IT’S LATE IN THE AFTERNOON
on a
Sunday in the coastal village of Mabua
in Surigao City, and people are making
the most of the day's fading light.
The stretch of pebble beach is lined
with parked fishing boats, some being
loaded with supplies for the nighttime
fishing trip, and rental huts, a number
of which are still packed with families
on their weekly picnic.
On a grassy patch of the beach, a
few residents watch a practice round
of cockfighting. For such training
days, fighting cocks are fitted with
homemade “boxing gloves” on their
knuckles to prevent any real injury.
Mock bets are made and the cocks fight
until one stumbles from exhaustion,
and the practice sessions are over. The
sun continues its descent into the sea,
bathing everything in glowing, golden
light. Except for a wailing rendition of a
Whitney Houston song with the videoke
on echo mode, it’s a scene straight out
of my childhood.
Surigao City is not quiet; it’s a rough
and tumble town that’s seen some of
the worst typhoons in the country. In
1984,
Typhoon Nitang ripped entire
roofs off buildings. In the aftermath
of the storm, my school was left with
a few walls, some pillars, a pile of
what used to be wooden desks, and
not much else. We had to stay home
and read by candlelight for a month
before power was restored. That year, I
learned the word
bakwit
before I could
spell it in English as “evacuate”; it was
a verb tossed around when the storm
signals came up and people living
along waterways had to bakwit to safer
ground, like a public gym or a school
building; it was also a noun used for
people who had been displaced by a
flood or a violent cyclone.
But it’s this same geography, being
right on the path of tropical storms from
Top to bottom:
Mabua's pebble
beach lined with
fishing boats;
local residents
watch a round of
cockfighting; a
fighting cock is
given some love
S U S T A I N A B L E S U R I G A O
89
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