HISTORY OF TACURONG "KAMPILAN" JAYCEES

The year 2010 marks the 23rd year of existence of Tacurong "Kampilan" Jaycees and the 57th year of existence of the Jaycee Movement in Tacurong.  It was in the year 1953 when JC Ricardo "Totoy" Santos the then Regional Vice President for Mindanao of the Philippine Jaycees came to organize the young men of Tacurong for the Jaycee Movement. The organization formed the nucleus of the first leadership organization in Tacurong which came to be known as the "Tacurong Chapter of the Philippine Jaycees.  The chapter was formally recognized and chartered on August 12, 1954 with Dr. Tony Velasco as its Charter President.  On its chartering and induction rites came no less than the Philippine Jaycees National President Jaime Ferrer - who was at the time the Undersecretary of the Agriculture Department, with him was businessman Louie Araneta. Among those who attended and graced the occasion were prominent community leaders, heads of religious and civic organizations and respected pillars of the pioneering settlers from the four points of the then Cotabato Empire.

The Tacurong Jaycees lived up to the expectations of Jaycee leadership in both the local, national and international levels.  They jaycees spearheaded and participated in various fields of community civic/leadership activities and endeavours, notable among which was the making of the first major thoroughfare in Tacurong which was made possible through the manual labor of the jaycees. Today, the said thoroughfare still bear the name in their honor, the "Jaycee Avenue" of Tacurong City. 

The Tacurong Jaycees active participationduring the late 50's Rat campaign earned them the most coveted title of "the Most Outstanding Jaycee Chapter of the Philippine Jaycees."  Foremost among the achievements of Tacurong Jaycees was during the Vietnam War when the Philippine Jaycees sent a Medical Mission to Vietnam  with JC Dr. Tony Velasco of Tacurong Chapter as the first Jaycee volunteer to the said mission.  The success of the Jaycee Medical Mission to the Vietnam War earned the Philippine Jaycees an  International Jaycee Award as "THE MOST OUTSTANDING JAYCEE CHAPTER IN THE WORLD" with full recognition of Tacurong Chapter as the principal contributing  chapter in garnering said award.

The Medical Mission of the Philippine Jaycees to the Vietnam War had not only placed Tacurong Chapter on top of excellent leadership in the international Jaycee Movement but most of all it earned for the entire Filipino nation a place in the hearts of the Vietnamese people.  During the 1967 flood calamity which struck Cotabato Empire, the Vietnamese Government sent immediate assistance in the form of a clay-soil brick making machine and a cash money in the amount of Php 1,000.00 - a generous amount from a country ravaged by war at the time.  What is worth mentioning is that, said assistance was given to the Philippine Government through Tacurong Chapter of the Philippine Jaycees.  For whatever reason, the Vietnamese Government may have at the time in giving Tacurong Jaycees such honor, we could only surmise even up to this day that: in the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese people, it was the Tacurong Jaycees  that they looked up to and owe much because of the Tacurong Jaycee volunteers of the Philippine Jaycees to the said medical mission. 

The year 1987 marked the rebirth of Tacurong Jaycees when JC Dr. Ernesto Matias, the then President of Isulan "Sultan Kudarat" Jaycees with JC Roger Almacen and JC Ram Malana initiated the organization and chartering on, May 2, 1987, of what came to be known as Tacurong "Kampilan" Jaycees.  The noble deeds and excellent leadership examples set forth by the Tacurong Jaycees served as the ideals and inspiration of Tacurong Kampilan Jaycees for many among its charter members became community leaders and excel in thier own rights.  JC Roncal Montilla, the Charter President became the Mayor of Tacurong for two terms and later on became the Representative of the Lone District of Sultan Kudarat; JC Lino Montilla is now serving his second term as Mayor of Tacurong City; JC Vir Paredes - City Councilor; JC Boning Enetorio - City Councilor; JC Jess Arcellana - City Councilor; JC Alex Roldan - Colonol PNP; JC Fred Canizares - Colonel PNP.  The rest of the charter members sre now successful in their fields of interests and businesses.

