Gamao as a place was considered then by the town folks as the dirty haven. Since our place was located just a few minutes walk from those disco pubs of Gamao, we would frequently hear the echoing music coming from the place during nighttime sleep. The mention of Gamao as a place then had always subconsciously depicts an ugly moral depravity. For us, residents of the place, we always made it a point not to be identified with the place. Each time we made reference of it as our home address during the taking of rides in our public transportation, and of scribbling our address on our school documents; we wisely used other references such as De Oro Shop, or Zafra, or Chinese School, or just put our generic address of Apokon Road, Tagum. We repudiated the thought of being identified with the place called Gamao, because to do so would make one a butt of jokes and unwanted name callings by fellow town folks.
Since boyhood days, the place was known for its nightlife entertainment- the pubs, the bars, the adult shows, and the loud jukebox’s music. During nighttime, the playing of melancholic songs such as America’s Inspector Mills and Joe Lamont’s Victims of Love, those blue music as I could hear then, it was like a lullaby, that soothes some anguished souls. As a child then I wondered if they got some balm from that music. I hinted that the phonographs’ needle inside the jukebox must had been blunted for endless playing of those popular songs.
It was in the mid -1980s, the goldmine rush that had suddenly made Tagum the favorite hangout of the “high graders”(the gold miners were familiarly called then), and Gamao’s nightlife seems endlessly busy. The high graders who after their death- defying crawl inside those air- tight tunnels and had came out alive or had been literally delivered from their presumed graveyards, those dark fox holes, those high graders must be grateful. After coming out alive from those damp deep tunnels, the lucky high graders had celebrated their second life, sadly though, their moment of cheering was not with their respective families. They had celebrated their extended lives inside those blinking pubs of the place called Gamao. Tales of unimaginable squandering of incalculable wealth by those high graders engaged in hedonism were common during those days. They were unmindful of the wastage, perhaps they were thinking that their nine lives were still up and they could still go back inside their pit to dig for more gold.
After they had wasted everything, they discovered that their hard-earned money are lost forever. They had squandered everything, including their health. But their most painful loss were their families who after discovering those escapades, their precious marriage had sadly crumbled, and only miracle could reconstitute them.