What we relearn from the death of Nora Aunor

Nora Aunor is alive.

Her body had died but her soul lingers.

In the Christian faith and tradition, where the majority of Filipinos thrive, it is believed that, in death and in the afterlife, the separation of the physical body from the spiritual soul is a divine intervention.

In this context, Nora’s spirit, therefore, is around—mostly in layman’s or various religious beliefs within the ninth day after her passing—wanders by itself, pays visits, stays or lives momentarily or in any given time with people, events and places she left behind, unites with objects, inanimate or animate etc. One is also inclined to believe, sooner or later, that she reincarnates in a person or a situation very akin to her history and experience—from the marginalized to the interclass. Such is the omnipresence of Nora even after her death.

She was hailed at the Heritage Park and Crematorium in Taguig City where her remains laid in state for a week while the entertainment community mourned her passing virtually and in-person.

Celebs of all shapes and sizes, persuasions and affiliations, big and small, arrived in droves to pay their last respects to the star of all stars.

Nora’s perennial arch rival Vilma Santos came at the break of dawn on a Good Friday to lay a wreath, say a little prayer and kiss her friend goodbye. Does the rivalry between them end in the demise of one?

Not necessarily.

Vilma will always equate with Nora beyond compare for one cannot exist without the other but only in the binary of commercial league and in the Filipino household.

On a personal level of artistry, though, Nora is unique and still phenomenal.

At this point, with the physical absence of Nora, Vilma has been relegated to nowhere to fight her own battle but will always be associated with her competitor even in dreams.     

Nora’s past loves Christopher de Leon and Tirso Cruz III were around to throw their love and care not only to their dearly departed but to her beloveds she left behind.

Social media were flooded with tributes through songs, poems, memes, file videos, exclusive shots, emojis etc. professing undying love to the dead.

The virtual platforms must have been overflowing in numbers eulogizing her but the physical presence of warm bodies of multigenerational fans queued up under the heat of the sun outside the chapel just to get in and to witness the final moments of their idol were goosebumps.

Was it deja vu of Noramania in the late turbulent 60s and 70s to the 80s when protests rallying behind social changes were mounted by the equally aggressive and progressive iconoclasts, activists who came from the same proletarian segment of society as Noranians?

Nora was and still is their symbol of hope but they, too, must deviate from the Nora armchair struggle to more daring revolutionary fervor to topple any type of tyranny.

Its election time and the Nora masses can spell a difference by choosing the right candidates to govern us, the very lesson her artistry has conveyed.

On a profound note, a friend of mine who is not known to be a Noranian had observed a meaningful death of Nora on a Maunday Thursday as Christendom would discern its Lent observance in the passion of Christ leading to His death and resurrection.

My friend has seen a parallelism between Christ’s crucifixion to save mankind from sins and to deliver us from damnation and Nora’s death to awaken the masses to lofty ideals like liberation from exploitation of the working classes.

Nora as representation of the lowly, ordinary and oppressed masses was expected and did fight against social injustice and inequality which she had shown in her films and in real events. She even joined rallies and marches of the progressive blocs versus corruption, corporate greed etc.—only some of the causes of poverty—in high and low places.

According to Ricky Lee, one of Nora’s longtime friends and fellow National Artist for Film, “Nora was a rebel who fought against the established order.”

We see a Nora Aunor in ourselves.

Nora’s spirit will never leave this earth or more to it, Nora is uncrushable.

The bits and pieces of Nora will stay in every human Filipino or generally, among human beings in the entire universe for she is everyman.

We will always be reminded of her mortality, and her immortality.

As long as there is life, particularly a quotidian of struggles—against oppression, or simply heartache or pain in the ass, Nora’s lifetime is our reference and how she resolved or unresolved them.

The art Nora represented is classic and catholic from the myriad roles she has performed onstage, on cam, on board, on cue from the abused vassal to the tyrannical office boss, from the martyr lover to an overpowering wife, from the fanatic religious prude to a liberated urban amazon etc.      

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Actor John Rendez is unfazed by flaks against him especially his dalliance with Nora. He had the balls to defend himself after his companion for more than thirty years was interred six feet below the ground. Without him, he exclaimed, Nora couldn’t make it alone which she conceded. In an interview, she denied a romance with him and declared particularly to her kids: “…Ang nanay n’yo, hindi iniwan ng taong ‘yan ng ilang taon, nawala kayong lahat, nagkaroon ng pamilya, ang nariyan, si John. Mahalin ninyo siya…(He didn’t forsake me for years, you were all gone, raised a family of your own but he was always around. Love him.”