What’s Baguio to Wood and Wood to Baguio

INQUIRER NORTHERN LUZON

Inquirer Northern Luzon : What’s Baguio to Wood and Wood to Baguio
By Maurice Malanes
Inquirer Northern Luzon
Posted date: June 10, 2009

AUTHOR and former University of the Philippines Baguio Prof. Ricardo Torres Jr. has long been familiar with Leonard Wood Drive in Baguio City, but he discovered something that awakened his basic “researcher’s instincts.”

The road was named after the American colonial governor general who helped establish Baguio as a hill station where he and other colonial officials, sick soldiers, sojourning colonials, mine prospectors and bored wives of colonial masters in Manila would come to relax and recuperate.

But Torres, who authored books on development, had an interesting discovery about Wood, which, he said, could make the colonial official “a stuff of legends” and possibly “a perfect material for Regal Films.”

Wood captured Torres’ enthusiasm in 2007 when he visited Culion, Palawan.
Culion in Philippine history books is described as a “leper colony.” The place used to carry a stigma as the island was developed as a sanitarium to segregate and find the cure for people affected with the Hansen disease or ketong (leprosy).

On his last day in Culion, Torres was walking toward the old town and in the middle of the old plaza, he saw a big monument under the shade of old acacia trees. On the faded memorial plate of the monument reads: “Dr. Leonard Wood: Built by patients and friends of Dr. Wood.”

“I didn’t know Leonard Wood was a physician. I only knew him as a road,” Torres said in a paper he read during the Baguio Centennial Conference at UP Baguio in March.
Torres was among dozens of academics, researchers and historians who presented papers—all valuable fragments of Baguio’s history—during the conference, which was UP Baguio’s contribution to the city’s celebration of its centenary this year.

“I was intrigued why Leonard Wood deserved a road in an upland city and a monument in a far-flung, God-forsaken island town,” he said.

Awakened instincts

He typed “Leonard Wood biography” on Google and it provided 239,000 search results in 0.23 seconds. “Leonard Wood” alone had 1,160,000 results in 0.15 seconds.

Among other things, Torres discovered a Fort Leonard Wood for military personnel in Missouri and a Leonard Wood Institute that does military researches to help the US Army brace for the future.

Closer to home is a Leonard Wood Leprosy Research Center in Cebu. And it was Wood who advocated the search for cure and care of leprosy in Culion, ordering the allotment of a big chunk of the colonial budget for this.

Torres discovered that Culion was Wood’s “second Cuba.” Described as a physician with a passion, Wood helped eradicate yellow fever in Cuba.

But Torres’ search always points to Philippine history when nationalism and the clamor for independence from the United States was a raging movement.

Wood had strongly opposed this movement because the soldier and physician, Torres noted, believed that the Philippines was not ready for independence as the country and its people had a very poor and pathetic public sanitation.

Torres had another interesting note: Upon Wood’s advice, his wife got hold of the largest gold tiara that was unearthed in Butuan in southern Philippines in 1922.

Many colonial faces

History described Wood as harsh, heartless, ruthless, uncompromising and tactless. As governor general from 1921 to 1927, Wood was “impatient” with Filipinos agitating for independence. In 1923, he banned the display of photographs of Filipino heroes in public schools.

The famous remark of Commonwealth President Manuel L. Quezon, “I prefer a government run like hell by Filipinos to a government run like heaven by Americans,” was said to have been made in reference to Wood.

And Wood’s dispute with Quezon included Baguio, said Torres. While Wood was advertising Baguio as the year-round national capital, El Debate, a magazine that Quezon controlled, “expressed that it is wrong to [advertise] Baguio since it is already popular and needs no propaganda” from someone like Wood.

The famous American writer Mark Twain also characterized Wood as a “colonial savage.” Twain cited how Wood in 1906 ordered and later justified the massacre of 600 Moro men, women and children in Mindanao.

Despite Wood’s ruthlessness and heartlessness, Torres noted another side of the colonial ruler, which could be worth considering at least in terms of governance and exercising political will.

Wood did not only push to develop Camp John Hay when he was commanding general of the Philippine Department from 1906 to 1908. He strove to develop Baguio as “an educational center of forum” for indoctrinating Igorot peoples.

When the basic infrastructures for the city were being built, Wood persuaded Mayor Eusebius Julius Halsema and the city council to fund a nursery for pine and eucalyptus trees to reforest barren areas, expressing alarm over the massive cutting of trees in the city.

He was said to be so concerned about the health of the population that, during one visit here, he dismissed the city physician for failing to contain 15 cases of typhoid fever.

Wood has ambitions, too

“Wood was a man with many colonial faces; a dedicated physician, a ruthless soldier and a military administrator with ambitions to be the next president of America,” Torres said.

He was a dedicated part of America’s Manifest Destiny. On a crusade and on the road to be a legend, Wood imposed a cure for countries that were, in his opinion, unable to govern themselves, Torres said.

Interestingly, Baguio helped cool Wood’s head. Torres noted how Wood and his wife would drive to Baguio “to relax from the rigors of colonial administration.”
He would take long walks and plan for its development and “you can perhaps hear him—no cutting of trees or I’ll shoot you,” Torres said.

According to him, Wood embodies one of the “idols of history” and perhaps the history of Baguio and the Philippines gives an “overemphasis on great men.”

Wood’s monument in Culion, said Torres, is an “idealized representation” of the ruthless man that was friend to the lepers but a burden to public finance.

“From another angle, Wood was made part of history by the councilors of Baguio, those who defined power,” he said. “In Culion, however, it was powerless Hansenites (lepers) that enshrined him to be part of history.”

In Baguio, Wood deserves that road named after him only if roads are for legends, Torres said.

After independence and after Wood, Baguio, he said, is now being built for lowland migrants, tourists, visitors, excursionists, traders and the ukay-ukay (used clothes) crowd.

As Baguio celebrates its centenary, Torres has posed a challenge as the city continues to idolize Wood: “Has anyone asked what happened then to the home of the Ibaloi? Is this part of history now just a mere representation?”

Thinking of the Filipino palate amid Mad Cow disease scare

(Reprinted from archive)

Thinking of the Filipino palate amid Mad Cow disease scare
By Maurice Malanes

Northern Luzon Inquirer--Thursday 29 March 2001

Time was when the traditional Filipino diet depended on where one lived.

Those who lived along the coastlines would rely mainly on fish and other seafood for their protein sources. The Igorot folk of old would get their protein mainly from wide varieties of upland beans and grains, and occasionally from meat when they would hold their traditional thanksgiving feasts called ca�ao or pedit.

Until now, most Igorot folk, particularly those in the hinterlands, still rely mainly on plant proteins and freshwater fish.

So traditionally the Filipino diet has been plant-centered. But thanks to the proponents of the steak and burger religion, the Filipino's healthier vegetable-fish-oriented taste buds shifted toward something meaty as steakhouses and burger chains continued to mushroom in urban areas from Tuguegarao City in Luzon to Davao City in Mindanao.

And proof that these establishments are cashing in on the Filipino's changing taste buds is that they now belong to the country's top 1,000 corporations.

With the Mad Cow and foot-and-mouth diseases now threatening cattle and livestock in the United Kingdom and other parts of Europe, which export a substantial amount of their livestock products to the Philippines, Agriculture Secretary Leonardo Montemayor has advised Filipinos to patronize locally raised cattle and livestock.

Problem is how can Filipino consumers be assured that the processed meats they buy from the groceries, such as sausages, hotdogs and hams, or the burgers they eat in fastfood chains are not tainted?


Advice

One good advice comes from Dr. Micaela Defiesta, Cordillera director of the National Nutritional Council.

"If it's not possible to eat beef and pork, we can go for fish," she said.

Fish, the traditional protein source in this archipelago, "unfortunately is not given priority," she said. "More and more Filipinos now go for burgers and steaks."

With the Mad Cow and foot-and-mouth diseases, Defiesta agrees with the suggestion that it is time for Filipinos to re-educate and re-orient their palates.

"If our forebears had simple but healthier taste buds, why can't we?" she asked. "My advice is for parents to put more fish in the diet of their children."

Fish, she said, has the same quality of protein as meat and has healthier polyunsaturated fats, which the body can easily absorb.

Other Filipinos, she said, can go for grains and legumes, and legume derivatives, such as tofu or soybean curd.

Defiesta said she saw the Mad Cow and foot-and-mouth diseases as an opportunity for concerned officials to look for, if not innovate, appropriate technologies and food security programs for various regions in the country.

Concerned government agencies and local government units, she suggested, could look at the prospects of further popularizing rice-and-fish culture which can help ensure food self-sufficiency in the localities, particularly in a landlocked region such as the Cordillera.

She also suggested the protection of the Cordillera's river systems that are rich in exotic fish species.

The Cordillera has seven major river systems and several tributaries, which have helped provide the protein sources of villagers since time immemorial. The rivers teem with eels, lobsters and various fish.

Mining operations and big dams, however, have threatened some of the river systems.

Still recovering from the pollution of a copper mine in the 1970s, for example, is the Amburayan River, the source of protein for villagers from Kapangan and Atok in Benguet and those in the uplands of La Union.

The Agno River has also lost its exotic fish species because of mining operations in Itogon town and after the Binga and Ambuklao dams were built in the 1950s and 1960s.

