A man of substance

A few days ago, I was accompanied by former Philippine Olympic Committee (POC) president Col. Julian Malonso to visit Ambassador Carlos J. Valdes in his home on Paterno Street, San Juan.

Malonso suggested the visit because he thought an interview with Valdes, his good friend, would reveal valuable insights on sports from a man of substance.

Valdes, 86, owes his long life to an unflinching devotion to God whom he calls "my co-pilot" and to sports. His list of achievements is something an average person wouldn’t be able to compile in 10 lifetimes.

When he was a boy living in Paco, Valdes learned to play basketball in sandlots. He was good at the game and developed a passion for it. When he was in his teens, he paid two centavos for a ferry boat ride across the Pasig River to the landing near the Singian Clinic off Malacañang then walked all the way to the University of Santo Tomas (UST) campus to play hoops at the school gym which had the only wooden floor in the country. That was in the 1930s.

A native of Bacolor, Pampanga, Valdes played junior varsity basketball and football at Ateneo then transferred to La Salle in 1938 to enroll in the commerce program.

"La Salle was well-known for its business course," said Valdes, one of seven children. "That’s why I transferred. In 1937, my last year at Ateneo, we beat La Salle for the juniors title in football. When I was in the juniors, our coach was Mayor Lacson and we used to beat the Ateneo seniors all the time. Some of my Ateneo teammates were Simon LaO, Freddie Villanueva and Billy Montinola. When I joined the La Salle basketball varsity in 1938, eight of us came from Ateneo."

With Valdes on the 1938 La Salle cage team were Leo Prieto, Gabby Moras, Albert Rey, Martin Avancena and Totit Valles, among others. In 1939, his teammates included Prieto, Valles and Bob Keesee.

"Chito Calvo was our basketball coach at La Salle," recalled Valdes. "He encouraged us to play football to improve our passing game. I joined the team B varsity in football and learned a lot playing against La Salle’s best players like Quinito and Paulino Ortigas, Long Miranda, Nono Crespo, Bulilit Reyes, Tony Garcia and Rafael Ygoa."

Although sports was a consuming passion for Valdes, he never forgot his academics. He was a whiz at numbers and for him, accounting was a breeze.

In high school, Valdes even tutored Ateneo’s senior players and did bookkeeping chores for the Chan family which owned a corner sari-sari store on Peñafrancia and Herran. At the time, the Chan family’s main business was repacking starch and coffee. Today, the Chans operate one of the largest Filipino-Chinese retail chains in Shanghai and own 70 outlets in countries like Vietnam, India and Myanmar. The popular Bench brand is an offshoot of the Chans’ business vision.

Valdes earned a commerce degree at La Salle in 1940 then moved to Far Eastern University for his Master’s and CPA studies. He later finished law at UST.

During the war years, Valdes played commercial basketball for San Miguel Corp. in the MICAA with teammates Angel de la Paz of San Beda, Vicente Radal of Letran and Licerio Kasten of San Beda.

A year before the war ended, something happened to open Valdes’ eyes to what he was destined for.

Valdes hitched a truck ride with the Narciso family from Concepcion, Tarlac, to Manila. But on the way, Valdes decided to get off in San Fernando, Pampanga, in front of the church, instead of proceeding to Manila. Bacolor was only six kilometers away and he thought of visiting his hometown. As the truck motored on, an American P-38 bomber suddenly appeared in the sky. While Valdes watched in horror, the plane unloaded a bomb that destroyed the truck and killed all its passengers.

Valdes was spared an early death. Obviously, the Lord had bigger plans for him on earth.

"Some people are born to live and die ignominiously while others are born to live to do great things." Valdes would realize the relevance of the passage in his later years.

In 1945, Valdes married Aida Abad Santos and their marriage produced 11 children. Only two of his sons played basketball for La Salle but their campaign as midgets was short-lived. One of them, Butch, broke an arm during a game.

As a CPA-lawyer, Valdes was in demand as a professor. He began teaching cost accounting at La Salle at the age of 26 and later took over the school’s commerce department. Valdes also taught at UST, Holy Spirit, Assumption and St. Scholastica’s. Not only was he a professor, he managed the books of those schools, too.

Valdes mobilized his students as assistants in his bookkeeping work and the on-the-job training eventually produced several of the country’s topnotch accountants, including Tito Sandejas, Noni Rodas and Barney Lahos.

With his flourishing reputation as a CPA-lawyer, Valdes established his own accounting outfit which later became the country’s largest Filipino firm of its nature with over 700 CPAs and 30 tax lawyers.

In 1974, Valdes was nominated for the position of Ambassador to the Vatican by Cardinal Rosales and Monsignor Gaviola. There were five other candidates so Valdes felt he would be bypassed.

"I knew the five other nominees wanted the position so I was the last choice," said Valdes. "The chances were good that I wouldn’t be chosen. I had an accounting firm to run and I wasn’t planning on a career in foreign service."

But when then-President Marcos called to inform Valdes of his selection, he was assured the assignment would only be for a maximum of a year and a half. Valdes couldn’t say no to the Chief Executive. Little did he know that the job would lead to 14 distinguished years in foreign service.

More on Valdes in tomorrow’s column.