Doña Cecilia



          Last week for Spring Break, I spent five days in Bogotá, Colombia.  I had lived there for over a year as a Fulbright Fellow in 2002-2003 and return about every two or three years to visit friends who I now consider my family.  Previous to this trip, I had not gone back since the Fall of 2008.  Bogotá is my favorite city in this world.  I’ve lived in five countries and nine cities and still, it’s Bogotá.  I love it because it’s beautiful, international, historical, delicious, cultured, smart and full of books.  I love it for all these reasons and even still, my affinity runs deeper. 

              This affinity, this connection to a country so far removed from the country I was born in or the country I grew up in, is hard to explain.  I guess the best way I can explain it is like this; when I am in Bogotá, I never get lost or scared.  I have intuition there.  I can always navigate people or public transportation with ease to find my way.  Ask me the first thing about which bus to take to get from my old apartment building in Vitória, Brazil to the mall across town, and I have no idea.  In Brazil, I couldn’t tell you how to get anywhere beyond walking distance to the school where I worked, the bank, the supermarket, my waxist, and the beach.  Beyond a five-block perimeter, I am totally lost.  But when I am in Bogotá, I never get lost.  It’s an energy.  The ground always feels really familiar, even when I am just discovering a new part of the city.  Even if everyone just assumes I'm Japanese, I hardly ever feel out of place there.  My Colombian friend Paula said it best when I tried to explain it to her one time in England.  I was telling her how much I loved Bogotá, how amazing and familiar it always felt.  She just looked at me and said, “Oh, you must have lived there in a past life.”  (She gets it because her past-life city happens to be Rome, Italy). 

            I get along better with Colombians than Taiwanese people.  This breaks my father’s heart but it’s true.  I got really lucky when I lived there in 2002.  Because I worked in the feminist movement, most of my closest friends to this day are Colombian women who are brilliant, have traveled, speak different languages and care about the world and its people.  And most importantly, they have all opened their homes, hearts and families to me at one time or another and not once ever allowed me to feel like I was alone in that foreign city.  Because of all these reasons, Bogotá is like home. 

            Yet, as much as I love to return home, this trip in March was more of an emergency trip.  I had originally planned to go in June, but my friend Carolina’s mom was on her death bed.  I never even knew.  I mean yes, I knew she had cancer but she has had it for two years now and I just assumed that she was fine, that her treatments were working, and that she would be okay.  So I was shocked when I called Carolina a few weeks ago to tell her that I would be there in June when she said, “well, I hope my mom is still here.”  I couldn’t believe it, I had no idea.  I started crying and tried to work out a way in which I could get there, fast.  I couldn’t really afford it at that moment, hence the June date.  I fell asleep that night and woke up at 5 the next morning to read, thinking about what Carolina had said.  I had to get there.  And as the beautiful synchronicity of the moment, God and the universe would have it, my mother, about an hour later, walks into my room and says to me, “Tina your frequent flyer miles expire today so if you’re not going to book a ticket, give them to me.”  I booked my ticket to Bogotá.

            Carolina was a friend from Los Andes University when I took classes there during my Fulbright.  I don’t remember how we crossed paths exactly on campus but I remember clearly the first day we had lunch.  It was in El Corral, the upscale hamburger joint on campus.  She spoke English because she had lived in Australia and she told me “I LOVE hip hop music” which was strange for a Colombian girl.  From her, I learned quickly that in Colombia, if you are going to be late for anything, all you have to do is repeat the words “Que pena” profusely to absolve you of your untimeliness.  She also told me that she had come from a family of die-hard Communists.  “Tina, my father studied in the Soviet Union in the 1970’s and both of my parents were members of the Patriotic Union.*” Don Samuel, her father, describes his time in the USSR a little differently.  He says:  “Yes Tina, I remember those labor camps, we would eat the same shit everyday…”. 

