Inocencio tells me that Joe is a prisoner in Pampanga. He got the information from a Filipino soldier who escaped from Bataan. (Beats me how the soldier knows.) Some Filipino Red Cross doctors are going north to try and help American prisoners any way they can, though they can't bring food or medicines. If Joe is there, Pacifico Ledesma will try to find a family nearby who's prepared to help get food to him at our expense.

On the subject of food, sugar is plentiful and cheap — and being used as sandbags in Cebu! Rice is mostly rationed but can still be bought by the sack at a price. Flour is rationed to bakeries, and can only be found at exorbitant prices. Some canned goods are still available. Milk is extinct. At the Astoria, the cakes are half size and cost twice as much though coffee is unchanged. Fruit is plentiful. Calamansi juice is extremely good, and out of the pulp Ma makes a marmalade that's as good as 'Olde English Marmalade.' Out of green papaya, one can make an apple sauce or jam indistinguishable from the real thing. Santol makes a jam identical to quince jam. In fact, one can make beautiful jam from mangoes, pomelo, papaya, and tamarindo, to name a few. With sugar available, it's a cinch. Alas, we'll soon have no bread to eat it with!