Collecting as stewardship
WHEN people marvel at my modest Filipiniana collection, I advise them that it is never too late to start. One need not rob a bank to collect things. As a boy, I started with things around me, from leaves in our garden to shells on a beach. Trash to someone was a treasure for me. I emptied my piggy bank once, to arrange coins by denomination, date, and design. Doing so taught me about Melecio Figueroa, who drew the sensuous Filipinas with a flimsy flowing dress, striking an anvil with a hammer. In the background was Mayon, with a whiff of smoke similar to that emitted by smokers in the family. In the 1970s Figueroa’s prewar designs were slowly replaced by “modern” coins with heroes on them: from Lapu-Lapu on a small, square aluminum coin that could float on water, to Tandang Sora on a coin with scalloped edges resembling a flower, from Balagtas on a thin coin similar to the US dime, to Rizal on the biggest, heaviest of coins.
Postage stamps, both foreign and Philippine, were visual aids to geography, history, art, flora, fauna, and way more than current events. As a martial law baby, I was fed idealized images of Ferdinand and Imelda that conditioned me to associate them with the mythical “Malakas” and “Maganda.” Collecting in my childhood instilled habits of mind that made me create a sense of order on a small set of objects. I ordered my universe before I learned of marvels beyond me.
Nobody told me nor taught me what to collect. The incentive came later when I collected bottlecaps long before Pepsi broke its promise to pay millions to those who held bottle caps that had “349” on them. Long before “349,” I collected bottle caps with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in the hopes of winning an all-expense paid trip to Disneyland. In those days, I had to outsmart the adults at children’s parties because they fought over the refreshments, opening every bottle of cola they never drank. All they wanted were the bottle caps, in search of the winning crown, the hardest to find was “Sneezy.”
After half a century, I graduated from coins and bottle caps to BenCabs and Amorsolos. As a college student on an allowance, I bought the best that I could afford. I started my Filipiniana collection in the 1980s, stocking up from the National Book Store Quezon Avenue bargain bins, where I completed my Nick Joaquin essay collection. Each volume of reportage by Quijano de Manila cost P1! My “Filipiniana Book Guild” collection began with the purchase at Bookmark Escolta of “First Voyage Around the World” an English translation of Antonio Pigafetta’s account of the Magellan expedition for P10. If you can find stray volumes today, you will fork out between P3,000 to P5,000, depending on the condition.
After school, I did my reading and homework in one of the many rooms that made up the maze known as the Heritage Art Center on Lantana St., Cubao. While its main line of business was art, there was something for every budget: from banana cue that I could afford to an Amorsolo or Luna for P25,000 that taught me I could never have everything I want. There were many used books to be had, none of them priced. When I inquired, Mario Alcantara simply said, “Pay me what you think is fair.” That’s how I got hooked. Books arrived by the sack, in the afternoons, brought in by “mambubulok,” pushing “kariton,” groaning with all sorts of junk from toilet seats to home decor. Nobody paid any attention to me as I opened the sacks of scrap paper bought by the kilo. I chose the books I liked, dusted them and when I presented my loot to Mr. Alcantara for pricing, he always said the same thing, “pay me what you think is fair.”
One day, I heard that the library of the diplomat Leon Ma. Guererro had been brought to Heritage for sale. A group project kept me in school longer than usual and when I arrived, the Central Bank governor was on his way out with a smile similar to that of a cat that had caught a rat. I knew I had to content myself with the remainder, which included an envelope with 30 issues of the revolutionary paper, La Independencia, edited by Antonio Luna selling for P100 each. I could not afford it, but E. Aguilar Cruz stepped in, bought a lot, and said, “When I am done reading these, you can have them for the price I paid. Pay when able.”
Looking back on almost half a century of collecting, I realize now that my journey has seen the happy intersection of skill and opportunity. Didn’t Napoleon quip that “ability is nothing without opportunity”? Many of the great finds and bargains that came my way were ignored by others who did not appreciate their true value. From books that fueled my writing, I picked up odds and ends during my research: old photos, letters, the first edition of El Filibusterismo, a copy of the Malolos Constitution, a silver quill awarded to Emilio Jacinto as a prize for poetry, even Apolinario Mabini’s hair. In time, I saw collecting as stewardship, I do not own but preserve a collection to be passed on to the next steward who will preserve it for a future generation. ————Comments are welcome at [email protected]
