I must have been in fifth grade when I first met Ray J. Moncada in 1974. He was my Practical Arts teacher at Silliman University Elementary School.
We would be cultivating the plants in our small garden fronting the elementary school building. “Heel up, boys!” he would holler at us, as we put soil on the base of the stems of the plants. He would check on our work, and would compliment me on how I watered my plants. “But when I ask you to work under the sun, magpahubak-hubak dayon ka!” he would tease me.
After graduating from college, I again met Ray Moncada at the College of Law at Silliman University. We would have been classmates had I enrolled one year earlier. He was a classmate to my buddies, Atty. Fitzgerald Lee and Atty. Erle Stanley Raterta, who were also his elementary school students.
From “Sir”, we now called him “RayMoncs.” We started to see the fun side of RayMoncs.
But even as he was now “one of the boys”, his advanced years and his life experiences made him the group’s conscience. I didn’t get to finish my law studies, but my friends who reviewed with ReyMoncs in Manila said he would periodically admonish them when they always took time to have a nightcap. “Don’t drink too much,” he would admonish them, “your parents are working hard just to send you to the Bar review.”
When RayMoncs passed the Bar a year later, one of my friends who took the Bar review with him called me to ask that I inform RayMoncs of the good news. There was no internet back then so the only way to inform Bar passers was by telegram or by long distance. At that time, he was working as a legal researcher in one of the Regional Trial Courts.
“Hello,” I said, “am I talking with Attorney Ray Moncada?”
Of course, RayMoncs didn’t know yet that he had passed the Bar, and hearing anyone call him “Attorney Ray Moncada” for the first time gave him a big scare. “Ayaw’g pasagad diha, Bay! Nakuyawan na ko diri!”
I couldn’t help laughing, and assured him that I was actually telling him the truth. Then I got a call from Nang Eva who asked if it was true. I assured her that her husband had indeed passed the Bar. We were just so happy for RayMoncs.
From then on, I would occasionally consult with Atty. Moncada for legal questions. Apart from those professional visits, we would engage each other in a friendly chat after church service. We would exchange jokes or tease each other over what the pastor had just said in their sermon.
One time, he suggested I should consider running for Mayor. He said he had a friend in Oroquieta who eventually became mayor after he simply joked about it, and eventually convinced him to consider the possibility. Since then, he was no longer “RayMoncs” or “Bay”. He and I started calling each other “Meyor”.
Another time I felt so happy for “Meyor” was when I first saw him driving his first new car — a Toyota Corolla. “Oh, it belongs to my client who left it with me,” he shyly remarked.
RayMoncs didn’t like to be the center of attention, and would gladly deflect any praise thrown his way.
“Meyor” had been a lawyer for about 30 years, but I most remember him as a friend — someone I can freely talk to or joke with.
Last Jan. 5, the first Sunday of this year, Meyor was seated one pew away from me. He was deep in thought. Dr. Angel Alcala, who was seated beside him, offered his hand to greet him a Happy New Year, and Ray looked like he was taken by surprise. So I leaned over to him and joked: “Meyor, did Dr. Alcala just wake you up?” He just smiled and laughed quietly, shaking his head.
That was the last time I spoke with Ray Moncada. I heard the news of the tragedy that befell him after I had gone back to Manila the day after that first Sunday.
I had hoped and prayed for Meyor’s recovery. Images of him spending time with his beloved family would keep recurring in my mind.
We keep holding on to the cliche that Dumaguete is indeed a City of Gentle People, to a point that we believe in it, making the death of RayMoncs from the hands of gunmen seem so impossible.
But in this time and age when killing someone over something so petty is a natural national phenomenon, we can only hope and pray for God’s justice to avenge his death, and to comfort his loved ones.
Let us count ourselves fortunate that we had the opportunity to get to know Ray Moncada. In his own quiet and unassuming ways, he made the world a better place than when he found it.
