Breaking The Curse

THIS PICTURE SAYS IT ALL. HAVE A GREAT THANKSGIVING CELEBRATION, ALL!

 

All members of the community and visitors had to touch the pig to transfer the curse to it. We were told the ritual would last for three days because all members of the community had to touch the ring and pig and not all were present on the first day. Here people start to move in to touch the pig. The pig was eventually killed and the meat was divided amongst the village. (Photo and caption by Jacob Maentz)

A Little History

A GOOD READ this Indigenous Peoples' Day/Dia de la Hispanidad/Columbus Day is Antoon Postma's study on the history of Calavite, a lost settlement/mission on the northwest hook of the island of Mindoro, its Parthenon on the hill. "The Calavite site, while still called Pinagbayanan or "former townsite" has only some Iraya Mangyan resident families. A certain Domingo Venturero, residing in Talaotao, a village on Golo Island, has claimed to own the area, including the ruins. Aside from that, the only visitors are treasure hunters who go inside and around the church, breaking open and destroying the stone walls, and looking for supposed wealth hidden there by the missionaries, as if the Moro pirates had overlooked something. Unless someone takes care of the church ruins, it is doubtful whether it will survive much longer as a historic monument." That was when Postma visited about 50 years ago; I wonder how the site is now.

From Punto Mindoro

Sublimate Hero?

APOLINARIO MABINI contracted the polio virus at age 31 that rendered him a paralytic, but it was not the bug that killed him; it was the cholera virus in his favorite drink, carabao milk, that did him in two months after he was allowed to return to the Philippines in 1903 from his exile in Guam, after he refused to swear allegiance to the American colonial government. Reading about epidemics and the Philippine Revolution, I strayed into this somewhat irreverent but interesting look at the enigmatic hero by Nick Joaquin in the July 28, 1962 issue of the Philippines Free Press.

A Saint's Petition

"THE MOST WONDERFUL and beautiful letter" out of the six left behind by San Ecequiel Moreno after the great fire of August 12, 1881 that reduced the capital town of Calapan to ashes, according to Antoon Postma, is this petition addressed to the Vicario Capitular of the Arzobispado de Manila, urging the creation of a town out of a Mangyan settlement named Sta. Cruz outside Sablayan, Occidental Mindoro. The future saint's concern and admiration for Mangyan virtues is evident in the letter, as is his awareness of their exploitation and abuse by Christian Tagalogs (true to this day to some extent). For San Ecequiel's other letters, evangelistic missions in Mindoro and canonization after death, read here.

     In compliance with the disposition of Your Excellency in the preceding decree, I am supplying you hereby with the information requested from me, and as suggested by the Fiscal with regards to the establishment of a townsite in the settlement of Sta. Cruz, an annex of Sablayan, together with the creation of new mission posts on this island (Mindoro).

     The petition of the missionary-priest of Sablayan in the name of the Mangyans residing in Sta. Cruz, is in my opinion worthy of attention and approval, due to the advantages it can give to the Religion and the State, once a town will have started in that place, with the obligations that its inhabitants have taken upon themselves.

     How many people know anything about Mindoro? How many have traveled the huge distances that are separating the different towns from each other; have felt the need for intervening settlements to divide those long stretches of roads that are extremely lonely and difficult?

     Only the poor Tagalog, forced by an urgent government request, would dare to undertake these trips, along narrow trails, with dense vegetation, crossing rivers and swamps, going up and down the mountains, without any hope or consolation of finding a resting place nearby, in case his strength fails him.

     That’s why it is clear that those Alcaldes [Mayores] who might have visited (all) the towns of this island are rare, yes extremely rare indeed, and that’s why the (government) orders are slow to take effect, [doing so] at some imaginary time in the vague future.

     Last month (Jan. 1876) I had to send some instructions to the missionary-priest of Mangarin, and I looked for a Tagalog man best suited for this task, one well acquainted with the way going there, and who had made several trips already to that place. I gave him money, and whatever he would still need on his trip, but nevertheless, it is now almost one month since he left, and at this moment I don’t know whether the message has been delivered, or what the response was of the missionary.

