Tuesday, November 20, 2007 Echaves: Passages By Lelani P. Echaves Thinking Aloud
IT'S along the way, and you might not have the chance to pass this way again,” explained the generous and accommodating Adelmo Laput, gene-neral manager of the Zamboanga del Norte Electric Cooperative (Zaneco).
My friends and I were on our way to Dakak Park Beach Resort in Taguilon, Dapitan City, but GM Laput appointed himself as our tour guide and so led us to the Rizal Shrine and some credible replicas of the Rizal family’s various houses. Even by to-day’s standards, the house of the Philippines’ national hero was big and well-appointed.
And so, remembering friends and colleagues’ arguments during my UP days, I said “Tinuod gyud diay nga burgis tu si Rizal, unsa?” And GM Laput said, “Parehas sad diay ka nila ug huna-huna?” We just laughed; my friends and I were taking in the sights on stolen time, hardly a circumstance allowing a debate.
Besides, the whole preserved area was living proof. About three smaller houses stood not too far from the parental home, reportedly the accommodations for Rizal’s friends when he or they visited. Some distance away were a Casa Cuadrada, and still farther away, a Casa Redonda.
Rizal’s various talents are legendary — doctor, author, poet and novelist. But at the Shrine, we saw proofs of Rizal the sculptor. And documentation of his various phases and faces, all 24 of them.
Throughout the protected Shrine compound, some distant relatives or residents of various ages volunteered to keep the houses and other properties clean and preserved.
Young and old ladies were either picking up fallen leaves, or climbing up trees for easier passage. Old men and women, probably in their 70s were sitting on the steps of the Rizal house or replica houses, somehow lending authentication to the whole view.
We were led to an elevated deck to which Rizal reportedly took his lady love, Josephine Bracken, for enjoying the breeze and the panoramic view. Such deck had been ordered cemented by then president Fidel Ramos, a move unwelcomed by the local folks because it was “tampering” with the original.
Dakak Park Beach Resort proved to be worth waking up early for, and taking the five-hour trip by Ocean Jet.
Prior to the trip, a friend had texted that Dakak was good for solitary writing. But I texted back, “I’m not into solitary writing yet; besides, like Frost, there were too many places to see and promises to keep before I sleep.”
Still, it’s a good place for conversations and knowing people behind their position titles. We learned that GM Laput married late, was once a priest, is married to a judge, and has a gifted child once featured in Promil’s TV commercials.
Precocious son Pete Adriel has an IQ of 160, and is now in Grade 3, though still six years old. An American company offered P5 million to bring him to the US to study him further. But protective father said, “Come back when he’s 15; if you’re still interested, it’s his decision. For now, I just want him to enjoy his childhood, because he will not pass this way again.”
