Watching Yaya Teresa (played movingly by actress Rustica Carpio) in Joey Reyes’“Ano ang Kulay ng mga Nakalimutang Pangarap?”, I saw my grade school classmate Antonia.
After elementary school, Antonia, a farmer’s daughter, didn’t go to high school. She worked as a helper in the Gomez family. She was more than just a helper to the wife of the master of the manor. She was a friend, a shoulder to cry on. In the quarrels of the mistress of the manor with in-laws, Antonia was also a combatant.
She was a surrogate mother to the two children of the Gomezes.
The Gomezes’ baby daughter, Georgie, even slept with her. She was the one who woke up in the middle of the night to bottle- feed the baby and change her diapers.
Georgie “inherited” Antonia from her mother when she got married.
Antonia took care of Georgie’s three children, who are all young professionals now, one of them working overseas.
Recently, Antonia had a serious misunderstanding with Georgie. She was forced to move out of the Gomez’s household and had a nipa hut built for herself. She is, in some ways, luckier than Teresa because she is in the province where housing is not a problem.
Besides she is still in her 70’s, very much up and about. Every time I go home to the province for a visit, we would talk about our fears of how we would depart from this world. We both share the prayer that we would not be a burden to anybody. Our conversation would always end with, “Bahala na ang Diyos.”
There are many Teresas and Antonias in our society where yayas are surrogate mothers and are considered a member of the family – a status not given to a labandera or a housemaid. Yet, they are not really a member of the family. The family is not obliged to take care of them.
The dilemma faced by the Bautista children with the octogenarian Yaya they inherited from their mother, together with the house other real estate properties that they were selling off (Andre, played by Ryan Agoncillo, aptly asked, “How about Yaya? Are we also going to dispose of her”) is also being experienced by children of other well-to-do families, who have become global citizens, less concerned about maintaining roots in the country.
What added depth to “Ano ang kulay….” was the inner conflicts of the characters. The youngest, Andre was the most conflicted, showing more compassion to Teresa than his more practical older sister Stella (Jackie Lou Blanco) and bother (Bobby Andrews). But he was also in no position to offer a kinder alternative for Yaya Teresa.
The last scene is heart- rending. The bent figure of Carpio walking slowly out of the Bautista ancestral house, which had been her home for more than six decades, into a dark uncertain future. At past 80!
“Ano ang Kulay ng mga Nakalimutang Pangarap?” is one of the 12 movies participating in the Sineng Pambansa All Masters Edition, a joint project of the Film Development Council of the Philippines and SM cinemas which started last Sept. 11 and will be on up to Sept. 17.
Aside from “Ano ang Kulay ng mga Nakalimutang Pangarap?”, the other movies are Peque Gallaga and Lore Reyes’ “Sonata”, Chito Rono’s “Badil,” “Joel Lamangan’s “Lihis,” Gil Portes’ “Ang Tag-araw ni Twinkle,” Mel Chionglo’s “Lauriana,” Tikoy Aguiluz’s “Emman” and Romy Suzara’s “Tinik.”
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