Elvira’s Quest

Elvira’s Paradise has come to a temporary standstill, construction wise, until we find an investor, we have had a number of enquiries resulting from our search, but none have actually come up with the money.

So to keep myself occupied I agreed to run in the Mrs. KFAANT, which stands for the Katherine Filipino Australian Association of the Northern Territory. It is a quest run every second year to raise funds for the KFAANT. I was approached by the President, Mrs. Rose Hewitt, Marichu Rawson and probably my best friend Mrs. Judy Payne and asked if I would enter the quest.

The winner of the quest is determined purely on the amount of funds raised by each contestant. This is the major fundraising venture by the Association, therefore a successful quest is most important to the Association, it needs the funds to pay for the rates, electricity, maintenance and if there is any money left in the bank, some capital works programs.

Some people have told me that I am crazy for entering the quest when I have so much on my plate. They tell me that I should concentrate on developing the Tourist Park, but if you can’t contribute to your community and try to improve the lives of the people around you, why were we put on this earth?

The final counting of the funds raised is to be held on Wednesday 27/08/08 and the crowning of the Mrs. KFAANT is to be conducted at the Annual Bario Fiesta on Saturday 30/08/08. Some of the Stalwarts of the Association are providing the entertainment for the evening by way of a number of traditional Filipino dances, and each contestant is going to showcase their talent as well as joining in with the local Filipino dancers for one number.

The other 2 contestants will be performing dances from the provinces that they come from and I will be singing, I hope. My voice hasn’t been up to scratch lately, due to a mild attack of the flu. Hopefully everyone will enjoy the evening of Filipino entertainment and food.

Meanwhile I am waiting for our first shipment of Cabins, Gazebos and Household and Garden furniture to arrive. It is scheduled to arrive in Australia by the end of September now, due to the cutback of ships coming to Darwin from Asia.

The hunt for one or more Investors continues as well. There is somebody out there in this big wonderful world of ours who can see the financial advantages of an Investment in Elvira’s Paradise, we just have to be patient and they will come. As it says in the Kevin Costner movie, “If you build it they will come”.

More Snippets from the Life of Elvira Loquias

When I was 15yrs old we had quite a few relatives living in our house in Davao, amongst them were my first cousins Virgie and Wilson, and my second cousins Dante, and Tata. Dante was studying to be a priest but had decided to pull out; he entered University to study accounting. Even though he already had a girlfriend he was showing an interest in me, as well as a few other men in our area, but I was too shy to entertain their attention.

Dante used to help me with my homework and would sit close to me at the kitchen table. One night while he was sitting next to me helping me with my homework he put his hand on my leg, and I thought “oh my god I’m not a virgin anymore”. That’s how naive I was at the time. Anyway one thing led to another and eventually we started a relationship.

We tried to keep it quiet, as we both knew that my mother especially wouldn’t like it. We used to go to the movies after school and go for walks on the beach nearby. One time when we were at the movies an uncle of mine saw us and told my mother. She hit the roof; as a result she kicked Dante and me out of home. Dante went his own way and I was left to my own devices. I was 16 by this time and had nowhere to stay; none of my relatives helped me for fear of upsetting my mother.

I ended up staying with a lady, who was a neighbour, who knew of my predicament. She told me that I could stay with her and she would help me continue with my studies, I was so grateful to her. I would get home from school and cook for her and wash her clothes and clean the house. There was one thing that I found confusing about her, she slept through the whole day and stayed out all night. I was only with her for a couple of weeks before I gathered the courage to ask her why she went out every night.

She told me that she was seeing different men each night and that they gave her money that is how she had enough money to support me. It dawned on me that she was a prostitute, and I couldn’t bear the thought that I was being supported by a prostitute. It went against all of my religious beliefs. I decided to find Dante, as my current situation was partly his fault.

I finally tracked him down and convinced him that I was now his responsibility, and we got a room to rent. I fell pregnant with my first child during my 17^th year. When his family found out that I was pregnant they told me that they would pay me if I got rid of the baby or gave them the baby after he was born. I used that money to go to Zamboanga; Dante had a brother there who was a doctor. I didn’t go there to get rid of the baby; I just wanted to get away from Davao until it was too late to get an abortion.

I only stayed with his brother the doctor for a few weeks. At first Dante’s brother didn’t want me to stay with him but I convinced him that it was Dante’s baby and that it was his families responsibility to look after me somehow. Dante was aware of where I was but didn’t tell anyone else in his family. Once I was 4mths pregnant I went back to Davao to stay with Dante. But after I went back he didn’t stay home much and when I would ask him why he always told me that he was working or playing basketball. One day I followed him and found out that there were 2 other women who thought that he was living with them.