The rest is history in the making so to say, in the words of the then Jaycees National Senior Executive Vice President for Mindanao - JC Mark Chua, "Tacurong is practically ran by the jaycees, making Tacurong a Jaycee Country".

Researched and Posted by:

JC Jun Robles

Charter Member, External Affairs

Team Leader, Search & Rescue Team, Tacurong City

Battalion Commander, Civilian Volunteers Organization, Tacurong City

Battalion Sergeant Major, 1st Sultan Kudarat Ready Reserve Battalion

THE HONOR FOR MY FATHER

It is a Filipino tradition to be respectful especially to the women and the elders; to respect our parents, with the respect for our fathers as above anyone else in the family.  It is our culture to look up to our  fathers as the head of the family, as the guardian and protector, as the bread winner, as the adviser and in most cases as role models whose ways, characters and good deeds their children and grandchildren  should follow.  Today, like in the early days, the word of  the father is law to the family.  Since time immemorial, it is an unwritten law for us Filipinos to carry the family name of our fathers.  In the present time, still the name and family name and the good deeds of our fathers puts more weight when it comes to recognition and acceptance in the community. It has been a tried and tested method, to gain instant recognition, in many family, clan and community gatherings in the provinces to introduce oneself, say: I am  John. I am the eldest son of  Juan dela Cruz. (It holds true even in the present day political exercises in our country.)   

To personally take good care of our parents in their waning years is one of the ways to show our love, respect and gratitude for them.  To continue the good deeds of our fathers is one way of preserving their name and; doing more good deeds is one way of honoring them.

For me to show my love, respect and gratitude - (for rearing me up to what I am now and for entrusting me his name and family name), and to preserve the name of my father, I named my two sons in his honor. My father is Leonardo Robles, Sr., I am Leonardo Robles, Jr., my two sons are named: Leonardo Robles, III and Leonardo Robles, IV. 

(P.S.  My two sons had entered into a gentleman's agreement that when they get married someday and who ever had a baby boy first, the baby will be named as: Leonardo Robles, V.)

The Way To A Better World

I was in college then, when I first heard the song - I really don't know the title of the song even up to this day - I have heard it being sang by a lovely young lady while strumming a guitar.  What really caught my attention was not the singing lovely lady, but a line in her song which run this way; "May be you and I can do great things/we may not change the world in one day/but we still can change something/today in our small way."  

A simple message from a song but I firmly believe is what each and everyone of us should have done to change this world of ours into a better world!

JUST PURE COINCIDENCE OR A MIRACLE?

      The year was 1977, I was then a second year college student at the Notre Dame of Tacurong College, Tacurong, Sultan Kudarat.  As a self supporting student, I was serving as a sacristan to Fr. Romulo Dela Cruz, DCC, the parish priest of Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria Parish of Tacurong. At that time, the areas under the ministry of Tacurong Parish included the town of Tantangan in South Cotabato where a  holy mass was celebrated once a month for the Catholics of the said town.