Mining operations in Mankayan town also continue to threaten the Abra River.

If only to secure and ensure the health and nutrition of rural folk, Cordillera's river systems must also be secured and protected, Defiesta said.

Donors help keep school for blind afloat

Donors help keep school for blind afloat
By Maurice Malanes
Inquirer Northern Luzon
Posted date: June 02, 2009

TWO years ago, a US Navy retiree was looking for the Tahanang Walang Hagdanan, a house for persons with physical disabilities, in Baguio City so he could offer his help, but the driver of the cab he took brought him instead to the school of the Northern Luzon Association of the Blind (NLAB).

The man did not turn his back, however. After assessing the needs of the blind children, the retiree, who preferred not to be named, volunteered to supply the school with four sacks of rice monthly and to provide dinner every Monday for the 39 children under its care.

He has been doing this since and has pledged to continue helping when the school year opens this month.

For Dona Rosario, NLAB president and executive director, the taxi driver’s mistake was serendipity. “Who knows the retiree was led by the Holy Spirit?” she says.


Quiet benefactors

An Indian couple has been doing the same thing, providing snacks or lunch once a week for the children.

This breed of quiet benefactors has kept afloat northern Luzon’s only school for the blind, especially at a time when its overseas donors had reduced their funding, says Rosario.

The school offers free elementary education to visually impaired children in northern and central Luzon and continues to encourage parents to enroll their blind children there.

Graduates cross into regular high schools and later pursue university or college education, or technical or vocational courses, such as health massage.

Economic crisis

The NLAB’s future, Rosario says, is at stake because its donors are also affected by the global economic crisis. The school is supported by the Christoffel Blinden Mission (CBM), a church-based German donor; Heinz Woelke Foundation; the Diocese of Baguio-Benguet; and other local civic, educational and religious groups and individuals.

Last year, the CBM provided nearly half of the needs of the pupils. This school year, it pledged only 33 percent, saying the current economic crunch affected its supporters among the low-income European parishioners, says Rosario.

The NLAB spends P6,500 for each child monthly or P253,500 for the 39 pupils enrolled last school year. With the reduced funding, it has to initiate fund drives to sustain its mission.

Rosario is hoping that more people will follow the examples set by the Navy retiree and the Indian couple. “Many people in both government and the private sector have yet to appreciate that if these visually impaired are educated they can become productive [members of society],” she says.

She cites blind couple Rolando and Martha Bitaga, who teach academic subjects, including music, at the NLAB school. Both are graduates of the school.
Other graduates have established their own massage clinics, helping reduce the number of beggars in the city, says Rosario.

The NLAB faces another difficulty this school year. Its lease on the lot along the Marcos Highway, where its two-story school has stood since 1985, will expire this month, forcing the school to relocate to a smaller house on Bokawkan Road.

Repair work of the practically dilapidated house is not Rosario’s only concern. She also has to face complaints of neighbors who claim that the front fence mended by the NLAB workers was illegal because it was not covered by a building permit.

The irony of it, says Rosario, is that the complainants are encroaching on parts of the NLAB property.

Rosario did her homework. Citing a historical document showing the original fence, she explained to city authorities that the NLAB was just involved in restoration work.

At times, Rosario feels like giving up. A former nun who refused to get paid for her services, she says her difficulties and trials sometimes stress her out, giving her hypertension.

“I cannot just abandon these children,” she says. “They are my inspiration.”

Helping heal wounds of Mother Earth

INQUIRER NORTHERN LUZON
Inquirer Northern Luzon : Widow helps heal wounds of Earth
By Maurice Malanes
Philippine Daily Inquirer Inquirer Northern Luzon
Posted date: April 21, 2009

NATURAL or organic farming has a way of helping Florence Macagne-Manegdeg recover from what she calls a “senseless murder” that left her a widow and to raise by herself two young daughters after her husband, Jose (Pepe), was murdered more than three years ago.

“Our backyard now teems with fruits – peaches, plum, persimmon, papaya; vegetables – soybeans, lettuce, tomatoes; flowers, such as jade, zinnia and vines; and herbal plants,” says Macagne-Manegdeg or Dom-an, as she is called by her family and friends.
With her teenage children, she tends her backyard in her home village in the upland town of Sagada, Mt., Province, where she was born and raised.

“In dabbling in natural farming, I am, in my little way, helping heal the Earth even as farming helps me and my daughters heal our wounds from our tragedy,” says Dom-an, 36.

Pepe, a 37-year-old lay leader of the church-based Rural Missionaries of the Philippines, was shot and killed on November 28, 2005, in San Esteban, Ilocos Sur.
He had just finished briefing farmers on human rights and was waiting for a bus to Metro Manila when he was attacked. He was to fetch his wife, who was arriving from Hong Kong, where she worked as a maid.

Beyond pity, rage

Coming home only to see her husband’s remains in a coffin was tragic enough for Dom-an and her daughters.

“I am through with mourning and grieving, and I have to be strong for my daughters,” she says. “I should no longer dwell in anger and sorrow. I should not fall into the trap of self-pity. I have to move on instead toward my journey of peace and healing.”
Dom-an is exhausting all avenues to seek justice for her husband. She has been writing to and engaging concerned officials in the military, the Commission on Human Rights and some members of Congress, as well as regional and international human rights watchdogs.

But she is also engaged in what she calls “peace and healing initiatives,” which include promoting organic farming and organizing an organic farmers’ cooperative in Sagada.

She says the key movers of the cooperative are widows, families of overseas Filipino workers and women farmers.

Through her backyard garden, Dom-an has helped show that “healthy and joyful” food could be grown the traditional and natural way, especially in Sagada where chemicals and pesticides are used in some commercial vegetable farms.

In helping promote organic farming and the cooperative, Dom-an has to collaborate with the municipal government, community elders, the non-government Montañosa Research and Development Center, and the Episcopalian Church-supported St. Theodore Hospital.

“In the process, I’m also reintegrating with my community, my roots, and this is all part of healing,” she says.

Cultural envoy

In between preparing compost, sowing seeds and planting seedlings, Dom-an also dabbles in indigenous music, particularly the nose flute, which she has been playing since 1993.

The nose flute is spiritually significant for Dom-an because one uses one’s breath to produce music from the indigenous instrument.

Playing the flute, apart from writing poetry and essays, she says, is one of her ways of “communing with our living planet.”

For her music, Dom-an was invited by the Sacred Earth Network to help perform in a “healing music concert” on Saturday at the La Mesa eco-park in Quezon City.

Dom-an always brings along at least two nose flutes and she would play them if given the opportunity, making her a cultural envoy of her hometown.

During the congressional inquiry on human rights issues at the University of the Philippines Baguio last month, she played the nose flute before reading a statement about the circumstances and the impact of the extrajudicial killing of her husband.

On March 28, when many of Baguio’s establishments switched off their lights for “Earth Hour,” Dom-an did a “Spark in the Dark” concert at Bliss Café in the city.

Peace, healing institute

Despite the violent death of her husband, Dom-an is now busy with peace and healing initiatives. Part of her long-term dream is establishing the Kasiyana Peace and Healing Institute.

Besides promoting organic farming and cooperativism, the institute seeks to complement the indigenous restorative justice system of Sagada, which stresses peaceful resolution of conflicts, reconciliation and healing, rather than falling into an endless cycle of violence through vengeful killings and retaliation.

“The institute dreams of helping heal our wounds and those of our very own planet,” says Dom-an.

Faith-based public vigilance emerges in Baguio

(Filed with PDI 31 March but unpublished as of 1 April 2009)


Faith-based public vigilance emerges in Baguio
By Maurice Malanes

BAGUIO CITY, 31 March – A new form of public vigilance based not on ideology but on faith has emerged in Baguio.

This has been dramatized by a well-attended March 30 religious-led multi-sectoral “awareness rally” against the reported opening of a casino at Camp John Hay. And not only the Roman Catholics, mainline Protestants, evangelicals and Pentecostals, but also Muslims participated.

Instead of the usual red flags and banners of militant activists, the estimated 2,000 or more anti-casino rally participants held streamers, placards and banners bearing biblical passages and statements pointing how gambling could corrupt society’s sense of right and wrong, break up families, and could add to the city’s rising crimes.

Marching for almost a kilometer from the Baguio Convention Center down Session Road, the rally participants led by bishops, priests, pastors and an imam converged at the City Hall grounds where they held a 20-minute ecumenical worship service.

Selected representatives of the Baguio Multi-Sectoral Group and the Baguio-Benguet Ecumenical Group later made an audience with members of the City Council who were having their regular session.

The council accommodated the religious leaders, who also officially handed over a resolution opposing the opening of a casino in Baguio, which was signed by 15,000 signatories in just a week.

Their resolution pointed that the Bases Conversion Development Authority and the Camp John Hay Development Corporation “surreptitiously signed” a “Casino Cooperation Agreement” on July 1, 2008 for the establishment of a casino at Camp John Hay without informing the Baguio public.

Their resolution also said that the establishment of a casino at the former American resort violates the second item of 19 conditions, which the city council in 1994 required before approving the Environmental Compliance Certificate of the Camp John Hay developer, Fil-Estate.

