I didn’t go to Disneyland. My only experience of a theme-park was a trip to the Fiesta Carnival during San Miguel Corp. Bottling Plant’s family day. But my whole neighborhood was an adventure park for me and my neighborhood friends. There was a rice field at the back of our house, and we spent countless afternoons there tumbling, running, flying kites that our fathers made for us. We trekked to the nearby train tracks to make our own musical instruments for Christmas caroling – we laid down the tin caps of beer and soda bottles along the tracks so they’d be flattened when the train passes. And then we’d punch holes in the middle of the caps so we can string them with heavy wire and use like a tambourine.
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| Mito loves playing ball. He has a Little Tikes stand-up basketball hoop, but it's just him and us who play. |
The street in front of our house was the ultimate sports field. We played football, Pinoy style of course, with our mothers actually watching while sharing the daily gossip. We made our patintero lines using water. Heck, we played siyato, which meant we actually stood in position to intercept a thick wooden stick that our opponent was supposed to hit really hard to make it fly really far, and our mothers cheered us on and did not freak out about the possibility - and oftentimes the actuality - of the stick hitting us right smack in the head. We played with marbles, tex, rubber bands, palara. We collected those and stored them in jars at home, and it annoyed my mother to bits that she constantly threatened to cook them and make us eat them. We played with spiders, beetles, dragonflies, (not frogs).
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| Just another day of exploring. I think this is the day he learned to make mud. :-) |
All the families in our street would sometimes rent a jeepney and go on an excursion; an extra long bangko had to be put inside the jeepney so about 30 people can sit. We’d go to Pugpog, this famous river resort, and “swim” all day while eating the crunchiest indian mangoes. By swim, of course I mean crawl along the water by holding on to the rocks – living in Bulacan, a land-locked province, meant we didn’t have much chance to learn how to actually swim (except in flood waters).
I remember our very first trip to a swimming pool resort. I was about 10 years old then, I think. We were supposed to go to Paradise Resort in Malolos, and it speaks of how simple life was back then that the idea of going to a place that had “paradise” in its name meant days of blissful excitement and anticipation for me. When we got there, the place was packed, so much so that the people were not swimming anymore, they were just standing in the water. We were refused admission. I was absolutely heartbroken. We decided to go and see another place, Fantasy Island, in the next town. All the way to that second place, I kept muttering, “paraiso na, naging pantasya pa.” Mercifully, that resort turned out to be even better than the one we originally intended to go to (or maybe that was how my young broken heart felt when hope was revived). It had lots more trees, less people, and a higher slide. So that whole day, I kept on exclaiming, “fantasy come true pala ‘to!”
I went to our barangay public school, together with all the kids in our street. (Back then it was the few private school students who didn’t fit in – they were rich, and therefore, they cannot be our friends.) I was bullied once by this planet of a 6th grader (I was in 4th grade at that time) who sat me down behind the inverted ice cream cone monument in our school grounds and cursed me and threatened me, all because she heard me singing the theme song to Valiente the day before while we were walking home and we were in front of their house – apparently she was being teased about something related to that afternoon soap, so she lost it when she thought I was in on the teasing. I didn’t cry, and that day, me and my neighbor friends all walked home and sang the song really loud when we passed her house again. And I think that was the first lesson I had on how to handle bullies – can’t show them you’re scared. She never bothered me again after that, except for the occasional death stares which didn’t scare me at all.
December mornings back then were still really chilly. We had contests on who can make the biggest breath rings those mornings. I lost at least four sweaters that I accidentally left in school – I would wear them in the mornings on the way to school but by recess time, I’d take them off to play, and then forget about them completely. Money was a lot harder to earn at that time, so you can just imagine the scolding I got over those lost sweaters. But then it would be Christmas, and then Rizal Day, and there would be a Rizal Day quiz bee among the students of the different public schools in our town, and I would almost always win, so I would be forgiven for the sweaters. In fact, my parents would buy me a new one because I would need a sweater when I get my Rizal Day award during the town celebration on New Year evening.
I grew up singing in our church’s children’s choir. I spent Sundays in Sunday school. We learned to act, dance, draw, write essays in Sunday school and church camps. Our Church would give out Christmas gifts to the church kids every 24th of December, and it was the joy of our Christmas seasons to get those really thick multi-colored ballpens that were almost impossible to write with but were always a good source of bragging rights. (“Sa kin apat na kulay.” “Sa kin anim!” “E wala ka naman purple!”)
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| He's an iPad expert. |
Sigh. Life was so much simpler back then, and therefore so much easier as well to fill with awe and wonder. We didn’t have much, so whatever little extra we had was oh so sweet. We had friends – actual friends that we played with outside. Yes, we did also stay up ‘til really really late when we finally got a family computer, but I think I was already in high school at that time. I don’t think I’ve ever been as busy as when I was a kid.
I don’t know how to do it but it is my mission to try as much as I can to give Mito the childhood he will remember as the best childhood ever. I don’t know if I should adopt my idea of what that childhood should look like to the changing, developing times. But I know that I don’t want Mito’s active play to be restricted to the Gymboree playroom, which is why I encourage him to go out of the house and walk and run around the neighborhood every day. (Sadly, of the 4 kids who live in the apartment row we’re renting, Mito’s the only one who goes out to play. The others have porcelain skin.) I know that I don’t want to buy every single toy Mito wants, and I want him to learn to make his own toys. I know I don’t want to have to drive to the Fort just to teach him about patintero and piko. I know I don’t want him to grow up thinking playmate=Mom, Dad, and yaya.
I have a tough mission – self-imposed, yes, but tough nonetheless. I wish there would be a campaign to encourage parents to help each other give the kiddos a child’s childhood. Seriously, if only my neighbor mommies would let their kids go out, I think a big chunk in my mission would have been accomplished already.
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| Fun day! Wish more days were like this. :) |