How he managed to have 3 women all thinking that they were the only one that he was living with, I still don’t know. I contacted both women and they said that as I was the one that was pregnant they would leave Dante alone. We lived happily, or so I thought.

Before I gave birth my mother got sick from Meningitis and was admitted to hospital, I tried to visit her as often as I could but my sister told the nurses that I wasn’t welcome there, so sometimes they would refuse me entry into the hospital ward. When my mother passed away, at the age of 32, I would go to our family home to make sure that my younger brothers were being looked after. They weren’t.

My father was already seeing another woman only 2wks after my mother died. In the area that our family home was, all of the houses were abutting each other, and a fire started that couldn’t be put extinguished. Even though the fire started over a kilometre from our home we only had time to get the families clothes, we couldn’t save anything else.

All of the residents who lost their homes were billeted in the local school assembly hall. That was the last time we saw our father for quite a few months, he moved in with his girlfriend, soon to become his second wife, and told us that we would have to look after ourselves. I made sure that the younger ones had somewhere to stay, my sister went on her own, my brother Rueben took care of his older brother Bulloy, and Nilo and I looked after Eric and Jun Jun.

When I went into labour Dante took me to the hospital. I was in labour for 27hrs most of which was spent in the corridor of the maternity ward. While I was there a doctor came to examine me and during the examination I felt an immense feeling of relief while the doctor was seeing how dilated I was. So from then on every time a man walked past in a white coat I asked him to examine me, it really did relieve the pain.

Finally when the first doctor who examined me came back I asked him how many doctors were on duty, he said he was the only one. I now imagine that the first bogus doctor was the cleaner or something and he went and told all his friends, and they took turns at wearing his white coat. Some people may think that this is funny, but it was a long time before I did.

When I awoke after the baby was born it was over 2 days since Dante had brought me there. I asked the nurses if anybody had visited me and she told said that not one person had come to see me or enquired about me. In the Philippines if you don’t pay your hospital bill they won’t let you take your baby home, so as soon as the nurse left I bundled up my baby and escaped from the hospital. When I got home I saw that Dante had taken all of his clothes.

I knew that there were only 3 places that he would go, Cebu, Zamboanga and Manila, as he had relatives in those cities. I wrote these three names on pieces of paper, folded them up and prayed for a long time for god to let me pick the right city. I picked Manila; I didn’t know anyone in Manila. Remember I was 17, naive, and alone. I packed a bag with all of my possessions and went to my grandmothers house to tell her what I was going to do, and asked her if she would send Eric and Jun Jun to me once I found somewhere to stay in Manila.

She gave me all the money that she had, which was only 5pesos, and told me that we had a cousin who was a purser on the Williams shipping line, and he worked on the ship that ferried between Davao and Manila. I stood at the bottom of the gangplank to the ship waiting to see a lady of the right age to follow up the gangplank. I knew how things worked there, I would follow a lady up the gangplank but a little behind her, carrying my baby, I would be stopped by the attendant and asked for my ticket, I would then tell him that I was the babysitter for that lady up ahead and she had my ticket.

In the Philippines you never question someone who you think is rich, so he let me go. I sat on the deck out in the open trying to avoid the ticket collector, but he finally came to me and asked for my ticket. I admitted to him that I didn’t have a ticket but that my cousin was the purser on the ship. My cousin was called, and I introduced myself to him. I begged him to let me stay on the ship until Manila and that somehow I would repay him if he paid for my ticket.

After he did this for me I had another surprise, they found Eric. He had followed me onto the ship and hid in a toilet until the ship had left the harbour. Being only 4 years of age I had to admit that he was one brave little boy, but it meant that I had to ask our cousin the purser to stand me for another ticket for Eric.

Kelvin, my baby, was hungry, cold and dirty, and was crying constantly. A lady came over to me and told me that for some reason she felt connected to the baby and asked if she could hold him, she also gave me some money to buy some milk for him, as I didn’t have breast milk due to my malnourished state.

While she was nursing my baby I told my story about how I had done my raffle and Manila was chosen to find my baby’s father. But that I didn’t know anyone in Manila and I had placed my trust in God. I showed her a photo of Dante, she was shocked, and she told me that she knew him. He was a distant cousin of hers and she was going to Manila to his wedding.

