Scent of Apples - A Collection of Stories (Bookzcity)

Further Details About This Book:

San Francisco, circa 1967. We are a restless, homesick pair, my mother
and I. Ensconced in a gloomy flat, we are trying desperately to
adjust to a new world and act like everything’s fine. But there are
visible chinks in our armor. At least once a year and no matter
how little money we have, my mother finds a way to go back to
Manila and visit everyone and everything we’ve left behind. She
just can’t seem to let go. I, on the other hand, stay put and find my
solace in reading books and writing sappy poetry. No way am I
going back or admitting that I miss anyone or anything. We’ve
been in America for only four years, but the Philippines and my
beloved Manila are like a distant planet. I’ve decided it’s best to
forget and deny.

During one of her trips back to Manila, my mother comes
across The Day the Dancers Came, a collection of stories by one Bienvenido
N. Santos, in a local bookstore. Intrigued by the book’s
evocative title and bright yellow cover, she decides to buy the
book as a gift for me.

Reading those stories was an eye-opening experience. My education
in the Philippines was of the convent-school variety, overwrought
and colonial. We were taught the literature of Longfellow,
Kipling, and their ilk, but nothing by Filipino writers. It was
as if they didn’t exist. Ironically, it took emigrating to the United
States to shock me from my sleep.