to our apartment,” I said. “It’s getting chilly out here.”

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES “No,” he said. “Noli’s just come up. He told me not to go to your apartment tonight or else he would throw me out.” “That would serve you right,” I said, clenching my fist, getting all of Noli’s anger in me. “Hell!” I cried impulsively, jumping to my feet. “Let’s go to your apartment. We’ll bust the door and take the . . . out of both of them.” “No,” said Delfin “you will wake up the little girls.” I stared at him for a while, spitting at the pavement at my feet. Then I sat down again and laughed softly. What had gotten into me? What business did I have straightening, so to say, the back-hanging collar of this cuckold of a man, countryman or no countryman? “Oh, well,” I said after a while, “I guess you know best.” “No,” he admitted. “I’m all wrong. I’m all sick inside of me, worse than leprosy.” “You know,” I said, “there are many nice girls at the Club.” “I know.” “Some of them a lot better looking than Mildred. And a million times nicer.” “How do you know?” “I don’t. But I know Mildred.” “I love Mildred.” “Love, my God! What do you know of love? It’s a curse; it’s a disease that has got into you.” “I know. I know. I told you it’s worse than leprosy. But sometimes I tell myself it’s love. We called it love in the beginning. We have moments of beauty together, Mildred and I, and I find this nowhere else. No other woman could give it to me. I cannot live without her, I tell you. I can’t. . . I can’t.” He held his head in his hands and he was quiet. I sat there, looking at him, and thinking: Lord, the things Filipinos do in this country. The things we say. The things that happen to us. What keeps us living on like this from day to day, from loveless kiss to loveless kiss, from venomed touch to venomed touch. Thrill of the gaming table, what keeps us alive, thrill of a woman, sight of her body, sharp fleeting moments of dying . . . they are the blessed ones like Nanoy, though it took him too long to die. Busy with these thoughts, I had not noticed a man leave the building. Now only his back was visible in the street light beyond. His steps were brisk and fast as though already late. “Was that the man?” I asked. “I don’t know,” Delfin answered. “I don’t know any one of them.” Then we stood up, and together we walked through the hallway, pausing in front of his apartment. The door was closed still. Delfin placed his hand upon it, and it opened quietly to his touch. “Goodnight,” he said, his teeth sparkling in a happy smile. I went up to my room, groping in the dark. Someone had turned off the stairway light again. Now I would have to fumble for the lock on our door, or maybe it would yield to my touch like magic. ii It was not often during these many years in America that I could look forward to a Christmas with honest joy. Christmas to me was just another day. It meant more people spending money, bigger tips, and the spoken words, “Merry Christmas.” It meant that there would be more boys at the club, more little men at the races. It means silly talks in corners, at lonely tables in Filipino restaurants: “Last night I dreamed I was back home in the Philippines and it was Christmas. Sister was a grown up lady. She was wearing an afternoon dress I had brought at Hecht’s. She was lovely, like my memory of Mother when I was a child. There was a whole platter full of rice cakes, suman wrapped in yellow leaves. The air was full of the smell

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES of roasting pigs. And many little children came to me and kissed my hand. In each of their palms I placed a new silver dollar—I had a bagful from Riggs National Bank—you should have seen the glitter of the silver under the lamplight, you should have seen the glitter in the children’s eyes.” Sometimes Christmas meant walking up and down the icy streets, looking for a restaurant, and finding none, for most of them are closed on Christmas Day. Because most people should be home on Christmas instead of walking up and down the streets, with icy winds blowing from the River, their steps swinging to the music of Christmas carols, sung everywhere, loudest in the crowded street above the din of hurried steps turned towards home; megaphones blaring forth joy to the world, the Lord is come. But, please Lord, let me find a place where I could eat. I’m so hungry. But I looked forward to that Christmas with honest joy. For the first time in many years, I had a Christmas gift for someone, for two little blonde girls who called me Uncle. Once I had fever and I kept to my room. Every time the boys came from work, the first thing they said, invariably, was, “Anne and Esther want to know how you are.” On the third day, the two little girls came to my room crying. “Mom would not let us see you,” they said, “But now she’s away. Get well quick, Uncle,” they pleaded. Anne put her little soft hands on my forehead. “Do you have a headache?” she asked. “A little,” I said, truthfully. She passed her fingers across my forehead, lightly, gently. Little Esther said, “I’ll rub your legs.” “Don’t,” I said, “that will tickle me.” And we three laughed. After a while, I said, “You’d better go now.” And they kissed me goodbye. When they had gone, I turned to the wall and closed my eyes. And one day, shortly before Christmas, the two little girls came up to me, crying. “Uncle, Uncle, we’ve a Christmas tree!” They opened the door of their apartment wide enough for us to see across the hall in corner: a pretty lighted Christmas tree. The next day I got busy asking friends what I could give for Christmas to two little girls. There were a number of suggestions. Different persons told me different things. I spent the next few days, walking through F Street, between 7th and 14th Streets, looking for an apt gift for each child. And I was happy within me. For the first time in many years, there was a glow in my heart, Christmas felt truly like Christmas, and the songs in the streets, and the carols in the air, and the little tinkling bell in the hand of the Salvation Army man or woman now freezing in the cold—all had meaning. As soon as I had their gifts packed nicely, one for Anne and the other for Esther, I attached a little print card decorated with holly on each, and wrote “Merry Christmas.” My hand didn’t seem heavy and my heart was light; there was no hesitancy, no sluggishness in the movement of my hand as I wrote on each, “Love, Uncle,” as though my hand for such things need not have to tremble, since there was nothing to hide, and something deep to say which I was just saying now, after these many years, love to you, to anyone, this time to two little girls with windblown curls and the prettiest freckled noses you ever saw. I gave the two little packages to Mildred. She stood by the open door wondering what it was that tugged at my heart, like the singing of many happy voices that have not had voice nor music for a long, long time. On Christmas Eve I went down after dinner and the little girls were there awaiting me. I stood by the open door while their hands held mine, pulling me into the room. “Where’s Del?” I asked.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES “He’s working tonight,” said Mildred. She stood in the hall, slim and attractive in a red housecoat. She was combing back her yellow curls. “I’ve just had a bath,” she said as though to apologize. She exuded soap and orange blossoms. “Merry Christmas,” I said as I allowed myself to be pulled in by the two very eager girls. “Nice Christmas tree,” I said. “The winkers don’t work,” said Mildred. She showed me a box of winkers that she said she had been trying to use. I fixed the socket and the wire ends, and turned on the juice, but they wouldn’t work. I sat on the rug and fixed the wiring. Then Esther went to the door and came back, saying “I’ve closed the door. Uncle is staying with us tonight.” Anne was also saying something else. Mildred had turned on the radio and there was loud singing. I heard Esther’s words, but I didn’t bother to weigh their meaning. Mildred watched me as I worked, and she, too, knelt playfully on the rug and pattered around the Christmas tree. The little girls were dancing about and singing. Soon I turned on the juice again and the winkers came on and went off in a glorious moment that seemed success, and the two little girls gave out a cry of happiness. It was shortlived, because the winkers didn’t come on any more, and I was beginning to get embarrassed about my inability to do anything about them. “We shouldn’t have put them on too early,” Mildred explained, and in a resigned voice, added. “They’re really no good though. The other light will do.” “But we like the winkers, Mom,” the girls cried. And they urged me to keep on trying. So I spent several minutes more, tinkering with the wire ends. I was getting hot around the neck, so I said, “Mind if I take this off?” and I removed my jacket, and the girls ran away with it to their room. “Be careful!” Mildred shouted after them. She turned to me and asked. “Isn’t there anything important in your pockets?” “No,” I said without looking up from my work. Well, by the time the winkers were good and working, it was nearly bedtime for the little ones. The whoop of delight with which they announced my success was not as loud nor as vociferous as their first, though protracted, yell of delight earlier in the night. Anne gave a Christmas poem about a silent house without noise, and without a mouse, but she kept yawning and forgetting the lines, we had to clap our hands before she was through. Then Esther sang “Silent Night” and Mildred and Anne joined her; and I kept humming, too, and it seemed, I had always known the melody without having been aware of it. “Now you’ll go to bed like good girls,” said Mildred, “And Santa Claus will fill your stockings with gifts.” “Yes, Mom,” they said sleepily as they pulled me to their bedroom. It was a pretty bedroom, done up in blue and red. There was a bed where they slept side by side. Over the wall that looked like a fireplace, they had hung two empty stockings. “That’s mine,” said Esther. “This is mine,” said Anne. Mildred pulled Esther to her and started dressing her for the night. “Help me,” said Anne, getting up on a chair. And I helped her, a little awkwardly at first. “Thank you,” said Anne, putting her arms around me impulsively, and nearly falling off the chair. Then she kissed me hard on the cheek, saying, “Goodnight, Uncle.” “Goodnight,” said Esther, pulling me down to her. And she kissed me on the cheek, less fervently, sleepily.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES “It’s beyond their sleeping time,” said Mildred, as she turned off the light and closed the door after us. “I have my jacket there,” I said. “It’s all right,” said Mildred. “What about a midnight snack?” I turned the radio low as Mildred got busy in the kitchen. “What would you have?” she asked. “Anything,” I said, going to the kitchen. “I’m not really hungry.” “The kitchen is a mess,” she apologized. Then she added, “Del should be here by now. It’s past midnight. I wonder what’s detaining him?” Mildred placed a couple of sandwiches before me and a bottle of cold milk. She sat at the other end of the table with a glass of milk. “Spending Chritsmas with the boys, I suppose?” she said. “Maybe,” I said, not really having any plans. “Did you know Del quite well before you came to America? He talks a great deal about you. It seems you people knew each other quite well.” “Yes,” I said lying deliberately. When we talked of boys we liked to our American friends, we always said we knew each other in the Philippines; and we talked about our families as though we had deep ties of association and kinship. Mostly it was just talk. Perhaps it gave us strength to talk like that. We didn’t wish to be known as the forgotten children of long lost mothers and fathers, as grown-up men without childhood, bastards of an indifferent country. “Yes,” I repeated, “We knew each other very well,” adding another deliberate lie. “His family was well known in our province. His father was tall and dark like him, and deeply loved by all. Del’s father was noble.” “And his mother?” Mildred asked. “He talked of her more often.” “She was a sweet lady. She was loving and religious. She was faithful.” “Do you want another glass of milk?” Mildred asked. “No, thanks,” I said, “I’d better be going. Must be past midnight now.” “I’ll get your jacket,” she said. When she came out of the girls’ bedroom, she had the jacket in her hands. “Let me help you,” she said. “No, thanks,” I said, taking the jacket gently from her hand, and folding it. “I’m just going up like this.” “Well, it’s Christmas Day,” Mildred said, giving me her hand, “Merry Christmas, Ambo.” “Thanks,” I said, “Merry Christmas also.” I let go off her hand quickly. Mine were trembling so. “Anne and Esther make me very happy,” I said. It was a great truth that I had to say. “They love you very much,” Mildred said, undoing the bar, “I never bolt this door except . . .” As the door opened, we saw Delfin sitting on the stairway, his head in his hands. Now he looked up at the sound of opening door, and when he saw me, he stared hard and long. Then he looked away and bit his lips. “How long have you been sitting here?” Mildred asked him. “Come on in.” Delfin had not moved. He was looking at me still with deep upbraiding eyes. “Merry Christmas, Del,” I said, trying to be casual. What else could I tell him, what could I say? Did I not sit up with him on a night in autumn, while the door to this apartment remained bolted from the inside? Now he had hidden his head in his hands, and when he looked at me again, his face was contorted as in pain. I wanted to give him my hand, but it lay heavy on my side, my trembling

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES fingers clawing at the folds of my woolen jacket. With great effort, he stood up in answer to Mildred’s now insistent bidding, and as he came to my side, a great sadness was on his face, no longer pain, and tears stood in his bloodshot eyes. In a vague whisper, he said, in the dialect, “Why you too, Ambo?” Then he went in, and the door closed upon them. Instead of going up to my room as I had intended, I put on my jacket and went outside. It was a cold night; an icy breeze was blowing. But I walked on and on. Then the bells of St. Mary’s on Fourth Street began pealing loudly, but the spirit of Christmas had already gone out of me, all the songs, all the music, all the singing gladness within me, all memory of ringing bells.

Carlos Bulosan 4. The Faith of My Mother Originally published in FOLIO (formerlyLiving Poetry), Vol. IV, No. 1 Autumn 1946 (editors: Margaret Dierkes & Henry Dierkes). Retrieved from http://www.oovrag.com/stories/stories2008b3.shtml My sister Marcela was sick for a long time with a mysterious disease. She went to bed on her sixth birthday and stayed flat on her back for three years. She just looked straight into the low ceiling and tears rolled down her face. She never made any noise during the day, but at night we could hear her sobbing bitterly. There was nothing we could do for her, so we turned away and tried to sleep. Mother was always working in the fields and doing some chores in the house. Sometimes Marcela would ask Mother to sit by her side. Mother would rest only for a few hours, because when the dawn came, she was up again, cooking for my sister and preparing to go to work. But one day when she came home from the public market she found my sister walking in the yard as if she had never been sick. Mother put her load on the ground and ran up to my sister and grabbed her with great tenderness. Then she knelt on the ground and started to cry. The neighbors came to the fence and hung on it with solemnity, for they had shared the agony of my sister's illness. Mother carried Marcela in her arms and rushed up the house. She ran from the living room to the kitchen, and back again, looking for something she could not find. Finally she saw me sitting on the windowsill and caressing Uncle Sergio's new fighting cock. "Where is our santo, son?" she said (Santos are wooden figures of the saint and the Holy Trinity carved by journeyman artists for the village houses.) We had a santo, a wooden figure of Jesus on the Cross, but it had disappeared when my brother Silvestre came home for a visit from Manila. I said, hoping father did not sell it: "I didn't see it for a long time, Mother." "Go to your uncle and borrow his santo," Mother said. "Yes, Mother," I said, jumping off the windowsill. I ran down the ladder with the cock in my hands. My uncle was not home. I took the santo from the niche in the wall and carried it with the gamecock to our house. The rooster had dirtied the face of St. Peter with its wastes, so Mother took it from me and went to the kitchen. She filled a small wooden tub with water and washed the santo with soap. Father suddenly came up the house feeling ungracious and mad. "You sure take good care of that piece of wood while your husband walks in the street like a stinking pig," he said. "Why do you say such an unholy thing?" Mother said. She wiped the santo with her skirt and went to the living room. She put the figure in the niche and lighted a candle.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES My sister Marcela knelt on the floor beside Mother, and they started to pray. When Father saw that my sister could walk, he looked at me with cruel eyes. He looked as if it was my fault that I did not tell him why Mother had to clean the santo. His face changed suddenly and inevitably, because he was also a religious man in his own way. Maybe he was not as religious as Mother, but he felt grateful that my sister was well again. Father knelt beside Mother and my sister, bowing his head low in sincere devotion and even clapping his hand restfully under his wine-stained chin. There was nothing I could do, so I knelt beside him with the gamecock in my arms. He looked sideways at the cock, but Mother was already chanting the litany. I tried to concentrate on the holy beard of St. Peter, but the rooster kept cackling and pecking at the floor. Perhaps the cock was also praying because when the ceremony was over, it wiggled out of my arms and stood on the floor for quite some time staring at the beard of St. Peter. Mother looked at Father with great admiration and respect. She looked at me and the gamecock, but there was doubt in her face. My sister got up and kissed Mother's hands; then she kissed Father's hands and went to the kitchen. Father and Mother got up and walked about the house with great holiness. I climbed down the ladder and walked in the bright afternoon sun. For quite some time there was great holiness in our house. The rains came and the farmers started planting rice. Then the dry season came and the women and children went to the fields and harvested the rice. The men hauled the rice bundles in small carts and stacked them in their granaries. Then the hot days came and the women spread their bundles in the sun to be dried, so that it would be easy to separate the husks from the grains with wooden pestles. The men sat under the coconut trees and drank wine from big earthen jars and talked about their women and children. Toward the beginning of November, before the Christmas holidays occupied the minds of the townspeople, peddlers from all over the island of Luzon started coming to our Province. From Pampanga, a province to the south of Pangasinan, our province, came cloth peddlers with long broad canes, and walked in our street for many days. From the province of Ilocos Norte, in the northern part of the island came illiterate peddlers selling prayer books and paper bound vernacular novels. And from Abra, another province in the north, came men who sold plow handles, bolos, knives and other metal implements that were necessary to the peasants in our province. Then in the middle of December, when we were preparing for the holidays, the santo peddlers with their wooden figures hanging on both ends of long poles that they carried on their shoulders came to our town shouting their wares. The women untied their handkerchiefs and counted their year's savings. When the first santo peddler came to our street, Mother grabbed her money and met him eagerly. The peddler bent his knees and let the pole slide off his shoulders. The wooden figures stood on the ground. Mother picked up a small figure of St. Lourdes. "How much?" she asked. "Five pesos," the peddler said. "It was only a peso ten years ago," Mother said. "Lady, that was ten years ago," the peddler said. "That was in my father's time. In my grandfather's time, if you want to know, it was only ten centavos. And you could get it for nothing sometimes because people were not hungry for money. The artists were interested only in their art, but the worshippers were interested in the divinity of the santo. From my grandfather's time to my time, however, many years of intensive study in woodcarving have elapsed. Now you tell me that five pesos is too much for this beautifully hand-carved figure of St. Lourdes, the patron saint of your province."

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES "You should have been a politician, uncle," I said. "You talk pompously and also beautifully." "Do you think so, son? The peddler said. "Maybe you should have been a town crier or poet or something like that," I said. "Yes, I believe what you said, son," he said. "We are born with a very special gift for humanity, but nobody seems to care when you are not a politician. I took to carving wooden figures because I can say anything I want to these mute things. When I am alone in my shack in San Vicente-that is my town-I put my figures around the wall and talk to them. St. Judas-are you surprised?-is the best listener because he has a guilty conscience." "They talk to you, too?" I asked. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you that they do," he said. Suddenly he looked at Mother and said, "Lady, St. Agustin, the figure in your left hand, is six pesos. And that one in your right, St. Joseph, is ten pesos." "You sure know your coconuts," I said. "I like selling better than carving, although I am a great artist," the peddler said. "I am not a quiet man, but I was forced to silence by my work. Woodcarving needs deep concentration of mind and body. Now I like shouting aloud to the world, because I feel as though I were the herald of kingdom come." "You should have been a preacher," I said. "I like your voice very much." "Do you think I am honest enough to be a preacher, son? " he asked. "I don't care if you are honest with the santos or not," I said. "But I think you've a holy voice." "Is there money in it?" he said. "Yes, there is money in it," I said. "But there is more money in gambling." The peddler grabbed me with affection. When the women in the neighborhood started coming, he pushed me in the corner of the gate. I knew that he wanted me to stay there and wait for him. I knew that he wanted to talk to me about gambling. It was then that Father started coming down the road toward our house. He stopped behind the women who were bargaining with the peddler over the prices of the wooden figures. At first he seemed bored and disinterested, but he pushed his way closer when he saw Mother holding the figure of the Holy Trinity. "How much?" Mother asked, rubbing the nose of the Virgin Mary." "Twenty pesos," the peddler said. Mother trembled a little. "That is too much money," she said. "Besides, I have only a very little faith." "Do you think twenty pesos is too much for the Mother and Father of God-and the great Child Jesus Himself?" he shouted, gesticulating wildly with his hands. "I have only four pesos." Mother said. "Lady, how long did you earn that money?" the peddler said. "One whole year," Mother said. "Well, you can have St. Lucas," the peddler said. "He is worth four pesos." "I don't remember him," Father said suddenly." "Is he a holy man?" "Well, kind of, " the peddler said. "Who is he, anyway?" Father asked. "Oh, he is a man in San Vicente," the peddler said. "You have a holy man in San Vicente, the town of santomakers?" Father asked suggestively. "Well, this man is a town character," the peddler said. "He is always doing some mischief here and there. I thought of making a santo while he is still alive, so that it will not be so hard for him when he goes."

