Wow. I’m in Vigan again. But now for fieldwork and alone for the first time. It’s going to be interesting.
I am billeted in an old house turned quaint inn near the center of the town. It’s 1:23 am right now and I am hearing a group of men from the cafe just across the street sing pop ballads in succession with a guitar like it’s not a working Monday in a few hours. I don’t know why I always feel at home in this town. It’s the same feeling I get when I walk through UST. Maybe it’s because of the old architecture, or maybe I lived here sometime in my previous life or maybe it’s just that my mom used to tell me a lot of stories about these places. My maternal grandfather after all, hailed from Vigan, met my grandmother who is from Tuguegarao and they settled in Aparri to build a (very big) family. I remember finding a set of yellowish nearly-tattered correspondences between my lolo and lola once inside the drawer of a dilapidated mah jong table. I read them, of course, (are you nuts?!) and some were stamped from Vigan to Aparri. They were already married then and my lolo was out for business of some sort and my lola was manning their newly-installed drugstore. What I loved most was that in between serious talk of business and the trivial details, they still managed to squeeze in some thoughtful expressions of endearments which didn’t sound cheesy or contrived.
This evening I was eating my supper in the inn’s cafe: Pipian – that’s chicken soup with ground rice and smashed kamias infused with achuete for color. Across me in the intimately drawn place near the bar was a couple seemingly on holiday and at the other table, three men drinking beer talking about wedding photography. In another section were families of 4 and 5 and in the separate function hall was a group of elderly who seem to be celebrating something. I scanned the menu. Everything was familiar to me. Ilocano dishes that are sinful and flavorful and simple all at the same time. I envied the men drinking beer. I thought of how it must be nice to share a beer with someone else right now. But I smelled the homey aroma of coffee and decided that drinking it with cake later sounds more apt. The beer will come sometime soon. I texted some friends and gushed about the place. Somehow the Christmas lights in the dim-lighted brick-enclosed tableau made me happy and a bit nostalgic.
As I walked along the cobblestoned street of Calle Crisologo to look for an ATM machine, I wondered at how convenient it is to be alone. I never liked being with people whom you have to campaign what you find interesting to. But as I grow older and experience more things, I recognize that the inherent call is to share these to others. Life is too beautiful to keep bottled up. There’s always that urge to make others see what you find fascinating. With that comes disappointment if people did not share your excitement or fear for being responsible for another person’s quality of experience. Those always kept me in containment. And always I dreamed of someone whom I did not have to explain myself to. But I guess God is smart in that he made us different and created a need for communicating. It’s encourages humble effort of reaching out. If everything would have flowed perfectly between and among people, and everybody understood each other automatically, we would have been only be emotional robots.
I'm pretty sure there's an unfinished thought there somewhere but I'm sleepy and there's something in the air that tells me it's okay to let things hang for a while. Every town or city has a personality. To me,Vigan feels like an old friend who is open to new things but knows that it does not need to accumulate these or show-off to look worthy or important. It just lets time take its steady course accumulating stories, even if unfinished, along the way. This confident laid-back quality rubbed off on me somehow. As if I were in a couch dialogue that has spontaneously commenced after supper, with throw pillows and a warm blanket, I've already settled in.
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