Scrapbook
The students of Grade Two Section Perseverance of Sta. Presincula Academy seemed harmless and ordinary. It was their honor, under the gaze of the merciful Mrs. Sinistra, to erase the writings on the blackboard before and after each class. Every recess, everyone (except, of course, those who didn’t have the money) would crave the custard candies, chocolates, and rice crispies that the principal sold for cheap. The girls would happily cut their paper dolls, while the boys would sneakily explore the secrets of life behind the custodian’s house.
If the children were asked what they want to be when they grow up, a lot of them would say, “I want to be a doctor to help the sick,” or “I want to be a lawyer to defend the poor.” But in the deepest corner of their minds (and this they wouldn’t admit to anyone), what they really wanted was to be the principal (or the director, or even the owner) of Sta. Presincula Academy.
They’ve never seen their teachers go home at the end of the day. So they thought that they all must be living there in the school grounds.
“Maybe they’re studying too when we’re not around.”
“But who teaches them?”
“Who else—the principal!”
“So the principal lives here too?”
“What do you think, dummy.”
“So that must be why they know about everything…”
“No, stupid. They’re still studying about everything, of course. But everything we know, they already know. So that thing you all do behind the custodian’s house, the Madam knows about it too.”
And in time, even the things the children still didn’t know, the Madam would’ve already known too. She was about to catch up with them, and get ahead of them even, and the mere thought of it terrified the children.
But everything was about to change. Because one day, when some of them once again didn’t bring their monthly donation of floor wax to the school, Mrs. Sinistra wanted to discuss in class the difference between a house and a home. She was hoping to etch on the students’ minds that their classroom was not just a house but a home they have to keep tidy and beautiful.
“What is a house and what is a home, and how are the two different?” she began. She scanned the room to find the face of the student who hasn’t brought floor wax for three months.
“You, Leticia,” she called out.
“Madam, a house—” the student paused to think. “A house is a place where people eat, live, and play.” The young girl was somehow pleased with her own answer, especially with those last three verbs—live, eat, and play.
“And what about a home?”
The girl couldn’t answer. So she was called to the front and asked to write A house is not a home on the board for a hundred times.
Mrs. Sinistra’s vocabulary was difficult, Ido thought as he picked his nose. Like metaphors, he thought. And he remembered his poet neighbor who taught him the words vocabulary and metaphor.
“Madam,” Froilan raised his hand. “Sister Mary Jo said, the house could either have or not have love. But a home needs to have love. That means a house might not have anyone living in it. But a home needs people inside it. When no one’s in it, it isn’t a home, it’s just a house.”
“Ah, very good,” praised Mrs. Sinistra, even though she thought that the nun could’ve taught them a little bit more. Nevertheless, she could already use the boy’s answer to finally move to the subject of floor wax.
“Madam.” Another child who also hasn’t brought the required floor wax for quite sometime raised his hand.
“Yes, Lino?”
“Can you tell us what abaloryo means?”
The teacher didn’t expect the question, and she was sure it had a malicious intent. Her face briefly showed surprise, but only for a very brief while. But that look of surprise on her face was something the children would never get off their minds because they’d always remember it.
Mrs. Sinistra felt her table, looking for her stick, as a swarm of bees seemed to suddenly came from nowhere, buzzing loudly inside her head.
“Keep quiet! Keep quiet!” she shouted, hitting the table with her stick, though no one made a noise other than Leticia, with the tingling sound of chalk on the blackboard. The whole class was quiet because they now had the same question as Lino, and they were all eager to hear their teacher’s answer.
Mrs. Sinistra sat down and looked up at the ceiling. Aab, aba, abaka, abakada, abahin, abala… She sifted through the rolodex in her head. A-ba. Like a swelling belly. Lor-yo. Like a release from this. Abaloryo. Not human, nor animal.
Toribio thought that it must be a bird sent by God, singing Abaloryo! Abaloryo! after the evening vesper. Anabelle wrote the word in her notebook, drawing flowers around it: roses, gumamelas, gladiolas. She thought of coloring her drawing and putting it in a frame, then giving it to her beloved father. Meanwhile, Bona teared up a little, remembering her dead sister whose name was Loreta Rosario.