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES "I like that sentiment very much," Father said. "I am a town character too. Do you think you can make me a santo before I go?" "It depends," the peddler said, evading the attentive ears of the women. Then he whispered something to Father. "It is a good racket," Father said. The peddler turned around and smiled at me. Then the women paid the peddler and went away rubbing their figures with their skirts. Mother was still undecided. "Lady, are you waiting for kingdom come?" the peddler said. "Three pesos for St. Mary," Mother said. "Ten pesos," the peddler said. "Three and a half," Mother said. "I need the fifty centavos for rice." "Lady, it is five and I will never go down," he said. "Maybe St. Mary likes to be sold for three and a half," Father suggested. The peddler pondered over it. "I think you are right," he said. "All right, three and a half." Mother paid the peddler and went to the house. When everybody was gone, Father saw me hiding in the corner of the fence. The peddler told me to come out and gave me a figure of Christ on the Cross. He was completely nude. "You like it, boy?" the peddler asked. "You don't need that santo, son," Father said, grabbing it away from me. "That is only for grown men. You still don't understand certain ways of the world." "Do you know this holiest of the unholy, boy? The peddler asked. "He is my youngest son," Father said. "You have a fortune in this boy," the peddler said, twinkling with delight. Then he grabbed me affectionately in his arms and said: "Now, tell me more about the gambling racket."

5. Sometimes It’s Not Funny Originally published by University of Washinton Press 1914-1976.Retreived from Bulosan: An Introduction with Selections 2004 pp. 53-58. Anvil Publishing.

That winter I was living with Bill and Leo in a little apartment house. There were two bedrooms and a kitchen downstairs. We took turns sleeping in the bedroom; but since I worked at night and came home late, I usually slept on the couch in the living room. It was a very pleasant arrangement, because when I came home early sometimes, Leo slept on the couch. Bill worked during the day, so he always had a room upstairs. The neighborhood was surrounded with small bars where jukeboxes played all night long. I would stop at one of the bars sometimes and drink a glass of beer. But one night when I was feeling a little low, I sat at a corner table in my favorite bar and drank several glasses of beer. I was giddy when I stumbled into the apartment. I lay on the couch without taking off my clothes and went to sleep almost immediately. When I woke up an hour later, I felt cold and hungry. I looked out the window and saw snowflakes falling, making soft little noises on the tall grass in the yard. I stood there in the darkness for a long time, listening to the lovely sound and contemplating the whiteness of the night.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Then I walked into the kitchen hoping to find something to eat. I found a few pieces of bread and a glass of milk in the frigidaire. I sat at the table and started eating, listening to the quiet sound outside in the night. I was about ready to lie down on the couch when I heard a soft knock on the front door. I did not expect any visitor because it was quite late, so I opened the door with some reluctance. And there she was—a small strange woman, shivering and looking at me with pleading eyes. I did not know why, but I opened the door and led her into the kitchen, helping her with the wet overcoat before she sat down. Then I made some coffee and filled a cup for her. I filled another cup for myself and sat with her, drinking silently and waiting for her to speak. After a while she said, “My name is Margaret.” I put out my hand and touched hers, and there was something promising yet tragic about it. I got up and poured more coffee into our cups, wondering what to say. It was my first time to be alone with a girl. It was in that half-tragic mood when it started to rain. I could hear the water falling on the roof. I went upstairs to see about the windows. I closed them and returned downstairs. But when I entered the kitchen, I saw that the girl had slumped down in her chair. She was sound asleep. For a moment I did not know what to do. Should I carry her upstairs to one of the empty bedrooms? She looked so tired and helpless. I went upstairs and fixed a bed for her. Then I returned to the kitchen again, lifted her carefully, and carried her to bed. I took off her shoes and stockings and loosened her clothes around the neck. And when I felt satisfied that she was comfortable, I put out the lights and watched her breathing silently in the dark. Then I went downstairs again and lay on the couch, my hands folded under my bed, thinking far into the night. It was the first time that a girl had entered our apartment. Bill and Leo and I had been living together off and on for six years, and we had never thought of breaking up for the company unless of course, one of us got married and wanted to live in another place. I was thinking of all these things when I went to sleep. When I woke up it was already morning and I could hear the snowflakes falling in the yard, making a noise similar to that leaves make in the autumn when they fall to the ground. Quickly, I rushed upstairs to see if Margaret was still asleep. She was. But she had turned her back toward the door and I could not see her face. Her unusually long hair was twisted about her and made a little nest in the bed. I wrote a simple note saying that when she woke up, her breakfast would be on the table. I tacked the note on one of her shoes so that she would not miss it. Then I went to the other room and saw that Bill and Leo were sleeping together, their backs to each other. The blanket was falling away from Leo, so I lifted it up and covered him. I went downstairs then and started to prepare breakfast, thinking of Margaret, wondering what kind of toast she would want with her coffee. I was already eating when Bill came down hurriedly, drank a cup of coffee and rushed out to work. He did not say a single word. I was washing the dishes when Leo came down. He ate his breakfast slowly and seemed secretly happy. Then he went to work. I could hear his heavy shoes crunching in the thick snow down the pathway. After a while Margaret came down, too. She was lovely. She was young and lovely. She was happy and lovely. “Good morning,” she said. “Good morning, Margaret,” I said. She sat at the table then, and it was like a song. I leaped from my chair and set the plates in front of her. I rushed to the stove and fried some eggs. I glanced back at her. She was

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES quiet and lovely. I put the food before her and sat down, watching her, absorbing her, feeling something sinking deeper and deeper inside me. She was lovely. Then she said, “Leo proposed to me last night.” I was stunned. I found her in the night. I took her out of the snow. I was angry. I was mad with Leo. I was mad, mad, like that time when I was a little boy and my cousin stole my precious toy. “I promised to marry him,” she said. I was stupefied. I had carried her upstairs. I put her safely in bed. I tucked her in like a good little girl. I prepared her breakfast. I waited for her to come down. And now she had promised to marry Leo? I did not even see him last night. How long did it take them to get acquainted with each other? “We will get married as soon as possible,” she said. Then I knew that my little dream was broken, and the pieces were rolling away from me. I could hear a man walking down the pathway. He was kicking the snow. Was he angry, too? Was something he had been building up for years stolen from him? But I could only say, “Congratulations.” “Thanks,” Margaret said. “You were very nice last night. “You were very nice too,” I said. But something soft died inside me. I said, “We will be friends always.” I left her then. I was absent-minded in the shop that day. My thoughts were at home with Margaret. I had just met her the evening before. But I felt that all the years I had hidden inside me were coming out into the open, drying in the bright summer sun. And the sun was not too friendly, but not too cruel either. When I came home from work that evening, I rushed upstairs to see if Margaret was already sleeping. But I found Leo and Bill sleeping together in Leo’s bed. I could not understand it. I went to the other room and found Margaret sleeping in the bed where Bill would have been that evening. I was puzzled. I went downstairs and prepared the couch, thinking of Margaret. Once before dawn, I heard the soft sound of moving feet in Bill’s room and afterward the noise of splashing water in the bathroom. Toward morning it began to rain, and I could hear the monotonous sound it made on the roof. Peacefully, I was lulled to sleep. When I woke up, Leo and Bill had already left for work. I went upstairs to see if Margaret was still sleeping, and she was alone. I went to the kitchen and prepared breakfast. I had already set the table when I heard her coming down the stairs, pausing at the window in the living room to watch the rain falling. And then she came to the kitchen and sat at the table. I said, “Did you hear the rain last night?” “I did not,” she said. “I didn’t even hear you come in, although I tried hard to wait.” I felt comforted. Just a little sentiment like that—and I felt vast and large. Perhaps the long years of living alone had blossomed at last, and bloomed in Margaret’s presence. “I have wonderful news for you,” she said. I looked into her face. I looked into her eyes. “Bill proposed to me last night,” she said. “And I promised to marry him.” “I thought Leo had proposed to you,” I said. “And I thought you had promised to marry him.” “That was the other night,” she said softly. And there was nothing I could say to push away the darkness that came to terrorize my life. I stopped eating. I sat looking into her eyes, but there was no light there to show me the

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES way out. I looked, hoping to stand on some huge promontory of thought and reached out my hand into the darkness and push it away so that the broad light of day could come again. I went to work, but it was like a dream. I did not remember anything. I went through the motions of working, but everything seemed mechanical. Once I found myself staring blankly into space. I also heard myself groaning, but I could not understand it. And I was afraid I would start talking to myself. I came home late that evening because there was some extra work for me at the shop. I found Bill sleeping soundly in his own bed. Leo was sleeping in his. I went downstairs and lay on the couch, wondering what had happened to Margaret. It began to rain at dawn. But I fell asleep when it started, making it seem like the noise of rustling leaves on some faraway mountainside. The next day was Sunday. It was our day off. When I woke up, I found Leo and Bill eating breakfast. I joined them at the table. “Where is Margaret?” I asked. “She is gone,” Bill said laughing. “She came, and she went.” “I thought you were going to marry her,” I said. “I was not the only one who was going to marry her,” Bill said sarcastically. “Leo is another man. The first night.” “That is the only way with some women,” Leo said cynically. “Propose left and right. The racket started with a cute little man in a legendary garden and a delicious apple tree.” Bill started to laugh loudly. Then Leo joined him. Then I knew that they were chiding me; that Margaret was another page in the history of their lives. Then Bill stopped laughing. “Why didn’t you propose, too?” he asked me. There was genuine feeling in his voice, sympathy in his face. “You could have done it. But now she’s gone.” “Yes; but now she is gone,” Leo said with finality. Bill started laughing again. He was almost choking. He slapped the table with his palms, stamped on the floor with his feet, so great was the mirth that Margaret’s two proposals had evoked in him. “But sometimes it is not funny!” I screamed above his laughter. Leo was startled. Bill suddenly stopped laughing. They looked at me. But they could not understand the tears in my eyes. It was like the end of a long prayer. I jumped from the table and rushed outside and ran madly across the snow. I raced down the street, not knowing where to go that cold morning. I kept saying, “Margaret, Margaret, Margaret.”

6. The Odyssey of Constancia Drake Originally published by University of Washington Press 19141976. Retreived from The Philippines is in the heart : a collection of stories with an introduction by E. San Juan, Jr. 1978 pp 65-72. New Day Publication.

Constancia Drake was born of a poor family in a little Ohio town. She was the last of three sisters who had long gone away when she was old enough to question their family misfortune. But she was a good little girl and she adjusted herself to the conditions at home at an age when her girl friends were still playing with naughty boys in the moonlight. She found an afternoon job at the local bakery when she was going to high school; but before she finished the second

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES year the old man of a heart attack. Constancia could have gone away then like her sisters, but there was the old woman to take care of because she had been bedridden, ever since she could remember. She quit school, therefore, and found a full-time job in a little store that sold trinkets and knick-knacks, and on Sundays she wheeled her mother in a chair down the block and made the neighbors admire her courage and good virtues. Thus she lived and worked for many years until one day, when she approaching twenty-five, her mother died in her sleep. Constancia buried her quietly and left town. Constancia went to New York and took a job at a department store, but it was a bad year, so that after a while she was laid off. It was during those days of heart-breaking job hunting, she was living in a furnished room somewhere near Columbus Circle when she met a man who made her heart flutter and she dreamed wildly about the future. She found another job immediately waiting at tables. Then she moved to a better rooming house on Madison Avenue so that she would have some kind of respectability when her man came with his silent ways and exciting stories about the world. Now this man had knocked around the globe a great deal. He had seen a long distinguished service in the war and came back with a mellowed mind and a heart that beat kindly for every one. It seemed that he had been born in a small town also somewhere in the Middle West and had wandered a lot since he was twelve, at which age his family scattered never to meet again. Ralph Rollinson, because that was the name he gave Constancia, saw his country widely as the next man but did not understand a great many things. But what he saw in other peoples abroad opened his eyes at home. He did not feel at ease again until he met Constancia at a small restaurant one night in the spring. It was love at first sight—at least on the part of Constancia Drake who had never known this kind of love before. But to Ralph Rollinson, who had seen love in many forms and shades, and who had almost experienced a great love in some foreign country where he had seen service as a soldier, it was a kind of love that needed tending and good care. It was something that came to them at an opportune time, something to mould tenderly into a truly magnificent thing in the midst of the great ruins around them. When Ralph Rollinson finally found a job driving a truck, Constancia could at last plan for a definite future, she thought of marriage many times because she was then getting on in years, and one cold night when the snow was falling outside her window, she prepared a warm pot of coffee and presented the idea to her man. Well, marriage was something that was both in their minds, and so it was settled that in a month’s time they would fulfill their dream. But a week afterward there was a teamster strike in the city and Ralph Rollinson sat around in Constancia’s room for days and then one night he went out to attend a meeting and never came back again. Of course Constancia would not believe it. When the first few weeks passed by without a word from him, she still hoped that he would appear one night. She waited for several months and then a year passed, but in the middle of the following year when the snow began to fall again and Constancia was almost down to her last dollar, she packed up her things and left for West Coast. She went to San Francisco, of course, because she had a girl friend there who had told her that it was not difficult to get a job in that city. But it was a bad year everywhere in the land and San Francisco was also shaken down to its roots. Constancia was determined to fight it alone for a while, but when she could not stand it any longer she went to look for her friend. Constancia found her after a long search at a place that she would rather keep to herself. She packed up her things again, for the hundredth time at the age of thirty-five, and went to Los Angeles because it was winter and she had hoped to enjoy the sunshine that she had heard so much about when she was still in her hometown.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES But it was raining when she arrived and somewhere on the mountains she could see caps of snow. The warm rain was a new experience, but she could not be mistaken about the snow because she had seen plenty of it as a little girl. Constancia looked out the window of her room in a downtown hotel and listened dreamily to the gentle patter of the rain on the roof and the exciting noise of water rushing down the drain. It was a new city and there were many new people in it. In as far as she was concerned, it was a city of golden promise and years of delight. She had forgotten Ralph Rollinson by now, except once in a while when she saw a man walking in the street that seemed like him. She had almost forgotten her father and mother because that time with them seemed far away and irretrievable. Now in this promising city she would surely find something at last to hold on to; she did not know what would it be, but her heart told her that it would change the whole course of her life. Change for the better? She did not know, of course. Change for the worse? And she was afraid of that thought. Anyway, she found a good job one day taking care of children in the house of a rich man. And she enjoyed it because she was once again closer to a kind of life that reminded her of a time when she was still a little girl with curled brown hair. The youngest girl was naughty, but she was a darling. She taunted Constancia once in a while with a bottle of ink, but she merely grabbed the child and kissed her affectionately. And when she was permitted to take her to town, Constancia often carried the child to her room and opened cute little boxes of candy. She was very happy and contented with her job and the people at the large house were very nice to her. And then she began to be lonely. She was now nearing forty and there were patches of grey hair on her temple and above her ears. She thought of Ralph Rollinson again these days. And when it was cold outside she stood by the window and watched the rain falling in slanting motion, driven by the wind that came down from the valley not far away. And she thought: In the morning I will buy a new light dress and plan a trip to Mexico. I will also buy a hat to protect myself from the strong sun of the south. And she did just that. She had an extended time off in the afternoon of the next day, so she went to several stores looking for the things she wanted, but finally she found a place where the salesman was very pleasant and courteous. He was not like other salesmen that she had known who were always trying to sell something that was not worth her money or measuring up her legs and weighing her bosom. Well, this salesman was really nice and when he asked her somewhat fearfully if she would like to have dinner with him, Constancia’s heart fluttered a little and she wanted to weep with joy. Why, yes, it had been such a long time since one so nice invited her out. And he was good-looking, too. It was agreed then in a silent but mutual way that they would meet at a certain modest place not far from where he lived. Constancia went to her room and put on the new dress, although it was in the middle of winter and the rain was falling heavily that night. But she wanted to please him, and to be close to him, because he had sold the dress to her. And that was something that had brought them together. It took her quite a while to fill up the deepening edges in her face, especially the unmistakable lines in the corners of her mouth and eyes. But she used a considerable quantity of hormone cream and covered it up lightly with powder of brownish color. Now, really, the wrinkles and the sure signs of age in her face were hidden. Before she entered the place where she would meet him she murmured a prayer of hope that she had known as a child at home. Robert Reskam was there waiting for her, all attention, dressed somewhat elegantly. Constancia almost screamed with joy. But she got hold of herself and sat down in front of him. They were bright all night long, pleasing each other with kind little words, choosing phrases that would not be misconstrued with double meanings. They had a few glasses of white wine. They ate gaily. And they danced too, whispering nice things to each other. And when they

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES parted at her door, he kissed her lightly on the lips and for a brief moment Constancia’s heart seemed to stop beating. When his footsteps died down the hallway and she was standing in front of the mirror in her room, Constancia noticed that her tears were making inroads in her face, and the wrinkles of age began to appear again. She opened that jar of hormone cream and dabbed a large amount on her face and spread it carefully down her neck. The she undressed and went to bed, but it was already near morning when she stopped thinking of Robert Reskam and sleep came to her like a dream. They went around a lot after that evening. And when she thought that it was about time, Robert Reskam asked her to marry him. It was a dream come true. It was worth the long years of waiting. It was worth the sacrifice and the prolonged denial. It was the ultimate fulfillment of all that she had longed for down the unhappy span of her life. And she thought one morning before the week of glory; I know now that happiness comes out of grief, the sharing of grief, and the forgetting of grief. It comes to all, the young and the old equally. It comes to any one who is capable of acquiring it. It belongs to every one. It is not the sole property of this or that man because he is rich or poor. Or because he belongs to this race or believes in that religion. Good Lord, I know now. And she looked at her fast-greying hair, nearly all white now, wondering if she should touch it up with a little coloring to hide a few years that were gone from her life. But when she remembered that Robert Reskam’s hair was as nearly grey as hers, Constancia smiled and pushed aside the foolish thought that marriage belonged only to the very young. So she went to bed early that night and for the first time she slept soundly and long. When she woke up the city was covered with snow. She went to work hugging herself with the comforting thought that soon she would have a husband to warm and any amount of snow in the world could not thaw the warmth of life. The days passed by slowly but full excitements and anticipations. When the morning came for the marriage the sun shone brightly in the sky. Constancia interpreted it to mean that it was a favorable sign. She prepared herself carefully and she even hurt herself with the many pins that she had stuck here and there to make her body shape out in a flattering way. She was ready before the hour came and she sat on her bed thinking of the money she had in the bank, making it stretch out so far that she even included a honeymoon to Honolulu. Then she started to smile foolishly to herself because her imagination had wildly run away from her like a horse galloping down the valley of home. And the memory of home made her think of her father and mother who had been both dead all these long years. She smiled just the same, thinking: I wish Pa and Ma were here now to see me in my bridal clothes. I bet they would love this satiny dress and these snow-white frills bordering it. She meditated warmly waiting for Robert Reskam, who did not appear that day nor the day after. Still Constancia waited for a few more days in her bridal clothes. But when three weeks passed and there was no word or sign of Robert Reskam, she carefully folded the much-folded clothes. Then she went quietly about her work again, and when the rich man for whom she had been working went away, Constancia found another job in an Old People’s Home. It was not easy to be with old men and women, but she was nearing fifty herself at this time. She could understand the eccentric old folks who unbared the ruins of their lives to her every day. It was the only job she could find now because the stores and even the houses of the rich people would not hire her any more. One look at her grey hair, all white and wiry now, and at the thick wrinkles in her face and hands, and she knew the answer right away. That was why she had given up the idea of pretending to be younger than she actually was and looking for a better job. When she found the Old People’s Home she made up her mind to stay until she herself would be committed in it. And then one day when she was sixty and her eyes were getting very weak, Constancia was scrubbing the kitchen of the Home when an old man in crutches knocked on the door. She stopped and turned around somewhat grouchily. Then she jumped to her feet and ran to the old

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES man screaming. She wrapped her weak old hands about his neck and wept bitterly. The world could not now contain her happiness and her sorrow. Robert Reskam had come to her after nearly twenty years of silence. He had come back a broken a broken old man, incapable of work, and probably would not last another year. It seemed that on the day when they were supposed to get married, Robert Reskam had an automobile accident on his way to pick her up. He was confined in a hospital for three long years, but when he was finally released he could not quite make up his mind. He realized that he was of no use to her. He wandered about in his helpless way and lost her. But somewhere in the mist of years he had heard about Constancia again, so in one desperate attempt he went to Old People’s Home and found her scrubbing the kitchen floor. And not long afterward Constancia was admitted into the Home for the old. And after a few difficulties were ironed out, Robert Reskam was also admitted into the place. So at long last, after more than five decades of great sacrifice and soul-wrecking denial, Constancia Drake sat happily with her broken old man in the sunny yard of the Old People’s Home.