The second condition contained in City Resolution No. 362, series of 1994, states that “the BCDA shall ensure only wholesome, family-oriented entertainment and recreational activities are conducted within the (John Hay Economic) Zone” and that “no casino operations shall definitely be allowed under any guise or form.”

Participation in governance

At the council’s session hall, the religious representatives accompanied by lawyer and church lay leader Alex Bangsoy actually engaged the city council and in a way participated in policy-making and governance as they took turns in arguing why Baguio, being an educational center and a city with a youth-dominated population, couldn’t be transformed into a gambling capital.

Vice-mayor Daniel Fariñas assured the religious leaders that the city council wouldn’t allow casino or gambling in any guise or form. To this, Roman Catholic Bishop Carlito Cenzon of the Diocese of Baguio said he had so much confidence in the city council that it wouldn’t fail its constituents.

But Cenzon asked whether the 19 conditions, which the city council required in 1994 for the development of John Hay, were weakened as was reported.

Earlier, Bangsoy cited a Philippine Daily Inquirer report, which quoted Mayor Reinaldo Bautista as saying a 2003 Supreme Court ruling on Camp John Hay had weakened the 19 conditions set by the Baguio government as prerequisites for its development, including a prohibition against a casino inside the tourism complex.

This statement plus the council’s “changing positions” on casino and other gaming forms are, according to Bangsoy, “very disturbing.” He again cited the same Inquirer report (March 8), which quoted BCDA president Narciso Abaya as saying “the city’s position on the casino kept changing.”
Besides the 19 conditions for the operation of the Camp John Hay Special Economic Zone, the city council has banned all forms of gambling in Baguio, including a casino, since 1989.

The council has affirmed this ban in a resolution approved in 2002, and another measure passed on Feb. 2 this year.

But Abaya noted the city council also passed a resolution in 2003 that approved the request of the Camp John Hay-Poro Point Development Corp. (JPDC), the office that previously managed the CJHSEZ, to operate a gambling and entertainment complex there. The JPDC has been replaced by the John Hay Management Corp., a subsidiary of BCDA.

The only condition the council imposed in that resolution was that only tourists and Camp John Hay club members can enter and participate in gambling activities. The council again overturned this 2003 resolution with another resolution in 2008.

In the council’s recent dialogue with the religious leaders, councilor Pinky Rondez was already pushing for the outright repeal of the 2003 City Council Resolution 248, which practically approved a casino at Camp John Hay.

Bautista had said no casino would rise inside Camp John Hay “while I am the mayor.”

Still, leaders of the Baguio multi-sectoral group – the same group that catapulted a cash-strapped Braulio Yaranon to the mayoralty seat in 2004 on an anti-gambling and anti-corruption platform -- made a strong message to City Hall last March 30 – that they are closely watching their elected officials every step of the way.

Landscapers meet, compete

Landscapers meet, compete
By Maurice Malanes
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 00:50:00 02/15/2009

Filed Under: Construction & Property, Economy and Business and Finance

BAGUIO CITY, Philippines—At 45, Simplicio “Simple” Sawey, has remained single partly because he already is married to his passion—landscaping.

“Landscaping and propagating and buying and selling plants are my bread and butter,” says Sawey, a native of Cervantes, Ilocos Sur, who quit an education course when he had only a year left to finish it.

For Sawey, dropping out of college didn’t mean that he would forever be tied to a blue-collar job. Instead, he let his creativity run loose and wound up with a livelihood to which he is totally devoted.

Stress relief

Edna Dollaga, a government employee and a mother, also shares Sawey’s passion for landscaping. But she considers it more of a hobby that relieves her of stress from work.

“I can say that I have less wrinkles than many women my age because of the stress-relieving effect of the orchids and other plants I water each morning,” she says.

But landscaping, as Dollaga has found out, can also be profitable.

Another landscaping hobbyist is Rose Cuilan, an entrepreneur who shares her passion with her husband. Her husband propagates white anthuriums and other plants, including balete, which form part of Cuilan’s landscaping work.

Like Dollaga, Cuilan gets delighted, while the stress of work flows out of her, “as I get to encounter plants with blooming flowers.”

Sawey, Dollaga and Cuilan are among artists competing in a landscaping event under “Market Encounter,” one of the features of the Panagbenga (Baguio Flower Festival).

Extra income

Market Encounter at Burnham Park also offers landscape artists the chance to generate income by allowing them to put up stalls at the park where they can sell plants.

Through Market Encounter, potential clients may get to meet talented hobbyists and landscape artists to help them spruce up their gardens.

The landscaping entries Sawey had submitted in past competitions, for instance, did not only catch the eye of local clients but also resort owners from as far away as Marinduque and other provinces.

The landscaping tilt has two categories: The open and Cordillera.

Under the open category, the landscape artist can unleash her creativity, making use not only local but foreign designs as well.

The second category involves designs patterned after the Cordillera landscape. Apart from the mix of perennial and non-perennial plants, a common thread ties the 11 entries under the Cordillera category—the integration of stone walls that reflect the age-old engineering skills applied on the rice terraces in the region.

Rocks and stones

But the 14 entries under the open category also has something in common with those vying under the Cordillera category: The use of rocks and stones.

“Rocks and stones really play a big part in landscaping,” says Sawey, who has submitted entries in both categories.

Almost all the entries in the two categories also incorporate water—a waterfall or a spring in the Cordillera category, and gushing fountains or wishing wells in the open category.

Salvaged driftwood and old pieces of lumber have also found comfort among the plants in the various landscape entries.

Organized as the Panagbenga Society Landscapers Association, the landscapers and plant enthusiasts understand a common language—plant taxonomy. And in knowing each plant species or variety, they have come to know how to make the right mix of plants in a landscape.

Landscaping and trading plants at an orchidarium in Burnham Park occupy a great part of Sawey’s life and art.

He says he feels fulfillment in pursuing his passion, which also allows him to earn enough to send poor but talented relatives to school.

For Dollaga, landscaping, even as a hobby, has helped her augment her income as a government worker in these hard times.

Since she also incorporates white anthuriums in her landscape entries, Cuilan is promoting the rare plant, which she and her husband propagate in a greenhouse. The Cuilan couple supplies white anthuriums to regular customers in Metro Manila.

The three landscapers, and other participating artists, tend to shy from discussing the income they generate in creating art.

But lawyer Damaso Bangaoet, a Market Encounter coordinator and one of the founders of Panagbenga, pointed to a brand new vehicle parked at Burnham Park, and tells the Inquirer: “Katas ng landscaping yan (That vehicle came from a landscaper’s earnings).”

Overheard at Burnham Park

Overheard at Burnham Park

A middle-aged Caucasian guy was walking along Baguio City's Burnham Lake in northern Philippines when a man supervising boat rides asked him, “Are you looking for a Valentine date? I have here my sister (pointing to a middle-aged woman) who is very much available and still a virgin.”

The Caucasian couldn't hold his laugh and, patting the head of the boatman, said, “I don't have to look for a Valentine date. I have my wife.”

Free Meals

Free Meals

A sign at a northern Philippine highway restaurant reads, “Free meals for Christians.” So one time during a stopover, a bus passenger, claiming he was a Christian, ordered a sumptuous meal there. After finishing his meal, he rushed out so he wouldn't miss his bus. But one of the waiters stopped him.

“You must have forgotten to pay your meal,” said the waiter.

“But your sign says meals are free for Christians, and I am one,” the passenger replied.

“A Christian prays before he takes his meal. But you didn't,” the waiter reminded the “Christian.”

(Acknowledgment: This was taken from a Sunday sermon by Rev. Dr. Simplicio Dang-awan Jr., United Church of Christ in the Philippines-Baguio)

Hunger survivor heads feeding program

Inquirer Northern Luzon : Hunger survivor heads feeding program
By Maurice Malanes
Northern Luzon Bureau
Posted date: January 21, 2009

BAGUIO CITY – He was just 9 days old 56 years ago when he and a twin brother, who were born to poor farming parents in the interior village of Sapid in Mankayan, Benguet, were rescued from starvation. His seven other younger siblings were not as lucky – they all died of hunger.

Coming to the rescue of Donald Soriano and his twin Ronald in 1952 was Elva Vanderbout-Soriano, an American missionary who founded the Bethesda orphanage (now the Bethesda Ministries International) based in Barangay Tuding in Itogon, Benguet.
Raised by and educated through the orphanage, Soriano (who assumed the married surname of the orphanage’s founder), seeks to return the favor from what he calls a lease on his life.

Since 2007, the Bethesda Ministries International, which Soriano now heads, has embarked on an integrated nutrition program for underweight or malnourished children in elementary schools in Luzon.

Bethesda collaborates with the nongovernment Assisi Development Foundation, which has a similar initiative called the Hapag-Asa (Hope for the Table) program.
“The underlying philosophy of the program comes from Christ’s admonition for us to help feed the hungry,” says Soriano, now a bishop.

He visited remote villages and found that many children drop out of school because of lack of food.

He cites Bot-oan in Buguias, Benguet, where children have to walk one to two hours to reach school. With the uphill climb to school, the children get hungry along the way and they end up eating their baon or packed lunch so they have nothing for lunch.
Seven elementary schools in Buguias are among the recipients of Bethesda’s feeding program, which also covers some schools in parts of the Cordillera, Ilocos Sur, Nueva Vizcaya, Quirino, Isabela, Bulacan, Quezon and Metro Manila.

