“I was always against her going to Mindanao because I knew it was very dangerous,” Lulu Orena tells me with a smile a few hours before Ces was to check out of The Medical City. “But Ces has always had a mind of her own. Minsan she will tell me that she’s going there for an assignment, when she does, I always remind her – ‘Ces, paano na ang mga anak mo pag may nangyari sa iyo?’”

Dressed in a white cotton tunic over slacks, Lulu was still visibly tired but terribly relieved that the worst was now over for her eldest daughter, Ces. She recalls how on she became hysterical upon finding out on the morning of June 9 that Ces had been kidnapped. “Chary Villa called me to confirm that she was missing and that she had been kidnapped. When I heard the news I knew that my worst nightmare had just begun.” On the ride from her home in Fort Bonifacio, all the way to the ABS_CBN studios in Quezon City, she says she was a wreck. “I was shaking all over and having palpitations like crazy. Nanginig talaga ako,” she recalls.

On day one of her abduction, she had the chance to speak briefly to Ces, whose first words to her were, “Mommy, mommy, please don’t cry,” Lulu shares. The nine days that followed were the most difficult days of her life. “One more day was just a day too long,” she says looking back. “I was so hungry for news the whole time that I kept the television on at our house 24/7. One television was tuned in to ABS-CBN and another one to GMA-7. The radio was constantly tuned in to DZMM. “I really wanted to go to Sulu. I didn’t care. I just wanted to be near my daughter. To be in the same place with her. When I saw on television, the things she had left behind in her room, it really broke my heart and I wanted to board the next plane to Sulu but my children would not let me.”

Lulu is grateful for the blessing of her children. Daughter Grace kept her company all throughout, while only son Frank and youngest daughter Joyce were busy with the negotiations. The rest of the Orena brood had been tucked away in a safehouse with Ces’ three sons, while Lulu and Joyce, opted to remain at home. “I would just be crying at makakagulo lang ako sa negotiations.” Each day that came and went was sheer torture she says. When nightfall would come, she would break down in tears, thinking of how Ces was faring in the jungle. “Pag uulan, lalo na akong nalulungkot and I would really storm heaven with my prayers. I would ask God, all the saints, Mama Mary, Ces father (who passed away in a helicopter crash in 1993) to please keep her safe from harm.”

Sleep would come fitfully and only when her body could no longer take the tiredness. “They gave me sedative but it did not work,” she smiles. A mother’s anguish and worry, far surpasses the effects of any drug. Lulu clarifies that there is no truth to the news that she had a stroke or a nervous breakdown. “I was close to it, I guess. I became very depressed and lost all desire to eat and exercise – things that were part of my daily routine. All my thoughts were focused on Ces.” Respite would only come briefly when her grandchildren would return home from school and wrap her in their hugs, saying that it was going to be okay and that their aunt would be home soon. “I don’t know what I would have done if my children and grandchildren were not around. Siguro patay na ako ngayon,” She shivers at the recollection.

At the time of our interview on Friday afternoon, Lulu was still feeling the effects of the stress from the last nine days. “Medyo nanlalambot pa rin ako but I cannot stop thanking God for carrying us through,” she shares, her tired eyes, beaming with joy. She is also very grateful to everyone who prayed for her daughter’s safety. She made special mention of her late husband’s classmates, members of PMA Class ’61 and their wives who threw their full support behind her. “I am just so grateful and having gone through an ordeal such as this, I realize that the most important thing in life is really just family. Money will come and go. You can always earn it. Material things will lose their value. To have a strong faith in God and having your family intact, safe and sound, that is what’s most important.”

When the chopper carrying Ces finally landed on the helipad of The Medical City that rainy Wenesday afternoon, Lulu says that it was a miracle made real. She shares that the very first thing a tearful Ces whispered in her ears when they hugged was, “Mommy, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.” Forgetting all the anguish she had just been through, just like any mother faced with a repentant child, she told her eldest daughter, “Don’t say sorry. It’s all right. You’re home now and that’s all that matters.”

PUBLISHED IN MY “ROOTS&WINGS” Column in the PHILIPPINE DAILY INQUIRER, June 22, 2008

I would DEFINITELY not want to be the lady in the above photo.

An AFP news report says, “A random selection of travellers getting ready to board airplanes in Washington, New York’s Kennedy, Los Angeles and other key hubs will be shut in the glass booths while a three-dimensional image is made of their body beneath their clothes.”
Talk about invasion of privacy.

“While it allows the security screeners — looking at the images in a separate room –to clearly see the passenger’s sexual organs as well as other details of their bodies, the passenger’s face is blurred, TSA said in a statement on its website.

