Education – Page 4 – PATHLESS TRAVELS

2014-03-212019-10-13

The motto that didn’t make sense

When I was a Grade 4 newbie at the Kamuning Elementary School (having transferred from the neighborhood annex near K-D or what is now Erestain St.), I was a highly focused student who observed all goings-on, obeyed all my teachers, followed all the drills and assignments, and mostly kept to myself except for a handful of co-nerds (or were we co-dorks?) like Raymond Co and Goldwyn Azul.

But as the school year wore on, I gained more confidence, indulged my curiosity, and began to show my incipient rule-breaking tendencies. One early object of this curiosity was the Chi Rho sign that some of the girls in class always wrote on top of the test papers, quizzes, and theme papers that they passed. Continue reading “The motto that didn’t make sense”

2014-03-212014-03-21

Bamboo shoots

Many years have carved these slopes.
It was around this time in March when
North wind tarried on, defying summer thirst
And a thousand shoots of green rejoiced. Continue reading “Bamboo shoots”

2013-10-122013-10-12

A precious gift from the Alhambras

Those who stayed for extended periods in the old Kamuning house invariably noticed the books. Four tall book cabinets higher than a grown man (two in the living room, two upstairs), and additional bookshelves scattered all around the house, contained hundreds of titles, when we young siblings still lived together with our parents under one roof.

A gift from the Alhambras — A PRECIOUS GIFT FROM THE ALHAMBRAS. Correction. Make that, literally, a ton of precious gifts from the Alhambras. These three are merely a drop in the great outpouring of affection for books between two families.

This huge assortment of books, pamphlets, monographs, and a Britannica set (1968 edition) even had a name: our parents called it the “Pio Verzola Library” and had the most important volumes stamped and tracked with a card pocket at the back of each book. My mother had some library training, and so we kids were taught that the books at home followed a system similar to what we followed in the school library. Continue reading “A precious gift from the Alhambras”