Migs Bassig

(Happy Mother’s Day to you and yours.)

“Bird’s tongue.”

My mother was alluding to how the people in her northern province of Tuguegarao –my province, technically– nicknamed their dialect. She was in a nostalgic repose by the bedside table, where prayer cards and religious icons and scapulars had been scattered. I myself was in a holy disposition, and by that I mean my mouth was shut, my ears were open, and my eyes were looking past the open window and at the dark velvet sky. Midnight was approaching, yet we both knew that the conversation was not to be cut off in the midst of her deep torrent of remembrance.

“Ratata-tata,” mother went on, mimicking the unique chattering tempo in which the Ybanag language was spoken. Like a bird’s tongue indeed – quick pecks of words which were hard to catch, harder to comprehend, and blasphemously complicated to translate. Ratata-tata.

Ybanag, however, was the invariable lexicon during her youth. She said it was what the nuns of St. Paul College used whenever they prayed their rosaries. It was what the conservative high school girls spoke in whenever they murmured and gossiped about new and upcoming films from the West – those that often raised eyebrows and challenged old-fashioned attitudes. Mother should know; she had been one of those girls.

She said: “You know, it was my thirty-year-old Ybanag-speaking cousin who made the advertising rounds in one of those 18th century Spanish calezas (horse carriages), going round the small neighborhood, yelling, in bird’s tongue and at the top of his lungs, that for a mere five pesos an individual would be admitted to watch the double programme screening at the local cinema: ‘Now showing…Hilda Coronel in her first starring role! Double with To Sir With Love!’”

Mother, by the way, loved Sidney Poitier. She first saw him in one of the town’s several dilapidated theaters. It was a place where people brought yesterday’s newspapers to keep the bugs on the seats at bay; where the intense stench was of dry urine and the nearby wet market; where instead of popcorn, viewers would bring slices of green mangoes to eat, plastic bags of fish sauce (or bagoong) to dip those slices into, and warm peanuts, the empty shells of which the familiar faces in the back row would throw recklessly at the audiences seated up front. The provoked would react with sharp hisses in bird’s tongue.

That was way, way back. To pursue her collegiate studies, my mother then moved to Manila – the city, the capital, the hectic life. “Your grandfather would visit from the province every now and then,” she gently explained, without the restless vibe of someone who grew up in a society of Ybanag-speaking people. “In each day of his stay here, we’d go shopping in the malls and stalls of Quiapo. That was where he’d bought all those cheap but elegant leather shoes!” In her voice, I heard mother smile. Of course I didn’t really see because I was looking at the tiny stars above, which suddenly seemed even more splendid.

“And we’d watch movies, too,” as if she only remembered. “There were cinemas in Santa Cruz, in between the busy districts of Tondo and Quiapo. How your grandfather loved those action films!” She turned off the lamp and the night was darker, more sacred.

“Then came The Graduate – I believe you had once asked about it – and with such an interesting plot, I just thought I’d bring my father with me,” she said, barely above a whisper, and which could have sounded as the antithesis of the bird’s tongue. “The film wasn’t even halfway through when your grandfather asked me, ‘My child, my child, what in heaven’s name are you watching?’ As you can imagine, the film caused a lot of controversy when it came out. Even more so here in the Philippines.”

I didn’t think there was anything confessional in my mother’s memory. Parents might be prone to induce guilt on children but not the other way around. In fact, I must say that we both enjoyed her anecdote with silly giggles, giggles contained within the four walls of my mother’s solemnly configured bedroom. After that we kissed each other good night - recognizing that words were not only unnecessary, but also that words, in whatever language, would anyhow be lost in translation.

One learns new things when in an unfamiliar place, when in a (rather) strange land.

I was taking a stroll in Gaisano Mall, Davao City not so long ago when a quick look at the box office put me in a state of shock. Movie tickets cost only seventy-five pesos each! That’s less than two US dollars. (And it wasn’t just because 10000 BC was showing. Quality of film had nothing to do with price.)

Finding this out was quite a big surprise to me, considering that in Manila where I live, one would have to shell out a minimum of one hundred and twenty pesos for a movie at most theatres. Make that a hundred and fifty (or more, exclusive of excessively salty popcorn) if one is a posh moviegoer who cannot not watch in upmarket cinemas such as in Greenbelt, Shangri-La, or Eastwood City. Three hundred if one were to go to the IMAX Theatre in SM Mall of Asia.

