ESCUETA, NIKOJHON T.

BPE 3-1
QUIZ 2
1. B
2. A
3. B
4. A
5. B
6. D
7. C
8. B
9. A
10. C
11. B
12. A
13. B
14. A
15. A
 RIZAL’S TIMELINE & MY TIMELINE

RIZAL’S TIMELINE MY TIMELINE

1848 José Rizal’s mom, Teodora Morales 1997 my parents Mariecel Tinoso and Rolly
Alonso-Realonda y Quintos, and dad, Escueta, got married on April 6.
Francisco Rizal-Mercado y Alejandra, marry
on June 28th.

1861 On June 19th José Rizal is born to 1998 on July 10th I Nikojhon Escueta born as
become the seventh child born to his the eldest son of my parents.
parents. Three days later Rizal was christened
with the name Jose Protasio Rizal-Mercado y
AlonsoRealonda.

1870 José begins school under the instruction 2004-2005 I enter kindergarten at San Rafael
of Justiniano Aquin Cruz at just nine years of elementary school. 2011-2012 I Graduated at
age. elementary.

1871 José continues his education under the 2012-2013 I enter junior high school. 2015-
instruction of Lucas Padua. 2016 I graduated in junior high school. 2016-
2017 I enter senior high school. 2017- 2018 I
graduated in senior high school.

1872 Rizal is examined by those in charge of 2018-2019 I enrolled in Tarlac State

college entrance to St. Tomas University in University.
Manila; he enters the school system as a
scholar.

1875 Rizal enters the Ateneo as a boarder at 2020-2021 currently I am in 3rd year collage
just 14 years of age. 1876 At the age of 15, studying Bachelor of Physical Education.
Rizal receives a Bachelor of Arts Degree from
the Ateneo de Manila. He not only receives
this degree, but receives it with the highest
honors possible.

1877 In June José begins to go to school at St. 2021-2022 I expect to graduate in my course
Tomas University in Manila where he studies and I will going to pass the board exam.
philosophy.
 REACTION PAPER

‘’Perchance, an Encounter with Mabini de la Maleza (Mabini of the Underbrush)’’

Preparing my property accountabilities for my incoming retirement from active service, a