Ninotchka Rosca 7. The Goddess First published on Monsoon Collection. 1983. Queensland: University of Queensland Press. Retrieved from The Best Philippine Short Stories of the 20th Century Edited by Isagani Cruz, 2000 pp. 548-557.

MARTHA, stepping into the elevator reeking of metal polish, became typist number forty-three in a roster of one hundred working for a corporation that received messages from all over the world. The messages had to be copied in quadruplicate, the replies to them typed in triplicate. Both message and reply were written in antiseptic prose, as clinical as the thirteen floor hall cut up into cubicles by vinyl panels. Martha occupied cubicle number three, with its narrow table, two chairs, four cantilevered shelves, and a poster; it varied from Roman to Greek, Swedish, French, the South Seas… One was even in Banawe rice terraces. But for Martha, it was the Roman Colosseum. Like all the girls of the thirteenth floor, Martha wore a blue and beige uniform. Her hair was knotted into a smooth helmet, and she carried the mandatory black patent leather bag matching her shoes. She also had the same near-sighted vagueness about the eyes. During the half-hour before closing time, when the girls jammed the ladies’ room and powdered, combed, and roughed themselves furiously, Martha had trouble picking out her face in the mirror. Martha would steal a glance at the girl standing beside her and wonder if that vagueness in the eyes concealed a secret like her own. Martha was seven years old when she was violated, but she never told on the culprit. The moist excitement she had shared with him precluded that. She had accepted his ministrations passively; she could not prevent her mind from fusing with his as he had groped for her in the damp geography of the flesh. Afterwards she had gone to her room, removed her clothes, and looked at herself in the mirror. The garden boy’s frightened sobs still echoed over the left ear. She saw, in the mica world, a little girl, her face nothing more than two huge eyes fringed by lashes so thick they cast shadows on the cheekbones. She acquired the habit of brushing her skin with her fingertips: a gesture half-irritated, half a caress. It took months before she realized she could not rid herself of the pollen of the boy’s touch. The knowledge was sudden and fragile. One twilight she had been walking with her

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES cousin Sela, who, at ten years of age, had the crispness of a morning sea. Martha did not like being with Sela. Her cousin made her aware of her thinnes, her paleness, and all the other errors of her body. They were two blocks away from their district when a dark man in a soldier’s uniform stopped them. He asked for the location of a street neither Martha nor Sela had ever heard of. Martha stared at the man while Sela told him of the streets’s non-existence. The man was fingerin a huge mole besides his nose. Abruptly, with his eyes fixed on Martha, he offered them ten pesos if they would help him attain carnal release. Martha turned to Stela for enlightenment. Sela frowned and tugged at here arm impatiently. “What did he want?” she asked. Sela, brought up as strictly as Martha, shrugged. She was listless and disturbed. “He said something. I don’t know. It sounded impudent. Anyway, we’ve been told never to speak strangers.” “I wonder what he wanted.” Martha said. She was almost certain it had something to do with what had been done to her. Standing a foot away from the man, she had felt the heat rising from his flanks. The skin above his upper lip had been beaded with sweat, and the fingers feeling the mole had seemed like brown worms groping for passage. Dinner made her forget, she was eating a ripe mango when a banging of doors and shouts announced her aunt’s arrival. Sela, turned out, had walked into a houseful of dinner guests and had screamed the vulgar word used by the man. In the disorder that followed, her cousin had laid the blame on Martha. Her father rapped the knuckles of her hands with a wooden ruler. She was then sent to bed with the admonition that children should be seen, not heard. Upstairs in her room she forgot her mother, her aunt, and, after wishing that warts would grow on her face, her cousin. What reminded was the worry over her instinctive understanding of what the man wanted. In the dark she saw her body luminous as a glow-worm. Her drift to sleep was a passage to the dark side of the moon. Despite her inadequate vocabulary, she realized that she knew that terrain. Her fears were justified. Her stigmata were as visible as Ash Wednesday’s cross of sorrow. The innocence of grown-ups astonished her. In a crowded bus she watched slyly her mother’s grateful nod at a man’s offer to hold Martha on his lap. Her spine stiff with knowledge, she bore his heavy hand on her thigh without rancor. An implicit conspiracy lay between her and the exhibitionist who waited for her every afternoon as she walked home from school. She even smiled at the lunatic who bathed naked at a leaking fire hydrant. On Friday she played truant and slipped into a cheap movie house. She found them there – the mean who had surrendered to strange passions. Their need was so violent it called to her, roamed the aisles for her. Martha, Martha, the voices whispered in the dark. They catacombed her in their melancholia. Afraid she was on the brink of insanity, Martha fled and swore never to return. At sixteen, she had her talk with her mother, who handed over her fail-safe weapons in the world. Life, the old woman said, was to be got over as quickly as possible. For the flesh, there could be no celebration. On lived for death and died immortality. Shortly after third difficult afternoon among the azaleas, her mother was taken ill. She became as faded as the mynah bird kept in a rusty cage. Her death was of no surprise to anyone. Martha herself looked without emotion at the corpse stretched out like a larded fish on the matrimonial bed surrounded by icon, rosaries, medicine bottles, and the vapours of corruption and incense. After the funeral, Martha’s father eloped with a married woman; he sent his daughter quaint postcards with European stamps. Sela, her cousin, become engaged. At the betrothal party, Martha was introduced to the young man. He acknowledges here presence with reluctance and immediately returned his eyes to Sela. He did not simply loot at Sela; his eyes devoured her, licked here, and gnawed at her. He flinched at any attempt to claim his attention, and his hands

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES were constantly reaching out to touch Sela’s arm, cheek, shoulder. Martha hated her cousin’s smugness. Sela, she thought, could not even begin to understand the nature of the man’s devotion. Martha stood as close to him as she dared. She spoke to him, and the remnants of his passionate glance, whenever he turned to her, made here skin crawl. She considered drawing him aside, but the house too crowded, the young man too entangled in the wed Sela’s hair and perfume. She had to give up the idea. She lived alone, made no friends, and reduced her conversation to what was necessary. Working as a typist enabled her to map out her movements. She hated the day when her blue and beige uniform, her flat helmet of hair, her patent leather bag and shoes drove beauty from her face. In the daytime she was full of imperfections: eyes too large, mouth too swollen, skin of an indifferent colour. But in the evening… She refused to use the electric lights and lit candles instead. Naked, she would pace through the rooms, watching her blazing self in the mirrors. She thought the reflection had eyes that waited. She was nineteen when she was picked up at the corporation’s cocktail lounge, where an afteroffice hours drink was part of the affectation of the thirteenth floor girls. Martha had just finished her gin and tonic when a man slid onto the bar stool beside her. He offered her another drink, which she accepted. As she sipped the cold liquid, she listened to him. He had been watching for several days now, he said. She had seemed so cold, so apart from everything. She never giggled like the other girls; she didn’t even smile. Martha glanced at him from beneath her lashes. He had blue eyes. Pale blue eyes. Fish eyes. Pale blue silver fish eyes. He smiled, guessing she was dusting his face with her own brown-black eyes. In a strange sort of way, he said, she was very beautiful. He said it again after Martha’s third drink. She was beautiful. That evening they dived into her mother’s deathbed and nearly tore each apart. He was nearly fifty, but he had the capacity to surprise her still. He probed as thoroughly as a doctor searching for a suspected disease. When her flesh was detonating with his ferocity, he spoke to her again and told her of her beauty. His hands leeched to her skin. He held her down until the anger of his body passed. The next day they saw each other again and the same thing happened. Without having said the word love, they become lovers. He was a Frenchman, an engineer assigned to the corporation’s mines. He was alone, having abandoned his wife and children. “Actually, wives and children,” he said, laughing. His good humour was constant, and he chattered endlessly. She was good to him. He said, for him and because of him. Once he visited her in her cubicle and worked himself into a fury over the poster. “The Roman Coliseum, my ass!” he exclaimed. “Take a Greek print. Take French. Take a Tahitian hut. Or take a banana peel and tack it to the wall. Anything but Roman.” She shook her head. The Greek she said, was too delicate, the Swedish too landscapy; she preferred this one because Roman was… well, it was… “Cold and grandiose,” he finished for her. His dislike made her flush. They met three times a week. Between their meetings, Martha was a chair, a table, a machine, a pair of hands. The hour before closing times she could hardly keep still. She stared blankly at the teletyped messages on her table: was in Lebanon, branch closed, three hundred laid off; India in famine, dispose of wheat; Liberian tanker cracked up at sea, oil headed for resort coast. There was a nary a whimper. With a soft-lead pencil, Martha scribbled her own message on the paper’s margins: hello, how are you, how beautiful you are, love me, define me, please love me. He held her fingers between his lips and said they tasted of communion wine. He kissed her and told her of the shape of her mouth beneath his own. He talked to her about herself. Martha

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES listened to his breathing. Dullness grew in her. She lay awake, images of herself in his hands running through her mind. Finally, at four o’clock, she tried to rouse him, but he said something in French, brushed her kisses away, and snored peacefully. He missed an appointment. The gin stale in her mouth when she went home. In the morning there were purple circles under her eyes. She felt as sticky as a salamander. He apologized, complained of fatigue and the heat, but never restored the third day to their routine. Martha began to find her typed papers soggy with tears. She stared at the walls with suspicion. He missed another appointment. Martha climbed in grimly. “Smile,” he said. “I’m here.” She reached over and leaned on the car horn. A wall ripped through the night’s stupor. He had to knock her arm aside. Martha screamed. She demanded to know why and was attacked by hiccups. He hated scenes, he said; they were too inelegant, too heavy on the soul. She said an obscene word. He lost his temper and told her she was frigid anyway. This so shocked Martha that her jaw dropped. She stepped out of the car and took the bus home. For months the incomplete statement ran through her mind: How dare he…? How dare he what? Beneath her fingers, the world moved on smoothly. Two airplanes hijacked by Palestinians, insurance loss; Picasso dies, art investment secure; Bangladesh drying like a prune in the sun; Baguio mines pollute ten thousand acres of rice fields. She typed out messages in quadruplicate, replies in triplicate. The Roman poster went neglected on the wall. At night she wore a blue and beige nightgown. She lost the desire to see her body. When the annual basketball tournament of the corporation was held, she was the only one who showed up in her uniform. The Frenchman was in the grandstand with the other executives. With his white hair, he looked like an ordinary old man each time he slouched in his seat. Now twenty-one, Martha was attending her own betrothal party. The young man was a junior executive in the corporation. He had a brilliant future. He also wore gold-rimmed eyeglasses and carried a Gucci bag, and his pants were help up by a Cardin belt. She received congratulations. The courtship had been conducted during car trips, for the young man would pick her up after office hours and drive her home. They said good-night at the gate her house. Martha was conscious of her image as the perfect bride-to-be. She greeted each stranger’s face that approached, handed out the drinks, drank to her fiancé, answered his parents with respect. She allowed the guests to precede her to the buffet table. She herself ate nearly and sparely. No one noticed the glances she flicked at the door. In a moment of weakness she had slipped an invitation into an envelope addressed to the Frenchman. She drank a quantity of white wine – a taste she had acquired from the foreigner. Queried about how many children she wanted, Martha suppressed a shudder and replied that that was up to her husband-to-be. No, she was not going to work; he wished her to stay home and take care of the family. As she spoke, she had the uncanny feeling she was fading away. When she made her farewells at exactly ten o’clock, she was already convinced that the wine, the food, the white and pink décor, and the pink and white faces had nothing to do with her, in her white gown, collared and sleeved, she sat primly beside the young man in the cream-coloured Volkswagen. At the second red light she glances at him. He had a nice mouth, she thought. The plae light of the mercury bulbs revealed his tiny ear to her. Her hand reached out to touch him, but at that moment he looked at her with a polite inquiry in his eyes. Did she like his parents, he asked. She said yes and stifled a yawn. How about his aunt? Again, she said yes. She had taken care of her husband for nearly a year when he had fallen ill. She was a good cook, too. Before she left the car, she smiled at him and said she would take care of him, too, if and when he fell ill. He laughed and said that though he did not foresee such a misfortune, it was of course expected of her to just do that. He leaned over and brushed her cheek with his lips. Martha’s

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES eyelids drew the curtains on the world. Her fingers tightened on his shoulder. He withdrew abruptly and with some embarrassment said he’d pick her up the next day. Martha let him go. The mynah bird had long perished, but its rusted cage was still there – a whimsical antique sculpture. She would have to sell the house, she thought the rooms, looking at the relics of her parents’ life together, she undressed slowly. It was cold. Her toes caressed the rose-embossed carpet. How strange for her mother to have chosen such hedonistic furnishing. The noise of a key being fitted into the front door lock made her jump. Her first impulse was to run to the bedroom. But the door was already opening. In panic, she ripped the curtain off the dining room window and draped it around her body. The cloth was stiff; the print of gamboling tigers made her feel ridiculous. But there was no time for anything else. Already the door was opening. The Frenchman walked in. he tossed the key into the air, deftly caught it with his right hand and pocketed it. “you look marvellous,” were his first words. “Mistake number one: always change locks at the end of a love affair.” “I’m getting married,” she said. “Everybody does. Eventually.” He said, limping into the room. “Oh! my gout. Three girls had got married on me. You’re the fourth.” “I don’t know if I should,” she said abruptly and surprised herself. “Now, I’m going to be a father to you,” he laughed. “Go ahead daughter. Tell daddy what’s bothering you. The concept of marriage? ” “No,” she said, “of need.” “Strange,” he said. He went to a cupboard and took out a bottle of whisky. “Ah, yes,” he went on as he poured himself a drink. “At my age, the only shot of fire left is alcohol. To be young again! And getting married. Girls, women. I can only love them with words nowadays.” The years had ruined him. He slumped into Martha’s favourite armchair and sipped his drink. Things were critical, he said. He had to make a decision soon; to stay or return to France. But what was there in France for him? On the other hand, what was there for him here? Martha listened and walked about the room. She did not notice the tightening orbit of her walk. He watched with amused eyes. When she stopped in front of him, he put down the glass with an ironic smile and embraced her. “You smell of spring,” he said. He tried to lift her but the years had melted his muscles. Martha’s toes touched the carpet. She walked, she followed. Her toes were so tiny, he said, her kneecaps were gorgeous. How beautiful she was, with her eyes, her impeccable, arrogant mouth. He fashioned a sacrifice with his words. Martha listened, trembled, and surrendered herself. Limb by limb, word by word, he drew her from chaos and gave her life. He groaned, twisted his body and tried to take her to the path of mortality. “Come with me,” he said. Martha, immortal, lay beneath him with crossed arms. “Jesus,” he said, “I’m too old for this.” He dropped beside her, curled into an embryonic position and fell asleep. He was snoring when he stood up. The world in the mirror was leprous with shadows. Martha felt the coldness of the bathroom tiles. Through the open door the Frenchman’s snores sounded like weeping. The girl in the mirror had her right hand on her left shoulder. There was a glitter in her eyes. Her hair crackled away from her brow and melted into the darkness. Martha smiled: a little smile, a mere lifting of the corners of the mouth. How beautiful you are, she whispered. How very beautiful. Your luminous hair, your white arms, the navle pit of your belly. How very, very beautiful you are. From the bedroom, the groans of the last, the true, the eternal worshipper accompanied her voice.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Months later, when Paco was pressed to explain his behavior, he could only come up with a lame statement about pain. It was, he said, a precondition to man’s knowledge of himself – probably. Of course, he could not be sure. When one was under detention, one was never sure of anything. Paco had been the “guest” at the district’s annual undercover men’s conference. It had lasted for three days with about a hundred participants. Twenty or thirty of them took part in the game with Paco. He couldn’t be sure of anything. They pulled out two fingernails from his left hand and extracted a canine tooth. They also ripped a strip of skin – six inches long, an inch wide – from his right forearm. Two bamboo splinters were driven beneath the nails of his big toes. He wanted to tell them what they wished to know and even what they weren’t interested in. but each time he opened his mouth, he was struck dumb by amnesia. He couldn’t remember anything – not even his name. He tried to die by hanging his head against the walls. But that only made him dizzy. Maybe that was why torture failed, he said. The pain became so intense, so exquisite, nothing but itself existed. It became verily the person. But he was just guessing, he said. Actually, he could offer no explanation. To the last night when he made his escape, he still could not explain why he betrayed no one.

8. Generations First published on Monsoon Collection. 1983. Queensland: University of Queensland Press. Retrieved from < http://www.docfoc.com/generations-ninotchka-rosca>

Mumbling calmed the soul. To Selo, this was knowledge that came with old age. He would sit outside on the front ladder, his bare feet resting on the last rung, and mumble. Words would push up from between his lungs, past his tonsils, and work their way between his toothless gums. His lips spat them out in small explosions. There were any number of things to mumble about: sometimes he told a story, sometimes he just followed the movement of the sun from east to west, sometimes he grumbled about the house, the road, and the harvest. Today he made sounds. It was summer, but enough water remained in the. Irrigation canal to feed the seedbeds. Viewed from the house, the canal was a shimmering distortion in a brown palm of land distorted by heat waves. The two boys playing in the yard had grown used to Selo's mumbling. The older, nine years of age, drew a circle on the ground with his dirty forefinger. He was not quick enough, and two drops of sweat fell from his brow into the circle. Against the soil's glitter, the sweat drops were black, shallow holes. He studied them for a moment; then, carefully, he covered the holes with two chipped marbles-one orange, one blue. Just outside the line he had drawn, his brother's toes dug into the powdery earth. The older boy ignored his brother just as he ignored Old Selo. Grandfather's bad humor, their grandmother used to say, had started with the withering of his right hand. The bird-claw that resulted had not been her fault. As a matter of fact, she had saved his life. The claw was nothing more than an extraneous addition to the whole-regrettable but unimportant. She had saved his life. Because of the debt, the boys' memories of the old woman were rimmed with guilt. No one had been able to help her when her turn to die came. It took place at the height of the monsoon season. The house was so waterlogged the bamboo posts had split their brown skins and were mottled green. A translucent pair of leaves even sprouted from the middle node of the bamboo holding the kitchen wall up. Grandmother,