The scan only takes seconds and is to replace the physical pat-downs of people that is currently widespread in airports.”
Next time you are headed for the United States make sure you don’t have any ratty underwear on you. That would be oh so embarrassing!

Read the full report here.

Photo from Getty Images

There is a pall of gloom upon my house right now.

Last night our helper lost our beloved three year old pug, Pare. Right under her nose. Right under her watch.

We came home at 6:30PM and I recall seeing him briefly in the garage. By 845PM, M, our helper said casually, “Wala si Pare?” I was no longer able to finish my dinner, as did the kids. I flew out of the house, on to the streets in my tsinelas and began looking for him. After about 20 minutes of going up and down our streets, I decided to drive to my mom’s house, pick up two of her helpers and when we got back home, resumed our search. We did not find him.

Today we put up posters on all the village gates, sent out flyers to all our neighbors and prayed. But I am numb. I cannot even cry. Neither can Pia, who loved the dog dearly. I don’t know, maybe when you have experienced one loss after another, something in you dies. either that or your heart just becomes stronger? I don’t know.

It’s now almost 24 hours since he disappeared. I hope that whoever has him is good to him. I pray he will be returned to us by someone whose conscience will bother him or her. I mean what blessing can there be in a stolen dog? You have taken someone else’s joy. God sees everything, whoever you are.

We are sad. So sad but life has to go on. It’s a painful loss. I know it’s not quite right to say but — better a dog than a person. Para na lang hindi ako masyadong malungkot.

A part of me wants to strangle the helper who lost him. She’s really been such a challenge to us. And now this. Sanctions obviously have to be put into place. He was a beloved family dog.

My family’s grief is in suspended animation right now. We are sad but we cannot cry just yet. And again, I keep telling myself and my children, God allows this for a reason. May we be able to discern it. And if it is part of His plan, may He return Pare back home to us.

I never had a thing for those expensive flip flops.

Okay, they’re admittedly more comfortable than your run of the mill tsinelas (rubber slippers) but I was never really crazy about them. Buti na lang. A New York Times article cites a recent study that says flip flops can be painfully bad for your feet and legs when worn for long periods of time. “We found that when people walk in flip-flops, they alter their gait, which can result in problems and pain from the foot up into the hips and lower back,’’ said Justin Shroyer, a biomechanics doctoral student who presented the findings to the recent annual meeting of the American College of Sports Medicine in Indianapolis.

Five years ago, a report published by the American College of Foot and Ankle Surgeons talks about the rise in heel pain among young people in the age 15-25 age group. “A major contributor is wearing flip-flop sandals with paper-thin soles everyday to school. Flip-flops have no arch support and can accentuate any abnormal biomechanics in foot motion, and this eventually brings pain and inflammation.” The folks over at the Ateneo de Manila University trying to implement the dress code and banning the wearing of flip flops to school should rejoice at these two reports.

Ten years ago, on an early evening not very different from today, our lives were changed forever by the loss of our eldest son, Migi.

Much has been written and said about that life-changing event, the nigtmare that you wold not wish, even on your worst enemy. The loss of a loved one changes you forever. The loss of a child leaves a mark on your heart and soul, so deep, that ten years later, as you draw a finger across the wound, you can still feel the ridges of the scar, and you cannot help but remember.

But today, ten years later, you are able to remember with thankfulness, for the brief time given to you, to parent a little boy who filled your life with great love and joy for four years. Our lives have been forever changed by your loss, Migi, and in the process, so many lives, ironically, have been made better by the searing pain of your departure.

Last night, I caught P, holed up in one of the rooms of our house, crying buckets while scribbling away on a notebook. She said that she would share its contents with me today. I thought that this was one anniversary where I would be able to get through the day without tears, but no, here I am at 7PM, crying buckets myself as I read this. Today, I sent out messages to special friends and family who had helped us navigate the journey this last decade. Now, with my daughter’s permission, I share with you her beautiful memories of her eldest brother and how loss can impact a heart’s child, just as deeply, perhaps even more than we as adults feel it. And how, in the process, the gift of loss is that it blesses you with a heart and mind wiser beyond that of your peers, and an unshakeable faith that no matter what happens, God will see you through.

Dear You. I will admit I have absolutely no idea about what possessed me to write this letter. I thought that maybe it was because I’ve been so caught up in my vulnerability- I am a teenager after all. But it wasn’t that. It’s tomorrow, and my realization that after so long - there are still so many things that I haven’t told you.