This website is dedicated to the memory of my parents
Cenon Nunez Tiongson, MD and Vicenta Ferrer Tiongson

My father, the late Cenon Nunez Tiongson, M.D. (December 22, 1923 - September 7, 1981) was a soft-spoken and quiet man yet vignettes of his life portray a man of noble passion who desired to live the present to the fullest. Captivated by the womanhood and beauty of then a student of dentistry Vicenta (Nenita) Ferrer, he married her halfway into finishing medical school. He barely made it to the graduation of the Medicine and Surgery Class of 1955 of the University of Santo Tomas in Manila, a university that prides itself on being older than Harvard. Our mother loves to tell us that Tatay was among the seven senior medical students of the batch who were placed on conditional status. They were made to take a series of exams that determined if they could be conferred the degree that year. Tatay was the only one among the seven who was able to join the class graduation ceremony. Aside from starting a new family, he loved enjoying the high-spiritedness of his youth's latter years so it was not surprising that he did not even make it to the upper three quartiles of his class. Nor was it surprising that he was the only one who hurdled that final test.

When coming to America was everyone’s dream and at a time when getting a residency training and landing a doctor’s job in a hospital in the US was easier than passing a medical school exam, he chose to be close to home. He headed straight south instead of going northeast to the West. For eight years, he served as a community physician of Catarman, Camiguin, an island of wonders and wonderful people who speak a different language, a language that he later became more fluent in than his own.

Around the time Nanay (Mom) was pregnant with their tenth child, the family moved further south to the inland province of Bukidnon, which means mountain dweller. For nineteen years until he passed on, Tatay was almost everyone’s doctor in the smallest town of the province.

Sadness over the suddenness of his death still grips me. What lighten my heart are stories about how the townsfolk admire and dearly love him.

Gone with my father is the town’s "24-7 emergency room" that at night was also our living room. Many times it happened that once or twice in the dead of night, parents with a sick child or children with a sick parent would come knocking at our door. The nearest hospital was 25 kilometers away and for a population with less than 1:100 car ratio it was practically unreachable after sundown. When a patient's condition necessitated immediate hospital admission and there was no other means of transport, he himself would drive and take the patient to a facility. As a healer, he was always available anytime in his office, our home or a patient's home. The townspeople certainly took good care of our father's generous heart that he went on to serve them for twenty years until his untimely passing.

It is not hard to imagine how sorely he is still missed,

Vicenta Ferrer Tiongson
September 25, 1928 - July 3, 2004

On behalf of my Mom's sisters Aunt Mila and Aunt Ildie, our family and families, relatives and friends, I would like to thank all of you here today. Sincerest thanks also goes to all those who could not possibly join us this afternoon but in one way or another expressed their sympathy to us who are most affected by the passing of a great mother, sister, grandmother, aunt and friend. The outpouring of support will never be forgotten for it immeasurably eases our pain and sorrow.

When our father passed away 23 years ago, the ritual was a solemn one. There were no eulogies. With the exception of the priest, everyone in the church was quiet. Silence was the expression of our sorrow and other people’s sympathy over the unexpected death of a quiet man a whole town loved.

I persuaded myself to say something before you today not to adapt to changing times and cultures but to sincerely honor my Mom who always reminds me not to be shy. She often reminds me to come out of my shell and share my thoughts to others. It is just fitting to remember all the good deeds she has done in this world. She always has something positive to say about everyone. She is never judgmental. For me, her understanding about the nature of human weaknesses and strengths is one of her remarkable traits. Nanay as we (her children) address her has become everyone’s Nanay.

Nanay was born in Tayug, Pangasinan in Luzon on September 25, 1927 and passed on to the eternal world on July 3, 2004. She was officially baptized Vicenta. Our late grandparents Ramon and Felisa later gave her the second name Nenita in hopes their first born child Vicenta blossoms into a healthier and happier Nenita. Her parents wish is granted for indeed she becomes what they want her to be, full of life and talents, a full-time mother turned breadwinner and a linguist, fluent in four Malayo-Polynesian languages, Pangasinan, Ilocano, Tagalog and Cebuano and in two Indo-European languages, English and Spanish. Playing piano is the language of her soul.

Sometime during her childhood, Nanay contracted rheumatic fever that permanently damaged one of her heart valves. As a child, her heart function was not strong enough for her to be as active as the other children in their neighborhood so she instead learned piano by ear and played it with all her heart.

She lost her piano when their ancestral home burned down as a result of the hostile conflict during the second world war. For fifty long years, she did NOT have a piano she could call her own but she kept her passion alive by playing in churches, senior centers and social events. For her birthday, using the very first fruits of labor that I earned in this beautiful continent, I got her the piano that she had tried playing a couple of times at one Goodwill store. It is not a grand piano but she plays it with all pride and virtuoso like it is grander than a grand. For her, it is as precious as her first piano that was ravaged in a sea of flames brought about by an adult war that she and her neighborhood were never a part of.

After our father’s death, from the island of Mindanao (The Land of Promise) she moved to the bay area of the Golden State of California to join her sisters and one of my sisters.

Two years ago, her shortness of breath and fast irregular heart rhythm due to valve malfunction became life threatening. The only recourse was to replace the damaged valve with a new one that would last for another ten years. The procedure entailed risks like possible death from the surgery and stroke. Miraculously, she survived the heart valve replacement surgery that was done at Stanford.

When I was little, my Mom would touch my forehead to check my temperature when I was down with fever. To comfort me, she would tell me stories about our great grandparents, grandparents, uncles, aunts, cousins, relatives and family friends most of whom I did not meet yet. There was no television then. That is one of my earliest memories of my mother.

After her heart surgery she moved to the house, together with the same piano I gave her eleven years ago. I was told how happy she was that all those times during her recovery I stayed home for her every night. I learned her way of providing loving care to someone ill. Touching her forehead and massaging her head brought healing smile to her face.

Only a few days after the surgery, she started playing the piano again. On workday mornings her effortlessly woven soothing piano sounds would awaken me. Her morning music is as uplifting as the crowing of roosters at the break of dawn in paradise-like towns that still live in harmony with the cycles of the planets as exact as the rhythmic coiling of our double helical DNA. During my childhood, mechanical clocks were not in vogue yet. The serenade of the cicadas was my lullaby. The intensity of the morning chill and the position of the sun on the horizon would tell if it was time to get ready for school.

Some afternoons during her post-surgical recuperation while I was asleep next to her, she would watch on muted TV her favorite Oakland A’s play. Being careful not to awaken me, she would just cheer silently for her team. Those happy times with her was cut short when her post-surgical recovery was complicated by a debilitating cerebrovascular accident that rendered her paralyzed and speechless. She was not able to recover to live with me again.

Nanay, without you, I would not be here today. I can’t thank you enough.

If we can hear the melodies of your creation and existence, you are one of the most beautiful music ever transcribed and translated.

I know now that you are still here with us and that now you can hear how distorted the sound of the world has become. Wars among selfish leaders and invasions by greedy men not only broke your piano into pieces but irreversibly punctured the pulsating bosom of our Mother Earth.

Nanay, don’t worry about us because we are optimistic that soon the whole world will again be gently moving in synchrony with the tranquil drumbeat of the universe. I think that's The Preplan and human beings can only either delay or hasten its much needed comeback.

We all miss you so much, Nanay.

Church eulogy in July 2004