Reminiscing With Helen - And Ciara

It's Friday and all's well in the household of the Sottos (Sen. Tito and Helen Gamboa) -- as usual. Tito Sen. (as the Senator is fondly called by family and friends) is ready for the drive to NAIA; he's off to Singapore for two days for some "business matters." Giancarlo, the couple's 20-year-old son who's a dead-ringer for Rudy Fernandez, kisses his Mom goodbye as he rushes off to school. Daughter Ciara has no classes today (only on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays at UST where she's enrolled in the Conservatory of Music) and she's home to help Mama Helen entertain four cherished movie-writer friends from way back when Helen was the reigning pop queen, singing Downtown (the Petula Clark hit) and Thirty-First of June, among others, clad in mini-skirt, wearing large and dangling earrings and a pair of high-heeled boots. Those were the days!

The guests include this columnist, Tempo's Nestor Cuartero, DZXL/Journal's Mar d'Guzman Cruz and balikbayan Raoul Tidalgo (entertainment editor and columnist of The Filipino Reporter, the top Filipino newspaper in the US East Coast, based in New York).

No, there's no special occasion at all, just a simple get-together and an hour of reminiscing over servings of kare-kare, adobo, fried hito and some Kapampangan delicacies prepared by Helen herself. The house on Greystone Street in White Plains is the same one our barkada of aspiring movie writers used to visit years ago when the generation of Ciara Sotto wasn't a glint in their parents' eyes yet. White Plains was then a vast grassland and Helen bought the house and lot for a "measly" sum per square meter. Now, the whole property costs millions of pesos.

Helen is very slim, looking not a pound heavier than she was when she was doing Bang-Shang-Alang and those pop movies in the late '60s and early '70s, stopping only when then band member Tito Sotto (remember Tiltdown Men?) swept her off her feet and eloped with her right under the very nose and watchful eye of her mother (the original stage mother, if I may say so).

Helen's a health and physical-fitness buff and she's putting up a gym near her house where she and her friends can do their taebo to their hearts' content.

"It will be for the exclusive use of me and my friends," says Helen, understandably including her niece Sharon Cuneta who has shed more than 58 pounds so far, now looking very slim and trim, good enough for a "before/after" advertisement.

Daughter Ciara doesn't need to, yet. She's barely 20 and fit (with a tight waistline), looking more like her father than her mother.

Helen and Tito accompanied Ciara to San Francisco first week of last month for the recording of Ciara's two songs to be released as flipside single and to be included later on in Ciara's third album.

"We stayed there for only four days," recalls Helen whose complexion is as white and as fair as the maja blanca spread out on the dessert tray. "As soon as we came home, saka naman namin nalaman that Tito's GMA 7 show, Brigada Siete, won as Best Magazine Show at the New York TV-Film Festival. Sayang. Had we been informed when we were still in San Francisco, we could have flown to New York so Tito Sen could personally receive the award." Sayang.

The two songs Ciara recorded in San Francisco are entitled Ganyan Din Sana (by Ernie dela Pena) and All This Time (by Joyce Lee), both arranged by Homer Flores. Tito himself and Sharon Cuneta's Mega Music are producing Ciara's single, to be released by Ivory Records.

Why record the songs in the US?

"Tito Sen kasi has this agreement with Kenny Buttice, the former road manager of Madonna when Madonna was new in the business," explains Helen. "The plan was started noon pa. The chance came only last January."

When Ciara was recording Ganyan Din Sana, sound engineer Steven Hart (Buttice's friend) was so touched that he told Ciara, "I don't understand the lyrics but I get the feeling (of the song)."

Ciara's single will be launched soon, to be accompanied by a music video to be directed by Richard Gomez no less.

How was it recording in the US? How different was it from recording here?

"High-tech doon," gushes Ciara, "hindi masyadong nagku-cure. Tuloy-tuloy ang recording."

After making us listen to Ciara's song which filled up the Sottos' spacious sala, the walls adorned by huge framed photos of Tito and Helen, and some paintings by the masters, we bid Helen and Ciara goodbye.

The house at Greystone Street looks the same way it did -- well, almost! -- 30 or so years ago. And the warmth of Helen's welcoming arms feels the same. It was like going back to an old, long unvisited home for the four of us.