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES who had complained of chest pains for weeks, had a coughing attack so fierce she sounded like a joyous frog. The fit lasted for hours. It would take her by the throat and snap her small head back and forth, while bits of matter-red flecked with foam-ejected from her mouth and darted around like tiny bats. Mother, a Lysol-soaked rag in her hand, chased the steaming bats and shouted for the rest of the family to keep away. It was hard work, but she would not allow anyone to help. Finally, grandmother gave a terrible series of yelps. Her eyes disappeared into her head. She fell, cutting her brow on the pallet's edge and overturning the chamber pot. Since that time, the boys had known that a man's interior was dark red and gray, spongy and foamy. This was wisdom uncovered by death: a man's interior was uninteresting, made up of tissue so dark-red it turned black in the gaslight. A man was neither good nor bad inside, only uninteresting. Old Selo, on the other hand, could not remember that evening. One day his wife was there; the next, she wasn't. After thinking about it, Old Selo decided that death was a sin of omission where the dead forgot to live. It was all as simple as that. The dead didn't do anything. The living mumbled like him, shouted like his daughter-in-law, cursed like his son, cried like his grandsons, or turned into beauties like his granddaughter. She was fifteen years old and had dark brown skin and straight black hair reaching down to the small of her back. With her large eyes, her nice mouth, she could have a future. Selo glanced at the sacks piled near the shed-brown jute sacks fat with rice grains. It had been a good harvest. His claw itched. His left hand caressed it. Like all the men in the village, he had indulged in man-talk in his youth. He and the other men had been members of a supposedly national society of peasants. They had gathered in the empty schoolhouse during evenings and had made plans for the future. It had been exciting to think of cramming the landlord's genitals down his throat. It had been exciting to talk of snaring and roasting his dogs grown vicious on a diet of meat. The dogs had chased old Selo once, when he had tried to deliver the landlord's share of the harvest himself. In high hopes, Selo had had the society's insignia tattooed on the skin web between his thumb and forefinger. Other men in the village carried the blue sickle on their bodies-on the chest, above the heart; on the thigh; on the skin web between thumb and forefinger. It betrayed them when the landlord's goon squads started kicking house doors down. The massacre went on for months, with the odor of putrid flesh mingling with the harvest fragrance. The rivers seemed full of crocodiles then, with all the bodies floating in the water. The landlord's men hadn't reached their village yet, but old Selo's wife was already screaming that he was a dead man. Taking his courage in hand, he whetted his fan-knife and prepared to excise the tattoo. At the last moment, however, he remembered his friends, bodies fertilizing the fields. He dropped the knife. His wife cursed him for three hours and finally lost her patience. She heated a silver coin in the charcoal stove and with her blackened firethongs dropped it on Selo's tattoo. The house posts shook with the old man's bellows, and disconsolate screams answered him from a cloud of ricebirds hovering over the field. The trick worked. When the metal cooled, his wife ripped the coin off Selo's hand, deftly stripping the flesh underneath. Selo, angered by his wifes triumph, wrapped his hand in a rag. He refused to let anyone look at the wound. The boys waited for the vehicle to come into sight before rising to their feet. It was a jeep with a trailer and a dust cloud streaking behind it. When the jeep stopped before the bamboo gate, the dust cloud blew towards the house, forcing the boys to avert their faces. Old Selo remained as he was and tasted gritty soil on his lips. Four men jumped off the jeep. All had tooled leather gun belts around their waists. One wore a bun hat. "Your father home?" the man with the hat asked. The boys looked at each other. Finally, the older one shook his head. "That's all right," one of the men called out. "The rice is here, anyway." The hatted man scratched his nape and frowned.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES "Listen now," he said to the boys. "Tell your father he left only thirty sacks of rice for the propietano. He should have left fifty. Then, he owes me ten more for the seeds and five more for the weeder. So, we're talking thirty-five sacks now. Can you remember that?" The boy felt he should say something but could not find the words for what he wanted to say. He gave a shrug and nodded. "Okay," the man turned to his companions. "Load up." One of the men was strong enough to lift an entire sack by himself. The other two worked together. As they moved back and forth, the pile of sacks sank closer and closer to the ground. "Come on, come on," the man with the hat said, "it's tricky business. Never know what these peasants will do." He tugged at a sack impatiently Old Selo scuttled off the ladder, drew something hanging on the nearest house post. He rushed towards the men. The boys shouted: It was enough warning. The man with the hat evaded the downward slice of the machete. The blade buried itself in the topmost sack's belly. Old Selo tugged at the hilt, and gold kernels bathed the jute sacks. Without hurry, the man with the hat seized Old Selo's wrist and wrung the weapon from him. Reversing the machete, he struck Old Selo's chest with the hilt. A cry escaped the old man. His spine hit the ground and the man with the hat pinned him with a foot. "It's okay," he said to his men. "I'll keep him quiet. Hurry up now. I don't want more trouble." When the jeep with the trailer disappeared, the boys helped Old Selo back to the ladder. He seemed to have forgotten the incident and resumed mumbling, his lips speckled with blood. The boys looked at each other. They walked to the gate, squatted down, and waited. It took some time for the horse-drawn rig to appear at the road's rise. It moved so slowly that the boys could hardly keep still. They lost control when they recognized their mother and sister among the passengers. The older boy was aware of his incoherence, but impatience pushed the words out of his mouth. The afternoon's story had to be told. Still shouting, he watched his mother climb down the rig and help his sister maneuver a basket past the dirty wheel. The horse, its flanks covered with sweat and whipmarks, snorted; its skin trembled. The mother tried to wipe off the blood from Selo's mouth, but it had dried and would not come off. She released her skirt's hem impatiently and pushed the old man up the ladder. Meanwhile, the two boys menaced the basket their sister was carrying. She threatened them with a flst. They shied away, returned and tried to peer into the basket, sending it banging against the girl's shins. She shouted at them to leave her alone. There was nothing in the basket but food. The distressing news set the younger one wailing. Mother leaned out of the window and ordered him to stop or else... Inside the house, Old Selo had clean lips again, his daughter-in-law having used a wet rag on his face. He watched as she prepared the evening meal. She held an eggplant down with her left hand, forefinger extended and pressed against its end, while her right hand stroked through the eggplant's flesh with a knife. Her fingertip was never more than a hair's breadth away from the blade as it sliced through the vegetable. She grumbled as she worked. She had warned Old Selo's son, she said, but he would not listen. He kept talking about the law. But what in god's name had the law got to do with people? Laws were paper and ink; they were kept in filing cabinets in offices in town and city buildings. Now, if it were the law of the sun or of the seas or of the earth that would be an altogether different matter. People's laws had nothing to do with people. The girl smiled at herself in the cracked mirror on the wall. Her eyes sought out the photograph of an actress pinned to the wall. Like her, the actress had limpid eyes and a small mouth. The girl sighed and lifted the weight of her hair from her nape. God willing, she would have a future. She smiled again, and then picked up a thin blue towel draped on a battered bamboo chest.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES "Where are you off to now?" her mother asked in her usual harsh voice. "To the canal," she said, "to take a bath." "Take the boys with you." The girl crinkled her nose. "Why do I have to?" "Because you're no longer a child," came the answer. "Because of what could happen which must not happen?" "It's not as if I take my clothes off," the girl muttered, but her voice had lost its conviction. "Take the boys with you." They tried to keep the canal's lips as bare and hard-packed as the summer fields, but green things somehow managed to make their way there. They took root overnight, dipping hair tendrils into the water: bizarre flowers of purple and yellow, stringy weeds, and the mimosa pudica. The girl hated the mimosa for its deceptive shyness. At the least touch, its leaves folded and drooped but only to bare the thorns on its stems. The boys stripped immediately and dived into the water. They swam, transformed into sleek brown puppies with iridescent limbs and bodies. The girl watched. Then she too entered the water. First she washed her hair, scrubbing it with crushed herbs and leaves. Then groping beneath the water, she cleaned the soft secrets of her body. Her fingers cupped her unfinished breasts. Sighing, she leaned back in the water and lifted her face to the sky where the sun was beginning to cool. It was nearly dusk when they left the canal. The boys shared the weight of a pail of water while the girl shivered in her wet clothes. At the backyard's edge, the girl abruptly signalled for the boys to stop. From the house came her father's growls, her mother's shrilling. The boys' eyes widened. They turned to the sister, but something in her face made them look away. A clatter of tin plates erupted from the house. There was the sound of a slap, a sharp cry. Then, the creaking of the ladder as someone came down in a hurry. The girl showed her teeth. Dinner was ready. The mother was picking up plates from the floor. She pointed to the table. The boys smiled and carried the pail into the kitchen. The girl changed her clothes. "Rice!" the older boy exclaimed. "Not gruel. Real rice." "Might as well eat it," the mother said. "It won't last very long." She drowned the rice mound on Selo's plate with soup. A twinge of anger shot through the girl. It was a shame and a waste. Grandfather couldn't take anything solid anyway. But that was the way it was, the way it had always been. Even with eating, one took a vow akin to marriage- one ate as the others ate, for richer and for poorer. Old Selo waited for the table to be cleared. It seemed hardly possible that the day was over, as the day before had been over. The sun was born in the east, died in the west; the dry season came and merged with the monsoon season. Flood and drought. And all through the changes of time, men worked in the fields, holding on and holding out, coaxing the earth into yielding the golden kernels, so tiny they seemed like babies' gasps. Why couldn't the sun and the rain clouds be nailed to the sky? Instead of men, the elements should hold on. Hold on, as his wife used to say. Obediently, the old man lowered his body to the mat spread out by his grandsons. His body loosened its moorings and entered the sea of sleep. He dreamt, his dream melting into the dreams breathed out by his daughter-in-law and his grandchildren. One dream now possessed the house, each member of the family giving to it. There were scenes of joy, a morning rimmed with hope, a child's universe of a toy. "Wh-wh-what?" the granddaughter murmured. Something was in the yard. It moved, its bulk rustling against the nipa fronds of the house's walls. In the dark, the boys' eyes were pitted stars. The girl looked at her mother; the older woman was also awake, listening in the dark. Before she could say anything, the door

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES blew open so violently it tore its upper rope hinges. In the doorway, a man's shadow stood, his head and shoulders dusted by moonlight. Resentment came into the room. The man halted, prowled about the accusing air of his family. His insulted soul gave him pride. Son-of-a-goat, he said, he was a man, and a man had rights. So the law decreed. Circling, he came upon a face. His grief balled itself into a fist. Without a word, he smashed a blow into his wife's face. Something heavy struck his back and clung to his neck with little claws. The man beat at the thing on his back. He swept it off and threw it to the floor. He began to kick at it. But the white bat shrieked in his daughter's voice. The man stopped. The shadows were unravelling themselves. There were his wife, his sons, his daughter and Old Selo, his father, curled like a gnome in the corner. He found the door and lost himself in the night. "Stop him," the mother cried out. "Not me," the girl said. "He kicked me. The son-of-a-bitch kicked me." "Don't say that," the mother said. "Follow him and see he's all right." "He's drunk." "Do as you're told," the mother said, dabbing at the blood on her mouth. "It's curfew time. If the soldiers find him, everything will be over for sure." The girl did not move. "Please follow him," the mother said. She was still stroking her mouth. "Please. We have to-to hang on." The girl kicked at a pillow. "All right," she said. "But if he kills me, it will be on your head." "Take your brother with you," the mother called out. The older boy was already running after his sister. He caught up with her in the yard. She took his hand, murmured something that sounded like everything had to be over and led him to the gate. Moon-touch had transformed the world, and the two halted before the alien landscape. The boy felt he was gliding on silver water. From a distance came their father's voice. He was cursing the night. "He's making for the town," the girl said. "Son-of-a-whore," the boy muttered. "He'll hit a checkpoint for sure." The girl broke into a run. The boy followed his eyes darting with suspicion among the strangely lit objects of the night world. The girl shied suddenly, bumping into her brother. "A snake," she said. "I don't see anything." "I heard it. Never mind. Hurry." It was too late. Three shadows broke the silver road. The father was trying to convince the two soldiers that a man had the right to get drunk where and how it pleased him. Particularly when the harvest was involved, yes, sir, particularly ...One of the soldiers replied by pummelling him in the ribs and stomach. "Pests," the boy whispered and spat on the ground. "Sssh," the girl held her brother's hand. "It will be all right. He pays now. Don't worry." "Pay for what? They'll take him to the barracks now." "Sssh. I'll take care of this. Go home and tell mother everything's all right. I'll bring him home." "Sure." "Believe me. Trust me. I'll get him out." "How?" The girl did not answer. Looking at her, the boy saw her lips had pulled back, her teeth were bare. In the moonlight, her mouth seemed full of fangs.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES She entered the room on tiptoe but hardly a second passed before a man's voice exclaimed: "Well, what have we here?" There were two of them-one seated behind a varnished table, the other on a canvas bed. The first held a notebook and wore fatigues; the second was in his Undershirt and pants and was polishing his boots. "Please, sir," the girl said, "my father ..." The room smelled of wax and detergent. Light spilling from a naked bulb overhead turned the floor blood clot red. "Which one is he? The men here are so active it's hard to tell who has sired whom," the sergeant said. "He was picked up, sir, just a while ago." The girl swallowed. In a softer voice, she added: "He was drunk, sir." She told herself that nothing had changed in the room. The bulb still swung from the frayed cord; the light was as harsh as before. There was no reason for the hair on her nape to stand. "What do you want with him." "I've come to take him home." "Child, it's not as simple as that. First, we have to take him to the judge. Violating curfew, disturbing the peace. And so on. Then we'll have a trial. Since it's Saturday, we have to wait till Monday to even begin. The judge will either fiI:le him or send him to jailor both. It may take weeks, months-maybe years." "Please, sir, my mother's waiting." "I suppose you can pay the fine." "We don't have money," she said, flushing. "But we have rice." The soldiers looked at each other. The sergeant said there was nothing to be done. As a matter of fact, the girl herself was violating curfew and he was tempted to arrest her, too. The soldier on the cot laughed. "You want to see him?" She nodded. The sergeant stood up and motioned for her to follow. "We locked him in the toilet," he said. It was an outhouse. The father rose from the cement floor when the door was opened. He bleated at the sight of his daughter. "Go away," he said. "Go away. Tell your mother I'll be all right. Go on home." His left eye was swollen. A blue-grey lump glistened on his forehead. The girl swallowed again. She stretched out a hand to him but the sergeant pushed her away. He closed the door on the father's voice. "Well, he stays there," the sergeant said, "at least until he's sentenced." The girl stood before the table. "Please, sir," she said, "I must take him home." "Can't do. Not unless you pay the fine. Do you have money?" The girl bit her underlip. "No? Maybe you can pay some other way.What do you think?" The sergeant turned to the other soldier. "Can she pay some other way?" The man laughed. His eyes glittered. "I should think so. She's old enough. And peasant girls are strong." "How about it?" the sergeant asked. "You owe your father that much." The girl's mouth opened. "Any self-respecting daughter would do much more. How about it? We'll give him a bed, make him comfortable while you're paying. At dawn, we'll give him to you. How about it?"

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES The other soldier yawned. The girl looked at the lightbulb. If only the light had not been as harsh. "How about it?" the sergeant repeated. "There are only four of us here. You're lucky." Sometime in the night, the toilet door was opened and the father was taken out. He was given a cot in the barracks. Gratefully, he stretched his limbs, his sore muscles creaking. Sleep came to him, but he was awakened almost immediately. He had turned over and had nearly fallen off the cot. It must have frightened him, for his heart beat furiously for several minutes. His fear was transformed into a woman's cry. After listening for a few seconds, the father decided it was a bat shrilling in the dark. He went back to sleep and was awakened again, this time by a dog's barking. He lay with his eyes open, looking at the shadows of the strange room. From somewhere in the building came a man's low laugh. It was morning when he rose from the bed. The Sun was On the brink of rising. A soldier came and led him to the office. It was empty, the blankets on the cot neatly folded. The soldier pushed him towards the door. "I can leave?" the father asked. The soldier smiled and nodded. He patted the father on the shoulder. A smile cracked the man's dry lips. He bounded through the open door. The cool of the morning eased the creases on his face. Under a kamachile tree, his daughter waited, a scarf tied about her head. . "What are you doing here?" the father shouted. "Waiting," she said, dropping her eyes. "Waiting for you." He looked at her with suspicion, but she did not seem to have changed. "Come quickly," she said. "Mother's waiting." She stepped away from him. She turned too quickly and stumbled On a pebble. The scarf slipped off and when she bent to pick it up, her skirt rose, revealing a bruise at the back of her left thigh. The father looked away. Waiting," he mumbled. "That's another word for it. Waiting." He gave a short bark of laughter. Thin wisps of smoke-dewdrops evaporating-curled from the ground. The air was cool and carried the scent of roasting corn. The father's head turn, his eyes scanning the fields. Softness lay in his chest. His daughter walked in front of him and he was seized by an impulse to tell her how he had first met her mother. "Well, now" he said, clearing his throat, "I suppose we have to tell. Tell your mother." "Let's not talk," she said. He quickened his pace, leaving his daughter behind. At that instant the sun touched a tree so violently that its branches crackled. The tree absorbed the light. Soaked through, it began to glisten, returning the suds' warmth. Open-mouthed, the father looked at the tree. He was still looking at it when something hard and jagged smashed in the back of his skull. "I have the right," the daughter said. It was the boy who found them. He had left his younger brother in the fields and had wandered off, asking himself what had happened to his father and sister. "Whoreson," he said, "they killed him." "Yes." "Why?" "There was no one else to kill." The boy looked at her curiously. Her skirt was splattered with blood and white matter. "You tried to lift him," he said-tentatively, as though it were a suggestion. The girl smiled. "I learned so much this night." "Well, we have to hang on. Hang together." "We can take him home now."

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES The boy took her hand. "Not yet," he said. "We have to hang on. Hang together." He guided her to the path. "We'll tell mother. But first, we must take a bath. Whoreson. They must have struck him a hundred times. His head's nearly gone. A hundred times. Whoreson." A whimper broke from the girl. "Ssssh," the boy said. "It's all right. We'll tell mother. She'll find someone else. But first, we must take a bath. In the canal." They left the road and took a short-cut across the field. They saw the youngest brother playing near the canal and waved to him. After a while, the boy said: "It's all right. Who'll complain against soldiers?" They picked up the youngest and preceded to the canal, the older boy still busy with what could happen. The girl, he said, could be indentured now, as a servant to the landlord. "Mind you take care of yourself there," he said. "Mind that you do that. And someday, someday, maybe we can all go to town and live there."\ In the house, the mother was teasing old Selo by pretending to carryon a conversation with him. Since the old man paid no attention but merely mumbled, she was forced to comment on a variety of subjects. She made coffee for him and sat beside him. Together, they gazed out of the window. A fly hovered, and the mother flicked at it with her hand. Old Selo said something. "What?" The woman asked, laughing. "of course, flies are lovely, with rainbow wings. But let them settle on you and they'll lay eggs. They breed maggots. Don't ask me why. Maybe because they're forced to breed on trash, garbage, all the sick things. Maggots." Old Selo mumbled on. The mother saw the children crossing the fields. She smiled and waved to them. They were free-so her man must be coming home soon. Yes, there they were the three of them, the boys and the girl. They were headed for the canal which was shimmering a distortion in a brown palm of land distorted by heat waves. Old Selo looked and mumbled. Though it was summer, enough water remained in the canal to feed the seedbeds.

9. A Party for Mrs MacArthur First published 20 January 1990.;Santos, Bienvenido 1995 “The Day the Dancers Came” 1960 Dalisay Jr. Penmanship pp36-38. Retreived from Abad, Gemino H. 2012. Hoard of Thunder Philippine Short Stories in English 1990-2008 pp. 9-17. UP Press. To have survived the great is greatness enough – was how Basilio Santos explained his obsession with Mrs. Douglas MacArthur, wife of the son of Arthur MacArthur. This bit of logic came to him one early Sunday morning as he was walking to the neighbourhood flea market. Its truth was so surprising he found himself halted at the intersection where Chinatown central began. He looked up; he looked down. All the shops were still closed, and only about a half dozen men were out on the streets. He noted how sunlight noosed a pagoda roof and a water tank; trash from last night’s commerce- trampled purple plums, shredded green leaves- glinted on the sidewalk. For a minute, he left he was inside a movie, at the mouth of King Solomon’s mines, exotic gems tossed by a casual hand his for the picking. When he returned empty-handed to his apartment, he told his roommate Iliong what he’d discovered. He repeated it to Pearl when, alert as a puppy, she arrived for lunch. Neither thought much of it. From behind the curtain dividing the living room and which screened off

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES his sleeping area, Iliong grunted. Pearl, on the other hand, claimed there was no need for an excuse. If Basilio wanted to host a party for Mrs. MacArthur why, then, a party there should be. He really had no intention of becoming a host but he could not disappoint her. She was young and eager, twenty-two years old, as austere and simple as her name. when she showed up on his doorstep, holding out a letter from his niece back home-a niece who wasn’t at all on his brother’s mind when Basilio boarded the ship that took him from Manila to San Francisco-all he could think of was how perfect would be at a party for Mrs. MacArthur. With spring just beginning, she wore a peach-colored shirtdress, a pert box hat, sheer stockings, and white shoes, and because she’d just been to church, white lace gloves. She looked, as Basilio told Iliong, “proper; a little off but right, nevertheless.” When she came again the following Sunday, he had what he thought would round heroff to perfection-a 24-inch string of faux pearls. It was unfortunate she was wearing jeans, which pronounced the fake pearls atrocious. Gallant but atrocious. But being what she was, barely able to contain her eagerness to make a dent on this brave new world, she took to the idea of a part for Mrs. MacArthur immediately. She called up a few “pillars of the community,” as Basilio referred to them; checked up on some restaurants; even drew up a taped music, just as afternoon tea was better than dinner. “Why tea?” was Iliong’s only comment. “Because no one does afternoon teas anymore.” Basilio answered, echoing Pearl and thinking how odd it had turned out be. All he needed for his dream. It seemed, was an energetic, young and much focused woman. These were halcyon days. Pearl’s busyness at what she called “pre-op organizing” (forgive her language; she was an RN) had scattered the idea of a party beyond Basilio’s thin social circle. Now, not a week passed without at less a call from someone wanting to be invited. Neither she nor Basilio had anticipated that Mrs. Douglas MacArthur could be vital to so many situatons. “WWII veterans lobbying for benefits,” he told Iliong. “Bataan survivors petitioning for citizenship. Diplomats working for more aid loans. Anti-defamation legues…” From the depths of his bunk, Iliong answered with a neutral sound. He didn’t like the idea of a party and had his doubts about the intrusion of strangers into his Basilio’s quiet life. He warned Basilio that Pearl could be dragging them into something they couldn’t handle. Laughing, Basilio repeated that to Pearl, to show her he did not take Iliong seriously. But Pearl, delicately raising a cup of coffee to her rose-patal lips, gave him a measuring look. He became conscious of the faded rust-colored, paisley-patterned curtain sealing off Iliong’s world from the living room. Fear awoke, its neck hood swollen, in his heart. It was careless of him. He rarely talked about Iliong, letting the curtain sever him from reality as effectively as any Berlin Wall. For some reason, the way Pearl had looked during that first visit had compelled him to explain how Iliong was an exceedingy sick man and worse, most grievously embarrassed by his illness. In the second of their four decades together, Basilio’s roommate had contracted a disgusting though nonfatal skin disease, whose nature he was not about to afflict Pearl with, and had decided to withdraw from all eyes. “That was how we put it,” Basilio had said, lowering his voice. “From all eyes. He’s at peace now and enjoys hearing about the world from me. He listens in to conversations here, of course – but that’s nothing. It’s only to break the monotomy. What harm could come from that? We’re only two old men together.” Pearl had demanded to know the exact symptoms,, rattling off one skin disorder after another. “Shingle! Must be . . . eczema! or such a thing as pseudo-leprosy. . . “ This was followed by suggestions to visit one doctor after another, and Basilio had been hard put to fend off her enthusiasm. Truth to tell, he had enjoyed it, since the girl, dismayed that a compatriot

