These are the stories of the people of San Rymundo.

MY COMING TO SAN RAYMUNDO
By: Ittihaya Quisai

Our family originally came from the Municipality of Parang, Sulu. We were forced to leave our hometown during the 1974 war which resulted in the burning of the town of Jolo. We left our home because it was razed to the ground during the military operations conducted in Parang against the rebel forces.

Our family also suffered a casualty. My elder sister died from a direct hit of the air strike during the said firefight between military and rebel forces in Parang, We moved from one place to another where there were no military operations going on.

I still remember the times when I and my younger sister took solace in crying when we were hungry. Our meals during those hard days were mostly “linugaw” augmented by whatever vegetables our parents could scrounge around the area where we evacuated.

Lima kaming magkakapatid na lubos na naghirap dahil nawalan ng hanap buhay ang aming mga magulang. We were down and out when my father decided to come to the capital town of Jolo. We were lucky that a friend of my father took us in and brought us to San Raymundo and live with them in a small house made of bamboo.

Being new in Jolo and jobless, with our parents having no other work skills but farming, made life harder for us. We survived by charity extended to our family by the friend of my father and nearby neighbors. Those were the hardest times of our lives.

Later, my father was able to eke out a living when he learned how to drive a tricycle (pedi-cab) and our lives improved a little bit in San Raymundo. Six years later, my father died leaving us to manage our own lives in a place where we were brought by fate.

Having been reared in the farm we had to make the necessary adjustments to cope with the daily requirements of living. Fate again played its part when we were taken cared of by the Charity Sisters, missionary nuns assigned to the beleaguered town of Jolo.

The nuns gave me the opportunity to go to school and recommended me for scholarship for my college education. Today, after college and having settled down with having a child of my own, I am gainfully employed as a teacher in a non-formal school supported by TESDA, CIDA and Barangay San Raymundo.

Since my childhood days to the present, I have experienced the ravaged of war/conflict. The memories of the horrifying experiences we underwent still hound me. I am still searching for that total peace and helping in my own little ways to help being about peace in San Raymundo, the community of which I am now a part. We hope to turn to a peaceful and progressive barangay with the residents there living in harmony and cooperation.

Non-Formal School Teacher