I think [Manila Bulletin] By JAMES SORIANO
August 24, 2011, 4:06am
MANILA, Philippines —
English is the language of learning. I’ve known this since before I could go to school. As a toddler, my first study materials were a set of flash cards that my mother used to teach me the English alphabet.
My mother made home conducive to learning English: all my storybooks and coloring books were in English, and so were the cartoons I watched and the music I listened to. She required me to speak English at home. She even hired tutors to help me learn to read and write in English.
In school I learned to think in English. We used English to learn about numbers, equations and variables. With it we learned about observation and inference, the moon and the stars, monsoons and photosynthesis. With it we learned about shapes and colors, about meter and rhythm. I learned about God in English, and I prayed to Him in English.
Filipino, on the other hand, was always the ‘other’ subject — almost a special subject like PE or Home Economics, except that it was graded the same way as Science, Math, Religion, and English. My classmates and I used to complain about Filipino all the time. Filipino was a chore, like washing the dishes; it was not the language of learning. It was the language we used to speak to the people who washed our dishes.
We used to think learning Filipino was important because it was practical: Filipino was the language of the world outside the classroom. It was the language of the streets: it was how you spoke to the tindera when you went to the tindahan, what you used to tell your katulong that you had an utos, and how you texted manong when you needed “sundo na.”
These skills were required to survive in the outside world, because we are forced to relate with the tinderas and the manongs and the katulongs of this world. If we wanted to communicate to these people — or otherwise avoid being mugged on the jeepney — we needed to learn Filipino.
That being said though, I was proud of my proficiency with the language. Filipino was the language I used to speak with my cousins and uncles and grandparents in the province, so I never had much trouble reciting.
It was the reading and writing that was tedious and difficult. I spoke Filipino, but only when I was in a different world like the streets or the province; it did not come naturally to me. English was more natural; I read, wrote and thought in English. And so, in much of the same way that I learned German later on, I learned Filipino in terms of English. In this way I survived Filipino in high school, albeit with too many sentences that had the preposition ‘ay.’
It was really only in university that I began to grasp Filipino in terms of language and not just dialect. Filipino was not merely a peculiar variety of language, derived and continuously borrowing from the English and Spanish alphabets; it was its own system, with its own grammar, semantics, sounds, even symbols.
But more significantly, it was its own way of reading, writing, and thinking. There are ideas and concepts unique to Filipino that can never be translated into another. Try translating bayanihan, tagay, kilig or diskarte.
Only recently have I begun to grasp Filipino as the language of identity: the language of emotion, experience, and even of learning. And with this comes the realization that I do, in fact, smell worse than a malansang isda. My own language is foreign to me: I speak, think, read and write primarily in English. To borrow the terminology of Fr. Bulatao, I am a split-level Filipino.
But perhaps this is not so bad in a society of rotten beef and stinking fish. For while Filipino may be the language of identity, it is the language of the streets. It might have the capacity to be the language of learning, but it is not the language of the learned.
It is neither the language of the classroom and the laboratory, nor the language of the boardroom, the court room, or the operating room. It is not the language of privilege. I may be disconnected from my being Filipino, but with a tongue of privilege I will always have my connections.
So I have my education to thank for making English my mother language.
Friday, August 26, 2011
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Marcos and memory
By Randy David
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 01:20:00 03/27/2011
THE CORPSE of Ferdinand Marcos, who died in exile in Hawaii in 1989, lies unburied in a family museum in Batac, Ilocos Norte. Imelda Marcos, now a member of the House of Representatives, insists that she will allow nothing less than a hero’s burial for her husband’s waxen remains. More than 200 of her fellow representatives have signed a resolution asking President Aquino, whose father was murdered by the regime, to authorize the late dictator’s burial at the nation’s Libingan ng mga Bayani.
This congressional action stinks. It seeks not merely to legislate collective amnesia but to re-write history. In effect, it revises the meaning of the heroic people power events that culminated in the termination of the dictatorship in February 1986. It is perhaps not a coincidence that this congressional initiative is being launched in the wake of the 25th anniversary of the Edsa revolution. They’re testing the waters. And, Sen. Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is not even president yet!
