15th POST REF-LOLA

Please read first my previous postings.

CONTINUATION
My father's words lingered in my mind...
Maybe that was how BAD FAITH worked...
I already understood what his words meant but my mind, my ego whatever would/could not accept the TRUTH... That evening my father & I & my best friend who lived with us
took a bus to Batangas... I was "dazed"...
The events that followed deserves a book but these are not what I want to discuss here. Those would fall under the topic BAD FAITH... This one is about ESP.

I found out or the news of my LOLA/Grandmother's death came at about 5:30-6:00PM November 26, 1976.
That very SAME DAY these were the events of/in my life:
[I was tempted to "take a risk" & challenge the readers to check for themselves the actual day corresponding to that date but I have to admit I was afraid of committing a mistake & be accused of fabricating/inventing a story - So I checked just a moment ago in some Internet
PERPETUAL CALENDARS websites what day November 26, 1976 fell.
I am/was not mistaken - that was a FRIDAY.
My fourth year high school graduating class was going on an excursion trip to the beach if I'm not mistaken & our teachers allowed us to go home early (Half-Day) to give us time to prepare for the trip. But I was not fond of going to parties or trips & I did not intend to go along.
[For this reason some of my classmates considered me a "KillJoy". I really had zero "social life". I had one or two close friends classmates/schoolmates with whom I played basketball on weekends or whom I visited in their homes. But the parties I almost always avoided. My aunt commented that I did not know how to socialize... She always told me that in Life it is not WHAT you know that really matters but WHO you know... & socializing was the means to get linked to people...
But I disliked acting or modifying my behaviour just to get along or please others... That was simply not me... If there is anything I did not really learn in school or in life it is this "SOCIALIZING"... "Do as you please"... "Act naturally"... I really HATED "scripted behaviour" & would have made a VERY BAD actor... [This is one of my initial assessment of MUSLIM's (or MOROs) behaviour that initially attracted me to them - that they were NOT PRETENTIOUS... Of course, all this "first impressions" have changed now after having met so many people.] But I'm really "sensitive" to PRETENSIONS. For me, an "artista" gives the negative connotation of 'pretender" rather an "artist" who practices ART. I can appreciate artistic drama/plays... I guess Hollywood kitsch or whatever should get the blame... I have a friend who assured me that European CULTURE [as in art, art criticism] is REAL/GENUINE & not artificial PUT-ON... that a CONNOISSEUR is not a CON man! HAR!
Camus's character Mersault's attitude in The Outsider/Stranger closely approximated my attitude... or that's why this novel "felt familiar".

I was secretly pleased at the announcement of early dismissal. That gave me all the time - I had the rest of the day to spend in our high school library with its EXCELLENT collection of books - literature, science, math, crafts etc. etc. After eating my lunch, I went to the library to spend the rest of the day. The pleasure trip was never in my mind...
I only looked forward to spending more time (about 5 hours) in the lib!. (Oftentimes lunch break was too short & in the afternoon end of class there were too many students...) I was then really FREE all by myself in the LIBRARY!
I am no longer sure if the lib closed at 4:00 or 5:00 but I believe that was 5:00PM
I normally went home by commuting. I walked all the way to Katipunan Avenue where I took a "DM" (white) or "JD" (red) bus [CUBAO-U.P. BALARA Fare then was 15 centavos or so!] & it entered UP campus through a road between UP BA & Vinzons Hall...
[It was quite a long tiring walk through the rolling terrain of Loyola Heights from the ATENEO high school to the gate & the bus stop... I passed by the Bellarmine hall, the Rizal lib. etc. But I had a technique to amuse me while walking to fight the feeling of drudgery... I usually imagined I was an anti-communist fighter pilot [the COLD WAR!] aboard a Huey helicopter & the grass I trod/walked on was the thick jungles of Vietcong-infested Vietnam... the Mekong River [images I saw in the National Geographic magazine to which my aunt had a lifetime subscription membership courtesy of her American friends.] I expected sniper fire anytime from the green thicket... I had to be quick/alert & throttled my 'copter's engines... Before long I'd be through the gate & at the waiting shed...

[Actually I can check & confirm the time by seeking through almanacs or records but anyway I'm relating the facts or TRUTH...]

It must have been past 5:00PM...
I was walking along the sidewalk/pavement near the Rizal lib approaching the gate when FOR A BRIEF MOMENT (less than 5 seconds, maybe at most 3 seconds - it was just a "split-second") I noticed on my right the lights of MARYKNOLL (that was the name then of MIRIAM COLLEGE)
(These) STRUCK ME (Imitating CAMUS's words!) - the lights were VERY GLOOMY [I repeat, that was the "FEELING" the scene/sight of the lights gave me - GLOOM, VERY GLOOMY...
I told myself or spoke to myself exactly in Tagalog "PARANG MAY PATAY"...
I am not sure if I really saw "it" there & then or I remember this only from memory or reconstructed it only from my memory [The latter would weaken the case because scientists know memory can deceive - there is false memory...)
I saw a hazy "image" of four lights surrounding a bier... In Tagalog - PANGITAIN ng BUROL ng PATAY... Then as quickly as it came it "disappeared" - the whole PANGITAIN. It turned out that the lights were the lightbulbs of a "carnival" or fair of some sort in Maryknoll/Miriam.
[Investigators can check if indeed there was a carnival or some kind of fair that date in Maryknoll...]
Again I "told myself" in Tagalog "Ay, ilaw lang pala ng perya..." I continued walking until I reached the bus stop & if I'm not mistaken rode a JD bus to Philcoa... When I reached home i don't remember the events except for that memory trace of my approaching or being beside the REF & my father speaking...

This experience I consider to be a case of ESP/PREMONITION/whatever...
Of course life is so full of mysteries & coincidences... e.g. Jung Synchronicity etc...
But I ask the READER to judge for him/herself...

My LOLA died around noon (She was eating lunch & NAHIRINAN/in Batangan Tagalog: "NALUOGAN" & asked to lie down a moment...) I'm wondering now if somebody close to me emotionally - either my mother or my grandmother herself "transmitted" that DEATH message... since I got it at around 5:00 it is possible that my mother learned about her mother's death around that time [I have not checked this] But if I'm not mistaken we already had a telephone then so she should have known much earlier unless it was by telegram... I believe someone "transmitted' to me that message or what?
How can a death premonition occur?...

I was DEEPLY EMOTIONALLY ATTACHED TO my grandmother...

Addendum: I asked my mother & was told she learned about it earlier by phone...]