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES should remain untreated when the most advance medical technology was available, rang him up even in the dead of night, as she ended one hospital work shift and before starting another. To discuss symptoms and possible diagnoses, she said. It had taken, all in all, three months of evasion on Basilio’s part to convince her it was hopeless. After that, the paisley curtain had become no more than curtain meant to hide unmentionables. That she hadn’t forgotten. Pearl showed Basilio one somewhat brisk evening with a fall nip in the air. Looking up from the list she was making, a list which contained such admonitions as find out Mrs. MacArthur’s first name!, Pearl had turned her head towards the curtain while her eyes’ pupils had sisled back to basilio, “I don’t think anyone’s in there,” she said, face suddenly all-knowing, no longer young. He had no answer for her. He was sure he had a roommate, indeed recalled being with him on the day peace was celebrated at Times Square, when all the bells of New York rang like maddened angels; when men and women came boiling out of street corners, buildings and shops, hats a skew, mouths stretched open by screams of joy; when strangers pressed lukewarm beer bottles into his hands and receiving a nod to the question, Are you a Filipino?, urged him to have one for MacArthur! Oh, yes. Certainly, that was his roommate’s voice slithering, cool as a snake, into his ear saying, “Well, now, we can go back to invisibility, no?” The words, having been spoken, an omen for Basilio’s declining years, were imprinted, as it were, on Broadway’s clangorous air. He’d been young man before WWII. Suddenly, as the final dingdong of the bell of Japan’s surrender petered out into silence, he was old. He lost his job. The engaging Irish woman, who’d shared his coffee-and-Danish every five o’clock Monday to Friday, moved on; an eviction notice arrived, saying he had to make way for a new building. He found himself renting a desolate apartment at the border at the border between what could be called Manhattan proper and the alien territory of Chinatown. On the edge, as he would say to Iliong and to himself over the years; on the edge and never quite sure of one thing or the other. . . Who cared? Casualties of peace could not lobby for attention like casualties of war. There had been sickness-of that he was sure. If he felt around his brain carefully, he would find twilight memories of a country of pain. But he was too scared to call all that up. As soon as a batwing of darkness stirred the settled air of his mind, he fled, closed a door to his footprints and firmly turned a key. It was swell enough,, he would say to himself, that he survived; and doubly lucky that Iliong had survived with him. Now and then, mostly at dawn, when street traffic had not begun and the garbage trucks had long ceased their grumbling, such a silence would possess the three-room apartment as to rouse Basilio. Staring at the rectangular pane of the front window made translucent by a mercury street bulb, he would be assailed by a certainty that he was alone, had always been alone, and that the world outside wasa lying empty and fallow. But Iliong always answered his panicky call: Yes, Bas? A low voice, without inflexion, abrupt and reassuring as a candle in the dark. He had been tempted to breach the integrity of the paisley curtain. There had been days when he hadn’t even dared to look at it, fearing that fear would overcome him, that he would storm that delicate barrier. Weeks when the dread that he’d completely lost his mind, that he would not, ever, be able to tell whether Iliong was fact or fancy, assailed him. At such times, he moved like a zombie in his own home, hoping the presence behind the curtain would betray its nature, with a word, a sudden move. . . But that passed, as everything else did. Fear ebbed and with it, the fear of fear. He grew used to Iliong answering whenever he called out. With Iliong and now, Pearl, Basilio could count himself among the truly blest. He had two friends to think of as he walked among the flea market stalls, waving to familiar vendors, accepting for inspection this or that gewgaw, carefully considering a purchase. He could let

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES drop casually that perhaps his friend would like such a scarf. . . or that a brooch would indeed be useful to his friend, Pearl. Each time either’s name dropped from his lips, a profound gratitude seized him and his eyes would water. He was so very, very lucky. Better to be thankful and not question, not to look for flaws, he told himself while mulling over whether to buy or not a half-dozen steamed buns to share with the two. Today being Sunday with Pearl would be coming for lunch. That was a pleasant thought. It was always Sunday with Pearl while Iliong was for every day. A special treat and a staple. What more could a man ask for? Better to simply savor the idea of a party for Mrs. MacArthur, rolling it over and over in his mind like a rock candy. Better to be content looking at Pearl, over the food-speckled table top of their regular lunch diner, and to imagine how she’d fit in with the Mozart, the orchids, and the fragility of bone china. She was trying her best, Pearl said a bit guiltily. It was just bad luck that everything happened all at once this season. With the mother “back home” due for an eight childbirth, Pearl had had to take on a second job-which made it difficult to work on the party plans, not to mention holding on to a tentative romance (here she flushed a little) with a nice young man, a Caucasian in law school whose splinter-studded and bruised left hand she’d bandaged one day. “but I’m trying to apportion my time equitably,” she said, and followed that with a confession the young man to resolve their status. She smiled, little white teeth barely showing, dipped a delicate forefinger into her cup of tea, and sucked on it. Basilio was unperturbed. Preparations for party, any party, took time, he said. And what the hell, they hadn’t managed to discover Mrs. MacArthur’s about it,” he told pearl, patting her hand as it lay half-curled like a shell on the tabletop. He himself was busy. He didn’t tell her but he had been putting together a portrait of how he and Pearl, and perhaps Iliong, would look at party. Though the details were largely accidental, dependent on what caught his eye from day to day, still they were legion, demanding a time-and-patienceconsumiing vigilance. He scoured the flea market for the pieces that would complete his vision. A tuxedo set which fitted him (perhaps it had been a boy’s, for basilio was a small man), priced at thirty dollars. A silk dress, the color of champagne, its folds falling the way silk fell against Jean Harlow’s flesh in those old movies. Like seawaves, he said happily. When the dress came back perfect from the cleaners. This and other stuff he hung in his bedroom closet, tucked away among clothes bought for Iliong, clothes which went unworn. He had not told Pearl what the party was about, really. Not that it wasn’t to honor a great lady, Mrs. Douglas MacArthur, wife of the man who, along with his father, placed Basilio’s country on the map. But Basilio was also convinced-why, he didn’t know- that the party was just the means to draw Iliong out of his self-imposed exile. He was certain its celebratory air would somehow make its way to parting the divide of paisley curtain, and one afternoon, the afternoon of the party to be exact, Basilio was sure of it, as he and Pearl donned their finery and prepared to leave for the reception, as the two of them were delirious with the thought of standing shoulder-to-shoulder with a little white-haired lady auraed by dignity, the paisley curtain would stir, would part a little. An eye would peep out, a voice would ask, What are you up to now? And Basilio would pretend not to notice the momentousness odd that instant and, winking at Pearl, would say negligently, Oh, we’re only off to tea with Mrs. MacArthur. At which Iliong would be offended that he wasn’t invited, would be hurt, would pout, would sulk, and Basilio would produce, from the generous recesses of his bedroom closet, the proper costume for the man; produce all the pieces of it – top hat, silk gloves, a little cane, shirt, jacket and pants, shoes, and a frilly-edged handkerchief for the breast pocket. And hand it ovre to Iliong with the admonition to hurry and dress up smartly, because they were all about to step into their rightful niche in the world.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Gathering the components of this dream would take a while, what with only a social security check between himself and the poor house. So he was in no hurry, he told Pearl – which was a lie because he was in a race, he damn well knew it, looking at and into her face where the softness was congealing into angular lines of bitterness. He poured her another cup of tea and asked about her mother, her young man, her work… anything at all stop himself from saying what he wanted but didn’t dare say. It would be useless anyway; such a bit of wisdom could not be transferred. It had to be experienced. How could he tell her, he demanded of Iliong when the Sunday guest was gone, leaving the opaque from window sprayed with dusk’s red-golden light – how could he tell her that one never got used to it, that there was no way of reconciling one’s self to it? “You hope that with time, it will ease up,” he said. “But it doesn’t happen. Because you know that each day of your absence is a day you can never recover. Events transpire; things happen. Children and tress grown without knowledge of you. Pebbles shift in the riverbed. Whole chunks of memory are filed away without your participation. You go to sleep with this thought. It doesn’t wane with time, only sharpens, increasing your sense of loss. And you realize that departures are not onetime but constant, daily, and not only yourself but the landmarks you abandoned are leaving. Leaving. In your absence, the earth has moved by that much in the vastness of space. How could I tell her this, Iliong?” “You use words so well, Bas,” Iliong said. “You should’ve been a poet.” He laughed. “And starve even more than we already did?” He walked to his bedroom, past the mismatched fortune of the living room and the sorry litter of the kitchen with its grease-blackened cast-iron stove-oven. At the farthest end of the railroad-type apartment was the closet, set against the last wall. He pushed one of its sliding doors open. Inside were the clothes for Iliong and Pearl, their nearly complete costumes which, he was sure now, would never be complete, just as they would never discover Mrs. Douglas MacArthur’s first name soon enough for the party ro become truth. That had been in the brittle quality of her glances – undeniable, despite her attempt to cast an ordinary light on her words. There was trouble with the young man, she’d said jauntily, right hand fluttering in a wave of dismissal. She was angry. Bitter and angry. Mind muscle, and bone clenched about a volcanic rage. Basilio recognized the symptoms. His heart skipped a little, remembering the desolation of his Irish lady’s leave taking. He’d felt then he was losing a world, this world – which was unfair, for he’d gambled away the old one for its sake. And having lost so many worlds, he’d built a shell, a snail’s lair to carry on his back, impossible and misplaced. He’d asked Pearl what the problem was, and she’d answered airily that the young man was being evasive. And what, he’d persisted, was she going to do about it? “Force truth out,” she said, the pupils of her eyes contracting to hard points of black light. And she’d added something about the difference between his and her generation, speaking as though they were islands isolated by time. Before leaving, she told him of how, because there were no public toilets, male pedestrians would spread their legs, casually unzip their pants, and urinate in scant privacy of the steel beams of Mac Arthur Bridge in Manila. Basilio pressed both knuckles against his closed eyes, rubbing gently, smoothing himself with the motion. She spoke the truth, Pearl did; had always done so, since she had the courage of the unhurt. Only time and repeated punishment could break her from the habit, and a longer period and more grievous punishment before she learned to lie to herself. But she would learn – eventually, if she were to survive. In the meantime… O, Bas would be the one to pay, of course, he being the most vulnerable and closest to her. It seemed almost predestined that driven beyond endurance by the

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES lies that attent all sel-exile, she would hurl herself against the frail veil of the rust-colored paisley-patterned curtain, to crash through the barrier into the world beyond – to find what? Perhaps, a young man, whose skin had been endowed by a strange disease with the smoothness of mango skin, impervious to time. Handsome and lithe, he would take her hand on his arm and draw her to Times Square where peace was being celebrated and where they would trade embraces with strangers before moving on the Waldorf for an everlasting party in honor of Mrs. Douglas Mac Arthur, a perfect little party attended by tall, confident men in tuxedoes and slim women in silk dresses and stubby-heeled shoes, not a strand of hair out of place in the whole ballroom, floating on the music of Mozart and eternal happiness. Or then again, perhaps she’d find nothing but a four-drawer bureau, a small table with a porcelain basin and pitcher, and a naked bunk – all shrouded by an inch-thick layer of pale relentless dust.

Michelle Skinner 10. Scent of Flowers 1990 Contest, First Prize University of Hawaii on Manoa. Retrieved from Philippine American Short Stories pp. 34-48. Philippine Arts, Letters and Media PALM Council and Giraffe Books 1997

Underneath the hotel, the elevator door slides open and Linda squints in the familiar fluorescent glare. She crosses her arms against the cold and tries not to breathe deeply the sickly sweet smell which pervades the hall. The walls and ceilings are lined with large, flat black pipes, and Linda walks down the hall following one of the pipe trails. It leads her to a large room full of women wearing brown, yellow and orange hotel uniforms imprinted with a Hawaiian tapa cloth pattern. Non-uniform sweaters are pulled over their blouses. The women sit in front of gray tables pulling laundry from the carts arranged around them. There is also bit of heavy sweet smell in this room although it smells mostly of detergent and fresh, warm sheets. “Hi, Linda,” says Albertine, the Hawaiian lady who is the supervisor of the housekeeping staff, “You on your way to work?” “Yeah.” “Ines, your daughter,” says one of the Filipino ladies. Linda’s mother has already turned in her chair. She holds a pillowcase in one hand and motions to her daughter with her free hand. Linda takes a chair from a nearby table and sits beside her mother. Sitting among the piles of laundry, her mother tells her about that morning. “I was watering the plants on the lanai, and I thought I noticed a sweet scent in the air.” She folds the sheet once, twice, finally tossing the compact bundle into the basket with the other folded sheets. She reaches for another. “But, none of the plants have flowers. I thought the scent came from that green hanging plant in the corner. You know, the prickly one. Except that I don’t think it’s a flowering plant.” She lays the sheet on the table and looks at Linda. “You know, I thought of your grandmother. That’s what the smell of flower means, that the dead are paying a visit.” Linda listens quietly. She doesn’t look at her mother but instead fingers a corner of the sheet. Her mother takes up the sheet and continues folding. Under the fluorescent lamp and against the whiteness of the sheet, her mother’s hands appear splotched a painful purple. “I sat down to wait.”

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES “What happened?” Linda asks. “Nothing. A breeze came to the apartment and blew the scent away.” “Maybe it was one of the plants you smelled.” “No. I checked, and I didn’t see any flowers.” Linda’s mother finishes one basket of sheets. She stretches her arms and then rubs her shoulders. “Are you thirsty?” she asks. “You want to split a Coke?” “O.K.” Linda’s mother gives Linda two quarters. She begins folding laundry from another basket as Linda walks to the Coke machine. “The dead don’t come to visit here,” Linda hears one of the Filipino ladies say. “they know this isn’t their home.” Later that evening Linda changes out her restaurant uniform so she won’t be too conspicuous and waits for the number fifty six bus outside the market in Kuhio. It’s a well-lit place. Linda tucks her long hair behind her ears and checks her watch. It’s eleven-thirty, and the bus won’t be along for another twenty minutes. She leans back on the palms of her hands and looks around at the other people who are waiting. A car pulls up to the corner. “Linda,” says the driver. She looks into the black car. “Mario.” “Going home? You need a ride?” She hesitates. She is not sure she wants to ride with him, her ex-boyfriend. “Yeah. Yeah, I do.” He stretches across the seat and opens the door. “Get in.” Linda settles into the darkness of the car. It is better than the buses which are much too bright for her and other tired people traveling toward darkness and sleep. Linda sits with her arms crossed against her chest. Mario turns the radio up. Apparently he had turned it down to talk to her. Linda watches his dark hand and fingers searching for radio station. “What you want to listen to?” “Anything,” says Linda. He doesn’t reply but continues to turn the dial. Finally he settles on a station playing dance music. I got to get a new stereo. This one’s junk.” Linda uncrosses her arms and relaxes into her seat. She stays on her side of the car and leans against the door. “Hey,” Mario nudges her on the shoulder. “How you doing? Haven’t seen you for a while.” “I’m doing O.K.” They head over the bridge and out of Waikiki. He doesn’t take the freeway but takes almost the same route the bus would. He is cruising, looking out his window at pretty women. Linda looks away. “How’s your folks?” “Fine” “Your sister?” “She’s O.K.” “She don’t live with your folks no more?” “No.” “She’s a wild one,” he says and smiles at her. He smiles his pretty-boy smile which alarms Linda. They drive past the lei stands of Manukea which will open in five hours for early morning business. As they turn right, Linda thinks she smells flowers in the air. She leans her head out the window, and her hair blows in

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES the breeze. It can’t be from the lei stands. Those are locked up, shut tight, the sweet pink and orange petals sealed off from the night. “Do you smell those flowers?” she asks Mario. But she has spoken too softly, and he doesn’t hear her above the radio. They glide through the sleeping part of Chinatown. Linda remembers what her mother said. This is an old part of town with small, tight shops and narrow streets. The dead must walk the streets every night. But these are Chinese, so maybe they don’t believe in that story. “Do you know that story?” she asks Mario. She forces her voice above the level of the radio. “What?” “Do you know that story about the flowers? If you smell flowers, that means the dead are coming to visit.” “Is this a old Filipino story?” “Yes.” They are at a stoplight, and he runs his hand through his sun-browned surfer hair. “Never heard it,” he says, disappointing her again. He lays his brown hand back on the steering wheel. They enter the dark and dangerously quiet streets of Kalihi. Mario stops in front of her apartment building. “Here you go.” A group of boys are lounging in front of the building. “Mario!” one of the boys yells. “Hey, Jimbo!” Mario says. “Howzit?” Linda doesn’t hear the answer. “Thanks,” she says. “No problem.” He smiles his smile with half-closed eyes. Linda is glad that the car is big and much wider that necessary for two people. He is still smiling, looking at her, pulling her toward him. “See you around,” she says. He nods, she looks away, and gets out of the car. Linda hears the car leave as she walks toward her apartment, toward the yellow light in the entrance. As she approaches, the boys run their eyes over and past her, smoke rising casually from their lips. Slowly, like waking animals, they move across the light coming through the doorway. Linda moves toward them briskly to hide her weakness and lack of confidence. "Hey, Linda," one of the boys says softly, his eyes half-closed. "Where you go so late?" "You and Mario back together?" They shift, the inside of their jeans scratching together. Sweet smoke burns her tired eyes, and boys are roo heavy with smell of sweat and smoke and everything she doesn't want to know, Linda pushes through them, their sweat bruising her arms, their breath on her hair almost too heavy to bear. "Hey, Lin!" One of them calls down the hall to her. She pauses at the stairs, but does not look at them. "You seen your sister lately?" Linda climbs the stairs. "We have!" The laughter diminishes, but she cannot escape it anywhere in the stairwell, in the building of chipped, yellow walls. She hunches her shoulders and pull her bag closer for protection, for comfort. She wishes that the boys did not need her or anyone else to humiliate. She enters the apartment and knows the darkness is not empty. "Hello," her father says. He is sitting in the dark living room. Linda stands tired, trying to hold back all the secrets he cannot know.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES "Hello," says Linda. She turns on the hallway light. "How was work?" "O.K." He rises from the couch where he had been lying. "Have something to eat before you go to bed." "I will," Linda says, knowing she won't eat. " I want to take a shower first." "All right," he says as he disappears into his room. In the shower, Linda uses hot, hot water, the hottest she can stand, to wash off the smell of everything. And finally her body is smooth to her fingers and smells as sharp and as clean as the soap melting in the shower. She falls asleep between the dry sheets with the smell of the soap. On Friday, after work, Mario gives Linda a ride. He passes by the bus stop and beeps at her. "Thought you'd be here," he says as Linda gets in the car. "Thanks," she says. They drive in silence through a side street and down to the canal which is the edge of Waikiki. Linda doesn't know what to say to him. She doesn't want the ride but needing it makes her angry. She tries to lean her head against the door. But the constant vibration hurts her so she has to sit up. She thinks for a moment that maybe she ought to say something. Instead she let the radio fill in the space within them. "Do you want to go to a party?" asks Mario. They are waiting for a stop light. "I don't think so." "Come on." He pulls her hand like a child. "Come go with me." He smiles, trying to melt her. "No," Linda said. She pulls her hand away. "No, I'm tired." "You sure?" "Yeah, I'm sure. I'm already tired." The radio plays, but they are silent, and even the radio cannot penetrate the silence. Linda thinks it is a hurt silence. It is dense. The apartment, when she enters, is quiet. Linda doesn't want to break the silence, so she takes off her shoes and leaves them by the door. She glides through the darkness and into her room where she undresses by the bit of light sneaking through the edge of the curtain. But it is impossible to be quiet in the bathroom, so she hesitates, then flips on the light and turns the shower knob. The sudden sound of water makes her cringe. Afterwards, she wraps herself in her white terry cloth bathrobe and walks out to the lanai. She checks the plant for flowers. She checks even those plants she knows cannot bear flowers. She likes to believe that anything is possible. But the Japanese bamboo shoes no secret to bloom, the prickly hanging plant in the corner is nothing but profusion of spiny green leaves. She looks up at the nearly identical apartment next door. She is hoping too hard, she thinks. It is not comforting thought. She walks back inside. "Linda?" says her father as she passes his room. "Yes," she reassures him. Linda wakes the next morning to the ringing of the telephone. "Hello?" She tries to speak clearly, as if she is completely awake. It is her sister. "Hi, Helen." "Is he there?" "Yeah." Linda looks toward the bedrooms. "But he's sleeping. Helen . . ." Linda suddenly feels she must talk to her sister because Helen would understand her. "You want to meet for lunch today?" "Today?"

