An encounter with the Holy Week traditions of Balayan, Batangas

Balayan church, a national cultural treasure.

Good Friday in Balayan, Batangas was a totally different experience. 

We were there two years ago to cover the much-hyped 'Parada ng mga Lechon’ on the feast day of St. John the Baptist, 24^th of June. We expected to get doused, of course, and we took care that we, not our camera, would get the drenching. Seeing only the heads of roasted pigs on parade even if these were dressed up in various character configurations was a big let-down.

 

Paintings on the dome ceiling of Balayan church.

We spent Maundy Thursday and Good Friday at a new resort a short walk away from Balayan Bay. Thursday lunch was still meat while we listened to various sopranos of senior women chanting the life and death of Jesus Christ. Our hosts were strict on keeping Friday meatless and they served Balayan’s version of the danggit (not salty), and, of course, the famous Batangas sinaing na tulingan with an array of vegetable dishes on the side. Then there was this bottle of preserved dark lilac calumpit fruit, already sweetened by two years of fermentation, a twist to the desserts of ripe mangoes, bananas and sago’t gulaman.

Interior of Balayan church.

On Good Fridays, our hometown church and churchyard would be beehives of decorators adorning the many carrozas for the early evening procession. But not at Balayan’s antique Immaculate Conception Parish Church, a national cultural treasure. It was bereft of carrozas of dioramas depicting scenes from the passion, agony and death of Jesus Christ, and of life-size images of santos, santas and other characters in the pasyon story.

We saw a few carrozas later in the afternoon, all assembled at the church yard. We were told that the images owned by families depicting the passion story were borne in the Holy Wednesday procession.

Subli folk dancers strewing flower petals around the cross.

The mass before the Good Friday procession featured the veneration of the cross through a folk dance: Subli. This is a tradition in Batangas. In this instance, high school students performed the dance which included strewing flowere petals around the cross.

The Good Friday procession in Balayan is called 'pagbuburol', hence, the central figure is the Santo Entierro (Dead Christ). Only the Marias were in attendance--Magdalena,Veronica, Betania, Jacobe and the Mater Dolorosa--plus St. Peter and St. John the Evangelist.  The procession was long with throngs of people lighting the way with candles. 

The pasyon chanters provided the music for the procession. One group were all seated in a trailer provided with a sound sytem, microphones and loud speaker. In most towns, there would be brass bands. In our town, each carroza owner provided canned music (pasyon, hymns, etc).

The Santo Entierro of Balayan.

In our hometown, the Santo Entierro is honored with rituals: it is fetched from the house of the caretakers/family owners after the afternoon siete palabras, brought to the church for veneration, and later becomes the highlight of a procession of some 50 carrozas. 

When we were young, my mother and other women in the neighborhood would attend the ‘funeral’ of the Dead Christ by 10 o’clock in the evening. He was borne in procession from the church to the house of the caretaker, usually a descendant of the original owners of a century ago.

Pabasa chanters provided the musical accompaniment of the Balayan procession.

They have a similar final 'pagbuburol' in Balayan. The folks there say that this is a continuation of the earlier procession.

There is another image that Balayanese venerate, that of a fallen Christ, prone on the ground on his knees. We were able to take a glimpse of it when the procession passed by its shrine. We thought it looked like the typical fallen figure without the cross on his shoulder.

The Black Saturday religious rites, according to our hosts, are long tests of faith and endurance: the fire and candle and holy water ritual, the baptism mass, and all these culminating in the midnight Easter Service with the salubong of the grieving Mary and the Risen Christ.

As the Balayan midnight service was happening, we were getting into our hometown to witness the traditional early Sunday morning salubong rites: an angel inside a giant flower hoisted above the carrozas of Mary and her resurrected Son, and she would lift the black veil as she sings to Mary the good news of the resurrection.

Discovering the Lopez Family of Balayan, Batangas in Boston, MA

The Lopez ancestral house, Balayan, Batangas. Photo taken by the author in 2014.

My fraternity brother based in New Haven, CT and I were on our way to Copley Square of Boston, MA when, out of curiosity, we paused in front of the New England Genealogical Society building and decided to check what can its library be holding. I keyed in 'Manila' to the desktop computer on one of the tables; a list came out including pdf version of the book 'The Story of the Lopez Family, A Page from the History of the War in the Philippines' published in Boston in 1904, and digitized by Google. A copy can be downloaded from Googlebooks. 

The editor Canning Eyot said that the letters of Juliana Lopez formed the backbone of the book, which also included exchanges among her other siblings. These chronicle the friendly-to-hostile turn of events during the Philippine-American war that affected their family, the province of Batangas and the Philippine Republic, all because of their brother Sixto Lopez, a very good friend of Jose Rizal.

The story said the family was from Balayan, Batangas, and this reminded me of visiting an ancestral house there two years ago in July during the annual 'Parada ng mga Litson' (Parade of Roasted Pigs) event there. I reviewed my files and found out that this was the house of the Lopez family which has been converted into a museum. It was full of historical memorabilia like heirloom pieces and pictures on the walls but I was more interested in the architecture and construction of the house, amazed at the envelope of capiz windows around the main floor.

