Cirilo Linsahay Dumotan (July 9, 1909 - September 13, 1986)

Papa was raised from a dirt-poor family of eight (three sisters and two brothers) in Tankulan.

His father was an unskilled carpenter who more often than not, has no work while his mother was a plain housewife by anybody's standard.
In spite of this crippling poverty, he set his sight towards a better future, hoping that in one way or another, he could turn his life around.
He was a firm believer in education so he enrolled himself in an agricultural school in Managok, hundreds of kilometers away from home.
This secondary school was run by American soldier known as the Thomasites. These Thomasites established the first public education in the country.
Papa trod every step of the way, unmindful of the blazing heat of the sun or the driving rain with only a threadbare shirt on his back, a bagful of corngrits and dried salted fish and an only other pair of clothes to wear to school.

During vacation and in between his studies, he was a farmer first and foremost.
He worked hard in the field from sunrise to moonrise, tilling, weeding, planting, harvesting and taking care of their beast of burden.

Papa was the most honest-to-goodness man God has ever created.
He was a man of intelligence and deep convictions.
He was an inspiring presence and straight as an arrow.
Once you know him, you would walk to the ends of the earth for him.

He was not only good looking but he was handsome in a rugged sort of way.
Any woman who fell for his charms was asking for a broken heart. But, fall in love he did! With Mama, who at a very young age of 15, was as pretty as spring time.
It was love at first sight for both of them and they will not have it any other way.
They loved each other with a love no one would ever understand, more than anything that their hearts could hold in silence.

Though quite reluctant, Papa tried to ask Tatay Iping (Mama's father, Felipe Cahuan) for Mama's hand in marriage. But Tatay would not hear a word of it. He was immovable as the proverbial Rock of Gibraltar.
Papa was turned down just as fast as he had proposed.
Accordingly, he was a nobody, someone who would not amount to anything. He has nothing to his name, no feather on his cap and not a penny in his pocket.
Their family name was not a by-word because, in Tatay Iping's words, they were wallowing in the quagmire or destitution. Thus, all his sincere intentions were vehemently denied.

In time, he realized that their love that defied all convictions would not survive the forces that tore them apart. So, he decided it would be best to get back to his studies and try his luck again when he had graduated.

With all the seemingly insurmountable hardships and sacrificeshe endured, he was able to graduate and was awarded the diploma for a two-year Elementary Teaching Course. More or less, he was now a teacher and it made him a fulfilled man you cannot second guess.
At least he has realized a part of his lifetime dream.

Upon returning from graduation, he retraced his steps back to Mama's heart only to find that the love of his life was already married.

Not one to brood over his private sorrows, though nursing a broken heart and trying to forget his disappointments, he went to the farm in Kaangan (Ticala) to lick his wounds in seclusion. There he spent all his working hours working in the field. Applying all the techniques and expertise as well as the knowledge he learned from Managok Agricultural School, laboring as if there's no tomorrow.

Then Papa reached a crossroad in his young life and politics presented itself.

While working in his farm in Ticala, his close friend, a certain Mr. Ducusin, the erstwhile secretary of the municipal government in Maluko filed for Papa's candidacy as vice-mayor without Papa's permission and knowledge. He was listed under the ticket of Mateo Gumaling, a candidate for mayor.
Since he was not interested in his candidacy, he just went about his work day in and day out.
He never campaigned for himself, much less for his fellow candidates.
Because politics was not his cup of tea, he ignored all the election sorties, preferring his farm work over everything,
But, in spite of his indifference, he won the position without even lifting a finger.

But since the noblest profession has carved a niche in his mind and heart, he decided to apply for a teaching position in the Bureau of Public Schools, Division of Bukidnon, under an American Schools Superintendent.

He was given the most remote barrio school in Bukidnon, Omayam, as his first teaching assignment where the inhabitants had never known nor heard about a teacher.
Some were know to be headhunters, others with cannibalistic tendencies.
This was a place where the forces of the good and bad supernaturals were known to exist and strong enough to scare you out of your mind.
It was here that he witnessed tribal wars between fierce tribes and the infamous "Tampeda hu Balagen", a ritual either ending or commencing a tribal feud.
That if successful, will pave the friendship between tribes but if it fails, will begin a war that will escalate for generations.

But papa was a very persuasive person both in manner and speech so he won them easily to his side.
he was thus successful in teaching them their first ABC's. For a teacher's life on the job was far from easy but his love for teaching helped him withstand the difficluties.
He considered teaching and eternity job.
For who can tell how far reaching are the ideas planted in the heart and mind of a child?

For three months he taught in Omayam, then Kaburakanan and Silae for another three months.
Places that were worse than the ones he left.
Being one of the "best teachers" of the Division, his responsibility was to start and develop the schools in the jungle.
A person who never shirks from responsibility he has promised to uphold, he moved on from one place to another without qualms or misgivings nor regard of his personal safety.

All the hardships he endured in the mountains was compensated by winning the confidence of the American Superintendent. His reliability, honesty, sincerity in his work, dynamic leadership and above all, his punctuality, which is the most important virtue considered by the Americans, won his superior.

After his legendary "Tour of Duty" in the mountains of Bukidnon, this time he was assigned in a much nearer place to civilization, Kalasungay.
Here, there was no shortage of girls.
One of his female co-teacher tried her best to catch his attention and win his heart, sending him love notes in an envelope filled with fragrant talcum powder (since there were no stationery those days). But, he never took advantage of their flirtations because deep in his heart he still cherished that "someone" who had taken his heart away.

And though hard as he tried, he was unable to forget the face that was never far from his mind.

To get over his heartache, he met and married, though not necessarily loved, a woman from the Hilayag family, who became his first wife but died shortly thereafter leaving him childless and a young widower.