Home is my brother

By Al S. Mendoza

A BROTHER OF MINE has arrived from Toronto, Canada, where he has been living for the last 19 years.

In the family, we call him Kuya Pepito. We still do.

But his full name being Jose, my brother’s college chums had rechristened him Joe.  So, many of his Manila-based friends call him Joe. His wife, Aurora “Ting” Valenton from Talavera, Nueva Ecija, calls him Joe to this day. They call him Joe in Toronto.

You know in the Sixties, Americanizing nicknames had become the in-thing. The favorite targets were those coming from the provinces taking up college courses in Manila.

Thus, two more of my brothers had their nicknames changed in Manila – also by their college classmates. My Kuya Manoling (Manuel) became Manny and my Kuya Itiw (Vicente) is now known as Kuya Vic.

My nickname has always been Al (from Alfonso). Maybe, had I been nicknamed Ponsing or Ponso by my parents, I would have been known now as Alfie?

My elder brothers and sisters, and my aunts and uncles, love to tell me that when I was asked what my name was when I was about three or four years old, my quick reply was, “Aso Pusa” – from Alfonso Mendoza, of course.

But back to my Kuya Pepito.

He migrated to Toronto in 1988 with his wife and two kids.

He’s retired now and enjoying a pension of Canadian dollars monthly.

“It’s not that big, just enough to tide me by in   Toronto,” he says of   his pension.

Kuya Pepito’s two sons are employed. The eldest, married, lives with his wife and son in a separate house. The youngest, unmarried, lives with his parents.

Kuya Pepito’s wife still works. She’s a high-level budget executive in the Toronto bureaucracy who intends to also retire three years from now.

My brother likes it there, but he prefers to retire here.

“The proposed set-up is, I’ll stay here six months and the other six months of the year I will spend in Toronto,” says my brother.

That’s because his wife prefers retiring in Toronto, which my brother understands fully because his wife’s mother and several sisters and a brother also now live in Toronto.

We are nine siblings, and it’s only my Kuya Pepito who had gone to live overseas. Maybe that explains why he’d much prefer retiring here than living permanently in Toronto. His longing for a close contact with kin hounds him – eternally it seems.

He is not alone.

I have several friends, who have already elected retiring here for the same reason that they prefer to be close physically with their relatives again.

We all have our comfort zones. But I guess nothing beats the comfort of being right into the heart of blood relations.

In the end, family is what matters – never the land of milk and honey.

(For past columns, click http://sundaypunch.prepys.com/archives/category/opinion/general-admission/)

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