Manila Days
  • Home
  • About
  • Starts and Ends here
  • American mission

Oi-koi-men-e boat

9/24/2012

Comments

 
Picture
“Bilis, Kerry, bilis!” Laling drags Johanna by one arm as I run across Wright Street to Ellinwood.
“Yah, yah!” Late again for Daily Vacation Bible School. Laling waves me in the direction of my class. Voices spill out and jostle:
“… joyjoyjoyjoy down in my heart--deep and wide--downinmyheart downinmyheart--der’s a fountain flowing deep and —peacethatpassesunderstanding-- downinmyheart.”
In Chrys der is no Eees or Wes!” I slip into the Quonset hut.

“Children,” says our beloved Miss Payuan, “we will make a Oi-koi-men-e boat. Take a cardboard and draw like this.” We swab thick white stinky paste over our outline. We painstakingly line tiny green mungo beans for the boat hull, and paint the lapping ocean blue. We carefully press purple kidney beans into the cross in the boat. But the rice clouds overwhelm.
“Mabuhay!”
“Danny!”
“BoooombA!”
"Victor!”
Rice rains over our hair, the table, and floor.
“Class, class, class! Kumanta tayo!, “Let all the world…”
Easy to distract, we screech,
“Let aaaall da worl in ebrey corner sing my GOD and KEENG
Da hevnsarenottoohigh, His praises there may fly,
Da earth is nottoolow, his praises there may grow.…”
Let aaaall da worl in ebrey corner sing my GOOOD AAAAAND KEENG!

Miss Payuan fumbles in the flannel board box, and decides to recount how Jesus stood up in the boat and stilled the storm.
But Jesus in the flannel board boat lurches sideways. 
Roger raises his hand.
"Roger?”
“Titcher, let's kanta to Jesus, “sit down sit down you’re rocking da boat.”
Yah! It's TRUE! Orange Jesus is standing in the Oi-koi-men-e boat!  Daddy says never stand when the boat is moving. We take merienda of sugary ensamadas and kool-aid and are dismissed with our Oi-koi-men-e bean mosaics. I am secretly alarmed. What is the cross doing in the boat? Won’t it fall over and sink it? Why did Orange Jesus stand? Does he walk on water because he can’t swim? These things they don’t tell us in DVBS.


Comments

    Kerry (Kathryn) Poethig

    We were "fraternal kids", Americans in the Philippines from Magsaysay to Marcos. I thought our story needed elaboration.

    Picture

    Archives

    January 2017
    November 2014
    November 2013
    September 2013
    August 2013
    July 2013
    May 2013
    April 2013
    March 2013
    February 2013
    January 2013
    September 2012
    February 2012

    RSS Feed

    Categories

    All
    Arrival
    Christmas
    Days Of Rage
    Dreams
    Early Years 1957 60
    Exile
    Food
    Fraternal
    Furlough
    High School
    Lesbian
    Malate
    New York
    School Days 1960 67
    Theology
    Trees

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.
Photos used under Creative Commons from Jeff Kubina, digipam, Neville10