No Graveyards for Flowers and Candles

Dear Friends and the Pulsewire Team,

Hello! I know everybody is excited for the result of our training program. I did have some breathing space this fast few days and I take this opportunities to write stories and letters for everybody of you . I did finish this one article i will post for my journal. But before I will finally post it , I would appreciate your comments for final editing. Hope you will find time iving me your feedbacks. Thank you so much!

Best wishes to all,
malaya

“It’s been a long time you’ve gone! Where have you beeen ? I’ve missed you so much! I excitedly hug her with my arms full of warmth for a long lost friend and a comrade. You lost so much weight, don’t you? Everybody is missing you!”

She just responds with a gentle look at me followed by a deep silence.

Tamara, her young teen-ager daughter is with her. It’s a surprise visit of Luing and Tamara at my home today. Oh! you know I really cried when I saw Tamara’s few days ago. I always read her letters for you and … “Yes,” she smilingly nod at me. Understanding the pain of what she meant, I give her a smile back.

While sitting together in our bamboo sala set, Luing excitedly opens her goody bags for us and Tamara keeps talking to her. I can still see the usual Luing who is so gentle and thoughtful in her ways. She loves to bring foods as “pasalubong” (presents) for everybody whenever she’s away for days. She always brings foods for Tamara after day’s work. I look at Tamara and I can feel the high spirits of a child being with her mom. It’s unexplainable feeling of happiness being united with a mother after two long years of waiting and agonizing uncertainty.

This is the fourth time of seeing Luing in my dreams after their abduction two years ago. She was a woman activist colleague, whom I work closely in our advocacy work on human rights. In my dreams, I always talk to her and ask how is she and Nilo. Nilo was another activist friend. He was a peasant leader and we spent good and bad times together in our advocacy campaign on electoral reform before he and Luing were abducted. They are included in the list of more than 200 Filipino activists missing under the “US Global War Against Terror” of the Philippine government under President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.

The loss of a loved one being a desaparecidos is not strange to me. I’ve suffered the loss of my first husband Sandy twenty years ago. He was a trade union activist. It was the worst feeling I ever have. Four months of being married. Four rosy months of celebration of love, then came nights of constant nightmare.

I was so depressed for two years. I can’t even laugh to the funniest jokes my friends cracked for me. I always cried, whenever I remembered him even in front of others. There’s a feeling of guilt whenever I stopped searching for him. I feel so powerless and helpless where to find him.

I didn’t stopped hoping that he will surface anytime of the day. Out of desperation, we went to faith healers, card readers and palm readers just to have grains of information. Some told me he is still alive and he will be home on his birthday. Yes, I did wait and wait and wait… but no one arrived home. It took time for me to let go, though after all those years there still pain whenever I remember him.

Yesterday was November 1, Halloween Day. But for us Filipinos, it’s a day of remembering of our departed love ones. As a tradition, everybody cooked native delicacies and set servings for the spirits of the departed. We visit graveyards, light candles and bring foods and flowers. Others spend overnight for a get together.

But for families and friends of desaparecidos, it’s different. There are no gardens of remembrance to bring flowers and foods and candles to light for them. No prayers for the dead. Just prayers, hoping they are still alive or eternal peace wherever they are.

I dreamed of Luing maybe because he reminds me that she and Nilo are still alive. Maybe she’s telling me that life after all is beautiful when it is given away and shared for a greater and noble cause. Maybe she’s telling me, “It’s okay, don’t worry about us. It doesn’t matter if we have no graveyards to bring your flowers and light candle for us, what matters most is you remember us.”

It’s a constant struggle of uncertainty, of choices between life and death for those who are left behind. It took time for others to move on. For others it took lifetime letting them go. But for me, there’s certainly one place of their memories. They live within our hearts and within the hearts of millions Filipinos and women whom they fought for. They are our inspirations.
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Sandy, Luing and Nilo and other fellow activists who perished without any traces of footprints are truly one of my many inspirations that keep me giving, hoping and fighting for freedom and a better tomorrow beyond my lifetime. They will be remembered forever in our hearts even they have no graveyards for our flowers and candles.