Balikbayan
THE DIVISORIA OF MY CHILDHOOD is a colorful memory of endless pasilyos, pungent incense sticks lit in ash jars that adorn Buddhas and pictures of old Chinese loved ones, and rolls of colorful kortinas or the immaculate katsa taking whatever possible space in the already crowded walkways. While Divisoria today still enjoys the high traffic of shoppers, its fully air-conditioned malls have transported the busy pasilyos into its emporia of never-ending alleys of clothes, bags, shoes, and many more. But then again, there are still people like us who long for the real Divisoria. I walked this land again, and at Recto, where the legendary Tutuban Station of the old Philippine National Railways stood—immortalized, ironically, through a mall—I saw that the tracks were slowly being eaten away by filth.
At the far end where the road turns to Abad Santos, the statue of Bonifacio stands in front of the Mall Tutuban, which in the 90s turned the station into a heritage and commercial site that remembers Tutuban as a prime trading point of the yesteryears, and as a place where the enterprising Katipunan founder was said to have sold abanikos and bastons.
Drinking had never been this lonesome. Not that I don’t enjoy drinking with Mom who, by the time I was writing this, had already finished two glasses of margarita. In this Panglao night, my glass of cabernet sauvignon is starting to fill me with reverie. 
