EPIPHANY was celebrated last Sunday, January 2.
This used to be a grand event at our ancestral home in Siquijor.
We used to observe Epiphany (Three Kings Day) on January 6 with a feast (kumbira) because it was also the birthday of my father and thanksgiving celebration for the coming of the “3 kings” to the family — me and my two brothers. I am the youngest among the three.
Epiphany is a major Christian celebration by Christians until the church changed the celebration of the Epiphany according to the Episcopal Conference on a Sunday between January 2 and January 8. Since then, the King’s Day no longer regularly coincided with my father’s birthday.
Since my father died 30 years ago, the celebration became subdued. And when our eldest “king”, died in 2017, the celebration became just a memory. The “2nd king” is now in Mindanao and I am in the Visayas. While common celebrations can still be done online, the birthday of my father cannot be done virtually except the singing. Many of us are also not connected by wifi.
Interestingly, the bible doesn’t mention how many wise men there were-just that three gifts were given and that they came from the East. The common consensus is that there were between two to twenty wise men. They were likely to have been Zoroastrian priests. It wasn’t until about 500 AD that three was accepted to be the standard number of wise men-the reasoning was simply due to the number of gifts, thus the three of us became the 3 kings of the Ligutom family as my parents were given as gifts by God of three children.
A number of our cousins and relatives would call me every January 6 to reminisce the times that we were in our house in Talayong to celebrate our papa’s birthday and give honor to the “3 kings”. The birthday then of my father was almost the same as the Latin American celebration. It was a day of eating , drinking, dancing, singing and renewing of bonds among relatives and friends. Actually, it was mainly because of our father’s day and not of the Epiphany nor of us, the 3 kings.
Our father was called by most of my young relatives, including the younger generation outside of our clan as “Papa ”, as a show of respect. He was an undefeated “teniente del barrio” reigning longer than Marcos did but he was “defeated” by my mother when she requested him to give up politics. He was the epitome of excellent and ethical leadership. He only finished third grade and was unable to attend any of the modern leadership and management trainings that we now have, but his command of the English language was impeccable. He also commanded respect and obedience from community leaders and his constituents.
Despite his lack of formal schooling, he prepared contracts among community members who have special agreements, like contracts of sale. There was no Katarungang Pambarangay at that time, so he settled all conflicts from land disputes to marriage squabbles. He was a spokesperson (kagun) of the traditional “pamanhikan” which requires wit and facility of the “rhymes and riddles” of learned spokespersons. The fate of marriage was believed to depend largely on the intellect and strategic negotiation of the “kagun.” He never experienced a single failure nor denial in any “pamanhikan.” While it usually would take days or weeks of negotiations, he did them most of the time on the first attempt.
He was referred to by many people as “Kapitan Huligong”(bumblebee) because he was very talkative. He was the life of any party. Weddings, birthdays, wakes (tukaw), death anniversaries (hubkas), he would always be surrounded by the attendee-folks because of his stories, jokes and analysis of community events. He was learned but sometimes innocent too. One one occasion, while eating ice cream, he returned the cone after eating its contents, not knowing that it was part of the whole package. He felt ashamed after seeing other people eating the cones.
The family likened him to an ant (sulom) because on his way, he would always stop and talk to the persons he met, like the kissing ants. Sometimes, I would cry when I went with him to town on Sundays because it would take us so long to return back home because of his friendly nature. “Pa, gabii na!” I would continually remind him. We still have to tend the cows and “masuko na si Mama”. This was the only reason he would end his conversation with the people we met along the way. I would think now that he was a member of a what we jokingly call a Japanese gang named “takosa” (“takot sa asawa”).
Our barkadas also called him “Haring Surikbot” because of his stories about the life of an imagined king named Surikbot. These stories were actually his “kathang isip” about the adventures of kings in the olden times. These could be stories which were orally passed on from generation to generation.
Us “3 kings” were all known as “mga anak ni kapitan”. Despite our achievements in life, our father was always referred to as “the father of the three kings”. I am still Nonoy, the son of Kapitan Dodoy.
He was a very emotional person and when my spouse first visited our place as a fiancée , he cried, hugged her and whispered “ please love and take good care of my son.” He was a godfather to many baptisms and ninong to numerous weddings. He spent a great part of his life in public service and never heard of him being accused of abuse nor of corruption.
He saved so many breaking marriages, reconciled relatives and arranged amicable settlement among fights during social gatherings.
He died a rich man not because of material wealth but of the countless people he served, assisted and the many who were grieving whom he put smiles on their faces. He touched the lives of people of all ages. He was a very loving person.
January 6 is still “three kings” day to us and the birth anniversary of Julian “Dodoy” Calunod-Ligutom.
Yes, it is said that “walang forever” and “some good things never last” but my father will forever be in our hearts and of the people whom he touched by how he lived his life as a servant leader.
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