Damn if you do, damn if you don’t

(This column appears in today's edition of the Leyte-Samar Daily Express)

Hi there! It’s a new week. Take your pick, PNoy’s new car, the nominees for the post as new COMELEC chair (thanks Balay and Samar groups), the PAO head’s CESO exam result and yes, Sharon falling flat onstage during a concert.

So PNoy bought a new car, so? Why rant about it? Why, did he re-align some government funds to get it? Let’s not even start discussing what they will say if the President bought it after his term. On top of being a thankless job, I mean job in government, it’s a damn-if-you-do-damn-if-you-don’t existence. So, my take on the issue? Let it go. Or should I say, so what?

Let’s pan our sights somewhere where we can take things lightly. So things are going up, thanks heavens there was something err, someone that went down - poor Sharon. Let me give me give you what The Professional Heckler has to say on this news: “Sharon Cuneta tripped and fell down flat on her buttocks while taping a birthday concert at the Big Dome stage last Tuesday. Cuneta’s husband, Sen. Francis Pangilinan says the megastar is now okay. He didn’t give any update though on the condition of the stage.” Oops, no offense meant to her fans, like the professional heckler, just wanna make you smile today.

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Last Friday I featured the first part of the speech delivered by Dr. Rolando Borrinaga during the reopening of the Fr. Cantius Kobak, ofm – Samar Archeological and Cultural Museum. The event was held at the CKC campus last December 29, 2010.

Dr. Borrinaga is a professor at the U.P. Manila School of health Sciences. He was the co-translator of the late Fr. Cantius in the book Reseñan de la Provincia de Leyte (the colonial Odyssey of Leyte, 1521-1913) by Manuel Artigas u Cuerva. This book won the National Book Awards for Translation in 2006 by the Manila Critics Circle. Dr. Borrinaga also authored The Balangiga Conflict Revisited and Leyte-Samar Shados.He is an active members of the Board of trustess of the Philippine National Historical society.

Here’s the second part of Dr. Borrinaga’s message:

“Our co-authored book came out in 2006 under the title The Colonial Odyssey of Leyte(1521-1914), and this won the 2006 National Book Award for Translation given by the Manila Critics Circle. I am donating a copy of this book to the museum along with two other books I have written and published – The Balangiga Conflict Revisited, which came out in 2003, and Leyte-Samar Shadows: Essays on the History of Eastern Visayas, which came out in 2008.”

“I am also donating a copy of Vol. 54 of The Journal of History, published in 2009, which includes my paper titled “The 1984 Scott-Kobak Correspondence: A Sharing that Reconstructed the Sixteenth-Century Bisayan Society and Culture.” The title is self-explanatory. Also in this volume is the paper titled “The Pulahan Movement in Samar (1904-1911): Origins and Causes,” which was written by George Emmanuel Borrinaga, my son who now teaches history at the University of San Carlos in Cebu City, and who accompanied me here.”

“Finally, I would like to turn over a mounted picture of Father Kobak. At the back of the frame are written his signature and the dateline – “Calbayog, January 1970.” Let me tell you how this came into my possession:”

“Around March 2004, Father Kobak learned after a routine medical check-up that he was suffering from cancer of the lymph glands. It did not take him long to accept the fate that he was going to the Great Beyond. He offered to bequeath to me the last items in his personal archives – including books, documents, and manuscripts that he had held on for years. I humbly accepted the offer, and promised to take care of them. He sent the items in about 10 mail parcels which contents eventually measured about two meters in thickness. Some of the parcels arrived after he had passed away.”

“I am now working on a few manuscripts left behind by Father Kobak, which hopefully will see publication over the next few years. One of these is the English translation of Vocabulario de la Lengua Bisaya, the oldest Bisayan dictionary compiled by Fr. Mateo Sanchez, SJ, in Dagami, Leyte around 1616 and published in Manila in 1711.”

“Father Kobak may be gone, but aspects of his work are still coming out in the historical literature. And with the reopening of your museum, all these are assured of a house to go home to – in Calbayog, a place that always meant a lot to him.”

“Thank you and good afternoon.”

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The late City Councilor, Educator and Calbayog Historian Patrio “Nonong” Barandino will be laid to rest today. Viewing at the Sangguniang Panlungsod Session Hall will commence at 8:00 am. A mass will be said at 9:00 am, it will be followed by a necrological service. He will be buried at the Oquendo cemetery after the 1:00 pm mass at the Holy Infant Jesus Parish Church.

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This is it for now. Have a great week ahead! Ciao!