“Where did you get that word?” Mrs. Sinistra asked Lino, still shooing away the bees in her head with the stick.
Lino still had his hand raised even after asking his question. It was the first time he has done so in class, so his seatmate even had to lower his hand for him. “I found it in a book, Madam.”
Mrs. Sinistra was about to ask which book when Froilan raised his hand again.
“Madam, I heard that word once from my grandpa, when his spirit haunted his own wake.” When he realized that no one believed him, Froilan simply carried on with a barrage of questions. “But Madam, what is abaloryo? Is it a word in English or Filipino? And how is it different from a house and home?”
“All right, all right,” the Madam let out a deep sigh. She finally gave up. “Let us all find out what abaloryo means. So now, that will be your assignment,” she ended, the bees still buzzing in her head.
That morning, no one volunteered to erase the writings on the blackboard. Leticia’s writings remained there until the next day. (And though these would also be eventually erased, some say they’d still reappear on the board especially after it rains and the chalks are all wet.)
That same morning, no one also bought custard candies, chocolates, and rice crispies from the principal’s office. So the principal was quick to call a meeting to discuss the poverty in their school and how it could be resolved soon.
After classes, no one loitered around. No one lingered on the streets to play with tin cans, to run around, to chase one another. No one turned on the TV in their homes. No one even waited in front of their houses for the passing of the ice cream vendor. All the children stayed inside, flipping through their dictionaries. And those who didn’t have one went to those who did.
One of the houses they visited was Lino’s. His family had an English-Filipino Filipino-English dictionary left behind by an American missionary because it was too heavy for his luggage. Several neighbors tried convincing the family to let them borrow the dictionary and bring it home for a day or two. But Lino’s mother would always refuse. Because just like that night, even from the kitchen sink, she closely watched her son by the light of a lamp searching through the thick book, oblivious to the mosquitos going in and out of his ears.
“Lino, memorize everything written there (whatever’s written there) as early as now, so you’ll grow up smart,” the mother told her son.
The next day, all the children had new words for Mrs. Sinistra. Romulo asked what braggadocio means and how to use it in a sentence. Prima asked about the mala-’s she found: malakolohiya, malagihay, malagunlong, and malainibay. Mrs. Sinistra wanted to add to the list her own set of words: malala, malamlam, malarya, and malas. Leticia asked what summum bonum means and how is jure divino different from deo volente. The teacher still hadn’t answered any of the questions when five more children raised their hands.
“Keep quiet! Keep quiet!” Mrs. Sinistra told them off, hitting the table with her stick. The Madam hit the table a little harder today because she wanted to be as vicious as she felt her students were by raising their hands at once. “Keep quiet! Keep quiet!” she went on, even as she laid in bed that night.
But instead of keeping quiet, the children decided to come up with their own rules. Every day from then on, they’d bring a new word to the class. And whoever brings a word that Mrs. Sinistra already knew would get a punishment. They would be the one to stay in the classroom during recess to comb out the lice and pick out the dead and white strands of hair off their teacher’s head. Because of these rules, no goody two shoes has since stayed in the classroom to serve their teacher. And so the lice and the dead and white strands of hair multiplied on Mrs. Sinistra’s head fast. “Where are you, my children,” she’d often say, making sure they hear her call whenever they passed by without even turning to look through the window of their room.
One day, when all that was left on the Madam’s head were dead and white strands of hair, she went to class with a smile on her face. Behind her, the Quasimodo Mang Igna, the school custodian, followed. He carried a big and thick book they had probably found in the garage (which they really did, as we will see in a bit). Mang Igna carefully put it down on the Madam’s table.
“Children, gather around. I have a surprise for all of you,” Mrs. Sinistra announced to the children, shooing Mang Igna away. Mrs. Sinistra was too excited that morning that she forgot the early morning prayer and daily health and hygiene inspection before starting the class.
“Gather around,” she said again.
The children obliged, standing up to go to their teacher’s table. Some did stay in their seats, as they thought Mrs. Sinistra was about to sell their school’s official papers, official pencils, and official crayons (just like how the principal sold the offical custard candies, official chocolates, and official rice crispies in her office).
