by Larry Farmer
Chapter 9
I was getting to know more of the farmers with every monthly Samahang Nayon meeting. Though I still seldom knew what was being discussed, I enjoyed finding out, from the farmers themselves, their conditions and attitudes. These meetings were the most convenient way to accomplish this. Since I was just passing through, so to speak, I enjoyed talking more from a curious level than a professional one. It helped me gain perspective on what our bank could do to help them.
I talked Lois into attending a meeting with me. It was one of two cooperatives near her village. She had never been to a Samahang Nayon meeting before and wanted to see one. But I needed her for translations at times, too, with some of the farmers.
It was a Friday afternoon, and she made arrangements to come in with me and our bank team back to Cotabato City afterwards. This required a jeepney ride from the Samahang Nayon, the short way to the coconut tree trunk bridge we all had to take. But for once, she now had a ride in the bank jeep waiting on us at the other side of the small river, all the way to Cotabato City.
Word was out about my singing. I now opened every single monthly meeting at every single Samahang Nayon with a song. Attendance was up because everyone knew this American guy, me, was going to be there and sing. I now, as a matter of course, brought my own guitar, a cheap but functional one I’d found in a shop in town.
And finally, to my glee, Lois was there to behold me doing my musical thing.
After the meeting, we sat next to the Samahang Nayon president as we ate. He was one of the more responsive and successful of those I worked with on projects. His yield increased significantly from the fertilizer machine I brought for him from the International Rice Research Institute, the one Lois had helped me cart from the airport. The IRRI agent who introduced the machine to me was so pleased with this farmer that he flew all the way from Manila to hand deliver a machine made especially to share with the rest of his Samahang Nayon, with the stipulation that the president show other farmers in his cooperative how to use it. The president of this Samahang Nayon also expanded his backyard fish ponds to two. Each was twenty yards in length and ten yards in width. It supplemented his diet well, and he even sold surplus in the local market place.
“How many acres do you own?” I asked him.
“I own what in America would be twenty acres,” he answered. “With irrigation, I harvest three times a year. Even in the dry season I get good harvests.”
I looked around. His farm was where we held our meetings for this group. “You have pigs and ducks, too,” I mentioned.
“And chickens,” he replied. “I even have surplus eggs for the market. I also sell balut on the market.”
“What is balut?” Lois asked.
I looked at her and made a face. “You don’t want to know.”
The Samahang Nayon president laughed. “It is duck fetus,” he said.
“It’s a developing embryo,” I explained further. “Fertilized duck eggs hatch in about three weeks. The buyers wait until a couple of days before the egg hatches and then boil it in water. Then they add soy sauce or whatever spices.”
“I am sorry I asked,” Lois said, squirming. She looked at me directly. “Have you ever eaten one?” she asked me.
“It’s not kosher,” I answered.
“You little cop-out.” She laughed. “You get to weasel out of every inconvenience with some obscure Jewish law somewhere. And how is it not kosher?” she challenged. “You can eat eggs. You can eat chicken. And duck.”
“We don’t eat blood,” I replied, grinning over my gotcha. “But I’d dream something up if I had to. I thought about eating it once. Just to see. I didn’t get past the smell. Then the Filipino I was with cracked his open, and I saw this shriveled up duck fetus. Gross. But one night I was on a bus to Manila during my week for Central Bank meetings. Coming in from the countryside somewhere. It was pitch dark, and the roadside vendor was selling food items. Including balut. I made up my mind I was going to really do it this time. Eat it in the dark and not look at it. I cracked the shell open. Whoof! The smell got to me. But I gutted it out. I psyched myself up and put it up to my mouth. And just as I was ready to take a bite, here comes a bus with its lights from the opposite direction, and there was this duck fetus staring right at me. I couldn’t do it. I gave it to a little girl in the seat behind me.”
Lois laughed in mock victory. “So much for the Marines,” she said.
I let her enjoy herself a bit before turning back to the Samahang Nayon president.
“How many are there like you in this Samahang Nayon?” I asked him. “You have twenty acres. Do any other farmers have as much or bigger?”
“One farmer has fifteen acres. Two have ten. Three have eight acres. Most are five acres or less. Several only own two acres.”
“We don’t get our loans paid off by many in your group,” I said.
“They don’t have much left after they pay back the Chinese traders,” he answered. “If the traders don’t get their money back, they bring men to collect. Our bank has American money. The farmers know this. They look at the bank loan as aid. Or at least many do. The smallest farmers, the ones with less than five acres, they have a bit of fruit for a meal besides rice. If they are lucky, they catch a catfish in a stream now and then. Occasionally they kill a chicken they own. Their one normal full meal is of rice with a pinch of salt. They call it spot. A spot of salt. They never have enough to pay a loan.”
“I guess Mr. Rancon knows this,” I said. “The bank even has me trying to collect loans. I don’t really collect, I explain our problem to some that don’t pay back these delinquent loans. I hope the Peace Corps doesn’t find out I’m doing this. But the bank leaves me only the bigger farmers and some of the businessmen that borrow. I went to one house to collect, and it was a two-story house, very nicely furnished, with new paint. The bank is just a sucker. That’s what people think.”
