LEST READERS GET BORED, this will be my last column on Antonio Luna and boric acid eyewash for 2009.
Two decades ago, I went over Luna’s papers and other personal effects. Nobody was minding these at the time because they did not seem as valuable as his paintings, drawings, watercolors and sketches. There I was in the dusty fire-trap of a bodega in Heritage Art Center in Cubao, Quezon City, alone with history screaming out to be written. In another room, art historian Santiago Pilar was busy with the papers of Juan Luna’s son, Andres, a prominent Manila architect before the war. Had Professor Pilar and I known that all these historical sources would literally go up in smoke we would have photocopied everything. As they say in Filipino, “Nasa huli ang pagsisisi.” (Regret comes in the end.)
I was an undergraduate student on allowance at the time, so I was surprised by what I uncovered. We know Antonio Luna as a general during the second phase of the Philippine Revolution and the subsequent Philippine-American War, but when I saw his school notebooks in legible and, one could say almost feminine, penmanship, I couldn’t imagine this man whose bad temper was legendary and led to his assassination in 1899. As a student in the Ateneo Municipal, he won many prizes, including one in calligraphy. Before he wore stars on his shoulders, he had peered through a microscope and drawn organisms in his notebooks. It is not well known that he was a chemist by training and took courses in Institut Pasteur in Paris, which led to his pioneering research on water from the Pasig River, mosquitos as carriers of malaria, and even the purity of carabao milk. These papers made Luna whole, and provided flesh and blood to the short references we have to him in textbook history.
Old fogeys often disagree with my presentation of heroes because they insist on saintly, perfect, images of bronze and marble instead of human beings. I believe in the importance of Filipinos revisiting their past and seeing their heroes plain, as ordinary people like themselves, because it is in their humanity that we appreciate our own capacity for greatness.
Looking at Luna’s flowing penmanship made me ask: If he were to submit a handwritten application to a human resources department today, what would the evaluators conclude from it? Would Luna be considered over Apolinario Mabini who had very small writing, or Emilio Aguinaldo who had the worst penmanship.
Luna’s student notebooks may have been written a century before I was born, but his detailed expenses were relevant to me because I had to live on allowance, too. His expenses were not as detailed or interesting compared to Rizal’s, but one can see how he spent his money in 1892. No month is indicated in the notebook, but Luna’s regular expenses covered food, transportation, and mail:
“Sabado 15: lavada (laundry); desayuno (breakfast) $.25; barberia $1; almuerzo y comida (lunch and food) $3.60; cartas (letters) $.80; tranvia $.60. Total $11.25.
“Domingo 16: tesar ropa (tighten clothes) $6; desayuno $.40; tranvia $.90; comida $1.80; commissionaire (?) $.50; tranvia $.30. Total $9.90
“Lunes 17: desayuno $.40; cartas $.60; papel de luto, attaches, cuadernos (notebooks) $4; baso (glass) $.80; comida $2; coche y tranvia $2.60. Total $10.40
“Martes 18: LN(?) $10; desayuno $2.20; cartas $.60; coche y tranvias $8; almuerzo y comida $3.20.
“Miercoles 19: desayuno; almuerzo $1.50; comida $1.65; propina (tip) $.30; artal (type of empanada) $.50; tranvias $1.20; coche $3.40; cobre 500 francos Cesar.
“Jueves 20: desayuno, almuerzo $1.50; comida $1.65; propina $.30; artal $.50; tranvias $1.20; coche $3.40; cobre 500 francos Cesar.
“Viernes 21: alcool $1.20; peitnole (?) $.70; propina $.15; desayuno $.25; hotel $5.20; rranvia $.90; carta $.25; tranvia $.30; comida $1.55.
“Miercoles 26: tranvia $1.20; cartas y telegramas $.50; almuerzo y comida $1.75.
“Jueves 27: pan (bread) desayuno, corillon (?), cartero (mailman) $1; Recibi 2000 francos M.B. (Mariano Benlliure?)”
The above list did not make sense to me the first time I read it, but two decades later everything fell into place. The expenses were made from late September 1892 to December of that year. Why was Luna spending so much money on taxis and tranvia? Why is the biggest sum given to a lawyer? Antonio was living with his brother and his family in Paris and on Sept. 23, 1892, Juan Luna in a mad rage shot and killed his wife Paz and his mother-in-law Juliana Gorricho and wounded his brother-in-law Felix Pardo de Tavera. We will never know Antonio’s whereabouts during the murder, but we know from the above expenses that he was working for his brother’s release from jail.
In February 1893, Juan Luna was convicted of murder, but because his was considered a “crime of passion,” the French court set him free but ordered him to pay court costs and a small sum for documentary stamps. It is often said that Luna was acquitted. Court records say otherwise: he was a convicted murder whose sentence was commuted.
Comments are welcome at aocampo@ateneo.edu
