Walterina’s life story: Stranger than fiction - STAR BYTES

Walter Dempster, Jr. was up to his neck with house chores – cooking and at the same time doing the laundry for the entire family – when he heard the terrible news that the Philippines was at war. This was on Dec. 8, 1941 – the feast day of the Immaculate Conception, patroness of the Manila Cathedral where he served as altar boy years before he turned transvestite.

The Dempster family was still staying in their Pasay apartment when Japan invaded the Philippines. The Pasay folks, however, didn’t see Japanese soldiers until Dec. 15 of that year. In their olive drab uniform and coming from the direction of Las Piñas, the soldiers passed through F.B. Harrison – on foot, in army trucks and in flashy automobiles freshly confiscated from rich Filipino homes.

There was total blackout at night that time and the Japanese imposed a curfew among civilians from 7 p.m. to 5 a.m. of the following day. But the curfew didn’t deter Walter from having fun. He’d still sneak out in the middle of the night and walk to the cruising area in Dewey Boulevard where he’d meet with other homosexual men also in search of male company.

Lucky them. Since this was still during the early phase of the war, the Japanese and the more notorious Korean soldiers were not yet that cruel and oppressive. Individuals caught violating curfew rules were merely given a body search and told to go home.

When the flow of life returned to normal, Walter resumed his career as an exotic dancer – this time at the Tsubaki Club at the corner of Mabini and T.M. Kalaw. Like in the pre-war days, he still made nightclub habitues believe that he was a girl.

Strolling one morning at the Luneta, he met a lieutenant of the Japanese Imperial Army right in front of the Rizal monument. The official, looking regal and handsome in his military uniform – complete with a sable – was clearly smitten by the feminine grace of Walter who was garbed in a white blouse that looked immaculate against his swirling blue skirt.

As soon as the Japanese officer introduced himself, Walter immediately told him the truth about his gender. But the lieutenant didn’t care about Walter’s sexuality. He still invited Walter to come with him to his quarters at the nearby Army and Navy Club for some intimate moments.

Walter’s romance with the Japanese official could very well have inspired Imelda Papin’s hit song, Isang Linggong Pag-ibig, because it lasted for only one week. Just when everything was starting to get serious between them, the lieutenant – to Walter’s dismay – was given a new position the province.

Since that Japanese officer didn’t give a hoot about Walter’s being a member of the same sex, Walter got encouraged to flirt with other Japanese soldiers. One evening, he was at the Luneta again with four transvestite friends when they chanced upon a group of Japanese officials. The Japanese military men obviously got attracted to Walter and company and invited all of them for a night of pleasure at the Luneta Hotel.

But too bad for Walter and friends, this bunch of Japanese officers turned out to be homophobic. When it was discovered that Walter and companions actually had male equipment tucked under their dresses, the cross-dressers were mercilessly kicked and punched by their respective partners.

And that was only the beginning of their nightmare. The Japanese officials summoned the MPs and the group of Walter and friends were all herded into an army truck and brought to the Rizal Memorial baseball stadium where they were beaten up some more and, later, sodomized by their Japanese captors.

The following day, they were moved to the basketball stadium were they were kept for several months _ from mid-1943 up to the early part of 1944. On the way, they were made to do chores for the Japanese and Korean soldiers – washing their clothes, cleaning their boots and tidying up the barracks. Food was the same at every meal – a small bowl of thin gruel.

At night, starting at 7 p.m., the soldiers would come in and make sex slaves out of them. Walter and companions had to handle about 10 soldiers every night. And these were sex-starved soldiers fresh from combat.

Every night was a harrowing experience for Walter and company. While being subjected to anal intercourse, they would also be forced to perform oral sex on a procession of soldiers – while at the same time being kicked and hit with the butt of a rifle.

After each ordeal, they would find themselves with their rectal area bleeding and swelling. To reduce the inflammation, they had to sit on a basin filled with scalding hot water and guava leaves gathered from within the compound of the Rizal Memorial stadium.

Their sufferings finally ended one night – when they were supposed to be transferred to an undisclosed place. Made to board an army truck, they were traversing the length of what is now EDSA (toward the Balintawak area) when their vehicle suddenly developed engine trouble. They took this opportunity to jump out of the truck and ran away from their captors – and onto freedom.

After checking on their loved ones and friends, they proceeded to Tarlac where they waited out the end of the war working as bailarinas in some cheap night spots.

Although scarred by the brutalities of war, Walter managed to pick up the pieces of his life during the liberation period. He even joined a couple of gay beauty contests. In the 1959 Miss Philippines pageant for the third sex, he was given the title Miss Iloilo and was crowned by movie actress Rosa del Rosario.

It was in one of these gay beauty pageants where he picked up the name Markova-after the prima ballerina Alicia Markova who was visiting Manila that time.

Walter remembers that he was supposed to do one of his exotic dances – a la Yvonne de Carlo – as an intermission number. But for some reason, the pageant organizers told him to do a ballet number instead – which he did to the wild applause of the audience. From then on, he was known as Walterina Markova.

In the ’60s, Walter shifted careers and worked as a makeup artist for independent movie companies. Later, he helped train Japan-bound female entertainers.

Today, he is back in Pasay and is staying at the Home for Golden Gays which was established in August 1999 by Councilor Justo C. Justo to help abandoned members of the third sex.

Walter Dempster, Jr’s. life story is now the subject of a film by Gil Portes – Markova: Comfort Gay. Rated B by the Film Ratings Board, this movie is one of the entries in the forthcoming Metro Manila Film Festival.

In the film, even Loren Legarda, who plays herself in her capacity as a broadcast journalist, doubts the veracity of Walter’s story – particularly the part where he was supposedly made a sex slave by the Japanese oppressors.

But whether or not he is telling the truth, we should always bear in mind that it was not only Walter and the comfort women who were savagely raped during the Japanese invasion of the Philippines. All Filipinos – men, women, young and old – who lived through the horrors of the Japanese occupatiion was actually raped, brutalized and dehumanized by that cruel war. It was actually the entire nation that was raped by Japan.

And now that we are facing uncertain times once more, my only wish is that we may never be at war again with another nation – and especially not among ourselves.