Would that the Philippines pull the likes of ‘Aling’ Norma and ‘Mang’ Joe out of peripheral shadows

End-of-season deep discounts on summer clothes as autumn creeps in have triggered in me wishful thinking again about Aling Norma’s itinerant home-service hemming and alteration services in Pureza, Sta. Mesa, where we used to live. 

Many times, I had fitted a pair of pants or woolen coat supposedly my size but always either too long or wide on the shoulder. Disheartened, I would steal into the children’s department but often caught empty-handed or paying for a size 14 Girls’ top with juvenile cut, not a few times wishing…if only Aling Norma were here, if only I stuffed her in my suitcase— quite a surreal possibility that she (and a number of neighbors) proffered when she learned I was immigrating to Canada.

I did pay the neighborhood dry cleaner $12 for hemming a silk-lined woolen pants—a perfect fit but which fell past my toes—and a couple of denims at $8 each, a splurge that I bemoaned for weeks, calculating how Aling Norma could have bought a dream sewing machine and some with the total.

When a mysterious something (to me) broke in the toilet and would not flush, panic gripped me, aware that Mang Joe, our prompt fixer-upper from Antonio Rivera in Tondo, lived an ocean away. He refitted our bathroom in Pureza, installed a pump, and built wall cabinets for almost a quarter of what I would have paid a licensed plumber here in Vancouver.

But with deep breaths, I resorted to Google for a lesson on the parts and mechanisms of a flush toilet. In an hour, a Home Depot sales assistant who had walked me through sky-high ceilings and shelves left me as lost as Alice (in Wonderland) while with my eyes I scaled the bins choosing which brand of lever to fit into the rubber-stopper. Having acquired a skill, did I applaud myself? I had thought of Mang Joe, instead.

It took us eight years, no kidding, to clear up our terrace, where the contractor who renovated our condominium unit had stashed cans of leftover paint, extra pieces of laminated floor boards, and recently a broken folding chair—between my sister and me, how could we with puny limbs hoist these on our heads or shoulders to the basement storage or a recycling center?

If only Uding, my cousin’s sidekick, were here, he, for nothing or for a cup of brewed coffee, could have long dragged these out; many times I’ve stayed wishing until a fog descends suffusing me with a mild stupor.

But stringent reminders from Strata Council to rid our patios and terraces of garbage shook me to finally call up the numbers on the side of a truck parked from across the alley that had long “begged” me for “Pat” to pick up any garbage. Pat McQuinn, licensed to haul off the stuff, did so two days later at a minimum fee of $50, which could have made Uding feel like a crown prince.

How rueful to realize that none of these wee struggles underlying the difference between life in North America and the Philippines figure in selfies via smartphones or posted on Facebook—a life back there with such taken-for-granted services that Canadian friends consider almost “royal”.

Indeed, would that other countries list among job requirements “earnestness,” like Aling Norma’s wish to fly with me, no matter how surreal, as well as neighbors who echoed it. Or would that making it by any means, she and other neighbors could respond to in-demand calls for odd jobs here as common as household chores, such as starching and ironing linens, scraping off gum and candle drippings on marble floors, and even if bewailed by most, cleaning homes with cats.

Would that like birds migrating requires nothing. But better yet, would that the Philippines pull the likes of Aling Norma and Mang Joe out of peripheral shadows.