By Michealina V. David
NOSTALGIC.
This is how most millennials delineate streets, where juvenile moments are embedded in cement and asphalt.
One of these streets is named after a flower—Rosal, in the young city of Las Piñas. And nostalgia for the foregone is found here: the carinderia of 56-year-old Aling Cynthia.
A resident on Rosal Street since 1989, many millennials living in this subdivision fed on the meals she sold and still sells, especially her specialty chicken adobo.
Aling Cynthia’s day starts at dawn sweeping fallen leaves into a pile at the corner of a yard fronting her wooden house.
That house are the first few built on the street nearly three decades ago.
She remembers there were still no flooding that time, and neighbors were sparse.
Her customers, nonetheless, were still more than a handful.
“Hindi pa masyado matao noon, nagtitinda na ako. Pero ang mga tao lalabas pa, bibili sa mga liit-liitan ng mga bahay na may tinda-tindahan na,” Aling Cynthia told the BusinessMirror. She said it’s different today as most of the houses on the streets have two to three floors. Despite that, the floodwater have seeped onto the first floor.
Aling Cynthia blames the building frenzy too as, in her simple logic, the growing pile of garbage, for the flooding.
“Walang disiplina, eh. Kahit sa loob ng kanal sinasaksak ’yung basura, sa kalsada, kaya bumabara.”
She thinks the people have grown alienated with their neighbors, so much so children are no longer playing on the street.
“Noon nag-e-exert talaga ’yung mga bata na napagpapawisan, nakapag-iisip, naglalaro talaga nung pisikal talaga na laro,” she told the BusinessMirror. “Ngayon, hindi ka na napapawisan kaya ang mga bata obese, may diabetes.”
From her small eatery, Aling Cynthia was able to raise her three daughters. She was also able to save enough to buy a small house in Cavite.
Nowadays, the store opens intermittently, as Aling Cynthia stays frequently away from her home on Rosal Street. Likewise, the arrival of customers have become few and far between.
Indeed, time has changed institutions and, with some residents here considering Aling Cynthia as one, it will do so for streets like this one of the young city of Las Piñas.
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Michealina V. David is an intern of the BusinessMirror. Her story is the first of a series under the Millennials page where we ask millennials to write something about his or her street. Contributors may send a story or feedback to the editor at dennis.estopace@gmail.com.
Image credits: Michealina V. David