Note that the Marcos family never expressed any remorse over the abuses and crimes of the regime. Hence, they do not seek forgiveness. Not a single Marcos has been jailed for crimes committed against the Filipino people. Yet, instead of viewing this as the achievement of clever lawyers in a dysfunctional justice system, they treat it as a vindication of their innocence. Hence, they want Ferdinand Marcos to take an honored place among the nation’s heroes. Clearly, they are not asking the nation to forget the past; they want the nation to revise its remembrance of the past.
This move requires a radical re-wiring of our collective memory. We cannot honor Marcos as a hero without implying that overthrowing him was a mistake. We cannot give him a hero’s burial without signifying at the same time that the thousands who were made to disappear or killed by his henchmen deserve to rot in the unmarked graves into which they were dumped. We cannot positively remember Marcos today without spitting on the courage of those who fought his dictatorial rule. Those who think that this issue is all about laying a corpse to rest in a remote corner of this country are mistaken. A program of myth-making that aims to supplant memory has already been set in motion. Its end-point is not the burial, but the resurrection of Marcos.
Unfortunately, culture is on the side of those who signed the resolution. Indeed, our religious traditions prompt us to forgive and to forget. Diverse and sometimes contradictory emotions are being tapped in order to make burying Marcos at the Libingan ng mga Bayani the most worthy thing the nation can do. By focusing on the request to bury him in a cemetery reserved for war veterans, the Marcos family and their congressional supporters are trying to simplify what is in reality a complex decision filled with many ramifications. For now, we are being cued to think simply of Marcos as the brave war hero who deserves to lie in the company of his World War II comrades. Whatever you might say of him, the argument goes, it cannot be denied that Marcos fought for his country during the war. There is no reference to what he did to the Filipino people after he placed the country under martial law in 1972.
It is natural for us to feel resentful when somebody has wronged us. But in time we outgrow our resentment and we manifest this by not being vengeful in our actions. We call this forgiveness. But two things must be said in this regard. One, we may forgive not because we excuse the offense committed against us, but because we don’t want to be the prisoners of hate. Thus, we view forgiveness as something we owe to ourselves. Two, we may forgive, but forgiving does not require that we also forget. “There is no general duty to forget, not even in the truncated sense of duty to ourselves, since who we are depends on our not forgetting things that happened and that are important in our lives,” writes the Jewish philosopher Avishai Margalit.
In his brilliant book, “The ethics of memory,” Margalit ponders the memory of the Holocaust with the urgency of someone who wishes to overcome resentment over past hurts without forgetting the past. “What ought to be blotted out,” he says, “is the memory of the emotion in the sense of reliving it, not in the sense of remembering it.”
If a survey were taken today, it may show that a majority of our people have forgiven Marcos. But those who suffered personal injury under his regime may not be inclined to do so. It is upon them that the burden of forgiveness weighs most heavily. The ethics of forgiveness is a very demanding one. It commands us to forgive, even when there is no repentance, as a duty to ourselves. It admonishes us to forget the humiliation and the suffering we associate with the past, even as we continue to remember the past. Can we override the deep injury done to us and the nation, and forgive, so we can get on with our lives—without blotting out the past? And, assuming we have forgiven Marcos, does this oblige us to honor him with a hero’s burial?
My view, like Margalit’s, is that we must learn to forgive, but we must not forget. We must continue to remember not because we cannot leave the past behind, but because, living in the present, we have a duty to see to it that the seductions of authoritarianism do not ever again take root in our nation’s psyche. To forgive Marcos is one thing, but to honor him with a hero’s burial is to tell our people that it’s all right for another adventurer in the future to trample upon democracy and seize power for himself.
* * *
public.lives@gmail.com
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 01:20:00 03/27/2011
THE CORPSE of Ferdinand Marcos, who died in exile in Hawaii in 1989, lies unburied in a family museum in Batac, Ilocos Norte. Imelda Marcos, now a member of the House of Representatives, insists that she will allow nothing less than a hero’s burial for her husband’s waxen remains. More than 200 of her fellow representatives have signed a resolution asking President Aquino, whose father was murdered by the regime, to authorize the late dictator’s burial at the nation’s Libingan ng mga Bayani.
