Looking Back: Rizal as teacher and pupil

By: Ambeth R. Ocampo
Philippine Daily Inquirer
Tuesday, November 15th, 2011
 
"Last weekend I accompanied the Reading Association of the Philippines on a pilgrimage to Dapitan. Since most of the members were teachers, I advised them to soak in the atmosphere of the place and appreciate being able to literally tread the ground Jose Rizal walked on during his exile there from 1892-1896. To me as a teacher, the most relevant artifacts on display were the original table and blackboard (actually just a slab of Philippine hardwood) that Rizal used in his makeshift school for boys there. Everything else in Dapitan is a reconstruction of the original structures that once stood there. Thus, Dapitan, like Emilio Aguinaldo’s eccentric mansion in Kawit, is one of my favorite historic sites because it has not changed much since our heroes lived there.

"Dapitan was a social laboratory where Rizal put most of his ideas into action: he improved the town plaza and landscaped the ground with a relief map of Mindanao—a map that exists to this day; he taught the Dapiteños how to fish with a net and gave them their first taste of fluffy bread; he opened a sari-sari store, a school, and learned more about mangkukulam and herbal medicine in his effort to improve public health; he built a water supply system, tried his hand at the abaca- and brick-manufacturing business; he tilled the land and tended fruit-bearing trees on an estate bought from his winnings from the lottery.

"This is the Rizal that people have to re-discover in order to make him relevant to modern times. Rizal did not just write the “Noli me tangere,” the “El Filibusterismo,” and the “Ultimo Adios,” he wrote much more for a nation that does not read. Each time I go to Dapitan I re-read his letters to his family for here we see a plain Rizal, a Rizal without the overcoat, a Rizal who is heroic, although at the time those letters were written, he was yet to be executed to become a “National Hero” later.

"Anyone who reads the Rizal family correspondence will discover his nine sisters like Narcisa Lopez, his favorite, whose nickname Sisa is immortalized as a tragic character in the “Noli.” Sisa wrote him on Feb. 27, 1886, saying: “I suppose you don’t know yet that I’m now the mother of six children. In this letter you will see the names of the three older ones (in their own handwriting), and of the last ones, the older was Isabel, the deceased one, and the two, one girl and one boy, are called Consolación and Leoncio López, who is as fat as a melon. The children of Sra. Neneng are three: They are called Alfredo, Adela and Abelardo. Olimpia’s shortly will be three, like Sra. Neneng’s. The two who are not here are called Aristeo and Cesario; the older one called Aristeo, what a lively boy he is! His godfather is Sr. Paciano. He will be a useful boy when he gets older. At the age of two, he already knows a great deal. He is the only consolation of our parents, I tell you, because when you see this child, even if you are angry, you will be obliged to laugh, he is so funny.”

"Based on the above and the fact that Rizal came from a brood of 11 children, one can only wonder what his stand would be on the RH bill had he lived today. His large family was a constant ray of sunshine when he was homesick in Europe, and we can only imagine what joy Rizal got from letters. Another sister, Lucia Herbosa, in a letter dated Nov. 13, 1882, described a son born to her in 1882, whom they named Jose: “I amuse myself with José’s ear, which is like yours. I tell you that it is really like yours, but I pray that the likeness does not stop there, but that he may have your disposition, your goodness and diligence in good works.”

"In July 1886 Lucia’s husband wrote Rizal about their daughter Delfina who was suffering from “a little inflammation of (the) eye, which is the cause of her absence from school. What a pity she did not become a boy! She is bright and very studious. Her mother is always telling her not to read because her inflammation might worsen, but she is so hardheaded.” Imagine, a child insistent on reading! Twelve years later, in 1898, Delfina would assist Marcela Agoncillo in Hong Kong in the sewing and embroidering of the first Philippine flag.

"Even Paciano, Rizal’s older brother, was concerned about education, asking Rizal in July 1886: “Furnish me with information of the best schools there. We have many nephews, most of them promising. It is a pity that these ones should fall into the hands of teachers who teach unwillingly and do so only for show. It is true that they inculcate in children very sane principles, such as fear and humility, the first being the beginning of wisdom and the second of apostolic and civic virtue, but it is also true that fear and humility lead to dullness.” Rizal replied that “children are not allowed to be themselves, to make noise or to play. Instead, they are made to recite the rosary and novena until the poor youngsters become very sleepy and understand nothing of what is going on. Consequently, when they reach the age of reason, they pray just as they have prayed when they were children without understanding what they are saying; they fall asleep or think of nonsense. Nothing can destroy a thing more than the abuse of it, and praying can also be abused.”

"We must not forget that the Philippines’ National Hero was not born great, he evolved over time, developing as a hero amid interaction with his family."


