Why Spain will continue to live on within our hearts

(Address delivered by STAR chairman Max V. Soliven to the forum of "CASA ASIA" on Oct. 28 in Barcelona, Spain)

Señores representantes de la Casa de Asia Queridos colegas y amigos del mundo de la prensa Señoras y Señores Buenas Noches Permítanme, ante todo, agradecer muy sinceramente a la Casa Asia esta magnífica ocasión que me permite persentarme ante todos ustedes en Barcelona para intentar hablarles de la visión de un Filipino que ama enormemente a su país y a su pueblo, pero que no olvida que también lleva un trozo de España, aungue sea muy pequeño, en lo más profundo de su corazón desde que un 16 de Marzo de 1521 por vez primera arribó a las costas Filipinas una nao Española. Por eso, Filipinas siempre será parte de la gran comunidad de naciones hispanas.

Queridos amigos:

Hasta aquí llega, con bastantes dificultades mis humildes conocimientos de la lengua de Cervantes que heredé de mis recordados padres. Aún tengo vivos en mi memoria los discursos de mi padre, Diputado de la Cámara de Representantes, dirigiéndose a la Asemblea en un correcto Español o interpelando en el idioma de Shakespeare o bien en nuestro gentilicio.

Pero llegó la hora de la verdad y tengo que hablarles en el idioma que mejor conozo a partir de ahora.

Creo que ustedes prefieren que les hable con el corazón. Lo haré así de una forma informal y si alguien lo prefiere puede consultar esta charla que dejo a disposición de la Casa Asia.

In a memorable movie by the American director John Ford, the actor John Wayne – who played a colonel of the United States Cavalry – made a remark that I remember vividly to this day. Scolding a junior officer, Wayne warned the young lieutenant: "Never apologize. It’s a sign of weakness."

Being weak, forgive me if I begin this short address with an apology. I apologize for not being able to speak to you tonight in Casa Asia in the fluent and eloquent Castillian which was my late father’s first language aside from our native dialect of Ilocano. He did not learn English until he

summon his Customs inspectors before they traveled on a mission to the outer islands or any foreign city, and teach them table manners and etiquette, for instance where to place spoon, fork and knife, "so you will not disgrace the Philippines by giving the impression we are barbarians."

My grandmother, Gregoria Jaramillo (alias Lola Oyang), was one of the first English teachers recruited by the Americans, yet she would lead the rosary in Spanish and make us recite every Novena in Spanish, too. To the day she died, she would order us children to "eat your legumes". She never knew that the proper English term was "vegetables".

Why do we Filipinos no longer speak English? Under the American Commonwealth, the new American administrators conducted all business and commerce, naturally, in their own language, which was English. They were not cruel colonial "masters", although our Revolucionarios, our independent Army, the Katipuneros had fought a bloody, four-year guerrilla war against them, between 1899 and 1904. Our forces under President and General Emilio Aguinaldo inflicted more fatalities and casualties on them – such as 4,000 Americans slain, or subsequently dying of injuries – than you Spaniards during the Spanish-American War.

Indeed, you betrayed us. Our Revolucionarios, whom the Americans later called, sneeringly, Insurrectos, had already overthrown Spanish rule in the Philippines when Spanish officials "sold" the Philippines to the United States in the Treaty of Paris, in which the Americans "indemnified" Spain with a sum of US$20 million for the loss of her colony of Filipinas. Since we were ten million Filipinos at that time, the bitter joke went around that the Filipino people had been sold into a new slavery at the bargain price of two dollars per Filipino!

