“Noche de Ronda,” the song for my hometown

If I sing another song, aside from “Usahay” or “Matod Nila,” or " Isang Saglit" , it would be "Noche De Ronda," which I prefer over " Besame Mucho" or  "Adios Mariquita Linda'', my favorite Spanish songs.

We are here now, on the eve of our Ronda town fiesta, and we are sharing music and wine, champagne and whisky on the rocks, with humba and torta, near the balcony inside a friend's lovely chalet, on top of Liboo Hills overlooking Tanon Strait and looking down at the lights that make our poblacion up and about for our Our Lady Of Sorrows' fiesta celebration tomorrow the fifteenth of September. This place is a replica of the original Ronda in the mountain top somewhere in the province of Malaga, Spain. It is also like Beverly Hills in California or the cliff in San Francisco overlooking the pretty town of Sausalito, across the world famous Golden Gate Bridge. We have always wanted to sing this song that we thought describes the nights in Ronda.

The lyrics written by songwriter Luis Miguel, goes like this: " Noche de Ronda, Que Triste pasas, Que Triste Cruzas. Por me Balcon, Noche de Ronda, Como Me Hiere, Como Lastimas Mi Corazon. Luna Que se Quiebra, Sobre la ti Niebla, A Donde Vas, Dione se esta Noche. Tu Te Vas de Ronda, Como Ella se Fue, Con Quieron Esta, Dile que la Quiero, Dile..., which in my rough translation ( I completed 24 units of Spanish under Professor Bernardo Jumao-as in SWU in the sixties), the song goes like this, morre or less: Nights of Ronda, How sad you go, By my Balcony, Nights of Ronda, How you Hurt me, How You Hurt my Heart. Moon That Breaks, On The Darkness of My Loneliness,  Where are you Going?. Tell Me Tonight. You Go Around. As She Left, who is He With? Telll Her That I love Her. Tell Him Too.''

This is quite a sad song, well, it suits our town. Our patroness is Our Lady Of Sorrows., and our town has had a lot of pains and sufferings. Last fiesta, our town mayor was assassinated inside his office inside the municipal hall in the wee hours of early morning a few days before last year's fiesta. In the past, we have had calamities, man-made and natural. We have had fire and flood, and typhoons and storms. We have had tragedies and serious conflicts. Our history is replete of elections where father and son contested the same position, where neighbors cut ties because of politics. But then again, at the end, we always reconcile and forgive each other. Because in Ronda, truly, blood is thicker than water.

Our town is quite small compared to our neighboring towns. We have only twenty thousand residents, compared to Dumanjug in the north with fifty-two thousand and Argao in the east with seventy-five thousand. But we are bigger than our southern neighbor, the cute and tiny Alcantara. We have thousands of Rondahanons in New York, LA, San Francisco, Hawaii and Seattle, and Texas. They also celebrate our town fiesta in their own state-side ways. Because of social media, everything that happens in Ronda is known in the US in a matter of minutes. Thus, this little party on top of Liboo is transmitted through viber, pm and Facebook and all Rondahanons from Dubai to Las Vegas, from Tokyo to Perth in Australia are singing with us, "Noche de Ronda.'.