{"id":1793,"date":"2023-06-04T14:29:14","date_gmt":"2023-06-04T06:29:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bangsamororeview.com\/main\/?p=1793"},"modified":"2025-04-21T20:38:26","modified_gmt":"2025-04-21T12:38:26","slug":"when-you-hear-hoofbeats","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bangsamororeview.com\/main\/when-you-hear-hoofbeats\/","title":{"rendered":"When you hear hoofbeats"},"content":{"rendered":"

Afdal B. Kunting<\/em><\/p>\n

Stuck in a traffic jam at Veterans Avenue again! During the day in Zamboanga, there is virtually no chance to rev one\u2019s engine and sprint to a destination. I was running a little late at around 7:15 AM, but the traffic build-up was already colossal. Just another day in Zamboanga.<\/p>\n

Typically, during these episodes of boredom, I would yearn for simpler times, the carefree Zamboanga of old, our Ciudad de Flores<\/em> (City of Flowers). The city was very much provincial then, like a charming barrio lass. Acacia lined avenues, verdant greenery and a profusion of bougainvillea flowers exuded a quaint country charm.<\/p>\n

After a couple of deep sighs, I stumbled across a favorite memory of my childhood, the calesa<\/em> ride. I was probably around four or five years old back then, in the late 1970s. Sundays were specially anticipated because it meant the possibility of a picnic at the beach at Cawa-Cawa Boulevard. We lived with my Angkong<\/em> (Granddad) and Amah<\/em> (Granny) at Sto. Ni\u00f1o, on San Jose Road, just a stone\u2019s throw away from the beach. It was a short walk for an adult but a fair distance for kids. So, a calesa ride was in order.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t know why this memory is something that I could recall after so many years. Perhaps happy memories are etched with more fervor in one\u2019s brain cells? Even today, the images seem so vivid. A typical jaunt to Cawa-Cawa would involve our Amah<\/em> Lei Wah and Ae<\/em> (Aunt) Rosita, calling us to prepare hurriedly so we can get a good spot at the beach. At that time, there were no beach resorts of note except maybe Caragasan Beach, but that was too far away. Apura ya, nuay mas ya kita lugar alya!<\/em> (Be quick or else we won\u2019t be able to get a spot there!)<\/p>\n

I would gather up our dog, Skippy, a poodle with a questionable pedigree and shepherd my younger brother, John, and first cousin Koji towards the camino<\/em> or road. We had a neighbor who operated a calesa, our suki<\/em> for these excursions. His name escapes me, we just called him Nyor<\/em> (Mister), but his features are still clear to me. He was a short, slightly rotund, jolly person. His weather-beaten face always featured a gap-toothed smile. \u201cHoy Peter! Anda ya tamen ustedez na aplaya?<\/em> (Hey Peter, you are going to the beach again?) We would reply in unison with a gleeful Si! Si! Si!<\/em> (Yes! Yes! Yes!)<\/p>\n

If you didn\u2019t notice, we had nicknames not aligned to our first names, my brother being Ahmed and Koji is Emmanuel. My Mmah<\/em> (dad) is a multi-ethnic Muslim while my mom is of Chinese descent. I was told that her parents came from Manila during the war leaving their fledging business to escape the fighting. Being Muslim, my dad gave us Arabic names, however, my Amah didn\u2019t like it one bit. Deficil habla ese mga nombre<\/em>. Hard to say those names. She would remark. Thus, we were nicknamed Peter and John after the Apostles. Our family was one multi-religion affair. Since my Dad was in Tawi-Tawi during our early years, we practiced a variety of religions before becoming Muslim later. We went to mass at the city\u2019s Roman Catholic cathedral, had a Chinese altar at home and celebrated the ancestors\u2019 birthdays, burned paper money and joss sticks. We even had lechon during birthdays! The crispy lechon ears were the first to be consumed! Those were carefree days indeed, just don\u2019t tell my dad!<\/p>\n

Back to the calesa. We clambered onto the brightly colored contraption whose sizable wooden wheels were bright yellow covered with flat gray rubber for a less bumpy ride. The dark red spokes provided a jarring contrast. The sky blue coach was average sized, easily fitting two adults and three boisterous boys plus the kutsero<\/em>. I don\u2019t know why, but the rhythmic clip clop clip clop of the hooves on the mixed asphalt and gravel road was a mesmerizing sound to my young ears.<\/p>\n

Nyor\u2019s horse was a cantankerous old stallion with a mean temper. We knew better than to come near its legs or mouth. Experience is a bitter teacher. When the grumpy horse strayed away from the chosen path Nyor kutsero would give him a healthy whack on his fly-covered butt. The judicious use of the whip allowed us to make good time and arrive at the correct destination. This horse also had a nasty habit of stopping suddenly and depositing a steaming heap of manure as we were eating our breakfast. Ay loko gat esta caballo!<\/em> (What a crazy horse!) My Amah used to remark in her shrill voice! I don\u2019t know if this was intentional, but it happened too often to be a mere coincidence! This caballo was toying with us!<\/p>\n

Since we would go early, we usually brought food to eat; suman ibus, tamal<\/em>, and alfajor<\/em>. The latter is a Zamboanga delicacy that is sort of like a biscuit made from corn and probably coffee. It felt like eating gravel, but it was Amah\u2019s favorite. The tamal, on the other hand, is a handy eat-as-you-go snack of steamed glutinous rice powder with coconut milk, chicken, sotanghon and boiled egg wrapped in banana leaf. Real good quality tamal just melts into your mouth, sending an explosion of salty, umami goodness. As you can probably tell, it is my all-time favorite comfort food. We form lifelong habits from childhood activities.<\/p>\n

After an hour or two hours of invigorating dips and feeble attempts at swimming, we would call it quits. Nyor kutsero knew to be back by that time to pick us up. The fare, a few centavos, was good enough for him to buy some tuba bajal<\/em> or coconut toddy for his afternoon buzz. As we headed back home, the horse\u2019s mane would flick in cadence to his clip clops. Boys being boys, we would rock our heads in unison with the horse\u2019s mane, not minding our salty skins and dry lips. Everything was a game back then.<\/p>\n

Such trips were highlights of my childhood. Sadly, as we grew older and my Amah became frailer, these trips became few and far in between. The appearance of more jeepneys and tricycles signaled the inevitable demise of the calesa.<\/p>\n

A loud honk broke me out of my revelry, the traffic enforcer was signaling for our lane to move. As I drove in a sea of cars, I found it remarkable that in the span of less than fifty years, no traces of the calesa can be seen in my city. Such a sad end for an iconic mode of transportation.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Afdal B. Kunting Stuck in a traffic jam at Veterans Avenue again! During the day in Zamboanga, there is virtually no chance to rev one\u2019s engine and sprint to a destination. I was running a little late at around 7:15 … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1793","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-essay"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":false,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bangsamororeview.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bangsamororeview.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bangsamororeview.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bangsamororeview.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bangsamororeview.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1793"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/bangsamororeview.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1793\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1794,"href":"https:\/\/bangsamororeview.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1793\/revisions\/1794"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bangsamororeview.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bangsamororeview.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bangsamororeview.com\/main\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}