Mass feeding

In collaboration with health and nutrition personnel of the Department of Education, Bethesda volunteers first measure the height and weight of schoolchildren before the feeding program begins.

After 90 to 120 days of feeding, the children’s height and weight are again monitored to determine any impact.

Although not all children are underweight, Bethesda resorts to mass feeding in recipient schools. “It won’t be good to see some children salivating while other children are enjoying their meals so we resort to mass feeding,” says Soriano.

The main component of the program is what is called Vitameal, a rice-lentil meal which Soriano says is fortified with 25 vitamins and minerals and can be cooked into a cereal mix.

A 79.5-gram dry Vitameal, if cooked, can feed 30 1-to-4-year old children, and a 159-gram Vitameal, 15 adults. Besides carbohydrates and proteins, Vitameal contains Vitamins A, C, D, E, B1 (thiamin) and B2 (riboflavin) and others.

Besides potassium, iron, zinc, phosphorous and other minerals, Vitameal contains iodine that, health experts say, is vital in developing the brain of growing children and is thus crucial in their intellectual growth.

Many Cordillera folk lack iodine in their diet. This explains the prevalence of goiter in the upland region. Goiter is the enlargement of the thyroid gland as a result of lack of iodine.

Cooking Vitameal is easy but instructions on ratio and proportion of water and the cereal mix must be followed, Soriano says.

“So we have to orient concerned DepEd health and nutrition personnel and participating school heads on how to cook the cereal mix,” he says.

As part of the orientation, Bethesda releases sample packs to concerned personnel so they can also develop menus and mixtures using locally available food.

In Sadanga, Mt. Province, for example, parents volunteer to provide locally available vegetables, such as tubers and leaves of gabi or yam, which are mixed with Vitameal.

As members and officers of the Parents-Teachers Community Association, parents in Sadanga also help school health and nutrition personnel prepare the cereal mix for the children.

In some towns, such as Bokod in Benguet, local officials provide counterpart funds for the feeding program. These funds are used to buy spices (garlic, ginger and onions) or slices of meat to mix with the cereal mix.

“We encourage these local contributions and counterparts to avoid developing a doleout mentality on the part of recipient communities,” says Soriano.

The Pinoy soul and indie filmmaking

INQUIRER NORTHERN LUZON
Inquirer Northern Luzon : The Pinoy soul and indie filmmaking
By Maurice Malanes
Northern Luzon Bureau
Posted date: January 14, 2009

BAGUIO CITY – When he first heard Ifugao elder and environmentalist Lopez Nauyac mispronounce “indigenous” as “indigenius,” filmmaker Kidlat Tahimik became inspired.
To Tahimik, it was a blessed “cosmic slip” as it could help him articulate the framework behind his filmmaking.

That framework is based on what he calls his “sariling duwende” perspective and approach in making independent films, which seek to help unfold the Filipino’s “Indio-genius” strengths.

The Filipino soul is often described as having been confined at the convent for more than three centuries under the Spaniards and trapped by Hollywood’s influence for decades. As a result, the Filipino’s indigenous way of looking at things and viewing the world has been suppressed or has become blurred.
Hollywood clone

Holywood clone

It is thus not surprising that the local movie industry, which also reflects the way Filipinos view the world, is more often largely a clone of Hollywood.

Hollywood’s commercial formula is generally a mix of fast-paced violence and sex. The output of this formula is what Tahimik describes as “McDo films,” in which the movie’s content is as predictable as the hamburger from that global fast food chain giant.

“When you use your sariling duwende, you are less likely to fall into the (Hollywood) commercial formula trap,” says Tahimik, who has received international awards for his independent films.

His first film, “Mababangong Bangungot (Perfumed Nightmares),” won three prestigious awards at the Berlin Film Festival in 1977. He was also honored for his 1981 film, “Turumba.”

His other films, such as “Bakit Yellow ang Gitna ng Rainbow? (Why is Yellow the Center of the Rainbow?),” and more than a dozen others are scheduled to be screened every 5:30 p.m. onwards at the University of the Philippines Film Center’s Ishmael Bernal Gallery in Diliman, Quezon City, on Jan. 12-15. The event has been dubbed the Kidlat Tahimik Film Retrospective.

Indie film fans can also view “Bakit Yellow ang Gitna ng Rainbow?” on the wide screen of the UP Film Center’s Big Cinema or Cine Adarna at 5 p.m. on Jan. 17.

Unique world-view

In between screenings are open forums during which the audience could discuss with Tahimik about his sariling duwende perspective.

“This (sariling duwende) is your unique world view, which develops and unfolds from your own context, indigenous culture and values,” Kidlat explains.  “So where you come from – be it a coastal or upland community – plus the cultural traits, practices and values your community holds dear all contribute to this unique world view.” 

To Tahimik, this unique world-view of the sariling duwende becomes one’s framework in telling his or her story through film, or even through a book or a feature story.
It can also be manifested in what is “Pinoy na Pinoy (truly Filipino)” in us, including the sense of humor of comedian Dolphy, which, Tahimik says, is by and large truly Filipino.

To some cultural workers, letting this view blossom can help build the nationhood of this country, which is still struggling for its true identity after centuries of colonization.

The growth of films, such as Tahimik’s indies, is “pivotal in realizing nationhood, not only for filmmakers and film enthusiasts but also for the common people,” film enthusiasts and event coordinators Pete Malaya Camporedondo and Marella Castro said in a letter to Avie Felix, theater faculty coordinator of the UP College of Mass Communication, when they were arranging for the venue of the retrospective.

Camporedondo and Castro feel that it is thus time to make Tahimik’s films accessible to a wider audience, especially students, educators, filmmakers and enthusiasts.

They also regard Tahimik as a “Filipino culture bearer” who does not only make films but also dedicates his time teaching filmmaking to the Ifugao people through a user-friendly video camera. Through this, Tahimik seeks to help record, promote and enhance the Ifugao’s oral indigenous storytelling.

To Camporedondo and Castro, Kidlat’s perspective is also vital in helping enrich the sociocultural studies of educational institutions.
Bamboo Camera Award

Bamboo Camera Award

To help encourage budding Filipino independent filmmakers, Tahimik helped start in 2005 what is called the Bamboo Camera Award.

Given to selected filmmakers during the Cinemalaya festival of independent films, the award seeks to recognize those “whose unique soul or sariling duwende is exposed and manifested in their work,” says Tahimik.

He says films chosen are “playful and vibrant but anchored on our distinct cultural traits and values as Filipinos.”

Tahimik will announce the 2008 award winners during a Bamboo Camera Night on Jan. 17 after the screening of “Bakit Yellow ang Gitna ng Rainbow?”

To Tahimik, who believes in the power of symbols to convey messages, his choice of bamboo as symbol for the award signifies an effort to help both filmmakers and audience not to grow weary in continuing to discover and rediscover their distinct spirits or unique souls in making and appreciating films.

IN MEMORIAM: Torchbearer of ‘Igorot nationalism’

IN MEMORIAM
Torchbearer of ‘Igorot nationalism’
By Maurice Malanes
Northern Luzon Bureau
First Posted 02:28:00 12/23/2008

Filed Under: Police, Crime, Regional authorities

BAGUIO CITY – Igorots of the Cordillera are not only mourning the death of the first television personality among them who was too young to die at the peak of his career. They are also grieving over the loss of the region’s envoy and torchbearer of what may be called “Igorot nationalism.”

Many Igorot and other supporters were shocked upon learning that Mark Angelo Cadaweng Cielo – Marky Cielo to his fans – died in his sleep at the family’s house in Antipolo City on Dec. 7. He was 20.

“My heart aches for a life so short … We Igorots know how long we had waited for a Marky Cielo – a young, handsome, humble, talented, good-hearted guy who never denied his Igorot roots,” laments a fan who signed her name only as Miss Buguias in an online feedback at GMA 7’s website on Dec. 11.

The television network GMA 7 sponsored the 2005-2006 reality talent show StarStruck where Cielo won as the “sole survivor.”

Cielo indeed was proud of his Igorot roots. Introducing himself in his website, markycielo.net, he said he grew up in Butuan in Mindanao then moved to Mt. Province in 2001.

“Of course, both places are in the Philippines,” he said as if to stress that any Filipino wherever he comes from could join show biz.

“My classmates convinced me to join StarStruck in 2006 and I won the Ultimate Male Survivor title. I won the first Sole Survivor title of the reality TV show and the first Igorot ever to join that contest,” he said.

During the later phase of the StarStruck contest, the finalists were asked who among them could be the sole survivor and one reportedly said Cielo could not qualify because he was an Igorot.

Many Igorot supporters said the statement smacked of bigotry and discrimination. They launched a counter-offensive through SMS (short messaging service or text message) and blog (web log) messages, which gathered support for Cielo’s bid to top the contest.

Apart from the overwhelming support, Cielo also showed his special talent, among them dancing, which charmed actress Lorna Tolentino, one of the judges.

Regional pride

The overwhelming protest against the ethnic slur on Cielo displayed the upland folk’s strong sense of regional pride or a kind of Igorot nationalism borne out of their history of resistance against Spanish conquest and other invaders.

