“Ang Abandonado”

    Most often than not, it is the heartless mother who is put to blame everytime a child is abandoned. Five months old baby Santino – (played by Zaijan Jaranilla) the lead character of the new soap opera of ABS-CBN titled “May Bukas Pa” was found by the Cementery caretaker (played by tata Cris Daluz) inside the cemetery.

             But unlike your typical abandoned child being adopted by cruel parents, Santino was turned over by the cemetery caretaker to the monks of a Franciscan monastery. And instead of a normal childhood with a father and a mother, baby Santino is raised by not just one or two but 12 franciscan priests! 

            Our first two taping days were all taken inside the San Guillermo Parish Church in Bacolor, Pampanga as the Franciscan monastery.  Rarely did we have rests in between takes as the scenes for the first week involving the priests and baby Santino growing up from a five months old baby till he reached 5 years old were lined up to taping. 

            I was glad to meet again tata Cris Daluz after a long while that I have not worked with him. Tata Cris Daluz had grown old, it was then that I realized that when we did “Pangako Sa Yo” where tata Cris played the role of Tata Isko, the adoptive parent of Ina (Kristine Hermosa) was already 8 years ago. Tata Cris had grown old already but still he is very much active in showbiz! Although he was complaining that the five month old baby that he carried and gave to the priests is very heavy! Indeed, ABS-CBN will never abandon you, tata Cris! 

            Santino’s growing up scenes with the 12 priests will be aired during the first two weeks. The initial telecast will either be on February 2. 

            The San Guillermo Parish Church in Bacolor, Pampanga is a good choice as the location for a Franciscan monastery. A day after the world-class volcanic eruption of Mt.Pinatubo in 1991, I was part of a team from the Department of Agriculture who conducted an inspection to determine the extent of the damage to the agriculture sector brought about by the eruption. I could still remember vividly the squalid  appearance of the church being covered with volcanic ash and inundated with lahar. Little did I know that 18 years later, I would be back in this church not just for a fleeting moment but for already 4 days and who knows we would be taping here for even two months. 

            The San Guillermo Church which some locals claim to be erected in the 1520s during the early Spanish settlement had seen the rise and fall of the town Bacolor, the grandeur and fall of the Spanish, Japanese and American colonizers, and of late the conversion from an agriculturally productive vegetable basket to now a barren wasteland with nothing but grasses and cogon growing wildly. 

            While the local residents never abandoned their faith in the Catholic Church even with the devastation of the San Guillermo Church, the mother of baby Santino abandoned him. However, as the story will unfold soon, the abandoned boy would soon be counting his blessings, instead of an ordinary couple raising him, he got 12 franciscan priests as his parents!