New Home "Over the Rainbow" at Down Under

A LETTER OF VON VOYAGE  TO AUSTRALIA

 Family photo 2019

Hello Mackie! Hello Markus!

Your Lola and I wish you both, so with your Daddy and Mommy, “Happy Trip to Australia.” We wish you “Good Luck!” and pray to God to guide you in your new country and home.

Your dream-come-true is perhaps the biggest event in your life, individually and as a family. It is a challenge you have to face, and there is no turning back. The future is over the horizon, or shall we say, like in the song, “over the rainbow.”

Do the best you can with determination, perseverance, dedication, love and unity – and never give up. You are pioneers, and these words have guided pioneers before you succeed in realizing life’s goal, more so, its meaning. So too, with you – and the test is probably greater at this time the world is unprecedentedly changing with the current pandemic crisis, and its ramifications.

How we wish we are with you, as we have always been together. There have been many trials we have gone through, but this time the game is mainly yours, and we must say, it is not without a difficult test.

But we are confident you will succeed. We know that the foundation in life you built with us through the years is broad and strong. And you can build an edifice, if not a monument, that speaks of joy, success, glory. But these are measures often used in motherhood statements; they must be imbibed in growing up for you children, and in growing old for their guardians, including us your Lolo and Lola who regard each day a bonus in our old age.

We dream of travelling to Australia once you have settled down. Your Lola and I hope we’ll still be strong to travel and do some chores, and for me to write and paint. And we hope your cousins and other relatives could do the same. Life, people say, is more beautiful the second time around. Gleaming over the Internet your new home is promisingly a place of beauty, adventure and respite. Of course, akin to the many beautiful things in the Philippines, the home of your birth and early childhood.

Someday you will visit us, too, especially in our ancestral home in San Vicente, and in Lagro where you grew up. We shall continue to improve and maintain them. They are still your “home, sweet home” and the simple comfort and amenities will be there awaiting your visit – or vacation which we missed earlier this year.

Indeed, the world is a village. The world has virtually shrunk and wired all around, and it seems to be moving on its two feet – one of travel and the other, communication. Both are precursors of the good life brought by progress in which we became vulnerable and obliging victims to this crisis. Now we have reached a crossroad. The world is on a standstill on the adage, “Stop, look and listen.” This is where humanity and the whole world are presently trapped.

You’ll understand more of life as you grow up. Be optimistic and take things positively, however difficult they may seem. You may not be able to change the world, as in Evan Almighty. God in that film said to Evan, “Yes, you did. You have a happy family, and you gave a lost dog a home.”

We wish you the best of everything. ~

Lolo Abe and Lola Cecille

A Glimpse on Family Life of Dr AV Rotor, with children and grandchildren

(Inset: Ulirang Ama Awarding ceremony, June 19, 2019)  ~