While one can argue that choice, variety, and legroom all constitute the premium amount we all have to pay for in Manila, it is still rather astounding that there are places outside of the nation’s capital where movies cost only half as much. Well, movies and other commodities. As I continued to explore Davao City, I had the chance to examine the price tags of pirated DVDs, rubber shoes, imported magazines, nylon guitar strings, haircuts, and brewed coffee – examine, that is, with absolute dismay, for even though there were bargains in Manila none ever came so ridiculous as the bargains in, say, many Philippine provincial cities. I’d never before heard of a twenty-five peso haircut!

But that wasn’t the last surprise. At precisely three o’clock in the afternoon at the department store of another mall, all the salesladies stopped what they were doing to perform a five-minute choreographed dance – from wherever they happened to be standing. It was Broadway over at the Men’s Underwear section!

Away from Manila, I learned that despite being a city rat, I’m still prone to enjoying the cheapest thrills in life. This is the Philippines indeed.

Run. Bike. Climb. These aren’t the things you’re normally allowed to do on a highway. But I was fortunate enough to have been invited to “94k Weekend” – last week’s pre-inaugural opening of the smooth and spanking Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway (SCTEX).

The new toll road is a flagship project of the Arroyo Administration and government corporation Bases Conversion and Development Authority (BCDA). Promising speedy and comfortable travel for tourists in Luzon (just 30 minutes from Clark to Subic!), the SCTEX is expected to become the economic backbone of Central and North Luzon, while also developing new centers of excellence in international service and logistics in Southeast Asia. Introductory toll rate has been set to P2 per kilometre.

For the 94k Weekend, BCDA gathered runners, cyclists, bikers, car lovers, families and leisure seekers in what turned out to be, quite literally, a three-day block party. Well, a block party with marathons and ceremonial torch relays and tattooed Mad Dog MC bikers with handlebar moustaches.

On Friday, the 250,000-strong Luzon Motorcyclist Federation, Inc. (LMFI) held an exhibit and convention on the grassy grounds of the Clark Omni Area. And then on Saturday, executives and corporate professionals put on their cycling suits for a friendly but competitive 150k race. Wall-climbing guests scaled a specially-constructed 3-panel wall. There was also a concert stage, on one side of which was a bazaar that sold –among many other things– imported tequila. And BMW Philippines built a mini-expo to showcase their latest luxury bikes and cars (a red M3 Coupé!), most of which were made available for test drives.

Oh. And then there was a 94-kilometre marathon.

It’s not every day that toll roads are open for runners but for this one summer weekend the organisers had made it possible. An invitation was sent to a team of athletes to cover the full distance of 94 kilometres; collectively, they’re called the Pinoy Ultra Runners, and I carried the journalistic burden of following them.

So they ran. They ran across an asphalt highway so smoothly paved such as you’ll never see elsewhere in the Philippines. They ran through the country’s most important economic hubs: from the Central Techno Park in Tarlac, through the Clark Freeport Zone in Pampanga, and to the Subic Bay Freeport Zone in Zambales (as well as several other duty-free, Americanized areas). They ran past 8 interchanges, 35 bridges, 255 culverts, 44 underpasses, and –ahem!– state-of-the-art computerized toll collection systems.

They ran to prove a point, to burn calories, or maybe just to view the northern scenery. (The SCTEX does offer breathtaking views of distant mountains, cliffs, and green landscapes.) They didn’t exactly run to finish first. In this case, after all, placing ahead of others did not really matter so much as conquering new challenges.

And treading new paths. Literally.

We found ourselves in the middle of the water in the middle of the day in the middle of the season. The mid-afternoon sun roasted us like muttons –to quote a little John Steinbeck– and we were melting like the cheese on yesterday’s pizza. Summer has officially made a blistering entrance. We were right in the middle of it.

“Let’s swim,” Marte Perez suggested.

A lovely, affable woman of whose age I shall diplomatically refuse to take an estimate, Marte dove from her husband Rolly’s pocket yacht straight into the cold waters of Taal Lake in Talisay, Batangas. Nykko, my photographer friend, made a louder splash: seemingly a thunderous beckoning to someone who had no intention to swim (or, to be more precise, was embarrassed to have his fear of the waters exposed.)

But how, in my representation of a local sports magazine, could’ve I declined? “No” was not the correct answer. So I dove clumsily, although I was already trembling before before I even hit the waters.

Petrified, I tried to swim and take notice of what was happening around me. A most fantastic sight! In an event dubbed as the “Summer Messabout,” the Philippine Home Boatbuilders Yacht Club (PHBYC) paraded a flotilla of homemade sailboats and motorboats – of different sizes, lengths (from 8 to 22 feet), and personalities.The tarpaulin sails danced with the breeze and saturated the vaporous backdrop with colours. Taal Volcano was a beauty to behold, too: a faraway mound full of textures, imaginings and mysteries.