In having resisted Hispanization, Igorots take pride not in having centuries-old churches in their midst, but in building historic monuments of their indigenous engineering skills such as the rice terraces not only in Ifugao but also in Mt. Province and other Cordillera provinces.

Being Igorot is therefore not a badge of shame, but of honor. The Igorots are a hardy people who resisted invaders and tamed tough terrain to help secure food for generations.

Another source of pride for many Igorots is their contribution in the last war.
Igorot soldiers who fought during World War II under the 66th Infantry of the United States Armed Forces in the Far East-North Luzon would relish telling stories about how they climbed Japanese tanks to drop grenades and would jump to safety before the tanks exploded.

After seeing the gallantry of the Igorot, Gen. Douglas MacArthur was remembered to have said, “Give me one dozen Igorot and we can win this war,” or something to that effect.

All these stories, most of them handed down orally, have become a source of regional pride for many Igorots, including those abroad.

Such pride, which Cielo carried to show business, makes his death a great loss to his people, who lost an “ambassador” in the glitzy world of television and the movies.

Shortly after Cielo won StarStruck in 2006, the independent research outfit ResearchMate Inc. based in La Trinidad, Benguet, surveyed 150 respondents in Mt. Province, asking them about their reasons for supporting him.

While 72 respondents supported Cielo because “he is from Mt. Province,” 85 respondents voted for the actor because “he is proud of his roots as an Igorot.”

Root factor

The root factor is thus largely significant: Igorot support for Cielo would have not been as overwhelming had he renounced his roots.

By being proud of his roots, Cielo also would have helped eventually shatter the colonial tendency in show biz to choose as stars mainly those who are Spanish or Caucasian mestizos or mestizas.

Mildred Cadaweng Cielo, the actor’s mother, said her son becoming the Igorot icon has become an accidental “mission.” With a report from Frank Cimatu

Conserving watersheds also justice issue

Conserving watersheds also justice issue

December 02, 2008 23:53:00
Maurice Malanes
Philippine Daily Inquirer

BAGUIO CITY – When Ifugao Gov. Teodoro Baguilat Jr. argued in a recent watershed summit that upland communities must be justly compensated for maintaining the headwaters and watersheds for the lowlands, he articulated the ecological principle that all ecosystems are interconnected.

Unfortunately, government policies on watersheds and ecosystems remain disjointed. Thus communities or provinces that host watersheds, which supply the dams that produce electricity and irrigate lowland farms, are not part of the “host communities” or “host LGUs (local government units)” as defined by the Department of Energy, said Baguilat.

As a result, provinces with watersheds have long been deprived of a just share from national wealth taxes, lamented Baguilat, who spoke during an inter-agency watershed summit in Baguio City in October.

To the Ifugao governor, it is time to give justice to Cordillera’s watershed communities, whose abundant natural resources have been conserved and managed through indigenous systems “passed on to us by our ancestors.”

He said the one centavo per kilowatt-hour set aside for host communities for the DOE’s development programs is limited only to communities where the dam reservoir is located. This, he said, is stipulated in the implementing rules and regulations of the Electric Power Industry Reform Act (Epira) of 2001.

Trickles

“Only trickles from the programs for the corporate social responsibility of the operating company reach the communities where water is sourced out, one of which is sponsoring cultural events,” Baguilat said.

He cited the Magat Dam, one of Asia’s biggest dams in Ramon, Isabela, which produces 360 megawatts (MW) of electricity and irrigates 85,000 hectares of farmland in Isabela and Nueva Vizcaya.

To Baguilat, Magat is Ifugao. Isabela claims otherwise.

Ifugao and Isabela officials are locked in a court battle over the jurisdiction of Magat Dam.

But while the case has yet to be resolved, the two provinces negotiated in March for an equal sharing scheme on the transfer tax accrued from the facility’s sale from the National Power Corp. to SN Aboitiz, said Baguilat.

For many years since the Magat Dam began operating, Isabela has been getting the bigger share of the 70-30 percent sharing from the dam’s franchise tax. In 2001, Ifugao officials had to haggle with then Isabela Gov. Faustino Dy Jr. for a 50-50 percent sharing of the franchise tax.

Struggle

Ifugao since then has been getting its share from the tax. “But we had to struggle for it,” said Baguilat. “Still, the share from the tax is unjustified as the true beneficiaries – the watershed keepers – are not yet justly indemnified.”

“The share we have received is only the fees from the dam operators for doing business, but communities which have kept the watersheds have yet to be compensated,” he said. “Without the watersheds, there would be no dams and no business.”

Baguilat attributes the remaining forests of Ifugao to ancestors, who have taught the way of the “muyong,” a clan or community-managed woodlot, which can still be found above clusters of rice terraces in the province.

Under the “muyong” tradition, only clan members are allowed to harvest wood from the woodlot and that whatever wood is harvested must be for the family’s needs only (such as for housing) and not for commercial purposes.

The irony, however, is that while Ifugao has a rich resource, which is primarily water, the province remains the 10th poorest in the country and its people remain “cash-poor,” said Baguilat.

Many Ifugao residents were forced by poverty to migrate elsewhere while some have followed the example of Benguet vegetable growers who would clear forests to grow commercial vegetables such as cabbages and potatoes. This is particularly happening in the forested town of Tinoc bordering Benguet.

Baguilat is leading Ifugao officials in helping push for what he calls a “pro-watershed cradle program,” which is being coordinated with civil society groups.

One of the program’s concerns is educating residents to rethink their commercial vegetable farming approach and shift to organic farming and agro-forestry such as integrating coffee, fruit trees with hardwood and other tree species.

Under the program, the Ifugao government also helps cooperatives, community associations and family enterprises how to process, package and market their products.

Baguio's oldest credit co-op soldiers on

Baguio's oldest credit co-op soldiers on
Unaffected by slowdown
By Maurice Malanes
Northern Luzon Bureau
Posted date: November 23, 2008

BAGUIO CITY--While some business sectors are feeling the pinch of the global economic meltdown or slowdown, this city's oldest credit cooperative servicing almost 20,000 members remains robust and kicking.

"Thank God, we are hardly affected by the global economic meltdown so we continue to help uplift the lives of ordinary folk," says lawyer Jesus Cendaña, board chair of the Baguio-Benguet Community Credit Cooperative or BBCCC.

Cendaña attributes the cooperative's strength and stability to what he calls the "power of the ‘we'" or the cooperative principle of "relying on our collective initiative and collective self-reliance."

"Ever since our cooperative was founded, we never borrowed money from outside sources, but we completely relied on the capital shares of members," he says.
Cendaña also credits the cooperative's success to its "service above profit philosophy anchored on self-responsibility, self-discipline, teamwork, solidarity, respect, industry, democracy and good governance."

Founded in 1958 by 15 members, most of them teachers of Saint Louis College (now Saint Louis University), what was then known as the Baguio Teachers Credit Union started with only a P250 capital.

In 1976, the credit union amended its by-laws, transformed itself into what is now the BBCCC, and opened its membership to all residents of Baguio and Benguet.
The cooperative now has more than 19,000 members and has P940 million in total assets, including a seven-story building, which houses the cooperative's offices, a grocery store, a 200-seat conference hall, and three workshop rooms.

The BBCCC celebrated its 50th founding anniversary in October and "we're still counting and growing," says Cendaña.

It has come a long way so much so that it is now "extending our blessings to the community" through the BBCCC Foundation, says Amparo Rimas, the foundation's chief executive officer.

The foundation has adopted a barangay (village) in nearby La Trinidad town, helping build a water system and providing facilities such as a sound system for the village's daycare center.

It has also adopted one of Baguio's parks for it to maintain and improve and has offered scholarships to needy but deserving students.

The cooperative counts among its members lowly folk such as car-wash boys and vegetable vendors and prominent people such as the late Justice Romeo Brawner.
For ordinary folk, the cooperative, which offers various loans, has become a takbuhan (fallback) during emergencies such as when members had to pay tuition or when one had to pay a placement fee for an overseas job.

"One time I had to buy milk formula and I had no money so I had to run to the co-op grocery store," businesswoman Golden Guevarra, a co-op member, says. "I would also loan from the co-op to repaint or repair our passenger jeepney."

Besides tuition for her children, government office worker Glea Lagon says loans from the cooperative helped build their house and helped them procure a vehicle.

"Without a scholarship from the BBCCC, I wouldn't have been a registered nurse by now," says Rachelle Ann Coquia, a co-op associate member who passed the nursing board in 2007.

It is these various services which continue to attract members to the cooperative, Cendaña says and BBCCC continues to campaign for more people to join.

He says some 50 to 80 new members are added each month. "We are targeting to draw 100 members each month through our advocacy drive," he says, noting that the cooperative's current membership is still a small fraction of Baguio's population of 350,000 and Benguet's more than 330,000.

The ‘spirits’ of the Cordilleras

The ‘spirits’ of the Cordilleras
Maurice Malanes
Philippine Daily Inquirer

November 01, 2008

BAGUIO CITY – Many Cordillera upland folk are practically spirit-filled each day of their lives and not only shortly before or during Halloween.

So it’s not surprising to see an elder whispering a prayer and pouring a drop of native wine or liquor before he and others partake of their drink in someone’s house or at the neighborhood variety store.

