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They have to climb
those towering trees of Agusan forests in order to provide for their families
back home. They travelled all the way from the neighboring province in order to
harvest sweet honey and combs from wild bees that built their clinging wax
colonies on the many remaining forests trees of Northern Mindanao. Such a risky
source of livelihood indeed, there are dangers of falling from old tall trees,
of being stung by these wild bees, and of being apprehended and suspected as
government’s intel by some ragtag armed
groups of the historic proletarian struggle that are also lurking in the
forest. If Joshua Piven, the author of bestselling book The Escape Artists had only knew about this
nerve-wracking job of climbing forests trees unharnessed and removing stored
honeys from wax combs without protective suits, and risking oneself from bees’ sting attacks, Piven could have added this Pinoy's odd job on his list of stories on his
book.
This odd work is their only known means of fighting poverty back home. Unmindful of the dangers that go with such work which is familiarly known as “pamuhag”, they have become experts of this trade, though it was not an overnight mastery of skills, it took them years of death-defying climbs with flaming torch in one hand and an uncertain fate inside their souls, fogging the wax sanctuary with smokes from burnt coco leaves. The bees retaliated by attacking the intruders with painful stung. After these Mamuhagays have succeeded in clearing the bees’ sanctuary from combatant drones, the wax can be broken, and the oozing honeys are caught by a funnel placed in the mouth of plastic gallon containers pulled up by a rope from below. The same rope is used to bring down filled- up gallon containers and the honeys are being transferred to bigger containers that are waiting below. These Mamuhagays could fill as many as 5 to 10 twenty –gallon- containers, depending on the sizes of bee colonies they have literally conquered and destroyed. This tribe of Mamuhagays must be regarded as valiant colonizers because they can subdue colonies, the colonies of bees for that matter.
They have to make an estimate of their harvested honeys in order to cope with the expenses of travel, food and lodging while away from home, or else it could be a bad business or just plain break even. Their group composed of 5 to 10 persons, and each person must set to bring 20 gallons of honey back home enough for a month long sustenance of their families. The honeys are being bottled and sold at P150 per bottle (375ml) in the city by their spouses and able dependents. The city dwellers have rather preferred to buy honeys sourced out from the wild than those coming from artificially cultured Korean bees, maybe because the sterile urban settlers are still hoping to find products that are pure and undiluted and directly mined from the primitive wild forest. And the city dwellers must be grateful to this band of Mamuhagays; they had risk their lives and limbs just to provide the urban settlers with honeys coming from a thousand -years -old bees, whose colonies are much older than our present metropolis, and less complicated than this human settlements that we know. As the wise counsel from King Solomon aptly pronounced:
“It is not good to eat too much honey, nor is it honorable to seek one’s own honor.”
(Prov. 25:27)
Posted at 06:21 PM in Adventures, Books, environmental issues, family concern, Food and Drink, occupational hazards, pinoy concern, pinoyfood, tagum, wildlife | Permalink | Comments (0)
There was a time when we mounted over our buffalos’ backs on our way for the animal’s bathing time, and we were very proud to be called Vaqueros. It was our idea of manhood test if we could stand at the back of the animal without falling while the buffalo was running. Farming was our predecessors source of living, but for us it was our childhood adventure. Those taunting and name callings of being pisot (uncircumcised) were always a common thing among barrio kids. But most of the time it was our means of getting even on bullies. In fact not all Filipinos have practiced this Christian tradition of cutting the male organ's foreskin which was originally practiced by the ancient Hebrews and later adopted by the Roman Catholic religion. It our Catholic faith that has set this norm.
As kids in the farm, we had our predictable past times, from listening to drama on our transistor radio to diving and swimming on those deep irrigation canals and enjoying the cool water with our buffalo also swimming nearby, or to the chasing of wild ducks on swampy plains infested with blood-sucking leeches.
In 1990, the farm was destroyed. It gave way to massive moldboard plowing as it converted the rice paddies and coconut farms for the growing of high valued crops, the Cavendish banana.
The intensive conversion of the rice and coconut farms had caused unimaginable changes of the place.
Our old folk’s buffalos were sold to other farmers in the nearby towns who were skeptical then about the banana plantation, but after nearly five years; the skeptics also gave up their rice farms and also grew bananas. And the hardworking buffalos were sold and slaughtered and its beef were served during barrio fiesta.
The irrigation canals were covered and replaced by intensive drainage canals of the plantation.
