The Laughter of My Father

By Carlos Bulosan

The rich man’s children ate their good food and grew thinner and more peaked. The Bulosans, next door, went on eating their poor and meagre food, laughed, and grew fat. So the rich man sued Father Bulosan for stealing the spirit of his food. And Father paid him in his own coin, while the laughter of the Bulosans and the judge drove the rich man’s family out of the courtroom.

The Bulosans lived in Binalonan, in the Philippine province of Pangasinan. But the episodes of Father’s history that his son Carlos retells belong to universal and timeless comedy. No one can remain unmoved by Father’s excursions into politics, cock-fighting, violin-playing, or the concoction of love-potions. Twenty-four such stories make up the rich and funny collection called The Laughter of My Father.

“In the winter of 1939, when I was out of work, I went to San Pedro, California, and stood in the rain for hours with hundreds of men and women hoping to get a place at the fish canneries. To forget the monotony of waiting, I started to write the title story. It was finished when I reached the gate, but the cold hours that followed made me forget many things.

“In November, 1942, when there was too much pain and tragedy in the world, I found the story in my hat. I sent it to The New Yorker, a magazine I had not read before, and in three weeks a letter came. ‘Tell us some more about the Filipinos,’ it said. I said, ‘Yes, sir.’

“I wrote about everything that I could remember about my town Binalonan, in the province of Pangasinan. I received letters from my countrymen telling me that I wrote about them and their towns. It came to me that in writing the story of my town, I was actually depicting the life of the peasantry in the Philippines.

“These stories and 18 others are now gathered in this volume. For the first time the Filipino people are depicted as human beings. I hope you will enjoy reading about them.”—Carlos Bulosan

• Language: English
• Publisher: Valmy Publishing
• Release date: Dec 1, 2018
• ISBN: 9781789124842

Carlos Bulosan

Carlos Sampayan Bulosan (1911-1956) was an English-language Filipino novelist and poet who immigrated to America in 1930. His best-known work today is the semi-autobiographical America is in the Heart, but he first gained fame for his 1943 essay on The Freedom from Want. Born to Ilocano parents in the Philippines in Binalonan, Pangasinan, Bulosan spent most of his youth in the countryside as a farmer. During his youth he and his family were economically impoverished by the rich and political elite, which would become one of the main themes of his writing. Following the pattern of many Filipinos during the American colonial period, he left for America in 1930 at age 17, in the hope of finding salvation from the economic depression of his home. He never again saw his Philippine homeland. Upon arriving in Seattle, he began working low paying jobs. In 1936, Bulosan suffered from tuberculosis, underwent three operations, and spent two years mostly in the convalescent ward. During his long stay in the hospital, he spent his time reading and writing. Following the release of America is in the Heart in 1946, he was celebrated for giving a post-colonial, Asian immigrant perspective to the labor movement in America, and for telling the experience of Filipinos working in the U.S. during the 1930s and 1940s. In the 1970s, with a resurgence in Asian/Pacific Islander American activism, his unpublished writings were discovered in a library in the University of Washington leading to posthumous releases of several unfinished works and anthologies of his poetry. One of his most famous essays, published in March 1943, was chosen by The Saturday Evening Post to accompany its publication of the Norman Rockwell painting Freedom from Want, part of a series based on Franklin D. Roosevelt’s “Four Freedoms” speech. Bulosan died in Seattle on September 11, 1956, aged 42. He is buried at Mount Pleasant Cemetery on Queen Anne Hill in Seattle.

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Text originally published in 1944 under the same title.

© Valmy Publishing 2018, all rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any means, electrical, mechanical or otherwise without the written permission of the copyright holder.

Publisher’s Note

Although in most cases we have retained the Author’s original spelling and grammar to authentically reproduce the work of the Author and the original intent of such material, some additional notes and clarifications have been added for the modern reader’s benefit.

We have also made every effort to include all maps and illustrations of the original edition the limitations of formatting do not allow of including larger maps, we will upload as many of these maps as possible.

