Tuesday 26 March 2013

AN ORDINARY FARM BOY

by Earlie Doriman 
Life in the countryside. That’s what I yearn to have again. Simple. Straigthforward. Beautiful. Abundant. Most of the delightful memories of my childhood stayed intense and pulsating. More than three decades now but I could still smell our farm. I could still hear the rustling leaves while trees are dancing as the wind blows their natural serenades. The mooing cows and carabaos, and chickens dashing around the backyard. I could not ignore the birds chirping their happiness. And as the sun slowly fades from the heavens, the serenity of life becomes apparent on every living organism, except for diverse and eerie-sounding insects, that weave the nights with bits of unruffled creepiness.
I was a ‘farm boy’ at a very young age of five. I was like my Tatay’s (dad’s) buddy at the farm. I regularly went with him to a piece of land that we looked after, some kilometers away from our home. Everyday, around four in the morning, my Tatay never failed to wake me up, made me a hot drink ( usually a home made coffee with condensed milk plus a dish of locally made sweet square biscuit). And as he sand his machete, I would gather small rounded stones from the front yard, put them in my net bag, and set on the slingshot round my neck before we kicked off to the farm.
Side by side, we would walk silently into the biting cold of daybreak, me, occasionally singing along novelty songs ( you should not wonder why Max Surban and Yoyoy Villame were so popular to me) from the radio he held on one hand and holding me with the other. After less than an hour and with few other farmers we greeted along the way, the treasured farm would welcome us with wide embrace and warm gratitude. The chickens anxiously waited for their morning grains and as my dad gave them their food, I would go and get the goats from their pen and freed them at the nearby grassland, then the cows, and the ‘carabao’. Afterward, my dad and I were already on foot at the rice paddies. It’s a seasonal cycle at the farm, we grew and harvested golden grains twice a year, a hundred sacks, sometimes more when the harvest was generous. We used to harvest coconuts too.
It was an enjoyable sight during planting season, the farm was like a massive empty lake of mud and as people put the rice seedlings into the earth, it would slowly transform the land to a green territory of life and health, into an unbelievable map of rice field. You could get overwhelmed by the glorious-looking plots of food and abundance and in the next five months, my life at the farm journeyed blissfully with it. 
photo courtesy: dipity.com
Then came the harvest time, where people were more busy and alive. Children ran around the paddies, catching dragonflies, shouting at the thrill of finding some bird’s nest, laughing, and playing self-made kites. As the sound of the ‘rice harvest machine’ we called ‘TRACER ripped all other noises around, the once golden rice field became desolate and unwanted. However, one could glimpse that the barren-looking rice field promised another season of life in the following weeks to come. One season came and went.
 Life was wonderful in the countryside. Simple. Laid back. Uncomplicated. We grew our own vegetables, we have our own animals, we have our own fruit plants. Everything was available except electricity. I grew up with conventional oil burner to light the night. We used clay oven to cook our food. My brothers and I used to gather fire woods after school and collected dead coconut leaves to make torch. No electricity. No television, only battery operated transistor radio to hear our late night radio drama, and few radio quiz shows, and of course the old familiar songs on Saturdays and Sundays from our crank-vintage phonograph or turntable. My mum was a passionate Nora Aunor and Imelda Papin fanatic, so she had collections of their songs in long play vinyl disc. She played them once in awhile.
I started my grade school with no available electricity. The nearest town to get the recent connection from a local power station was a distant 20 kilometers which nowhere near at all. My siblings and I studied our lessons with an ‘oil lamp’ at the center while we silently read books and answered homework. No electricity, no television, only the presence of our own selves as we shared jokes at night before we went to sleep. 
I surely love to experience that simplicity again. Where nature knows my emotion and everything around is a consoling piece of blessing. I surely love my children to experience with me the beautiful childhood in the farm. So they would know how the trees are breathing and to understand that there is larger life in the humble countryside.

32 comments:

  1. I really can imagine you with your dad walking together going to the farm while reading your post. Love how simple life is before compared today. Great write up!

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    1. Hi Ronleyba,

      Those were the days, so fond to remember and so inspiring to tell. Life is different in the big city, it is even more different living abroad. I only dream the countryside scenes now, but still hopeful that day I could get the chance to relive its wonder.

      Thanks for reading.

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  2. To think, my friend was just telling her story of walking 2 hours just to go to school... and am amazed by it! Then this!!!! My, it was a real simple life!!! Scenes I've only seen in the movies!.. yet real!

    Guess we grew up in different worlds.. love your world too!!!.. beautiful, peaceful, full of life!

    Great post!

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    1. Thanks Gemma for dropping a note. I hope I was able to let you see my childhood world. It was indeed full of life, fun, and love.

      Thanks as well for appreciating this post.

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  3. I remember the days when we used to visit our "lola", their house is made of pawid and sawali. They don't have electricity and next day upon waking up, we'll have our nose picked and cleaned 'coz it was blackened by fumes from the "gasera". It will still be nice going back to simplicity amidst new technologies that we are enjoying nowadays.

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    1. Hehehehe..funny to mention the black soot, but it is true. That adds to the fun of an old countryside life.

      Yes, technology has eaten up all the simplicity of life, but it is cool as well to get this modern lifestyle, although once in a while we hope to retain the laid back living and the natural activities.

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  4. Nice :) you have great writing style.
    We have a farm and I cannot also forget the wonderful experience I had those days :)) The fresh air and the green surrounding :)

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    1. Thank you Em, I appreciate that.

