DAVAO CITY (MindaNews / 18 August) — The eyes of Ata couple Josephine and Dodong Macla light up every time they catch a glimpse of their tribemates on one of the giant screens at Davao City’s People’s Park. It is approaching the weekend of the annual Kadayawan Festival in this city.
“It’s like the Olympics,” Josephine says, holding her Android phone in one hand and her other hand cupping her elbow. Indeed, it is, as they are watching 11 tribes play friendly tribal games at the annual Dula Kadayawan on Thursday. The couple is seated at another part of the park and have a front row view of the games being livestreamed by city government employees.
The Dula Kadayawan gathers representatives from the city’s 11 tribes, playing games from both Lumad and Moro inclinations.
Josephine explains her favorite dula, the sisibow, a game reminiscent of lowlander siatong. In this game, a pair of players, usually a boy and a girl, take turns throwing bamboo sticks at another pile of bamboo. The pile comprises sticks leaning on one another, and whoever topples the pile “wins” the game.
“We won second place,” Josephine says, half-distracted by all the festivities around the already busy park that once served thousands of vaccinees during the pandemic.
The other games are as fascinating as sisibow. These include bibinayo (a team rice pounding competition) bubuntug (spear-throwing), kakasing (a home-made spinning top competition, kanggarotaya (a Moro version of tug of war), karang (stilt race), pana (bow and arrow competition), siklot (a cassava stalk balancing competition), sipa sa lama (a graceful and ceremonial version of ‘takyan’), sipa sa mangis (where players kick a ball towards a suspended basket that drops points when hit), solopot (a blowgun competition), sosakaro (water fetching), totaringki (fire-making), sasalisid, and usuroy.
In pana, boys test their prowess in using bow and arrow, while in sasalilid they must spear a wooden target rolled downrange.
Easier travel
Josephine is 27, and Dodong is 43. They have been living together for six years, and in recent years the travel downtown has been easier compared to when they weren’t married yet.
There used to be a time when people from Paquibato had to travel as long as 10 hours total to get to places like Davao City.
According to Ata Tribe Coordinator Roel Arthur Ali, travel is much easier now, with roads leading to and from a far-flung area once known to be teeming with insurgency only taking around three to four hours.
“Before the roads, we used to travel at least three hours on vehicles,” Ali says. The rest of the way, he says, consisted of four-hour walks, with some of the places like Macla’s Barangay Pañalum once inaccessible by basic government services.
Before the roads, if someone from the tribes happened to be in a medical emergency, Ali said that that would be it for that patient, as transport would take too long.
Paquibato is now a three- to four-hour road trip, which is relatively short, according to Dodong. To get to their portion of Paquibato, visitors have to pass through Panabo, hire an ‘Ongbak,’ tricycle at 100 pesos per head or 500 pesos if you want the trip to yourself. “If you’re a reckless driver, you can now make Paquibato in two hours!” he jokes.
Preserving cultural heritage
Back home, their communities in the upland struggle not only with basic social services but also with the preservation of cultural practices.
Volunteers help in the preservation of their customs among younger members of the community, in community level learning institutions called the Panoloan, locally translated as “learning spaces.” It is here that younger Ata keep the knowledge of their heritage alive, through lessons and sharings by volunteers and elders.
According to Roel, it is important to preserve what he calls, in English, their “legacy of culture.” And the way Roel sees it, the games are part of this.
Dodong says that each tribe has a version of the games being played during the annual sportsfest. In their communities, the different indigenous groups engage in friendly sport once in a while, even in this age where children are spending more time online.
For their part, the couple isn’t a stranger to digital connectivity, however limited. They say that their area has internet access, but it’s limited only to one of the networks, while the others are still trying to come in.
In terms of cultural heritage, the burden is shared among a group of leaders called the Lolopongan Topogoyan to Ingon, whose council provides counsel in terms of settling disputes, traditions, and other cultural topics.
The council of leaders provides each community with the guidance it needs to approach development, while also preserving their own heritage.
Roel says he is seeing the direct effects of the development in their area. He cites the impact of road networks and nearer facilities such as the Paquibato District Hospital. At some point, the teachers who were assigned to Paquibato would have to travel from Davao City by Monday dawn to get to their communities for a day or two of teaching, before they would come back downtown.
Because of the relative improvements, the teachers could now make their way back and forth, from two days a week to five now.
“These are small things but we appreciate the effects on our community,” Roel says.
Bagobo Klata tribe rules the games
According to the City Information Office, the Bagobo-Klata won seven of the 11 games, namely sisibow, kakasing, sosaroko, bibinayo, totaringki, solopot, and siklot. The tribe dominated the games for the sixth year.
The Matigsalug tribe came in second place after winning the pana contest (arrow shooting), bubuntug or bamboo spear throwing, and usuroy or tug-of-war.
The Bagobo-Tagabawa won the sisibow (boys), Obu-Manuvu clinched the major prize for the karang, and the Ata emerged as runner-up. Meanwhile, the Kagan tribe became the overall winner in the Moro games after winning three events – kagkingking (one-legged race) which is a newly introduced game, kanggarotaya, and sipa sa manggis (ball kicking game with the aim to hit suspended boxes).
The Iranun tribe won second place after winning the also newly introduced Moro game, the kakokor or coconut wringing and milking contest and sipa sa lama- a game similar to takyan but with more grace and ceremony. The Maranao tribe clinched the third spot after they won the kambaebae- the Moro version of Maria went to town.The winners received medals and cash prizes.
For Josephine, Dodong, and Roel, even if their tribe did not clinch the overall title, they see the games as a way for them to show others in the city their culture. Places like Pañalum and Tapak were so isolated in the past four years that the pace of the pandemic did not bother these areas. Panalum is closer to Panabo, while Tapak is nearer to the borders of Bukidnon.
And for the couple, it is the first of a few times they feel being seen by their downtown counterparts. After all, they are Dabawenyos, too. (Yas D. Ocampo/MindaNews)
