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On Cebuano Folklore, by Erlinda Kintanar-Alburo (Excerpts)

(From Bisayangdako: Writing Cebuano Arts and Culture, by E.K.Alburo (USC Press, 2016).

From “Heritage Stories”

It is important to give the same attention to the intangible forms precisely because they are non-
concrete and are bound to disappear in a matter of time. Oral narratives not only tell us how people
lived in the past. Like some folk songs and dances, they also tell us about the worldview, feelings and
attitudes of the people that historical accounts do not give.

Except for the story on the Kawit pastores from Medellin, the rest of the promdi stories are filled not
only with the engkanto, multo, and duwende that children growing up in the towns are familiar with;
they also repeat the motif of naming towns after some natives were asked what they were doing by the
Spaniards.

An alternative motif for town-naming is legend, such as the story of Campalabo in Pinamungajan. This
story narrates the origin of a landbridge, now an islet off the shore, built by Palabo, prince of the sea
who fell in love with a lovely mortal. That story combines intangible (the legend) with still a third form of
heritage, called natural heritage (the islet). Today, such heritage form merits as much attention as the
expressive forms.

From “Camotes Sojourn”

An interesting story is told of what is now a developing tourist spot, the cliff of Buhò, where one
encounters a seven-kilometer cave that branches out in two directions. In one branch are living beings
who the people believe are the Jesuits. The Jesuits guard the people from cholera, smallpox and other
dreadful diseases. The people living in this branch of the cave are rich merchants who trade in cacao,
gold and silver. They carry on trade with the neighboring towns, Cebu and Manila. At night they go
around their boats to protect the people from the Moros and the evil people of Homonhon, who are
blamed for the spread of cholera and smallpox in Poro. The people believed (at least those living in the
1950s, when such local beliefs were collected) that when anyone dies of such disease, he is brought to
Homonhon where he is resurrected and made a slave.

The second branch of the cave is the abode of malicious evil spirits who do harm when
provoked. They would go out and capture men, women and children from the town and make them
their slaves. It was believed that Buhò is itself a magnificent city comparable only to Manila.

In such a brief but convoluted folktale we see the history of Poro in a capsule, rendered into
legend. All mixed together in the historical consciousness of the folk are the Moro raids and the
stewardship of the Jesuits during the Spanish period, the cholera and smallpox epidemics of the
American occupation, and the pre-Spanish practice of Visayan slavery. There are traces of the Maria
Cacao tale that is more popular in the south, too.

All of the Maria Cacao versions talk of the cacao trade, naturally, but there is one from a barrio
in Dalaguete that swears to an underground city for the engkanto. Such claims, like there being a city in
Buhò, are compensatory mechanisms for places that seem to have been forgotten by time.
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Through such narratives do we learn what events of their past have made a mark in the
collective memory of the folk. They form part of the intangible heritage that oftentimes are forgotten in
favor of the more concrete evidences of conquest, occupation and delivery from other peoples. More
important than that, we also learn how they feel about it.

“Old Water Stories for Today”

Among the many versions of the origin of Mandaue, one involves also Mactan, Liloan and the Camotes.
The huge Lake of Mantawi once received the waters running down the slopes of Cebu from such rivers
as Subang Daku, and the village of Mantawi was then connected to Mactan by a land bridge which
disappeared when the currents of the Camotes Sea rushed to meet with the lake of Mantawi. The waves
formed a whirlpool or lilo by the shores of the place now called Liloan and of Punta Engaño in Mactan
island. The union of Camotes with the lake then formed the Mactan Channel.

It wouldn’t be surprising if a still unretrieved version of that story tells of forbidden love. The man
would have been named Mantawi, and the woman would have come from a place in the Camotes
islands (other than the Spanish-sounding Pilar).

The order in the universe before was dependent on a balance to be kept by deities and spirits who,
however, could not prevent breaking of the rules, in the same way that the moral and social orders
today when disturbed are difficult to restore. The parents in such stories would have good reason to
forbid the union of their children, the future guardians of the realm. Now the desire for love, which
upsets lives in such stories, are translated into the lust for power or for wealth.

Indeed, there is wisdom in myth and legend that eludes the undiscerning. Some “fairy stories” seem to
warn of the consequences of tampering with the natural order. The people of Malabuyoc understood
this when they resisted attempts to develop Mainit Falls and Kabutongan Falls out of the fear of
displeasing the spirits living there. In the case of Mainit Falls, whose waters are said to be therapeutic,
they probably thought that the healing waters would turn cold, its efficacy dissipated. (But perhaps such
vigilance of the folk has already given way to accommodate the tourism fever that everyone today
thinks is the answer to rural poverty.)

A barangay called Malubog (I believe near Toledo) was named after a stream that became murky after
the disappearance of a girl who often washed clothes there. That stream was considered the “lifeblood”
of the barangay, providing for all their basic needs from drinking to farming. The folk believed that a
huge creature living at the bottom of the stream was disturbed by the girl’s action, its motions causing
the lubog. I suppose the story, whose end I did not quite get, ends with the water not being fit for
drinking anymore.

Isn’t there an obvious message here about not polluting our drinking source? There are of course worse
things than washing clothes that bring about worse conditions than murkiness.

On the other hand, when the folk respect their abode, the spirits keep their peace, as in Buhisan, once
also a lake that exacted tribute or buhis whenever someone crossed it. A story is told of how the boat of
a logger transporting logs from upland capsized because he failed to pay the buhis. Since the
reforestation project in Buhisan, however, the spirits have been silent.
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One wonders if there isn’t a similarly instructive story of a sea nymph swimming back into the fresh
waters to symbolize salt intrusion.