“Do you know what this is?” the teacher said, pointing to the book on her table. With its width and thickness, it might as well be the Book of Life that lists the names of those who are holy and those who are evil. A rough gray cloth, or perhaps it had a different color that just turned gray in time, wrapped its hard cover, gnawed and chewed on by rats. Loose ends of fibers hung from the spine and corners of the book.
“This is a scrapbook,” the teacher went on. The children were surprised that Mrs. Sinistra answered her own question. Because only moments earlier, they didn’t know what to do. If they made a guess and gave a wrong answer, she might end up pinching their ears. But if they said, No, Madam, we’re sorry but we don’t know, that also wouldn’t be good, because in their classroom, they were never allowed to say I don’t know.
“And do you know what a scrapbook is?” the teacher asked again. And to answer her own question once more (because she also knew that only she could answer it), she opened the scrapbook somewhere in the middle.
The children were amazed with what they saw. The pages were clean! Despite its thickness, the book turned out to be empty. The paper was turning yellow, blending with the rust-colored stains on the margins.
Some of the students got excited. They thought that this might finally be the book that Mrs. Sinistra would ask them to read from then on. Meanwhile, others were suspicious, thinking this must be a trap somehow. They believed that their teacher was about to get back at them for all the strange words they previously asked her.
“Madam, what is it for?” Pipito dared to ask, even though he had the smallest voice in the class.
“Children, last night, God gave me this idea in a dream. Don’t you all love words? You’re all so in love with words, yes? So now, why don’t we start writing our own dictionary?”
But how? Do they have to pay for anything? And how much? The eyes surrounding Mrs. Sinistra had so many questions. They all wanted to ask Why, but the teacher would often get annoyed with such a question.
“Bring a new word to school every day. Share it to the rest of the class by writing it here on our scrapbook.” The teacher patted the book to make sure that they all understood where they should direct their new words from then on. “We shall call this our class pet project. Let’s all say it again one more time—our class pet project.”
At first, the children were hesitant to go near the scrapbook. The Madam placed it on a shelf near her table. And so for a time, the scrapbook and Mrs. Sinistra seemed to be one.
But in the next few days, someone noticed that the first page finally had something written on it. Everyone was shocked because they saw the haunting handwriting of their classmate: a house is not a home.
But this only encouraged others to write something themselves. Ido wrote his new word: alatwat. Meaning, “the echo of another echo.” He heard it from his poet neighboor, who was looking then for a word to rhyme with watawat (meaning, “flag”).
They never agreed that everyone should have a word beginning with the letter a, so Emilio wrote the word yutyot. Meaning, “the shaking or jerking of something.” All of his classmates, especially the boys, giggled. Since that day, they called him Emilio Yutyot.
Some wrote down words from English, Spanish, Japanese, Chinese, French, Latin, etc. But the Visayan Bona added the most words out of everyone. Words she claimed to have come all the way from across the sea.
They also wrote down words they were called in the streets or sometimes in their own homes. Words like letse, hayop, demonyo, lintik, and putang ina. They even had a long discussion whose mother was this putang ina, and if there’s a putang ina, how come there’s no putang ama, putang ate, putang kuya, putang lolo, and putang lola so they could all be together as one happy family. So they added all of these to their dictionary. They decided that the mother shouldn’t be alone in being a puta.
Because they could write anything in their scrapbook, they wrote down the words they’d often hear the adults say when they fool around but which they themselves weren’t allowed to say out loud. Words like pekpek, uten, kiki, titi, hilat, hindot, etc.
Some also added words they came up with to name things they thought still didn’t have any name. For example, what do you call an ice cream that has dripped and melted on the ground? Or a belt when it is being used to hit someone? Edmund came up with the word isplanksrrripdagbladag. According to him, this was the noise that cats make when they walk on tin roofs.
Others, instead of writing the meaning of their words, drew it. Some painted while others pasted cut-outs. Some wrote poems, riddles, and songs. Some even wrote entire biographies for their words.