In Kibungan town in Benguet, this practice, called petik, is for spirits, which include those of soldiers who fought and died in World War II and other members of the community who had gone ahead.

It is believed that the petik helps assure that nothing untoward will happen to those partaking of the wine and liquor.

With the petik, the discussion and the exchange of ideas and stories of men in the community will run smoothly as the spirits are not only watching over but guiding and inspiring them.

On the other hand, failure to perform the petik or missing out some important names of dead ancestors while performing the rite will be suspected as the cause of some troubles such as violence that may mar the drinking session and discussions.

There are also spirits in the mountains, forests, rivers and caves.

The Kankanaey believe that the kakading and pinad-ing live in the mountains and forests. A favorite abode of these spirits is a water-bearing tree much like the balete.

A tree believed occupied by these spirits, therefore, cannot be cut. Otherwise, something untoward such as sickness or even death can befall a person who dares to cut the tree.

If a tree has to be cut because a road has to be built, for example, the spirits have to be appeased through a ritual, which involves sacrificing and butchering an animal such as a pig or chicken.

The rivers also have spirit guardians called pinten.

A person has to first seek the consent of these spirits before he goes swimming or fishing. To get consent, one should first throw a pebble in a river pool and utter a short prayer offered to the pinten.

A no-no for the pinten is dirtying the river. It is believed that a person who dirties the river can get sick, a belief common among upland folk who take their indigenous spirituality seriously.

Expanding political arenas for indigenous peoples

Inquirer Northern Luzon : Expanding political arenas for tribes

By Maurice Malanes
Philippine Daily Inquirer

Posted date: October 15, 2008

BAGUIO CITY – Times have changed a lot since the 1970s when celebrating what was then called “Tribal Filipino Month” was mainly another form of protest against a dictatorship that killed and made martyrs of the likes of Kalinga chieftain Macli-ing Dulag.

Under the late President Ferdinand Marcos’ iron-fist rule, the Church and other religious organizations had instituted “Tribal Filipino Sunday” every second Sunday of October. Special Masses or ecumenical worship services were held to honor tribal Filipinos. Celebrants paid tribute to them and credited them for their wisdom in protecting and managing their lands and resources.

Tribal Filipinos, for instance, had been hailed for hunting, gathering and mining (or panning) from the forests only what they needed. Such appreciation of wise thinking was made in contrast to what their leaders and activists considered the corporate greed behind large-scale logging, mining and other extractive industries.

In the Cordillera, the celebrants lamented and spoke strongly against the “militarization” of tribal communities, which had protested against these industries, along with the Marcos regime’s “development projects” such as the proposed series of World Bank-funded dams along the Chico River in Mt. Province and Kalinga.

Marcos’ soldiers killed Dulag on April 24, 1980, but not the philosophy on land stewardship he articulated and the protests against the dams he helped lead. Among other things, he had said nobody could appropriate for himself the land because “only the race owns the land.”

“How can you own what outlives you?” Dulag once said.

Indigenous culture

In every tribal Filipino celebration, participants would not only pay homage to martyrs like Dulag but would also celebrate whatever aspects of indigenous culture had survived colonization. These included a strong sense of community, cooperation, restorative (as opposed to punitive) justice and holistic spirituality (as opposed to the dualistic religious world-view that colonizers introduced).

The celebration was, in a way, driving across an important message: Even before almost 400 years of convent culture under the Spaniards and more than 50 years of American influence, a flourishing culture existed in this archipelago.

In Marcos’ time, the event was limited to tribal leaders, activists, church leaders and other advocates. As a form of protest against the regime, it was usually held in churches, school gymnasiums or auditoriums or in public parks after a street march – which revealed the constricted space or arena for indigenous voices.

Changing political arena

The political arenas have changed, particularly after a new Constitution was put in place in 1987. After the lobby efforts of tribal Filipino leaders and representatives themselves, the Constitution has finally recognized the rights of “indigenous cultural communities,” including the rights to their ancestral lands and domains and to govern themselves according to their customary laws and practices.

These constitutional rights ushered in an enabling law – the Indigenous Peoples’ Rights Act (Ipra) of 1997. At the United Nations, the Philippines is often cited as a model of some sort because of the Ipra.

The act created a separate bureaucracy, the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples, which has employed mostly indigenous professionals.

During the Marcos regime, the political arenas for indigenous peoples were the streets, and, in some extreme cases, the hills.

Despite what some indigenous peoples’ leaders consider its flaws, the Ipra has helped provide a venue for indigenous peoples to engage the government. For example, indigenous communities can use Ipra’s free and prior informed consent (FPIC) process in evaluating and assessing and finally accepting or rejecting a development project, such as a mine or a dam.

Critics, however, cite some instances in which the FPIC process had been subverted. Their common issue was that only a few elders or local government leaders were involved. Some indigenous leaders had alleged that cases of bribery and corruption had tainted it.

Still, the FPIC process, if combined with indigenous peoples’ own vigilance, offers an arena where they can get a better bargain or register their sentiments.

Global arenas

Many of the issues of indigenous peoples, such as those related to land and resources, still persist. But the political arenas through which they could ventilate these issues have expanded even to the global front.

At the UN, indigenous peoples lobbied and strengthened their own ranks and networks and pushed for the creation of an arena through which they could be heard.

One of these arenas is the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, which has been chaired since 2006 by Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, a Kankanaey from Besao, Mt. Province. An activist since the First Quarter Storm, Tauli-Corpuz had immersed herself in the local indigenous peoples’ movement before working with the UN.

Other arenas, which needed more indigenous voices, include the UN Convention on Biological Diversity and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

One of the good news for indigenous peoples is the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which the UN General Assembly approved on Sept. 13, 2007.

Along with the Ipra, the declaration, says Tauli-Corpuz, can also be invoked by indigenous peoples in asserting their rights to their traditional knowledge, culture, land and resources, and their right to determine how best to govern themselves.

But unless it is put to good use, the declaration is just another document. The challenge, says indigenous peoples’ advocate and lawyer Elpidio Peria, is how to apply this by continually invoking it so it becomes a living document.

Love in action in the midst of war

Inquirer Northern Luzon
Love in action in the midst of war

By Maurice Malanes
Northern Luzon Bureau
First Posted 04:27:00 10/01/2008

BAGUIO CITY – An Army officer calls it “Project I.S.L.A.M.” or I Sincerely Love All Muslims. Having seen killings and sufferings, he conceived the project amid an all-out war that then President Joseph Estrada waged against the Moro Islamic Liberation Front in 2000.

Like the recent armed clashes ignited by controversies over a proposed government-MILF agreement on an expanded Bangsamoro homeland, the war of March-July 2000 exacted heavy collateral damage. Scores of innocent civilians, including women and children, were killed and thousands of others were left homeless, hungry and in despair.

Survivors – both Christians and Muslims – couldn’t help feeling bitter at a conflict that left widows and orphans. Their situation worried Lt. Col. Johnny Macanas, who was then assigned to help rehabilitate 100,000 Christian and Muslim evacuees in Marawi City. First-hand, he noted the “prejudice against our Muslim brethren.”

Now camp commander of the Philippine Military Academy in Baguio City, Macanas cites an incident when he and his troops went to give out medicines to the Muslim evacuees, but they refused.

“I asked why, and a Muslim elder told me, ‘What can we do with these medicines when we haven’t eaten for three days,’” he recalls. “This broke my heart because I learned that the government personnel in charge of relief operation gave food items only to Christian evacuees.”

Macanas, a Roman Catholic, says he prayed, “asking the Lord what I can do to serve our Muslim brothers and sisters and help bring peace.”

Reach out with love

Suddenly, he remembered Pastor Florentino de Jesus of the Christian Missionary Alliance who, before he died in September 1999, had advocated that Christians should reach out to Muslims with love.

The late pastor from Zamboanga City inspired Macanas to help establish Project Islam. At that time, many Muslim evacuees decided to return to and die in their home villages rather than remain at the cramped evacuation centers.

Among the Muslims that Project Islam first served were 30 families – the first batch of over 300 families – who sought to return to their village of Delabayan in Kauswagan, Lanao del Norte.

Macanas mobilized Christian leaders to explore how they could help rebuild the lives of the Delabayan villagers.

A church leader, Pastor Alex Eduave of a Pentecostal group, first approached Macanas to help in the project. The pastor and his congregation in no time collected rice and other food items, and gave these to the residents.

As they handed out two kilograms of rice for each Muslim family, Eduave and his members were apologetic for not being able to bring more. But Macanas says Delabayan leader Kamlun Moner told Eduave and his members: “It’s not the quantity of rice you gave that matters most but your big hearts.”

Macanas planted camote (sweet potato) in his family’s idle lot in Cagayan de Oro City and was able to harvest and donate several kilograms to Delabayan.

The next concern of Macanas and his supporters was how to help rebuild the houses of the returning villagers (the first batch had to stay first at a bullet-riddled school building).

The houses were razed after a military shelling and air bombardment in 2000. This was the fourth time since the 1970s, Macanas says, when Delabayan became a battlefield between the military and the Moro National Liberation Front.

From funds raised through special offerings of church members and contributions from donors, some coming from as far as Hong Kong, Macanas built 12 seven-meter by nine-meter houses, which were inaugurated in April 2001. An imam (Muslim cleric) and Eduave prayed and blessed the first batch of houses.

