Actually I had planned to attend these two seminars in Ateneo to revisit the place. When I received the invitation I right away asked my old friend Gene Genosa from those memorable ACELT days to take the seminars with me for a reunion of some sort. And luckily, after sorting through the funds for research in her Department and discovering that she has enough for a week’s stay there, she gave me the “go” signal and off we went on August 25-30.
I arrived there with Betty on Sunday morning of August 24. She followed me on the eve of the same day but since she had reserved for a place at the ISO dorm, she was taken in. I spent the night at Betty’s uncle’s residence which was just opposite the Ateneo compound, at the other side of Loyola Heights.
The event was like a journey back in time. On one of our strolls outside the ISO dorm, Gene pointed out the room on the second storey of the building where we used to hold our training sessions for UK-PELT. The place was very much the same except that the faces were no longer familiar. I remember Allan Waters, so polite and soft spoken and from whom we learned so much about. And the other British professors that we had, both in Ateneo and in UK.
With a newfound friend at the ISO dorm.
Of course we talked about our old friends too. The training have paved the way for promotion of many of our old colleagues, tho’ at least one has graduated from different career, and a friend, Lojean, the very brilliant scholar of our group is now abroad, but has separated with her husband.
The road leading to Cervini hall and the Church
The old canteen was still there, except that they did not serve meals on the week that we were there as a typhoon was rampaging Luzon and classes were suspended. But the seminars went on. We had to bear with meals ordered from Chow King or Mc Donald and Kenny Rogers. Twice we went to Cervini Café. The same place we went to sixteen years ago, when the canteen near the ISO dorm was not serving meals. I was amazed at the way they have managed the students and other clients to help maintain order. First I wondered why everybody was bringing their dishes to a certain area of the canteen. Then I read the warning on the wall, which was meant for everyone to follow to clean up their table after eating. Certain receptacles for used silver, dinner plates and left over food were provided and marked. All the waiters had to do was to wipe the tables for the next clientele.
A new structure was the church. There used to be a chapel near the Cervini hall and we strolled farther to visit the place and sure enough it was still there. But the new church was gracefully sitting on top of a hill beside the Cervini Hall. We walked inside and kneeled for a few minutes after I was sure that there was a tabernacle in the Altar. The building was modern and spacious. The second time we were there, there was a retreat for graduating students being held there, but the groups were not disturbing the solemnity of the place.
That was after we went to the office of Marlu Vilches, who used to be the director of ACELT. We waited for a few minutes for her as the reception said she has just arrived from UK and was holding a meeting. Well, we did not meet and that gave us a little disappointment, but we were happy to know that she has maintained her UK connections and that she is now head of The School of Humanities. I received text messages from her in reply to the note I scrawled on a pad at her office and I am glad that she still remembers me and Gene. That is Gene posing by the new church on the right photo.
That was one disappointment. Another was that I did not meet my son and granddaughter who live in Manila because of the typhoon. and the last was that I wanted to meet my Multiply contact Tess. But I could not set the date because of the seminar.
Well I found out that I really did nt need the seminar on ESP as I have learned enough from Alan Waters and Tom Hutchinson ( I still have the book authored by these two on ESP) and on Stylistics, I have read enough about it but I would say these were good refreshers and the whole stint allowed me to relive those days before and after our UK-PELT training aside from th fact that I added to the list of new friends that I met at the seminar.
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