The wild ducks moved to other places and sought new sanctuary that could host them and had nearly escaped extinction.
An inspiring story from a farmer's son who succeeded in college to become an engineer. This is his story:
Posted at 11:11 PM in Adventures, children, environmental issues, genealogy, pinoy concern, Sustainable Agriculture | Permalink | Comments (4)
When the cinema king of
Tagum, the late Ben A. Gonzales, the owner of Twin BAG Cinemas located at Abad
Santos Street had invited a band of Manila- based actors and actress, the whole
town went frenzy. Almost all day, as early as six o’clock in the morning,
people had thronged outside the gate of the king’s residence just beside his
twin theaters to have a glimpse of actors Jess Lapid, Jr. and the giant Bomber
Moran and actress screen named Liz Alindugan. It was a grand day for a town whose
settlers’ early days’ luxury was going to movie houses. Tuesdays are intended
for premier shows because viewed reels from Davao City will be delivered in
Tagum after a week of showing on that metropolis, and if one happens to be in
Davao City, they would be lucky to view films that were soon to be viewed in
Tagum. This was in the early 80s.
Cinemas had been around the town as early as 1960s, one gray-haired moviegoer told me. He enumerated those movie houses, some of it were still around during this writer’s childhood days in the 80s. That ubiquitous Filipinas Theater, the DJ Cinema, the twin cinemas of BAG, the lovers’ nest Lovel Theater and the pioneering Dalisay Theater. The townfolks had mobbed on these movie houses, it temporarily suspended all their pummel resistance on the economic difficulties during those days, and it was literally their momentary escape from the pressing realities of agrarian town life back then.
Our local cinemas’ extinction could be attributed to the evolution of film showing technology, the reel projector has mutated into a series of upgraded forms such as the VCR, the VHS and the VCD. The transmutation of film viewing from public cinemas to private homes was an inevitable consequence that many cinema operators had never expected to happen. The continuous emergence of film showing technology had finally displaced and closed down not just our local theaters but also the entrepreneurial Video Rental Shops.
On that peak and valley cycle of film showing mutation, many had thought that the large memory -capacity DVD was already the local maximum. At the turn of the century, literally, the whole world was surprised when a new medium of film showing has emerged. The Internet as a new medium of film showing has literally brought down the house of the film making industry itself. New films on their premiere showing thousand miles from us were being downloaded on the internet in less than an hour, transmitted by hosts of movie pirates, undetected and way beyond the apprehension of trans-national cybercrime busters, even the Interpol is powerless to track and prosecute these fearless film bandits.
Today, the city folks’ option of viewing films is getting wider, from their narrow choice of hopping from one local cinema to another during the 60’s up to the 80’s to our present spectrum of options, either through private home viewing or the revival of public viewing in our local modern cinemas that are making a comeback in the city. These cinemas’ larger- than- life screens and the state-of-the-art digital sound systems have brought new experiences to our city dwellers. And the city gradually regains its old fame as the entertainment capital of Davao region.
Does the private individuals initiative of reviving the local cinema could be one enough proof of the city's unending ascent towards joining the circles of those enduring metropolis of Southern Philippines? The private sector's investment here could be a hint of their inflexible confidence to this city of promise.
Posted at 10:22 AM in Anthology of My City, artists, filmshowing, tagum | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Why bank on the past?
Is there anything good about the past? What benefits one could get from those
unrepeatable past? These are questions that hound us today. For many who showed
such uncommon interests and dedications about the past, others cannot comprehend
the relevance of the past in relation to the present.
Historians are considered by many as beguiled whiners, and most promoters of history were usually honored posthumously, as in the case of the Bisayan singer Yoyoy Villame, whose song entitled Philippine Geography, Yoyoy was given his long overdue appreciation and recognition after his death by different sectors for his priceless contribution to our rich Filipino arts and culture. Historians seem irrelevant for this postmodern culture that we have nowadays. The quest for money, for fame, and for that laurel wreath of success, these mundane elements most sought-after by many if not all has caused us to forget the past. One American orator cautioned the aspiring millionaires of his metropolis, he poignantly stated: “After a man has acquired ten million, he must accept, with each additional million, at least one gall-stone”
Why bother about the past? Why study history? Or why write about history? Many statesmen have called upon their citizens, repeating the rhetorical lines: “Let us not forget the lessons of history.” And yet, we, Filipinos have remained forgetful and so we repeated our mass revolts, the one that we did in 1986 that toppled the late strongman Ferdinand E. Marcos from his 20 years of dictatorial regime and again we opted for another popular uprising in 2001 to get rid of Erap. What’s wrong with us? We do away with the Marcos in 1986 People’s Power but we had unwisely elected an actor turned politician to become our president in 1998 and sadly we had ousted him through another People's Power backed by the Makati business tycoons just half way through his term of office. Are we seriously studying our history? Because so many times we forget the past, and we just resigned to ourselves by claiming the lines, “history repeats itself.”