The Americans led by Commodore George Dewey had made the deal with General Aguinaldo in Hong Kong to enter the "war" as our allies against Spain. Thus, Dewey’s fleet sailed into Manila Bay and attacked the Spanish navy under Admiral Montoja, sinking most of Montoja’s ships. When American troops began landing in ever increasing numbers, however, it became clear to our generals, especially the brilliant and choleric General Antonio Luna (who pleaded with Aguinaldo to be permitted to attack the Americans "before they were too numerous and had grown too strong".) Aguinaldo turned a deaf ear to Luna’s exhortations and warnings. In fact he allegedly had Luna murdered in Cabanatuan, Nueva Ecija, because he feared Luna might mobilize a coup or pronunciamiento against him. So you see, even in our intrigues, doublecrosses, and treacheries, we Filipinos are very Spanish.

My wife, Ambassador Preciosa Quiogue y Silverio is with me in this hall tonight, and so I ask permission from her and beg your indulgence to talk about her grandfather. Her abuelo, Don Manuel Quiogue, had been a colonel of infantry in our Revolutionary Army. Like all officers, he fought the war on horseback – and was wounded once by the Spaniards and twice by the Americans. In one of the final engagements, he defended Guadalupe Church in Makati against the advancing Flying Brigade of US General Wheaton, and his battalion had fought almost to the last man, pounded by American artillery which also devastated the Church.

Don Manuel lost his right eye in that battle, and sported a romantic black eye-patch like Israel’s great General Moshe Dayan – who, by the way, I got to interview in Jerusalem after the Six-Day War. Don Manuel, which was what I always called him, never forgave the Americans for what he said was "their treachery and betrayal". He absolutely refused to learn English until the day he died at the age of 82. Thus, he spoke only Spanish and his native Tagalog, the latter now anointed as our National Language. (In The Philippine STAR, we also publish a daily newspaper in Tagalog with a circulation of 250,000, entitled Ang Pilipino STAR Ngayon.) Don Manuel’s main source of the news of the day was the daily Spanish language newspaper, La Voz de Manila (The Voice of Manila). Unfortunately, it stopped publication 15 years ago, for lack of readers.

In the pre-war years, when my late father, Benito Soliven y Tagorda, was a diputado in the House of Representatives (for two terms) and later a member of the unicameral legislature, National Assembly (Assemblea Nacional), the discussions and debates were both in English and Spanish, almost never in Tagalog. Our Assemblymen would switch, without a pause, from Spanish to English. Today, some of our Congressmen can’t even speak English, even of the most plebeian variety. They speak either bad Tagalog in the Batasan (Lower House) or Taglish, which is a combination of clumsy Tagalog and English.

In the Senate, formerly the scene of fiery debates between such greats as Don Claro M. Recto, Cipriano Primicias, Camilo Osias, Manuel Roxas, Tomas Oppus, et cetera, many Senators cannot even discuss subjects logically. One is a former basketball star, another an aged movie lothario, another a popular television newscaster – you get my drift. This, alas, looks like a universal phenomenon. If Jennifer Lopez and Madonna were Filipino citizens, they would be elected to our Senate. Surely, Ricky Iglesias, who, at least, proudly announces on CNN and BBC that he is half-Filipino. (He’s the son, as you know of Julio Iglesias and the never-aging beauty of whom we are still so proud, Isabel Preysler.)

With such deep Spanish roots, sprung from 350 years under the tutelage and rule of Spain, why did we Filipinos lose Spanish? Because the Americans, when they took control, were kind rather than ruthless. They permitted Filipinos to run every institution, insisting only that we do so in the English language, so they would know what was happening.

Next, they established an educational system which offered free schooling to every boy and girl who aspired to learning. This is the manner in which my father, who had been an impoverished orphan working as a servant, was able to go to school. The public school system set up by the Americans was excellent. They did not force the early teachers to utilize English, but they sent 1,000 American school teachers aboard the transport USS Thomas – thus, they were dubbed "The Thomasites" – to spread the English language and America’s message of democracy, liberty and equality. The Thomasites taught from Aparri in the north to Sulu in the south and were very much loved, because they lived with and sympathized with the people.

My papa finished grammar school, still in Spanish and Ilocano, and won a scholarship to the Jesuit seminary in Vigan, in our home province of Ilocos Sur.