     If this happens with a special dispatch well paid for, it can be imagined what would happen with the orders that are sent by a descending line of court officials through someone who is not interested whether his message will arrive sooner or later, and who is not urged on by Gobernadorcillos, or village heads.

     From the above it is clear that it is of great advantage to establish the village in question, because it is going to split up the 12 leagues (about 67 km) between Mamburao and Sablayan, and facilitate the communications that bring so many benefits.

     The new townsite will not change altogether the conditions prevailing in Mindoro, but to a certain extent it surely will. It is a step forward in the execution of the great job that has to be done for the island. The place in question couldn’t be more appropriate, and favorable results will undoubtedly be obtained, as already pointed out in earlier reports.

     This new township deserves also special attention and protection because the ones requesting the formal establishment are pagans. They pledge themselves to conditions that are most beneficial to the Religion and the State; they are now subjects who want to obey authorities that previously they did not submit to, and didn’t even know about; they are people searching and requesting for our Faith and our Tradition, and it is reasonable and fair that we accept them. It is important to do it in such a way that the fruits, obtained by the hard work of the missionary, will not be lost, and I believe therefore, that it is very important that we treat them favorably in everything possible, even to the point of spoiling them at the beginning.

     The Mangyans of Sta. Cruz are still like children who need encouragement, like fragile floats that can’t sail without a favorable wind in the back, and where the slightest contrary breeze will make them founder.

     A kind and fatherly treatment of them is needed; we have to please and not to oppose them at present, and undoubtedly, the results will be favorable and will still increase in the future. When they come to recognize the advantage of living in community, enjoy and be happy with the benefits that Religion offers them, together with the security provided by the government, they will like to participate in well-being and progress for their fellow beings, and give additional support to the missionary who brings the Good News to those who are still left behind in the jungle.

     Today, more than ever, it is imperative to give protection to the Mangyans of Sta. Cruz, once the creation of new missions in this island is realized, which is the subject of the serious consideration of this dossier, as expressed very well in the Fiscal’s opinion, and about which I will be saying something presently.

     After the statements of the authorities of this Province, of the priest of Sablayan, and of the Most Reverend Fr. Provincial of the Recoletos in their respective excellent reports on the case in question, I am the only one still to add my recommendation and opinion to those of such respectable and competent persons.

     I will do so, without many words, without giving more reasons in favor of this matter, because all have studied it in depth, and all agree, supported by strong arguments, that the creation of new missions is profitable and necessary, if this island is to be pulled out of the decadence it finds itself in.

     However, since my humble opinion is requested, together with relevant additional information, I will do so most willingly and will state what I think and know about this particular case.

     If I would be telling Your Excellency, that even aside from the Mangyans, and just considering the welfare in the secular and spiritual sense, and the progress already established on the island, that for these reasons alone there is already a need for the creation of new missions, I would have said enough.

     There are l8 towns on the island itself, and three on the two islands of Sibay, Semirara and Caluya, villages belonging to Mangarin. All of these 18 towns are along the beaches that are surrounding this immense and large island, without roads for communication, as I pointed out already.

     In most of the villages there is no respectable person to be found who could take care of its inhabitants, no one to enlighten and watch over them, no one to imbue in them concepts of helpfulness, progress and dedication to work.

     The local authorities are practically useless, although for these positions the most qualified persons have been elected. Only the Provincial Authority, by making a special effort, is able to visit these villages once, and the parish-priest only a few times, a year, which is the most they can afford.

     It is impossible for only 5 parish priests to frequently go around the whole coastal area that has a length of 85 to 90 leagues [or from 460-500 km], let alone also the 3 islands that belong to Mangarin.

     For example, it is practically impossible for the parish priest of Naujan to be in charge of more than 3000 souls of the town itself where he resides, as well as of 2,000 more who live in 6 other towns, also within his jurisdiction, comprising an area along a shoreline of 20 leagues [or 110 km] in length.

     Because of this lack of supervision and instruction, the inhabitants of these towns are ignorant and lazy, and have no incentive to work. Most of them spend weeks and months in the forests without returning to the town, living on the fruits and edible rootcrops that the fertile soil of Mindoro spontaneously and in abundance supplies them with.