While other students in the school were busy playing trading cards and rubber bands, the entire Grade Two Section Perseverance was obsessed with their dictionary project. Every day, more words were added to the scrapbook. Only few pages to go and they would have completely filled it up.
They finally stopped pestering Mrs. Sinistra. The teacher should have been happy with the dictionary, but she was not. The truth was, she felt annoyed whenever she saw it. The book lay quietly on the shelf, but it always reminded her of the things that her students knew but she herself did not. And as she taught her classes, its presence felt like that of another teacher in the classroom. The teacher whom the students trusted more, listened to more.
Her children picked up such a really weird hobby, Mrs. Sinistra thought. It didn’t seem to suit their young age. And what if their parents complained? What should she do with the dictionary whose very idea she herself came up with? She remembered how just the other day, after an entire afternoon of rain, termites swarmed the old shelf where the dictionary lay. But before the insects could even reach the book, the children had already killed them all with their bare hands. Not a single termite survived. Mrs. Sinistra shuddered from what she saw. She would never admit it to herself, but she felt a flash of fear from the children she was teaching.
For her peace of mind, Mrs. Sinistra talked to the school priest about it. The priest didn’t believe in malignant spirits, but he believed that a ritual could help ease people’s minds. He agreed to bless their classroom. But he was going to do it in the afternoon, once the students had all gone home.
When he arrived, the priest wore a plain polo shirt and an old pair of jeans. Not a habit as Mrs. Sinistra had expected. It was already five in the afternoon when they began to pray. There were only three of them in the room, the priest, the teacher, and the custodian.
Nothing terrifying happened. No strong wind blew out the lit candles. No door nor window closed on its own. And no object, big or small, flew around, which was just how Mrs. Sinsitra imagined it would go. That afternoon passed just like any other afternoon, except from then on, Leticia’s handwriting stopped showing itself on the blackboard, on the walls, and on every other surface where one could write.
“Do not fear,” the priest advised her before finally leaving. And it was exactly what Mrs. Sinistra did.
The next day, the scrapbook was no longer on the shelf. The students looked for it in every corner of their classroom but failed to find it.
“There’s only one person who could’ve stolen it,” John Jorge said. And there’s really only one person they had in mind—their classmate Ade. Why Ade? Well for one, she hasn’t come to school, so she must be guilty. And then, she’d always ask them for a piece of paper instead of buying from Mrs. Sinistra. Sometimes, she’d even ask them for food. She probably wanted to keep the dictionary for herself because they didn’t have one at home, but she was also probably too shy to admit it.
So they decided that later that afternoon, they would all go to Ade’s house. It was their chance to finally be like the heroes in the movie Kontra Bandido (1986).
Mrs. Sinistra told them off. She reminded her students that it’s not good to blame someone without any proof.
The Madam wasn’t the least bit angry when she scolded them. In fact, she even smiled at them. When she finally sat down after her sermon, the Madam was still smiling. It was the second time the children saw their teacher smile for that long. They could still remember the only other time she did.
The teacher went quiet for a while to savor the relief she felt. Her birthday was coming up, she remembered. Why not invite the students to her house? She’d definitely do that, she decided. So on that day, the students were also about to learn that their teacher didn’t really live in the school grounds.
Where the scrapbook ended up is an entirely different story. The truth was, it was simply returned to its old place, there in the garage, back with other junk. It also went back to its old purpose—as a rest for the custodian Mang Igna’s feet.
It was Mang Igna’s sole pleasure to lean back on his chair and rest his feet like a king on the scrapbook. But of course, he’d only do it after he was done with everything he had to do each day.
The scrapbook was comfortable a footrest. Whenever the old man’s soles itched, he’d simply rub them on its rough cover. It was as if he had found his own foot scratcher. His bunions would also often want to feel the smooth and soft pages of the book. And once the paper grew warm from all the rubbing of his feet, his toes would turn the book to another page.
Mang Igna wondered one thing about the scrapbook: its owner. On its first page, a child’s handwriting could be read: Anacleto Simeon Seguno, Second Grade. But Mang Igna didn’t know how to read. He even had to call a student to read it for him. It was then that the students of the Academy learned that Mang Igna couldn’t read. And so it became yet another of his flaws. The dark hunchback turned out to be illiterate too! Surely, he also didn’t know how to write and count. And if he happened to be able to count, there’s no way he could count up to a hundred.
