A Close Encounter with the Tita

. "Unhappy the land that is in need of heroes." -- Bertolt Brecht

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FRONTING the PC as I occasionally glance at the live TV coverage of Cory Aquino's funeral march, and in lieu of tears and maybe of prayers, I pound this keyboard as I indulge in a nostalgic trip down memory lane -- one that traverses a good part of my rebellious youth but focused on that one "stopover" moment which moistened my eyes a few mornings back, then turned watery last night as I listened to the eulogies delivered in the televised necrological rites.

The early morning I heard the news that Cory died, I was posting a long comment to an article in a sports website that I couldn't help but postscript and punctuate with "Long Live Cory!" I assumed that the site's readers would understand that it was for Cory's memory that I shouted-out to live long, even as I was aware of the site's notorious vicious posters with their cut-throat critiques and foul language ready to jump in on that one shout-out. But none of what I expected came in as if no one paid attention to that one line.

So, here it is again: Long Live Cory!

Cory's memory lives in this blogger not only for the "tita-ness" that she assumed, or what the people conversely bestowed upon her as she took her place in Philippine history. She was a titan; she was indeed everybody's Tita.

But back in the immediate days and weeks following her husband's assassination that triggered waves of confetti revolts, she was simply "Cory" that everyone came to know. She was the Cory that I literally had a very close encounter with, albeit for a few seconds -- a memorable moment for me, but which I'm sure, she never remembered.

The close encounter happened in a protest-march held one December afternoon, not in the confetti-rained Ayala in Makati, but in faraway España (not in Europa), in old Manila. It was a protest-march that started at the Welcome Rotonda in Quezon City and was destined to end in Plaza Miranda, Quiapo.
 

If memory serves, days before the march, the Government commission the dictator Marcos first tasked to look into the Ninoy Aquino assassination (was it the Fernando Commission?) came out with its findings that exonerated then military chief Gen. Fabian Ver, among many other findings that enraged the thinking public. Indeed, we were no fools, and march we set out commemorating International Human Rights Day, circa 1983.
 

Protesters were massing up as they came in droves at the assembly point at the Rotonda, when from out of the blue, Cory appeared with not a few men and women whom I supposed included a retinue of closed-in security. She was in her trademark plain, not-so-tight short-sleeved yellow blouse and black slacks, and sporting a new (curly) hairdo that radically veered away from how she appeared in news photos and rallies in the immediate weeks post-Ninoy murder.

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Bemused by the reality that this huge figure would lend her presence to a principally Left-inspired mass  action  at  a time when rumors of factional splits within the broad coalition Justice for Aquino, Justice for All (JAJA) were a-brewing, I stood unmoved but awed, smiling at the sight of this woman in yellow slowly coming right to the spot my shaky little feet were planted on. With her familiar smile she stopped beside me, and as she looked onto the direction of Quiapo softly chatting with the two men who came closed-in with her, she nonchalantly held on to my right arm. Still awed but a bit more bewildered, I didn't move, didn't say a word, and just looked at the people around us. Dang! Suddenly there were thousands of eyes pinned on to the woman in yellow poised to kapit-bisig (link arms) with this shabby proletarian in maong blue.

For a few seconds she held on to my arm until men who I presumed were the leaders and organizers came and led her forward to the front. I stayed on my spot as I watched her disappeared into the thickening crowd.

 

Along España the march slowly progressed with all the chanting and sloganeering, and when we reached the corner of Washington Street, I went to the front section where I thought Cory was. Someone told me she had already left.

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This minute am aware that she's leaving.

I glance at the TV showing images of a slow-moving funeral cortege wading through a flood of people chanting in the rain -- and even as her final resting place is a few hours away, I knew that Tita Cory had already left. .

Long live Cory!

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