Looking at the picture of the house I took, I noted that there were two large tarpaulin pictures hanging by the windows for passers-by to see. These are the same pictures included in the book:  that of Sixto Lopez and Jose Rial, and that of Clemencia Lopez.

Photo from page 32 of the book.

The first picture was "from a photograph taken in Hong-Kong on Rizal's return from Europe in 1891. ... It is interesting .. because of an incident which occurred when it was being taken. In response to the customary injunction to "look pleasant," Rizal said to Lopez, "Yes, -- imagine that you are just about to be executed by the Spaniards!" These were prophetic of Rizal's tragic death, which occurred five years later."

Before the outbreak of the war, Sixto was in Washington to seek recognition for the new Philippine Republic. He was also advocating for negotiating peace with the United States. 

At the start of the American occupation of Batangas, the Lopez family extended hospitality to the American officers stationed there, keeping their house in Balayan open to them.

Eventually, the US military forces would turn hostile to them even if Cipriano, who was an officer in Aguinaldo's army, surrendered with his men and arms. Mariano resigned from his post in the Malolos Congress to attend to their businesses, which included shipping. 

But Sixto did not want to take the oath of allegiance to the US. He failed to convince General Malvar and other die-hard generals from Batangas to surrender; they persisted in their armed resistance. The Americans considered Sixto still an enemy, and pursued a scorch-earth policy (water and fire methods) in the province just like they imposed in Panay and Samar. 

Photo from the frontispiece of the book.

Part of the narrative on the Lopez saga mentioned Felipe Buencamino, labelled here as evil genius and Judas, who recommended arrest of wealthy non-combatants, and 'extermination of the entire population of Batangas'

The Lopez house in Balayan, their estates and ships were seized by the Americans, and Lorenzo, Cipriano and Manuel arrested and imprisoned in an island on Manila Bay.

Clemencia went to the United States in April 1902 to "seek justice at the hands of the President [Theodore Roosevelt] for her imprisoned brothers" with the help of their friends in Boston but her petition was denied. 

There were other friendly Americans in Manila who vouchsafed for them, sending testimonial letters to civil and military authorities about the integrity of the family.

Eventually, the saga came to a happy ending, the family honor restored and their business losses incurred in their shipping business compensated by the Americans. 

This is not only the story of one family, It tells us how America made us Filipinos bow under the threat of water and fire in their so-called 'pacification campaign'. 

'Wet & Wild' Parada ng mga Lechon in Balayan, Batangas

Note:  This photo-essay appeared in slightly different version in the 27June-03July 2014 issue of the weekly FilAm Star, "the newspaper for Filipinos in mainstream America," published in San Francisco. This blogger/author is the special photo/news correspondent of the paper in the Philippines.

Getting ready for the parade? or the feast tables?

I had to wake up very early on 24 June for the two-hour trip to Balayan.  A very Pinoy breakfast of suman sa latik, bibingka and tamales with a choice of Batangas barako coffee or thick tsokolate was waiting for us—a busload of Pinoy and a couple of FilAm tourists--at Casa del Rey, a social venue constructed along the architectural lines of vintage houses of the affluent families of the Spanish colonial times.  Balayan still has several heritage houses, preserved or reconstructed, to show off.

We were joining the Parada ng mga Lechon at 9 o’clock, and we were prepared to get wet so we brought extra clothes to wear after the revelry around the plaza and the Kanluran side of town.  Our tour organizer provided us plastic raincoats but I decided to use it for shielding my camera instead.  Our companions were receiving loud jests from folks armed with water pistols, water hoses, and pails of water because of their covers.  In many instances, I had to ask a water warrior to target some parade participants for a photo-op.  I was not spared though of this ‘baptism by water’ but they had the gracious courtesy of giving me the splash at the back for the sake of my camera.

This wetting day is supposed to echo the baptism of Christ by his cousin San Juan in the river Jordan, but the celebration in modern times no longer carries that religious connotation.  It’s simply a wet holiday in Manila, and towns and cities named after the saint where no one is spared the dousing; walang pikunan, eh, the Batangueno would say.

How the wet revelry of June 24 and the parade of roasted pigs came together is a unique story with strong socio-economic colors.

From the folklore that our Balayan host Ms Annette Martinez-Mejia told us, a social divide between the Kanluran (western poblacion) and Silangan (eastern) areas of the town existed in the olden times.  The working class resided in Kanluran and the affluent families in Silangan.  Hence, the heritage houses that still stand today are in the eastern side.

She said that Balayan has always been celebrating thanksgiving on June 24. Only the rich could afford a lechon, well, until one day when one working class family had a child coming home with a college degree, and the father had a lechon carried around Kanluran as a show of pride and thanksgiving.  That’s how the working class started joining the thanksgiving ritual of a lechon parade, our host narrated.