Having seen the success of Project Islam’s housing project, the National Housing Authority coursed P6 million through its leaders to build more. With this amount, houses for more than 300 families were put up.

Their secret: All the labor was done by volunteers and the villagers themselves so they spent only P50,000 for each house.

Macanas and his volunteers also built a water system for the community.

Despite the efforts of Macanas and his church supporters, the Delabayan villagers still had one fear – that they will be converted to Christianity.

To dispel their apprehension, Macanas proposed to his supporters that they help rebuild the community’s mosque. This would prove that they were just out to reach out with love and with no conditions.

Citing doctrinal reasons, half of the 100 pastors who helped build the houses declined to help. But Macanas and the other pastors pursued the plan, sought donations again from donors, and built a mosque bigger than the damaged one.

This finally earned the full trust of the community, prompting Moner to declare that they have become “born-again Muslims, who have renounced rebellion,” says Macanas.

Delabayan is now known as Islam Village, where more people from other places have also settled.

Waging peace via information technology

Waging peace via information technology

By Maurice Malanes
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 00:18:00 09/10/2008

BAGUIO CITY – Through two movie house-size screens installed at the Baguio Convention Center, over 1,000 high school students played a scissor-paper-rock game, held workshops, exchanged testimonies and ideas, and prayed and sang with their fellow students in Cotabato City.

The theme of the three-hour Internet-based video conference on Aug. 29 revolved around building peace and mutual understanding through dialogue between and among Christian, Muslim and even non-Christian and non-Muslim youth.

The virtual conference’s theme struck a relevant chord with the conflict and violence in a few areas in Mindanao, which were ignited by a scuttled proposed agreement based on an expanded Bangsamoro territory.

Organized by PeaceTech, the video conference enabled students of Baguio and Cotabato, who were grouped into 10 to 12, to reflect during a 25-minute workshop on how ignorance breeds prejudice, which eventually leads to conflict.

PeaceTech is a nongovernment organization holding peace-building-geared video dialogue series among Muslim and non-Muslim youths in various countries. Among its supporters is Queen Rania al Abdullah of Jordan.

In the same workshop, the students pondered upon how they could benefit if Filipinos were united and how they would envision the future of their country.

In another workshop, the students were asked about what they loved in their faith, what three steps they could take to promote better Muslim-Christian understanding, and what they could do to help promote peace.

Battling ignorance

Volunteer facilitators synthesized the reflections of each of the workshop groups and two representatives from Baguio and one from Cotabato were chosen to report a summary of what transpired in both workshops.

The representatives recognized ignorance as the root of prejudice, which, in turn, leads to stereotyping and generalization that create distrust and hatred and ultimately conflict. Both underscored the need for more education and enlightenment to fight and overcome ignorance.

“For our part as youth, we can no longer afford to be apathetic. We should get involved and seek to deepen and broaden our knowledge and understanding about our Muslim brothers and sisters if we are to overcome our ignorance and prejudice,” said the Baguio representative.

The Cotabato representative noted that both Christianity and Islam are religions of love and peace so conflict, he said, could be resolved only through dialogue.

“We love our own faith and we are committed to understand each other’s faith even as we have to remind one another to appreciate and work with what is good in each of us,” he said.

Rahana Ganda, an Office of Muslim Affairs staffer who moderated the video conference in Cotabato City, said the youth of Baguio and Cotabato were united in their vision to achieve peace as they stressed the need for open minds and tolerance.

The activity also enabled two women to share their experiences of prejudice and violence under the hands of some Filipinos from both Christian and Islamic faiths.

A girl introduced only as Jeryl said she, her family and relatives were abducted in July while traveling in Mindanao. An armed gang flagged down a van, in which Jeryl and her relatives were riding, and demanded all Christians to alight.

“We, girls and women, were sent home, but the gang members mercilessly killed my two uncles,” Jeryl said.

She said she had difficulty overcoming a feeling of hatred against Muslims after what happened.

“But as a born-again Christian, I had to open my heart and mind to forgiveness,” she said, noting the incident was not the fault of all Muslims.

Theater actor Bart Guingona, the PeaceTech video conference moderator in Baguio, and Ganda in Cotabato appreciated Jeryl’s boldness and strength in moving toward healing through forgiveness despite her experience.

In Cotabato, a Muslim girl, Yas, also shared her experience during an evacuation of civilians in Kauswagan, Lanao del Norte, who were fleeing an all-out war against the Moro Islamic Liberation Front in 2000.

“Would you believe, only Christians were being rescued [and allowed to board the boats]?” said Yas. “So I was crying, pitying myself for the misfortune of being a Muslim.”

Like Jeryl, it took Yas some time before she overcame the bitterness she felt after that experience. And like Jeryl, Yas leaned on one important teaching from her faith – making room in her heart for forgiveness.

Asked about how she perceives Christians now after the experience, Yas said: “I realized it would be unfair to regard all Christians to be the same [as those who refused us to board the boat]. I also realized that we can have inner peace only if we are able to forgive.”

Common humanity

Speakers for the video conference stressed that all religions, if unmasked of all their external trappings, essentially talk about how all human beings are interconnected. They also said Christianity, Islam and other religions all advocate peace and harmony.

Fr. Rene Oliveros, a Jesuit priest who also specializes in Islamic studies, said Christianity’s ideal core teaching on peace could be summarized by the Beatitudes, a passage from the Sermon on the Mount declaring what makes a man blessed.

He said the Beatitudes, among other things, talks about how “blessed are the peacemakers for they are children of God.”

Oliveros lamented, however, that Christianity today has become “far removed from the teachings of Christ.” He traced this to “institutionalized Christianity, which became a tool for colonization.”

“The kind of Christianity brought by our colonizers already had a prejudice against Muslims. We need to liberate ourselves from this,” he said.

Prof. Moner Bajunaid, Marawi State University chancellor, said Islam is a religion of peace and peacemaking and its followers have to continuously work and struggle for peace.

Former Bukidnon Rep. Nereus Acosta, who attended the Baguio event, reiterated Albert Einstein’s edict on peace and asked the students from Baguio and Cotabato to remember this passage: “Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved through understanding.”

As war continues to be waged in some villages in Mindanao, PeaceTech has embarked on waging peace via information technology, primarily banking on the youth who are going to inherit the country.

And why wage peace?

“It is in the minds of men that war begins, so it is also in the minds of people where peace must be waged,” said Imam Bedejim Abdullah, one of the event’s organizers.

Einstein gives vital clue for Filipino inventor

Einstein provides vital clue for inventor

By Maurice Malanes
Northern Luzon Bureau
First Posted 21:40:00 09/14/2008

BAGUIO CITY -- THE CURRENT fuel crisis does not worry Victor G. Ayco at all.

A scientist and inventor, Ayco sees the crisis as an opportunity for the country to tap the inexhaustible potentials that science can offer in finding alternatives to fossil fuel.

“Many seem to anticipate a bleak future because of the prospect that one day the world’s fossil fuel deposits will finally run dry,” says Ayco, 70. “But fossil fuel is not the only source of energy that can run engines of cars and other machines. There are other inexhaustible alternatives [to fossil fuel].”

He based his radical optimism on what he regards as a vital clue from one of the geniuses of the 20th century -- Albert Einstein. That clue is the theory of relativity, or E=mc², where E is energy, m is mass, and c is the velocity of light.

The Mandaluyong-based chemical engineer says Einstein’s theory helped him perfect his gas-saving product, which he demonstrated recently before Baguio City motorists.

Essentially, Einstein’s relativity theory, says Ayco, states that “from matter we can produce energy.”

His invention called “aero-nitro power injector” took 15 years of research and experiment. Patented on Dec. 11, 1985, the device has been marketed only recently through Energy Philippines Inc., a private firm, which Ayco co-owns with other partners.

The inventor says his device “converts ordinary nitrogen (a noncombustible substance) in the atmosphere into combustible nitro-gas, and serves as gasoline and diesel additive in gaseous form for efficient engine combustion.”

With efficient engine combustion, a vehicle can run more kilometers with less fuel and emits almost zero toxic pollutants.

Like a science teacher

In introducing his product, Ayco explains like a science teacher how an internal combustion engine performs two processes. One is the chemical process, which involves combustion or burning. The other is mechanical, which involves motion.

The combustion process for gasoline or diesel involves burning hydrogen and carbon. Incompletely burned fuel leads to the formation of three chemicals -- hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide, and oxides of nitrogen, all of which have been proven hazardous to health and the environment.

Incompletely burned or unburned fuel can also cause other harm. This is because carbon gets stuck inside the engine and can lead to “spark knock” or detonation, which can destroy an internal combustion engine.

Detonation occurs when, after spark fires, it creates a small fireball that spreads across the cylinder.

Unburned carbon sticks to the engine chamber walls and are emitted from the exhaust pipes as carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide.

With unburned carbon, a car engine runs roughly, fuel easily runs out, power gets lost during acceleration, toxic black smoke gets emitted, and carbon deposits are formed within the combustion area and intake valve.

Saving fuel

Noxious wastes, Ayco says, deprive a vehicle of fuel economy and performance, leading to costly repairs.

Ayco’s “aero-nitro power injector” is encased in a stainless steel cylinder, measuring five inches long and two inches in diameter, which can be attached to the intake manifold of any diesel or gas engine.