PHBYC members were building a canoe on site –at Commodore Peter Capotosto’s Taal Lake Yacht Club– to show visitors how easy and practical the process was. Armed with pre-cut panels, epoxy, hammers, screwdrivers, power drills, a paint brush, and basic carpentry skills, the group built the 15-foot Moth in a span of merely six hours. (It was one-legged multimedia artist Cherrie Pinpin’s first canoe, but everyone took turns paddling the new boat around Taal Lake.)

Then – the back of my head resting on the pillows of water – I gazed at the vast, cloudless sky. Suddenly a single bird flew across the view. It prompted me to muse upon what Kenneth Grahame once wrote: “Believe me my young friend, there is nothing – absolutely nothing half so much worth doing as messing about in boats.” It was to be the epitaph for the death of my fears.

I was first to climb back on deck; Rolly followed suit. We enjoyed a wine-less conversation about his life in sailing and his prologue to that. He was from the Northern province of Tuguegarao as I was; attended Ateneo de Manila as I did; studied English literature in college as I regretted not doing; photographed professionally for seven years (and ran a theatre company) as I could only have dreamed of.

“But you’re still young anyway,” I almost wanted him to say. Instead he smiled silently, allowing me to arrive autonomously at this conclusion. The rest of the sailors continued to mess about, and the winds scattered gently all throughout.

“Ahoy! Ahoy!” we afterwards kept yelling at those who happened to sail nearby. Roy Espiritu and Louie and Cheryl and Mario Garcia and Cherrie and Felix and Ben and Kuton – I don’t want to miss any names here – all waved at us as if we were friends either long-lost or newly-professed. But did it matter? Was I not feeling the oats best described as bohemian? For as the sun began to set and the blue sky faded into orange, I seemed to have settled in a kind of camaraderie where I felt no storm could come. And I heard the delicate waves of the lake echo exactly where we were.

Home.

*** The PHBYC was formed in 2006. The boat building craft compelled the founders and members to create a web-based forum at www.pinoyboats.org, which has become PHBYC’s central point of contact. Being the country’s first virtual yacht club, the group has quickly dispelled some of the myths about boating – that it is only for the rich (building can cost just as much as a regular mobile phone!), that sailing is a difficult skill to learn (members attest that it’s way easier than riding a bike), and that water sports are dangerous (“It’s very safe,” said Rolly. “You’ve simply got to respect the water.”).

Have you ever taken the Manila LRT (Light Rail Transit)? Well – you should. It’s one of the quickest and cheapest ways to commute in the Philippine capital. Now, a cultural project is even allowing passengers to wax poetic during the ride.

The Instituto Cervantes de Manila, led by Director Jose Rodriguez, and the Light Rail Transit Authority have collaborated to install posters inside the carriages of LRT – all of which contain Spanish-language poems by such celebrated writers as national hero Jose Rizal, Jesús Balmori, Claro M. Recto, José Palma, and Fernando Maria Guerrero; Spanish poets Calderón de la Barca, Lope de Vega, García Lorca, Antonio Machado, Luis Cernuda, Luis Rosales, Miguel Hernández and Gil de Biedma; and Latin American writers Pablo Neruda and César Vallejo. The poems, of course, have Filipino translations (so we can stop ogling at strangers and start memorizing some fine verse).

This new promotional campaign, entitled “Verse in the Metro”, was launched recently to encourage reading among Filipino commuters, as well as to strengthen the ties between Spain and the Philippines, two countries that share a common past that spanned more than 300 years.

“With almost one million commuters riding the train every day, it provides a great opportunity for the reading campaign to reach as many people as possible,” Rodriguez said.

Instituto Cervantes is the cultural arm of the Spanish government that promotes and teaches the Spanish language and culture. It is the largest Spanish teaching organisation worldwide, with more than seventy (70) centers in four (4) continents. With its collection of classic and contemporary Spanish literature, movies and music, the Instituto library has become an important agent in promoting the Spanish language in the Philippines and is an indispensable source for those who are interested in Spanish and Latin American cultures.

I may be wrong, but don’t they do this in New York City as well? I do hope that authorities of the Metro Rail Transit line adapt the project, instead of frantically bombarding stations and carriages with advertisements. Because if we’re going to improve literacy, we might as well learn from the masters.