Oh, my Manila!

MANILA, Philippines - The layout and sprawl of the noble and ever loyal city seem to have the walker and casual promenader in mind, though admittedly the sidewalks may not be as wide as they were during the time of our forefathers. If you want to see Manila up close, its alleyways and hidden byways without risk of being mugged or sweet talked by a confidence trickster, it is best to do so on a holiday when its mythic crush of people is somewhat lessened, on foot and preferably on a balmy day, say, a holiday like Araw ng Maynila.

Or if you want to see literally its underbelly, take the Pasig River ferry any which way but better downstream toward the sea, count the bridges along the route and marvel at the slalom like moves of the boat maneuvering through clusters of hyacinths on the waterway. Under Lambingan bridge in Sta. Ana, scrawled haphazardly in white paint could be these words: D’ Stalkers of Manila. Can’t imagine how the graffiti writer accomplished the task, clinging like Spiderman for the sake of posterity.

The earliest memories I have of Manila are the occasional visits to grandparents on either side of the family tree: to Cavite Street in Gagalangin, Tondo where Lola Paning was, and to Sta. Ana of old Maria and her American serviceman husband, with the overwhelming smell of aparadors. The house in Tondo, it’s been said, is long gone, the patio where the elders once drank beer and whisky since overrun by the elements or termites, while all that’s left of the Sta. Ana digs is a steel bottle opener in the shape of a horse, the tikbalang of past days laid to rest.

The old folks’ early years of marriage in fact were spent if not on Cavite Street, then on Zamora Street in Sta. Ana, number 2382, as attested by a note on the inside flap of a first edition copy of Tess of D’Urbervilles, one of the few books rescued before much of father’s library burned down with the Faculty Center last year, not in the noble and ever loyal but in Quezon City, where the folks had eventually moved and settled to teach at the state university when it also transferred from Padre Faura to Diliman.

Then of course there was the 14 years of stay in an apartment on Conchu Street off Vito Cruz, where the kids took their first steps, usually on morning walks to Becky’s a block away on Bautista, owned by kin of the city’s former mayor, Antonio ‘Yeba’ Villegas. If Manila is given to strollers, then Vito Cruz now Pablo Ocampo is fertile ground for fiction or, how shall we put it, its own strange afflictions.

That stretch of road going west leads to the sea, specifically the joggers’ haven that is the CCP complex on the border with Pasay, where the late Caloy Abrera also did his rounds, before a blues train rudely interrupted him.

The floods in that Malate neighborhood were epic, twice or thrice the cesspools seeped through the apartment, and once there was a leak in a second floor room of mysterious origin, until months later a bullet was found atop a cabinet. The floods would sometimes see an old-timer lounged on a foam mattress, wading nonchalantly through the dark water as if it were the most natural thing.

The kids were enrolled in nearby JASMS, first in the annex along Taft, then on Indiana now Pilar Hidalgo Lim, setting of the short story ‘The Yellow Shawl’ aka ‘Wing of Madness’ by a National Artist of note. And though the annex has long been demolished, any reconstruction has been going at snail’s pace, the machinery usually idle under rain or sun, perhaps jinxed by the duendes, certainly not by Mrs. Cruz the principal who energetically led the children through their morning calisthenics.

Early in 1998 upon joining newspaper row in Port Area, more adventures were in store for the noble and ever loyal, though the commute or drive got longer three years later when the floods forced us to move to higher ground. Still the LRT ride – particularly the homestretch stops of UN, Central, Carriedo – provided enough entertainment if not random enlightenment, counting syllables or watching a toddler pick his or her nose.

Look up, young man, look up: the sign on the Feati building has been immortalized in a short story by Greg Brillantes, when the despondent protagonist stares into the murky waters of the Pasig thinking of ending it all, until he happens to snap out of deadly reverie and stretches a bit and sees the message of hope. It is also a sign that reader soon must get off to catch a jeepney ride to Port Area, past the counterfeiters of IDs and diplomas and seaman’s book at stairs’ bottom hawking their wares, need some document quick? Look up, young man.

The sidewalk of Railroad Street teems with its own stories, not least of stray kittens and bag ladies and ramshackle turo-turos, the jukeboxes long gone. But when it rains, the railroad becomes a river, and watch out for that CCTV might catch you cursing at your wet socks. It was from the Muslim traders on 13th street at Port Area where we bought the kids their first bikes, riding one of them home to Vito Cruz on a summer night without traffic.

Speaking of sidewalks, there used to be a seller of secondhand books outside City Hall by the jeepney stop going north, bargain bins of found wisdom laid out on concrete.

In nearby Intramuros there was always a chance to come across the mass of St. Sylvester at mid-homily, was it not in Nick Joaquin’s books where we got initial glimpse of Manila, when as a child growing up in Diliman we read him? Yet you should have seen the expression on Quijano de Manila’s face when Marra Lanot first recited her poem ‘Manila to Me’ at a gathering.   

What’s the longest you’ve walked? Can’t be other than in the city of Manila, during the pope’s visit in the time of daang cerrado, when we tried to penetrate a human wall to get from Malate to Port Area. Walked in circles for hours, until a tricycle driver entrepreneur offered his services for an arm and a leg. The trip took tipsy tangents, parabolic detours, zippy zigzags through alleys and beside esteros, slums and madness, before sunset finally found us at the foot of Del Pan bridge.

The twilight hour! As a kid we’d throw a tantrum when left behind on father’s trip downtown, or threaten to jump off Jones Bridge if disallowed to watch Inside Daisy Clover or was it Splendor in the Grass. Anything starring Natalie Wood. What if he did jump? And surface decades later under Lambingan Bridge, swimming with the stalkers of lilies and hyacinths, the noble, ever loyal.