TIMELESS FRIENDSHIPS! THE GOLDS!
THE CLASS OF HS 1974!
“Please Come, I Want to See You”
Velada 2024 – A Personal Reflection
by Cori Ledesma-Sanders, AC74
It must have been a heaven-dropped idea because it came from out of the blue. In April, I was mulling over the year 2024 and something made me count backwards. Hey, I graduated in 1974. That’s 50 years! 50 years! I wonder if there’s going to be a reunion! I suddenly got excited. I messaged the alumnae association on Facebook but didn’t immediately hear back. I had not been in touch with any classmates since graduating in 1974. That’s when I prayed. Lord, if there is going to be a reunion, and if you want me to be there, please let me find out about it. The very next day, I received an email from a high school classmate based in Auckland, NZ.
Are you going to the velada?
What’s that?
Our high school reunion!
Holy cow!
It was Willie Mae dos Remedios who got me into the Viber group where everyone seemed to be excitedly planning for the October velada. The messaging traffic was heavy and had obviously been going on for some time!
You know what it’s like when the cool girls are planning a party and you’re just watching unobtrusively from the sidelines? That’s what it felt like. These girls all know each other, I thought. They’re talking about previous reunions I hadn’t been to nor even known about. My awkward insecure teenage self felt like an outsider.
So, I read the posts, overwhelmed by the towering bonhomie, the relentless goodwill, the banter and teasing, the pictures from previous reunions, etc.
I don’t know if I can do this. It will be like trying to penetrate an established circle.
Then Pia Montinola posted a quote about high school reunions and old friends, that, for some reason, softened my heart and helped me recover my courage. I thanked her publicly in the Viber group and that’s when others jumped in and said, “HI CORI”, and, “Where are you now”, and, “I hope you can come to the velada”, and, “Please come. I want to see you!” And on the strength of that welcome, I booked my flights.
The next few months were swallowed up in frantic efforts to lose weight, (This is like going to a wedding!) bumbling attempts to memorize dance steps meant for women 30 years younger than I with better footwork, memory, and flexibility (eye roll) and late-night wonderings about what it would be like to see all my old classmates again! That thought always made me smile. I had not seen these women in 50 years!
My cousin, Ica Manalo, kindly invited me to stay with her. And I was helping Ica tote some food into the rehearsal hall of Sunshine Place in Makati when I started hearing the one question that seemed to come out of everyone’s mouth when they saw me
“Uhm, who are you???”
This was inevitably followed by a scream of disbelief, laughter, and exclamations of “Mother Marie Eugenie!” and “Wow, look at your hair!”
The. Girls. Were. Wonderful.
It was like time hadn’t passed and yet, here we were, grown women with kids and grandkids. Old only in years. At heart, recycled teenagers!
The rehearsals for our dance performance were both exhilarating and nerve-wracking. After every rehearsal, groups of us would get together for pizza and pasta and the ubiquitous glass of sangria. And without fail, the locals would pull out their Senior Cards, firmly rebuff any attempts of us balikbayans to pay, and graciously say, “No. You’re balikbayans. You’ve already spent a lot to get here. This is our treat!” I was incredulous! And yet, by seemingly universal agreement, this was the line I heard every single time we went out for a meal.
Throughout the two weeks I was in Manila, I felt the full force of this downpour of kindness and generosity; and this wildly extravagant grace flooded my heart with awe and gratitude every time. My classmates! They’re so kind!!!
When Old Girls’ Day came, we donned our school uniforms (mine 2x bigger than before!) and attended the Mass officiated by Fr Tito Caluag. My best friend from High School, Susan Syjuco, and I slipped into the only pew that seemed to have space. It was reserved for AC Titanium graduates 1949.
Beyond the chapel, the Assumption bazaar oozed nostalgia, overflowing with all of our favorite goods from childhood: siopao, siomai, and Assumption tarts! I remembered how in Grade School, we’d swarm the chalet when the bell rang, and sprint towards the food stands, frantically waving our hands and thrusting our pesos under the noses of the staff selling these treats, yelling “Miss, Miss, Miss!!!” And how afterwards, we’d leave with satisfied grins, cradling our loot and hieing off to a place where we could scoff them with relish.
Later that day, I, together with all of the Golden Girls AC74, got all dolled up in sequined black tops and gold sablays, did our hair and make-up, helped each other fasten gold belts, necklaces, and bracelets, and waited nervously for our turn to go onstage. Would we remember our steps? Our blocking? Would we do our choreographers, Jo and Chito, proud?
This was the moment we’d all rehearsed and worked so hard for for months, and when it came, we gave it our all. We danced with all our hearts. We even remembered to smile and savor the moment! And, after the dance, along the corridors of Mother Rose Hall, each gem collective: the Silvers, Pearls, Jades, Rubies, Sapphires, Emeralds, Diamonds, and Blue Diamonds cheered and encouraged each other with warm and nourishing praise! “Ang galing galing naman ninyo!” “Wow, you guys are good! Great dance!” God, I whispered, this is like a foretaste of Heaven!
It was the bonding of all those weeks together that I’ll never forget: the rides in what we dubbed the Alabang School Bus; the laugh-out-loud conversations about the shared surprises of ageing (Talaga? Ikaw rin???), the wistful exchanges about Assumption rings we’d lost or relinquished to exes; and the reminiscences about former teachers (Remember when Barang flung open the heavy classroom door and boomed, “I smell the fumes of hatred!!!”)
We danced to and lustily sang the songs of the 70’s, the playlist of our hopes, dreams, and longings.
Among us were survivors of cancer, marriage break-ups, disappointments, and the deaths of loved ones. Yet here we all were – in a circle of shared humanity, still holding hands.
Of course, there were tears. Nobody, it seemed, could sing Handog and watch the screen with our fallen comrades without crying. These were our friends! Why weren’t they here with us anymore? How could they die so young?
Tatanda at lilipas rin ako
Ngunit mayroong awiting
Iiwanan sa inyong alaala
Dahil minsan tayo’y nagkasama
I thought about classmates who had died of sepsis, cancer, murder. And I wondered at how tenuous life is. Why am I still here when they are not? How long has each of us got? Who will be here at the next velada? Who won’t? What should I do with the time I’ve got left?
Before the final curtain came down on Old Girls’ Day 2024, I stood tall with representatives from each gem collective and sang, “All Hail to Our Beloved Assumption”. I was so proud of my school I could have burst out of my skin.
Like Fr Tito Caluag said, Assumption had molded us into women of faith, purpose, and service. Our education and our friendships were the incubator for the women we’d become. The friendships we make at school shape us.
When I returned to Assumption for the first time in 50 years, I remembered who “I” was. In over three decades of acculturating to white culture, I seemed to have forgotten. So, coming to this velada felt like a healing and a homecoming. I fell in love with my people and culture again and with the friends of my youth – with their guileless sweetness and authenticity, their boisterous exuberance, their easy surrender to laughter, their love for God, their generous kindness and hospitable hearts.
I felt so welcomed, so touched by their all-embracing spirit and their boundless generosity. I’d never conceived of anything so deeply touching as this.
“What we have once enjoyed deeply we can never lose”. – Helen Keller
That rousing symphony of friendship, fellowship, and joy that I basked in for two whole weeks felt like the golden sablay draped upon my shoulder as I danced. It glowed like a silken river of golden threads studded with sequins of laughter that caught the rays and reflected them back. It covered me all over with Light.
And, it reminded me that, as someone once said, “Old friends are echoes from the past, reminding us of the indelible footprints we’ve left on each other’s hearts.”