Sunday, June 19, 2011
I have always wondered if he had dreams beyond the age when he passed away at 52 years of age. He went to work in dark suit and necktie the norm for desk clerk where he worked for 25 years 8 hours a day. After office hours like a typical Pinoy he had his own stint, he was black marketing tobacco and alcohol to the local community. He was a good provider, not only to his children but also to his Filipino relatives as well as his friends who has given him sad stories of hunger, and financial needs. A very quiet man, he rarely spoke and if he does it was short and with sense. Talk I would remember as “The car is provided as a necessity and not a luxury.” “Each piece of rice or food that you waste is my sweat from working.” The best one was when my oldest sister was wearing a mini dress, “ Am I not sending you enough money, that your dressmaker can not make you a longer dress?” His everyday routine would pick up the newspaper in the morning, read the headlines, afterwards pick up a pen and start to fill up the little squares of the crossword puzzle. He was known to his friends as the walking dictionary. What is it with this man who I never really know but as a good provider? He gave financial help to everyone who was close to him. Working abroad, he was known to be a success to his Filipino blood family. The aftermath of the World War II when uncle Sam gave him the opportunity to use his Japanese language skill which he learned working for the Japanese government during their 3 years of Philippine occupation which one not dare to discuss….. He was on his way to the Ryukyu Islands. Years later he came back to the Philippines nobody heard about him for many years that they thought he died during the war. His father who had an illegitimate child was named after him. Later this half brother he provided a land to take care of their lively hood and his other siblings can harvest products in yearly rotation. I remember as a child as we walked the property line, to my little feet it took a day, he told his children “ this are all yours” as I panned the greeneries of the hills, bamboos, fruit trees and tall coconut trees. This was later subdivided by his siblings as he has named the property to his sister whom he trusted to be our guardian if something happens to him. For some reason, those relatives who greedily put their hands and claim the properties died one by one or some bad things happens to them. This was the boy who came back to his root and cared when he had the best of everything he shared. This was the boy whom has to live in another town and lived with his maternal aunt to pursue his education when all their wealth was spent on his mother who got sick and his father can not afford to send him to school. This was the boy who during his graduation, his father walked to the next town to borrow a pair of shoes to use for his graduation but came back too late and the graduation ceremony was already over when this boy was called and received the top award of the graduating class and he had no shoes.
He was known to all as a very nice well mannered man, provided financial help to his relatives and friends. I admire him for whatever reason he had and even taking that risk of losing his retirement benefits and future of his children when his name was published in the newspaper involved in black marketing in a foreign country that nobody knew of the people he helped who was supposed to have known him. As I listened so many times of how much he is appreciated my heart would scream as the legacy he left to others was not the same as mine.
As I struggle myself when he was gone, reaching my goals that maybe he dreamt of and to be proud of me. Raising up my own child as a single mother, his memories lingers in my everyday life. Our only difference is I never looked back as I reasoned out that my father’s obligation ended with him…….
Memories of Guillermo Sagaya Tulio
…… on the back of my head, I can hear my mother’s voice talking to my sister and my brother. “If everything is cheap in the Philippines why you guys are bringing so many presents there but when you come back to Japan, you don’t bring anything but a pack of dried mango?”
He was known to all as a very nice well mannered man, provided financial help to his relatives and friends. I admire him for whatever reason he had and even taking that risk of losing his retirement benefits and future of his children when his name was published in the newspaper involved in black marketing in a foreign country that nobody knew of the people he helped who was supposed to have known him. As I listened so many times of how much he is appreciated my heart would scream as the legacy he left to others was not the same as mine.
As I struggle myself when he was gone, reaching my goals that maybe he dreamt of and to be proud of me. Raising up my own child as a single mother, his memories lingers in my everyday life. Our only difference is I never looked back as I reasoned out that my father’s obligation ended with him…….
Memories of Guillermo Sagaya Tulio
…… on the back of my head, I can hear my mother’s voice talking to my sister and my brother. “If everything is cheap in the Philippines why you guys are bringing so many presents there but when you come back to Japan, you don’t bring anything but a pack of dried mango?”
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