Early this month I was in Davao and it took a great resolve on my part not to watch Caregiver, knowing that it got raves from oggs cruz (http://oggsmoggs.blogspot.com/) and lilit reyes (http://egreyes.blogspot.com/), two movie critic bloggers whose views I truly value even if I disagree with some of them. No, not that I don’t like Sharon Cuneta, I just felt the movie---judging from its trailer—was too close to home; Ate Mai, our nurse-niece, works as a carer in London.
Then last week, I was back in Davao, and with nothing much to do on Wednesday night, I decided to watch Caregiver: it was a mistake!
Before Ate Mai, I had no idea how miserable a nurse’s life is in a care home in London. And it was surreal because almost everything that Ate Mai told me was depicted in the film. I cried the whole time Sharon was shown in the care home doing exactly the things Ate Mai told me she does in London: enduring the eccentricities and occasional violent outbursts of patients with alzheimers and dementia; doing the toilet and the laundry; throwing the garbage and a slew of things that a nurse normally doesn’t do.
One time Ate Mai told me that every time she cuts the nails of her patients, reads to them, or just holds their hands, regret always creeps into her, regret that she hasn’t done the same thing to her lola, our mama, who died when Ate Mai was just six years old. Being an eldest apo, Ate Mai is a lola's girl.
If one thing, Caregiver serves as a reality check, especially for Ate Mai’s siblings. Now they know what Ate Mai has to give up here and to put up with in London just so they will have a comfortable life. As I sat in the cold moviehouse of SM, I wished that Ate Mai wouldn’t reach a point where, like Sharon, she has to remain in London for lack of choice.
The one thing I told Ate Mai on the phone minutes before she planed in for London last May was this: If things get real tough, always remember that you have a family to come home to, one that loves you so much no matter what.
