The quest for the bar dragon

Ever since the bar exams were moved to November, the results were released in early May of the following year. But it can be earlier this year for the 2017 bar exams. How about the first week of April?

Justice Lucas P. Bersamin, the 2017 Bar Exams Chairman, is noted for his punctiliousness. We may presume that he has run a tight ship over the 2017 bar exams.

One case in point is the dress code that was imposed in 2017. You would not see an examinee in shorts like this one from the 2016 exams:

CNN Philippines photo

On January 8, the examiner in Civil Law already reported a perfect score to Justice Bersamin according to this FB post:

It was followed by another post on March 18 about a near perfect score in Remedial Law.

Just who is this "demigod'' in the above posts? See this post from before the 2017 exams:

We may also presume that this demigod runs an even tauter ship over his examiners. In the same  FB post, Atty. Morgan, my favorite source of lawyerly chitchat, mentioned  a conversation he had in September 2017 with AJ Bersamin.

With such young and healthy examiners the checking would be over much, much earlier than May. So the results may be out after the Holy Week!

Now here's an interesting item from the Inquirer about the 2017 bar exams:

After at least four years of withering assaults, verbal or otherwise, from their professors these nine examinees just could not finish the race. If there are a couple of thousand bar flunkers, another couple of thousand of bar passers, and 10 or more bar topnotchers, may we call these nine as bar dropouts?

We are often regaled with the stories of the topnotchers. Or of bar passers with interesting names like my schoolmate Habeas Corpuz and his fellow passer Nat King Coles.

Rappler photo.

Forgotten are the dropouts who surely have some fascinating stories of their own. This is a story of one of the 2017 bar dropouts; a story of my pilgrimage to the hallowed grounds of the bar exam dragon.

Actually this is a story of the conclusion of my pilgrimage. To retrace my pilgrimage from law school rooms in Cebu to Room 323, 3rd Floor, St. Martin de Porres Bldg. of the University of Sto. Tomas, Manila you may refer to the footnotes.

In March of 2016 I was finally through with law school. Many of us in the graduating class decided to take the bar exams a year later. And regretted.

In the midst of my online review in May 2017 I experienced dizzy spells. A blood test revealed I was low in all counts of red blood cells, hemoglobin, and hematocrit. I was put on ferrous sulfate. By September they were back to stable levels per another blood test.

So I bought two round trip plane tickets. The first would bring me to Manila on the Thursday prior to the Sunday exams, give me time to pick up my exam permit the following day, rest on Saturday, face the dragon on Sunday and return  home on the Monday. The other ticket was for the next week’s round trip. I planned to buy the other round trip tickets after the 2nd Sunday exam. In fact I was hedging. The ASEAN summit would be around the 2nd Sunday and I was half-expecting chaos. If I couldn't return to Manila, I would only waste one round trip ticket.

There would be no such thing as rest prior to the exams as suggested by many reviewers, at least for the first Sunday. I had this heavy backpack filled with 4-day supply of clothing and my favorite   blanket, without which I could not sleep well, when I reached Manila on the Thursday. From Terminal 3 of NAIA I took the white airport loop bus to the EDSA terminal of LRT 1 and MRT. The first long line I joined happened to be for MRT. Oops!

Finally got onto the LRT coach. It was standing room all the way to Central Station where I alighted, took the jeepney to España, got off and walk my way to Earnshaw to my lodging house.

How did I manage to do this, I who had only been to the vicinity of UST 20 years ago when I was still carrying a printed map I bought in National ? This time I had a mental note of Google map from my desktop PC at home.

On Friday morning I went to the police outpost near the stairs of the footbridge in front of the gate of UST and sought direction to the Supreme Court. The officer pointed out a jeepney that plies the route.  So off I went to Mt. Olympus on Padre Faura, if you know what I meant.

I got down at Luneta prematurely. I had only a bird’s eyeview of the vicinity from my mental note of google map. Padre Faura, to my chagrin, was still some blocks away. After much walking I thought I  had a blister in my toe. It was in fact a toenail  constantly entangled in my sock that was causing discomfort. In my last year in law school I was already retired so I found no need for socks in my dress code. But hey, I was on my way to Mt. Olympus, hence the socks.

It was almost noon when I got my permit. And I missed my midmorning snack depleting my sugar. I went back to Luneta and along the way looked for a Chowking outlet where I could have chop suey and tofu. But found none. So I made my way back to España and ate a meal of chicken at Jolibee then walked back to the lodging house.

In the evening I was feverish after all the anxiety and excitement during the day. Daytime of Saturday I was alone in the lodging room as my three roommates/classmates were still at their last minute review, or whatever it was called. In the evening we made arrangement with the canteen of the lodging place for our breakfast and the lunch packs which we would bring to UST.