This congressional action stinks. It seeks not merely to legislate collective amnesia but to re-write history. In effect, it revises the meaning of the heroic people power events that culminated in the termination of the dictatorship in February 1986. It is perhaps not a coincidence that this congressional initiative is being launched in the wake of the 25th anniversary of the Edsa revolution. They’re testing the waters. And, Sen. Ferdinand Marcos Jr. is not even president yet!
Note that the Marcos family never expressed any remorse over the abuses and crimes of the regime. Hence, they do not seek forgiveness. Not a single Marcos has been jailed for crimes committed against the Filipino people. Yet, instead of viewing this as the achievement of clever lawyers in a dysfunctional justice system, they treat it as a vindication of their innocence. Hence, they want Ferdinand Marcos to take an honored place among the nation’s heroes. Clearly, they are not asking the nation to forget the past; they want the nation to revise its remembrance of the past.
This move requires a radical re-wiring of our collective memory. We cannot honor Marcos as a hero without implying that overthrowing him was a mistake. We cannot give him a hero’s burial without signifying at the same time that the thousands who were made to disappear or killed by his henchmen deserve to rot in the unmarked graves into which they were dumped. We cannot positively remember Marcos today without spitting on the courage of those who fought his dictatorial rule. Those who think that this issue is all about laying a corpse to rest in a remote corner of this country are mistaken. A program of myth-making that aims to supplant memory has already been set in motion. Its end-point is not the burial, but the resurrection of Marcos.
Unfortunately, culture is on the side of those who signed the resolution. Indeed, our religious traditions prompt us to forgive and to forget. Diverse and sometimes contradictory emotions are being tapped in order to make burying Marcos at the Libingan ng mga Bayani the most worthy thing the nation can do. By focusing on the request to bury him in a cemetery reserved for war veterans, the Marcos family and their congressional supporters are trying to simplify what is in reality a complex decision filled with many ramifications. For now, we are being cued to think simply of Marcos as the brave war hero who deserves to lie in the company of his World War II comrades. Whatever you might say of him, the argument goes, it cannot be denied that Marcos fought for his country during the war. There is no reference to what he did to the Filipino people after he placed the country under martial law in 1972.
It is natural for us to feel resentful when somebody has wronged us. But in time we outgrow our resentment and we manifest this by not being vengeful in our actions. We call this forgiveness. But two things must be said in this regard. One, we may forgive not because we excuse the offense committed against us, but because we don’t want to be the prisoners of hate. Thus, we view forgiveness as something we owe to ourselves. Two, we may forgive, but forgiving does not require that we also forget. “There is no general duty to forget, not even in the truncated sense of duty to ourselves, since who we are depends on our not forgetting things that happened and that are important in our lives,” writes the Jewish philosopher Avishai Margalit.
In his brilliant book, “The ethics of memory,” Margalit ponders the memory of the Holocaust with the urgency of someone who wishes to overcome resentment over past hurts without forgetting the past. “What ought to be blotted out,” he says, “is the memory of the emotion in the sense of reliving it, not in the sense of remembering it.”
If a survey were taken today, it may show that a majority of our people have forgiven Marcos. But those who suffered personal injury under his regime may not be inclined to do so. It is upon them that the burden of forgiveness weighs most heavily. The ethics of forgiveness is a very demanding one. It commands us to forgive, even when there is no repentance, as a duty to ourselves. It admonishes us to forget the humiliation and the suffering we associate with the past, even as we continue to remember the past. Can we override the deep injury done to us and the nation, and forgive, so we can get on with our lives—without blotting out the past? And, assuming we have forgiven Marcos, does this oblige us to honor him with a hero’s burial?
My view, like Margalit’s, is that we must learn to forgive, but we must not forget. We must continue to remember not because we cannot leave the past behind, but because, living in the present, we have a duty to see to it that the seductions of authoritarianism do not ever again take root in our nation’s psyche. To forgive Marcos is one thing, but to honor him with a hero’s burial is to tell our people that it’s all right for another adventurer in the future to trample upon democracy and seize power for himself.
