(UNTITLED)

Entry No. 2

Little by little, piece by piece, like teardrops forming a downpour. Father Narvaez, with his right leg still buried on the ground, laid back on the soil and fervently tried to put things in perspective. It was not because he felt weak, neither does the weight of the world seem to hang on him. What grew heavy in his heart was the fact that it seemed that all things are either blown by the wind, or that life is like a leaf - slowly descending from a great big tree - from its birth then falling to the ground. Soon it would be forgotten, and all markings that would be left is a single twig, where once it tried to feed the caterpillars, and gave shade to numerous little insects. It was a full moon that night. The mango tree seemed to be silent, as if paying reverence to Luna, unnerved by an intruder beneath its branches. Scanning the fruits that would soon be ready by May, Father Narvaez grew accustomed to the grasshoppers singing their serenade, and to the chirping of the kulisap, which seemed to last from dusk ‘til dawn. But tonight was different. A strange kind of silence emanated all around him, like the sound he heard during a solitary meditation in Rome. It was not an eerie sound – unsetlling maybe, but never fearful - a silence encased in a strange melancholy. A silence that was so loud he could practically hear it screaming on his head.

He then chanced upon a spider, slowly weaving upon its web. Nestled high, secured from the torrents of the rain, the spider was unmindful of the curious eye staring at it as if it was a novelty, something to help the priest contemplate on his musings. He noticed that the moon was slowly moving, right above the web, just like it does on a total lunar eclipse. He noticed too, the changing of the color of the moon. From a bright whitish yellow, from the illusion produced by the movement of the earth, and from the spider’s web clinging on a branch, the moon seemed to be turning into a red round plump tomato, almost ripe, yet not in its fullness. “The moon is a big red tomato,” he grinned.

Staring at the moon right above the spider’s web, Father Narvaez had let his mind be drowned by the flashbacks of his life slowly turning into crystals. “Maybe Death is grinning upon me,” he thought. Right there and then, he embarked on a journey that was his past. He should have taken it as a sign, a premonition of some sort, the conversation he had with Father Damaso, and the latter’s complaint of the barbaric ways of the indio, or his distrust upon a Filipino priest like him. Indeed, the execution of Father Mariano Gomez, Father Jose Burgos and Father Jacinto Zamora at the province of Cavite made evident the deep animosity between colonialists and natives, even among the servants of God. The fat Spanish priest who served San Diego for twenty years did not bother to say it on his back, instead, like a whiplash he declared, “I bet that you - Father Salvador Narvaez , that you would not last for five years without being corrupted by the indios - and all the things the Holy Church has taught you, would be burned down into ashes. Everything is bound to happen. Lintek! Mother Spain’s effort to civilize you and your people is just a waste of time.” Those words left a vile taste in his mouth.

Now that he was beginning to think about it, he also remembered how Mang Turino, Father Salvi’s gardener, warned him that the latter was not in a good mood when he stopped by San Diego’s church. The slightly thin priest with a crooked nose was to assign him to a parish that needed his assistance.

“Good morning,” he said in tagalog, alighting a coach, looking at the gardener trimming a sampaguita bush on the garden at the back of the church.

“Good morning po,” Mang Turino bowed his head.

“Is Father Salvi in?” he inquired.

“Yes he is Father,” the gardener replied while staring at his slightly brown skin. “But I wouldn’t go in there if I were you just yet.”
Father Narvaez was curious.

“Well, humbly speaking Father, I know things. Maybe it would be better if you go back at noon, right after Father Salvi has taken his siesta.”

“Why is that?”

“This morning, as soon as the morning prayers were said, and the church bells were tolled, Father Salvi shouted angrily at the sakristan mayor and asked for tsokolate-a.”

“And what’s wrong with that?” he asked.

“Tsokolate-e would mean a light cocoa drink. Tsokolate-a would mean a strong, thick cocoa drink. And that makes the difference.”

Father Narvaez gave a soft laugh and dismissed the gardener. He continued to walk towards Father Salvi’s parochial residence.

That was a turning point in his life, that by some sort of scheme, he was thrown to a farming village called Malamig, where he now lay - taking a journey that started at the outskirts of Barcelona - while looking at the sky beneath the spider’s web, and the moon was red, looking like a plump round tomato.