      It was around 7:30 in the morning in the mid-1977 that Fr. Dela Cruz and I was traversing the rough and dusty road from Tacurong to Tantangan for the scheduled monthly mass. We are aboard the parish owned green jeep which the young parish priest was driving when halfway to our destination, somewhere along Barangay Mangilala, the jeep's engine sputtered and died.  Fr. Mulong, as we fondly call him, tried to restart the engine many times but failed. He glanced at me with a questioning look, I explained that I have checked thoroughly the vehicle earlier, the engine oil is in perfect level, the water in the radiator is full and the gasoline tank as well is full.  He tried the horn, its shrill blast echoed in the early morning, an indication that the battery was well charged. After many trials, the engine still would not start.  Fr. Mulong, worried about the waiting extended parishioners, decided to go ahead and to hitch a ride on the first vehicle that would pass-by enroute to Tantangan.  As per plan, I was to be left behind and to ask assistance from any driver to tow  the vehicle  back to Tacurong.  With a worried look,  the good  father silently picked up the bag containing the equipment  for the mass, as he alighted from the jeep, I saw a young woman running, from a house nearby, towards our direction and approached  Fr. dela Cruz.  In between sobs she told the good father about her ailing grandmother and asked the young priest to administer to her the last rite.  Without a word, Fr, Dela Cruz followed the woman towards the house. I was left behind in the vehicle trying to check every wiring connection  that might have loosened while travelling along the rough road.  After a while, Fr. dela Cruz came back, still with the woman, who before leaving thanked the young priest profusely for giving her grandmother a hope for a heavenly after-life.  Just as if on cue, a bus loomed from the horizon and upon seeing Fr. Dela Cruz in a priestly white robe stopped to ferry the good priest to his destination.   I stood along side the jeep watching for the first vehicle that might help me in towing the jeep back to Tacurong.  Minutes passed by but not a vehicle coming from any direction was in sight, as the sun rose higher and perspiration started to form in my forehead, I decided to take a refuge inside the jeep.  I sat in the driver seat and subconsciously  turned-on the ignition key, and I got the first shock of the day, when the engine sputtered to life!  Instead of going back to Tacurong, I decided to follow Fr. Mulong at Tantangan.  I arrived thirty minutes later after driving slowly and praying hard that the engine will not die down anymore. An hour later, Fr. Mulong came out of the chapel  and saw me  smiling beside the jeep, he asked me who fixed the engine.  He was amazed when I told him the engine just came to life when I turned the ignition key on.  We came back to Tacurong later without any engine trouble at all.

(P.S.  I came to remember the event few days ago when I, with my three kids, passed by the said place, on our way to Koronadal City, and the  event flashed back in my mind as if it was only yesterday.  The then young priest is now Bishop Romulo Dela Cruz, DCC DD of the Diocese of Kidapawan)

THE PAIN THAT CHANGED MY LIFE

Barely a week after my graduation at Payao Elementary School, in Binalbagan, Negros Occidental, our family migrated to the Land of Promise - Mindanao, to search for a better life. The year was 1966, we left negros Island penniless, my father - orphaned at an early age and just a "sacada", a sugar land worker in a hacienda - has no savings much more properties to sell for this migration. My father have just enough money for food and fare for our family of eight. From our barrio, we traveled by land via Bacolod to Dumaguete in Negros Oriental then by sea to Cagayan de Oro City then by land to Wao, Lanao del Sur and a week later after we left Negros Island, we arrived in a government land settlement area in Sitio Tumbao Camalig, Barrio Banisilan, Municipality of Carmen of the then Empire Province of Cotabato.

From the vast plain sugar land of Negros, we settled in the fertile rolling hills of Banisilan, in the hinterland of Mindanao. We left Negros penniless and arrived in Mindanao with nothing except for our clothes, cooking utensils and farm equipment and a big dream of having a land of our own someday. Hoping for a better life is our strength to move in this new land, if we failed or if worse situation comes to worst, going back to Negros is clearly remote and seems almost impossible, we have "no way out" so to say at the moment.

On the first morning after we arrived, I woke up so disoriented, so confused and felt so lonely that I cried after realization hit me that I am now in a strange land where everywhere you look you see nothing but large expanse of green rolling hills and a dark shape of a mountain in the far horizon. I felt so alone knowing that I am far away from my friends and classmates, far from everything that I've been used to in the past twelve years. It took me months to get adjusted to the new environment, to a new home, new faces of neighbors with different dialects, customs and traditions. I have to face new challenges in life, no matter how hard it is, after all I have my family - my source of comfort and strength. I worked in the farm like the rest of the children in the community, going to school is just an impossible dream at that time, we have no money to spare for my education, besides, the nearest high school was almost twenty kilometers away. Months later, I asked my parents to buy me a piglet for me to raise and to allow me to save part of my earnings from working at our neighbor's farms. It was my plan to go back to school. By the end of the year, I was able to save P103.00 pesos from the sale of my pig and harvest earnings. With the meager amount in hand, I was able to enroll for my first year in secondary education at La Purisima High School, a Catholic run educational institution at Wao, Lanao del Sur. Like the rest of people that time, I have to travel on foot the almost 20 kilometers distance in coming to school and in coming home during weekends.

