‘… I hope — wherever he is — he has seen how I’ve tried to make up for my hardheadedness and is satisfied.’
TWO days ago, I took a trip down memory lane. I asked UP Manila Chancellor Dr. Michael Tee if I could pay him a courtesy call and he asked me to see him at 1 p.m.
So I took an early lunch at Cafe Adriatico then decided to troop over to the UP College of Medicine (UPCM) on Herran St. a bit earlier so I could drop in on my father’s old office.
My father was a professor of Physiology at UPCM from 1962 (the year I was born) to 1994 (the year after my mother passed away). Throughout those 32 years of teaching, hundreds and hundreds of students worked through his syllabus, which he would give his students at the start of the semester so they could complete the course at their own pace, with regular exams to eat their progress. From the rank of instructor, he reached the rank of professor (with some Roman numeral signifying his seniority) but I know he was equally proud of the fact that he became chair of the Department of Physiology in the 1980s, following the footsteps of his colleagues and classmates Drs Augusto Litonjua and Zenaida Bagabaldo.
His office was at the farthest right end of the second floor of the Salcedo Hall which houses the Biochemistry department on the ground floor. That building had three floors serviced by an old Otis elevator that I never rode because it took forever and often got stuck between floors. I remember a wall where you could find the portraits of past department chairpersons and I used to stare at them whenever I’d drop in for a visit.
My father never really pressured me to follow in his footsteps perhaps because my two brothers did, but yes at least twice he asked me whether I was interested. The first time was when I was in high school and very quickly, I said no, reasoning that “doctors are poor.” He calmly explained that I was wrong because his classmates who had good practices were not poor but since he chose to teach, he had to survive on an academic’s paycheck. That didn’t move me.
The second and last time he asked was when I was in the first year of my pre-law, saying that my general education could still be credited to a pre-med course. I still said no and he never asked again. He would just rib me whenever the medical board results would come out because for years and years the UPCM not only had a 100% passing rate, the topnotcher was always a UPCM grad. The same couldn’t be said of UP Law.
As I’ve grown old, I have grudgingly come to accept that my father was right. I should have taken up medicine. Perhaps I would have ended up a professor like him, living a simple life on an academician’s paycheck, but taking supreme satisfaction from the ranks of students who eventually graduate to become some of the best medical practitioners here and abroad. (Then again maybe not ha-ha). Or yes, maybe I would have chosen to practice and teach at the same time, getting the best of both worlds; in either case, I think it would have been a fulfilling life — medicine being such a noble profession.
But Fate has her ways, and so since I chose a different path, I’ve had to find ways to somehow contribute to his field and his beloved college and campus. And I’ve been fortunate as I’ve had employers (Coca-Cola and the Zamoras of Nickel Asia) that listened when I suggested we devote some support to PGH (Coca-Cola donated $1 million during the hospital centennial in 2007) and to the National Institutes of Health (a recipient of P50 million from Nickel Asia this year).
Today marks my father’s 8th death anniversary (and my 62nd birthday). While I didn’t listen to him (I rarely did ha-ha) I hope — wherever he is — he has seen how I’ve tried to make up for my hardheadedness and is satisfied.