1st Sunday. At 4 AM lights were already blazing and my classmates were all dressed because they have to get out early in order to catch the last minute tips. I joined them at early breakfast. There was little choice on the menu and they were those that would not be kind to my stomach: greasy, etc. The boys (they were in their late twenties and they call me Manong) brought their packed lunch with them, while I brought mine back to our room. My plan was to join them at UST at 7AM;  go back to our room for lunch and head back to UST before 1PM. Exam time was 8-12 and 2-6.

Having only some bites of breakfast I was already terribly hungry by 11:30. When a couple of other examinees handed in their booklets, I followed suit and almost run back to our lodging place. On opening my lunch pack, I foresaw trouble in the afternoon exam. I am not sure how it was done, but the chicken looked like it was cooked in water, toyo and oil. I ate half of the rice and planned to last the whole afternoon by stuffing more kitkat chocolate bars into my transparent bag which was actually a transparent ziplock bag.

This is how my ziplock bag looked containing an umbrella, bottled water, kitkat bars, 6 pens (recommended by most just in case 5 would dry up in your quivering fingers), several meds.

Trouble was indeed brewing even before the Labor exam booklets were handed out at 2PM. My kitkat was almost gone. And my fingers would cramp when I would open one. I had to punch the wrapper with my pen before I could tear it apart. Later I felt something sick in my stomach. It was not painful but it seemed that the inside of my belly was hollowed out.  My supply of Maalox was no more. And I sensed that anytime I would just drop asleep on the arm of my chair but I did not have any headache. Back home I always had this sensation when I was late to meal. The quick solution would be hot Milo and crackers or even plain hot water.

Around 4PM I stood up and the male watcher thought I was going to the urinal and made the motion to escort me. I asked him where I could get some hot water. He advised a female watcher to get me to the clinic. The clinic was in one of the classrooms on the ground floor. It was one of the temporary clinics for the exams, one each for every building where the exams were held.

The staff made me smell something, gave me hot water and meds for my stomach, and took my blood pressure which was off the chart according to the doctor. I had to linger until my sick sensation was over. Along the sides of the room I noticed pregnant women writing vigorously on exam booklets.  Apparently they had earlier made arrangements for their excitable state.

When I felt a lot less queasy, the kind doctor, whose name I regretfully failed to know, escorted me back to Room 323. I returned to my booklet but it seemed I already lost my stride. My penmanship became terrible; my thought was all about food.

If there was anybody in the exam room that prayed for the bell to ring the end of the exam, that would be me. In my law school life I’d always wait for someone to pass the exam booklet ahead of me. Finally one got up and queued. He was wearing a blazer of Ateneo. Haha.

I dropped by the clinic and the doctor said my BP had stabilized and suggested I go straight for a hearty meal. There were still only a few examinees on the way out the gate. It was yet about 5:30PM.

It was very festive outside the gates at España. The sidewalk along the UST side was empty. The bar ops of the various law schools were massed at the opposite sidewalk. Every time somebody exited the gate they would shout in unison.

To go to the other side of the street one has to climb a footbridge. In Cebu we would call it skywalk. As an examinee climbs down, the mass would shout words of encouragement. When my turn came to pass through the throng, it was as if the Red Sea parted as they were murmuring  “Congratulations, Sir”. And when I stroked my palm over my gray hair they erupted in applause.  If they only knew!

2nd Sunday. Having nothing else better to do at home, and with the ASEAN summit going on smoothly I decided to go back just for the fun of it and also to make use of my remaining round-trip ticket. 

Near my lodging I found that a nearby 7-Eleven store sold rice with tuna omelet in pre-cooked packs which they would reheat for free. This one I could eat and became my breakfast and lunch for the 2nd Sunday.

At exam time I thought I was doing well; but after doing the arithmetic, I know my 1st Sunday would pull me down. So I bade goodbye to my roommates and the dragon that I came to slay would live to puff another day when I became one of the 9 dropouts of the 2017 bar exams.

Congratulations to those who make it to the list!!  First week of April??

My predictions: the topnotchers will be from Bulletin #13 list of takers.

BTW, I'm on iron supplement again because my lab test in the last week of December 2017 showed a dip in my red blood cells and hematocrit. 

Acknowledgements - to those who helped me in my quest to slay my bar dragon, my deepest thanks. Also my apologies for disappointing you.

FOOTNOTES:  Intended mostly for the reading entertainment and learning enjoyment of my children, nephews, and nieces, and their children. May they wisely carve their own paths.

