By Raoul Suarez
The little sari-sari store opens before the sun rises and closes after it sets. It has been that way for so many years now. No signage. Nothing that states what the name of the store is. You do not get to see logos of soda, beer, or telecommunication companies. No. It had none of that. It was just a plain wooden shack situated right beside the old waiting shed. It had a small square window where you can hand in your money and get your goods. Inside the store, there were transparent mayonnaise jars loaded with candy. Cigarettes. Katol. “Chisnaks” housed inside a transparent plastic bag dangling and being held up by a wire. A lighter is attached to a string and tied to the window. Sardines. Noodles. Plastic toys. Pens. Paper. A small refrigerator that housed all sorts of soda. Typical. Old school. A nice old lady named Luna owned it. People would call her Tia Uning.
She was a stout old lady with curly hair who always wore a skirt and a t-shirt. She wasn’t much of a talker. She did not spend her time listening to gossip. Her life revolved around her little store. She also liked betting in the numbers game. Sometimes she won some money. Most of the time, she lost. She would read the papers and listen to the news. She did not have a lot of friends in the barrio. Not a lot of people talked to her. The exchanges she had with the residents were always very transactional. No small talk. Just pure business.
She wasn’t originally from the barrio. She was not a “tumandok.” That’s what people would tell me. Her clan used to live in a faraway town and they eventually decided to move to the city a couple of decades after the Japanese occupation was over. She was an only child. She had two years left in elementary and graduated from one of the schools in the city when they moved here. Before she was done with high school, her parents met an accident and that left her orphaned at an early age. She had to live with some of her relatives who also moved to the barrio. This did not shake her but it changed her so much. Some wounds cut us so deep that it takes a long while to heal. And when it heals, it leaves very bad scars. She continued to live on. She was dauntless. She was determined. She earned a living by selling fish in the morning and puto in the afternoon. She was also earning extras as a “kubrador.” She knew a lot of things about the numbers game. Daily double. That’s what they used to call it. She wanted to get a college degree but she was not able to. She lived a hard life and married at an early age.
She got married to a fisherman five years older than her. Gregorio. A tall and sturdy man with sun-kissed skin who also shared her determination to succeed and do better in this life. They toiled together and eventually had enough money to buy themselves a tiny house and start a small business. They decided to run a sari-sari store and had a small room that they rented out so they can earn extras on the side. The room was small but it can cater to two people. They had one lone boarder, a bachelor named Val, and he paid double so he could have the place all for himself. He lived with them for decades and they treated him like family.
Tia Uning and Tio Gorio, they were gifted with four children. All girls. Her husband, died before she gave birth to their youngest and she was left to fend for herself. She raised her children alone. With diligence and hard work, and a little racketeering, she was able to send them to good colleges. They all finished their degrees and became professionals. They lived a very simple life. Low-key. Down to earth. Humble.
Life was becoming a little easy this time. After her eldest child finished her degree, she started working and helping her mother out with her finances. Tia Uning used the money she was able to save from the rackets and by selling encyclopedias on the side to buy the vacant lot behind their house so they can expand. A small boarding house was built so she can earn passive income. Six rooms to be exact. Each with two double-deck beds. Not too spacious. Not too cramped up either. Just enough for four people to coexist.
The store remained the same. No changes were made to it. The setup was the same. Business wasn’t as good as it used to be. It did not have a lot of customers. Not like the old days. Parents would sternly warn their children to avoid the store and tell them to buy goods somewhere else. People who grew up, got married, had kids, and lived in the neighborhood all their lives. People from the barrio. They forbade their children to even come near her store. Even during the day. It has been an open secret. Tia Uning. That nice old lady. She was rumored to be an aswang. A tiktik. A kling-kling as some others would call it. A gabunan. And people would avoid her. They would not look into her eyes for fear that she might come for them at night. Those with infants and small children had garlic and other repellants placed on their doors and windows. She was a threat. A menace. Most of us believed it. Some of us did not. Others were not afraid and they continued to be nice to her. Because they believe that aswangs do not plague their own neighborhood. They are better than thieves and drug pushers. They shy away from their own barrio and hunt somewhere else. That’s what they say. That’s what some of the others believed.
Rumor has it that Tia Uning was turned. “Nayanggaw.” That was the word for it. But nobody had proof. There were stories that a man from a farming town in Capiz lived with them and rented the room way back when her boarding house can only cater to two people. People say that he was the reason behind all of it. They said the man was an aswang trying to escape persecution. But we always saw him during the daytime. He sold encyclopedias for a living and helped Tia Uning earn extras by teaching her and her children how to market these goods. He was nice to the children in the neighborhood. He went to church on Sundays. Then he eventually disappeared. And with his disappearance came the rumors. With the expansion of the boarding house came envy and hate. Tia Uning. She is an aswang. A tiktik. A kling-kling. A gabunan. There were witness accounts. Some people say that they saw her with her eyes red, hairs standing, bent over in one of the dark alleys in the barrio, salivating and making gruesome noises. But nobody dared to confront her about it or even backed the claim. There were other witness accounts. Another side of the coin. Some people would tell stories about a black pig with long hind legs. Late at night on a full moon, it was seen walking in her backyard wearing the same clothes she would wear and it disappeared during the daytime. Most people believed it. Some of us did not. She was judged. Branded. Labeled. Shunned. Avoided. And the gossip spread like wildfire. But through it all, her store still opened before the sun was up and closed after it sets.
She got older. She became sickly. Nobody knew what it was that caused her suffering. Nobody asked. Nobody cared. Nobody paid her a visit. She was just there. Bed-ridden. Dying. Withering away. Until one day when her youngest daughter came home, she decided to finally give up the ghost and meet her creator. People in the barrio, they breathed a sigh of relief. Tia Uning is gone. The menace. The aswang. The tiktik. The kling-kiling. The gabunan. She already passed away. And her curse, she passed it on to her youngest daughter. The young girl had become her replacement. The new aswang. Her successor. That was what most people assumed. And maybe they were wrong to judge her. This old lady who worked hard and toiled all her life to make a living; she became the stuff of nightmares that made children stay inside their houses. The “kucho-kuchos” in the barrio were all but unfounded. She was feared and isolated. Feared and put into isolation by people who did not even take the time to get to know her better. And the fear of the unknown can be a bad thing. People will always be afraid of things that they can’t explain.
It was a very solemn wake. Only family members, a few friends, the Barangay Captain and some Barangay Officials, and people who did not believe the rumors came and paid their respects.. Her daughters, they buried their mother. In grief. And maybe in disbelief that people would treat her and talk about her like that. But they did not say a word. They did not hate. They just lived on. They continued to honor her memory and what she has done for them. A few weeks after her burial, they put most of the property for rent and started living elsewhere. They visit the barrio once in a while.
The little sari-sari store still opens before the sun rises and closes after it sets. It has been that way for a few years now. No signage. Nothing that states what the name of the store is. Business was good. It was picking up. A nice old lady named Luna used to own it.
