I was around four or five when Mommy first told me about Dad. She said that they couldn't marry because he was already betrothed to someone else from birth, as is the custom among upper-class Indians. The exchange and merging of property was supposedly a done deal—there might have been some resort island involved, as a dowry.

She learned that her father had leapt out a second-story window at the back of their house. The shock of the impact somehow left him temporarily blinded and he would not have escaped without the help of another soldier who guided him to safety through back alleys as the Japanese searched their house.

Angkong preferred to cook with kitchen doors tightly shut. No one, not one of his ten children, was allowed to venture in to learn the secrets of his cooking — like how he used “Ngo Hyong,” a Chinese five-spice combination, to flavor his juicy “hong ba," his version of adobo, my Auntie Claire's favorite.

Our patriarch, Eusebio Morales, managed to keep his British wife, Frances, at his side by negotiating with the Japanese soldiers. He offered to chlorinate the water plant in Balara, Quezon City, in exchange for house arrest for Frances.

Reading through his letters, I discovered that my grandparents were wary of him because he was a “Manila boy.” One of the notes I found were addressed to them. He told them that he knew that they looked at him with suspicion as he was from Imperial Manila, but he assured them that he had good intentions with their Elma.