When we got off the ship, her father and mother were waiting for her; she introduced me to them and was slapped in the face, in front of me, for bringing me with her. I explained the situation to them and told them that we had only just met on the ship. I forced them to give me a bed for the night and promised that the next day I would leave them alone.

The next day I found out where Dante was working and went to his office. There I showed him his baby and convinced him to take us in and cancel the wedding. We then moved into a room that an Aunty of his had. They were very poor and survived on the pittance that Dante’s mother sent to them. Once Dante’s mother found out that we were living with them she stopped sending them money. Of course eventually they told us that we would have to move out, because they would starve without his mothers help.

The night they turned us away a cyclone was battering Manila. We walked until we got to Munoz Markets where we could stand out of the rain and wind, we just stood there for hours, until eventually I asked Dante where we were going to stay. Thinking that he was the man and would know what to do. He said that we would just stay there until someone feels sorry for us and takes us in.

I was not going to just stand there and wait for something to happen. Eric was already picking up the centavos that people were throwing at our feet. Passers-by thought that we were beggars. I handed Kelvin to Dante and told them all to wait there; I would find us a place to stay.

I picked up the skewers that were thrown on the street, they were used to skewer the chicken feet that were being cooked and sold on the sidewalk. I then stuck them in the ground as I walked and I kept going until I found a sign advertising a room for rent. I knocked on the door of the house with the sign and made a deal with the owner to let us stay there on the promise that I would pay them as soon as we could, and that I would cook and clean for them as well.

The room that she gave us had a dirt floor, I mad a hammock for Kelvin so that he wouldn’t have to sleep in the dirt and Eric lay across mine and Dante’s legs to keep him off the floor as well. Dante and I slept sitting up. Dante lost his job as soon as he broke off his wedding because his wife to be was the manager’s secretary. But I have to give him credit; the day after we slept in the dirt he got a job as a taxi driver.

A soon as we had saved some money I went off again to find somewhere better to stay, that is how I met the woman who I will call Mummy for the rest of my life along with hundreds of other people whom she has taken into her home. Mummy had a big house not far from Munoz Markets and someone told me that she often rents rooms out and that she is a very kind lady.

I went to Mummy’s house and told her my story and straight away she said that I could stay in her spare room. Compared to sleeping on a dirt floor I felt as though I was in a palace at Mummy and Kuya’s house, Kuya is Mummy’s husband, and he likes to be called Kuya because he likes to think that he is everyone’s elder brother. A nicer couple you would never meet.

Going to Bali

Well it’s only 2 more days and I’m off to Bali with my friend Amanda. My man couldn’t come with me, well someone has to work, so I asked Amanda if she would accompany me. I am going there to have a look at some Cabins and Furniture for the Tourist Park. The one thing that my man keeps asking me to remember to get is one of those wooden bridges, he says that he is going to build a big water feature along the side of the Ablutions/Entertainment Shed, and he wants to put the bridge in the middle so that our guests can walk from the Caravan Park area over the Water Feature via the bridge into the Entertainment area. Sounds spectacular, we’ll see how it turns out, I hope he is right, and I hope that he can do it. Years ago he couldn’t even change a light bulb, but now he thinks that he has become quite the handyman. I would really like to buy four poster beds, and traditional Balinese furniture for the huts, and then we have to make the gardens as tropical as possible. My man wants to be the full time gardener, so he is making sure that there are enough gardens to turn the job into a full time one.

I am not going to describe the Bathrooms until they are completed, but what I have in mind will be most unusual, and I hope beautiful. Anyway, a week in Bali to most people sounds like a nice little holiday, but I am expecting it to be hectic and even a little stressful. My man has been dealing with a few people on the Internet getting prices and designs, and we came to realize that I might have better luck and quicker action if I go over there and deal directly with them, perhaps the manufacturers and myself will understand each other better on a face to face basis as opposed to using the written word. Just so that you can put a face to a name I will post a picture of Amanda and myself at the back of the waterfall in the swimming pool.

7 to 8 yrs of Age

We didn’t have running water in our house, not many people did in our province, so we had to go down to the river with buckets and get our water, this is commonly called pitching water in the Philippines. Kids being kids I thought that my mother was picking on me because it seemed to me that I was the only one in our family who was told to pitch water. I complained to my father, and not long after that complaint he decided to dig a well next to our house. I remember fondly sitting at the top while he dug the well talking to him for hours at a time. I thought that I was helping him; sometimes I would pass him something or help him pull the bucket of soil up to the surface. Once the well was finished all of our neighbours, most of whom were relatives, came to our house to get their water. I would stand at the gate and threaten the kids who were pitching the water. I told them that they couldn’t have the water because none of their family helped my father and I dig the well. Once again, I got belted by my mother for this, she told me that I have to be more giving and charitable. It didn’t stop me, I still wouldn’t let them take water from our well if my mother wasn’t there and as well I threatened to bash them if they told. Remember I was only 7 or 8 years old.

