Twenty-Three Years Ago and Today

Twenty-three years ago, we decided to drive up a particular mountain near Baguio that offered an excellent view of the surrounding mountains and overlooked an area known as "The Mines" where locals indeed mined. There were large scars upon the land. Twenty-three years later, the mines aren't visible anymore and instead houses dot the landscape. 

Twenty-three years ago, you walked down a rough trail from a pull off to a rock outcropping where you could take in the view of "the mines". Twenty-three years later, the trail was a sidewalk that led you down the hill in a zig zag pattern so that you had to pass by a maximum number of vendors trying to sell cheaply produced souvenirs. Even if you were in the market for a cheap souvenir, you had to watch your step as there were people everywhere and random steps everywhere. And for all of this, you had to pay a toll just to visit the area.

Twenty-three years ago, there was a lone Igorot native in the area who kindly posed for a photograph with me. The top of his head barely came to my chest but he was smiling and so was I. Twenty-three years later, the only "Igorots" to be seen were those tourists who paid money to dress up as one and get their picture taken. These sorts of enterprises are nearly everywhere the tourists are these days. Nobody is smiling.

After escaping the tourist crowds, we did some walis (native broom) shopping but weren't able to find any that were the style and price we were looking for. Twenty-three years ago, I had bought a half dozen or so of the native made brooms to bring back with me to America. We've used those brooms up one by one and our last two were worn down to their bristle nubs. Later on my SIL would order some from a local who still made them. He wove them while we took one more adventure and when we returned, they were done. While we didn't find some walis, we did find some real ube jam made from the local sweet potato at a convent known as the Good Sheppard. Their ube jam is famous because they don't adulterate it with fillers like those you find in stores. It has become so famous, they will only sell it to tourists (not locals who will mark up the price and resell it) and only two per tourist. Since we were many, we were able to get our hands on a good number of jars which we brought back to America as souvenirs and to eat ourselves.

Hungry, we found a restaurant that served family style meals nearby. Like many Filipino restaurants out in the wild, they are very utilitarian and very minimal staffed. We had to order our food up at a counter and bring it back to our stainless steel table with plastic chairs. We even had to go get the drinks we paid for.

Filipinos mostly eat chicken and pork and due to financial reasons, rarely eat the cuts from either you would expect to choose from in any restaurant here. I never see chicken breasts, thighs, wings or legs. Instead, most chicken dishes are made from chicken backs. Likewise with the pork, you never see any pork chops, loins, hams or roasts. Instead you see stuff like the dish above which is half of a hog's head.

A more identifiable shot after consumption. The face is prized for the skin which is fried and very crispy with layers of gelatinous fat and just a tiny bit of meat which is chopped up into smaller pieces and eaten with rice.

After lunch we once again tried to enter the Philippine Military Academy where my MIL used to work in the offices. The first time we tried, I had been denied because I didn't have a passport, something that has never stopped me from entering in the past. The second time we tried, I was denied because I had been wearing "slippers" or what we call sandals. Despite hordes of Filipinos walking through the gate in their slippers, I was told no and when the person doing the telling is holding a machine gun as chest level with his finger on the trigger guard, I tend not to argue any points. The third time with my passport (which they didn't even ask for) in my pocket, closed toe shoes on my feet and even wearing pants and a button up shirt for good measure, they let me in. 

My wife was born on the base, her parents had met on the base and her mom had a career on the base in the accounting office, so it was nice to see all the places again though because it was pouring rain (rainy season), I didn't get pictures of all those places. Instead, we went to a small recently opened up museum where they had this nifty painting above of a Filipino revolutionary names Emilio Aquinaldo mowing down a platoon of Americans during the brief Philippine-American War. The U.S. had acquired the Philippines from the Spanish after beating them in a war the year before. The Filipinos celebrated and declared their independence which of course, the U.S. didn't recognize and so we had a short lived war that killed 200,000 natives and 4200 U.S. soldiers, a few of them pictured above.

They also had a replica of the 1734 Velarde-Murillo Map, named after a Jesuit priest that drew it. Being a map-head myself and having spent a lot of time in the Philippines, it might be of no surprise that I too have a copy of this map hanging on the wall  of my office just feet from where I am typing this post. 

It poured rain the entire time we were on the base, including as we drove by a memorial for fallen Americans that I didn't get out and photograph, but just as we were about to leave through the gate, the rains stopped briefly right next to this very phallic shaped hat and sword "monument". In fact, it is built on a slight rise so until you have walked up the hill, you don't see the sword or scabbard at all nor can you see the lower part of the helmet. You just see a large object thrusting up into the sky. 

Finally as we wrapped our day, we stopped at a restaurant known for their coffee, that was situated up on a hill that overlooked this venue below where a wedding was about to happen. We sat down just as the bride exited the vehicle and after posing for a few pictures, made her was through the blue sheet and down the aisle.