THE LAUGHTER OF MY FATHER

BY

CARLOS BULOSAN

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Contents

TABLE OF CONTENTS 3

MY FATHER GOES TO COURT 5

THE SOLDIERS CAME MARCHING 10

MY MOTHER’S BOARDERS 15

THE GIFT OF MY FATHER 19

THE DEATH OF MY FATHER 24

THE TREE OF MY FATHER 29

THE CAPITALISM OF MY FATHER 34

THE POLITICS OF MY FATHER 38

MY FATHER HAD A FATHER 44

A DAY WITH MY FATHER 49

THE MARRIAGE OF MY FATHER 54

MY FATHER’S LONELY NIGHT 59

MY FATHER AND THE WHITE HORSE 63

THE SONG OF MY FATHER 68

MY UNCLE MANUEL’S HOMECOMING 72

MY FATHER’S LOVE POTION 78

THE TRIUMPH OF MY FATHER 83

MY FATHER’S TRAGEDY 88

MY FATHER GOES TO CHURCH 92

THE SON OF MY FATHER 96

MY FATHER AND THE FIGHTING RAM 100

THE EDUCATION OF MY FATHER 105

MY FATHER’S POLITICAL APPOINTMENT 110

THE LAUGHTER OF MY FATHER 115

REQUEST FROM THE PUBLISHER 119

DEDICATION

To Grace and Dorothy and my Mother

MY FATHER GOES TO COURT

WHEN I WAS four, I lived with my mother and brothers and sisters in a small town on the island of Luzon. Father’s farm had been destroyed in 1918 by one of our sudden Philippine floods, so for several years afterward we all lived in the town, though he preferred living in the country. We had as a next door neighbor a very rich man, whose sons and daughters seldom came out of the house. While we boys and girls played and sang in the sun, his children stayed inside and kept the windows closed. His house was so tall that his children could look in the windows of our house and watch us as we played, or slept, at ate, when there was any food in the house to eat.

Now, this rich man’s servants were always frying and cooking something good, and the aroma of the food was wafted down to us from the windows of the big house. We hung about and took all the wonderful smell of the food into our beings. Sometimes, in the morning, our whole family stood outside the windows of the rich man’s house and listened to the musical sizzling of thick strips of bacon or ham. I can remember one afternoon when our neighbor’s servants roasted three chickens. The chickens were young and tender and the fat that dripped into the burning coals gave off an enchanting odor. We watched the servants turn the beautiful birds and inhaled the heavenly spirit that drifted out to us.

Some days the rich man appeared at a window and glowered down at us. He looked at us one by one, as though he were condemning us. We were all healthy because we went out in the sun every day and bathed in the cool water of the river that flowed from the mountains into the sea. Sometimes we wrestled with one another in the house before we went out to play. We were always in the best of spirits and our laughter was contagious. Other neighbors who passed by our house often stopped in our yard and joined us in laughter.

Laughter was our only wealth. Father was a laughing man. He would go into the living room and stand in front of the tall mirror, stretching his mouth into grotesque shapes with his fingers and making faces at himself; then he would rush into the kitchen, roaring with laughter.

There was always plenty to make us laugh. There was, for instance, the day one of my brothers came home with a small bundle under his arm, pretending that he brought something good to eat, maybe a leg of lamb or something as extravagant as that, to make our mouths water. He rushed to Mother and threw the bundle into her lap. We all stood around, watching Mother undo the complicated strings. Suddenly a black cat leaped out of the bundle and ran wildly around the house. Mother chased my brother and beat him with her little fists, while the rest of us bent double, choking with laughter.

Another time one of my sisters suddenly started screaming in the middle of the night. Mother reached her first and tried to calm her. My sister cried and groaned. When Father lighted the lamp, my sister stared at us with shame in her eyes.

What is it? Mother asked.

I’m pregnant! she cried.

Don’t be a fool! Father shouted.

You are only a child, Mother said.

I’m pregnant, I tell you! she cried.

Father knelt by my sister. He put his hand on her belly and rubbed it gently. How do you know you are pregnant? he asked.

Feel it! my sister cried.

We put our hands on her belly. There was something moving inside. Father was frightened. Mother was shocked. Who’s the man? she asked.

There’s no man, my sister said.

What is it, then? Father asked.

Suddenly my sister opened her blouse and a bullfrog jumped out. Mother fainted, Father dropped the lamp, the oil spilled on the floor, and my sister’s blanket caught fire. One of my brothers laughed so hard he rolled on the floor.

When the fire was extinguished and Mother was revived, we returned to bed and tried to sleep, but Father kept on laughing so loud we could not sleep any more. Mother got up again and lighted the oil lamp; we rolled up the mats on the floor and began dancing about and laughing with all our might. We made so much noise that all our neighbors except the rich family came into the yard and joined us in loud, genuine laughter.

It was like that for years.

As time went on, the rich man’s children became thin and anemic, while we grew even more robust and full of life. Our faces were bright and rosy, but theirs were pale and sad. The rich man started to cough at night; then he coughed day and night. His wife began coughing too. Then the children started to cough, one after the other. At night their coughing sounded like the barking of a herd of seals. We hung outside their windows and listened to them. We wondered what had happened. We knew that they were not sick from lack of nourishing food, because they were still always frying something delicious to eat.

