The Land of Our Fathers

Yesterday we were in Davao for various errands and one of them was to visit a lot in Bansalan, Davao del Sur. Bansalan is the land where my father hails from. He was born and raised there; all his siblings and half siblings and their father before him. In fact my grandfather's family used to own a huge part of land and some they divided among relatives (the large clan that is so common to ages past), and some they've donated to schools and other public structures.

My cousin, seen on the pic, showed us around, especially the school which is still standing today and is bearing our grandfather's name.

It's not everyday you get to see a school with your name on it, so of course we took a pic.

Based from my dad's stories and other relatives', my dad when he was still a student here wasn't really attending classes frequently, spending most of his time picking fruits from trees instead. And yet he didn't flunk a single subject! LOL!


What was weird to me though was when we visited this school, it was a Monday and there were plenty of students around. We were treating it like a special landmark that we have to take a pic at the front of the school. I'm sure the students and faculty in this school were a little weirded out because it was just the same old school that they see everyday. To them it's nothing special.

It's like when we see some people taking pictures at a mall we frequent. It does seem funny, like- "What's so special about this mall? These people might not have seen a mall before." And the jokes would commence.

This time, we were those people. I just felt a little embarrassed about that. They don't know why we think it's special, and I'm sure I don't like to explain it to everyone giving us weird glances. :/ So yeah, escape promptly. :)