Footnote 1: Three law schools and a detour.
When I decided in 1992 to take up law my main criterion for choice of law school was convenience in going from office to school and finally to home.

From the back gate of our office it would just be a matter of crossing the street to get to the University of San Carlos (USC). I was already familiar with the place. In 1978 I took at USC a summer class in accounting, the first subject in my accounting course, while engaged as an electronic technician.  (I was into electronics before I became a typist. I was a high school teacher prior to working as technician.  Getting confused now? See my complete employment history in the footnote.)

On the other hand, from the main gate of our office I could take a short cut on foot on my way home. I would enter one gate of the campus of Southwestern University (SWU) and exit through another gate on the opposite side. A hundred meters away would be the house where my wife, 3 children (ages 1 to 5), and I lived on a rented room.

SWU also had a law school. That's where I enrolled in the 1st semester of 1992.

By each end of the evening class everyone, who were mostly professionals, would be very hungry and would hie off to the school canteen before going home. I would simply walk straight home to the supper awaiting on the table. By then the kids were mostly asleep. The missus would still be preparing the next day's meals and my office wear. Life was much so simpler then.

And so too was law school. No Chan-Robles virtual library, lawphil.net.  Or scribd, :-). If one needed a Supreme Court decision a student would go to the library, look for it in the SCRA and have it photocopied.

I thought that was terrible at the time. Until I had this professor later who told us that they did not even have photocopiers in their days at UP Law School. Their barkada of 6 would copy by hand different decisions. One of their barkada, a fast typist, would produce 6 carbon copies of their notes. Their typist would later become an associate justice of the Supreme Court.

From the start I knew I would not get my law degree in the usual four years allotted. Although I finished my accounting course on time, that was because many of my subjects from my previous courses were credited. It would be different in law school.

I was a sabbath-keeper (though not a 7th Day Adventist) which means I could not go to school, or any "worldly" event, between Friday sunset to Saturday sunset. So for two semesters I was severely underloaded but excited about another course, the 4th, on my transcript of records. (Refer to footnote entry regarding my messy TOR.)

Earlier in the year the HR department at our head office issued a new qualifications standard (QS) for all departments. I was at the time a clerk-typist in the Administrative Section of the Cebu regional office but detailed to the staff of the regional head. The QS required the administrative staff  to have at least 12 units in public administration. My accounting course did not have any.

Our section head, who was a lawyer, and three of us in the administrative staff decided that instead of going back to undergrad classes, we might as well gun for the masteral degree.  I enrolled at the University of the Philippines – Cebu College for a Masters in Public Management. What was supposed to be a two year course, I finished in four years; again because of my sabbath-keeping. I was almost kicked out because at UP you have to finish the course in 5 years. But I finally did earn my diploma.

Not only that; sabbath-keeping was deleted from the tenets of our church. Finally, I thought, I could now get a full-load of my law course. But by then the two older children were already in high school and the eldest would soon be in college. We have also relocated outside the city and were paying for the mortgage on our house. The law diploma went under the radar for a while.

When my eldest finished her accountancy at the USC she was lucky to get hired right after getting her CPA. Her younger brother was still in engineering school. The youngest was still in high school. It meant I could send somebody else to college. Why not me to the college of law?  The tuition fee would be about the same. Also I was already earning enough not to worry over the budget for law books.  I had promised to myself after my fling with the law at SWU that I would not go back to school using borrowed and outdated books. Or xeroxed ones after having read the admonition of law book author Abelardo Domondon about karma on those who use pirated books.

Since we have moved residence there was no more need for me to use the short cut passing through SWU. In fact it would already take me out of the way. Whereas just outside USC I could take the jeepney on the way home. So USC it was. But with only a few units earned at SWU, I decided to begin all over again.

From Bay to Manong

While at SWU my classmates were mostly professionals and of my age. We called each other Bay (friend). At USC most of my classmates were full time students. At my insistence they called me Manong Rank.

Needless to say, law at USC was even much more difficult for working law students than it was when I was an accounting student.

One night in class I asked my professor in constitutional law  whether it was the policy of the college to harangue the students in order to winnow the crop. She said it was not a policy; it was not prohibited nor discouraged either. In another class, I commented to the professor who was about my age (which means he was also a senior citizen) that it seemed easier to pass the bar than to finish law at USC. He agreed and in fact 7 of his former students transferred to SWU and were now lawyers.

One of my classmates did move on to SWU and passed the 2015 bar exams. A colleague of mine at my workplace,  a bank examiner, who was also studying at USC encouraged me to transfer with him to SWU.  I kind of said “been there, done that” but I need another school to be the 7th on my TOR. He took the 2016 bar exams and is now a CPA-Lawyer.

