1 0 2 years in the name of law and love

MANILA, Philippines - I step into the home of Delfin L. Gonzalez and am greeted by Beethoven’s 7th Symphony. The music flows from the speakers in his room and permeates the whole ground floor.

Gonzalez, who seems many years younger than his 102 years, is a classic himself. While he credits good genes (his older brother lived until 107) and everything in moderation for his physical longevity, his secret to maintaining a sharp mind is owed to a passion for reading. “I’m never idle,” says Gonzalez, showing STARweek his latest acquisition, a two-volume bright red boxed set of H.G. Wells’ The Outline of History.

Gonzalez keeps his collection of Harvard Classics under lock and key – a complete set of tomes handsomely on display, together with some of the last printed copies of the Encyclopedia Brittanica. Gonzalez reads everything from biographies and science, from history to classic literature. “Kung baga sa kutsilyo, dapat hinahasa rin ang isip (Just like a knife, the mind must be sharpened, too),” he says.

Aside from books, Gonzalez is passionate about music. He remembers classical music being played at the grandstand in his hometown in Bulacan as his first exposure to music.

“I’ll be honest with you,” he says, “I’m a computer idiot.” His patience with typing gets only as far as the Occupation, when he learned how to type and make multiple copies on onion skin paper. The tedious process of correcting each copy when there were mistakes was too much for him. Anyway, he points out, he had a secretary. Now, his phone is handled by his driver or by the trusty Flor, his housekeeper.

What he does love about technology, however, are all the new components for playing music.

He calls on Flor to reveal to us a phonograph tucked behind a large cabinet, which is also filled with a collection of vinyl records. Four more cabinet doors are opened in his library to reveal boxes of CDs and records, filed neatly under various categories: symphonies, opera, concertos… the extensive assortment has grown over the years. Gonzalez says he started collecting shortly after the war and would buy his albums whenever he would travel.

He counts Grieg, Chopin, Tchaikovsky and Wagner among his favorite composers, but his favorite song is Because (composed in 1902 by Edward Teschemacher and Guy d’Hardelot, and made popular by Perry Como in 1947), since this is the favorite song of his dear wife, Auring.

Finding his sheet music of the song, which is yellowing and brittle with age, he sings:

“Because, you come to me,?with naught save love,?and hold my hand and lift mine eyes above,

a wider world of hope and joy I see,?because you come to me!

“These lyrics are my favorite:

“Because God made thee mine,?I’ll cherish thee,?through light and darkness

through all time to be,?and pray His love may make our love divine,?because God made thee mine!”

Gonzalez adds, “If my father could have afforded a violin, I would have become a musician.”

The seventh of 14 boys growing up in the early years of American colonization, Gonzalez’s father, a carpenter, could not afford to buy him a violin. However, his parents were adamant that their children receive a good education, so they moved to Tondo, which Gonzalez describes as a melting pot during his time, as immigrants settled there from different provinces, hoping to make it in Manila.

Gonzalez studied at the Tondo Primary School and Tondo Intermediate School, then went on to Torres High School (named after Filipino Supreme Court justice Florentino Torres), where the rough-and-tumble Tondo boy remembers terrorizing his teachers.

With almost eidetic memory, he recalls answering back to his English teacher Natividad Zacarias as a 14-year-old high school freshman, telling her defiantly, “Nobody is perfect, including you,” when she rebuked him in class for mispronouncing a word.

This was the first of many times the young Gonzalez was sent to the office of Mr. Burns, the principal – and the first of many offences that earned him a whipping. After the first few years of misconduct, the high schooler decided to shape up and he became popular as a leader among his peers – he was junior class president and president of the board of presidents in 1930, then went on to serve as vice president and president of the student council in his junior and senior years, respectively.

Because of his experience in high school with leadership and debate, he decided to pursue law when his father asked him what career he wanted. Besides, he says, he was not good in medicine, business, engineering or math, though at some point he considered entering West Point. “Law was the only path that I thought I could succeed in.”

He excelled at the University of the Philippines, becoming the editor-in-chief of the 1938 Philippinesian, Club Manresa president, a member of the editorial board of the Philippine Law Journal and president of the junior student council. Gonzalez graduated with a degree in Law in 1938.

The veteran attorney likens being a lawyer to arnis: “I like the thrust and parry, the argument-counter argument and thinking on your feet. I thrive in that.”

The fresh graduate’s goal was to become a partner at one of the four American law firms that were established in the country. Out of the four, one replied that they would keep his application on file. The other three did not even bother to acknowledge the greenhorn lawyer. So, Gonzalez struck out on his own.

After liberation, the courts reopened in 1946, and one Saturday morning – Gonzalez remembers because Saturday was motions day at court and he was filing one – Atty. Carrascoso approached him with an offer to come work as second assistant at his law firm. Ross, Selph, Carrascoso & Janda had indeed kept Gonzalez’s application on file.

After a career at the law firm which spanned from 1947 to 1961, Gonzalez took on a new path, as the first Filipino executive at Benguet Consolidated Inc. where he served as vice president and general counsel.

Becoming a leader in his field, Gonzalez co-founded the Chamber of Mines of the Philippines and the ASEAN Federation for Mining Associations.

The 102-year-old attorney was recently honored by the Philippine Bar Association. Part of the citation reads: “As the oldest voluntary national organization of lawyers in our country, the Philippine Bar Association is honored to give due recognition to its venerable, ageless and devoted member. As a true role model, may his life as a loving husband, father, brother and son, and his long successful career in the practice of law serve as an inspiration to fellow lawyers and others who aspire to join our noble profession.”

Symphony No. 9

Proving with his many stories that Gonzalez can remember dates and names well, I ask him a more personal question – what are his fondest memories?

