Visiting Ka Pulê

I had always meant to visit Ka Pulê but each time I drove in front of his house, I was always running late for an appointment or telling myself that there will be a more opportune time. So last Saturday as we drove down from Tagaytay City towards our place in Lipa, I suggested to Karen and Hannah if they would be interested in dropping by Ka Pulê’s house and pay him a visit? After all these years, we all agreed that we all had questions that needed answers, and it was now or never.

We were 112 years too late.

Yes 112 years too late, but we knew that. We had always assumed that Ka Pulê died from complications caused by a paralysis of unknown origin. Others presumed he had died in prison as a revolutionary. But it turns out that Cholera finally cut him down even after Ka Pulê managed to avoid it first as a student in Letran and then when he fled from it in Guam. On the third strike he was out. We also learned that Ka Pulê had become a “paralytic” late in life because of polio and not some back injury or horse riding accident.

Since we were there already, it seemed but proper to spend our available time to learn about Ka Pulê from the accounts of family members, friends, pictures, articles and his very own writings all put together thoughtfully, professionally and with a high standard of excellence by people who took pride in the “Sublime Paralytic”, The Brains of the Katipunan” and a “Son of Barrio Talaga – Tanauan, Batangas.”

By now you must have figured out that Ka Pulê is none other than one of our less celebrated national heroes Apolinario Mabini and that our unplanned visit was to the Mabini Shrine and museum in Barrio Talaga, Tanauan City Batangas. Anyone who sincerely wants to learn and understand a time and place such as the Philippines during the time of Spanish and American colonization and get to know why Mabini richly deserves the title “The Brains of the Philippine Revolution” MUST spend time at the shrine and patiently go from room to room representing various stages of Mabini’s life in relation to Philippine History. 

Although our initial intention was to visit Ka Pulê and learn more personal details about his life, our visit to the Mabini Shrine also made us appreciate what Filipinos and Filipinas as well as a sprinkling of African Americans and sympathetic Spaniards did and endured in their desire to win freedom for Filipinos. As modest as the shrine may be, my wife, my daughter, and I, learned more about Mabini and the Philippine-American war in two hours than everything we’ve ever been taught or learned in school or media. I honestly make no exaggerations.

From the onset the exhibits made it clear that Ka Pulê a.k.a Apolinario Mabini loved learning and took advantage of every opportunity even to the extent of becoming a working student and achieving two degrees finally becoming a lawyer. This, Mabini later expressed was at the cost of his mother’s life. I opted to use the Tagalog version since Ka Pulê was a Batangueño and because Tagalog better expresses the depth and tragic poetry of Mabini’s recollection:

“Noong ako’y bata pa at hiniling ko sa iyo na gusto kong mag-aral, punong-puno ka ng kagalakan, dahil ang pinakapangarap mo ay magkaroon ng anak na pari; para sa iyo, ang maging alagad ng Diyos ang pinakadakilang karangalan na maaaring asamin sa mundong ito.

Batid kong nahirapan ka nang tustusan ang aking pag-aral, pinilit mo pa ring kumayod, Hindi alintana ang init at ulan, hanggang sa maratay ka dulot ng pagkakasakit na naging sanhi ng iyong pagpanaw.

Hindi ako pinagpari ng tadhana. Gayunman, dahil nanininiwala ako na ang tunay na alagad ng Diyos ay hindi ang nakaSutana, kundi ang lahat na nagpapahayag ng kanyang kabutihan sa pamamagitan ng mabubuting gawa sa lahat ng kanyang nilikha, mananatili akong tapat sa iyong nais hangga’t may lakas pa ako na gawin ang nararapat.”

According to his friend Melencio Bolaños, it was that very poverty that nearly prevented Mabini from formally taking his oath as a Lawyer because he did not have the money to buy his cap, his Toga and Mozetta (a short cape).

At the last minute “We noticed from the window, a magnificent car approaching and which stopped in front of the house. A young man came and came up in the house and gave him a card, together with a package wrapped in silk which contained all he needed for the graduation: hat, toga, and mozetta. A respectable lady from Santa Cruz had given him this gift.”

That lady turned out to be a distraught businesswoman who had sought out advice from various Lawyers but did not find their opinion acceptable. Mabini on the other hand gave out his advice and did so Pro Bono or for free.

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Almost as if he saw the future that we now live in, Mabini shared his insight about the first Philippine Constitution after he was pressured to publish it by a group with vested political interests:    

“I still did not have any motives to suspect that the strongest defenders of the publication of the Constitution would be the least inclined to uphold it at the slightest insinuation of danger to their persons and interests.”

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Mabini’s standards for who qualifies to be Senators were very clear and nowhere near the current standard:

“Ang Senado ay isang katipunang lubos na kagalang-galang at kinaroroonan ng mga taong hinirang dahil sa kahusayan sa pag-uugali” at “lawak ng nalalaman sa anumang larangan at industriya.” Kaya’t walang makakaakyat sa mataas na luklukang ito kundi ang mga piling mamamayang nagpakita ng ‘di pangkaraniwang talas ng isip at kasipagan.

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Even in the seemingly mundane task of ordering a coil spring for his pocket watch, Mabini still manages to be eloquent:  

“Having a watch, one feels that the hours are slipping away and if the fleeting time saddens those who are happy, on the other hand, it comforts one who suffers, because it reminds him that sufferings pass away in the manner the joys and the greatness in this world have to pass away.”

Sensing his mortal end, Ka Pulê wrote:

“ I wish nothing more than to be able to fall into eternal sleep, satisfied that I have not left behind a bitter memory.”

Apolinario Mabini (Guam 24 May 1902).

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