* * *
public.lives@gmail.com
Thursday, February 24, 2011
PMA Alumni Speech: Jan 2010
Philippine Military Academy Alumni Association
January 23, 2010 at Tent City , Manila Hotel
By Washington Z. SyCip, Founder SGV & Co.
After graduating from the University of Santo Tomas and passing the CPA Board exams at the age of 18, I found that I had taken my student life too seriously, missing all the fun and yet unable to practice my profession as CPA licenses were issued only at age 21. My father then agreed that I could take further graduate studies at Columbia University in New York . I had completed all requirements for my Ph.D and was working on my dissertation in the Columbia library on the day when Pearl Harbor and Clark Airbase were bombed by the Japanese.
The Japanese armed forces quickly captured Manila and imprisoned my father when he refused to cooperate with their “co-prosperity” movement. To be more involved in the war effort, I joined the Second Philippine Regiment at Camp Cooke , California , which was one of the two Infantry regiments in the U.S. Army that were identified for the day when the U.S. would return to the Philippines . After completing 3 months of basic training, we were all interviewed. Since I had the advantage of a better academic background and the
highest IQ score in the Regiment, I was told that the military was short of people for intelligence work. I was quickly transferred to a University in Denver for eight months of Japanese language school followed by a cryptography school in Virginia . Eventually I found myself in an Air force unit in India working on Japanese air force codes in the China -Burma- India Theater. On V-J, or Victory over Japan day, all messages stopped when Japan surrendered. A few of us were asked whether we would like to extend our military career and be sent to officer training school. I don’t think there were any volunteers as we were all anxious to return to our homes. My father had lost a lot of weight but was fortunately alive. He was taught how to plant mongo beans in the Muntinglupa prison by Senator Salonga who was his prison mate.
So here I am, a former Staff Sergeant, having the privilege of addressing the top officers of the Philippine Armed Forces!!
My introduction to the activities of PMA was a few issues of your magazine “The Cavalier” – and from newspaper articles about the role of the Philippine Army in trying to maintain peace and order with the NPA and Mindanao problems.
Your letter had asked me to talk about how SGV, the firm I founded in 1946, has been able to maintain its integrity over the past 64 years. Your PMA is over a hundred years old. I am therefore not sure that my comments will be of use to you.
I retired from SGV 14 years ago and I no longer have any equity interest in the firm. I would, of course, still be very concerned about the professionalism and integrity of the firm that I founded and that still carries my name.
I started the firm with one clerk – I was the senior partner, the junior auditor and the janitor! From the beginning I was convinced that the success of any organization would have to depend on the quality of its people. While I was still single, I assured all the university graduates that I was interviewing that none of my family will be in the firm. I did not want the prospective staff to feel that I intend to build a family empire. All the bright students were told that progress of the individual within the firm will be based on performance.
Like PMA, we had strict and rigid rules in accepting applicants. Many of the bright graduates are from poor families and have done well in public schools, inspite of our declining educational standards.
SGV is known for its tough training programs, and these training continues throughout their stay in the firm. Our job is to increase the assets and decrease the liabilities of every person during their career with SGV.
During my 50 years with SGV, there was not a single case of anyone asking me to promote a staff or moving someone into partnership. Everyone accepted the fact that every movement upward was based on the performance of the individual. There was only one occasion where I had to dismiss a partner. He had failed to keep appointments with the client because he was seeing a girlfriend and had not been honest with the firm.
I told the partners that they don’t have to ask the staff to show up on time at 8:00 a.m. if they arrive at the office at 7:30 a.m. However, if the partner plays golf and not show up till 9:30 a.m. the staff will, of course, follow his example and be late at the office.
Through the years many of our very competent partners have been drafted into important government positions including many members of the Cabinet. We have a rule that such partners should not return to the firm as we did not want the public to feel that we are putting our partners into the government in order to have an inside track of government activities.
I was therefore mildly shocked when I learned that in the Armed Forces before a person can be promoted to be a colonel his promotion had to be approved by the Commission on Appointments in Congress. It is also my understanding that every subsequent promotion also had to pass through the Commission. Is this the ideal
structure for an Army where discipline, loyalty, and integrity are essential to maintain an efficient fighting force?