During bible days,
the children of Israel had been exiled to a foreign land called Babylon which was ruled then by
Nebuchadnezzar; there were two prophets during those dark days that had served as the Israelites’
historians. The historians had reminded the people of their past rich heritage as a nation in
the promised land with abundance of flowing milk and honey. Prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah had served the exiled children
of Israel by bringing to their remembrance their past glorious days under their
great military leaders such as King David and King Solomon. During the diaspora,
the two prophets had become the historians that gave hope for newness to the
exiled children of Israel and reminded them of the past glorious nation that they
once had, a nation abundantly blessed by Jehovah, the God of Israel.
Who are the exiles of today? What about the diaspora of many OFWs in faraway lands? Are they not our contemporary exiles? Metaphorically, these OFWs are exiles to foreign lands. They could be considered as refugees, seeking asylum in foreign lands for pure economic reason. Our nation’s current economic difficulties have driven away many of our countrymen as OFWs, as exiles to strange lands with equally strange cultures and inhabitants. There are untold numbers of fathers and mothers that have joined in this phenomenal diaspora, which is so alarming and disquieting to imagine, and taking place in our nation these days.
Literally, our overseas workers are seeking economic asylum because their expertise and knowledge are direly needed by the host- developed countries and a decent pay is also a welcome benefit which in fact our fatherland could impossibly match. Many families have sadly become fatherless because of the need to earn much for the children’s future. And others too have become motherless. Back home, many children are unknowingly growing, and are prematurely being weaned from the warm embrace of their indomitable mothers. And the children have become defenseless and vulnerables to the many unsolved evils of society.
We beat our bosoms for
all these unwanted pain. We have to mourn for this aching reality that befell on
many of our families nowadays. All of us have to feel the pain. All of us have to understand the loneliness that these children are going through.
The absentee fathers and mothers are now exiled to new lands where they sought economic refuge. Unknown pain, indescribable emptiness, and choking heaviness were born by many of these nameless parents, added to these is the unbearable orphanage that many children have suffered while being left behind under the care of relatives and guardians. How much money could compensate all these unwanted sunderings? If only money can truly provide the needed balm to all these human sufferings. Could these orphaned children bore the pain long enough?
We need to remember the fatherland. We have to draw water from the wellspring memory of the past. We have to remember the past in order to find hope for newness. One soldier of the Union Army during the American Civil War was caught and imprisoned by the Confederate Army at the Andersonville prison camp, and the dying soldier after observing the daily deaths of his fellow prisoners inside the camp and for various causes-starvation, diseases, untreated wounds contaminated with poisonous gun powders, and the soldier’s chance of living was getting slimmer each day. He had written this famous line in his diary: “Hope is a good medicine.” John L. Ransom survived the ordeal and his famous diary was published in 1881 entitled Andersonville Diary.
We have to hope for
newness. Our nameless fathers and mothers who braved through this inevitable
separation from their families must draw hope from the wellspring memory of
the past. We have to hope that someday, we will be reunited with our families,
with our children, with our love ones and we will all be fed and clothed like those citizens of
foreign lands that they have worked for. We have to remember the past, our
cemented bonds with our children. We have to remember the past; our childhood
days when we had enjoyed unequal care from both mothers and fathers without
the fear of being abandoned. We must draw hope from those past memories in
order to dream for newness for the future of this peculiar community we called
home.
We have to hope that someday our countrymen will not leave the fatherland and their families just to earn money in foreign lands, and live there as exiles in order to provide for their children’s needs and futures. Someday, tomorrow will be brighter than today, we need to hope for this. The great Apostle to the Gentiles had once written: “For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what he already has? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.” NIV(Romans 8:24-25)
Hope is still a good medicine! Gloc 9's song could be a knife-cutting-truth that criticizes this nagging reality of common Filipino families nowadays. I am trying to absorb its throat - choking message .
Posted at 08:29 PM in family concern, OFW, pinoy concern, tagum | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBack (0)