(Babble On, for Sunstar Davao, Nov. 14, 2008.)
My grandmother Luz Lee passed away on October 3, 2008. It was a difficult time for the family. To honor her memory, I thought I would share the beautiful eulogy that my cousin Arlene L. Wong wrote. It is very touching and brought tears to my eyes.
EULOGY:
Luz Lee, Mama Luz, or Angin, as she is fondly called, came home to the Father only a few days ago, but we have missed her long before then because of her illness. Let me tell you about our grandmother, a woman who enriched her own life and those of others by her GIVING.
Orphaned by their mother at a very young age, Mama Luz, the eldest girl in a brood of nine children, had to juggle the responsibilities of managing a household, looking after her siblings and helping with her father Chiew Ning’s tailoring shop. She was eventually left with no choice but to give up her schooling. Meanwhile, her siblings all went on to complete higher education, made possible by Mama Luz’s selfless dedication to her family. Even without a diploma under her name, grandma strove to educate herself and was soon successful in one of the things she did best – tailoring.
Angin wasn’t the emotional or affectionate type of grandmother that the psychologists of today would surely approve of, but she wasn’t any less of a grandmother because of this. She had been a steady, silent presence in our lives. She doted on us without indulging us, expressing love and concern not so much with words but with small acts of kindness.
The summer before I left to attend university in Manila, she sat me down for a talk. Alarm bells started ringing in my head because my grandma didn’t do pep talks. It must be something I had done. With my heart beating so fast, I made a mental list of my possible offenses during the past week. She would then look at me lovingly and proceed to tell me to be friendly to the people I would meet in Manila. “Who knows? You might just end up marrying a fine young fellow from Manila or Cebu,” she said. It had been a pep talk after all; the first – and last one she ever gave me. Her advice may not have worked, but I appreciated my grandma and her kind words nonetheless.
Toys, tsinelas and candies aside, our Sunday dinners in Toril became more memorable with Grandma’s own dose of tough-loving: As soon as the dishes were put away for washing, she would subject all nine of us grandchildren to an inspection of our bruises and then proceed to press freshly-boiled egg on them. As painful as it was, crying was definitely a no-no. Not so much because she thought it was a sign of weakness, but because our ever-practical grandma thought it pointless to shed tears; it was more important to learn from our mistakes or experiences and unceremoniously move forward from there.
Ever the health buff that she was, she made it a daily habit to walk around the village or the palengke – the whole stretch of Magsaysay Avenue even – as exercise. During meal times, the dining table wouldn’t be complete without a dish or two of fruits and vegetables. Of course, who wouldn’t remember her favorite tagline? “Drink carrot juice to fight cancer!” Why, she even gave some of our cousins P20 just so they would empty one glass of the drink.
During school days, our playtime would be cut short as soon as grandma called us out in her singsong voice, “Mga Tata~~!” She would then take out her folded sheet of yellow paper for it was time to recite the multiplication table out loud to her – one by one, from numbers 2 to 9. Her persistence and patience soon bore fruit: we, her grandchildren, were among the fastest in our classes when it came to tackling multiplication problems.
Mama Luz instilled in all of us the value of hard work as well as hard-earned money. Mom once told me that as kids, grandma required them to bring back a stack of used papers on their way home from school. She, together with her brothers, would pick up newspapers and other materials on the streets, which would eventually be used as packaging for the merchandise in City Model, the family-owned tailoring shop in Toril. While growing up, my sister and I were also encouraged by grandma to help out in the store – our very own playground as kids.
Angin was a peacemaker. Whenever trouble brewed, she was always there to mediate and patch things up. While her no-nonsense approach to conflict resolution may have offended the sensibilities of one party too many, she cannot be faulted, for she only had everyone’s best interests at heart.
She was also the first to rush to any family member’s side in times of need and difficulty. Her thoughtfulness and generosity had extended to the people under her employ, and as we found out much, much later on, even to strangers. Mama Luz once testified at the baranggay hall in defense of an employee who was wrongly accused of domestic violence. She secretly sent out bags of groceries to friends week after week for several years until she became ill. Strangers have come up to us telling us of how grandma once rushed to the pharmacy to buy them a tube of ointment or a bottle of eye drop upon overhearing them complain of their discomfort. Perhaps some of you here even have your own story to tell of how my grandma touched your life with her generosity.
I take pride in having a grandmother who was always a woman for others… a cheerful giver… a silent worker… a planter of good seeds.
As I looked at my grandma lying peacefully in her bed at the CCU – free at last from the intrusion of tubes and needles – I gave her limp fingers a final squeeze. In my mind’s eye I saw the gentle smile on her lips and the glint in her eyes – much like the one I always saw there whenever she heard the word ‘lechon –’ and I knew that she is in a better place.
You finished the race Granny, and you finished it well. Farewell…until we meet again.
(Kelvin’s cousin, Arlene Wong, was an editorial assistant for Entrepreneur magazine. She studied and worked in Hefei and Shanghai before coming home to Davao city).