In any organization, it is essential that you motivate people. Better performance should be rewarded by faster promotion and financial rewards. I note that all your members are identified by being a member of the class when you graduate. While the identification by graduating class may promote cohesiveness, is this divisive relative to the whole organization? Does this prevent the rapid promotion of younger talented people of later classes? Is it proper for key government officials to be a member of a particular class?
In an article in your magazine, I note the following paragraph:
“A PMAer may be absolutely loyal to the Constitution, but would that loyalty at all times prevail over the personal loyalty demanded by military and civilian superiors whose loyalty is not to themselves? A PMAer may have a very high sense of honor, but can he impose his integrity on others, say corrupt superiors? Can the PMAer keep his courage, integrity and loyalty intact, by just ignoring betrayals, corruption, electoral fraud and other forms of misconduct swirling around him or her?”
I think you can answer these questions better than an outsider like myself!
I was pleased to read the article in your July-August 2009 Cavalier:
“If we have neglected to build a respectable air defense capability, the main reason was the failure of our leaders to give it top priority. We had an AFP Modernization Plan that was revised many times. Billions of pesos from the proceeds of the sale of part of Fort Bonifacio were supposed to finance the AFP Modernization Plan to include modernizing the air defense capability of the PAF. Until now many are wondering where the money went and why we do not have a modernized AFP. It is a topic that needs to be fully explained by our leaders to the present and future members of the AFP in particular, and the Filipino people in general.”
We in the civilian world are also at a loss as to what happened to the P7 billion proceeds from the sale of property at Ft. Bonifacio for the modernization of the Armed Forces.
You are much more aware of the so called “Comptroller mafias”. What surprised me was how many of the PMA graduates were aware of this practice and accepted the rather unusual procedure which were supposed to overcome red tape but was at the same time opening the doors to corruption.
We who are in the private sector wonder about the rapid changes in the military leadership. In the private sector, we will not have CEOs with one or two year terms if we want reforms or proper planning for the future. Is it possible to carry out reforms in an organization as large as the Armed Forces when there is such rapid changes in the leadership?
Sixty years ago most observers of Asia thought that the Philippines will be, next to Japan , the leading country in East Asia as we had two assets -- democracy and Christianity. Why are we now one of the worst performers in the region?
In February of 1987, when freedom in the Philippines had been won with what the world would know as “People Power”, Rafael Salas was keynote speaker at the district meeting of Rotary Clubs in Manila . In a speech that one Rotarian referred to as the best SONA he had ever heard, Rafael spoke on “Managing the Aftermath”. Let me read to you part of what he said:
“But this freedom cannot be fully exercised unless there is order. Governments are instituted to insure peace, stability and continuity; to enable the citizens to plan their future and insure the survival and growth of their children. The resumption of hostilities with the NPA and the constant threat of rebellion in Mindanao and a very high incidence of crime are pointers of the lack of order I speak of. Insecurity stifles productivity. No long-term investment and high productivity can be encouraged when businessmen feel uncertain and insecure. The administration has exerted a sincere effort to resolve these problems. But time presses. Order must prevail. A free society cannot be mobilized for development unless there is a feeling of safety and confidence in the future.”
It seems that 23 years later we are faced with the same problem. The large number of private armies with unlicensed guns all over the country scares many visitors and our own people. Our being ranked as one of the most corrupt countries in East Asia scares much needed foreign investment.
You often hear comments blaming the Armed Forces and the Police force for the high incidence of crime. I tend to disagree.
In studying the Philippine problem and comparing our situation with our neighbor countries, it is clear to me that our political structure favors the solution of short term problems ending with a ribbon cutting event before the end of the politician’s term of office. The government - and also many in the private sector - refuse to adopt long term solutions to the root of our problem which is poverty!
The Asian Development Bank just released a report pointing out that the Philippines and India , who claim to be democracies, lag behind East Asian countries in reducing poverty. China and Vietnam , both authoritarian states, are the two countries that have rapidly reduced poverty. Are there lessons to be learned here?
To solve poverty requires long term planning. There is perfect correlation between poverty and education. An illiterate is almost always poor – our high dropout rate and the declining standards of education is the most serious of our many national problems.
