Burial Jars in Inquirer

My efforts for this blog have paid off! An article of mine about the limestone burial jars was published in the op-ed section of a national newspaper. “Where They Should Be” appeared in the Youngblood section of the Philippine Daily Inquirer on December 30, 2012. What an exhilarating way to end the year. Here are the first few paragraphs:

Upon seeing the burial jars, I had to take a deep breath. I had to keep the tears from flowing.

I was in the University of San Carlos (USC) Museum in Cebu City, and the burial jars I had come to see were taken half a century ago from Kulaman Plateau, my hometown in Mindanao.

For several weeks before the visit, I spent hours almost every day doing research online on the archaeological artifacts. By scouring websites and poring over downloadable academic papers, I felt that I had been a witness to the journey of the burial jars—how they were discovered in the caves and rock shelters in our town and ended up in museums in the Visayas, Luzon, and even as far away as the United States.

Seeing the jars for the first time, running my fingers along their vertical ridges, staring straight at the hollow eyes of their anthropomorphic covers, I felt reunited with long-lost loved ones. I had reached a major point in my search for identity. I had found a missing part of me.

The body of the article contains mostly facts about the burial jars—their features, where they are discovered, the explorations conducted by some institutions, where the jars are now. The information isn’t much different from what you can read in The Burial Jars page of this blog. The Youngblood article ends this way:

It is sad that the jars were taken away from their original sites, even if the institutions involved have done so much in preserving them and informing the public of their significance. It is despicable that some of the jars are blatantly put on sale online as though they were limited-edition action figures or used laptops. Nobody should put a price tag on archaeological artifacts; they are invaluable treasures of a tribe, a locality and even a nation.

If I had the money, I would buy all the burial jars now on display in California and take them back to my hometown. Unfortunately, all I can afford to do is see the ones that are in museums in the country. I’ve ticked off one destination in my list, and there are a few more to go.

Whichever museum I will visit, however, I have a feeling the experience will be the same: Upon seeing the jars, I will have to take a deep breath. I will have to keep the tears from flowing. No, I won’t let myself cry. I’ll cry only, in joy, when the limestone burial jars are back in Kulaman Plateau, where they came from, where they should be.

You can read the complete article at inquirer.net. Perhaps for the sake of consistency, the editor used “Kulaman Plateau” all throughout the article. Note, however, that in some parts, I originally used “Kulaman” only and I was referring to the barangay. The village of Kulaman is the seat of government of the municipality of Senator Ninoy Aquino, while Kulaman Plateau covers an area that includes some parts of Kalamansig and Lebak towns.

Snapshots of my article. Yay! I’m sharing the page with a former chief justice of the Philippines and the present prime minister of Japan.

Karl Gaspar, Manobo Advocate

I first came across the name Karl Gaspar on a book about the Dulangan Manobos. Gaspar is quoted at the back portion of the book. He praises the author, a missionary priest, for his dedicated service to the indigenous people of Kulaman Plateau.

Upon reading Gaspar’s statement, composed merely of a few sentences, I told myself right away that this man could write. My impression was correct. My personal online research on the Manobos led me to one of the several books he had written. I have previewed the book once in Google, but I can no longer find it now, so I can't provide you the link. However, I can still remember that one chapter of it is devoted to Gaspar’s spelunking experience in Kulaman.

The book is a combined travelogue and reflective essay. In a clear and entertaining prose, Gaspar lets the reader see the beauty of nature and join him in his spiritual journey. Here’s some more info on Karl Gaspar, a staunch advocate of indigenous peoples:

• A citation from Ateneo de Davao University
• Karl's Musings, an old blog
• SouthAfrica, another blog

The most recent news I’ve heard about Gaspar is that he won a 2012 National Book Award from the Manila Critics’ Circle. The winning book is Manobo Dreams in Arakan: A People’s Struggle to Keep Their Homeland.

Manobo Monsters 101

As with most Philippine tribes, the Dulangan Manobos have their own set of mythical creatures, most of which are spirits believed to cause harm to human beings. Manobos use the term busaw in referring to all kinds of evil spirits, but some of these spirits have specific names. Here are the weirdest according to Fr. Rafael Tianero in his book Violence and Christianization in Manoboland:

• Meta-es Fakol. This shape-shifting spirit normally appears as a rat and attacks at nighttime. It kills chicken but doesn’t eat them. It also sodomizes the spirit of human beings who move their bowels at night, causing them to have hemorrhoids later on.


• Lemodok. This apelike spirit has a short neck and a short torso but as tall as a tree. That is because it has very long legs. The legs come in handy for the spirit’s favorite activity: urinating on people. The victim’s body becomes unbearably itchy, and sores break out in his skin. He may eventually die.


• Siling. This spirit likes to fish, swimming upstream against the current. When it gets bored in the company of fish, it looks for a human being and tickles him to death.


• Fegelilong. This spirit can mimic a woman’s appearance. When two lovers agree to meet in a place and the woman doesn’t come on time, the spirit will assume the likeness of the woman and show itself to the man. The man will die as soon as he sees his fake sweetheart.

More spirits are described in Fr. Tianero’s book, which is unfortunately not available online. For more details, see bibliography.

Not Your Usual Datu

When you hear datu, what immediately comes to your mind is a tribal leader whose words are law in his turf and is regarded with utmost respect even in other hamlets. When you’re in Kulaman, however, and you meet a datu, don’t be so impressed right away. Aside from the title, a Dulangan Manobo doesn’t have much in common with, say, the legendary ten datus of Borneo or the datus in present-day Muslim territories.

A datu in Kulaman rules a large household only, not a village composed of dozens of families. He is nothing much more a patriarch of a small clan. Harland Kerr, who with his wife lived with the Dulangan Manobos from July 1955 to October 1956, wrote that a datu has “little authority outside [his] group.” Kerr further observed that one Datu Migted “seemed to command little respect in Datu Undas’s territory” and “datus referring to other datus not related to them were by no means reluctant to disparage them.”

I wish to discuss why a Manobo datu doesn’t possess as much power as datus of other tribes enjoy, but Kerr didn’t provide a thorough explanation in his paper. So for now, let me just point out the other differences between a Manobo datu and the traditional datu we have in mind.

With a limited number of followers, most of whom are his younger relatives, a Manobo datu has to work his own farm. He has to provide for his wives and children. In contrast, Kerr noted that a datu of the Kalagan tribe can “be a tyrant if he were so disposed.” A Kalagan datu has a claim to the possession of his subjects, so he doesn’t need to work.

The title of a Manobo datu is not hereditary. If a Dulangan Manobo aspires to be a datu, he must achieve the status by hard work and cunning. He must possess a wide tract of land and a good number of horses for others to want to be part of his family. He may then style himself a datu or his followers may start calling him datu. The title isn’t conferred by any person or body recognized by all the Manobos. So, as stated earlier, a Manobo datu does not automatically command respect outside the premises of his farmland.

With the influx of Visayan settlers, and the introduction of elections, the weak datu system of the Manobos is becoming obsolete. Soon datus will be a thing of the past. The good thing, though, is that some Manobo leaders have learned to adapt with the changes. So far, one or two Manobo datus have been elected as members of the municipal council in Kulaman.