MSU: WHY THERE?

 

“MSU sees exodus of students after deadly bomb attack” - Rappler

Why was MSU bombed?

Why was MSU put up in Muslim land?

Why do students go to MSU?

The trio above could be among the many questions that could come to anyone’s mind after reading the headline.

The first question could be based on the cold hard fact that amid the global conflicts such as the Israel-Hamas war, MSU is nothing more than a benign school of innocent students, faculty, and staff. The second question could be derived from the nagging feeling about the deep-rooted polarity between Christians and Muslims. The third question could be put simply: “Why study there?” For the bombing victims, it has ultimately come to a point of life and death situation.

The first two questions, I will leave to the minds of the experts, analysts, and chroniclers.

The third question: “Why do students go to MSU?” I think I could make out the gist since I was on campus as an engineering student from 1971 up to my graduation in 1976.

Looking back, I graduated First Honor at Lagao Elementary School in General Santos City. After graduation, my mother took me along on a vacation in Iloilo, as my prize, to pay a visit to my brothers and sisters studying there.

Still basking in the sunshine of my achievement like any typical proud mother, she couldn’t help but talk about me around the neighborhood.

I heard one neighbor tell my mother: “Your bright boy must study in UP High” -- words that echoed then in my mind constantly.

One morning, I found myself in a classroom of students, so different – in image and bearing -- from my elementary schoolmates. For the first time, I felt overwhelmed after picking up tidbits of personal information: heirs to wealthy families, scions of political clans, first and second honors, and so on. One graduated from International School and spoke like an American I had watched only in a movie.

Everyone seemed to hold their breath when I told my UP high school freshman class that I came from Mindanao – the only one. I told them my father’s job: a rice mill operator – unintentionally wrong choice of word. My father was a mechanic. Somehow that covered up our poor family status. Only for a while. My absence in the cafeteria during break times later on took the wraps off my financial distress.

To cut this short (you may read the whole story in my ATABAY article “My Life-Changing Year In UP”), I found myself, one morning, eating my first meal after coming back home. I was devouring hungrily a braised pork belly -- nalipasan ng gutom (let hunger go by) for a year -- while my mother, a dressmaker, sewing a neighbor’s dress in her old Singer sewing machine, was watching me with moist eyes.

Being poor and, by a twist of fate, having gotten in the world of the well-to-do, affected my psyche particularly my academic performance. The tough break shot down Sherlock Holmes’ claim that the brain works better on an empty stomach.  The best I did -- came off Number 11 in our freshman class of 40 in one grading period.

My mother enrolled me the next school year in our local school, MSU Prep High. I graduated as a Valedictorian. The recurring question “Where to go to college” triggered in my mind the haunting words “Your bright boy must study in UP High” which sparked me off to study at UP Diliman.

I took the government exam for the “poor and deserving” high school graduates and earned my wings as a National State Scholar. I thought it would be my vehicle driving me to reach my dream. I was mistaken. The state scholarship could hardly foot the bill for my living expenses in Manila.

In the nick of time, the MSU Scholarship came on the scene. Like a manna from heaven, it granted me a Full Scholar status.

The rest is history.

My parents were poor. That all of us seven siblings graduated in college, two with doctorates, three with masters, and the rest professionals, in various fields, has always been the cherished conversation topic over our family dinner table.

My parents were poor. Lacing through such a reality, this is the common thread that weaves the fabric of the academic journeys of most, if not all, MSUans particularly the victims of the recent bombing. Sad to say, the deaths and injuries have kept coming up against the question: “Why were they there?”

Many years back, I recall two traumatic incidents in MSU – a war and a bombing. At the height of the war, we got a glimpse of a battle tank and armored personnel carrier rolling around the campus with soldiers in full combat gear. All at once, we got an earful of distant explosions from the skirmishes between the government forces and the rebels.

During the evacuation, suffering from a high fever, I rode the school bus in a convoy of vehicles to Iligan City. The school and the Iligan community, closing ranks to deal with the crisis, billeted the student evacuees to various accommodations. I was lodged in Rhodora Apartment where Ma’am Loable took care of me until I got well and back on my feet. Most, if not all student evacuees went back to the campus when classes resumed.

In the bombing incident, grenades exploded right in the middle of the performance of the local band in a folk-rock live concert. I decided to stay on campus until the situation went back to normal.

During those dreadful incidents, I never thought of going home. The two-way fare for me then was too expensive. A dewy-eyed snippet: going home, one student said he would miss his bed and a locker in his dorm -- he had none of those luxuries at home.

Further on, I could only form a picture of him missing the Garces’ pakbet, mani and turon. Or, the foggy morning run, winding up in a drink of fresh cow’s milk in Aggie Farm. Or, the late afternoon stroll on the golf course with the landscape of the fairway rolling on the terrain of the grass sloping down the next green. Or, the sundown sight of sunflowers that seemed to soak up the last rays of sunset. Or...

Why there? For the “poor and deserving” students in the middle of their academic journey, to turn around means to take the risk of falling down from the tightrope walk on their respective paths in life. Taking aim at their goals, the only way is for them to walk forward, whatever it takes, under the aegis of MSU, my alma mater.

Head collage courtesy of free stock photos

Video clips courtesy of  YouTube