We lived approximately an hours quick walk from school and I have always hated walking, so when I started school I walked the first day, but I noticed that there were trucks, carrying logs to the sawmill in town, driving past every few minutes. On my second day of school I took my time leaving home, so my sister and brothers were well ahead of me, I did this on purpose. My plan was to flag down a truck and ask the driver if he would take me to school. The first truck to come along went past without even slowing down so when the next one came along I jumped out onto the road and waved my arms, it was either stop or run me over, thank god he stopped. I gave him a sob story about me being to little to walk to school alone and that I was scared, he told me that if I was at this spot at this time every day he would stop and take me into town. I was rapt. My sister and brothers couldn’t work out how I managed to get to school before them, and I didn’t tell them for a long time, when the truck would pass them while they were walking I would crouch down so that they couldn’t see me. When I did tell them they told my mother who forbade me to get in the truck anymore.

When I was in Grade 4 my father got a job as a Nestle representative, sounds impressive, but it wasn’t by today’s standards, it entailed pushing a delivery cart around his designated area, so he had to move from Nabuntaran to Davao City, I missed him so much that I didn’t eat properly and lost a lot of weight. I was a real daddy’s girl. When my father came home to Nabuntaran on weekends I would sneak out of the house and go down the mountain to my uncle’s home, there I would wait for my father to arrive on the bus and walk home with him. The problem was that he didn’t arrive until about midnight and it was a 4hr walk home. Mum wasn’t happy with me when I did this, but my father was. I would only walk for a few minutes then my father would hoist me up onto his shoulders and carry me the rest of the way.

Sometimes when she would chastise me he would stick up for me, telling her that it was good that I was different to all the others, and that one day I might be rich like I always told them, then I could look after them. He really believed that I would be the one child of his that would make a success of my life. I used to tell them that I was going to be rich, not knowing what rich was, I just wanted to be rich because my mother told me that if I wanted to own a car I would have to marry a rich man. I don’t want to be rich, I just want to have enough to be able to do what my mother taught me, share my good fortune. If Elvira’s Paradise is successful I fully intend to help the deserving people.

I nagged my mother to let me go and live in Davao with my father, telling her that I didn’t belong in the jungle, I wanted to see the world, and at that time the world was just somewhere bigger than Nabuntaran. How things have changed, back then i nearly starved myself to death to get out of the jungle, and now i am developing a Tourist Park, Elvira’s Paradise, in what i refer to as the Jungle or in the bush. It’s not as bad as it sounds; it’s only 10 klms from Katherine in the Northern Territory of Australia. My cousins who lived nearby used to run away and climb up trees to hide if a stranger came to their house, that is how remote and shy the people were, I didn’t want to be like them. Finally mum agreed to let me go to Davao, she was concerned that I was losing so much weight that I might get sick. Once in a while she would visit in Davao, but it was a tough task, with my older sister and 3 brothers, at that time, and no vehicle, so she didn’t come much.

My Father would finish his rounds and then go to the park to play the Filipino version of checkers, for money of course, staying there until very late into the night. I had to fend for myself; I did my own cooking and washing, for myself and for him. Even though I love my father very much I have to admit that he is a very selfish man, a bad gambler and sometimes a heavy drinker, he has always put himself before anyone else. I lost more weight than I was losing in Nabuntaran; this made my mother decide to move the family to Davao.

Once the whole family were united in Davao my father didn’t go out as much, but he started bringing his friends and neighbours home. He would buy the alcohol for them and make my mother feed all of them, she didn’t mind doing this because in her mind we were better off than they were, and it is good to share your good fortune. We had several cousins from Nabuntaran staying with us because once we moved to the city their parents sent them to school in the city, the education standards were better there than in the province. They of course stayed for free but they were expected to do the housework, cooking and other menial chores. Once again I started to get belted by my mother. My fault was that being a child I tended to look at things with a simplistic viewpoint. Because these cousins worked in our house and didn’t get paid for their work I referred to them as slaves. My mother tried to get me out of this habit by belting me, but it didn’t work, if she told me to do something I would say “tell one of the slaves to do it, it’s their job”, bang, I would get hit. My theory was that if you worked and didn’t get paid that was slavery.

