01-089 [Family]
1883.10.11 Madrid
From: José Rizal
To: Francisco Rizal Mercado
Madrid weather — Living with Lete and the Llorentes in better conditions — The local gymnasium — Drawing classes — Christmas greetings — Christmas at Madrid — Eager for family news — Political trends in Europe — The Columbus banquet.
* * *
15 Baño, 1st floor, Madrid
28 October 1883
MR. FRANCISCO RIZAL MERCADO
MY DEAR PARENTS,
Though without letters from you to give me news about your health, I know, however, through another person that you are admirably well, which makes me infinitely happy. As to myself, I’m perfectly well, without any ailment or sickness, thank God. The cold season comes rather late. Last year, by the 15th or 20th of October, almost everybody in Madrid was already wrapped up in cloak or overcoat and chilblains were beginning to show on ears and fingers. Until now I still go around without an overcoat and only at night I put it on, although carelessly. However, the rains have converted Madrid into a repugnant puddle.
I now live with Lete and the two Llorentes. Between us four, we have taken the first floor of house No. 15 on Baño Street to which you can address henceforth your letters. We have rented the furniture for 12 pesos for two years and the house costs us 19 pesos a month, which together with the cost of light, maid, water etc., etc., costs each of us 8 1/2 pesos a month. Add to this the cost of lunch which is 10 reales fuertes daily, that is, 15 pesos a month, and we save 1 1/2 pesos, because formerly we paid 24 pesos a month in worse conditions — poor lodgings and poor food. With this I send you the plan of the house. In this way we avoid being exploited too much by the leeches; we live more comfortably and more decently at least, because we aren’t crowded as in barracks, tyrannized by landladies and landlords. Our house is rather elegant, above all the parlor and the study which are very prettily papered.
As I remember having told you in my previous letter I have classes from eight in the morning until eight quarter at night, excepting a half hour that I spend taking lunch, that is, from two thirty to three o’clock in the afternoon. The gymnasium agrees well with me. Persons of all ages and of both sexes, also belonging to all social classes, go there. However the gymnasium is inferior to those we have at Manila as to its equipment and location. Girls from four to five, even young ladies of 17 and 18, young men, gentlemen, and old men of sixty exercise an hour and a half. We have seen bumps, lameness, defective hands or arms corrected little by little. By going there in groups of six or seven, one pays only 2 pesos each, but as many of our countrymen leave, we have to pay 3 pesos each month.
My drawing classes — landscape, perspective, and ancient — at the Academy[1] keep me busy five hours. My professor of landscape is a Belgian, Mr. Haes, the best in his field here. I want to know this branch of the fine arts, inasmuch as the Philippines is a country of landscapes, and models for drawing or painting figures are hard to find there. After having seen the school of fine arts at Paris, this one of this crowned villa is disillusioning and were it not for its building it can almost be said that it is equipped on a level of that at Manila, only here they give neither pencil nor paper nor crayon nor colors, as in that of Don Agustin.[2]
As probably, on account of the quarantine and the slow movement of ships, this letter will not get there until about the 15th or 20th of December, I wish you now a happy and poetic Christmas with its pre-Christmas Masses and poto bombong and salabat[3] which ought to be the joy of the little nephews and nieces. With respect to this, I’m waiting to know the name of the new nephew[4] that my sister Olimpia is going to give us. The uncles, aunts, and grandparents can prepare little Christmas presents. To their bad luck I’m very faraway, though it is true that neither did I give them any present when I was there. I don’t know how we shall spend Christmas here. It seems to me that, if it is like that of last year, I can save myself the trouble. Everybody, from the maid, postman, newsboy, barber, bootblack, gate-keeper, café waiter, university beadle, tailor, to the shoemaker — all ask one for a Christmas present, although they know that one is as clean as the paten. For lack of nephews and godchildren then, we have here a whole craving humanity, the majority of whom, like the night watchers, dedicate [vexingly] poor verses to one, others little paintings, the theater ushers chromos, and finally others, like the clothes pressers, nothing at all. From this can be deduced that here occurs the reverse of what happens there: The Chinese shoemaker, the Chinese water-carrier, and every Chinese is the one who gives presents to his customers.
I’m glad to know that the money stolen from my sister Neneng has already been found by the civil guard. This is what they have written me from Manila; I’m not very sure of it. It is true the news didn’t come from home, but after all, provided it is true, it does not matter if it is told by other persons.
If sometimes it may occur to you to write me, tell me something about the affairs of the family, for although I can’t do anything for it, nevertheless I’m sufficiently interested in it to wish to know what is happening to it. I would be happy, though, that nothing bad has happened since the last letter of the month of May that I received from there until this date.
Concerning news in general of Madrid, nothing new has occurred here since the last events at Paris: The change of ministry,[5] the majority of whose ministers are very well known at their homes; as proof of that, there is Mr. Suarez Inclan, minister of colonies, of recognized obscurity; Europe continually threatened with a frightful conflagration; the scepter of the world that is slipping from the trembling hands of decrepit France; the northern countries preparing to pick it up; Russia whose emperor has the sword of Nihilism over his head like Damocles of antiquity — this is civilized Europe.
The banquet in honor of Columbus was held here; to attend it one must pay 8 pesos, and to make a toast (it seems to me) 16 pesos. Those who shone there were the American[6] Mr. Calcaño with his poetic eloquence, or an eloquent poem, and Mr. Romero Robledo with his fluency and very tendentious speech. A countryman of ours from the Visayas, Mr. Graciano López, delivered there a speech complaining about the administration at Manila with such sublimity and hispanism that he won many times the applause and the bravos of Americans and Spaniards. It was a pity that the banquet held under such happy auspices should end with a duel between an American and a Spaniard.
With nothing more for now, regards to all our relatives and friends, kisses to the nephews, embraces to my sisters and brothers-in-law. Bless your son who loves you truly.
RIZAL
The articles you sent me through Paterno arrived, but the jars of jelly and bagoong were broken and their contents spilled.
[1] Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, Madrid.
[2] Don Agustin Sáez, director of the school of fine arts at Manila.
[3] Poto bombong or puto bumbong is steamed ground glutinous rice cooked in bamboo joints about six inches long and seasoned with a little salt and eaten with sugar and grated fresh coconut. Salabat is a beverage made of sugar md water flavored with ginger. It is the beverage that accompanies the puto bombing. The puto is cooked on the sidewalks of the streets leading to the church.
[4] He was Aristeo Ubaldo (1883-1954), who later became a noted ophthalmologist and professor at the College of Medicine, University of the Philippines.
[5] The ministry of Sagasta Martinez Campos (8 Feb. 1881-13 October 1883) was succeeded by the ministry of Posada Herrera.
[6] “American” here means Latin American.