     Many of them subsist on the work of the Mangyans, who are being exploited by them in a shameful way, [they] deserving the most severe punishment [for this exploitation]. The Mangyans are being deceived by them with false deals that most of the time result in their becoming slaves of these unfortunate people.

     This laziness, apathy and lack of interest, this way of living is the root of all other vices, and of the fact that they are not interested at all to have roads, or any progress in their towns, which are just a group of small and worn-out houses, and shelters for some criminals, who are acquainted with the simplicity and ignorance of the inhabitants, and feel confident not to be known and discovered.

     Some time ago one of these [criminals] was the manager and trusted person of a Gobernadorcillo, and neither this official nor the townspeople were in the least suspicious of him.

     Who could put a stop to all these abuses, free the people in these villages from their ignorance, make them into useful workers, and look after the progress of their miserable towns? What I have said already serves as an answer.

     The parish priest during his visits is aware of the abuses and denounces them, he enlightens wherever he can, works hard to make the addicted give up their vices, succeeds in obtaining the conversion of many. However, once the parish priest has left, they return to their old vices, partly because surely no one will reprimand them, and also because they are not well enough aware of the advantages of virtue, and the bad consequences of vice.

     Taking all this into consideration, one is bound to notice the need for the [population] increase of some missions, were it only for the proper well-being and progress of what is existing already.

     If apart from that, one seeks to increase the population, and wishes to do something in favor of the thousands of souls that are hidden in the forests, then, by all means, the six or eight missions suggested should be created.

     The number of Mangyans is hard to estimate, although an approximate number is given of 30,000, but I can only say for sure that there are many, and that after trekking for 3 or 4 hours from the beach into the interior, starting at whatever point of the island, one can still encounter the Mangyans.

     These people are gentle, and obedient to their leaders and elders, don’t cheat, and stick to their given word as if it were a solemn oath.

    They don't practice polygamy, and marriage is a formal act considered to be indissoluble. They punish disobedience, theft and other crimes, especially adultery. As far as could be verified, they have a rather vague belief in a Supreme Being, in the immortality of the soul and in reward and punishments.

     These customs and beliefs of the Mangyan are extremely favorable for a good result of the missions, and we may trust that with God’s help, abundant fruits can be obtained.

     The Tagalog, abusing the Mangyan the way he does, treating him more like an animal than a human being, receives from him obedience, submission, and even, I venture to say, respect.

     If the Tagalog managed this with the way he treats them, what not could the missionary achieve who is not abusing him? He will give him whatever he can afford, will teach him, and free him from slavery, and will treat him with the kindness of a father to his son. The missionary will be prepared to live with the Mangyans, and suffer with them when they suffer, or enjoy when they enjoy. With his soft character and patience he will make them better disposed; will make them accept his fatherly and affable treatment, and the meaning of community life and work, and in this way they will group together in settlements that should be organized initially in a way most advantageous to the purpose we have in mind.

     The Mangyan will come to realize the value of his labor, and the real price of his products. There will be no more deceit in the presence of the missionary, and the Tagalog will have to eat “by the sweat of his brow."

     Once the Mangyan is acquainted with us, his conversion to the Faith assured, and settlements established, it will not be difficult to open up roads of communication with the interior of the island that today is still a kind of enchanted castle filled with treasures, but fortified with its spectral and dense vegetation and inaccessible to the best prepared and most daring explorer.

     At present, hardly the ninth part of the land area of this island is under our control or known to us, all the rest we don’t possess in reality, nor do we have any knowledge of it.

     Therefore, if it is desired to develop and effect the temporary and eternal happiness of those thousands of people who are buried in the mire of disbelief, if it is desired to understand this island, make profit and utilize the riches it has in store, in my opinion, and in the opinion of all the prudent persons who know Mindoro well, it is important, nay, it is imperative, that the missions requested
should be created.

     This is the most appropriate way and one that will only cost a little money (which will be recovered with accrued interest), and eventually the lives of some missionaries.

     The poor health conditions in all underdeveloped and virgin land, the exhaustion of daily trips and other travails, will snatch these valuable lives away. But what can we do about it? It has always happened like that, and it should not he discounted as a setback in this great work.