missing item – and I cannot understand why it was added among my responsibilities – is a bust
of President Emilio Aguinaldo. This was fabricated in 2004 by a sculptor whose name I already
forgot, when President Aguinaldo was conferred a posthumous doctorate, honoris causa, in
distinction of being the President of the Universidad Literaria de Filipinas – among the first
republican universities of the continent - that materialized at the site of the current Tarlac State
University and him being acknowledged as the honorary first president of TSU.
With the bust left at the conferment’s site for some time, subsequent renovations and
relocations, further complicated by scholarships and fellowships in other countries and
institutions where I had to be absent at my home university for some time, have made it
untraceable at the moment.
I am continually asking a utility man to help me locate Aguinaldo’s bust and he merely scratches
his head every time I do so, as he believes it was among those condemned items kept in
storages of other campuses and it cannot really be traced anymore.
Before the 2020 Christmas Break, I asked again the same personnel and he suddenly
remembered that there is an abandoned Mabini bust in one of the storage areas. “But for sure,
it’s a different one,“ he added. Quipping to myself that I’m the expert historian here, I told him
that it’s the one I’m looking for.
Leading me to it in an abandoned storage area, lo, indeed it was a Mabini. “I know who is
Mabini, and who is Aguinaldo, sir” he told me, and I the historian, the NHCP commissioner and
a PHD & Professor in history could only laugh at myself.
And in front of the bust, for some time, I was speechless. It was a filthy Mabini, sullied and
polluted by the ravages of time and environment. But, notwithstanding, it is one of the most
resplendent sculpture pieces I have seen in a long time.
“In many years I was assigned here, this bust was merely left in this place and I am sure many
gallivanting students made fun of it,” he told me of the patches of green while I was examining
the bust. In classical etching was the name APOLINARIO MABINI (thus the personnel was so
certain). And then, an etching on its right side made my heart palpitate: the signature
‘ATCaedo’.
My immediate reaction was to have the bust transferred to our Museo-Archivo Tarlaqueño for
safe- keeping and for restoration; immediately asking permission from the campus director that
I am taking responsibility for it. I immediately got in contacts with colleagues who can restore
and make up the bust and bring back its old glory.
Then I ‘googled’ about Anastacio T. Caedo, the famous sculptor who duplicated the feat of his
teacher (Guillermo Tolentino), finding out that he was responsible for the panoramic mural at
the Capas Death March Memorial and Shrine at Malutung Gabun area along the Capas-Bamban
Road. I had an inkling that the abandoned Mabini could be from the defunct Tarlac Historical
Society (THS) and the Mabini bust could have been done when Caedo was doing the gargantuan
memorial.
From the papers of the late Dr. Leonardo Guevarra of THS, I was able to find out just a couple of
days ago that it was not so. In a letter of appeal of 9 August 1965, the Tarlac Chapter
Commander of the Knights of Rizal, the said Dr. Guevarra, was appealing to his fellow UP
Alumni to help in the construction of a life-size statue of Mabini to adorn the UP Tarlac Campus
set to open that month. He mentioned in that appeal that there is already an available Mabini
bust that was donated by then UP President Carlos P. Romulo, a Tarlaqueño. Thus, the majestic
Mabini bust at the B. Gonzalez Hall of UP Diliman, also done by Caedo in 1965, is the long lost
rich brother of the ‘Mabini’ recently encountered.
Unfortunately, UP Tarlac, said to be a brainchild of then Governor Ninoy Aquino, was dissolved
during the Martial Law period for obvious reasons. Some of its holdings, including the Mabini
bust, could have been turned over to the care of the Tarlac Historical Society. In turn, its
members could have negotiated with then Tarlac College of Technology, a forerunner of the
present TSU, for its safekeeping. Hopefully, a real answer is in the offing.
Akin to this, a press release of 16 April 1971 from the Tarlac Historical Society and the
Department of Public Works made mention that though Anastacio Caedo was contracted for
the mural at the Capas Death March Memroail and Shrine, it was not consummated. The mural
was actually completed by a certain Eduardo P. Suizo.
But why Mabini and Tarlac? When Tarlac was made capital by Aguinaldo for his fledgling
republic, Mabini was actually invited by the former to be the Chief Justice of his Supreme Court.
It should be noted that Mabini was once the trusted adviser of President Aguinaldo, the “Brain
of the Revolution” who shaped the course of the First Philippine Republic. In the first ever
Aguinaldo Cabinet, he served as the Prime Minister and the Secretary of Foreign Affairs. Yet, he
resigned this important position on 6 May 1899, when the capital was then in Cabanatuan. And
it was because of a malignant factionalism in the Aguinaldo government.
Three days earlier, on May 3, the revolutionary congress was suddenly reconvened in San
Isidro, Nueva Ecija; wherein some neophytes were appointed (like that in Tarlac) in place of
those who could not attend the sessions so that the government could adopt a new posture on
the costly and devastating war with the Americans. The United States presented its offers of
autonomy and some of the revolutionary leaders of Aguinaldo were interested. But Mabini
could not be convinced; and he found his staunch supporters in the likes of the inimical
Generals Antonio Luna and Francisco Macabulos who were only for an uncompromising
independence for the country (Long Live Independence! May autonomy die.) Nevertheless, an
ingenious machination by the advocates of Autonomia succeeded, and the Mabini Cabinet fell.
In the thermal springs of Baluñgao, near Rosales, Pangasinan, Mabini found a sanctuary for his
failing health and embittered emotions. Yet, it was not enough distance to let him be an outcast
Aguinaldo’s Republic , especially with the reconvening of the Tarlac Revolutionary Congress of
14 July 1899.
Through the machinery of La Independencia (the revolutionary herald founded by General Luna
and which was then transferred in Bautista, Pangasinan; after his assassination, Rafael Palma
