Philippine-German relations (I)

    Klaus

October 26, 2007 by Klaus  
Filed under Klaus

It’s a topic, which I am interesting in, since first time I met my mentor Professor Dr. Hermogenes Bacareza in 1987, who used to be the Chaplain of the Philippine Community in Berlin. Father Gene was the one who introduced me to the Philippine media. During our time in Berlin we published two magazines called “Ang Mabuhay” and “Deutsch-Philippinischer Informationsspiegel Berlin” for Filipinos at home and abroad,  published in German and English. I started also my column in “Tinig ng Bayan”, a mission oriented magazin published in Abra.

I learned a lot of him. I know my readers of this blog would like to know more about Philippine-German relations. From time to time I will write about it in this blog.

Regarding Dr. Johannes Zobel let me explain as follows: Historically we must give credit to some early missionaries, who introduced pharmacy in the Philippines, and who were the first to study the various medicinal plants of the 7107 islands. The Jesuit Brother Georg Josef Kamel is significant in the Philippine-German history  for having pioneered the establishment of the first regular “apothecary” in Manila. Other followed, i.e. the historic Botica Boie, founded by the Spanish Dr. Lorenzo Negrao, to be taken over by the Germnans Heinrich Schmidt and Friedrich Steck, who, ten years later, opened another drugstore, Botica de Sta. Cruz”,  and the Botica Zobel, established by Johannes Andreas Zobel in 1932.

The German scientist who is very well-known, is Feodor Jagor. He was born in Berlin in 1818. While studying in Paris, Jagor became interested in ethnology because of the discussion about the Pacific Islands. Most of the time Jagor stayed in Madrid speaking Latin, French, Spanish and German. In 1873 Jagor, being satisfied with his study, he published the book “Reisen in die Philippinen” (Traveling to the Philippines).

Dr. Rudolf Virchow, noted for his medical researches on pathology, must be mentioned here too, even he never traveled to the Philippines. Virchow wrote many monographs on Philippine anthropology. 1899 he published a book which has been translated into English by O.T. Mason, “The Peopling of the Philippines”.

(To be continued!)

About the Author:  Klaus is from Germany, but has been living in the Philippines since the late 1990’s. Klaus is a journalist by trade, having written for a number of newspapers, studied also Publishing House Management and Marketing and has also been a Radio Host here in the Philippines.