Second Post - Noel Tadiar Florendo

My earliest recollections of the Florendo family were when we arrived in Dumaguete late 1948. Our family moved there so Mom and Dad could both practice medicine at Silliman University Mission Hospital. Auntie Lina was very instrumental in getting us to Dumaguete from San Fernando, La Union. I was born on November 11, 1944 to Federico Florendo, Jr (eldest son Tatang,) and Purificacion Tadiar. It was a wonderful childhood spent with the families of Auntie Lina and Uncle Joe Rabor, Uncle Teddy and Auntie Vic Florendo, Uncle Ando and Auntie Nonette, and several other aunties, uncles, and cousins including the children of Tatang’s brother, Lolo Felino.

I left Dumaguete in 1956 to start high school at UP Prep in Manila but returned to Silliman after one year to finish high school graduating in 1960. I again returned to UP to start college but left there after three months to enroll in Wartburg College in Waverly, Iowa courtesy of recommendations from the Drs. Tiempo of Silliman (well known Philippine literary figures) who had taught earlier at Wartburg. Starting college at 15 was extremely difficult since I had a huge cultural and educational barrier – the only course that I was more than prepared for was biology which Auntie Lina had taught at Silliman High School. In spite of these obstacles I graduated.

In 1964 I started in the PhD program at the University of Tennessee in Memphis in Anatomy. My research on the substructure of a cellular organelle, the ribosome, gained me an invitation to be a research fellow at Yale University where I worked and published with Paul Greengard. Dr. Greengard was awarded the Nobel Prize in Medicine and Physiology in 2000. I subsequently returned to the University of Tennessee in Memphis where I earned my MD degree, graduating first in my class and recipient of the medicine award.

After graduating I decided to stay in Memphis and do my residency in Pathology at the Baptist Memorial Hospital. During my senior year I was one of the pathologists who performed the autopsy on Elvis Presley and was later interviewed on ABC’s 20/20 by Geraldo Rivera. I am still to this day being asked about the autopsy results.

Currently I am a staff pathologist with a group of 20 colleagues. During my 30 years with the group I served 10 years as president and now I am content to read slides and do routine pathology work. My sister, Joy, still practices internal medicine in Ohio. Her daughter, Cristina, also a pathologist, joined our group in 2000 . My brother, Fred, is now retired from cardiovascular surgery and resides in Phoenix. Fred had to retire early because of an untreatable skin allergy to surgical gloves.

My daughter, Katherine, practices neonatology in Kansas City and has three children with husband Chuck who is a perinatologist. Alan, my son, has an MBA and law degree, and practices in Manhattan, New York. My wife, Debbie, and I currently reside in Memphis with our two dogs. My mother divides her time between living in Memphis and Dumaguete where we still have our family residence.

Joy, Fred, and I try to visit Dumaguete every year where we enjoy scuba diving. We also enjoy skiing every winter almost always in the Snow Mass/Aspen area. Earlier in life I was avid biker, swimmer, and runner and participated in triathlons for three seasons, but now I am content to enjoy the “triathlon” of the “young once” – hot tub, steam baths, and massage.

Retirement? Not anytime soon.

Pictures:

Noel with his then 4 year old grand daughter Mary-Olivia.

















Group photo taken at Joy’s wedding in June –
Standing is Fred, Noel, Debbie, Bill(Joy’s husband)
Seated is Auntie Puring, Joy, Candy (Fred’s wife)

First Post - Donato Joaquin

Dony aka Junior

Manong Rudy and I were born during tumultuous times in Europe, a time when the Fascists were taking over Germany and Italy. Over a quarter century later, I was preparing for a trip abroad and I needed a birth Certificate to secure my first passport. Mama spent hours waiting at the Manila Post Office but they could not locate a certificate for Donato, Jr.

Giving vent to her suspicions, she asked the clerk to check if there was a Mussolini Joaquin born on October 5, 1938. Sure enough there was and not only that there was an Adolf Hitler Joaquin born the year before. Papa wanted those names for us, perhaps enamored by the rise to power ofthose strong men but Mama had vehemently objected. Doing the next best thing that he could, Papa covertly registered us under those names and never told a soul. When his secret was revealed he must have convulsed with laughter as he lay in his grave. It also dawned on me why he was calling Nicky, Tojo and Doel, Truman.