The president nodded agreement.
“James and Lois,” the president said suddenly, as if surprised about something. “I notice you only have well water to drink. Aren’t you afraid to get sick? Our well is safe from amoeba, but we did not think to boil it for you to protect from germs.”
“We’re okay,” Lois assured. “We’re acclimated now.”
“But it’s the tropics,” the president fretted, “and every area is different from the others.” He looked around frantically until he spotted his son. “Anak,” he called out. “Tuba.” The president then pointed up toward the top of a coconut tree.
“Anak means child,” Lois translated.
“I know,” I replied. “I know that from a Freddie Aguilar song. But the president here said tuba, too, and that’s coconut wine. I hate that stuff.”
“Not kosher?” Lois chided me. “How have you survived that anti-social aspect in your obliged cultural interchange?”
“It’s kosher, but they don’t know it.”
I looked frantically at the president, hoping to stop his kid from climbing the coconut tree at the edge of the yard before it was too late.
“No tuba,” I yelped.
The president looked at me to make sure he heard correctly. He then turned back to his son, who was already at the base of the coconut tree, ready to make his ascent. The president then shouted out a string of instructions to his son, who left the group of coconut trees in front of him for another group in another area of the yard.
“Watch how he all but runs up that coconut tree,” I said to Lois. “It should be an Olympic sport.”
The boy jumped as high up on the trunk of the tree as he could. Then, like a bear running vertically with arms and legs synced left and right, he shimmied barefoot to the ripe coconuts just under the palm-like branches at the top. Holding on with one hand and gripping the tree trunk with his knees, the boy took a small knife secured in a belt loop and sawed at a coconut until it was severed enough to twist off. He looked beneath him to make sure the space below was clear, then dropped the coconut to
the ground. Soon he cut off a second coconut in the same manner.
“It makes such a loud thud, doesn’t it?” Lois remarked.
“It can kill you,” the president explained. “One of my pigs was sleeping under a tree once, and a coconut fell on his head. It fractured its skull just like a small anvil.”
“Why did your son get the coconuts for us from that tree instead of the first one he was at before?” Lois asked further.
“To make coconut wine,” the president explained, “we must remove the coconut at a proper time, while the milk nectar—I don’t know the word in English—while there is a flow. If the coconut is still there, the liquid goes into the shell hollow of the coconut and collects. That’s what is happening now. See? The man there opens up the coconut to get to the meat and the milk. It is clear, sweet liquid. Some say coconut water.”
The president pointed at a man hacking at the top of the two coconuts with a machete. The president’s son then brought us the coconuts.
“As he opens the coconut, fresh, sweet milk, or water, comes out,” the president said. “James loves it, but not our tuba.”
“Tuba is so sour.” I puckered at the thought of it. “If you get it the first day, it’s still pretty sweet. But usually they only bring it down from the tree after it’s already turning sour.”
“That is the best stage of fermentation, after three days,” the president said.
“So,” Lois mused, “the tuba liquid collected at that first tree your son was ready to get is that coconut water coming from the glands of the tree. Sort of like molasses from a maple tree. This water would collect in the coconut shell, but you siphon it off into a bamboo jar instead. That’s what I see up there in the tree top, I think, some kind of bamboo jug or jar.”
“Yes,” the president said as he smiled at her intelligence. “Would either of you like mango?” the president then asked. “The mango tree is even easier for my son to climb. We have a tree in the back. A very big one. Many mango now.”
“That would be lovely,” Lois said.
“Sure,” I seconded.
The president barked further instructions to his son, who then scampered off.
“You have meat for a change,” I said as I took a bite from my plate. “Usually I’m just fed catfish.”
“The meat is just for you. We killed it special for you. Also your friend Lois with you.”
“Don’t do that,” I said showing embarrassment. “I’m just here along with everyone else. Don’t show me extra favor.”
“But we killed our dog for you just like you asked before. He was just a puppy when you said to it, ‘You’re next.’ So now he was fully grown and so we killed him this morning for you like you asked us to do.”
Did I miss something in the translation? Filipino to American? Did he somehow misunderstand about “You’re next, dog,” or did I misunderstand just now about how I ate a dog?
Now I was paralyzed. I had just eaten a dog that was killed because I opened my big mouth when I first got here. This time yesterday that precious dog was alive, but now it was not only dead but being eaten. By me.
And by Lois because of me.
How was I going to finish my meal? But I was going to do it. I was sure dog was not a kosher food. But that dog died for my sins. I was going to do my duty. Somehow. God, I gagged inside, don’t ever let me do this again.
I looked at Lois in desperation. How was I going to get out of this? But the dog was already dead. And dead because of me. Me!
In spite of herself, a laugh at my plight burst out of her.
“You want me to eat it for you?” she whispered. “Since you’ll go to hell or whatever happens if you break kosher.”
I looked at the dog meat before me, then back at her. I wanted to make a joke to ease the agony, but couldn’t. “I’ll eat my share. Thank God they gave some to you.”
She took her fork and stabbed hunks of meat from my plate and placed it on hers.