He pauses only for a moment before saying, “All my fondest memories are related to this young lady,” referring to a framed photo of his wife Auring which sits facing him, front and center on his work desk.

As a young man, Gonzalez moved to Sta. Ana, where three ladies who were described as “beautiful but aloof” also lived. They were the Carballo sisters who studied at St. Teresa’s. They had Spanish blood and their father was a judge.

Gonzalez, who was then in law school, received an invitation to a party thrown by the Young Ladies of Sta. Ana. It turns out, the party was held at the Carballo home and there he saw Auring, the vice president of the young ladies’ organization.

“I was guardedly stricken,” he describes – because he already had a girlfriend at that time, a student at the Conservatory of Music.

While he figured out what to do, he invited Auring and her sister to watch a concert at the Metropolitan Theater, where the Manila Symphony Orchestra was to perform Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 under the baton of Prof. Alexander Lippay.

During intermission, Gonzalez and his two companions went out to the lobby to get refreshments. As the young man walked back to Auring and her sister with the drinks he had bought for them, he saw they were talking to two other ladies – his current girlfriend and her stepmother! Needless to say, Gonzalez was free to court Auring in earnest soon after the concert.

Gonzalez waited to pass the Bar before he proposed to Auring – he needed to be sure that he could make a living and support her before they got married.

“I wrote her a letter which I knew she would receive the following Thursday,” he narrates. “Then on Friday I went there and she was waiting for me at the door of the house and without talking, I saw her looking at me holding the letter. That was it!”

They had planned to get married in January of 1942, but fate was in a hurry. Instead, they got married on impluse on Dec. 9, 1941, on the second day of World War II.

They couple was worried that Gonzalez would be drafted. “I’d rather she be a widow than a spinster,” he quips. Their entourage was small because of the circumstances – the Columban priest Fr. Kelly who officiated the marriage, Gonzalez’s elder brother, Auring’s mother and a lone sacristan at Malate Catholic Church.

The Japanese were raiding Cavite and Corregidor, Gonzalez says. “We could hear the bombs… Where else can you find a wedding with real fireworks?”

Auring passed away in 2007 – after being married to Gonzalez for 66 years. “I still mourn for her,” he says, tearing up just at the thought of losing the love of his life. “I’m 102 years old, I think it’s about time I go home.”

The music swells as Gonzalez pauses. It is the theme from the movie Titanic. This version is just an instrumental, but the all too familiar lyrics come to mind – Near, far, wherever you are, I believe that the heart does go on.

Rhapsody in Blue

The music changes to Gershwin’s jazzy Rhapsody in Blue, the piano solo dancing playfully. Gonzalez reminisces about what he misses of the years gone by.

Transportation comes to mind at once – Meralco’s tranvia was always on time, he recalls. There was no traffic and public transportation was cheap – just a few centavos, and there was always the old reliable kalesa.

He waxes nostalgic about the odor of tanneries that will tell you that you have reached Bulacan, and the distinct taste of Marilao pancit which he introduced to city girl Auring to celebrate their engagement.

The practice of law has changed throughout the years as well. “We were all generalists,” Gonzalez says – in the past he handled labor, public utility, civil and criminal cases all. “Now everyone has a specialization.”

He adds, “Maraming law firm na umuunlad (Many law firms have prospered)… I’m happy for them.” When he started out, his salary was all of P40.

“The country is now more prosperous,” Gonzalez goes on. “We’re no longer a basket case, we’re now a growing tiger in Asia. But up to now, corruption in government is rampant.”

From his observation, corruption occurred because of dire poverty and hardship during the Japanese occupation. “People learned to steal and cheat because of poverty.” This was only aggravated through the years, especially during Martial Law, says the man who has witnessed it all.

On the new administration, he says of Duterte: “He’s unorthodox” – not elaborating whether this is a positive or negative trait. What the veteran lawyer does not agree with is the “shoot to kill” attitude towards criminals. “There is really a drug problem here in the country, but killing them without due process is not the way to do it. That’s why we have the Constitution, due process,” says Gonzalez, whose political idols include Lee Kuan Yew and Nelson Mandela.

 Adagio

Looking back on the accomplishment he is most proud of in the 102 years of his life so far, Gonzalez says, “I don’t think it’s an accomplishment, it’s just that I was able to do what I have been hoping to do – give my parents some of the creature comforts that they never had as a carpenter and housewife.”

With Auring, he was able to bring up five children, all academic achievers who went on to do post graduate studies in prestigious schools abroad. “Those are the joys of my life.”

The one thing he does enjoy about growing older is being able to still give advice to his grandchildren: “I play my role to the hilt as a grandfather.” He has 16 grandchildren and 8 great grandchildren.

“I am optimistic about our country because I have a stake in it. Especially now that I have children and grandchildren and great grandchildren. I want them to live a happy life,” he says.

“I went through the war and I hope that there will never be war again,” he says. But, considering all that has been happening in the country and the world in recent years, Gonzalez says, “I am guardedly optimistic.”

“Everybody should do his duty as a citizen. Obey the law,” he advises. “The strongest weapon of the citizen is public opinion.”

He tells young people: “Read, read, read. The human mind has a limitless capacity for learning.”

As our conversation comes to an end, I catch a tune that I am not familiar with. It is a moving orchestral piece with a solo violin taking up the main melody.

After a little investigation online, I discover that the piece is from Queen Symphony, composed by Tolga Kashif, a British composer of Turkish descent. The symphony debuted in 2002 and is based on the music of iconic rock band Queen.

The particular part that was playing at the end of our interview was from the third movement – Adagio – with the subtitle, Who Wants to Live Forever?