Searching For Borges
For four Filipinos, the search for the final resting place of the Argentine literary icon, Jorge Luis Borges, in Geneva, becomes a journey into the mysteries of the soul
It was Vilma’s idea. She had this remarkable notion that the Argentine poet and fictionist, Jorge Luis Borges, was buried in the heart of Geneva. “I read it somewhere or must have heard it from someone,” she said. “I’m almost certain that Borges was finally laid to rest in this city.” She proposed that we spend the morning of the following day, a Saturday, to look for the gravesite of Borges. Such an expedition offered an excuse to explore the historic part of the city like they’d never done before.
Earlier that Friday, February 22, Vilma missed the sightseeing trip to Montreaux. She had to go to work in one of the international offices in Geneva that tries to secure civilians in times of war and systematic violence. That trip was the brainchild of Claro, her husband and my brother. He took me and my wife Jo on a tour of the lakeside town of Montreaux where a medieval castle had been converted into a museum, and where, every year in summer, some of the finest jazz musicians converge in concert. It was Vilma’s turn to direct the tour itinerary the following day, a non-working Saturday.
The decision to search for Borges was agreed upon that Friday evening in the apartment of Angelica, Vilma’s work colleague from Mexico. She was due to leave for Budapest to assume a new assignment. She gladly welcomed me and Jo to stay a few days in her flat, amid the clutter of boxes and luggage being prepared for another destination. Her apartment window had a view of the magnificent Mont Blanc and was right across the main train station of metro Geneva. That evening, even Angelica sparkled at the idea of four Filipinos looking for the final resting place of a revered literary icon of Argentina, buried in this central city of Switzerland.
He belonged to the rich company of Julio Cortazar, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Pablo Neruda, Octavio Paz, and many more South and Central Americans who assaulted the humidity of our imagination.
It was 2008. Vilma and Claro had been residing in the mountain town of Crozet in France, a few kilometers away from the border of Geneva. Because we couldn’t get our French visas, Jo and I opted to visit neighboring Geneva for a few days to fulfill an agreement with Vilma and Claro to spend some time together. We were on our way back to the Philippines after working for two years in Macedonia, one of the countries in the Balkan region that still makes Europe unpredictable and appealing.
All four of us are blood Filipinos. We have been living away from the home archipelago for several years. Vilma is quite special. She was born in Spain of Filipino parents. Her father was a pelotari who played the Basque game of jai-alai in the Philippines before migrating to the country where the sport originated. She grew up in the United States. When she met Claro in New York, they were like stars in the sky utterly oblivious that they were part of a brilliant constellation.
Work opportunities brought all four of us to places that once existed only in the geography of our dreams––Mexico, Sri Lanka, and Switzerland for Vilma and Claro; Bhutan and Macedonia for me and Jo. Like many other members of our respective clans, we had dispersed like pollen in the wind. At one point in time and space, Claro and I did not see each other for 15 years. During that period, Claro attempted to train as a matador in Mexico, until Vilma reminded him that a bullfight was blood sport, a slow and agonizing ritual for a condemned victim. It must have been at that time when Claro decided to transform his talents into a serious trainer of dogs. During our Montreaux tour, we were escorted by his competition champion, Uncas, a cool and alert Belgian Malinois. Uncas was named after a warrior-hero in James Fennimore Cooper’s The Last of the Mohicans.
Never had Claro and I met for a reunion in a country not our own, not in winter. We never thought that Geneva could remind us of Borges, and that we’d be confronted by someone’s ability to foment mystery.
We celebrated that Friday evening. Claro cooked meatless pancit bihon, Vilma prepared a special vegetable pie, and Angelica surprised everyone with a cactus-and-cheese salad. Jo and I, the vegetarians, were overjoyed. We missed Lucho, the son of Claro and Vilma, who could not join us because of his high school prom.
At dinner we spoke about Borges––not being a stranger to us. He belonged to the rich company of Julio Cortazar, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Pablo Neruda, Octavio Paz, and many more South and Central Americans who assaulted the humidity of our imagination in the 1970s and 80s through translated versions of literature made available to us. These soothsayers and sorcerers helped us reclaim our birthright as children of tropical gothic. Some of us even assumed the image and strength of our churches and metamorphosed into earthquake baroque.
Our conversations dipped into the well of kinships, then swallow-tailed to a recollection of the trip to Montreaux. Chateau de Chillon, once owned by the family of the Duke of Savoy, rests on the shores of Lake Geneva. Across the clear and placid waters, the towering realm of the Alps, still covered with snow, stood invincible. We speculated on how the royal inhabitants of the Chateau managed in the past to keep warm or to regain their freshness in winter.
Jazz eventually overcame us. Montreaux is the site of an international jazz festival held annually. At the town center, we found the Miles Davis Hall, one of the venues for the performances. Next to the Hall is a park with a grand view of the lake. The sculptured images of Ella Fitzgerald, B.B. King, and Ray Charles are displayed on the lawn. As we walked across the park, our attention was arrested by a life-size statue of a man seated pensively but who didn’t seem to be a musician. We went closer to investigate. It turned out to be a solid and thoughtful image of Vladamir Nabokov, the Russian novelist and émigré who made Switzerland his home. He lived at the Hotel de Palais (Palace Hotel), situated just across the street, from 1961 to 1977. The title of his autobiography flashed in my mind: Speak, Memory. We spent some minutes imagining a preoccupied Nabokov, writing one of his masterpieces in his hotel room, looking every now and then outside his window to see the park, the lake, and the mountains.
