By Fr Joseph Panabang SVD
Bakit?
At out Filipino gathering, during our sharing of experiences, Sr. Alice Amarga, RVM was telling how she almost died of her first malaria attack. Her doctor was able to save her but she could not understand why after a month her doctor died. So she kept asking. “Why, why Lord?” Yours truly could not resist suggesting: “Maybe the Lord admonished the doctor, ‘bakit mo binuhay siya?”
Snakeman
During our Filipino gathering it was revealed tat one of the Filipino priests is fond of looking for snakes. When Pina Manalo, our Filipino architect working in Accra arrived, she was asked by her Lebanese co-worker about this priest. The Lebanese said to Pina: “I hear you have a Filipino priest her who looks like snake?”
Ininglish Pa
It was the bout between Nelson Azumah of Ghana, the reigning World Super Featherweight champion, and Jeff Fenech of Australia. Deep in the bush we were watching the fight live on black and white television run by a car watching the preliminaries with all diligence and rapt attention and listening attentively to all the commentaries in English. Because of the delay we became restless except him and we started getting edgy and noisy. He stood up and started blasting everyone. Our catechist whose name is “Hurt’ knew the man well. He stood up and holed, “How come you are so engrossed in the commentaries did you notice they are in English?” we all laughed and our friend stopped blasting us.
My Church, Go, Go
We were crossing a traffic roundabout circle on our way to a Filipino gathering when the police stopped us. One could guess their intention. One police bent over us through the window about to do the forbidden business when their boss shouted, “Roman priests!” then that police (looking as if he had a drop drink) said: in broken English, “Roman asore; meye asore, my church go, go.” As we sped away, Fr. Victor Leones said, “Roman church, my church? I should have asked him to make the Sign of the Cross.”
Who was the Priest?
At home we call him “mayor.” Here we call him District Secretary (DS). Our DS was accused of embezzle of government funds. During the court hearing held in the open loud speakers blaring through the whole town, the DS admitted he indeed gave a considerable amount to a party in honor of a Methodist Minister. At this point, someone grabbed the microphone and asked in a loud voice; “Did you also give to the Roman Catholic Priest who really did something for the town?” much to the amusement of the crowd. [ Was that priest you, Fr. Joe? Ed]
Going and Coming
Sr. Nelia Gura, RVM once asked me what I mean by saying missionary life is an endless series of excitements: “Simple, while preparing to visit a village, I feel excited to go and the following day I feel excited to come back.” Her smile told me she knew just what I meant because she had had the same experience.