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES "Yeah. Today." "O.K. How about Ala Moana?" "Isn't that kind of far for you?" "I moved." "Oh." Linda adjusts to the information. "How about twelve-thirty?" "O.K. Where should we meet?" "The food court?" "Yeah. O.K." Linda hangs up and looks at the clock siting by the stove. It's only six o'clock. She walks back to her room to get more sleep. "Linda?" says her mother from the bedroom. "Who was that?" asks her father. "No one." At twelve-thirty, when Linda gets to the Food Court, her sister is sitting by the entrance, near the juice bar, her sunglasses on and her feet propped up on one of the chairs. She sits carelessly, her skinny body in jeans and a T-shirt, looking for disapproval. She has bleached a single, long, white streak through her dark hair. "Hey, Lin," Helen says. "You changed your hair." Hellen pulls at the strand of hair and smiles. "Yeah." She looks at Linda. "Let's go to McDonald's." They walk around the corner to the pink and green McDonald's. Linda pulls a leaf off one of the plastic plants by the door. The plants are everywhere in the restaurant - the ceiling, the walls, surrounding the tables. She wishes they were real and that the leaves would bend over and tear in her fingers. Helen studies the menu through her sunglasses. Finally they order, and Linda pays for it. Helen carries their tray to a table. "So, how you been?" Helen asks. She opens a box and lifts out her cheeseburger. "O.K." "Yeah? How's school?" "It's all right." Helen nods and eats one of her fries. "How's Pizza Hut?" "Busy. I'm glad I'm not in the kitchen anymore." They are silent as they chew on their food. "How are you?" Linda asks. "O.K. O.K. I'm doing all right." "You said you moved." "Yeah. I'm living in Makiki now." "That's far from work." "I'm not working there anymore." "Where are you working?" "At a club." "Really? Which club?" "Just a club," Helen says. Linda eats a french fries. "Where do you live now?" she asks, stalling. "Nehoa Street," says Helen. "Fourteen-oh-two Nehoa." They continue eating quietly. Helen finishes her hamburger and begins eating her fries. Linda doesn't know what to tell Helen. She feels ridiculous and pathetic here in the presence of her sister.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES "So, what's the problem?" Helen asks. "What?" "You asked me to come here." Linda wipes some ketchup off the table. She picks up another napkin and wipes the spot completely clean. "I don't know," she says finally. She stares at the tabletop, "He's goodlooking," she adds. "I know that," Linda says. "He doesn't understand, everything's easy to him. He scares me," Linda finishes softly. This is not at all what she wanted to say. "Why does he scare you?" "I don't know." Linda stares at her fish sandwich. "Just something." "Shit, Linda. You scared too much," Helen says and resumes eating her french fries. Linda feels too miserable to eat anymore. Helen finishes her fries and wipes her hands carefully, finger by finger, on her napkin. She adjusts her sunglasses and stands. "I got to go. If Mom and Dad ask, tell them I'm O.K." Linda is left sitting at the table with the barely eaten fish sandwich. She watches her sister walk outside. Helen looks back and does not wave, just looks through her dark glasses. Linda realizes she didn't even see her sister's eyes. She wants to tell Helen that everything is too close and not at all simple. She can't explain it. On Sunday, after they get home from the noon mass, Linda's mother sits in the living room reading the newspaper. Linda first changes out of her dress, then joins her mother. Her father is on the lanai watering the plants and turning the soil with his hands, the trowel forgotten behind. She sits on the couch and reaches for a section of the newspaper. When her father has washed the dirt from his hands and replaced the watering pitcher, he joins them. The sports section has been left for him, and he picks it up. Linda adjusts the crocheted throw on the couch to cover up the coffee stain. It's a humid day. Her legs and arms stick to the upholstery and the throw. She glances at her father, who is staring intently at the page before him. His lips move slightly and he seems about to say something so she waits. Nothing. She returns her eyes to the open page in her lap. "The bitch!" Her father says. His hands clutch the newspaper tightly. Linda and her mother stare at him. He tears the paper apart and throws it violently. It floats. He kicks it. Linda's mother rushes to his side, but he pushes away from her and stomps out to the lanai. Linda waits while her mother, the paper shielding her face, learns the source of her father's anger. Finally, her mother, dazed and shocked like a child or a very old woman, looks up at nothing in particular. She holds a torn page out for Linda and joins her husband on the lanai. They speak in low voices, her father angry, her mother soothing, but confused. Linda does not hear what they say. She scans the page of the basketball scores and basketball articles. She notices the ad for the Club Brazil, with beautiful, exotic girls and a picture of a woman who cannot be anyone but her sister. Her sister in a bikini. She can see her sister's eyes, although not very well. It is a small picture. The eyes are dark and small as she remembers them. But they are smiling, not defiant like she knows her sister to be. She doesn't think her sister has changed as much as the picture implies. Her parents have stopped talking. Linda leans across the coffee table and looks outside. Her mother looks strange in her church dress and slippers. They are standing with their hands on the wall of the lanai, staring at the next building. Her mother's head jerks as if she is waking up. She looks cautiously at her husband. Linda needs to get away, but is afraid that if she walks outside, she will have to look at the whole neighborhood of low-cost apartments. She will be filled with the sight of tired, older,

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES and angry young people. Helen said she, Linda, was afraid of a lot. Helen is fearless and careless so she cannot be touched by such things. Linda pretends she is like this also. She walks to the door and puts on her sneakers. On her way out she catches her mother's eyes. They look away from each other. Downstairs Linda finds that the boys are not there. In their place they have left cigarette butts and the faint smell of beer and urine. Linda walks around the block looking at everything. It's not as bad as all that, she tells herself repeatedly. She passes the yellow buildings, old long ago, and says hello to those she knows. She keeps her distance. Climbing the stairs to her apartment, she thinks that Helen would have left and not come back. When she gets home her parents do not say anything. Her father sits in his chair reading the entertainment section of the newspaper. The sports section is nowhere to be seen. Her mother is in the bathroom heaving buckets of water against the wall of the tub. The water splashes loudly against the tile and the smell of Pine Sol permeates the whole apartment. Linda walks into the bathroom and tells her mother that she will speak to Helen. On Friday, Linda decides that she cannot put it off any longer. She cannot find her sister in the phone book. She can't even remember her address so she sits on the couch and looks at the sports section of the Sunday newspaper spread on the coffee table. Finally she picks up the paper and tears out the ad. Twelve-sixteen North Beretania Street. She refolds the sports section and places it in the closet with the other papers, in the middle of the pile so her parents will not have to look at it. She arrives at the club at five o'clock, thinking it won't be full of customers yet. But it is the kind of bar which attracts the afterwork crowd, and it is Friday. Linda stands by the doorway, waiting for her eyes to adjust to the dark room. When they do, she realizes that a number of men are staring at her. She walks to one corner of the bar and waits for the bartender to notice her. "Yes?" The woman looks at her suspiciously. "Is Helen here tonight?" Linda asks softly. "Who?" The woman's voice is demanding. "Helen," Linda raises her voice. "Is Helen here tonight?" "No. Helen not here yet." "When will she get in?" "Maybe six, six thirty. You like something to drink?" "Yes. I'll have a Seven-Up, please." Linda looks around the room. She catches the eye of a few men and quickly looks away. Helen could look right through them, the way she looks at most anything. Linda can't do that. A karaoke plays somewhere in the dimness waiting to accompany the first person brave enough to sing. The bartender sets a small glass of Seven-Up in front of her. Linda hunches her shoulders protectively and waits. The man next to her lights a cigarette, and she wrinkles her nose as the smoke drifts past. Linda watches the door, and she orders another Seven-Up so as not to feel so lost. Helen enters half an hour late. She runs a hand through her hair as she walks across the room. Her brown stomach is exposed between the short yellow blouse and the jeans she is wearing. She stops at the bar to talk to the bartender who points to Linda. Helen walks over. There are no empty seats, so she stands. "How you doing?" Helen asks. She tucks her hair, with the white streak, behind her ears and leans against the bar. "I couldn't find your number in the phone book," says Linda.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES "Did Dad send you?" "No. I came on my own." The bartender sets a drink by Helen, but she doesn't seem to notice it. Helen looks Linda in the eyes. Linda thinks Helen's eyes still look the same. But she's not sure. "So what's the problem?" Linda doesn't answer. She drinks from her glass of Seven-Up. The man sitting next to Linda leaves to sit at a table. Helen takes her drink and climbs onto the barstool he has vacated. "Well, what does Dad want?" "You know what he wants," Linda says impatiently. "He's upset about the picture." "Yeah, yeah" "He thinks you're embarrassing the family." "I don't think that many people even saw the damn thing." "It doesn't matter," says Linda. "He saw it. And so did Mom." "So what am I supposed to do? Beg for forgiveness?" She runs a finger through the wet rings on the counter. "It's a little late now," she says softly. "Just don't do it again," says Linda. It's all she can think to say. They sit without talking, their elbows on the bar almost touching. A woman in a sleeveless gold lame dress is standing in the circle of light which serves as a stage, saying something about a song. "That's the owner," Helen says. The owner holds her left hand out to the audience, and a man in a business suit weaves his way through the crown toward her. After a minute of chatter, the woman leaves the man behind in the circle of light. Music fills the room, and the man begins singing "The Girl from Ipanema" to the music of the karaoke. "He's not very good," says Linda. "None of them are," says Helen. "You should hear them when they're really drunk." They both smile. "That's a nice blouse," says Helen. Linda looks down to see what she's wearing. It's her sleeveless polka-dot blouse. "Thanks, she says. "It's new." "It's nice," says her sister. "Why did you move?" Asks Linda. "I moved in with this guy Steven." Linda wonders what happened to Guy. She knows sho should not ask, but she doesn't know what to say. She's not quite sure what to say to her sister anymore. Helen shakes her head. "Anyway, that's why you couldn't find me in the phone book. It's his apartment and the phone's under his name." "I hope it works out," Linda finally says. "Who knows?" Helen shrugs. "I always fall in love with them, and then it never works out." Linda realizes that Helen is not fearless or untouchable. Her sister, like her, hopes for too much. "It'll work out," Linda says, trying to help her sister. "Yeah, well, it's fun while it lasts," says Helen. Linda wants to tell her sister not to say that, not to talk like that. But she doesn't say anything. "How's Mario?" "I don't know," Linda sighs. "I just don't know." Helen stirs her ice with her finger. Finally she slides off the bar stool. "I have to get to work," she says. "Yeah." Linda is standing. "I better go."

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Helen reaches for her drink, then turns to Linda. "Tell them I'm O.K." "I will." Linda takes the bus to the hotel where her mother works. When Linda visits, it is always at the same time of day, and her mother is almost always folding sheets. Linda says hello to Albertine who gives her a flower from a plastic bag full of flowers. "I have lot of hibiscus at home," Albertine explains. "And they look so pretty I thought I'd share them." "Thanks," says Linda. "Put it in your hair," her mother says. Linda places the flower over her right ear. "Very pretty," says her mother. Albertine smiles, then returns to her folding. Linda notices a number of the other women wearing flowers. The flowers look sad under the fluorescent light. And they do nothing to ward off the cold. "Did you talk to your sister?" Linda's mother asks. "Did you tell her how angry your father was?" Her mother sets her elbows on the sheet she has just folded. She leans her face on her hands. "Yes." Linda plucks the flower from her hair and twirls it in her hand. "Yes, I told her." "What did she say?" "She won't do it again. She promised." "That's all?" "What do you want?" Her mother is silent. Linda smells the flower, but it smells green, like grass. Not like a flower at all. "I have to go," Linda says. Linda walks to her usual bus stop. It's almost nine o'clock on a Friday night, and she's certain that Mario will come by. She does not get on the number fifty-six when it stops. A few minutes later Mario does drive by, but he doesn't expect her, and she has to stand at the curb and wave to him. "Hi," she says. He opens the door for her. "You're early." "I didn't work tonight." Linda leans her head toward the window so the breeze will blow on her face. It smells of car exhaust and food. "I was just visiting my mom." She runs her hand through her hair, again and again, pulling the tangles loose. She can feel Mario watching her. She continues to run her hand through her hair, but it only get tangled again in the breeze. "Let's go somewhere," she says. They go to Ala Moana Beach. Holding her hand, he drags her, running, toward the outcropping of land. They climb down the slope onto the large black rocks which sit in the black water. "Come on," he urges and holds out his hand. Linda takes off her shoes. She climbs down hesitantly, afraid that she will slip and fall and be smashed against the wet rocks. He is a shadow, but she grabs his hand. She can hardly see him in the dark. He lays a hand on her stomach then moves away from her. A few moments later she hears him slip into the water. She walks cautiously to the edge of the rock and feels his clothes against her bare toes. "Come in," he says.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES "The waves. . ." "They aren't bad. Look." The ocean surges softly, and the waves break in white splashes under the small slip of a moon. This is not at all like it is under the bright light of day. "The rock are sharp." "Trust me," he says, like someone who says it often. Linda takes off her clothes and slides into the blue-black water. She slips underwater, and, for a moment, it is all silence. She rises, her wet hair clinging to her neck and shoulders. The warm, heavy sea is on her tongue, and the smell of it is only slightly unpleasant. "Trust me," he is saying. And she knows he is not to be trusted even before she touches him. She knows she is hoping for too much.

11. Natural Selection In the Company of Strangers pp. 15-25. 17 November 2009. HI: Bamboo Ridge Press

The intellectual awakening of the Philippines which followed the American occupation and the establishment of modern school system is one of the most gratifying results of American control in the islands. . . . It is because of this intellectual awakening the desire for growth and development that the American teachers have an opportunity of doing so important a work in introducing western methods and ideals, and in keeping the schools in close touch with western culture. - Henderson S. Martin, Secretary of Public Instruction, from Report of the Philippine Commission to the Secretary of War, 1900-1916.

April 7, 1909 Dear Anna, I am safely arrived in the Philippine Islands after two weeks’ voyage over the Pacific, not quite as pacific as I had hoped. Although I had means this fist letter to begin with my initial impressions of Manila, residual seasickness, exacerbated by an unpleasant encounter with some local food on my second day in the tropics, resulted in my being diagnosed with dysentery and bedridden for almost two weeks. I was then, upon doctor’s orders, confined for a further two weeks thereafter, until I regain my strength and usual weight. I am rapidly mending, with only six more days left in my confinement, and the good doctors at the military hospital have told me I shall soon be fit and ready for my duties. I admit to chafing at being so delayed in arriving at my new school. As you may recall, classes at the new agricultural college are to commerce mid-April. However, I quite likely shall be able to depart within the next week, certainly before the end of the month. My superior has written urging me to remain in Manila until duty discharged, as I will be no good to them in my current condition. As I still tire easily, due to the effects of my recent illness, I am afraid this shall be a rather brief missive. Let me assure you, dear sister that a am indeed feeling better every day and look forward to writing a much longer letter upon my complete recovery. Yours in good health, Your brother Harry

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES April 12,1909 Dear Anna, I must once again apologize for the brevity of my previous letter. As I am indeed in much better spirits and health, I deemed it best to write you immediately. The doctors at the U.S. military hospital have given me a clean bill of health, and I plan tomorrow to begin acquiring a few of the necessities I shall require for my new post. My hope is to leave for the college and my teaching duties within a week’s time. This unexpected interlude in Manila has allowed me to become acquainted with some old hands here teachers who have traveled around the archipelago and been stationed at many sites. A Mr. Brown, currently resting here in Manila before taking up a new station as superintendent in Tar-lac has visited me almost daily and told many stories of his years spent among the Bon-Toc Igorots in the northern hinterlands. I must say that even after many years spent on my doctoral fieldwork in Mexico, I feel unprepared for the sort of deprivations he has encountered. He has, however, assured me that my new college is quite within a day’s reach of Manila and frequently supplied with goods from the capital as well as regular mail service. Many others have given similar assurances, including a Miss Atwater, a scholarly matron who spent many years as an elementary school teacher not far south of the newly established college where I shall soon be teaching. I hasten to add that I am currently ensconced and rather comfortably, at the home of an American businessman who lets out some of his many rooms to fellow Americans passing through Manila. The home is laid out very much in the Spanish style to which I grew accustomed in Mexico – one enters the courtyard area around which are arrayed such rooms as the sala and library, which is meagerly stocked with books as I recently discovered upon finally venturing in there. However, the courtyard itself is quite pleasant with an abundance of plants in large Chinese ceramic pots and even a feathery palm in the middle, growing from amongst the flagstones. It was under that palm where your invalid brother stationed himself during this last week as the doctors had encouraged me to get some fresh air. So, every afternoon, I had simply to walk to the door of the bedroom, call out “Ayudame por favor!” and one of the male servants, usually the one called Domingo, would help me down the stairs from my room and arrange the steamer chair for me, always ensuring to provide me with some cool water – well boiled, mind you – and a small merienda of pan de sal, a Spanish bread very popular here, and warm broth, as recommended by the doctors. As I had hoped, my Spanish, from my fieldwork in Mexico for my Cornell studies, has proven useful. As I am feeling well enough and the doctor yesterday gave his assent, Mr. Brown has arranged an excursion for us this afternoon. We shall travel by carromata along the bay to Luneta Park. The sea air will doubtless do me good. With much affection, Your brother Harry August 3,1909 My dearest Anna, I do apologize for any consternation caused by my first letters from the tropics. Let me assure you that I am in the best of health and completely recovered from my illness, so far recovered in fact, that not two weeks after writing last I commended my duties at the new agricultural college, to which your much anticipated letter was forwarded. I have copied my new address at the top of this letter, so you may send your missives directly. I do hope this missive finds you and your family continuing to fare well. That Matias has gone through his first harvest season with his father is certainly a milestone. I recall many

