A Moment with Aklay

He has become a byword in the town of Sagada, Mountain Province, this European baptized Philippe who now goes by his adopted name Aklay.

Every Friday morning, he bakes. By noon an array of warm bread is ready on his open shelves (no sanitary glass cases here). You can have your pick of multi-grain, caraway, chocolate bread and even loaves studded with almond nuts. Put five of his oatmeal cookies in a brown bag, and the bag’s bottom gets torn. That’s how heavy and packed each cookie is.

What’s nice about the man is you can drown in his Aidan Quinn eyes. And on Fridays he does smell yummy from all that kneading and baking.

His town mates find him a bit of a conundrum. ’Tis said that he owns a map of Sagada like no other, that he has uncovered old trails, that his visa may have expired and needs renewal. When I ask him if these speculations about him are true, he points to a long, detailed, hand-printed map the size of a huge Chinese scroll. Not intimidated by tall wild grasses, he hacks his way through not-so-frequented areas to discover more of Sagada and its unknown but fabulous views.

On this map, a work in progress, he has painted some birds slowly becoming extinct in this part of the Cordillera like the peregrine falcon. This big bird is the last in the food chain: the earthworms eat leaves heavily sprayed with pesticides, the smaller birds eat the worms, the falcon hunts and eats the smaller birds. Aklay blames all that pesticide for killing off these birds of prey.

As for his being wanted by the immigration authorities, he shrugs and requests that I take photos, using teacher Fara Manuel’s camera, of all parts of his house, but I must leave him out of each picture.

A striking thing hanging from one of his kitchen hooks is an old pasiking (backpack). Its twin is safely housed at the Bontoc Museum.

Drop in on a Friday. And if the baker is in the mood, you can watch him toss a tray here, lay loaves of bread gently as though they’re fragile infants on a spot there, all to the beat of French cabaret music.

‘It’s Not Easy Being Green’: On Baguio’s Veteran Pine Tree

The first time I laid eyes on the Veteran Tree, looking upward and downward, the feelings that overcame me were of dismay and mild disgust. “Mild” because this was not the first time that city authorities did something to further the uglification of our beloved but already benighted and blighted Baguio.

The Veteran Pine, as it is called, is nothing more than the Benguet pine (pinus insularis), but what sets it apart from the thousands upon thousands of pine trees still standing in different parts of Baguio and outlying Cordillera is its age of over 100 years, its having survived the carpet bombing of the city during World War II or, as the landmark beside it states, “defying time, fire and the elements.”

And yet by the unthinking—the more appropriate word is stupid—act of cementing the base of the tree, its survival is put in jeopardy. For how can the roots of the tree absorb the moisture and the rain that feed the tree? Elementary, Watson, we feel like telling the insensitive city officials. What is the Bureau of Forest Development for if it cannot care correctly for a historical tree?

If the tree has feelings, we know these would consist of a sense of loneliness, “missing the contemporary neighbor pines felled long ago by the ruthless axe man,” according to the landmark. Yet who is being ruthless by cementing the base of the tree and covering up its roots? Hello, Garci, can you assure us of one million votes from the city’s residents and visitors to clamor for the removal of the offending cement base?

What incensed me was how a sense of what is aesthetically pleasing and pleasurable has continued to elude our government officials, particularly the ones in Baguio. Where were they when they were taking their undergraduate humanities classes when the topic was striking a balance between people’s needs and enhancing, not destroying, the environment? We only have to be at the veranda of SM City Baguio to see a panoramic view of a city that looks like a monumental cemetery with occasional, I’m tempted to say, token trees to break the monotony of houses and buildings.

There is one real estate developer in the city known for bulldozing pine trees and other trees that are in the way so home and commercial lots can be apportioned. The rationale is the people who buy these lots will plant trees anyway to make up for the felled ones. The logic is ill logic. In other places like Bali in Indonesia, structures are built around trees even if it means that the house is not a perfect cube or rectangle. Truly our officials have a lot to learn in terms of nature conservation, and the learning must be accompanied by action or else we throw away our natural patrimony.

What should be done is for developers to take a meditative stroll in the remaining groves in Ambuklao and Camp John Hay, the veritable lungs of the city. In the words of Henry David Thoreau, a naturalist and author of the classic Walden Pond, “Strange that so few come to the woods to see how the pine lives and grows and spires, lifting its evergreen arms to the light—to see its perfect success.”