     Because there is still Faith, there is still Heroism, there are still Apostles and Followers of the Crucified, there are still men who are eager to give their lives for the sake of their brothers, and die martyrs’ deaths.

     They are the fortunate ones! The Country will always remember them, and God will give them a great reward, eternal life!

     This is all I want to say in this connection, as a proper response to the request of Your Excellency, dated the 31st of last month. May God bless you for many years to come!

Calapan, 18th February, 1876
(SGD) FR. ECEQUIEL MORENO

San Ecequiel Moreno, Vicar Forane of Mindoro, 1873-76, patron saint of cancer patients

Dogeaters In Coney Island

NOT ABOUT MANGYANS, but recently discovered book The Lost Tribe of Coney Island by journalist Claire Prentice is a welcome addition to the imperial Gothic shelf, especially because its story took place on nearby ground. The event was an offshoot of the St. Louis Exposition of 1904, not out of government initiative but private enterprise this time, when Truman K. Hunt, doctor and conman in charge of the Igorot village in the Midwest, returned to the Philippines after the exposition closed and recruited his own band of Igorots comprising 51 men, women and children who were eventually exhibited in Coney Island and became a hit at its old Luna Park (nothing to do with the new Luna Park with the Cyclone roller coaster) in the summer of 1905. Their exploitation, deception and degradation in the big city is told and documented by Prentice in this amazing book. "Americans gone rogue, as Prentice puts it, have long been a part of the Philippines’ landscape, but Truman Hunt, an inveterate liar, a bigamist and a slave driver, seems nearly unparalleled as far as scoundrels go. In some sense, this slick-talking charlatan becomes a stand-in for America itself, or a certain version of America in its more opportunistic historical moments, blind to its own faults and willing to do anything to turn a buck. As Antoinette Funk, Hunt’s lawyer, declared at one of his trials: 'The government set the example of exhibiting the people. The government was the first to bring them to this country for show purposes.' She had a good point, if not a defense."--Robin Hemley in The New York Times 

A young Igorot girl at Coney Island in 1905 (via Claire Prentice)

Seeing $$$: Truman K. Hunt with some Igorots at the World's Fair in St. Louis in 1904 (via Claire Prentice) 
Credit...

The Postma Manuscripts

I COMPILED INTO A BIBLIOGRAPHY (in neither the MLA or APA format) all of Antoon Postma's work deposited at the Mangyan Heritage Center library in Calapan, accumulated in his almost six decades of working and living with Mangyans from 1958 to 2016. Aside from the five books and about a dozen journal articles he has seen publication during his lifetime, the bulk of his remaining documents are unpublished manuscripts, many of which one may consider as overlapping and repetitive, but testimony to Postma's accreting and evolving understanding of his subject. I am most interested in information I am yet to discover on subjects like Mangyan reducción efforts by early Spanish missionaries, Mangyan interaction with the American imperial government during the early 20th century, abuses committed against Mangyans by the military and lowland Christians in more recent times, and information of anthropological importance (or curiosity) like the rituals in gathering of honey, boiling water to make salt, removing poisonous substances in wild tubers to make them edible, and so on. I wish Postma had done research on the shore-dwelling Mangyans in Bansud before they were driven inland by Christian settlers from Marinduque (the name of the town came from "basud", Mangyan word for "delta" where they once farmed, fished and flourished before turning to the mountains.) But there is none.

With what is available however, book-worthy nonetheless, I have asked Emily Catapang, Executive Director of MHC, to have their text typed up in a CD and submitted with hard copies to UP Press or Anvil for consideration, and she is open to the idea. To enter Postma's world in Panaytayan, Mansalay, Oriental Mindoro, click on his photo in Kurt Hoerbst's slideshow.

(by Kurt Hoerbst, 2007)

Postma's 2004 handwritten transcript (first page) of Karyo's account of his travel to America in 1904, as gathered by Fletcher Gardner in 1939 

The Folk Element

BECAUSE I BELIEVE THAT the most unadulterated version of folklore is one that was collected (in accessible English) long ago, I was glad to find a copy of the first edition of Filipino Popular Tales (1921) by Dean Spruill Fansler, an early scholar of Pinoy folklore from Columbia University and protege of Franz Boas, "Father of American Anthropology". From 1908 to 1914, Fansler taught at the then young University of the Philippines.

