About Ampy (part 2)

Like my other aunts and the women of her generation, Ampy was a person of faith. More than anything, her world revolved around prayer groups, catechism and the bunch of equally religious men and women at St. Anthony Church whom she always called "sister" or "brother." Living in that house where religion was the norm (except for my uncle who was non-practicing) was no doubt one of the most exciting episodes in my childhood. I lived in a world of superstitions. One night, we suddenly even had to drive to a family friend's house to witness a esperitista session. The owners claimed that the house was being inhabited by evil spirits.

In Ampy's house, too, we often had bouts with the devil. Mentally challenged, my other aunt launched into cursing fits on certain nights. Sometimes, she would appear so enraged with almost blazing eyes and walk around the house murmuring frighteningly, that we thought her possessed by the devil. Sister Luring, one of Ampy's church friends, taught me a Latin prayer to use against evil spirits. It was salvum pactum iguritatis igosum, which she had lifted from a black, crumbling book and which I memorized by heart and muttered repeatedly from my room against the devil enslaving my aunt.

Ampy, for her part, taught me a technique to acquire the gift of tongues, or the proverbial miracle at Pentecost described in the Bible. During their house prayer meetings, her churchmates would close their eyes, pray aloud simultaneaously, sing and chant as if they spoke in different tongues. The technique was to produce the "la" sound repeatedly and with increasing speed until your summoning was heard and the holy spirit descended upon you. As an observer, I was fascinated by it no end. My life there was practically fantastic and supernatural. No wonder, my life ambition then was to become a priest and religion was my favorite subject in school.

Around the age of 8, I despised without effort my mom's being overprotective, so Ampy was the understanding and lenient alternate mom I had. She answered my questions about school work attentively, unlike dad who was rather impatient. Ampy never spanked me and she scolded me rather diplomatically. I felt extremely bad whenever she got mad, because it meant that my behavior had been truly unacceptable.

The few times that she did lose her patience happened while watching the televised Marcos electoral campaigns towards the end of 1985. My mother's family was from Ilocos Sur so Ampy was a die-hard loyalist. Growing up in a house full of Marcos t-shirts, pins, calendars and plastic fans, I was a young little loyalist myself. Whenever Marcos was shown on TV in his campaigns, I would shout at the top of my lungs "Marcos pa rin!!!" together with the huge throng of loyalists listening to his speech at the Quirino Grandstand. I would run amok in the living room, beat the sofa with throw pillows, roll on the floor and shout so loudly that the Cory fans in the neighborhood discovered our political clingings without difficulty. These outbursts were comparable to the cursing fits my mentally challenged aunt was capable of, that Ampy had no choice except to pin me down on the floor. In front of Marcos on TV, she would make me lie on my stomach and she would sit on my back like a cowboy on his horse. We would stay that way for about an hour in the living room until the campaign show ended and I was too exhausted to shout.