But when he finally learned the name of the scrapbook’s owner, the old man often thought about him. Who was this Anacleto? Probably an old student of the Academy. But he’d been working at the Academy for so long, and he’d never met a single Anacleto. Maybe he studied there for a very brief time. But how come he only wrote his name and grade on the scrapbook? Why didn’t he write anything else on it? Maybe he got shy or was somehow embarrased? But what stopped him? Or who? But this Anacleto, he must be rich, no? Mang Igna knew that only the children of the rich could ever have a book as big and thick as this.
As he thought more and more about Anacleto, the more the unknown child became fully formed in his head. Until he grew a face, and then a body of his own. Until he could talk to the old man at night, when there’s no one else in the school. Thanks to the scrapbook, Mang Igna now had someone to talk to.
When Mrs. Sinistra ordered Mang Igna to bring the scrapbook to her class, he grew restless. Anacleto threw a fit every night, just as a rich kid would. Meanwhile, the old man felt a pang of regret. Because aside from being his footrest, the book also served as the pillow under his head. Out of all the old books hoarded in the garage, it was the thickest, and so the perfect one to be his pillow. And for each night he laid with it, the scrapbook gave him long sleep and sweet dreams.
But that was before, when the scrapbook used to be a peaceful companion. Aside from its owner’s name and grade level, it had nothing else written on it. It was quiet as it was empty. But when Mrs. Sinistra returned the scrapbook, the old man saw how it has been mistreated. How the teacher let anyone write anything on it, draw whatever on it. But what could he do? He was just a custodian. He could only erase graffiti on walls. Graffiti was the kind of writing he grew up with, not just the ones on walls, but even on supposedly decent signboards and books. It began, Mang Igna could recall, the first time he tried to learn how to read. The a-e-i-o-u that the teacher dictacted so clearly became e-o-a-u-i for him. Sometimes, the letters would group themselves accordingly, like little soldiers lining up. All the e’s would form a column of their own, and so did the other letters. And how could he learn to read if the e’s wouldn’t go with other letters, only with their fellow e’s, just like the other letters did?
The first time he tried to read the word daga, only the letter d remained on the page, while the rest ran off like rats upon seeing a cat.
Even his own name confused him. He often asked himself if he was called Mang Igna because he was a Rafael Ignacio or an Ignacio Rafael.
So his teacher decided that he’d never learn how to read. His teacher couldn’t understand his case. And as expected, he didn’t learn to read any better. Because his book had already been torn up by his frustrated teacher. So his parents decided that he should just stop going to school altogether. That he should just help them with farming instead. There in the fields, where there’d be no letters to confuse his head.
But what was he doing then in the school? Did he just come there for a job? Maybe he still hoped that for the last time, he could still learn. And at his age…
“Can you read this for me, my friend?” he asked Anacleto, whom he could make out in the last rays of the sun. He saw the child slowly came in through the door.
The young boy was surprised. But he obliged and asked for the book. When Mang Igna handed it to him, the old man heard some giggling by the window. When he turned to look, he saw a few boys watching, as if mocking him. He recognized their faces. They were all Mrs. Sinistra’s students. He grabbed the child before him by the collar. He snatched the book from his hands. The boy quick ran outside, laughing.
Mang Igna followed to face the children. “You’ll never get this book!” he shouted at them. They all ran away. One day, they’d return, Mang Igna knew. They’d never stop pestering him. He also knew that there could only be one owner of the scrapbook. Either Anacleto or Mrs. Sinistra’s students. But never him.
So the next day, the old man did what he thought he would never do. He sold the scrapbook to the collector of bottles and newspapers, who would sell it on to a junkshop.
The story of the scrapbook would have ended there, but on his way to the junkshop, the collector chanced upon a group of vegetable vendors. They had just harvested squash and would be sending them all the way to Manila the following day, and so they needed something to wrap the vegetables with. And so, the vendors bought the scrapbook from the collector, who sold it per kilo.