             I would almost always stay with Carolina in Bogotá when I lived there and when I went back to visit.  When I was sick or my apartment needed to be fumigated, I stayed with Carolina.  When I went to visit after returning to the States, I stayed with Carolina.  They often invited me to their weekend home in Anapoima, Colombia.  Some of the best and most memorable conversations I ever had in Colombia were   

with Don Samuel and Doña Cecilia (her mom) about Pasto (the region they are originally from), the Patriotic Union, social movements, politics and the news.  Doña Ceci was always a character.  Like Don Samuel, she 

Don Samuel, yo y la Doña Cecilia en Anapoima, 2006

 had been a Chemistry professor at La Nacional (one of the best universities in Bogotá which is historically leftist.  Sometimes the year needs to be extended due to the constant protests).  She was a total ballbuster with everyone.  She would say to me, “Tina, I saw those women in Pasto and they would come to me and say, ‘Oh, my husband hit me…’ and I would get so mad and say, COME ON, YOU JUST PICK UP THAT FRYING PAN AND WHOOP HIM BACK!”  (Hilarious in Spanish complete with hand gesture of grabbing imaginary frying pan.) Many a time Ceci and Samuel have made me wonder why my parents can’t be Communist heathens too :(

They also put up with all my bullshit.  The elephant that is always in the room when I hang out with them or their extended family is the one time I went totally crazy when Carolina invited me to a family Sunday outing during my time living there.   The only reason I had gone was because she swore we would be back at a certain time because I had something due the next day in school.  I was naïve though to not know that a Colombian family outing on a Sunday never has a clearcut expiration time, especially if they drive you into the mountains and decide to stop and eat at every single meat or dessert place along the way.  By 8pm I’d had it, I felt trapped and it started to piss me off that Andrei, her brother, was driving so fast down the narrow curves of the mountain that I started getting really scared.  I pleaded with him to slow down but he wouldn’t stop and went on and on about how I couldn’t boss him around.  So at yet another restaurant on the side of the mountain that night, in front of Carolina, uncles, aunts, Doña Ceci and Don Samuel, I began to yell like a crazy person across the table at Andrei, throwing at him whatever Spanish profanities I could conjure up in my mind.  I was so mad that I was in tears and the words could barely even come out right.  On the way back into the city, I didn’t ride with him but with Carolina's cousin and before we even got to the apartment building, I jumped out of the car at a corner and took a cab back to my apartment.  Okay so yes.  That was totally crazy.  But they forgave me and never turned their back on me.  And I loved them for it.

So what do you mean that I will never see Doña Ceci again? 

Sitting in the waiting room at the Santa Fe hospital last week was surreal.  One of those things where you can’t really integrate the moment with what is actually going on.  I only lost it once (of course, in front of Carolina’s extended family) when I started crying hysterically and Carolina had to come out of her mom’s room to tell me “Hey Tina, just remember that you’re here to comfort me okay?” before I stopped.  By that point, her mom was already in and out of consciousness. 

  

After a long day in the hospital.  Caro, me Tania, Andre, more friends and family
March, 2011


             I got to see Doña Ceci twice.  The first time, she couldn’t talk and could only nod her head.   It felt like I wasn't even seeing her because nothing on that bed was her.  Doña Ceci was never literally or figuratively shrunken, immobile with tubes throughout her body with an inability to move or speak.  During that first visit, I couldn’t feel the moment because she wasn’t there. 

                The second visit was better, even if it was on the day that Don Samuel had called Carolina and Andrei at seven in the morning to hurry and get to the hospital quick.  I had stayed with them at the apartment the night previous but awoke when I saw Andrei grabbing clothes and bustling about the room where I was sleeping and asked him, “What’s going on?”  He said, “We’re going to the clinic.  I think my mother is going to die today.” 