“Just this one time I’ll eat dog meat for you,” she said, trying to hold back another laugh at my expense. “I’ll ease your pain and eat most of it. But let me tell you. I know you don’t believe in heaven the way a Christian does, but if I’m going to help you on this, you hear me out. You owe me, so share my analogy. When you get to the pearly gates and face St. Peter, that dog is going to be there waiting for you.”
I got the vision of it and laughed at the joke she made for my emotional state.
“He points at me, right?” I said giggling, following her storyline. “That’s the guy. That’s the one I told you about. And he’s a Jew, too.”
Chapter 10
I looked at the map. There was no way I was going due east to Digos, then due north to Davao, on up to Butuan City on the national highway, then cut back due west to get to Cagayan de Oro. Even if that route on the national highway allowed me to take a full-sized bus. It was more direct to go due north from Midsayap. On the map it looked straightforward. My one concern was that the map showed few villages, much less towns or cities, anywhere on that highway due north to Cagayan de Oro from Midsayap.
A Peace Corps Volunteer from a rural bank in Cagayan de Oro, assigned there by the Central Bank, had heard me talk about our computerization efforts in Cotabato City at the bimonthly meeting in Manila. He decided his bank could benefit from getting a computer as well. He was willing to learn from manuals, as I had, but asked if I could spend a few days getting some of their personnel started. I could stay with him in his Nipa Hut in a nearby barangay.
I brought three days’ change of clothing for the trip and my bank’s computer manuals. By the time I got to Midsayap, where I was to transfer to a jeepney in order to head north more directly to Cagayan de Oro, it was lunch time. As I got off the bus at the marketplace, I noticed a white girl. I knew instantly it wasn’t Lois—the girl’s hair was wrapped in a bun, and she wasn’t nearly as pretty. But I wanted to know who she was. I wondered if somehow she was a new Peace Corps Volunteer.
“I’m a missionary,” she said after we introduced ourselves. “I work with the university here.”
“I didn’t know there was a university here,” I responded.
“There are two, actually,” she explained. “The other one is Catholic. So what are you doing here?”
“I’m a Peace Corps Volunteer.”
“Oh, I meet Volunteers every now and then. How do you like it?”
“Challenging,” I said with a smile. “But I enjoy it. I’m so busy I don’t think about it one way or the other. But since you asked, come to think of it I like it.”
“Some Volunteers don’t seem all that busy,” she mentioned skeptically.
“You get the gamut,” I said, feeling embarrassed she had noticed some not so worthy specimens of PCVs. “Most contribute, while some work real hard, and are very devoted. Some, I don’t know why they’re here. Peace Corps makes it easy to go home, so they could go home if they aren’t up to it here.”
“I’ve met some that wonder about that same thing,” she said, “why they’re here.”
“Yeah. So, what do you do here?” I asked to change the subject. I wondered if she needed to feel superior to us.
“Mostly mission work,” she replied. “I use the university as a base. I live here on the grounds. I minister to students, proselytize some with families in the area. I teach a Bible class, too, for the university.”
“Where are you from?”
“Abilene, Texas.”
“Oh, from the South like me. I’m from Mississippi.”
“I knew you had to be from somewhere like that,” she said with a laugh. “With that accent.”
“Your Texas drawl’s not strong.”
“My parents were missionaries. They’re originally from Texas, but we lived a lot of places, and I suppose that accounts for why mine’s not as strong.”
“Is it okay for you here?” I asked.
“I like it all right. I’ve been here a year. I’ve lived like this a lot of my l
ife, growing up. I feel I have a purpose.”
“That’s good to hear,” I said. “I guess you’ve seen politics like this and poverty like this before then.”
“Maybe I did when I was small,” she replied indifferently. “I don’t remember anything this bad. As a Peace Corps Volunteer, I guess you work with small farmers.”
“Yeah. They’re my main clientele. If that’s the word to use. Where I’m going now is to help a bank computerize, but mostly I work with the poor. Try to find ways to generate income for them on small farms.”
“That’s good. I just think it’s horrible how poor they are. And how much they have to pay for rice. That’s their staple food, and they can’t afford it.”
I thought about what she said. I had to remind myself she was a missionary, but somehow that didn’t explain it.
“The price for rice is low,” I explained. “Artificially low. Mandated by law to be below market price. That means that producers, these small farmers and such that you’re talking about, don’t receive what they could because the price is artificially set low. It even gives them a reason to plant something else if they think they can get as much or more for a substitute crop without working as hard.”
“Well, the price of rice needs to be even lower. These people are starving.”
“They wouldn’t be as poor,” I explained patiently, “if they received market price for their produce, which is rice. Marcos fears a revolution, and he fears it’s going to start in the industrialized big cities. He has seventy percent of the population, which is rural, starving by keeping the price of food artificially low. They’re already poor, but this makes it nearly impossible to make a living. And with his cronyism and taxes, meaning his cut of things, industry is struggling too. So these rural poor have nowhere to go. They’re stuck on the farm. But as Marcos keeps the price artificially low, it takes away some of the pain in the cities. Or at least he hopes so. I was never more a capitalist than by coming here and seeing how government intervention screws things up.”