Vigan was the former Ciudad Fernandina (named after his Catholic Majesty King Ferdinand) founded by the grandson of the great Conquistador, Miguel Lopez de Legaspi, who had become commander of the Army at the age of 22, took the island of Mindoro, then the two towns of Cainta and Taytay (not far from Manila), ran Majayjay in Batangas, then went north to establish Spanish hegemony in the Ilocos region. After Legaspi’s death in 1573, Salcedo captured Camarines, Albay and Catanduanes in the Bicol region of southern Luzon. Incidentally, the Church archdiocese which includes Vigan is called the Archdiocese of Nueva Segovia.

Spanish names will forever endure throughout our archipelago. Just consider our family names and patronyms to this day! Or the names of our towns and cities. We have Betis in Pampanga, next to Angeles City (after Nuestra Señora de los Angeles), not far from the hometown of our President, Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo which is called Lubao. Our President speaks perfect Spanish, like her late mother Evangelina who was a medical doctor. Her own father, Diosdado Macapagal (who used to quip that his first name means "God-given") was also President of the Philippines, so they constitute a political dynasty – which, in the Spanish style, is not rare in our Filipinas.

We have a Betis in Bacolod down south, and a Solsona in Ilocos Norte further north then my own hometown of Santo Domingo, Ilocos Sur. Scan a map of Filipinas, and you’ll find the same place names as you will when gazing at a map of Spain. Madre España indeed gave us our names, our habits good or bad – and our Catholic soul. We are a Catholic archipelago swimming in the Muslim sea. Indonesia is to our south, Malaysia is to our west, and beyond that, far beyond, Pakistan. In between are the Buddhist realms of Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand and Myanmar (Burma).

The Cross planted by the great Ferdinand Magellan, on March 21, 1521, still stands in that charming queen city of our southern Visayan islands. When Legaspi arrived – sailing from Navidad, Mexico – to reclaim "Filipinas", he landed in Cebu on April 27, 1565. There he established the first Spanish settlement in the Philippines. A small statue of the Baby Jesus’ had been miraculously preserved and found (it had been brought there, reputedly, by Magellan – who had died there when he and his men fought with the Chieftain Lapu-Lapu in Mactan to help his new allies, Rajah Humabon – which is what he got for meddling in local politics).

Anyway, in honor of that statue of the Santo Niño (Holy Child), Legaspi named the city after the Santissimo Nombre de Jesus, the Holy Name of Jesus. He built a fort which still stands there today, the Fuerte San Pedro. Cebu was dubbed a "ciudad muy leal y noble".

Incidentally, the 5th centenary (500th year) birth anniversary of the Adelantado Miguel Lopez de Legaspi will be celebrated this November 15 in San Sebastian, Euskadi, near his own little hometown. Like many of your Conquistadors and their captains and soldiers, Legaspi and Juan de Salcedo were Basques. Many of the Spanish-Filipino families so prominent in today’s business and society circles carry Basque names, as well as some Gallegos. Since Legaspi was the conqueror of Manila, the commemoration of his 500th year will also be observed in our capital city this coming February.

Barcelona, too, has always been intimately intertwined with us in our common history. Our national hero, Dr. Jose Rizal, who wrote everything of importance in Spanish, especially his Revolutionary novels, Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo (the latter opus he published in Ghent, Belgium), loved Spain, but he abhorred the despotic rule of the Frayles, the Spanish friars who were in the expiring years of Spain’s control both Lords spiritual and temporal. Rizal lived for some time in Barcelona, including in the Hotel España near Las Ramblas. I mourn the disappearance of such landmarks of our long association from Las Ramblas, like the old Hotel Manila and the Tabacalera building, for the Tabaqueria Filipina was for centuries the pioneer of tobacco cultivation and cigar-making in our northern provinces, including mine – and our most popular brand, Coronas largas, used to be the big cigar, El Conde de Guell!