The Most Moral

I DON'T KNOW HOW FORMER editor of The Brooklyn Eagle Charles Montgomery Skinner came to his conclusion about Mangyan morality in Myths And Legends Of Our New Possessions And Protectorate (1900), maybe from reading Dean Worcester, but I'll take it. The earliest book on Philippine mythology in English I've encountered so far.

Weeding Casualties

MAYBE THE UNIVERSITY OF WINNIPEG (then United College) should have held on to this first edition of Manuel Arguilla's How My Brother Leon Brought Home a Wife and Other Stories (1940), if only its library weeder foresaw the close to 80K Pinoys that would later call its city home. Weeding a collection is a tricky task dictated by a number of factors, poor circulation and plain ignorance among them, and unfortunately the book had no library due date card when it arrived to give me an idea of its circulation history. Mabel Cook Cole's Philippine Folk Tales (1916) from the USC library had the same fate, but maybe books such as these are better off safeguarded in a private library.

Of Ferals And Fetishes

WHILE I'M ON THE SUBJECT of American imperial Gothic (and not-so-Gothic) fiction about the Philippines, I am posting several more stories that I have come upon in this foray. The first is "Mivins" (1902), the only short story on this subject as far as I know that is not available on public domain, by our mysterious writer Sargent Kayme which appeared in Metropolitan Magazine, a copy of which I found on Biblio. Here the barong reminds us of the awesome blade that hacked the head off a carabao at one blow in Apocalypse Now. The second is by another little-known writer Charles E. Meyers: "The Anting-Anting of Maga" (1895) in Overland Monthly, which has shades of Robert Louis Stevenson and W.W. Jacobs. Then the three Laguna hag tales (1902-1903) by African-American U.S. Volunteer Army captain Frank R. Steward (whose narrator doesn't identify himself as such) in Colored American Magazine, and are the subject of University of Texas scholar Gretchen Murphy's angle of reading. What I consider the most sympathetic of the group are the poignant last two stories, also from Overland Monthly: Pierre N. Beringer's "Joseppa, Sweetest of Tagalog Children" (1900) and William O'Connell McGeehans's "The Spirit of the Philippines" (1902).

Mangyan amulets (Masaru Miyamoto)

Capt. Frank R. Steward

Imperial Gothic

WHO WAS SARGENT KAYME? Because I like mysteries, I did some online sleuthing on a recently acquired book to shed light on the identity of the author behind Anting-Anting Stories and Other Strange Tales of the Filipinos, a well-received book of short stories (in 1901 when America was fascinated by the exoticism of its new possessions) but only came upon one interesting lead. Written under a pseudonym, the book was thought to have been written not by "a soldier in the United States service but a well-known New England author" (Current Literature, 1901) and indeed reminds one of Kipling out of other writers of the Gothic during the imperialist period--Conrad, Croker, Perrin, Bierce, Crawford et al. "Mivins", the only other known work ascribed to this nom de plume, was a short story in the July 1902 issue of Metropolitan Magazine (More on this later). So if the writer was a well-known author, why use a pseudonym? Wouldn't using the real name help sell a book, much more one of demonstrated quality? Care to take a stab? I've given up, going instead for a story in the anting-anting collection that touches on Mindoro and gives one a taste of Moro terror and raw swift's nest.