From Manong to Sir

And thus I moved over to the University of the Visayas (UV) after 3 semesters at USC. My classmates were now professionals but mostly much younger than me. Those of my age, we called each other Bay. The younger ones called me Sir simply because I outranked them in number of years in service.

But it still took me another 4 years because of differences in course offerings and in the number of units in some subjects. Some of my transferee classmates managed to have their 2-unit subjects credited for the same subject with 3 units at UV. I decided to repeat them  because I was not in a hurry anymore.

A degree in law means 2 points or so for a government employee who is assessed for promotion. Passing the bar would be the equivalent of a masters’ degree. But I was already on retirement mode so there was no point to be in a hurry. All in all, I got my law degree after 6 years and one semester in 3 law schools when I graduated in March 2016.

Footnote 1 - Three law schools and a detour

My messy transcript of records.

·         1968-1971:  2-1/2  year Certificate in Inland Fisheries

Mindanao Regional School of Fisheries (now Zamboanga State College of Marine Sciences and Technology (ZSCMST)

Zamboanga City

·         Summer, 1972: 9 units of BS Industrial Education

Cebu School of Arts and Trades (CSAT, now Cebu Technological University)

Cebu City

·         1974 – 1976: Technical Electronics

CSAT

-          Finished all required subjects but did not get certificate because of lack of YCAP which was offered only on Saturdays

·         Summer, 1978: 6 units accounting, 3 units Phil. Gov’t.

University of San Carlos (USC)

Cebu City

·         1978 – 1^st Sem, 1982: BS Commerce

Cebu Central Colleges (now University of Cebu)

·         1^st Sem., 1980: 3 units Auditing (cross-enrollment)

Southwestern University (SWU), Cebu City

·         2^nd Sem, 1983: 3 units, Computer programming

SWU

·         1992-1993: 15 units LlB

SWU

·         1993-1997: Masters in Public Administration

University of the Philippines, Cebu Campus

·         2010 – 2012: 1^st and 2^nd year law

USC

·         2012 – 2016: LlB

University of the Visayas, Cebu City

Footnote 2 - My messy transcript of records

Meandering through the job market

·         1971-1972:  Dinagat Fishery High School (now Dinagat School of Fisheries, Dinagat Island

-          pioneer fishery teacher, also taught general science

-          it was a dead end job. I could not be promoted as I was a non-degree holder. If I took summer classes I would be on leave without pay as I was part of the vocational department hence entitled only to 15-day vacation leave.

-          as a non-degree holder I was paid less than my peers. They get P316 to my P272 per month.

·         1976: PhilCox Philippines, Cebu Unit

-          the company was a contractor maintaining the VOR, ILS facilities of airports

-          I was avionics technician assigned in Iloilo and Davao

-          one of our test pilots (and church buddy) was Jessup Bahinting. He perished in a plane crash with Jesse Robredo

·         1977 – 1980: worked for a cousin who was an outsourced marine electronics contractor for several Cebu shipping lines

·         March 1981 – November 1983: Bureau of Forest Development, Region 7, Cebu City

-                    -         Information and extension staffer

·         Dec 1983 – Dec 2014: Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas Regional Office, Cebu City

-          Clerk-typist, Information Officer, Administrative Officer, LAN Administrator, IT Coordinator

Footnote 3 - Work history, 5 so far

My religious oddysey.

As an infant, I was baptized a Catholic and confirmed as one when I was around 7.  Had my first communion thereafter.

Living with my grandparents from Grade 2 to 4^th year high, I went to church on Sundays and holy days. Helped rang the church bells.

In middle high I was enticed by a magazine that featured space exploration and other science topics on its cover. Each article would end with quotes from the bible predicting the end of the world and a paragraph on how we could escape. When I was 19 I became a member of the church behind the magazine – the Worldwide Church of God. Baptized at the same time with me was Jessup Bahinting, who perished in his own plane along with Jesse Robredo.

In the WCG, members paid a 1^st tithe to the church, set aside a 2^nd tithe for his expenses to church major gatherings (7 in a year and called holy days), paid a 3^rd tithe every third year supposedly to be given to the poor. And at every holy day we would be “encouraged” to give an offering with reminders that we “have not really given until it hurts”. And all these tithes are based on our gross income, not after tax and other payroll deductions. Can any other church beat that?

I left the WCG when I was 45. If I learned anything from the experience it was how to budget my income after deducting all those tithes and offerings.

When I got to 50, I dropped out of religion entirely. Haleluiah!

Footnote 4 - Religious oddysey