I would rank the cost of credit for the poor and the lack of rural health facilities as the two other factors that we must take into account to reduce poverty. Until we solve the problem of poverty, it may be unfair to expect the Army and the Police to solve our peace and order problem.
Your answers to the questions I have raised may help in improving integrity and loyalty in the Armed Forces. There are countless cases where courage has been demonstrated by you and your men – and here, the private sector may learn from you: how to speak out courageously even if it may affect adversely their business interest!
Thursday, December 2, 2010
Araw ni Bonifacio - INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos
Public Lives : Araw ni Bonifacio By Randy David, Columnist Philippine Daily Inquirer
Araw ni Bonifacio - INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos
Another article dealing mostly with the death of Andres Bonifacio.
To me it is clear what trasnpired is a power struggle with the Revolutionaries; specifically with the Magdiwang and Magdalo factions.
The sooner we realize this, accept the realities of revolutions and politics; and at the same time learn from this, the sooner we can move on. Let us move on and face the new challenges ahead, this is the only closure we can attain - inasmuch as all the parties are dead. Let us respect our heroes for their heroic deeds, accept their human weaknesses and learn from their mistakes and move on.
Our heroes are not saints. And I am sure they would all agree that they are not saints nor heroes. They are Filipinos who love their country, and did something extra ordinary.
---------------
"Bukod sa pahapyaw na pagtukoy sa alitan ng dalawang paksyon ng Katipunan—ang Magdalo at Magdiwang—karaniwan nang iwasan ng mga teksbuk ang pagtalakay sa konteksto ng trahedyang sinapit ni Bonifacio. May panahon na pati ang kontribusyon niya sa pambansang kasaysayan ay minamaliit, habang pinatitingkad naman ang kay Rizal. Hindi tama ang ganitong paghahambing sapagkat ang isyu ay hindi kung sino ang may mas matimbang na nai-ambag sa bansa, kungdi kung papaano sinuri ng bawat isa ang hinihingi ng panahon, at kung paano nila inialay ang kanilang talino at tapang upang tugunan ang hamon ng pambansang paglaya."
Araw ni Bonifacio - INQUIRER.net, Philippine News for Filipinos
Another article dealing mostly with the death of Andres Bonifacio.
To me it is clear what trasnpired is a power struggle with the Revolutionaries; specifically with the Magdiwang and Magdalo factions.
The sooner we realize this, accept the realities of revolutions and politics; and at the same time learn from this, the sooner we can move on. Let us move on and face the new challenges ahead, this is the only closure we can attain - inasmuch as all the parties are dead. Let us respect our heroes for their heroic deeds, accept their human weaknesses and learn from their mistakes and move on.
Our heroes are not saints. And I am sure they would all agree that they are not saints nor heroes. They are Filipinos who love their country, and did something extra ordinary.
---------------
"Bukod sa pahapyaw na pagtukoy sa alitan ng dalawang paksyon ng Katipunan—ang Magdalo at Magdiwang—karaniwan nang iwasan ng mga teksbuk ang pagtalakay sa konteksto ng trahedyang sinapit ni Bonifacio. May panahon na pati ang kontribusyon niya sa pambansang kasaysayan ay minamaliit, habang pinatitingkad naman ang kay Rizal. Hindi tama ang ganitong paghahambing sapagkat ang isyu ay hindi kung sino ang may mas matimbang na nai-ambag sa bansa, kungdi kung papaano sinuri ng bawat isa ang hinihingi ng panahon, at kung paano nila inialay ang kanilang talino at tapang upang tugunan ang hamon ng pambansang paglaya."
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
French Banquet in Malolos
Malolos Congress [Photo via Google Images]
Philippine Daily Inquirer First Posted 22:38:00 06/15/2010
Reggie Aspiras, One of our food columnists, sent a text asking what the Founding Fathers ate in Kawit on June 12, 1898. Contrary to popular belief, the declaration of independence was read from the window of Emilio Aguinaldo’s home in the afternoon, not early in the morning. At most, the Founding Fathers would have had merienda, or perhaps a dinner, to celebrate but unfortunately all that is lost to history. I would presume that bibingka was served sometime because in the book of accounts of the revolutionary government there was a budget allotment for “bibingquera ng presidente.” (Aguinaldo had a personal bibingka maker?) In another entry, we see that the foot soldiers were supplied with cigarettes and puto. I have yet find a reference to food served on June 12, 1898.