A good look at our own folklore may indeed equip us for survival and coping with change, more than we
think.

“Maria Cacao for Regreening”

One cave in Luzon is said to shelter the sleeping Bernardo Carpio who, as the legend says, will one day
wake up, break his shackles and lead the people toward a freer state. That’s an old, old story that folks
fall back on when they think they need a redeemer. We are a free state and don’t need that yarn, one
might say. But there are other states of freedom, of course, and the stories might be reinvented to fit
our needs for those states.

One such need is for regreening, or a freedom from stale air and from flooding. And one story that fits
that need is the story of Maria Cacao. Evolving from the figure of the nameless benevolent lender of
pre-Spanish lore, this deity became an engkanto with Spanish features. During the fiestas and other
celebrations of Argao and Dalaguete, she lent to townsfolk the festive wear and ware which she
brought back from her trips to America. She dominated the south of Cebu as Spanish guardian of the
countryside.

Her golden ship has been seen in Panay, Leyte, Misamis Oriental and even Palawan, or wherever
migrants moved from southern Cebu. But it is the older face of Maria Cacao that becomes more relevant
today, without the layers of commerce added later. This face is one of a generous guardian who could
be relied upon during emergencies. Maria Cacao is a complex and composite figure, but even before
cacao was introduced to Cebu and before she acquired her name, she was already keeper of the forest
in the same way that Maria Makiling stood steadfast in the mountains of Laguna and Maria Sinukuan on
the slopes of Mt. Arayat. Most of the forty versions of the legend that I have collected over the years
end with a sense of nostalgia or homesickness for a past order of things wherein the folk lived closer to
nature.

The genius that wove the threads of collective history into the legend of Maria Cacao connected the
deity’s benevolence with her plantation (when the cacao of Cebu surpassed in quality grown elsewhere
in the country), her trips abroad (when Cebu was first port of origin of the galleon trade),
Christianization of the Cebuanos (introduction of church sacraments of baptism and marriage, with the
accompanying parties), and finally her disappearance (she was “bribed” to move elsewhere by the
American engineer who built the bridge of Argao).

It was not the bribe (was that the 20 million dollars paid to Spain after the Treaty of Paris?) that sent
Maria Cacao away, though. It was the moral decay of a people that would not return the clothes and
china lent to them for their feasting, or if these were returned, they were given back as spoiled goods.
Sometimes, the wedding clothes were returned with the sequins and lace taken out, and the plates
were chipped or dirty. The old relationship of trust had given way to a culture of opportunism and, by
extension, of corruption.

The mountains have become bare after charcoal making, kaingin, and land conversion. The bridges
cannot bear the brunt of punishing waters. If only as symbol, Maria Cacao can help us revive a sense of
respect for Nature. We need to restore the old guardians of the forest.
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In short, we give back to Nature the same care we get from her. In this light, the yarns of old can
become an equipment for survival.

“Banilad Lore”

I had the chance to go over a collection of stories from Banilad put together by my friend Moling Ouano-
Savellon, recently retired like myself from decades of academic life. I confess that romanticizing the past
and idealizing rural life (especially in contrast with the complex urban) are temptations I have often
succumbed, but I’d like to think that it is promdi life that gives sustenance (not just in an agricultural
sense) and stability to the otherwise adventurous and fun-loving creatures that Cebuanos see
themselves to be.

To quote from the preface of the collection: “The traits of thrift, helpfulness, loyalty, kindness, love for
country, respectfulness, humility, industry, generosity, and other praiseworthy characteristics were all
passed on to us by our parents and grandparents through these old stories.” Also: “Had we continued to
relate these stories to the young, perhaps our modern society would not be as chaotic and violent as
this – where God seems to be unknown, and the much-admired goals center on the acquisition of
wealth, material possessions and luxurious goods.”

For Banilad was a rural village, too, once upon a time, with its share of legends and beliefs. Extraordinary
but explainable events there include the rain of fish sucked from the sea and spewed on the fields by a
strong waterspout. Then there was a carpet of fat caterpillars that a few days later filled the place with
an unimaginable array of colourful butterflies.

Fascinating are creatures like the kikik bird and the feared santelmo, as well as the shrimps without
eyes and the octopus in the sinkhole of Lamak; the hidden powers of one old manghihilot who
blackened his hair with crow’s oil and of another who could see duwende.

As to lessons, there are accounts of fields or parcels of land called buangan (where people become mad,
or which bring bad luck) because the place was acquired by deceit. The storyteller then asks, Why do
some factories suddenly close shop? How many times have these lots been sold and resold? The
buangan, we see, is a form of gaba, which in another story comes as a tumor, recognized today as
cancer, to a cabeza who hits a white monkey with a rock.

There is the story of a four-year drought that brings out the best in the village leaders, who share
survival strategies with the rest, like eating root crops and making landang from buli with the use of
kunyahan tool. A weapon against such drought was the tubod or spring, sweet-tasting still. As metaphor
for the price we pay for development, the water grows gradually gray as dust from the new road and the
new concrete building settles. The same fate follows the Butuanon river, which was clean and clear
before but is now filthy and foul-smelling.

The ecological thrust of recent tourism programs says that our natural attractions are worth preserving.
But not just so the tourists can gaze at them. The landscape is as much a part of us as we are part of it.
Traditions and folkways give us our identity, something that the now popular Gabii sa Kabilin proves. A
look at the stories of a certain village could certainly make the younger villagers wonder whether they
can do something to direct change, even redirect it to accommodate a past state.
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