em>Col. Ariel Querubin, who has been in detention for almost three years, was allowed to be with his 87-year old mother on her birthday on New Year’s day in their place in La Union. A friend who was there wrote to me the heartwarming reunion of the Medal of Valor awardee with his mother.
I had a very good reflection about hope and family this New Year. For the first time, I celebrated New Year out of town with a very special family. And the experience gave me a chance to reflect about how my mother had been spending Christmases away from us for 10 years now. How she must have longed to come home. Oh how I missed her now. Let me then share with you, a new year’s story about a mother and son that I will never forget…
Hours before the New Year kicked in yesterday, an 86 year old frail mother of a bemedalled soldier was standing by her cane outside the door, waiting for her son to come home. In the last 3 years, she had been hoping that among those who will come to visit is her detained son, Marines Col. Ariel Querubin, and it happened that night on the eve of New Year’s day and her 87th birthday.
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Even if it was just his silhouette forming from the distant dimmed lights, Eufrosina Querubin knew it was her son Ariel. She was already smiling and when he finally kissed and hugged her tight and said "Mamang," tears welled in her eyes and so did the Medal of Valor awardee sobbed in his mothers embrace.
Querubin has been detained for almost three years now as he stands trial in a military court for mutiny. Querubin was among the nine detained officers from the Marines together with his former Commandant Maj. Gen. Renato Miranda, whose relief triggered a stand-off at Fort Bonifacio on February 26, 2006. Along with 19 other officers from Army Scout Rangers led by Brig. Gen. Danilo Lim, they were accused of plotting to withdraw support from President Arroyo in February 2006.
Ariel's mother wasn't told that he was granted a 2-day pass to visit her. Only his sisters Yolanda who flew in from the US and Sonia knew and prepared the usual big party for their mother's birthday, and the greatest joy they could gift her with, is Ariel's homecoming. But Ariel even as he was granted the permission for a leave from detention, had somehow waited that permission will be revoked as it had always been denied in the past, and that apprehension was gone when he was finally in his mothers arms.
Ariel was initially escorted by two security personnel and two other custodial officers followed him to his home in Bauang, La Union. Amidst the joy and excitement of his children getting on a road trip to La Union with their dad, Ariel was worried if his mother will even recognize him, as she already was suffering from memory lapses on top of her hip and shoulder fracture only braced together by a metal for which she was operated earlier on. But a mother's memory will never be lost when it's about her son. Ariel's mother did not only remember him, but even his friends whom she remembered like family to them, Maj.Gen. Juancho Sabban and Brig.. Gen. John Martir.
Both were classmates of Ariel in the Philippine Military Academy and both also belonged to the Marines. Sabban is now Task Force Comet Commander and Martir is Deputy Chief of Staff for Communication and Equipment. They're both vying for the Marines Commandant post and while Sabban remained like a brother to Querubin, Martir will be a prosecution witness against his fellow Marines in the mutiny case.
"Like a son to me John calls me Mamang also. But I never expected him to forget that what we had before was more than just being neighbors in Fort Bonifacio we were like family, his kids when they came to our house were like my grandchildren too," Mamang said in straight English.
The New Year's eve in La Union gave the Querubin's their short lived moment as a family. Mamang fondly recalled how her son as a little boy had figured in many accidents and as a young soldier in many harrowing experiences. But a stand out in her memory was the day she received a telegram informing her of the death of her son.
"I really kept that telegram. The telegram told me that my son died a hero, and it spoke of his bravery and gallantry as a soldier, how I wept," she recalled of that bloodiest coup attempt in 1989 where Ariel's bullet-riddled body was lined among the dead soldiers as he was been clinically declared dead, until his finger twitched when the doctor was checking his class ring to properly identify him.
For a few years, his case was understudy by medical practitioners of how he could've possibly survived that multiple organ injury, and to this day he still got shrapnel metals embedded in his rib and legs that can still alarm metal detectors when going thru security check. The doctors only surmised that he was physically fit at that time so he stood every chance of survival. But his sister Yolly joked that Ariel could have nine lives, recalling the many car accidents he had figured in where many have died, yet he survived.
The New Year and Mamang's birthday had been a moment after 3 years for the mother and son to reconnect. They laughed as they reminisced his misdemeanors as a kid. They amazed at the thought of how he survived many near-death encounters but they were both thankful for the opportunity to be together that night, what he never did to his father until his death.
With sadness, the Querubins also remembered how Ariel who was a fugitive at that time of his father's death, couldn't even come to the wake for fear of being arrested. As military intelligence agents and authorities waited for him to show up in their home, he only spoke to his sister in a phone call from a distant sari-sari store.
"I don't know if it was fate or by design that not too long after that by accident or sheer coincidence that I was brushing elbows with my mother in Nepa Q-Mart. I was still hiding then, so I intentionally grew my hair long and sported a beard that my very own mother didn't even recognize me," Ariel was telling friends and family over dinner, while Mamang was chuckling at the thought of that incident.
"I mistook him for our neighbor who was a doctor. And when I realized it was Ariel, I hugged him, and before I could even start to cry he shoved me to a fruit stand nearby where we hugged and we exchanged how are you's," Mamang said.
Ariel was involved in the coups attempts of the 80's. He almost died in the 1989 coup but he escaped from the hospital three months after that. He was recaptured and got amnesty from the peace efforts that President Ramos offered to military rebels. He was reinstated, got back into service and started reaping military medals for his victory in combat. He got a gold cross 3 months after he returned to the service, he has 8 of those gold cross medals. He got his Medal of Valor, the highest military award, when he overran Camp John Mack, the third largest camp of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front. Most notable of his recent accomplishment was the neutralization of Abu Sayyaf spokesman Abu Sabaya.
"I have never prayed so fervently in my life as I do now. In this day and age, I offer five mysteries of the rosary every night only for Ariel, that the panel in the military court will be enlightened and touched by the holy spirit, that Ariel's lungs will always be healthy, that his diabetes will be gone and his malaria will be healed," Mamang said saying she doesn't pray for herself anymore after all she is managing her diet to keep up with her arthritis.
Already wrinkled and crouched in old age, Mamang still stands proud of her son. She showed a fine breeding that is evident in her son. The Querubins were not a wealthy clan here, but obviously they are respected. Their house is no mansion, but it's a comfortable home that did not have to ask his son more than he could earn. Everyone in the family stood for each other, and the people here are admired them for that.
"Ariel will always live his father's legacy, that is a good name. He will never go up the rank by any other means but his hard work. I don't mind him going only as far as a colonel, to me his my son, always my hero," Mamang said.
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