The La Madre Filipina and the Jones Bridge

If you happen to stroll around Rizal Park in Manila, I'm sure you have encountered this statue to the left of the Rizal Monument. It is a classical statue named La Madre Filipina (roughly "The Filipino Mother").

It is a picture of a wayward son repenting before his mother who is silently comforting him with eyes looking forward as if praying. Next to the mother is her young daughter seemingly absorbing the example of her caring mother. A very poignant picture indeed.

This statue did not originally belong to Rizal Park but to another landmark. It was part of Architect Juan Arellano's design of the Jones Bridge.

If you watched the tour of Manila video posted earlier, you would see it part of one of the posts forming the entrance of the bridge. Look closely, it's shown from 8:04 to 8:07!

There where four of them in all depicting different scenes but this seems to be the only one left. Post-war pictures show that all four posts bearing the statues definitely survived the war but were gone by the bridge's reconstruction in 1949.

Well who knows, one day we might see them reunited and restored.

Photo credits to Carinoza, Wikipedia, Hawayano, and LIFE.