The First Mangyans In America

THE LARGELY UNKNOWN FACT that among the non-Christian Filipinos brought by the Americans to the United States in 1904 to participate as living human exhibits in the St. Louis World Fair were five Mangyans from Bulalacao--Kabesa Sabong, Sinhigan, Daliwnan, Salayaw (who died there) and Karyo--was documented by Antoon Postma in a (somewhat disorganized) manuscript called The First Mangyans in America: Their Aborted Bamboo Mail 100 years after the exposition.  The manuscript was based on Karyo's early account of the experience (page 30), told from memory thirty five years after the voyage and after being urged by US Army Contract Surgeon Fletcher Gardner, who was "instrumental in attracting and recommending these Mangyans (to Dean Worcester) as interesting tribal subjects to their curious countrymen at the World Fair." The manuscript also delves into the fate of the unanswered and presumably lost bamboo mail sent by the families they left behind in the Philippines and known to have been under the guardianship of Gardner, duplicates of which reappeared years later. Some of the most powerful messages in the bamboo mail was one reminding a husband not to gamble and another warning Kabesa Sabong that his wife will kill herself by eating a poisonous sea crab called tanggalungon if he didn't return by the month of April. Last is the amusing but perfectly understandable effect of the voyage on the returned Mangyans (as reported by American officials in Mindoro) after having seen the "Great White City": Kabesa Sabong's character change when dealing with his village subjects (which was promptly corrected by authorities), the trophies, certificates and souvenirs they brought home, and the intriguing suggestion (apparently by Harold Conklin) that Karyo may have had a wife (or wives, and even an offspring!) in America. If there ever was, Karyo's descendants should collect far more than the 50 silver dollars he was paid by the Americans when he returned home.

Mangyan gentlemen at the turn of the 19th century (Dean Worcester)

The Kansas Connection

THE WICHITA DAILY EAGLE kept close tabs on the Philippine front this month in 1898 to monitor the situation for arriving sons in the 20th Kansas Volunteer Infantry Regiment, set to sail for Manila later that year. The 964 enlisted men and 46 officers that included General Frederick Funston, sly captor of General Emilio Aguinaldo, were officially mustered into service on May 13, 1898, but didn't arrive in Manila until December 6. Funston captured Aguinaldo in Palanan on March 23, 1901 and was lampooned by Mark Twain in his sarcastic satire A Defence of General Funston because of the tactics he employed in the operation: “begging for food then capturing his benefactor.”

The Wichita Daily Eagle, June 18, 1898

The proclamation muted below the headline

Where the buffalo roam: the 20th Kansas, home on the firing range

Frederick Funston with officers that captured Aguinaldo

A President's Message

MI HIJA, MI PATRIA. In one of his "fireside chats", periodic public affairs radio broadcasts from Malacañang through which he updated Filipinos on the activities of the republic, former Philippine President Elpidio Quirino spoke about fatherly pride and the country's affection for Spain, a powerful message for the Día de la Hispanidad, its purity unblemished by the annoying background noise. Still a grieving widower when he ascended to presidency in 1948 (his wife Alicia and three children Armando, Norma and Fe Angela were killed by the Japanese during the Battle of Manila), Quirino also faced the challenges of postwar reconstruction and the Hukbalahap insurrectos. His only surviving daughter Victoria became the youngest official hostess of Malacañang at 16, performing the functions traditionally ascribed to a First Lady, this time having returned with a medal from an official trip to Spain. 

Staying Alive

DÍA DE LA HISPANIDAD (October 12) is observed on the same week as Columbus Day. Spanish is the most widely-spoken foreign language in the city, and as a filispanophile trying to learn it late in life, I find memory trainer Anthony Metivier's book interesting, what with the Philippine flag on its cover, and am delighted to see and hear Pinoys speak the language. The use of Spanish in the Philippines started its rapid decline after the Second World War when American pop culture flooded the country (The New York Times' effect on man?) and got another nail in the coffin when the new constitution removed it as one of the country's three official languages in 1987. Its comatose state got some jolt when Spanish-speaking presidenta Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo signed a directive in 2007 requiring the Philippine school system to resume including Spanish in its curriculum, for which she deserves some credit. And thanks to the (dwindling) number of Spanish-speakers in the country (and maybe to the creole Chavacanos), we maintain memberships in the Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española and the Unión Latina. 

Also thanks to programs of the Instituto Cervantes de Manila, partnerships with the Spanish and Chilean governments which offer scholarships and teacher-training programs to Pinoy students and educators, and other filispanophiles like Pepe Alas of San Pedro, Laguna (his blog went belly-up in 2016; ¡Alas, que lástima!), the Spanish language torch in the Philippines is still alive, barely. Whatever. But this Chavacana girl's love song, applauded by viewers from as far away as Spain and Mexico, is haunting. TV Patrol Chavacano is equally interesting, although I cringe every time I hear the improper use of simple articles--el calle, el universidad--in every other sentence. Also check out these hour-long broadcasts of the radio program Filipinas, Ahora Mismo before it also folded up in 2009 when the Spanish government discontinued funding as it faced its own economic recession. (More ¡que lástima! Any wealthy sponsors out there?) Finally, let's move to madre España and watch the performance of "Yo Te Diré" by filispañola Alexandra Masangkay, star of the movie 1898, Los Ultimos de Filipinas, if only to see just how pretty she is. And this not-so-HD file of the anti-war movie (shot in the Canary Islands and Equatorial Guinea) without subtitles for exercise and look for the controversial Pinoy sex in public scene.

