Our family had little, yet his quiet determination gave me courage. When I passed the entrance exam to Metro City University, my mother wept with joy, but Hector merely sat on the porch, puffing a cheap cigarette. The next morning, he sold his only motorbike, combined it with my mother’s savings, and arranged for my journey to the city. His clothes were worn, his hands rough, yet he carried a small box of gifts from home, rice, salted fish, roasted peanuts and left me with a final word of encouragement:
— “Work hard, son. Make every lesson count.”
Inside the lunchbox, wrapped in banana leaves, I found a folded note:
— “I may not know your books, but I know you. Whatever you choose to learn, I will support you.”
Through undergraduate years and into graduate school, Hector never faltered. He continued laboring, climbing scaffolds, hauling bricks, his back bending further with each passing year. Whenever I returned home, I found him at the edge of a construction site, wiping sweat from his forehead, still watching over the work as if he carried my education on his own shoulders.