Baguio City is approaching its centennial in September this year. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if one of the activities to commemorate the event is a celebration of the long-living pine trees around us with picnics under their shade followed by enthusiastic tree-planting by every hundredth man, woman and child?

If the Baguio Country Club could start a 10,000-tree planting as part of its observance of its own centennial and to make those who complain about the fading scent of pine eat their words, why can’t City Hall find the political will to save the Veteran Tree from imminent rot and collapse, and let a hundred pines bloom?

Mabuti pa si Kermit the Frog. He sings an anthem to the color green: “But green is the color of spring / And green can be cool and friendly-like / And green can be big as an ocean / Or important as a mountain / Or tall as a tree.”
Photo of view from SM City Baguio mall by KIMI L. FERNANDEZ

Ceciboom as Performer, Private Person

Take it from Romy Comoda, who has been tuning Cecile Licad’s piano whenever she has a concert in her home country, “Maski na yung walang hilig sa classical music, pagnarinig siyang tumugtog, magugustuhan.” His duties used to take him to distant cities and towns, especially when music writer-retired impresario Pablo Tariman organized provincial tours for her.

The year 2003 was personally significant to me. Pablo gave me access to her, and she let me act out my fantasy of being her groupie. I had been following her rise since I saw her as a chubby, bespectacled child of 11 perform as a soloist with the University of the Philippines Orchestra under the baton of Regalado Jose in June 1973. The occasion was our freshman orientation program. Then UP President Salvador Lopez led the standing ovation.

I watched nearly all of Cecile’s performances in ’03 at Philamlife Auditorium in Manila, the Carabao Center auditorium at the Central Luzon State University (CLSU) in Muñoz, Nueva Ecija, at neurosurgeon Joven Cuanang’s residence in Antipolo and at St. Paul University in Tuguegarao, Cagayan. (When Irene Marcos-Araneta heard this, she said, “If one must be a groupie, might as well be a classical music groupie, di ba?”)

There were only two similar words for Cecile’s performances everywhere: electric and electrifying.

I listened to her rehearse and give technical instructions. She was worried that the gray carpet on the CLSU auditorium stage would muffle the sound of the piano and deprive people at the back of the hall of their listening pleasure. She politely requested that it be removed.

Earlier, Muñoz Mayor Nestor Alvarez laid out a breakfast buffet for her party that included her son Otavio. Hizzoner had his cook prepare white cheese, fried eggs sunny side up and easy over, longganisa, daing na bangus, eggplant omelette, corned beef, chopped tomatoes, mangoes, rambutan and bananas. And rice, of course. Cecile went back to the buffet table twice, each time piling her plate high with rice and various viands she was homesick for.

“I eat a lot of rice,” she said unapologetically in her husky smoker’s voice. Naturally she has to because she plays the piano “athletically so I burn off all that carbo.”

In Antipolo, her mother Rosario Buencamino Licad confirmed that “if Cecile eats well, she plays well.” She added that her daughter’s house in New York was full of culinary books and magazines.

Mrs. Licad repeatedly tells Cecile: “Never forget who helped you in your career because it wasn’t just one person responsible for you.”

Fred Mendoza, a family friend and once the producer of “Concert at the Park,” boasted of his complete collection of Cecile’s recordings that he built up since she was nine. He said whenever she arrives for a scheduled performance in the Philippines, her very first question is: “Meron ba tayong piano?”

Almost miraculously, a quality piano always turns up—at Philamlife it was a Steinway worth P7 million; for the outreach, there was a Yamaha.

Mendoza said those who could afford to give scholarships should do so. “Without scholarships,” he said, “there would be no Doctor Cuanang, no Cecile Licad. Many young Filipinos are forced to work because of abject poverty when they should be in school.”

Sr. Angela Barrios, SPC, echoed his views. In faraway Cagayan, she was on a mission to “make art and culture important in people’s lives. Talent shared by the likes of Cecile can make life meaningful.” It was Cecile’s second time to perform in her university, and the nun described her guest as possessing “audacious musical instincts” that reflect her “fabulous training.”