I think we Pinoys have the natural gift of learning a language, given the multitude of dialects in the country many of us know how to speak, and that we are losing out on opportunities in the Latin world, job-wise and otherwise, by skipping on this endeavor to learn a not-so-new language. I believe we Pinoys will be better served, and will discover a whole new horizon, if we learn and know how to read, write and speak Spanish the way we do English.

Miembros de la Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (ASALE)

Me Gusta

ESTE FRASCO DE BALSA, una especie de calabaza gigante para almacenar la tuba de Colima. The beverage became so popular in Western Mexico (it still is) that a decree by viceroy Luis de Velasco in 1610 prohibited the production of tuba because it had become the beverage of choice for the local Mexican population in the provinces of Colima and Zacatula and the sales of Castilian grape wine had dropped, costing Spain a large amount of tax revenue. Taverns and even churches replaced the Castilian spirit with the tuba, which prompted its prohibition and the deportation of Filipinos who produced it. "It can be averted, provided all the Indian natives of the said Filipinas Islands are shipped and returned to them, that the palm groves and vessels with which the wine is made be burnt, the palm trees felled, and severe penalties imposed on whomever remains or returns to making that wine.” Geographer Henry J. Bruman traced the Pinoy roots of Mexican palm toddy and its distillation in The Hispanic American Historical Review and Geographical Review. ¡Compuesta, y conquista al revés, señores! Here's to harvest season.

One For Captain Kid

BEFORE SAYING GOODBYE to serious history posts and getting down to work, I want to share this kid-friendly picture story, complete with music and sound effects, of a Manila galleon's voyage (based on Gemelli Careri's 17th century narrative) by columnist Adolfo Arranz and infographic designer Marco Hernandez in last May's blog issue of South China Morning Post. This is only one chapter in a series of posts; read the rest by clicking the other tabs at the bottom of the screen. Also Dutch resident Kees Koonstra's cool project for the town of Puerto Galera, on whose beaches still wash up grains of black, petrified rice from galleons that once sought shelter in its safe harbor, loading supplies before heading out the treacherous salida at the Embocadero. Aye aye, captain Kees! says SpongeBob SquarePants.

                                                     Such is the legend. Hear this truth:
                                                     Over the trackless past, somewhere,
                                                     Lie the lost days of our tropic youth,
                                                     Only regained by faith and prayer...
                                                             --Bret Harte, "The Lost Galleon"       

Homage to Puerto Galera's history

Kees Koonstra and Puerto Galera mayor Rockey Ilagan with the miniature replica of a Manila galleon

End Of A Deadly Passage

AFTER THE TE DEUM and the magnificent trade fair in Acapulco, flocked to by merchants and wealthy buyers from as far away as Peru, many questions still remain. Did Isagani Timbulan, one of four survivors of the Concepción who made their way back to Manila in 1639 ten months after the disaster, ever get to see once again his beloved Yanihan, who was on board the almiranta San Ambrosio that successfully made it to Nueva España? What about those rafts of coconuts and sacks of discarded mango seeds, used as toilet wipes in the meantime to extend their usefulness on the sea-tossed galleon? Who among the wretched and maltreated Pinoy crewmen jumped ship with nothing but rags and galleon trash on their backs to seek new lives in the New World? Art by Robert McGinnis of the James Bond posters fame.