A short notarized document legalized my name and off I went to Japan and Taipei the first of numerous trips that in a span of 20 years my company, the Caterpillar distributor for the Philippines, asked me to take. To attend meetings, speak at meetings, visit factories, travel with
customers and all sorts of reasons (and excuses) including representing the company in a golf tournament in Hong Kong.

It was during those years I met for the first time my bride, Nina, despite the fact that I had known her brothers and her mom many years before then. And this was long after A. Lois and A Nora had for years boarded with Nina’s family in Malate, Manila.

Dony (43), Nina (36), Rally (11), Sandy (8), Nadine (6)

Shortly before moving to California

Nina and I were married at the U.P. Chapel after a whirlwind courtship that lasted barely a year and was highlighted by a few breakups. And make ups. We quickly had four children but our first born died at infancy. So now we have Jose Dante called Rally, born during the First Quarter Storm of 1970 at the start of Marcos’ evil regime, Jose Alejandro also called Sandy and Anna Dina nicknamed Nadine. Sandy and Anna are names dear to us because these were the nom de guerre that Nina had used during her activist days. No need to stretch to deduce how Rally got his name.


It was always my desire to become an engineer like U. Ando and I felt proud to be the second in the family to be a tech guy when I completed my Mechanical Engineering course. Nina and I are both from the University of the Philippines which is the alma mater of the four eldest Florendos, Lina, Lydia, Elisa and Fred. None of my children had the chance to go to the UP, nevertheless our boys are now techies too. Rally is an Aerospace Engineer (Cal State Pomona) and Sandy an Environmental Engineer (UC Berkeley, MS UM Amherst). These disciplines are new and did not even exist during my time.

Nina I had dearly wanted to have a doctor in the family like the Rabors and the Fred Florendos, so Nadine is obliging us, and in about a year she will complete her PhD in Linguistics (UCLA). We should have done a better job at explaining to her better what we really wanted. At least we
know she is happy and successful at what she is doing. What I am dead certain is that I have clearly explained to our kids that it is a blessing to have grandchildren, and it is their duty to keep the family name in a continuum. But what does this old man really know. In time one of them may settle down and yield an offspring..perhaps before the Olympics go back to China.

Nina, my bride

It won’t be long now before I hang up my gloves. In the meantime I try to keep sharp and engaged pursuing my work at Terra Firma Mortgage, our real estate loan company. But I know I will persist on being physically active for as long as I can as would be expected from the life long runner that I consider my self to be.

Of the many marathons races that I have ran, two of the most memorable ones are the historic Boston Marathon, the acclaimed Mecca for all true-blue runners and the Berlin Marathon. I have run marathons with Rally and some other shorter races with Sandy but the only time both boys ever ran with me was in Berlin. It was special for me that without any prodding the boys had taken up the sport that I have learned to love. Someone asked if it was not a bigger deal that the boys became techies like me. I reflected a bit but said no it wasn’t simply because the boys were by nature techies all along.

The prognosis for another marathon run are now dimming for me considering the manifest chronological clock we are all bound by and the unexpected heart by-pass procedure that I underwent last year. But it could still be possible if ever I can find a race route that is flat. It is strange but the ones I have ran seemed to be all uphill.

With the children on their own Nina and I are now mostly by ourselves, it is not so stressful anymore. We try to travel a little bit and of late Nina had arranged a Mediterrenean cruise for my birthday with the kids and other friends in October. How could it be so? It is almost incongruous that I am not even used to being sixty, yet in a few short weeks I will be a bent septuagenarian.

Rally (38), Nadine (32) and Sandy (35)
Perhaps before the next Olympics in China

Next year I would like to spend a little more time at Casa Joaquin B&B especially during the cooler months early in the year. Perhaps it was really meant for me to live the life of a hard working inn keeper.