In the Garden of Eva

A dozen or so camera bugs and this curiosity seeker dropped in on former Sen. Eva Estrada Kalaw at her old family manse on Loyola (formerly Lepanto) street in Sampaloc, Manila, the heart of University Belt. She was all smiles, dressed casually in an all-peach attire complete with genuinely gold jewelry.

She spoke in a raspy voice that I couldn’t help asking if she used to smoke. “Yes, I was a chain smoker when I was a senator,” she said. “The sessions were so exciting that I couldn’t help but light up. At some point, I told myself, ‘Girl, you’ve gotta quit.’” She quit cold turkey.

Her hearing is sharp at age 92. I didn’t have to increase my voice’s volume for my questions to be heard. She spoke about how today’s senators can be divided into: good, puwede na and just in there for the prestige of being called “Senator.”

But she is happy with the performance records of the women senators, even Miriam Defensor Santiago. Of the latter, she said, “They call her loka, but she makes sense. She has never hidden the fact that she’s a little loka and claims that she got it from her mother.”

Sen. Kalaw is saddened that some members of the Upper House are not aware that a senator’s position is equal to that of the President. “During my time, we were keenly aware of that. We knew we were the checkpoint. If a President overreaches, we were there to call his attention.”

Of course, our parents’ and our own generations are aware of what an authoritarian did to his perceived enemies like Kalaw. She was one of the victims of the Plaza Miranda bombing in 1971. She suffered shrapnel wounds on her legs. But last Saturday, except for the black and white picture of her being borne by men out of the collapsed miting de avance stage in Quiapo, she walked with wings on her feet. She even boasted of how she entered Grade One at age four because she won a dancing contest in a provincial contest.

The Estrada house on Lepanto looks like it is caught between a vanished world that heritage conservationists are trying to save and high-rises to accommodate a growing population. Despite this, Eva Estrada Kalaw is unhurried and unfazed.

Photo by ANNA LEAH SARABIA