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While fog drapes the valley

It was a dry February morning, complicated by interplay of sudden heat and cold, when I was reminded of strawberries. I was also reminded of a possible headache come nighttime, with this undecided weather.

That, for you is La Trinidad, in this northern province of Benguet. Another writer called it the “valley of a thousand strawberries and one people” in an essay on our grandmother Herminia some years ago (The Harvester, by Ian George Taguba Babsa-ay). Yes, we still see them red berries dotting the gardens at this time of the year. Thousands, perhaps. But “one people”, well there still is something to hope for.

With strawberries still on my mind, I trekked to the Swamp Area or simply Swamp to us valley dwellers (strawberry fields for you, if you please). It was literally a swamp eons ago, with odds and ends of swamp life forms about, which eventually made it suitable for planting.

There, the strawberries were not alone. Patches of spring onions, lettuce, and broccoli created several shades of green. Rows of mums – pink, golden yellow, maroon, and peach – broke the monotony of green. And gardeners, men and women, young and old, worked the Swamp like a natural appendage.

But the Swamp is not the site of simple production force anymore. Against a backdrop of aging mountains, hills and a fair summer sky, I was rather perplexed by the string (quite a length) of souvenir shops. There is a makeshift corral at the entrance of the Swamp. A modest hotel waits at the end of the string of shops for tourists who would like to wake up to a fog-charmed morning.

Indeed, the makings of a rural struggle, manifested by the encroachment of tourism. While Panagbenga kicks off in the acclaimed City of Pines (with much triviality), the Adivay Festival was also conjured here, in the same spirit of promoting, enticing, and perhaps, generating income.

Swamp business

I wonder if all valley dwellers are keen on buying strawberries for the sheer consumption of it. Not to make business out of jams and jellies really. So I bought one kilo.

Some tourists, meanwhile, prefer to buy strawberries at the Swamp instead of the City Market, and pick them personally – the feel of mud in your shoes and all. And usually, they look up at trees, straining their eyes in search of strawberries. And they are more awe-stricken when gardeners point to the ground at them runners. “Ay, hindi pala puno!”

This month, City Market strawberries are sold at P35 a kilo. The Swamp people sell them at P40. I ask why.

While unloading crates of fresh (I was assured and I believed) berries, one manong says the price is precisely because of the “freshness”. A younger woman packing the berries said that bulbs are even lit and placed close to the palengke berries to make them appear shiny. Business is still good, she says, despite the meningococcemia occurrence. “Malako pay lang met” (They still sell), she says.

The Chrysanthemum Lady, however, does not share the same situation. A tacky sign reading “flowers for sale” is perched amid the flowers. A sight to behold, yes, but again our pages are not colored.

“Manu ngay ti maysa dozen?” (How much does a dozen cost?), I ask.

“Ochenta, ngem uray ited ko ti P70” (Eighty pesos per dozen, but I will sell them to you at P70), she said smiling. It appears I am the first customer. At the City Market (my only intention is to compare the prices, implications are inevitable), a dozen of these mums are sold at P100 to P120, she tells me while picking the flowers.

Business is not so good after the meningococcemia scare, she says, quite upset with how the whole issue was handled by concerned authorities. I know I look good with a bundle of flowers under either arm, so a dozen I took home.

Strawberries in one hand and the mums in the other, I walked back to the entrance. On the way, I met two elderly Bontoc women, heaps of tapis atop their heads. They need not balance the goods for these are relatively light, aside form the fact that they have carried heavier things on their heads. This is a practical way of carrying load for indigenous peoples, especially women, in the Cordillera countryside, for carrying vegetables, rootcrops, ubbak (foliage for swine feed), firewood, among others. This is practiced even among women workers in the urban areas, such as the knitters with their sacks of yarn and by-products, the newspaper and bottle buyers. It is not easy to balance a sack of empty bottles. Or heaps of jaryo.

Now, these beautiful old women were already displaying their goods before I could say I was not buying. “Daytoy tres, daytoy kwatro” (This one costs P300, this is P400), she says, pointing to the sinakwit then the kolibangbang. These two are abel or woven designs in the Bontoc tapis. The local hotel orders from them, and so do several of the shops. Business is good, they say.

Benguet cowboys

The Adivay Festival poster shows Benguet cowboys riding them horses, lassoing them cattle, dust all over the place. At least this one I saw at the Benguet State University. Horses really abound then, for practical use. The Ibalois used to have loads of cattle in their confines. If I am not mistaken, Dr. Patricia Afable wrote a book, launched just last year, on Benguet history. I will probably do a sequel once I find the book.

Perhaps in the spirit of projecting this image, several horses were tied to the makeshift corral near the entrance. A driver nearby called out to the watchers on the state of them poor horses.

“Matay met a dayta kabalyo dita ti pudut. Awan pay kanen da” (Those horses could die in this heat. There’s no food to keep them up), he said. Indeed, there was no grass to graze nor shade to cool off. An hour’s ride costs P200, half of it for half an hour. In Pacdal, an hour’s ride costs around P150. This one at the Swamp just opened last December.

Back home, I wonder what other things, situations will take shape in this glen. I washed the strawberries in saline solution and arranged the mums in several vases (which my mother later rearranged, with my permission).

Can tourism sustain the life of old La Trinidad? I only hope that changes, in whatever expression, will sustain the lives of them Swamp people and the rest of the valley dwellers in a good, simple way. # Abi Taguba Bengwayan for NORDIS

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