All Saints’ Day 2008

It has been embedded in my system that there are three most important dates I should go home (Gumaca, Quezon): Holy Week, Christmas, and All Saints’ Day. So last October 31, my sister Ethel, my two nephews CJ and Eloy, and I went to our hometown. It so happened that the All Saints’ Day is also the birthday of our dad. He turned 62 last Saturday.

I left our house at around 2:30 am and fetched Ate and her two grown up kids at Makati. We left Makati at  3:07 am. After about 2 and a half hours of driving, we stopped over at McDonalds Villa Escudero in Tiaong, Quezon, and had our fill of coffee. After 30 minutes, we went on driving. We decided to take the Pagbilao-Unisan route instead of Zigzag Road. The morning started with a rain and it might not be advisable to traverse the dangerous road. We reached the house at around 8am. Dad is already there waiting for us. We spent the day singing in our videoke and in the afternoon, Tiyo Johnny and Tiya Elvira arrived and we had some bottles of beer. Tita Mariz (dad’s new wife) and I butchered the native chicken also. I was the one who cut their throats.

The next day I woke up at 9:30am. Ate and the kids left already for the cemetary. So I followed them after taking a bath. I think there are fewer people in the cemetary as compared to last year’s. I stayed there for two more hours before buying all the things needed for our small gathering tonight. Unfortunately, Ate lost her cellphone while buying pancit at Kapitbahay eatery (or while buying tasty breads at Marvelous bakery).

When we came back, I was the one who cooked ginataang native chicken and relyenong bangus and inihaw na tilapya which gained much praises from the visitors. We concluded the night with bottles of beer.