He says the gadget enhances engine performance, eliminates smoke-belching, provides stronger engine power, and saves on fuel.

Activated chemically during fuel and air intake, the invention harnesses the air’s potential elements by producing up to 99.5 percent burning efficiency of fuel in the combustion chamber of an engine.

Ayco says he is processing how to get credits through what is called carbon trading because his invention prevents by 30 to 40 percent the formation of carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, and nitrogen oxides -- substances that are ruining the ozone layer.

Using a chemical catalyst, which Ayco has refused to identify calling it a trade secret, the gadget converts unwanted carbons and other volatile elements present in the atmosphere into combustible gaseous form.

Since the invention helps a car attain perfect fuel burn with near-zero nitrous oxide emission, which gives more power to a vehicle, using the gadget is like converting low octane fuel into high octane gasoline, he says.

The gadget also increases engine power by a maximum of 25 horsepower and increases torque by a maximum of 1,000 RPM (revolutions per minute).

Torque, also called moment of a force in physics, is the tendency of a force to rotate the body to which it is applied.

Ayco says his invention is “like a catalytic cracking reactor using a catalyst material that assists in a chemical reaction but does not take part in it, thus giving greater gasoline yield.”

Increasing mileage

Based on tests by government agencies, including the departments of energy, science and technology and environment and natural resources, Ayco’s invention can increase engine power by 35 to 60 percent, mileage by two to four kilometers to a liter, and engine life span by six to 10 years.

The tests also show that the gadget can cut down maintenance costs by up to 50 percent, can prolong life span of spark plugs and glow plugs, can decrease frequency of tune-ups and oil changes, and can reduce carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide emissions by 99.5 percent.

Ayco also says his gadget is not bulky and easy to install without having to alter engine as it can just be attached to the engine air intake manifold.

Suitable to most types of stationary and mobile combustion engines, the gadget can also last six to eight years and can be recharged after maximum use.

Ayco says that two important substances used in his gas-saving gadget are carbon and hydrogen derived from limestone.

Synthetic fuel

If taken a step farther, these limestone-derived substances combined with water plus a catalyst, which again he will not disclose, can produce synthetic fuel, which is much cleaner and more efficient than fossil fuels.

“My car actually runs on this synthetic fuel,” he says.

He invented his synthetic fuel in the 1980s and had sought government help to protect and mass produce it. But government agencies were lukewarm to his invention.

“This is understandable because Ayco has invented something which can change the course of civilization,” says Bob Roldan, one of the marketing executives of Ayco. “You can just imagine the implication over those who control the oil industry.”

In the meantime, Ayco and his business partners are busy marketing the aero-nitro power injector not only locally but also in Canada, Belgium and other countries.

At P9,000 per unit and with a 10-year warranty, where payments may be returned if one is not satisfied with the performance, Ayco’s invention is making brisk sales in urban communities seeking to reduce air pollution.

Unsung hero helps tell Benguet history

	INQUIRER NORTHERN LUZON Unsung hero helps tell Benguet history
	By Maurice Malanes Philippine Daily Inquirer
	Posted date: August 19, 2008
	MANKAYAN, Benguet – Then First Lady Esperanza Osmeña, wife of President Sergio Osmeña Sr., had baptized an Igorot soldier “Robin Hood,” not because of what the hero stood for but because of his height (almost six feet) and agility as he helped evacuate the First Family during World War II. “It was not clear to me now why the First Lady would call me Robin Hood,” says Amando Bolislis, now 88. “But I remember the First Lady suggesting that in case of promotion, ‘Robin Hood’ should be included.” Bolislis was one of those nameless, if not faceless, soldiers who helped rescue the Osmeñas in September 1943. From the Presidential Mansion in Baguio City, Bolislis and other soldiers took the First Family, as well as eight maids and two nurses, to safety in what was known as Camp Shangrila in the village of Sarat in Kapangan, Benguet. “From time to time, we had to carry on our backs or on stretchers the First Lady and other members of the family if we had to cross rivers or pass through muddy trails,” says Bolislis, who was then only 23. Now with gray hair and some teeth missing, Bolislis and his wife, Esther, would travel from their house in Cervantes, Ilocos Sur, to visit some of their children in Mankayan, Benguet, where he retired in 1980 as a security chief at Lepanto Consolidated Mining Co. A native of Kibungan town, Bolislis was among the young Igorot people who enlisted to fight the invading Japanese Imperial Army in the last war. In the jungles between Kapangan in Benguet and Bagulin in La Union, he was inducted on Oct. 9, 1942, as a rifleman of B Company, 43rd Infantry of the Philippine Scouts under Capt. Parker Calvert. Dangerous mission After training for six months on military tactics under Guilabo Caday-as of Kibungan and Sgt. Emilio Velasco of Mt. Province, Bolislis engaged in intelligence gathering and ambuscades against the Japanese along what used to be called Mountain Trail (now Halsema Highway) and in Baguio and La Trinidad. Bolislis did his first most dangerous mission in March 1943: To deliver an important letter to an Igorot sergeant in Bontoc, Mt. Province. The sergeant, in turn, would relay the message to Col. Donald Blackburn, an American officer of the 11th Infantry Regiment who escaped from Bataan and went to Kiangan, Ifugao, to lead a guerrilla force there. From Kapangan, Bolislis would have to deliver the message by foot. Donning only a g-string in which the carefully rolled letter was concealed and a blanket wrapped around his body, the barefoot soldier took an early breakfast, uttered a silent prayer, and embarked on his mission. His first obstacle was a Japanese checkpoint at Kilometer 90 in Buguias, Benguet. A Japanese sentry stopped and studied the tall, lanky Igorot in g-string. The Japanese got a shovel and barked, “Come, follow me!” Bolislis was frightened. He thought he would be digging his own grave. But the Japanese ushered him to a hill where he was asked to dig and gather roots of cogon grass. After gathering about half a kilo of cogon roots, Bolislis was asked to wash these so the Japanese could brew it in a big pot of boiling water. The roots, Bolislis discovered, were for tea. The Japanese allowed Bolislis to leave. “He kicked me in the butt before letting me go,” he says. He continued his journey until another Japanese sentry stopped him in Mount Data. After studying Bolislis from head to foot, the Japanese let him go. Crazy “With my getup, he must have thought I was crazy,” he says. “But again he kicked me from behind before letting me leave.” It was almost dark when Bolislis reached Dantay, a village at a junction leading to the towns of Sagada and Bontoc. He went to a house where an elderly couple, surnamed Bawingan, welcomed and hosted him for the night. The man, he found out, used to be a soldier at Camp Holmes (now Camp Dangwa) in La Trinidad. The next day, Bolislis proceeded to Bontoc. Not far from the town, he noticed a wooden drum being filled with water from a dripping spring. A Japanese sentry appeared and stopped Bolislis, ordering him to carry the drum before he was asked to leave. It was mid-morning when Bolislis reached Bontoc. He was instructed to look for a red house and to ask for “Wasay,” actually an alias for one Sergeant Anongos. When he got hold of the letter, Anongos told Bolislis: “This letter could have cost your life.” To this, Bolislis replied, “Kabunian (God) was on my side.” The letter, it turned out, contains an operation plan for guerrilla warfare. With his first mission accomplished, Bolislis was promoted from private first class to corporal when he reported to his superiors at Camp Shangrila. Another mission Bolislis was given another risky mission in December 1944: To get a sketch of the Lepanto mine in Mankayan, particularly pointing where the powerhouse stood. The Japanese had taken over the Lepanto copper and gold mines and the US Armed Forces in the Far East-Northern Luzon had intended to bomb the area. From Sinipsip village in the Bakun-Buguias border, Bolislis, also wearing a g-string and a blanket, was able to integrate with vegetable vendors. Disguising himself as a porter, he and the vendors trooped to Lepanto. He was able to enter the tightly guarded mining compound. But a Filipino Japanese collaborator became suspicious of Bolislis and brought him to a junkyard where he was tortured. He failed in his mission, but the sketch of the Lepanto powerhouse was so important that his superiors ordered him to return to Lepanto. He took another route, passing through Ampusongan village in Bakun town. From a mountain vantage point, he got a good view of the Lepanto mine with its powerhouse. He got the sketch. With the mission accomplished, he was promoted to second lieutenant. More battles Bolislis and other local soldiers joined the fierce battles in Lepanto and Mankayan, and along the Mountain Trail, which was still controlled by the Japanese in 1945. After seeing action in many battles in 1945, Bolislis fell ill and was taken to Mt. Pulag to rest and recuperate. While recovering, Bolislis got a mission order from Capt. Dennis Molintas: To evacuate to safety some 5,000 residents, including women and children, in Bokod, Benguet. He led all residents to safe grounds after crossing the Agno River and climbing Mt. Buhaw in Bokod. “The only casualty was a carabao (water buffalo),” he recalls. Bolislis left the service on May 7, 1946, and went home to Kibungan where he was welcomed with a traditional thanksgiving feast. Having finished only Grade 3, Bolislis, who speaks good English, would tell of his war exploits during family and clan reunions or parties. His story forms part of the still untold or unwritten stories of local soldiers, who helped liberate Benguet from the Japanese on Aug. 15, 1945, a historic day for the province.