After a year, everything went quiet well for our family, we now have a new house, a parcel of land to till, my younger siblings in elementary school and me in high school. Until one day in mid-1968, armed conflict erupted between the Muslim armed group and the Christian settler defenders. The once peaceful land we have settled, now became a land of chaos, of fear and uncertainties. We are often awaken at night by staccatos of rifle fires and dark nights are often lighted by burning houses and crop lands, by day smoke can be seen from afar, smoke of smoldering homes and burning crops. The situation demanded our family to migrate once more, this time not for economic reason but for security reasons. By October of that year, my family literally "evacuated" to Barrio Glamang, Polomolok, Cotabato. On my part, I refused to moved out with the family, I have to finished my first year high school before anything else, the reason that my family considered to allow me to be left behind. (My younger sister told me years later, that for the whole five months that I was left alone in Wao, Lanao del Sur to continue my studies, there was not a single night that my mother did not shed tears, thinking of her little boy all alone in a far away dangerous place.) I came "home" later in March of 1969 to a new place, to face new challenges in life, and once again losing my new found friends and classmates in Wao. Another pain in my heart - which included another year of not attending school, - this time, however, with a consolation; I am now in a safer place with my family. It was another year of hardship with my family after leaving Banisilan, to start anew with nothing in hand but a resolve to go on with life no matter how hard it would be. One day, my father told us, we have to move to another place, this time at Barrio Sinakulay, Sambulawan, Cotabato to till the land of a relative, my mother's cousin. It was on February 1970 when my father and me went to inspect the land offered to us. We found it to our liking and two months later, our family "migrated" for the third time. This time we hoped it is for good. We found the new place an improvement from our previous "homes", the rice lands are fertile,n the neighbors - of different tribes - are kind and the peace and order situation is still normal. For the next two years, we cleared the land of shrubs and trees, constructed water impounding dams and canals, planted fruit trees and vegetables and planted palay during the wet season and corn during the dry season.

After three years of working in the farm, to support a now growing family, my dream of going back to school - at least to earn a high school diploma- diminishes from day to day. We still have no extra money to spare for my education and besides I am too old anymore to be with young boys in high school.

It was already late in the evening that night in May of 1972, yet I could not sleep, even the many weeks of fatigue, hunger and the coldness of the rain in preparing the land for the planting season could not bring my tired body to sleep. The rising fever and the pain I felt from my almost raw skinned feet and lower legs- after continuously submerged under irrigation water and abrasions from felt grasses - was so painful that for many hours I cried in so much pain. It was that sleepless and painful night that awakened me to change my views in life.

The following morning, with a heavy heart and still with a high fever and in pain, I told my family that working in the farm is not the best life for me and maybe there is still a better future in store for me if I will be allowed to go back to school. A week later after that fateful night, I took the entrance examination and enrolled to continue my secondary education as a second year student at the Notre Dame of Tacurong College, Boys High School Department, Tacurong, Sultan Kudarat. I was already 18 years old then in the midst of 13 and 14 year old classmates. And, from that day on that I set my foot back in school, I never once looked back nor dreamed to be back that night and to feel the pain and frustrations that made me cry. I continued my studies up to college as a self-supporting student (serving as a store keeper, convent boy, janitor and everything just to get a free tuition in college). I graduated seven years later - after a stint with the Medium and Small Scale Industries Coordinated Action Program (MASICAP) scholarship program of the government - at age twenty five, in March 1979, from the Notre Dame of Marbel College, Koronadal, South Cotabato with a degree of Bachelor of Arts, major in Economics.