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES years ago my first such harvest with father. That first year was arduous for one not accustomed to such physical labor although I had many times assisted father with tilling and planting and other work on the farm. The harvest, however, was quite different from any other experience, requiring such an intensity of labor in a brief period of time that my body was left aching for weeks after. As you may remember, many were the nights when father and I had to complete our work by lantern light, and many were the mornings when you could not stir me from bed! Classes at our new agricultural college and farm commenced in the middle of April, and, as I arrived nearly two weeks later, I expected my days would be full of planting to account for the time lost during my illness. However, my superior let me know that as the monsoon season was soon to begin, we would be spending our days primarily in classroom studies. The Philippines does not have a winter or fall but has dry and wet season as well as a cool season, which I’m told comes in December and runs through early February, if we are fortunate. My colleagues and I, all five of us, convene all our courses in a very large army tent. If the weather is favorable, we are able to conduct some of our lectures out of doors, which is infinitely preferable to the hot and humid confines of our tent. We are fortunate, or so I am told by my superior, Dr. Bicknell, to have for our use two blackboards and a small cache of chalk. As ours is a government-established institution, we have been supplied, however meagerly, with most of the necessary tools. Nonetheless, we have learned to have a light hand with the chalk. My current accommodations consist of a small Army tent and cot shared with my colleague Nash. You will notice at the bottom of this letter a rather hasty sketch of it. Nash and I also share a small table for our few hygiene supplies. We plan, by the end of the year, to erect two school buildings and more permanent accommodations. To this end, we have met with the town mayor on two occasions. He also paid a visit to our college and farm, accompanied by several other town officials, including a young woman who seemed to enjoy conversing with Mrs. Able, wife of one of our teachers and a teacher herself. The young lady told Mrs. Able that the mayor had invited her as her aunt had expressed interest in being a possible benefactress to the college. We only hope this shall indeed be the care. Again, let me congratulate Matias for completing his first harvest. My regards to Karl as well and please give Alice and little Mary each a peck on the cheek from me. It is with no small amount of envy that I envision the apple butter and pies you and Alice must certainly be baking at this time of year along with the strawberries and raspberries you must be canning. The fruit most available here is the guava, which as you may recall, I was never fond of in Mexico. But I am learning to appreciate the pine-apple and coconut in these climes. Yours in good health, Your brother Harry October 15, 1909 My dear Anna, You may tell Matias and your husband, Karl, that I am once again a farmer. Strange as it may seem at the beginning of your fall, we are entering our corn planting season. The monsoon season having ended my colleagues and I as well as the students of this new college, were able, by the end of September to plant the four varieties of corn that I carried with me I had been warned by Nash and Able, prior to our planting, that some of the students might balk at such labor. Yes, we are an agricultural college, but apparently manual labor is frowned upon by much of the populace, who send their children to school in order that they may become professionals who do not engage in such labor. One of our students in particular is the scion of

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES a Spanish mestizo – a term used by the natives to refer to those of mixed Spanish and Filipino blood. He is heir to many hectares and seemed dismayed when told about the upcoming assignment. However, when Dr. Bicknell, our director, made it clear that such work was expected of all students as a demonstration of learning and that he himself would be participating, the student had little recourse but to take up shovel and rake on the appointed day. Bicknell assigned this young man with Mrs. Able with whom a foul disposition would have been most ungentlemanly. Through such maneuvers, the good doctor ensured that all went well. By the end of the week, the young man was resigned to the proposition of more labor to come. Currently, our student population consists only of twelve young men, yet we are moving forward with great enthusiasm for this new undertaking. As I recounted in one of my first letters, before departing from Manila I was fortunate to spend time with fellow pedagogues with many years’ experience in these islands. They cautioned me not to expect too much in my first year. One of the American teachers felt the Filipino temperament had not yet matured to the point as to be inclined toward creativity or accuracy. However, several others including the earlier-mentioned Mr. Brown and a Miss Youngberg, felt that such deficiencies were more the mark of inadequate education – exercise of the mind as Miss Youngberg called it – and the Spanish system of rote memorization. They did agree that preparing the students to be accurate and observant scientists would be quite a task indeed. While these shortcomings were not immediately evident in the few months of classroom instruction they have become more so now that I am in the field with my charges. They are eager yet somewhat careless lot as pertains to measurement, recordkeeping, scrupulous observation, proper staking, and other such staples of the scientific trade. In spite of much repetition, I have yet to see them properly maintain the stakes between the field of their own accord although I have reminded them that such staking is necessary to maintain the integrity of our recordkeeping and is, in fact, one of the hallmarks of a true biologist. Such difficulties are to be expected at the beginning of our program. I can only hope that after two full years with us, our young men shall indeed be more capable scientists. Wishing for some of your apple butter, Your brother Harry November 3,1909 Dear Anna Your news about little Mary’s influenza was troubling indeed. I do hope she has completely recovered after all of your and Alice’s ministrations. By the time you take receipt of this letter, Karl and Matias should have successfully completed all the harvesting. Just yesterday I was forced to release one of our fields – planted with Mexican corn variety “A” – from scientific study. The young men responsible for its care introduced a local fertilizer – chicken manure collected from local henhouses down the road – in spite of explicit instructions regarding the field’s care. Their reasoning was the plant growth would be aided by the fertilizer, which I acknowledge was quite likely. However, as I reasoned, unless they had a sufficient quantity for the remaining three varieties of corn, the scientific knowledge we can gain from the field in question was in jeopardy, I admit the field is likely to do better with the added fertilizer and told the young men so. They were all looking very dismayed after my rather blistering attack upon their less-than-scrupulous scientific methods. I encouraged them to acquire enough manure next time to fertilize all the fields. Also, rather than raze the field in question, I assigned them to care for it but refrain from including any analysis of said field in their journals. I must do the young instigator of this incident, a native boy named Esteban, some justice in acknowledging his initiative. He rose

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES well before the others in order to accomplish his task of collecting the chicken manure from the farmers, from whom he’d previously arranged to collect at least two buckets each. Truth to be told, this is not unlike my experience in Mexico although I had hoped for better from a territory governed over ten years by the U.S. It is, however, still too early to hope for such, I am afraid. Nonetheless, work is proceeding. We hope, over the next two weeks to plant the C’s – the cacao, coffee, and camote – the latter a local variety of sweet potato, which is staple in this region. The coffee and cacao are also native to this region. My colleagues, the Ables, shall be experimenting on different methods of wee and pest control. For now, the corn is the only crop under my purview. Postcript, November 7,1909 We have much entertainment of late, having been guests of honor at two recent gatherings in the community. One was hosted by the town mayor and the other by an elderly woman apparently the aunt of the young lady who visited our school not long after my arrival. They were quite jovial events with many musicians and much dancing. I discovered that as a guest of honor we were expected to dance quite often and with many of the young ladies there. Fortunately, as my Spanish – from my tine in Mexico – enabled me to converse with my hosts, I was not needed on the dance floor as frequently as poos Nash. Prompted by one of our hosts, the elderly woman known as Dona Mercedes to expound upon my recent experiences in the Philippines, I related the aforementioned story of the corn and the fertilizer. “Well, of course,” Dona Mercedes replied upon my completion. Seeing I was baffled, her young niece came to the rescue: “They are not too much interested in science, maestro,” she explained. “Their ultimate goal is increase of crops.” “As it is mine,” I protested. “Peor es nada,” the aunt reminded me which means, roughly, “Half is better than none.” Oddly, dear sister, this recalled to me father’s admonition that “beggars can’t be choosers.” I suppose I am, after these many years of schooling and work, still very much a beggar of this earth, mining her for all that God can provide. Thus was I reminded of my purpose in going off to Cornell: to ensure that we all are provided with adequate food. And, so highly did I enjoy the large quantities of food at the gatherings, particularly the noodles at Dona Mercedes’, which I praised very highly, that she was moved to send a large dish, freshly prepared, to the school the following day. Thus did all the students and faculty enjoy a very hearty supper. Her generosity did much to alleviate my yearnings for some of your home canned apples and berries or a loaf of fresh bread. Affectionately, Your loving brother Harry December 11,1909 Dear Anna, We at the college have been a little harried of late. Nash, my tentmate, was taken ill two weeks ago, and we had all taken turns the first week – especially when his temperature was quite high – ministering to him and trying to keep seemed little improved and Dr. Bicknell decided to send him to the hospital in Manila accompanied by the Ables. We are quite certain it is not cholera but the doctors at the military hospital can certainly do much better that we. In the meantime, while we await the Ables’ return, we are continuing to care for our fields but

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES have temporarily suspended all classroom instruction. We are all praying for Nash’s recovery. Rest assured, I am in fine health. Your loving brother Harry December 13, 1909 Dear Anna, The Ables have just returned and brought word that Nash is suffering from pneumonia, possibly brought on by the recent volcanic activity from Ta-al Volcano, which, while not near enough to pose a threat, certainly does spew gases, which of late the winds have blown in our direction. The rest of us are well. Harry February 26, 1910 Although I have not heard yet from you, as the mail is very often at least two months traveling over ocean, I thought it apt to write with my wishes for a blessed Easter and a fine and temperature spring. By the time you receive this, summer may already have arrived! My colleague, Nash, is now fully recovered and has returned to his duties. A blessing for many of my compatriots here has been the opening of a bakery not a mile from our school. A local entrepreneur, the young woman mentioned in previous letters, has taken it upon herself to import to our sleepy hamlet a baker in Manila. Currently, they undertake to produce at least three different baked goods each day: the usual loaf of bread, the ubiquitous pan de sal, and another sweeter Spanish roll called ensaimada. The baker has informed me that he knows many other recipes but cannot yet produce them as the demand is little and the ingredients quite dear. Often when I stop in the shop for my loaf of bread, the proprietress offers me a mug of Spanish chocolate or coffee and one of her rolls, and she, her elderly aunt (Dona Mercedes), and I converse in Spanish and in some English. Bothe were educated in one of the convents in Manila. The young lady, upon completion of her studies, subsequently enrolled in a newly established English language program at the American Normal School. However, after only six months of such schooling, she returned to his province to help care for her ailing father, who passed away soon after. Within a year of that, she opened her bakery because, as she said, she is not one to remain at home without any occupation. Of such mettle, I hope, will this nation come into the twentieth century. The two ladies speak Spanish very fluently although with more of a Castilian flavor than that to which I’m accustomed. I have discovered that my Spanish, while adequate for Manila, is quite inadequate for the provinces. Many of my charges here speak only rudimentary Spanish. Fortunately, the American teachers who have been here for ten years did their work well, and my students’ English is such that we are usually able to understand each other satisfactorily. We are, as is usual in our schools here, lacking in textbooks and tablet paper. One of the textbooks I had hoped to use for my next level of instruction is not available, thus requiring that I change my previously planned lessons. We do what we are able with what we have. We at the college, in addition to writing our lessons on our blackboards and repeating often the necessary information, also have the students work on the farm, which reinforces much of our teaching. We currently are nurturing cabbages, corn, tomatoes, potatoes, and various fruit trees. The native cacao and coffee are thriving under the weed and pest control conditions we have undertaken to maintain on some of our fields. We expect increase crop yields. My attempts to grow some carrots with two of my students failed miserably as the entire crop was attacked by pests while still young.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Thanks to the efforts of Dr. Worcester, my professor from Cornell, we have been able to acquire more of the three varieties of Mexican corn, which have proved so much more amenable to the native climate than the American Midwestern corn seed. I had suspected as much and, thus, many of our current cornfields are planted with these varieties, which I brought myself from my own stock. We hope within the next few months to begin a small program in animal husbandry and to this end, have been making inquiries in order to acquire some pigs and cows. Finding suitable dairy cows has proved to be quite a task in a country where there are very few cows to be had at all. Matias and his sister, Alice, perhaps would be happy to hear this as I imagine the milking of the farm cows falls on their small shoulders. They probably cannot imagine a land without cows. Affectionately, Your brother Harry March 5, 1910 Dear Anna, Having finally received your much delayed letter, I must express my condolences at the passing of little Mary. She is in the Lord’s hand and must be looking down upon you with fondness. I only wish I could have met her. Sorrowfully, Your loving brother Harry July 10,1910 My dear Anna, I have passed over a year in this new territory and have grown quite accustomed to the rhythm of life here. This is now my second monsoon season and the rains have been much heavier than those last year. We recently endured what s called here a bag-yo, a hurricane. Fortunately, we had by that time finally completed our two school buildings and two additional building mean to serve as accommodation for students and faculty and thus withstood the hurricane with little difficulty. One indeed was endowed by the young lady proprietress of the bakery and her elderly aunt. The other was erected thanks to the generosity of Don Abelard Quinones de Santiago, the father of our mestizo student. We also have erected a temporary greenhouse and hired a native man to be our farm supervisor. Bautista is very knowledgeable in medicinal uses of native plants and recently proved of great assistance to Nash, who was suffering from a severe cold and fever. I hope Bautista may prove useful in my plan to restart the carrot crop as he also has assisted us in better controlling cabbage pests. In addition to more pleasant accommodations and facilities, we now have daily delivery of bread from the local bakery and that, accompanied with the milk we get from our two new dairy cows, has made our mornings and days much more pleasant. Our students, quite unaccustomed to the taste of milk, excepting perhaps the occasional goat’s milk, were not fond of it at first. However, mixed with their morning coffee or chocolate, they find it very palatable, as do I. This and our promise to make ice cream later this year have certainly given them much more incentive to learn the animal husbandry portion of our curriculum. Although we now receive daily bread deliveries, I still shop at the bakery once a week, simply for the conversation. Also, the lady proprietress has taken to loaning me books from her Spanish library, for which I loan her my American ones in exchange. In this way, I have been able to read a small book of sacred poems by Lope de Vega. Recently, I have been attempting the Noli Me Tangere of the native hero Rizal, a book that has proved difficult due to the more

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES complex Spanish. This was a book considered so seditious by the Spanish authorities that Rizal was exiled and later executed for it. The lady has, in turn, developed a fondness for our Longfellow. Her English is as yet rudimentary, so I thought this among all my books, a good one with which to begin. And lest I forget, Marciano, he head baker, who now has two assistants, has recently added a coconut tart to the bakery’s offerings, owing to the abundance of coconuts in this region. While I still yearn for apple pie, the tarts certainly do much to alleviate such yearnings. He promised that I should successfully manage to cultivate apples here, he will undertake to make me a pie. Although the lady and Marciano are doing well, her elderly aunt, Dona Mercedes, has lately been much too ill to leave their house. Thus, I took it upon myself to visit her bedside the other day and pay my respects as well as read to her a verse from her Spanish Bible. I hope this letter finds you faring well. Do give my regards to Karl and the children. I am keeping you and your family in my prayers. With much affection Your brother Harry December 23, 1910 My dearest sister Anna, I wish you and your family a most blessed Christmas. As this letter will most certainly reach you well after the New Year, let it also come with my very sincere wishes for a joyful and blessed new year! Much has happened here since my last letter so many months ago. My sincere apologies for having delayed so long in waiting, which is inexcusable, but I think you shall understand once I relay the events of the past months. First and foremost, I suppose, I should let you know that your brother is finally and perhaps surprisingly after these many years, a married man. My wife is the former Miss Estrellita Domingo Santa Cruz, whom I fondly refer to as Estrella, my star. You may recall her from previous letters as the proprietress of the bakery of which I am so fond although for more reasons than I previously told you. We will have been married one month come ten January. Her aunt, who continues to remain in bed due to ill health, was able to bless our nation. As you can now surmise, many of the last few months were spent wooing my lady and ensuring that her aunt would give us her blessing. Both were quite the tasks for your brother, a bachelor these many years and quite unpracticed. Nevertheless, I apparently did well enough or perhaps they simply pitied me. Enclosed you will find a photograph taken at our wedding. Also, you will observe, at the top of this letter, my new address. As my wife’s home is situated very close to the college and her aunt desired that we keep her company, I have moved my few belongings there. This has worked quite out well for Bicknell, who joked that my marriage could not have come at a better time as he had recently hired and additional faculty member for our animal husbandry curriculum. My former quarters have thus been reserved for a Mr. Washburn, due to arrive midFebruary. May his arrival in Manila be more auspicious than my own. I can assure you I’ve never been happier. My only difficulty of late has been with the over-solicitousness of my dear wife. I had to remind her just this morning that for someone of an independent spirit, she should surely understand my wish to accomplish everyday tasks on my own. As this she had to laugh and thus was our first martial spat resolved. I wish you and your family the joy of Christmas and a blessed New Year! Much love, Your brother Harry Estrella sends regards as well.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES 12. Beautiful In the Company of Strangers pp. 27-37. 17 November 2009. HI: Bamboo Ridge Press Virgie never woke early. She had already thrown off all the sheets, but she was sweating when she got up. Sitting on the edge of the bed, she moved her feet around the floor, searching for the house slippers. One foot, then another slid into each slipper. She stood and glanced at Nita’s bed, partly hidden by the curtain that separated the room. Nita’s bed was empty and neatly made. A square, pink pillow embroidered with blue flowers was precisely positioned in the middle with half of it on the larger pillow tucked neatly under the bedspread. Virgie wondered what Nita would do if she moved the pillow just an inch. She noticed that underneath Nita’s neatly positioned pillow was a letter. Ani must have put it there. Nita would have hidden it away in one of her drawers. Virgie reached for her pack of cigarettes, took one out and lit it. The smoke rose slowly toward the ceiling, dissipating near the thin crack in the plaster above her bed. She took a few more puffs, and then pushed aside the curtain that separated her bed from Nita’s, although the curtain wasn’t in her way. She picked up the envelope and looked at the sender’s address. It was from George, the American from Iowa. Nita had dated him for two weeks last year and he had written every month since. Sometimes Nita read parts of his letters aloud, to get Virgie’s advice on how to reply. “He says, ‘You wouldn't’t like Iowa. It’s very cold in the winter, not warm like your Boracay. Today it’s 14 degrees Fahrenheit with the windchill. What is that in Celsius? Does he not want me to go there? Does this mean he’d like to come live here? ‘In the Philippines?” Nita hoped he would propose someday, so she was very careful with her replies. She assured him that she would very much like to see Iowa. “I’ll always be waiting for you in warm Boracay,” she had ended her most recent letter, much like all her other letters. “So he’ll remember to come back,” she had said. Virgie thought of that jealousy as she held George’s newest letter. She consoled herself with the thought that George was old and fat and smelled of days’ old sweat. Not that she did any better. She tucked the letter back under the pillow, just one corner sticking out. The cigarette was finished in another minute, and she stubbed it out in the ashtray. On her way to the bathroom, she stopped to push aside the curtains that surrounded Ani’s bed. Ani, in imitation of Nita, as usual, had neatly made her bed. The white of the sheets shone through the hole in the pink bedspread. Virgie undressed and dropped her clothes on Ani’s bed, since it was closest to the bathroom. After washing up, she put on jeans and a camisole top made of alternating layers of shiny, light pink fabric. Max, the German, had given it to her yesterday. She had promised to see him again today. She thought about how he resembled George. Nothing to be done about that. She sprayed her neck and wrists with perfume, powdered her face and put on lipstick and eyeliner, had neatly made her bed. The white of the sheets shone through the hole in the pink bedspread. Virgie undressed and dropped her clothes on Ani’s bed, since it was closest to the bathroom. After washing up, she put on jeans and a camisole top made of alternating layers of shiny, light pink fabric. Max, the German, had given it to her yesterday. She had promised to see him again today. She thought about how he resembled George. Nothing to be done about that. She sprayed her neck and wrists with perfume, powdered her face and put on lipstick and eyeliner, a little rouge. Studying herself in the mirror, she pursued her lips as if to kiss her image. Her eyes were wide, as if surprised. She relaxed her face, fluffed her hair and sprayed it with hairspray. It always made her cough. Coughing, she grabbed her purse and left the room.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Outside, there was a breeze from the ocean. It lifted Virgie’s hair slightly as she walked along the sidewalk, past the bars and souvenir shops, past the cigarette and chewing gum vendor, past the young boy who sold peanuts in the morning form the street, marijuana from the alley at night. His eyes were glassy as he looked up from rolling paper cones for the peanuts. She wondered how he managed to make any money. Down a side street, past the sari-sari store was a small bakery, really just a wooden window propped open from five to eleven every morning. Virgie bought two rolls of pan de sal, the only bread the bakery sold, and a bottle of Coca-cola. She leaned against the building and ate the bread then passed the empty bottle through the window. Checking her watch, she saw she had an hour before her usual nail appointment. It would be enough time to drop off her laundry at Aling Dalisay’s and go to Mercury Pharmacy. Best to be prepared. At the pharmacy, she walked at the counter until one of the clerks noticed her. Virgie passed her the latest prescription from Doctora Reyes. The young girl read the prescription and looked puzzled for a moment. Virgie realized she was probably new. “Shit,” she muttered. She could have found the items herself but now she had to wait for the child in front of her to figure out what the hell she needed. She started at the young clerk’s bangs, a little too long and covering her eyes, which were trying to read the writing on the small sheet. The girl had an outbreak of pimples on her cheeks. Virgie wondered exactly how old she was. Just as Virgie was about to interrupt her perusal, the girl scurried off to the pharmacist’s station, a raised glass cubicle on the right side of the room. She pointed to Virgie as she showed the pharmacist the prescription. The pharmacist pushed her glasses closer to her eyes then, without even glancing at the clerk gave her instructions while handling back the prescription. The girl seemed frozen the suddenly jerked her head and moved toward that shelves full of pharmaceutical products. Virgie glared at her watch. Maybe Doctora Reyes was right. Every few months, when Virgie went for her appointment, the doctor reminded her that she could find other work. “Alam ko, Doc,” Virgie always replied. She liked Doctora Reyes, who always spoke frankly, leaning back in her chair as if perpetually tired. “I’m concerned about your health,” the doctor would usually continue. “Yours is not a healthy occupation.” And she would tick off the dangers on her fingers. “STDs, AIDS, possible pregnancy and then what would you do, bodily harm - a lot those men could abuse you easily.” “I’m careful,” Virgie always replied. “That’s what all the girls say. You probably don’t even use condoms half the time.” Then Doctora would write the prescriptions and give them to her. “If anything happens, come see me.” The last time she had added. “Two more years, Virgie. You shouldn’t go more than that.” “You want to give me a job?” Virgie shot back. The doctor then shook her head. “This office isn’t the place for you. But maybe you’ll find something. The sooner the better.” The young clerk nervously dumped the packages of condoms and birth control pills on the counter. Virgie looked at her in irritation but the clerk’s eyes were fixed on the cash register. She bit her bottom lip as she punched in everything with great deliberation. Finally, Virgie was able to pay the clerk and take her package. She looked at her watch again just enough time to drop off the laundry. When she finally arrived at the salon, she was sweating and grateful for the sudden gust of air conditioning as she opened the door. Lulu was sitting in the chair closest to the door having her hair cut. “Not too short,” she was telling the stylist as Virgie entered. “You know how the men like it.”