One of the cousins was Wilson, I loved him very much and still do, when I look at a picture of him that was taken on our last visit to the Philippines I get all emotional, I miss him above all of my other cousins, sometimes even more than my sister and brothers. Wilson is now a Pentecostal minister in Nabuntaran, unpaid, and he has a small cocoa plantation. His annual income is only about $2,000 Australian, but has still managed to put 4 of his children through university.

My father eventually became the manager of the factory, he then proceeded to employ as many family members as he could, giving them jobs to lessen his workload, to the point where he had nothing to do so he could spend all of his time in the park playing checkers and gambling all of his pay away. If my mother didn’t get to him before he lost his pay packet we would have very little to eat for the week.

My older brother Bulloy started to shine shoes in the park after school, just to earn some pocket money. He would put all of his earnings in a tin moneybox, one that you couldn’t get your money out of unless you destroyed the tin. He thought that his money would be safe that way, WRONG. He would shine a mans shoes for a few centavos, so it took a long time to save up an amount that he could use to buy whatever he wanted to buy. I worked out how do get the money out of the tin without damaging it, this was quite and achievement for an 8 year old. But I had to work out how to do this without him finding out. I knew that he wouldn’t open it until it was full, this would waste the money that he spent on the tin box if he opened it before it was full. My brother was very frugal. I came up with the idea of putting steel washers in that were about the same size as the coins that I took out, and when the tin got close to being full I kept it just short of filling to prolong the act of opening up the tin. Finally he opened up the tin to reap the rewards of his months of hard work, imagine the look on his face when all he got was a tin full of washers. He went to my mother crying that someone had stolen his money. She lined all of the children up and asked each one if they had stolen Bulloy’s money. I was at the end of the line. The first in line denied the theft, and got a belting just in case he was lying, straight away, not wanting any more of my brothers or sister to get belted because of me, I owned up to the theft. My mother gave me a whack and my father stepped in to prevent more severe punishment. My mother and father had a huge argument over his intervention, and all he said to me when we were alone was that I was a naughty, naughty little girl.

The Early Years

Elvira Loquias – Autobiography

I thought that I would put my life story onto my Website so that people can understand what drives me, and learn a little about why and how I have got to the point in my life that I now am. Elvira’s Paradise,( i.e.: my Tourist Park), is a culmination of my life’s experiences. Remember while you are reading this story, that I came from a very poor family, my mother and father had very little education, and in general, the inhabitants of the Philippines are a very superstitious people.
I was born on 1/11/61, All Saints Day, in Nabuntaran, Davao City, Mindanao Island, The Philippines. The first chapter in the story of my life begins as related to me by my Mother.
Only a few weeks after I was born, my mother thought that I was a sickly child, so she took me to an old lady, who supposedly was something of a witch. She told my mother that the only way that I would survive and live a normal life was if my mother gave me to her and then bought me back off of her. My mother was horrified, she didn’t want to give me away no matter how poor she was, but the witch assured her that this was the only way of casting off whatever spell that had been placed upon me. So very early in my life it was decided that I was worth the princely sum of 1peso.
Then when I was only a couple of months of age my Mother had to go away to visit her family to sort out some problems that they were having. She left me in the care of my Grandfather as she was only going to be gone for 1 night, and didn’t think that she should take me with her because of the pollution. I was apparently born with weak lungs so the pollution affected me badly. I believe that I suffered from infantile asthma.
When my Mother arrived back home, of course the first thing she did was look for me. She couldn’t find me anywhere and my grandfather was off visiting some of his friends. When he returned home my Mother asked him where I was. He said that as soon as she left I began to cry and he became annoyed with me, so he took me into the Jungle and left me there so that he couldn’t hear my crying. It didn’t occur to him that I might need a nappy change or something to eat.
My Mother was furious with my Grandfather, not only because he left me in the Jungle, but also because he couldn’t remember where he left me; all he could tell them was that it was far enough away from the house so that he couldn’t hear my crying anymore. She had all of the neighbours out in the jungle looking for me. Eventually they found me, hungry, crying and dirty but otherwise fit and healthy. She kicked my Grandfather out of our house, telling him that he should have treated one of his own grandchildren better than he treats one of his fighting cocks or dogs. If one of his animals was crying or injured he wouldn’t just take it out in the jungle and leave it there, he would have gone and got someone to have a look at it to see what was wrong. From then on I had very little contact with my grandfather, and my mother never made him welcome in our home.