Benjamin was released in 1943. He started working in Santiago hospital in Manila and worked there for a while. That was all rice field then. It was the only building there that catered to the Spanish community. And then Benjamin had to go home to bring medicine for his father, Vicente Locsin.
Benjamin and I got married in 1944. Then we went home to Dumaguete. There were so many Japanese sentries there. You had to bow to them and smile. Vicente was getting very worried because the Japanese army was taking lots of professionals for questioning and they never came back. So he was scared that they will take his son.
It was only when we came home to Dumaguete and there were lots of Japanese coming to the house because Vicente befriended the Japanese because he did not want the Japanese to be against us. So when we came and they saw that Benjamin was a doctor, they got close to us when somebody was sick. They would call us and they would stay and make kwento (chat).
Benjamin's sister, Gracia Dominado, lived in a house across from us. She played the piano, so when the Japanese would come, they would call her to play for them. The Japanese officers knew all the classical music. They would tell her, “you play Hungarian Rhapsody.” They were very educated and were really gentlemen. I have no bad thoughts about the Japanese that I came in contact with. They were all educated, respectful. But the lower-class, not the officers—the enlisted men they call “low class,” they were the ones that abuse and kill and torture.
I was scared only when they began picking up prominent men like men who worked in the hospital or were engineers or in the treasury before the war. The Japanese picked them up for questioning and then they never come out again, are never seen, and many were executed. One time there was a friend of Benjamin's. I don’t remember his name. He was like mestizo (Spanish blood mix). We had a small clinic with Benjamin downstairs. That’s where we talked with him and we made stories with him. One time when he was going out already, the Japanese came and told him to go with them, and we never saw him again. That was the time when I got scared.
So when Vicente said, “I think it’s high time that you go to the mountains because I think the Japanese are getting suspicious.” That was the time we went. We arrived here after we were married in maybe late April and we went to Zamboanguita by boat in September. So it was 5 months were were here in Dumaguete. After that, we stayed in Zamboanguita for 2 days and then were taken up to the mountains by the runners of the guerrillas.
I enjoyed it there [in the mountains] because I was
playing mah-jong every day! That’s where I learned really how to play mah-jong.
There were 3 families that stayed together: the Dominados the Aviolas, and the Montebons. That’s why we call the place, “Do-Al-Bon.”
That was a famous place before. The families of those guerrilla officers lived
together in like a long barracks. They divided it into 3 compartments—one space
for the Dominados, Aviolas, and Montebons. It was decorated with sawali–very native—and each compartment has a stairs, so it’s private really, you’re
not together. But every morning after breakfast we start playing mahjong
already. The wife of Montebon, Aviola, and Dominado are all mahjong players so
they taught me how to play. So it was not scary for me at all.
I was living in the mountains, but Benjamin was asked if he would work. Major Dominado was very powerful, so when he asked Benjamin if he wanted to work, he said, “yes, I want to work. I want to help in the clinic up in the mountains." That was 1 1/2 hours walk from our house at Do-Al-Ban to the clinic. Benjamin stayed in the clinic. I would go and visit him at the clinic once in a while. But we would rest. There were small huts in the mountains. And you know the old people there did not know we were at war! They were saying, “why are you in the mountains?” We told them we escaped Dumaguete because there were lots of Japanese already there because we are at war. They would say, “why?” They remember only the owner of a Japanese store we had here and they didn’t know (why we are at war with him)!
Next: Liberation!
I was living in the mountains, but Benjamin was asked if he would work. Major Dominado was very powerful, so when he asked Benjamin if he wanted to work, he said, “yes, I want to work. I want to help in the clinic up in the mountains." That was 1 1/2 hours walk from our house at Do-Al-Ban to the clinic. Benjamin stayed in the clinic. I would go and visit him at the clinic once in a while. But we would rest. There were small huts in the mountains. And you know the old people there did not know we were at war! They were saying, “why are you in the mountains?” We told them we escaped Dumaguete because there were lots of Japanese already there because we are at war. They would say, “why?” They remember only the owner of a Japanese store we had here and they didn’t know (why we are at war with him)!
Next: Liberation!
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