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Rizal’s visits to Singapore

Looking Back By Ambeth Ocampo

[Philippine Daily Inquirer First Posted 02:08:00 06/20/2008]

SINGAPORE—If you care to explore beyond the shopping malls of Singapore, you will find two landmarks with reference to the Philippines, the most famous being an eye-catching bridge painted in the wildest colors by the late Filipina artist Pacita Abad. The other landmark, smaller and more dignified is one that commemorates Jose Rizal’s five visits to Singapore. The National Heritage Board of Singapore initiated a project in 2005 called “Friends to Our Shores” that commemorates visits by eminent personalities.

The original plan was to install a marker in the Botanical Gardens that Rizal had visited not once but thrice. President Macapagal-Arroyo was supposed to unveil the marker during her visit last year, but it was decided not to rush to do a better job. The Rizal marker unveiled by President S.R. Nathan yesterday is by a river near the Asian Civilizations Museum.

The National Heritage Board of Singapore provided the site and a setting for a bronze relief of Rizal’s profile by National Artist Guillermo E. Tolentino provided by the National Historical Institute of the Philippines. Our hero thus joins the other writers who visited Singapore, like Joseph Conrad and Somerset Maugham. I was wondering whether the emphasis on Rizal as writer rather than revolutionary was dictated by Singapore’s security concerns, but the fact that Ho Chi Minh has also been memorialized means that our embassy should begin negotiations to install a marker to commemorate Emilio Aguinaldo’s visit to Singapore in 1898.

Rizal’s visits to Singapore, and even that of Aguinaldo, underscore the fact that our relations go beyond the establishment of formal diplomatic relations between our countries. Our heroes and their visits to Singapore also antedate the independence of our countries. When Rizal and Aguinaldo were imagining a free and independent Philippines, Singapore was also under a foreign flag.

Rizal is a boon to Philippine diplomacy because he traveled a great deal and it is when we look back to a shared past with foreign countries he visited that we also get a glimpse into a shared future.

Textbook history tells us a lot about Rizal’s travels and how they resulted in an urbane and very cosmopolitan outlook. Yet in May 1882, it was Rizal’s first trip abroad and aside from the anxiety that accompanies all travelers then as now, Rizal had to cope with a pressing personal condition: he had left the country secretly, without his parents’ consent, without even saying goodbye to his fiancée Leonor Rivera. These emotions weighed heavily on him and we see a reflection of it in nightmares recorded in his diary, the first in Singapore. More significant is the admission that Rizal had precognitive gifts and he sometimes used it in school:

“It is true that I had a dream once that was fulfilled. Before the examination for the first year in Medicine, I dreamed that I was asked certain questions but I didn’t mind them. When the examinations came, I was asked the questions in my dream.”

Could this be the secret of Rizal’s genius that he was able to foretell exam questions before they were given? Wouldn’t that be cheating? If I were blessed with the same gift, I would probably be dreaming about winning lotto numbers and horse races. Rizal bought lottery tickets every week and actually won the second prize during his Dapitan exile.

During his tour around Singapore, Rizal saw the Maharajah of Johore and described him as “an old, stout man, respectable-looking and garbed in European style but wearing a sort of apron.” He didn’t like the food at Hotel de la Paix where he stayed. “There was neither order nor coordination in the service. I ate rice which was inferior to ours; the pineapples, though small, were sweet and tasted good; the banana, bad.”

Rizal also wrote about the Palace of the Rajah of Siam marked by “a small iron elephant and what-not on the pedestal placed in front of the building.” Today the Royal Thai Embassy is on Orchard Road and one wonders if this was the site of the Palace mentioned by Rizal, minus the elephant that is now in front of Singapore’s Parliament, now renamed Arts House. This elephant was a gift of King Chulalangkorn who visited Singapore in 1871. It used to be located in front of City Hall but has since been replaced by a statue of Raffles, founder of modern Singapore.

Many of the places and landmarks Rizal mentioned can still be visited today, and it is possible to retrace his footsteps in Singapore.

Rizal’s other visits were stopovers to and from the Philippines. These were short and seemingly uneventful because little is recorded in his normally detailed diaries and travel letters.

In 1896, he passed Singapore twice, first, en route to Cuba where he was to serve in the Spanish medical corps, but he was arrested in Barcelona. The second was when he was sent back to Manila. He was allowed to move around the ship freely when the ship was at sea, but each time the ship docked, he was detained in his cabin. Worse, 16 hours before they stopped in Singapore in November 1896, he was not only locked up in his cabin, he was chained to the bed to prevent him from jumping ship in the last port of call before Manila. Rizal’s friends lodged a petition with the Singapore Supreme Court for a writ of habeas corpus. This was rejected, Rizal returned to Manila, and the rest is history.