June is a busy month for historians in the Philippines because June 12 is Independence Day, and a week later Jose Rizal’s birthday is commemorated on June 19. Some history is discussed in classes that open all over the country around these dates, but we have forgotten a feast that was laid out months later in the town of Malolos, Bulacan, capital of the First Republic. Here the Founding Fathers of the Nation wined and dined their way to nationhood.
On Sept. 29, 1898 a fiesta was held in Malolos to celebrate the “solemn ratification of the declaration of Philippine independence.” What was served for lunch that day is documented through a wonderfully designed menu by Arcadio Arellano that was folded to resemble the Philippine flag, and opened to a festival of food in French:
Hors d’Oeuvre: Huitres, Crevettes roses; beurre radis; olives; Saucisson de Lyon; Sardines aux tomates; Saumon Hollandaise. [Entrees] Coquille de crabes; Vol auvent a la financiere; Abatis de poulet a la Tagale; Cotelettes de mouton a la papillote, pommes de terre paille; Dinde truffee a la Manilloise; Filet a la Chateubriand, haricots verts; jambon froid—asperges en branche. Dessert. Fromages; Fruits; Confitures; gele de Fraises; Glaces. Vins: Bordeaux, Sauterne, Xeres; Champagne. Liquers: Chartreuse; Cognac. Café, The.
Even in plain English the menu is still grand, so grand in fact that the late National Artist Nick Joaquin declared effusively, “The menu is a culmination, like Malolos itself, and should stand side by side with the Malolos Constitution.”
On top of the menu was a triangle with the date September 29, 1898 and on the flaps were the words “Libertad” and “Fraternidad,” obviously an allusion to the French Revolution. The word “Igualidad” runs down the center of the menu to complete the rallying cry of 1789.
For starters, the Founding Fathers were served: oysters, prawns, buttered radish, olives, Lyon sausages, sardines in tomato sauce, and salmon with Hollandaise sauce. The main courses consisted of: crabmeat in its shell (possibly torta de cangrejo better known locally as rellenong alimasag), filled pastry shells, chicken giblets a la Tagale (quite possibly the common adobo given a fancy name), mutton chops with potato straws, truffled turkey a la Manilloise (perhaps a pavo embuchado), beef filet a la Chateaubriand with green beans, and cold ham with asparagus. For dessert there was an assortment of: cheeses, fruits, jam, frosted strawberries and ice cream. To wash down the seven appetizers, seven courses, and four desserts, one progressed from Bordeaux to Sauterne, sherry and champagne, then to the liqueurs Chartreuse and Cognac, and finally to coffee or tea.
The Malolos menu inspires more questions than answers. Did the Founding Fathers eat everything as listed in the menu? Or was the food passed around in bandejados or platters, each guest choosing from the various courses and taking just enough for himself? What kind of cheese was served? Was it the hard type known to all as queso de bola that could withstand the long sea voyage from Europe to the Philippines? Where did the ingredients for this meal come from? Surely, the wines, cheeses and other European staples were available from Manila specialty shops. Beef and lamb were imported from Australia. Were most of the ingredients fresh—as in, freshly scooped out of a can? How do you explain the ice cream? Ice was not readily available in Manila until the Americans established the Insular Ice Plant in the 1900s. Ice for this meal was imported from the United States, cut out in huge blocks from Wenham Lake near Boston and shipped all the way to India, with Manila as a stop-over for refueling.
The Malolos banquet shows how food can be read as a historical document emphasizing that new research is sorely needed in an area previously believed to be overdone and over-studied. The food was French (at least on the menu), an allusion to France and the French Revolution, an overt expression of civilization.
For centuries, the Spaniards, followed later by the Americans, justified the colonization of the Philippines as a temporary period of education and civilization of its people. With this elaborate French banquet, the Founding Fathers flaunted high culture to emphasize that the Filipino people were not childish and immature, but rather they deserved independence and were capable of self-government. The Malolos Menu may be a footnote in Philippine history, but what a story that humble note makes.
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