      I know we all have unique share of a beautiful childhood and you have, i'm sure, experienced what it's like to be sitting along the hills overlooking the wide span of lowlands where people were busy doing farm works.

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  5. My parents always sends me and my sibs to the province every summer. I never really understood them then. But looking back now, I love how life was so simple there. The laid back life is so relaxing away from the hustle and bustle in the city.

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    1. I agree MissGennD, it is so relaxing and so refreshing to be surrounded with tall trees of massive branches, away from the high rise buildings and polluted air in the city.

      Thanks for your comments

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  6. wow!! i do miss the province now!! singapore is too concrete though i enjoyed here a lot but then growing up in the province and how simple life was before is really amazing! xx

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    1. Glad you still recall and miss the beautiful life in the province.. It is likewise grateful to reminisce the traces of our childhood and family.

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  7. you have very beautiful imagery, sir earl.
    i've never stayed in a farm for a long time, but i'm very welcome to the idea of staying in for a while. if there's one thing that i'm really anticipating when i go to a farm, it's the abundance of greenery everywhere :)

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    1. Thank you Athena,well appreciated.
      Yes, we still have ample of opportunities to try the life in the farm, in many parts of Europe, weekend farm getaways are flourishing, but not the most conventional method though..i think the new generation would find it so difficult to survive without electricity.
      But you can always try...

      Thanks for reading

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  8. I cant agree more. Such a very inspirational story. I grew up in an island province and I can relate to your story. I am missing the provincial life. Kaya pagumuuwi ako sa Catanduanes, wala akong pakialam kung iitim ako basta maliligo ako sa dagat, magpapainit ako sa bukid at lahat gagawin ko kahit sabihin pa nilang napakaprobinsyano ko. hahaha. Proud promdi to.

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    1. Pareho tayo..kapag nagbakasyon kami, i really see to it to walk the same roads i walked with my Tatay before, sit on the hills, climbed my favourite lanzones, and shout at the top of my lungs...just to burst out the longing of the farm.

      That's what i look forward next year.

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  9. ako din... naalala ko tuloy yung samahan naming maglolo yung naliligo sa ilog or umaakyat ng bundok.. ngayon di na... :(

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    1. Uu nga..ang sarap maligo sa ilog pagka galing sa laro...akyat sa bundok at minsan namimitas ng bayabas na di naman amin...hehehe.

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  10. You are not alone on yearning to be back living in the countryside. I am stuck in the city but always dream of one day going back for good. Love your account of harvest time. I was my lolo's princess, a bit bossy over my country cousins who are blessed with kind, warm hearts; let me get away with 'maldita' moments ;) How charming of your Tatay to give you hot drink and biscuit so early in the morning. Are we all ever going back to those simpler times? Are we? Are we? You've just poked the country girl in me into nostalgia.

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  11. Thanks for dropping by,

    Kidding aside Hazel, I can see what you are like when you were with your country cousins..you dictate a lot, you ask a lot, you were always right, and they gave you everything you wanted, the best mango, the best guava, the best fruits, the biggest share and all...Hehehehe...because we have cousins too who used to visit us during summer and they were just like you..But we didn't find it annoying..we were in fact happier when they liked what we gave them.
    We enjoyed their presence honestly.

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  12. it is indeed a peaceful life in the countryside. Time is slower and the view prettier.

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    1. It's different, the peaceful nights are different, the warm neighbours are different, the community spirit is different, and these differences are all that makes life in the countryside relaxing and homely.

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  13. I, too, want to have a simple life in the countryside BUT, I can't live without electricity and water so perhaps I can find a place where it's a given.

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    1. Fresh water is healthy..well, not all places are endowed with sources of spring...i understand, because water is too important...we used to have a very good spring water near our farm..i hope it is still alive.

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  14. that's also the life i always wanted to have... simple lang, sa bukid. but i also wanted my children to have a good life and education first. them before me... so city life na muna... nakikipagsapalaran. thanks for this. Yahweh bless.

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    1. I understand what you mean, ganun kami eh..kaya we're working so hard to save and give our children a much better life ahead..but going back to the countryside later in life is a retirement dream....peaceful and healthy...at random opportunities, pinupuntahan ko talaga ang aming bukirin at sinasariwa ang buhay.hehehe

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  15. wow, i love reading this one. i'm like reading a novel, you should try writing a book or an ebook.

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    1. Thanks a lot Germz. what a compliment I get here and it means so massively. It's just one of those nostalgia that inspired to write memories of the past. They are so amazing to relive everyday..they keep me going..they keep us going..

      Thanks again.

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  16. I never experienced this...
    living in the farm. I was born in Manila
    as my parents were being brought to life
    not in the province as well so I had no memories of
    countryside. I wish I had.

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  17. Its so much better to live in a simple life by countryside than in the fast-paced city like Manila. My dad has already lived this dream of a simple life after quitting his high-paying job just to be happy. I may do that but not in the next 20-30 years probably (save mode). ^_^

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  18. i can relate in some way. my parents both were from the province in bicol and live on a farm. but both of them really didn't find farming as their way of life so both moved in the city. but now we are often back in the province and love the simple, laid back lifestyles a good rest from the hustle and bustle of the city living!

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  19. Nostalgic! OMG, I remember the first and (last time) I was in our farm. That summer spent in the countryside was amazing! I remember chasing geeze, pigs and our guard dogs. Actually, I've been trying to write about my most memorable summer experience in the bukid and I consider this post an inspiration to write well about how beautiful it is to live a simple life in the country side. :)

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