replaced him as Editor-in-Chief), Mabini wrote in his provocative essay, Algo para Congreso:
“The news that Congress as a National Assembly had resumed its functions at the capital of
Tarlac caused us great surprise. Now that by the form of its constitution it cannot embody
genuine popular representation, as in view of the war the practice of suffrage is rendered
impossible, it should at least show in its resolutions that it is imbued with the popular
sentiment and acquainted with the necessities created by the present state of affairs ...”
Mabini’s concerns were about the contigencias de la lucha, the contingencies of the struggle;
rather than the pro-forma governmental structures, like in a copied but dysfunctional
constitution. “No revolutionary people should adopt a perfect Constitution, but should confine
themselves to a declaration of principles upon which they intend to complete their work,” he
said, since “the revolution does not constitute, it prepares.” He ardently believed that “(a)
revolutionist who knows only how to copy and has no initiative, does not deserve the name of
such.” And that “la rutina es la antitesis de la revolucion!, “ routine being the antithesis of the
revolution.
And Aguinaldo, who wanted to show his honorable posture to the world by still convening the
Tarlac Congress rather than to concentrate on the necessities of the moment, had a quick
retort. “Having seen the article “Something for Congress” published in the newspaper La
Independencia for the 24th instant, and signed by El Paralitico...” as he wrote in Tarlac on 21
July 1899, he suggested for the censure of his “prejudicial” writings since the writer (Mabini)
had the wrong notion that “the war we are waging is not in accordance with the will of the
Filipino people, but with that of a party ...”.
If it would have been any consolation, however, it should be noted that the half-baked Tarlac
Congress did its functions well in spite of the limitations, until the subsequent collapse of the
First Philippine Republic. It was indeed a lesson on contingencies lived; even its strongest critic,
Mabini, must have felt the sincerity of the Congress when he acceded to its request to be the
Chief Justice of the Supreme Court on 23 August 1899. Riding in a hammock brought by his four
brothers, he arrived in Tarlac and settled at the house of Don Sebastian Espiritu, along then
Calle Real. A neighbor, Don Ponciano Bundalian, then the acting Municipal Presidente of Tarlac,
even became the sublime paralytic’s close friend. Thereon, the people of Tarlac had renamed
the street ‘Mabini’, to commemorate the hero’s short stay in their town.
It was a short stay and it was sad that Aguinaldo had to listen again to his advisers (who would
only ally themselves with the Americans later on) and disapprove of the appointment of
Mabini. The latter had to go back to the thermal springs of Baluñgao, only to be captured by the
Americans in Cuyapo, Nueva Ecija on 10 December 1899; exactly a month when the
Revolutionary Congress in Tarlac folded up.
At this time, I have misgivings if I had the right to salvage the filthy Mabini, after recalling the
depth of his ruminations for his Fatherland during his painful lifetime. To be restored, made-up,
and exhibited once again as a museum-piece, knowing he questioned Aguinaldo’s fancies of a
Republic on display but in reality dysfunctional? Or for it to remain undisturbed like
underbrush- for almost half a century now, in my calculation - attuned and in solidarity with the
pristine backdrop of other weeds, dry twigs, and mosses, since he preferred to gather his
thoughts by the thermal springs of Baluñgao – and never to compromise with the colonizers?
I remember a favorite writer, Marguerite Yourcenar, and her monumental essay, “That Mighty
Sculptor, Time,” where she states: ``On the day when a statue is finished, its life, in a certain
sense, begins … and, as this life unfolds and is publicly received, the statue will bit by bit return .
. . to the state of unformed mineral mass out of which its sculptor had taken it.”
Thus, the green patches on Mabini’s bust were not effects of vandalism, as that personnel
thought so. They might be the prized patina – or the effect of erosion, or rather, of commune,
by the sculpture with nature and its whimsical seasons. Thus, adds Yourcenar of this: ”…of
those shipwrecked bronzes, fished up in good condition like a drowned man revived in time,
have acquired from their subaqueous sojourn nothing more than a beautiful greenish patina
--- .”
Thus, as a compromise, shouldn’t it be better that the bust will remain in this state?
Complementing the rich, glorious Mabini of UP in the capital, there is this Mabini de la Maleza,
Mabini of the Underbrush.
And what about the lost bust of Aguinaldo, Mabini being his confidante and later harsh critic in
our history? Well, who knows, paraphrasing Percy Bysshe Shelley’s Ode to the West Wind:
“If Mabini comes, can Aguinaldo be far behind?”
Photo 1 ‘Mabini de la Maleza’, as I am calling it, the bust done by ATCaedo (presumably 1965)
when ‘discovered’ in December 2020. LLDizon
Photo2 The Mabini bust also done by ATCaedo in 1965, presently at the B.Gonzalez Hall,
University of the Philippines, Diliman. ctto
Photo 3 The right side of the Mabini de la Maleza, bearing the signature ‘ATCaedo’.
Lino L. Dizon, PhD
Commissioner, National Historical Commission of the Philippines
Head, Center for Tarlaqueño Studies, Tarlac State University

REACTION:

Apolinario Mabini was one of the foremost of the Philippine revolutionary heroes. He was the
"brains" of the revolution. Crippled as a young man by polio, he realized that his physical
limitations not only limited his personal life but the struggle his beloved homeland was
undergoing to become a sovereign republic. He would also find his high ideals wounded by
persons he sought to serve and by the cruelties caused by warfare. Mabini, like José Rizal, was a
true Filipino nationalist and a devoted patriot. Fate would place his life as that of a mediator
between the people will and the decisions of the first leadership of the Philippines. His life,
despite some flaws, was selfless and motivated by high ideals. He would state, "I have no other
balm to sweeten the bitterness of a harsh and melancholy life than the satisfaction given by the
conviction of having always done what I believed to be my duty. God grant that I can say the
same at the hour of my death." (from La Revolución Filipina, e Introductory Manifesto)