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02.04.08Beans for Ballots
Trivia: Who were the first Igorots to vote in a U.S. presidential election? The St. Louis Public Library gives us the answer:
The Fair’s Philippine Reservation included villages for the three Igorot groups, the Bontocs, Suyocs, and Tingguianes. In the Philippines, the Igorots were farmers and miners.
Several Igorots showed an interest in the presidential election of 1904 and asked to be able to cast their ballots.
In response, two polling places were established in the Igorot village. Photographs of the two candidates Theodore Roosevelt and Alton B. Parker were placed over Igorot gongs; beans serving as ballots. Roosevelt carried the election, 83 to 2.
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01.25.08Take Two on That Logo
Earlier, we stated that the Baguio Centennial Logo looks cool. We still believe it does. However, Karla raises a valid point in the comment section which we are reprinting here.
Regarding the logo, it is aesthetically pleasing and exudes a city that is vibrant. Logo design is always a controversial process and everyone not directly involved has an opinion. Congratulations to the artist for coming up with a centennial logo that is vibrant. Baguio’s children will remember it for a long, long time because it is very colorful.
BUT it would have been better if it also made one FEEL that Baguio is located in the highlands and that it was once a dominantly Ibaloi place, had an American presence, and now a very cosmopolitan city. Possible solutions could have included an image of zigzag road somewhere, use of Ibaloi language in expressing “culture of caring”, a building reminiscent of American presence, people images that express this cosmopolitan complex.
True indeed. The logo might be a good representation of Baguio now but it says very little about Baguio’s history particularly its Ibaloi heritage. This is unfortunate because the centennial is, more than anything else, a celebration of the past. Maybe they can include an Ibaloy version of the tagline (”a culture of caring”) as Karla suggests? Or add a more distinctive Baguio/Ibaloy icon?
Of course you can say, “What about the strawberry and the sunflower”? Well, I’m not quite sure if these are distinctive enough. They are pretty generic symbols and are not really uniquely Baguio. In fact, without the headline (i.e., Baguio Centennial) you would be hard pressed to immediately identify the logo with Baguio.
Now, don’t get me wrong, the logo looks cool as I mentioned earlier. It is an inspired work and let’s give kudos to the artist who made it. There is no doubt that it is, to use Karla’s words, aesthetically pleasing. However, it lacks a certain connection with the city’s unique character, its cultural heritage, and the past 100 years. What do you think?
By the way, thanks Karla :-)
PHOTO SOURCE: Baguio Centennial Commission.
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01.24.08What is Your Vision for Baguio?
The Baguio Centennial Commission a.k.a Centecomm (sounds like a menacing Soviet agency during the cold war haha) is asking you to share your vision for the city in the next 20 years. Our ideas will be taken seriously daw by the Centecomm folks so let’s go ahead and envision something.
Mine is not so much a vision for Baguio but I hope that officials will pedestrianize the city. Instead of constructing projects designed to solve the problems of the rich (i.e., where to find a parking lot) let’s build pedestrian lanes that will encourage people to walk and make walking enjoyable.
Really a pedestrianized Baguio will be a much better city. You know, a city with cleaner air, lesser traffic, and healthier people too.
Oops, by the way, isn’t the Baguio Centennial logo above kind of cool? Congratulations to whoever designed it.
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01.23.08Are You a Limahong Descendant? Part II
In Part 1 of this topic, we mentioned that the legend of Limahong hiding and begetting children in the Cordilleras is most likely just a legend. But how do we explain the “Chinese” features of some Igorots/iCordilleras? I think it’s because our ancestors really did come from mainland Asia as Arcibald wrote in our earlier post, .
According to the current prevailing theory, people from the Philippines came from the north and not from the south. So as Edwin writes in his post here, it would seem like the migration wave theory (i.e., the Philippines was populated by waves of Negritos, then Indonesians, then Malays) that we learned in school may not be true at all.
Anyways, going back to the “Chineseness” of some Igorot groups, did you know that Barangay Tabaao in Kapangan, Benguet has a pretty significant number of people of Chinese descent? How did this come about?
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01.16.08War Allies
From Time Magazine/August 13, 1945
In the steep Caraballo Mountains of northern Luzon, a battalion of the 127th Infantry Regiment last week came upon a vast road block—a chasm blasted by retreating Japs.
A battalion commander, Lieut. Colonel Powell A. Fraser, had his jeeps dismantled, called for native bearers. Scores of volunteers—sturdy, brown-bodied Igorot women —eagerly picked up wheels, engines and other parts, carried them along paths which at one point soared 2,000 feet above the road. On the other side of the chasm the jeeps were reassembled, and Fraser’s men sped after the Japs. The Igorot women stayed behind to help the engineers rebuild the road.
Related Posts:
It Was Also a Women’s War
Those Gallant Igorots -
01.10.08Are You a Limahong Descendant?
Legend has it that Limahong, the Chinese pirate who raided Manila back in the 1500s, escaped to the Cordilleras when Spanish/Filipino soldiers regrouped to kick his ass out of the capital.According to the legend, Limahong and his band of pirates sought refuge in the Cordilleras and married the local women. This supposedly explains why a lot of Igorots have some East Asian features. See above photos for instance.
It would be cool to have a pirate for a forefather but the legend is, apparently, only a legend. From the writings of Francisco Antolin in 1789 (translated by William Henry Scott):
1574: At the end of this year the famous pirate Limahon came with many sampans and armed Chinese to take Manila which he was unable to do due to the resistance of the Spaniards. He had to retreat and seek refuge in Pangasinan, and they also drove him from there.
The histories of Father Colin, Father Gaspar, and the Franciscans, refer to this whole affair with considerable detail, and none of them says that any of these Chinese took refuge farther inland in the mountains of the Igorots, but rather that those who survived at liberty took to sea in their sampans, besides some 52 captives and prisoners in the fort in Pangasinan, who returned to China from Manila with the Chinese merchants.
An early account by Father Chirino printed in Rome in 1604 also recounts this event, and says that after the few Spaniards of Manila had vanquished the enemy Limahon, who had brought more than a thousand warriors with him, they made him retreat to Pangasinan, and even from there he was forced to flee from us with light boats which they carried to the sea on their shoulders, leaving the heavier ones in the river and some spoils in their forts and camps, which our forces took.
Thus there is no basis in the early histories for the idea that the Igorots are descended from these Chinese of the pirate Limahon.
So I guess that settles it. But, then again, one can argue that just because no Spanish writer “says that any of these Chinese took refuge farther inland in the mountains of the Igorots” does not mean that it didn’t happen. After all, school history books don’t mention that Gabriela Silang is part Tingguian but this doesn’t mean that she is not. And it’s not like a pirate running away from authorities would shout, “Hey, I’m going to hide in the Cordilleras.”
Anyways, what we find most interesting in Antolin’s writing is the fact that, apparently, questions regarding the Igorot-Chinese link is not a recent “modern day” issue (Read this blog for instance) but dates back to as early as the 1700s.
INFO SOURCE: Nanzan/PDF File. Click here for a non-PDF version. PHOTO CREDITS: Dialoguebetweennations for Vicky’s photo. Girlwithagun for the boy’s picture.