Franciscan missions were later established in California (once thought to be an island) to provide life-saving citrus to the Manila galleons

The Acapulco trade fair

Love In The Time Of Corcuera

SEBASTIÁN HURTADO DE CORCUERA'S autocratic governorship is demonstrated by his early conflict (three years before the Concepción tragedy) with the Augustinian Archbishop of Manila Fray Hernando Guerrero, precipitated by the execution of fugitive Spanish artilleryman Francisco de Nava on the grounds of San Agustín Church where had sought refuge after he had murdered a female slave he had fallen in love with, but was captured by Corcuera's determined police after they ransacked the church. Offended by the governor's blatant disrespect of ecclesiastical jurisdiction, the archbishop refused to lift, even on such a festive day being the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary (this day in 1635), Corcuera's previous interdict suspending all religious functions of the church, but was forced to relent and render church services when the Jesuits took the side of the governor.  Fray Casimiro Diaz, from material collected earlier by Fray Gaspar de San Agustín, wrote: "There did not fail to result certain charges against the governor, such as his having ordered the secular priests to be detained in the guard-house; his declaration that he could not be excommunicated by anyone except the pope; and if an order were given to him to arrest the pontiff, he would arrest him, and even drag him along by one foot (which he was proved to have said by several persons)." Rodrigo Duterte's hero? Read on: "The governor freed himself from all these charges by excuses in a manifesto which he published; but as it is not a part of my duty to examine their adequacy, I shall not do so...for there is no liberty in Filipinas to enable anyone to complain, or to speak his mind against what the government manipulates." In May of 1636, the governor ordered the exile of the archbishop to Mariveles Island, and the cabildo of Manila cathedral took over the administration of the archdiocese. Within a month he was allowed to return to the city, albeit under humiliating conditions. 

Equally telling is the account of Corcuera's own Filipino slaves among the hundreds of men, women and children captured during the Moro Wars of 1638 in Tatiana Seijas' Asian Slaves in Colonial Mexico (the Portuguese began the African slave trade across the Atlantic in 1526), and how Corcuera justified them to the court as "legal slaves because they had been captured in a just war against Muslims, and the enslavement of women and children in a just war was fully allowed under Spanish jurisprudence." And beginning November of 1639, four months after the four survivors of the Concepción reached Manila, and up to February the following year, nearly 25,000 Chinese were killed in the second Chinese massacre in the Philippines. The slaughter was precipitated by the murder of Don Luis Arias de Mora, a "heartless and extortionate" Spanish alcalde-mayor and overseer of public land around the lake towns of Biñan-Calamba, by his angry Chinese rice-farming settlers. Desperate and oppressed beyond what they could bear, they set out, 300 strong and armed with bolos, bamboo poles and farm tools, for Manila. But "this was hardly an anti-Spanish uprising, much less anti-Filipino. It was a bid for survival by cornered men." What followed was an epidemic slaughter of the Chinese, including loyal servants in households, upon Corcuera's order and out of paranoia. The governor later boasted to the King that he and his men had killed about 25,000 Chinese (close to the current count of Duterte's EJK casualties) and thus suppressed an armed rebellion, when in reality it was no more than a weaponless, stormy protest group. It makes sense that national hero Dr. Jose Rizal, champion of the fight for freedom and against oppression, would trace his roots more than two centuries later to those Chinoys of Biñan-Calamba (which may have encompassed the town of San Pedro, where my family presently owns a house in a subdivision). Blair and Robertson's account of the entire episode in Volume 29 of The Philippine Islands is a lengthy read, but Jesuit Charles J. McCarthy's summary in Philippine Studies grasps its essence. My wife being also of Chinese ancestry, I wonder how her forebears survived those pestilential years.

Sebastián Hurtado de Corcuera, Governor of the Philippines, 1635-1644

San Agustin Church. Pen and ink drawing by Noel Bueza

Like Egyptians building a pyramid, Pinoy slaves labor on a Manila galleon. "Sometimes as many as 600 laborers were forced to work at building galleons and other ships. Some of them plane, some saw, some nail the timber, but the greatest number fell trees on the mountains, and these must be many and large, to keep out the tempestuous seas the galleons are to cross," wrote 17th century traveler Gemelli Careri. "Obtaining the lumber was the hardest work. Thousands of men serving under a labor draft sweated out grueling workdays that ran from dawn to sundown. They felled, rough cut, and transported the logwood that was shaped into the galleons at Cavite." Painting by Noel Escultura

Lading a Manila galleon at the port of Cavite. Art by Roger Morris