It was that pain that changed my life!

Afraid Of The Dark

One sunny day, my four year old son Jun-jun came home tired and perspiring from running. In between heavy breathing he asked me, "Dad, how could I stop my shadow from following me?" I was caught off balanced and dumbfounded, not knowing what to say. Jaycee-R, his seven year old older brother butted in just in time to save me. He said, "you better play at night so your shadow won't follow you, because shadows are afraid of the dark."

The Essense of Time (A Watch Ad)

An old watch had stopped and rested, exhausted after years of travel through time but a new watch (time piece brand) will take over to keep track of the time until eternity.

My Father's Favorite Story

(This is one of the favorite stories of my father which he used to tell us during night time when we were still in Payao, Binalbagan, Negros Occidental.)

In the early days, it has been a tradition of the Filipino people for the parents to choose whom their children should marry when they come of age. The fathers usually looked for young men who are industrious, responsible and most of all respectful especially to the elders. On the other hand, mothers are observing young girls with good behavior, caring , industrious and most of all a good cook. The arrangement were usually done verbally by fathers, with their drinking buddies as witnesses, during a drinking spree over a gallon of "tuba or lambanog", after work in the field. To seal their agreement, the parents call each other "balae" or kumpare and kumare.

There was this young man and woman who, few years before, had been arranged by their parents to be married comes the next harvest season. The young man was really in love with the woman, but the woman was in love with another man whom she wanted to marry. However, as Filipino culture dictates, the woman should be respectful to her parents and therefore should abide with their wishes or face the wrath of the whole family for losing face to the family of the man whom she is going to marry. The date of the wedding was set but the woman, to show her dislike for the man, demanded many things such as a new big house complete with amenities, a couple of household help and a lavish wedding gift and celebration. Everything the woman asked for was accepted to be provided for by the man's family except for the request for a couple of household help. This enraged the woman and had resolved to put the man's life in misery by not attending to her role as expected of her as a wife. She told her friends about this resolve. The wedding day came and almost all of the people in the community were invited to attend the wedding celebration. The lavish affair became the talk of the community for many weeks.

At the days end, after the wedding, the newly married couple moved to their new home. The man brought with them his favorite pets, a white cat and a black dog, the latter he cared for the past six years. Not a word was uttered between the couple since they arrived home that afternoon. The wife was busy thinking of ways to show her dislike, much more of her hatred for her husband, on the other hand, the husband was busy sharpening his "guinunting" - a bolo used as a protection and a tool of war in the early days. As the bright afternoon turned to dusk, ordinarily in those days, it is dinner time, yet the wife did not bother to prepare dinner. After a while the husband tested the sharpness of his bolo to his satisfaction, stood up and picked up his white cat sleeping in a corner. He asked the cat "go, you cook and prepare our dinner", the cat simply snug and uttered a meow of satisfaction to his master, the man then cut the head of the cat and throw it on the floor and the cat stilled after a few shudder of a sudden death. The wife was dumbfounded of what her husband did to the cat. Next, the husband whistled to summon his pet dog, who came jumping with joy and wag its tail for getting the attention of his master. The husband asked the dog, "go, you cook and prepare our dinner for I am now hungry", the dog just wag his tail faster, then the man cut the dogs head with one blow from his sharp bolo, and blood spurted from the decapitated dog and formed a crimson pool in front of his wife .The wife was now engulfed with fear and anxiety for what she saw. Then, her husband slowly turned his head towards her direction and pointed a bloody finger to her and said, "go, you cook and prepare our dinner for I am now very hungry." Seeing this, the wife, even without hearing her husband's last word, ran to the kitchen to obey her husband.

That night, the husband ate the most delicious dinner of his life prepared by his lovely wife with her around busy attending to all his need. From that day on they became the happiest couple and lived in harmony with their growing family.