My UPLB Christmas

Perhaps it was the ceremonial lighting of the 70-ft. Christmas tree at the Carabao Park of UP Los Baños that brought me back to the campus last Wednesday. At the onset, I must admit, the tree lighting at the university that saw me through was a big come-on for my recent return to the fertile grounds of UPLB — the same grounds that made my mind fertile with knowledge and ambition in the late ‘80s.

With quiescence, I merged with the crowd that gathered at the park. The invitation said the festivities would begin at 5 p.m. I arrived at 4 p.m., filled with excitement, bursting with joy that I was back at UPLB. I ogled the tall white tree that was bathed in soft, late afternoon sun. The breeze that accompanied the sunset in LB was warm, or was it because too much excitement was running all over me?

I used the excitement to rummage through the past.

It used to be that December was filled with nippy breeze during my time in UPLB. Early mornings and late afternoons were characterized by many students going to classes in parkas or jackets. The sun would be up but still there would be cuddle-weather throughout the day. Taking a shower every day, despite the cold weather during Christmastime, was “chicken feed” because the water that came from the tap, if there was water at all in the dormitories, was warm. That must be the hot spring water coming straight from Mount Makiling, from whose glorious foot the campus reigned in.

There was no Christmas tree lighting then — as this tradition only began in 2006, 18 years after I first set foot in UPLB. But there was Parolan or Lantern Parade where student organizations gathered their wits to create the most unique lanterns. Each muse of the organization would strut it out at the university auditorium to thunderous rooting from their “brods” and “sisses.” She would bring the parol to center stage and explain its relevance. Even if, sometimes, the lantern was bereft of relevance, the witty tongue of the muse would give meaning to the mundane. The explanation would always be inundated, if not inaudible, in the long and deafening cheering from the gallery. The Parolan at UPLB was an anticipated event. But in my three-and-a-half-year stay in college, the lady representative from UP Rural High School would always win deservingly. And because of that, the Parolan, during my time, earned the moniker PaRURALan. 

The lanterns from the Parolan event would then be displayed the following day at the Carabao Park. Humanities 1 and Humanities 2 instructors would require their students to make sense of the entries by asking them to write a two-page, double-spaced interpretation of their chosen parol. That would be the last term paper before the Christmas break at UPLB. In those days, “recycling,”  “waste segregation,” “biodegradable” and  “non-biodegradable” were already big terms; so those terms figured prominently in our typewritten reaction papers courtesy of Olympia typewriters or dot-matrix printers. The personal computers then were so huge and bulky they could be a weapon for amputation. Oh, the huge square floppy disks we used to save our Wordstar file could also cut a limb! But such was the joy of those “hi-tech” days. Electronic mail, though in existence already, was not so much a popular means of communication. No beepers, no cellphones. But there were genuine relationships among friends in the campus.

If the Parolan paper you submitted did not merit even a tres (a grade of 3.0) from the professor, you shrug it off and tell yourself, “I will make it good next time!” And many times, you said the same comforting line.

Then you find yourself running to the store of Mang Pogs and Aling Sexy at the Grove. You find a drink there that would make you happy. Mang Pogs and Aling Sexy, a convivial couple to many UPLB students of the ‘80s, were not merely merchants selling their wares of bottled drinks, blue books and junk food. Not everything in their store was for sale. One big thing came there for free: friendship. The couple (bless the soul of Aling Sexy for she passed away a few years ago) became friends with their customers. Many times, they knew the names of the students who regularly patronized their store. Those who were in their “credit list” were extraordinarily footnoted in their memory banks. Long before 7-Eleven made its presence in UPLB, the store of Mang Pogs and Aling Sexy was open all day long. It was the only store that sold beer, candles and even kerosene gas when inclement weather in the campus set in.

And when the weather was bad, you craved for the comfort food of Mother’s Best or Ellen’s Fried Chicken. Long before Jollibee and McDo came to the streets of LB, there were already those establishments. Add to this the Bat Cave that served the best lechon kawali with homemade liver sauce. Breakfast at the Sausage House and Westside Bistro on Kanluran Road was also heaven.

Of course, my Christmas at the university wouldn’t be complete without the APO-initiated Oblation Run. That’s a long story.

***

On those days when simplicity was the order of the day, I would bump into Fernando Sanchez Jr., commonly known as Dindo, in the university. I would see him mostly at the basement of the Student Union (SU) building, where his Upsilon brods would converge for a game or two of billiards. If my memory serves me right, my friends and I shared the makeshift theater at the basement of SU with Dindo when we watched the 1990 movie Ghost. For a fee of P10, a student, seated on a monoblock chair, could watch a film reeling from a VHS player and flashed on a 21-inch TV at the viewing room.

 Last Wednesday, I saw again the convivial Dindo, now 48. He was no longer in faded jeans and long-back shirt as he was when he was taking up BS Agriculture (major in Horticulture, with specialization in Landscaping) and Masters in Environmental Science at UPLB. He was in a lukot-yaman barong as he spearheaded the lighting of the Christmas tree at the Carabao Park. He is now the newly minted chancellor of UP Los Baños.

Abra, the hit rapper of today’s generation, was doing his crowd-pleasing number at the Carabao Park when I chanced upon the time to talk to the chancellor. He told me that foremost in his action plan is to make UPLB aggressive in R&D and to “lay the foundation for the sustained growth and development of the university.”

“We will support our scientists with the right tools and equipment,” said Chancellor Sanchez, who took his PhD scholarship at the Tokyo University of Agriculture in Japan in 1994. He also added that security within and around the university will be beefed up with the university working hand in hand with the local government.

Amidst the glow of the UPLB Christmas village, as there were also lighted Ho-Ho-Ho Man on a sleigh and reindeers flying in mid-air, the chancellor made his Christmas wish: “Let’s join hands. Magtulungan tayo for the good of the university.”

***

I’m ready to help. I’m doing my share by reminiscing the good old UPLB of my time.

I was barely 16 going on 17, with apologies to The Sound of Music, when I first set foot in UPLB. The hills of UPLB were alive, so to speak, when I entered as a freshman Communication Arts student in 1988. The hills have remained alive — just like the dreams they imbue in me.

The campus reminds me of the past — my juvenile irreverence, the joys and challenges of learning, my dreams that were eventually met.

UP Los Baños will always be a big part why I want my life to matter — the university took me seriously and equipped me with the right tools to somehow conquer the world.

To this day, UPLB remains my sanctuary. I visit the university once in a while to give my ode to the muse who first gave me the nod, the wink, the assurance that I would amount to something someday.

Before leaving UPLB that night, I looked at the big yellow star on top of the 70-ft. Christmas tree that was all aglow and I was reminded of the other dreams I need to pursue — for me and for others.

It’s Christmas now at the university. It always feels like Christmas every time I think of UPLB.

To UP Los Baños, I remain grateful.

(For your new beginnings, please e-mail me at bumbaki@yahoo.com. I’m also on Twitter @bum_tenorio and Instagram

@bumtenorio. Have a blessed Sunday!)