A Balayan citizen told me that Kanluran is actually the center of the celebration; hence, the parade goes mainly around this part of town.  The official version actually confirms this Kanluran thanksgiving tradition.  “To the poor people of Balayan, the parading of lechon in the plaza ... is the best show of thanksgiving and veneration to their patron saint. ...  As the years passed, as more and more people from the Kanluran district received blessings or became successful, more and more lechons were paraded every June 24. ... Starting in 1959, the the elders of the Kanluran district organized the Hermandad San Juan Bautista (Brotherhood of St. John the Baptist) to oversee the celebration of what has come to be known as the Parada ng Lechon  ...”

We expected to see almost a hundred lechons on parade. We counted less but we saw more still being roasted or being consumed at eating booths of families, neighborhood clubs and barkada groups along the way.  It seemed that beer and lechon were consume-mates everywhere.   There were make-shift stage platforms along the parade route where local live bands displayed their musical prowess to revellers. 

Our lunch was again very Pinoy:  crispy lechon, of course, dipped in the chef’s own sarsa mix, kare-kare, and the unique Batangas culinary fare of sinaing na tulingan.

A revisit of the town’s historical past came after lunch.

 On my own, I took time after the parade to photograph the antique church and the old bells in the convent yard. The convent itself was built along the lines of an affluent house during the Spanish era.

The official story on Balayan church says that the Augustinians put up a chapel in 1572, and the Franciscans constructed a new one 1575. The Jesuits headed by the famous chronicler Fr. Pedro Chirino also rebuilt the church in 1591. The stone church that we see today dates back to 1748. It was blessed and dedicated to the Immaculate Conception in 1795.  A bell at the courtyard with the inscription ‘San Nicolas de Tolentino’ shows that the parish belonged to the province of the Recollect Order for some time.

Costumed lechons!

The centerpiece of our historical heritage tour was the Lopez ancestral house, now a museum.  This was preceded by a historical presentation by a Balayan fellow, Emmanuel Martinez. We could have visited the heritage house of the Martinez family but there were still water warriors everywhere and we did not dare getting doused again.  We visited a reconstructed heritage house owned by Ross Sison, a relative of our host, to show a typical arrangement of a Balayan affluent household of the old times, and here the ladies were given opportunity to try the baro at saya of yore.

The Lopez of Balayan, Batangas Foundation calls the family house Casa Grande that includes the gardens, stables and granary.  Their family derived their wealth from rice, sugar and shipping. They were involved in the Philippine Revolution, and “[took] part in the events of 1901-1902, important years of Philippine-American solidarity when American anti-imperialists joined forces with Filipinos working for independence.”  The book ‘The Story of the Lopez Family’]Boston, 1901, republished in 2002], “contains translated letters by Clemencia, Sixto, Mariano, and other [Lopez] siblings that remain some of the most enduring documents of the arguments for and against American colonization.” 

The house was owned by Don Sixto Lopez, a contemporary and close friend of Dr. Jose Rizal. It's said that he secretly distributed Rizal's El Filibusterismo. According to historical accounts, he was the secretary of the Philippine Mission to the United States in 1898 to ask for American recognition of Philippine independence. Although he surrendered to Gen. Arthur McArthur, Sr. during the Philippine-American War, he was deported to the US where he remained in exile for many years because he refused to pledge allegiance.

His sister Clemencia, on the other hand, is said to be the first Filipina to visit the White House where she pleaded with President Theodore Roosevelt for him to end her brother's exile and to send him back to the Philippines.

Still on display at the Casa Grande are historical panels from "War & Dissent: The U.S. in the Philippines, 1898-1915" exhibition that was presented by the foundation at the National Museum four years ago. The exhibition was produced by the Presidio Trust of San Francisco. The texts and accompanying illustrations and pictures provide visitors esp. teachers and students an "eloquent testimony to the dissenting and assenting voices that ushered the Philippines and the United States into the twentieth century."

Before going back to Manila, we were set to go to the aplaya (beach) for a feel of the fresh air from Balayan Bay. Again, the dread of water warriors veered us to the modern mini-park by the bay, the Boardwalk, where we had a view of the emission towers of the Calaca coal-fired power plants in the neighboring town. 

This bay provided the impetus for the development of what became the Batangas province. Balayan was a shipping port, and many families like the Lopezes drew their wealth from shipping and marine trade.  According to history, Balayan was originally designated a town by a royal decree in 1578, and became a province for 151 years until 1732 covering the area that would become the provinces of Batangas, Marinduque, Mindoro, southern parts of Laguna, Quezon and Camarines.

This bay sustains the production of the town’s iconic product that can be found in Pinoy kitchens all over the world: Balayan bagoong (salted fish).  The bagoong makers are said to have a secret ingredient that they mix with the salted dilis that makes their product distinct from those made in other provinces like Pangasinan.

Historical glimpses plus our complementary gifts from our host family—Balayan bagoong, panocha and tsokolate balls—made our fun-filled wetting at the Parada ng mga Lechon very unforgettable.

Balayan's Basaan Na! Pistol Warriors.