One day the rich man appeared at a window and stood there a long time. He looked at my sisters, who had grown fat with laughing, then at my brothers, whose arms and legs were like the molave, which is the sturdiest tree in the Philippines. He banged down the window and ran through his house, shutting all the windows.

From that day on, the windows of our neighbor’s house were always closed. The children did not come outdoors any more. We could still hear the servants cooking in the kitchen, and no matter how tight the windows were shut, the aroma of the food came to us in the wind and drifted gratuitously into our house.

One morning a policeman from the presidencia came to our house with a sealed paper. The rich man had filed a complaint against us. Father took me with him when he went to the town clerk and asked him what it was about. He told Father the man claimed that for years we had been stealing the spirit of his wealth and food.

When the day came for us to appear in court, Father brushed his old Army uniform and borrowed a pair of shoes from one of my brothers. We were the first to arrive. Father sat on a chair in the center of the courtroom. Mother occupied a chair by the door. We children sat on a long bench by the wall. Father kept jumping up from his chair and stabbing the air with his arms, as though he were defending himself before an imaginary jury.

The rich man arrived. He had grown old and feeble; his face was scarred with deep lines. With him was his young lawyer. Spectators came in and almost filled the chairs. The judge entered the room and sat on a high chair. We stood up in a hurry and then sat down again.

After the courtroom preliminaries, the judge looked at Father. Do you have a lawyer? he asked.

I don’t need any lawyer, Judge, he said.

Proceed, said the judge.

The rich man’s lawyer jumped up and pointed his finger at Father. Do you or do you not agree that you have been stealing the spirit of the complainant’s wealth and food?

I do not! Father said.

Do you or do you not agree that while the complainant’s servants cooked and fried fat legs of lamb or young chicken breasts you and your family hung outside his windows and inhaled the heavenly spirit of the food?

I agree, Father said.

Do you or do you not agree that while the complainant and his children grew sickly and tubercular you and your family became strong of limb and fair of complexion?

I agree, Father said.

How do you account for that?

Father got up and paced around, scratching his head thoughtfully. Then he said, I would like to see the children of the complainant, Judge.

Bring in the children of the complainant.

They came in shyly. The spectators covered their mouths with their hands, they were so amazed to see the children so thin and pale. The children walked silently to a bench and sat down without looking up. They stared at the floor and moved their hands uneasily.

Father could not say anything at first. He just stood by his chair and looked at them. Finally he said, I should like to cross-examine the complainant.

Proceed.

"Do you claim that we stole the spirit of your wealth and became a laughing family while yours became morose and sad?" Father asked.

Yes.

"Do you claim that we stole the spirit of your food by hanging outside your windows when your servants cooked it?" Father asked.

Yes.

"Then we are going to pay you right now," Father said. He walked over to where we children were sitting on the bench and took my straw hat off my lap and began filling it up with centavo pieces that he took out of his pockets. He went to Mother, who added a fistful of silver coins. My brothers threw in their small change.

May I walk to the room across the hall and stay there for a few minutes Judge? Father asked.

As you wish.

Thank you, Father said. He strode into the other room with the hat in his hands. It was almost full of coins. The doors of both rooms were wide open.

Are you ready? Father called.

Proceed, the judge said.

The sweet tinkle of the coins carried beautifully into the courtroom. The spectators turned their faces toward the sound with wonder. Father came back and stood before the complainant.

Did you hear it? he asked.

Hear what? the man asked.

The spirit of the money when I shook this hat? he asked.

Yes.‘

Then you are paid, Father said.

The rich man opened his mouth to speak and fell to the floor without a sound. The lawyer rushed to his aid. The judge pounded his gavel.

Case dismissed, he said.

Father strutted around the courtroom. The judge even came down from his high chair to shake hands with him. By the way, he whispered, I had an uncle who died laughing.

You like to hear my family laugh, Judge? Father asked.

Why not?

Did you hear that, children? Father said.

My sisters started it. The rest of us followed them and soon the spectators were laughing with us, holding their bellies and bending over the chairs. And the laughter of the judge was the loudest of all.

THE SOLDIERS CAME MARCHING

I WAS A MONTH old when the First World War was declared, but the sound of distant guns shook away my childhood. I grew up quickly and found that my brother Polon was one of the 25,000 volunteers in the Philippine National Guard that fought in Europe. Suddenly the war came and suddenly it ended. Then my childhood was gone forever.

The soldiers were demobilized. Out of the eleven young men that volunteered in our town only three came back to live among us. One was dead in battle; two died of serious infection on the boat; three were injured and stayed in the city. The three who came back were always sitting on the lawn in front of the presidencia. They sat all day and part of the night without talking to anybody. They pulled