The five men placed their baskets of squash right there and then, by the side of the road. They all sat down on the grass. One of them took out the squash from the baskets. Another tore out pages from the book. Two of them wrapped the vegetables in paper, while the last one put the covered squash back into the baskets. They all chattered as they worked. They believed that the noisier they were, the quicker their hands worked.
The one who tore out the pages couldn’t help but read, even in bits, what he was holding. The others realized that their work was slowing down because they kept running out of paper. But instead of elbowing their companion, asking him to hurry, they joined him in reading, grabbing a piece of paper for themselves.
Their hands continued to work. But their eyes were nailed on the ground, where they placed their pieces of paper. Aside from their eyes, they also read with their mouths, whispering each word out loud. It was how they all learned to read as a child, and no one taught them otherwise.
They passed around each piece of paper before wrapping it on a squash, then put the covered vegetable back into a basket. They even took out the ones they previously finished, just so they could read the pages they missed. This was how their work turned out that day, not minding their squash being exposed to sunlight for a long while.
It was already late in the afternoon when they finished working. The scrapbook was already empty when they stopped. Not a single piece of paper went to waste. The remaining hard cover, one of them used to shield himself from the sun.
When the man who tore the pages went home, he found his five-year-old eldest child. And just like any other day, he found him staring at a wall.
“Papa!” He was suddenly excited when he saw his father. “Earlier I was chased by a tugi-tugi,” he happily reported.
The father didn’t furrow his brows. For the first time, in his head, he understood what the child said.
Translator’s Note:
Just as its first line describes the students as “seem[ingly] harmless and ordinary,” Allan Derain’s short story hides a dark discourse about power underneath its veneer of lightness and comedy. The specific site of the struggle—namely, a scrapbook-turned-dictionary—is a crucial object, as it harkens back to the long colonial history of the Philippines. Dictionaries served as an important tool for the Spanish friars in the 16th century to convert the natives to Catholicism. When the Americans came in the early 20th century, they also became a symbol for being civilized, with the new colonizers establishing a public education with American English as its most sinister core, a system that persists to this day. And so, in the story, when the children begin to create a dictionary in their own terms, there certainly lies the temptation to take this as an allegory regarding Philippine vernaculars revolting against structures of power established during the long history of colonialisms in the country. But, at the same time, considering with how it concludes, the story also appears to propose a different critique altogether regarding literacy, and perhaps literature itself, one that refuses such simple binaries.
As a translator, as much as my practice of rendering works in the vernacular to English permits the rest of the world in to my particular world that is the Philippines, I also believe in the responsibility of the readers to meet us halfway. And so, in translating Derain’s story, I decided to leave most of the new words the students brought to class untranslated, just as how they were in the original, without any hint on their definitions. After all, how easy it is to go type them on Google, and the rabbit hole that the readers are likely to find themselves in, just like the buzzing bees Mrs. Sinistra hears in her head, is just another part of the story.
Allan N. Derain is a writer, visual artist, and teacher. He is the author of several books, including the award-winning Aswanglaut (ADMU Press, 2021), The Next Great Tagalog Novel at Iba pang Kuwento (UP Press, 2019), and Ang Banal na Aklat ng mga Kumag (Anvil, 2014). His latest novel Pamimintana sa Pintong Rosas Budget Hotel is forthcoming from Vibal Foundation, and his first book of critical essays Ang Landas Palabas ng Nobela is forthcoming from ADMU Press. He currently teaches creative writing, art appreciation, and Filipino literature at the Departments of Filipino and Fine Arts at the Ateneo de Manila University.
Christian Jil R. Benitez is a Filipino poet, scholar, and translator currently pursuing his PhD in comparative literature at Chulalongkorn University in Thailand. He also teaches at the Department of Filipino at the Ateneo de Manila University in the Philippines. His first book, Isang Dalumat ng Panahon (ADMU Press, 2022), received the Philippine National Book Award for literary criticism and cultural studies. His English translation of Jaya Jacobo’s Arasahas: Poems from the Tropics was recently published by PAWA Press and Paloma Press. Read more of his works at christianbenitez.carrd.co.
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