Acacia

Acacia: Barrio Tale

Any barrio folk who had been away for decades might think the way I do tonight. After nearly twenty years of absence, knowing that at least half the people I once knew are no longer alive, I find myself reflecting on the best memories the barrio offers me. But there’s a caveat: with age, my memory isn’t as sharp as it once was. The vivid pictures I recall now take on a watercolor-like quality, as if they’ve turned into postcards. Perhaps that’s why Kurosawa, the Japanese filmmaker, created such beautiful films. He saw Japan in the deepest parts of his mind. I may not be able to see the barrio with the same clarity he saw Japan, but I do see it in my own way. It’s always beautiful. And always sad, in the way life and the past have been for me.

Lying in bed, I think of the people who lived in the houses I used to pass on my way home. Indang Odik, dead. Apung Gundang, dead. Indang Leti, alive. Indang Maring, alive. Apung Aling, dead. The list goes on, but it’s not about naming them all. What matters is how we spent time together in the barrio when growing old and dying were the least of our concerns. I never imagined how quickly time would erase us all. Memory is the only lingering proof that we were once living, moving souls on this earth.

I don’t want to dwell on sadness, but my past in the barrio wasn’t exactly joyful. You might suggest I focus on the present instead. But when I last visited, the barrio had become congested, full of faces I hardly recognized. The ones I did know were either senile or gone. My contemporaries had either moved abroad or were too embarrassed to see me.

That’s the truth. Even I, who has tried to live in two worlds, can’t win everything. I can’t live perfectly in two places at once. I’m the floating man, caught between two continents, two cultures, many races, and countless attitudes. In such a world, nothing is stable. Nothing is fixed. So I rely on memory.

My memory clings to one constant: the acacia tree standing beside Chanda’s Beauty Parlor, where jeepneys come and go. Chanda once lured men with promises of love and sex beneath that tree. She was a has-been, once working at BlueMoon, the only whorehouse in the barrio. Rumor had it she was riddled with diseases, so men stopped coming. But I’m not in the mood to talk about Chanda. I want to talk about the acacia tree.

The tree—ancient and weathered—stands with its trunk burned, leaving a hollow in its center. Remarkably, the bark still keeps the tree alive, and it continues to bear leaves. Whoever tried to kill it must be dead by now. The acacia has outlived its would-be destroyers, just as it has outlived wars, fads, heroes, sins, and gossip. With my limited time left on this earth, the acacia will outlive me too. It’s an immortal tree, a symbol of the barrio itself.

My grandfather warned me of the kapre that lived in the acacia tree. He described the silhouette of the half-man, half-horse creature perched in its branches during full moons. Smoke from the kapre’s tobacco would curl into the air as it asked, in a low voice: "Where have you been? Where are you going?"

When my grandfather was young, the kapre once asked him those very questions. The next thing he knew, he found himself three barrios away, lost in the dead of night. He had to knock on doors to find his way back home. “The kapre was offended,” he whispered to me, “because I didn’t ask his permission to pass by the tree.” If the kapre ever confuses you like that, the antidote is simple: just turn your shirt inside-out.

Many nights, I would sit by the window, staring at the acacia’s thick crown, waiting for a glimpse of the kapre. I saw him, though without his cigar. I often wondered how he could confuse people. But I was never allowed near the tree, not because of the kapre, but because of Chanda. No one wanted to be associated with her, especially after dark. Despite her efforts to change, the barrio had ostracized her. Eventually, she left for another island, never to return.

Life back then was simple and beautiful. People competed to see who had the cleanest houses, the most colorful gardens, or the nicest curtains. Even the dogs were too lazy to stir when a stranger visited. Life was so contented that missing Sunday Mass was the only crime you could be accused of.

It’s unclear when the kapre left. But people knew he was gone when Chanda’s old Beauty Parlor was turned into a grocery store by a woman whose husband had become rich working in Saudi Arabia. After that, everyone in the barrio began talking about working abroad. The competition shifted from keeping beautiful homes to earning dollars overseas. Families started leaving—fathers disappeared, mothers took on both parental roles, and children, flush with money, indulged in vices. Education seemed less important because, after all, someone was sending them money from abroad.

And everywhere, the old way of life was disappearing. Gardens were paved over to park new vehicles, trees were cut down to make way for businesses, and, in a misguided effort to build a new store, someone tried to burn the acacia tree. It survived, but the kapre left.

And when the kapre leaves, so the superstition says, confusion takes root and memory begins to fade.

When I return to the barrio now, I don’t recognize most of the people I meet. Locals have largely disappeared, replaced by newcomers. When I introduce myself, no one seems to remember me—my name is just a faint echo from the past. People are too preoccupied with finding ways to leave, training for jobs that will take them abroad. Some even talk of transforming the barrio into a city.

I was one of those who left for work abroad twenty years ago.

Perhaps that’s why I escaped the curse of forgetfulness, why I still remember.

At night, I turn my shirt inside-out. When the moon is full, I step into the hollow center of the acacia tree. There, I try to remember.

But even the acacia’s walls are cracking, ready to vanish forever.
2024-10-21 00:29:03
barrio