My Cabanatuan Experience in the early 80s

My family relocated to Umingan, Pangasinan from Cebu. It was a very long trip and stressful. I couldn't imagined I was going to live in a remote part of Pangasinan. A town that was near the "Bundoks" and the water system was coming from the ground. I had to pumped water in order for me to drink but the water was fresh and free of minerals or additives, compared to other water supplies found in other major cities in the Philippines.

I stayed there for the summer and asked my mom to enroll me in high school at the College of the Immaculate Conception in Cabanatuan where my cousin Monsignior Camillo de Gregorio was at the time the President of the school.

My mother was reluctant to be separated with me again. We were always separated because her job required traveling for a recording company in Manila and she traveled all over the Philippines. Moving to Pangasinan was the time to know her and my step-father but my education was more important to my family.

In 1983, I started my class in Cabanatuan. I was being teased by my classmates because I had a Cebuano accent and my Tagalog was not perfect.

Nueva Ecija is a Tagalog province and with a tremendous violent past. Political rivals assassinated each other just to become a mayor or a governor. Their dreams to become famous but never to served the people of Nueva Ecija who voted for them.

Everyone knew me in school probably because of my last name Stamatelaky or my connection that I have with the school President.

I have learned not only in school but in the streets of Cabanatuan. I have learned to make friends with the poor. I always have a connection with the poor and a bad relationship with the rich. I always avoided becoming a friend of the wealthy Filipinos. Because they always make the poor poorer and neglect them, to make their lives richer from the expense of the peasant but not all Filipino rich are like that some have heart of a cotton and some have heart of a coconut.

There are a lot of memories in "Caba". I met my first love Abi, the ten years relationship with her was extraordinary. she was not only my girlfriend but she was different from all of the women that I had relationship.

I discovered the name Benigno Aquino Jr. in N.E When he was murdered at the Manila International Airport. He changed my mind in how I think that I am Filipino and become awakened that I was living in a country that was becoming poorer in every minute of my life. The Filipinos was about to embarked in a journey to freedom because one man changed in how Filipinos think.

I graduated in 1986 without honors but was free from the Tyrant.