And after giving her all at those music halls, what happened to Cecile and her small party (son Otavio, film director Marilou Diaz-Abaya, who’s like an older sis to the pianist, Pablo, painter Alain Llaguno and me) in Banawe, Ifugao? We were almost trapped by a mudslide.

Gamely, we rolled up our pants and waded through the brown slush. Cecile knew her priority. Assured that Otavio could cross what was left of the road without falling into a ravine, she held on tightly to her music sheets and made it to the van of Mayor Alvarez waiting for us on the safe side of the highway.

Upon reading my published account of what happened, a male admirer of Cecile working at UP Baguio sent this text message: ”I read Licad stories. If I were you, those would have been tales of chivalry. Sa bawat yapak ni Cecile sa putik, pupunasan ko ang kanyang hita at binti, at siguro habang ginagawa ko yun ay binabasbasan niya naman ako ng sagradong usok ng kanyang sigarilyo!”

Pablo may have retired as impresario, but I still dream of the day when he can bring her back to Baguio and fill up another auditorium to the rafters.

Meanwhile, it's time to save up again for Cecile's concert at the Cultural Center of the Philippines Sept. 15 and 16.

Walk the Talk

Teacher-photographer Fara Manuel caught me huffing and puffing up the pathway behind St. Mary's School in Sagada, Mountain Province, one early morning last week. It's the road less taken, and the rewards are endless: grounds covered with pine needles, a commanding view of the poblacion, quiet and stillness everywhere, not to forget a healthier heart from that uphill climb. We were there for UP Baguio’s summer extension work (Fara handled acrylic painting for kids and one adult, I had seven kids whose ages ranged from nine to 12 for a creative writing workshop). Our wish is to connect with more Cordillerans through the continuation of this program.

Art Chuwariwa at the Hottest Museum in Town

The Baguio Writers Group (BWG) and the Bencab Art Foundation will hold an art writing workshop May 23-24, from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., at the Museum’s Larawan Hall, Km. 6, Asin Road, Tuba, Benguet.

Travel time to the museum is 15 minutes by car from Baguio City’s central business district and about half an hour by jeep.
The workshop aims to equip local writers, art enthusiasts and other interested individuals with analytical tools with which they can think and write about art and literature.

Resource persons are: Yason Banal, Philippine Star columnist and teacher at the UP Diliman Film Institute; Lito Zulueta, sub-editor for arts and books of Philippine Daily Inquirer’s Lifestyle section; and Francis Macansantos, BWG vice president, literary critic and multi-awarded poet.

The workshop will include lectures and writing exercises designed by the resource persons. Twenty participants will be accepted. Two fellowships will be given to young, deserving writers of Cordilleran roots who can submit a two-page art review or a profile of an artist addressed to BWG president Padma Perez on or before May 15 at the Café by the Ruins, Chuntug st., Baguio City.

For reservations, email baguiowriters@gmail.com, or text or call our number 0908-361-2844. Photo of sculpture by Junyee found at Bencab Museum by EV ESPIRITU

Tigil Yosi

what if
my nails turn yellow
& my lungs dissolve
& turn into ashes
will i writhe in pain
or continue puffing,
blowing white rings
till my eyes turn teary
& my breath smells like a sewer?

will i then quit smoking?

-- verse written to commemorate Earth Day 2009

Here's to You, Ida

My youngest daughter Ida has repeatedly asked me, "When are you going to do my portrait?" Well, Ms. Miranda Bituin, here's how I see you. This painting, "Miranda's Slippers," is part of "Summer Halo-Halo," the third exhibition of the tireless Baguio Aquarelle Society at Tam-awan Village Gallery, Pinsao Proper, Baguio City. Show runs till May 11. Other participating painters are: Roland Bay-an, Jenny Carino, Norman Chow, Merci Dulawan, Baboo Mondonedo, Toottee Pacis and Patric Palasi. Photo by ANDREW DULAWAN

An Aquarelle Rides Again

April's approach has not exactly been kind (I've not yet fully recovered from the assault of an intestinal virus, yes, a virus, not an egg or parasite). Despite the month's famed cruelty, I managed to steal three precious, unfettered hours for some gentle spiritual shampooing. Translation: I painted again despite pressing, more important deadlines.