Rizal was inspired by both Barcelona and Madrid in fostering his nationalistic ideals. Unlike Andres Bonifacio and Emilio Aguinaldo, who both adored him, Rizal wanted Filipinos initially to become equals to Spaniards and, in truth, even to be accepted as "Spaniards". But disillusionment set in. He assailed colonialism and Friar oppression.

In a letter to Mariano Ponce and his companions in the journal, La Solidaridad, in Paris, on April 18, 1889, Rizal raged:

"At the sight of those injustices and cruelties, while still a child, my imagination was awakened and I swore to devote myself to avenge one day so many victims... the day they (the evil priests and friars) martyrize innocent families... goodbye Friar government, and, perhaps, goodbye Spanish Government!... I say to our countrymen: The day on which you would see me in the clutches of the friars, do not waste time making petitions or uttering complaints or lamentations – it is useless. Try to put another in my place who may avenge me and make them pay dearly for my misfortune... Take comfort then and encourage our countrymen over there that they may know that jail is not death. What is death? Do they not believe in God?"

The time came, indeed, when Rizal was marched to the firing squad from Fort Santiago in Manila, past the Ateneo de Manila where the Jesuits had trained him – and which he loved. He died in the morning before a firing squad. Just before he died, he had smuggled out a poem in Spanish to his sister – Mi Ultimo Adios! My last Farewell).

Our hero had lived and studied in Spain between Sept. 1882 and October 1885. He had imbibed many of his patriotic ideals right here. It was poignant and fitting that the Spaniards had executed him – and that his gallant statue now stands proudly in Madrid. Madre Espana has at last recognized his heroism and the steel in his soul he had imbibed at her knee.

I could ramble on and on – but time is short. Let me just conclude with this thought. A journey to Spain is a voyage into our past. Your churres, chocolate E, your mantons de Manila, your cigars, your gestures and emotions are akin to our own. The place names roll off the tongue with the familiarity of our own patronyms and the appellations of our own barrios and hometowns.

The Americans colonized us for just a bit more than a half century, leaving us with Disneyland mentalities and McDonald’s, Pizza Huts, Burger King, Starbucks and Seattle's Best. The Spaniards were not merely after our riches, or the Galleon trade – they were after our souls. Thus, they captured us forever. Perhaps a better word is "captivated".

There are 7,000 Spanish words in our so-called National Language. But language is merely in the tongue, and can only be a mirror of the heart. Let us face it. We are fortunate to have drunk deeply from the Spanish well. It is our strength as Filipinos, not our weakness. No Indio could have been bravo without this spiritual underpinning. Even our great heroes who hungered for freedom and sought independence from Spanish tyranny and the tyranny of Friar monopoly, loved Spain and things Spanish – Rizal, Luna, Del Pilar, Lopez Jaena, even Bonifacio and Aguinaldo.

Their classical Spanish educations imparted to them the understanding of life and love which propelled them to heroic feats and immortality.

There is a grandeur to Spain, which mingles with Spain’s other self – indolence, hedonism, and lack of discipline – to form what we call Hispanic. How else could such a tiny nation burst out of the mists of history and wrest from so many continents one of the greatest and farthest-reaching empires of the world, an adventure so vast that once upon a time Portugal and Spain had to call on the Pope to demarcate which half of this planet should belong to the Spaniards and which half to the Portuguese.

Where has that empire gone? Its banners are in the dust. But it lives on eternally in the hearts of hundreds of millions – including ours.

Madre España! So mighty was the pride engendered by our Spanish "mother" that in time we were capable of rejecting the womb which nursed us – to go forth into the world on our own, defiant, self-confident – and, deep down imbued with the spirit of Don Quijote, born of the genius and gallantry of Cervantes – and, often enough, the humanity and devotion of Sancho Panza, too!

Viva! We are proud and grateful to be un pedazo de España en el Oriente! Somos diferentes was our schoolboy boast when we were in school.

In real life, this remains true.