                 By the time I got there, Ceci’s condition had stabilized.  It was a false alarm.  She had had trouble breathing the night before and the doctor thought that this would finally be the end.  But she was “okay” again.  I arrived and saw their long-time employee Lolita come out of the hospital room with her 17 year-old son David, in tears.  Ceci had always loved them both and been another mentor for David.  Carolina asked me if I wanted to go in.  I honestly wasn’t sure.  I didn’t think I should be there anymore.  These last moments should be for family.  I didn’t want to use up her precious energy with anymore of my bullshit.  “No Tina, go.”  Carolina urged. 

I walked in and there was Ceci but this time she was sitting up and looked right at me.  I was slightly at a loss.  I told her how much I loved her, how much of a hero she was to me and that my parents were thinking about her.  I kissed her hand, kissed her cheek and then stopped talking.  She just stared at me for a few seconds before she said in a soft voice but still, matter-of-factly:

“Tina, you haven’t said anything to me.”

“OH!  You want me to keep going!!!??!”  Now I knew even less what to say.  “Uhhh, okay, well can you believe that I still don’t have a boyfriend?”  I said, now half-laughing.

            She just stared at me, somewhat blankly with a sad expression and then said,  “What a pity.  So much knowledge.”  And after that, she wasn’t coherent anymore.

Oh Doña Ceci, ballbusting until your last breath.  How much I love you woman!  I left.  Those were the last words she said to me and that was the last time I ever saw Doña Ceci.  She died the day I got back to the States. 

            I’ve been sad ever since.  It’s been a week now and everything just feels harder.  I don’t want to be here.  I want to be there.  Even after only five days there, it’s strange to be in Buffalo again, walking down the halls of U.B., seeing snow, being with Americans.  It’s weird and there are very few people that I want to talk to.  I also can’t feel my blessings at this moment.  I’m a little handicapped.  My body seeks gratitude but sadness wells up in its place. 

            But I need to try.  I have to move on.  Finals are in a month and a half for God’s sake!  So here I go:

 Dear God, thank you for letting me see Doña Ceci one more time.  I know I was supposed to be there.  You are amazing with your ways.  What a gift she was.  God, she wasn’t a “believer,” but I know that you don’t really care because her heart could easily compete with her brain to fill the Campín stadium in Bogotá.  Thank you for all the time spent with her, everything I learned, everything she gave.  Don’t let me take her last words for granted.  Sure, she may just have been sad that I don’t have my partner yet, but God, I know she was also sad because I had studied and traveled so much that in a way, it was her way to say, "Tina, you've been given so much, do something more constructive with it."  Help me fulfill her wish.  Thank you.  And God, be with Carolina, Don Samuel and Andrei.  They are like family to me.  Take care of them now and always, let me see them again as much as I can, as soon as I can. 

               God, let this little tribute be the end of my sadness and the beginning of a new day.  Let me be able to feel that day again, grateful for your many gifts because I am grateful.  Thank you. 

            And Ceci, Doña Ceci, Gracias por siempre darme el amor, a veces no merecido, que usted siempre me había dado.  Gracias por siempre cuidar de mí y ofrecerme todo que usted tenía cuando yo estaba cerca.  Siempre la voy a recordar cuando me toca luchar por alguien.  Acompañeme por fis y ayúdeme con las fuerzas que usted siempre tenía y que voy a necesitar en esos momentos.  Gracias por hacerme reir siempre y enseñarme que más allá que pilas o cualquier otra cosa, una buena lucha requiere mucho amor y dedicación.  Nunca me voy a olvidar de sus enseñanzas.  No tengo nada más que decir sino gracias, la quiero mucho y que desde miércoles de la semana pasada, Bogotá jamás sería lo mismo con su ausencia. 

Adios mi Cecilia bella. 

   

With Carolina and Doña Cecilia in Bogotá, September 2008



Familia Feliz (Andrei is in England doing Grad School), 2008

*The Patriotic Union was a political group formed by ex-guerrilla members who were allowed to de-arm and demobilize in exchange for legitimate participation in the Colombian political process.  All their democratically viable candidates were murdered in the mid 1980s.