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES “Below the shoulder or shoulder length?” the stylist asked. “Below the shoulder,” she turned to see Virgie. “Virgie!” Lulu yelled. She held her arms out under the cutting gown. The hair stylist stepped out of their way. Virgie and Lulu embraced and kissed each other on the cheek. “Kumusta ka?” Lulu inquired loudly. Everything about Lulu was loud, from her sequined jeans, which peeked out from under the robe, to her red lipstick and pinkish and violet eye shadow. She had a husky voice, which she liked to characterize as sexy. “How’s business, ah?” she asked. “How’s tricks?” She laughed loudly at the joke, which she’d picked up from a movie, or so she’d told Virgie when she’d explained the joke. “Which one gave you that?” She pointed at Virgie’s shirt. “A new one.” Virgie sat down at the nail stylist’s station. “Looks like Bebe.” “I’m sure it’s a fake. He bought it at one of the shops by the beach.” “That’s all right. At least he has taste. Or did you choose it?” “I chose it.” The nail stylist interrupted to ask Virgie what color she wanted. “Something like this.” Virgie said, pointing to the one of the layers on her blouse. The stylist pulled out a bottle and showed it to her. Virgie nodded. “So, how long have you been with him?” “A few days. Three.” “Is he staying long?” Lulu asked. “A week.” “Does he stay up long?” “I don’t know.” Lulu laughed huskily. “That’s right. Keep him waiting! Good girl.” The hair stylist began to divide Lulu’s hair into sections, to touch up her highlights. “A week,” Lulu continued, “that’s good. Makes them feel they have to get a lot in a short time. Has he taken you to dinner?” “Only once.” “That’s OK. That’s still good.” An hour later they left for lunch at Lulu’s insistence. “I’ve been a week without a boyfriend,” she moaned. “I don’t know how I’m going to pay my rent.” Lulu, Virgie knew was not doing as badly as she claimed. She actually rented a small studio, by herself, in one of the larger hotels. She’d been around a long time but neither Virgie not anyone else knew how old she was. “She has to be at least thirty-five,” Nita, Virgie’s roommate, had said one night. She was explaining business in Boracay to Ani, the new girl. “But Lulu has charm,” said Nita, summing her up better that Virgie could have. “She charms everyone, men and women.” Ani sat on the bed, her legs drawn into her chest and her thin arms wrapped around them. She had arrived earlier that day, walking behind Ben as if she wanted to disappear. After some instructions, Ben had left her with them. He’s patted Ani on the shoulder as he left, and she had flinched. “Thirty-five,” Nita repeated, obviously to Ani’s nervousness. “But she looks younger. She’s very good with make-up.” Walking beside Lulu, Virgie wondered if she was indeed thirty-five. She didn’t look that much older than Virgie, who had turned twenty last month. “Doctora Reyes said to get out of the business in two years,” Virgie told her. “Look at this,” said Lulu, pulling Virgie’s arm.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Virgie looked at the window display Lulu was studing. The jeans on the rack were stitched in a reddish-purple thread. “Four thousand pesos,” Lulu read. “Maybe later.” She turned back to Virgie. “What did you say about Doctora Reyes?” “She told me to get out of the business in two years.” “That busybody,” said Lulu, walking on. She tossed her hair, now with light brown streaks. “She’s always trying to convert us.” Lulu turned the corner and headed toward the beach. Virgie hurried to catch up. “How long have you been here, Lulu?” she asked. Lulu turned suddenly. “You are not really going to do as the doctora says.” Before Virgie could answer, she went on. “We’re not all doctors. It’s easy for her to talk.” Lulu stalked on angrily passing the stalls that sold fresh fruits and drinks. Virgie followed silently. She couldn’t think of anything to say. Although she hated when Lulu got in one of her moods, Lulu usually was right. They walked on. At the first bar they passed, a man yelled to Lulu, “Hello, beautiful!” The other men at his table burst into hoots and laughter. Lulu tossed her head and smiled as she walked on. When she spoke again, she seemed in a better mood. “Rafi’s is the best place to meet someone,” said Lulu. “And I know the owner. He’s a friend. He’ll make sure we get the best.” Lulu sauntered along beside Virgie, her lips swaying as she planted each stiletto heel on the sidewalk. A trio of men, wet from swimming at the beach, turned to look at them, Lulu’s white blouse dipped down in a low V and was fringed with sequins in tan ad white and brown. It looked like she’d dusted her cleavage with some sparkly powder. “This is my Sex and the City blouse,” she whispered to Virgie as she entered the restaurant. Lulu leaned across the podium and flirted with the man who was to seat them. While waiting for a table, she asked to see Rafi, the owner of the restaurant. The young man went back to see if Rafi was in his office. “He’s Greek, I think,” Lulu said to Virgie, as they waited. “He looks Filipino to me.” said Virgie, looking at the young man’s retreating back. “I mean Rafi.” Rafi was in, said the young man, and Lulu could go back to see him in the office. “Come.” said Lulu as started down the hall. Virgie shook her head. “I’ll wait for you out here.” “I’ll seat your friend.” said the young man. A family of American tourists passed them talking loudly. “It’s so hot,” said the woman. She was sunburned and her hair rose in fine frizzy wisps around her head. The two boys with them, their sons probably, glanced at Virgie as they passed her. She ignored them and followed the young restaurant host, who seated her at one of the windows looking out at the beach and made sure she had a drink and a bowl of nuts while she waited. No one else was around. The young man returned and surprised her with a heavy fashion magazine from the U.S. “Thank you,” Virgie said, noncommittally. She was delighted. She loved the glossiness of such magazines, the perfumed smell of the pages, each one turned slowly as she studied the photographs. It was several minutes before she noticed another group had sat nearby, some waiters eating their lunch. She glanced at her watch. It was after two o’clock. The fans overhead turned slowly and breeze blew in from the ocean. A group – French, Virgie concluded after listening for a moment – walked in the door. The three men laughed boisterously as they were escorted to their table. A waiter rose from his meal and went to the men’s room. A minute later, he returned, picked up some menus, and proceeded to take the men’s orders. Virgie smoked her cigarettes and slowly slipped the ice water with lemon.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES “Would you like to join our group?” Virgie looked up to find the youngest of the three men who’d just entered. His eyes were light brown and his dark hair curl at the ends, just above his shoulders. She was tempted, but, always practical, declined. Max was here for another week. He had money. He wanted to see her. “No, thank you. I’m waiting for a friend.” Virgie finished her cigarette while reading the fashion magazine. Lulu finally rejoined her. “I’m hungry!” Lulu announced loudly. She glanced at the menu. “Rafi’s on the Beach at Boracay” read the menu cover. The cover featured a curvaceous woman in a bikini, curled on a beach chair, sipping a drink that was the same pink as her bikini. “The grilled fish with prawns is very good.” Lulu suggested. “And the paella.” “Let’s get that.” Lulu called the waiter and ordered paella. “And two glass of white wine.” She added, looking at Virgie, “Never too early to start.” The waiter came back shortly with a plate of grilled vegetables. “Compliments of Rafi.” Another of the Frenchmen came over and greeted Lulu. “Hello,” Lulu replied. “My name is Henri.” “Please have a seat.” Lulu said, almost regal in her politeness. She indicated the chair next to her. He sat and smiled at Virgie, said “allo” to her too. The waiter interrupted them with the wine at that time, so Virgie didn’t bother to reply. She took a sip of her wine and speared a slice of grilled eggplant. “Is this your first time on Boracay?” Lulu asked Henri. “Yes, I heard of this beach many years ago, but only now I am able to vacation here.” Virgie watched and listened as Lulu smiled and nodded with interest between sips of wine. Lulu expressed surprise where appropriate as Henri told of how he had planned the trip with his friends and told of an amusing incident that had happened to them shortly after their arrival in Manila. “No? Really?” Lulu interjected, wide-eyed. “Yes, really,” the Frenchman insisted, laughing. Virgie picked up a slice of grilled tomato with her fork. She sliced it into three pieces as she listened. Lulu laughed with Henri, leaning her hand on his knee, her newly cut and dyed hair swaying close to his face. Soon his chair was even closer to Lulu’s, her hand resting on his arm. The other Frenchmen abandoned their table to sit with Henri. “Your friend has broken that young man’s heart,” said Henri. He pointed to the young man who’d asked Virgie to join them. “Oh,” said Lulu, “this is Virgie. She is quite shy. Give her a few days,” Lulu pretended to change the subject. “How long are you here?” “We arrived yesterday,” Henri replied. “We will be staying for two weeks.” “See!” said Lulu. She turned to the young man. “Mister . . . “ “Julian.” “Mr. Julian, you have two weeks to change the shy, young lady’s mind.” Julian sipped from his glass of red wine and said nothing. He did smile a little.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES After lunch, Lulu and Virgie said goodbye to the men. “Our boss is expecting us at four,” Lulu lied smoothly. To demonstrate her interest in their welfare, she dispensed the typical tourist advice regarding snorkeling, renting watercraft, and purchasing sunscreen. She also recommended a good bar with live music at night. “The band that plays tonight is fantastique,” she said, imitating their pronunciation. “I guarantee you will like it.” “Will we see you there?” Henri asked. “Perhaps.” She kissed Henri goodbye on the cheek. Max was at the juice bar when Virgie and Lulu arrived. It took her a moment to pick him out since he looked like several of the other men drinking alone, sunburned, watching the women who walked by. But he waved when he saw her. “Hallo, beautiful,” he said. “I’m happy to see you.” Virgie leaned over and kissed him on the mouth. He held the back of her head in one large hand as he pressed her mouth open with his tongue. Virgie kissed back. He tasted like the fruit shake he’d been drinking. She wondered if she tasted like fish and wine. Max rubbed his free hand along her leg. When he pulled away, he noticed her blouse. “I’m glad you like this.” “I love it,” Virgie replied. She gestured toward Lulu. “This is my friend Lulu.” “Hello,” said Lulu. “We just had a lunch, but Virgie was anxious to get here as soon as possible to see you.” Max smiled. “I thought we could go swimming,” he said to Virgie. “I’d like to see you in a bikini..” He squeezed her leg. “Well,” said Virgie, one hand on her hip, the other on his shoulder, “you’ll have to buy me one.” “How much?” “At least 1,000 pesos.” He handed her 1,500. Virgie gave him a long kiss. “I’ll be back in thirty minutes,“ she said. Max waved. “You should have asked for more,” said Lulu. “I’ll get more next time.” “If there is a next time.” “There will be,” Virgie snapped. Lulu didn’t reply. They walked back to the room. Lulu lay on Virgie’s bed flipping through a magazine Virgie had picked up in a hotel lobby. She glanced at Nita’s bed. “Is she always so neat?” “You know Nita,” Virgie said over her shoulder. She felt a little nervous putting the money away in her hiding place while Lulu was there, but Lulu wasn’t watching her. “What would she do if we moved the pillow?” “Go ahead and move it. See what happens.” But Lulu didn’t get up. “Who’s your new roommate?” She nodded at the bed by the bathroom. “Ani,” Virgie began to change into her bikini. “You haven’t met her.” “How’s she doing?” “I don’t think she’ll last. She’s young.” “Some men like that.” Lulu flipped through the magazine a second time. She set it aside and sat up in the bed. “Don’t you have a television?” Lulu asked. “No.” “Next time you should definitely get enough money for a television.”

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES “And how do I explain that? Do I tell him I need 5,000 for an evening gown?” “Five thousand isn’t a very good television,” Lulu paused, “or a very good evening gown.” Virgie laughed. She whirled around in her bikini. “What do you think?” “Very sexy,” said Lulu. She flicked the belt buckle on the front. “Very modern. Where did you get it?” “Freddy made it. He makes the best bikinis.” Lulu nodded. “I’ll have to see him soon. I need a new one.” “Better get some money first.” “Don’t remind me,” Lulu groaned. “Oh don’t act that way,” said Virgie as she wrapped a skirt around her waist. “You’ve got Mr. Henri now.” “True,” said Lulu. “I’ll have to find him at the bar tonight before someone else gets him.” Virgie put on a jacket and zipped it halfway. They walked back toward the beach. On the way, Lulu stopped to look at shoes on sale in one of the stores. She put a pair on and walked around for Virgie. “What do you think?” “The heel should be a little wider and the toe pointier.” Lulu nodded. “A shame we don’t have a mall here.” Virgie had seen pictures of malls in her magazines: clean and cool with brightly arrayed, angular mannequins. “I’d like that,” she said. She suddenly envisioned herself amidst the round racks of a shop, silky fabrics, jeans, bright shoes arrayed on shelves along the wall. She longed for the cleanness of all that, the smell of newness. Lulu continued to walk around in the shoes. Virgie watched her walk near the boy who sold peanuts and marijuana. The boy looked up at Lulu then he turned to looked at Virgie. For a moment his eyes were clear and he reminded her of her brother. Then he stared back at Lulu, hips swaying in her high heels, walking in front of some men who were carrying snorkeling equipment and towels. The men ogled her. Virgie looked away. “Let’s go,” she said to Lulu. “What?” Lulu looked to her as if startled. “O have to go.” She watched Lulu returned the shoes. The smell of the ocean wafted toward them on a breeze. Fish and seaweed, she thought. It always smelled like fish and seaweed. Lulu was still looking at shoes, so Virgie turned toward a rack next to her and smelled the sleeve of a blouse. It smelled like all the other shirts she’d bought there. And it had the same coarse feel. Lulu out her own shoes back on. “I’ll leave you here,” she said. “I hope your date goes well.” “Thanks for lunch.” Lulu laughed. “In a few days, you can look for Mr. Julian. Que sexy!” Virgie smiled. They kissed and hugged goodbye. Virgie sat on the beach while Max swam. Before he had gone in, she’d rubbed sunscreen all over him, which had aroused him. “Not now,” she’s said, as he pushed his body heavily against her. The plastic straps of the beach chair dug into her back and legs and she didn’t like the smell of the sunscreen. “I thought you wanted to swim.” She tried to sound joking. Then she added, “Later.”

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES After swimming he came back to give her a kiss and brought her a bottle of water from one of the refreshment stands. “I think I will rent some snorkeling equipment.” “That’s good.” She nodded. “Have fun.” She waved at him as he walked off again. A strong breeze blew as she lay on the chair. February and the nights were still cool. She reached for the towel at the foot of the chair and covered herself with it, closed her eyes again. The breeze continued, blowing the smells of the ocean: seaweed, fish, crabs, salt. As a girl she had sat outside their home with her mother, in the red of early evening, grilling the fish and watching the pot of rice set on the fire steam. She sliced tomatoes and onions and put them in a guttered earlier that day when her father had pulled his boat ashore with the morning’s catch. His net was usually bulging with fish that he sold at the market and later, when the hotels and tourists came to the restaurants. When she got older, she had accompanied him as he went his rounds, selling the fish and crabs he caught. She stood in corners and sat on stools in the back of restaurants, staying quiet while her father negotiated with the buyers. Most of the buyers knew them and one, Tito Ben, who liked to sit and talk with her father, would give her a soft drink with a straw while she waited. He was from the village too but had moved to town to work in the restaurant he now managed. He and her father talked about the old times, people who were still alive and people who were long dead. “Maybe someday,” he said as he patted her head, “you will come here to live too.” “Maybe,” her father had replied. When she’d left the village, Tito Ben was the first one she had sought out. She had gone to the back of the restaurant, as she always had. The restaurant was empty and they had sat at a table, drinking soft drinks with a straw while she told him why she was there. The room was cold from the air conditioning and Virgie had shivered as he had explained what she could do. “You should stay home and help your mother,” Ben had said. “That’s why I’m here.” Ben had sighed and nodded. “Very well.” And in the morning, he had taken her to see Mrs. Tantoco. “At least she’s pretty,” the woman had said. Bed had looked away. She hadn’t seen him since then. Virgie opened her eyes to see Max’s face dripping with water. “Hello, beautiful,” Max standing so as to shade her from the sun. “Did you see many fish?” she asked. “Oh, yes!” It was beautiful, beautiful!” he exclaimed. She handed him the towel she’d used as a cover. He dried himself. “Would you like to eat dinner?” He sat on the edge of the beach chair. “I would like to go to the Italian restaurant.” “Then we will have to dress very nicely?” “Yes, true.” He dried the little hair he had so it stuck up. “Why don’t you come back to my room and shower there?” “No,” said Virgie, getting up. “I need to find my friend to borrow a nice dress.” “Don’t do that,” Max said. “I will buy you one.” He gave her 5,000. “I can never remember how much this money is worth. Will that be enough?” “Yes.” She kissed him on the top of the head and evaded his hands. “It may take me a while. Why don’t I meet you at the restaurant?” Max looked up at her, pain in his eyes. How many times had they been through this before? It was his second visit to Boracay, he’d told her. Before that, he had vacationed in Indonesia. Each trip had probably been much like all the others. Perhaps next year he would come back and look for her, or he might look for someone else. She carefully wrapped her skirt, tied it tightly.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Then she reached down to Max, smoothed the hair on his head. “Oh, Max,” she said playfully. “We’ll have a lovely evening.” She put the five 1,000 bills in her bikini top and put on her jacket, zipped it to her neck. She kissed him again, along kiss, and left him standing on the beach, towel in hand. The breeze blew harder bringing the smell of fish and seaweed again. She thought of buying a nice shawl and new perfume to wear with her red dress. Something to keep her warm.

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES APPENDIX C Curriculum Vitae

Name: MARY ANNE MAE EUGENIO BALADJAY Address: 324 #4 Sitio Bacood, Pasong Tamo, Tandang Sora, Quezon City Contact No: +63 906 505 6766 Email Address: [email protected] Date of Birth: September 1, 1997 Place of Birth: Quezon City Civil Status: Single Religion: Roman Catholic

Name: RHEGILYN FLORES NISAY Address: Blk 10 Lot 9, Villa San Mateo I, Gitnang Bayan I, San Mateo, Rizal Contact No: +63 917 371 5412 Email Address: [email protected] Date of Birth: January 19, 1997 Place of Birth: Bataan Civil Status: Single Religion: Born Again Christian

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POLYTECHNIC UNIVERSITY OF THE PHILIPPINES Name: SHAIRAH PARAGAS RIO Address: Blk 9 Lot 3, Palmera Spring 3A, Camarin, Caloocan City Contact No: +63 906 805 4408 Email Address: [email protected] Date of Birth: June 10, 1996 Place of Birth: Quezon City Civil Status: Single Religion: Born Again Christian

Name: JOANNA PATRICIA FLORORITA TIGAS Address: 317 San Joaquin Medium Rise Condo, San Rafael St., Brgy. Plainview, Mandaluyong City Contact No: +63 916 492 7336 Email Address: [email protected] Date of Birth: June 16, 1997 Place of Birth: San Idelfonso, Bulacan Civil Status: Single Religion: Roman Catholic

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RE/PRESENTATIONS OF WOMEN IN SELECTED SHORT FICTION IN ENGLISH OF FILIPINO-AMERICAN WRITERS: A FEMINIST STYLISTIC ANALYSIS

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