Daily Archives: 5 April, 2007

The Moriones of Marinduque

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At Boac Park, we had our first encounter with Marinduque’s signature Moriones Festival.  This religious melodrama, held here and in the nearby towns of Gasan and Mogpog, is the province’s main tourist attraction and  is based on the legend of the blind Roman centurion, Longinus.  Unusual for a Lenten festival, Longinus, not Jesus, is the focus of the week-long Moriones passion play. 

According to an often told legend, Longinus (or Longhino in Tagalog), who is blind in the left eye, was the Roman captain who pierced the heart of Jesus to ensure that He was already dead.  As he pierced the torso of the crucified Jesus with his spear, blood from the wound spurted into his blind left eye, miraculously curing his blindness.  While guarding Christ’s tomb, he also witnessed His resurrection.  From then on, he attained faith and goes around town spreading the news of Christ’s divinity and the testimony of the miraculous healing of his blindness.  The Roman authorities found his testimony seditious and ordered his immediate arrest.  Longinus is forced to flee but, after long searches, is captured not once, but thrice, escaping each time.  He is finally captured, for the fourth time, on Easter Sunday, brought before Pontius Pilate, tried and then executed by beheading. 

The passion play’s origin is uncertain.  Some say it originated from Mexico, being brought here in 1870 by Jesuit Mexican priest Fr. Pedro Santiago to dramatize the power of the Christian faith and to attract the rural population from the interior to participate and be converted to Christianity.  Mompog also   prides itself with being the origin of the Moriones Festival (as well as the Tubunganceremony).  However, the festival is also said to have originated from the town of Gen. Luna in Quezon, located 240 kilometers from Manila and 103.34 kilometers from Lucena City.  Even today, the town reenacts the Centurion at ang Bahay na Kubol during Holy Week with Lenten parades of senturyons and a reenactment of the 14 Stations of the Cross.   

The park was teeming withe the festival’s main characters, the moriones (the word morion relates to the centurion’s helmet, mask or visor).  They wear ingeniously outlandish, homemade Roman soldier costumes (close-fitting jackets, feathered helmets, thong sandals and capes).  The fantastic helmets are decorated with colored paper and tinsel flowers.  The colorful but grotesque masks are carved from a light native wood called dapdap and painted with faces that are neither good or kind-looking.  Longinus’ mask is the one with the blind left eye.  These “Roman” soldiers, mostly antipos (penitents atoning for sins or persons giving thanks for answered prayers, good harvest or cured illnesses) accompany Jesus on the way to his crucifixion.  Longinus is usually played by an old but nevertheless  strong man.
 
At the park, we gamely posed with a number of these moriones.  Other “Roman” soldiers were roaming the streets, beating indigenous kulatangs and chasing or scaring onlookers by thrusting their swords and spears, an act believed to drive away evil spirits.  They also play pranks on people, sing to the ladies or even engage in mock duels with their swords.  Some were riding Roman chariots.
 
Jandy takes a chariot ride

At the park gymnasium, Cheska, Jowel and Yor also joined a “Maskara Mo, Kulayan Mo!”mask painting contest.  Cheska was later informed, by text, that she was among the winners chosen.

Cheska and Jowel with their finished masks
 

Marinduque National Museum Branch (Boac, Marinduque)

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Marinduque National Museum Branch

We next proceeded to Boac Park, the execution site of Filipino revolutionaries and the surrender site of Col. Maximo Abad and his 300 Filipino soldiers during the Philippine-American War.  Within the park grounds is the Marinduque National Museum branch.  Housed in an old, historic building built in 1887, it was formerly used as a boy’s school, jailhouse, a library and the Municipal Trial Court Building. The museum, opened on February 22, 1995, showcases the province’s cultural and social heritage.

Cheska and Jandy at the museum’s staircase.

Luckily for us, the museum was open in spite of today being Holy Thursday.  Its displays include artifacts found in caves, shells, vintage photos, antiques, Moriones masks, costumes and pieces retrieved from galleons still buried under the waters between Pingan and Melchor Island.

Marinduque National Museum Branch: Boac Park, Poblacion, Boac, Marinduque. Open Mondays to Fridays.  Admission is free.

Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception ( Boac, Marinduque)

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We first visited, via a short hike up a hill, the fortress-like Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception.  Built in 1656, this church houses the statue of the miraculous Ina ng Biglang-Awa (translated as “Mother of Instant Mercy”), the province’s patron saint (since 1792) to which is attributed deliverance from a 19th-century Moro attack. The revolution’s flag was brought here by Canuto Vargas to be blessed in 1899.

Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception

The cathedral has a simple brick facade and a 4-storey (square at the first 2 storeys and octagonal at the upper 2) bell tower on its left.  Its carved wooden portals are decorated with flora and fauna, cherubs and the images of the Four Evangelists: John, Luke, Mark and Matthew. Within the church grounds is an old, broken bell.

Cheska with the old, broken down church bell

As the church doors were locked, we weren’t able to see the church’s well-maintained and faithfully restored interior said to have brick walls, wall-hung period lamps, a ceiling with designs of Muslim brass gongs, two sets of Stations of the Cross (in wood and stained-glass windows) and three richly decorated and intricate retablos (altar backdrops).

Ancestral Houses of Boac (Marinduque)

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Once settled in our suite at Villa Carlos Resort, we prepared breakfast at the balcony, cooking (not allowed though) canned food which we brought along for the trip using my portable stove.  That done, we now left the resort to explore Boac in detail.  The town proper had many large, high-ceilinged Spanish and American-era ancestral houses, some well-preserved and others dilapidated and in need of repair.  Many have capiz windows, ventanillas and double roofs with unusual braces reminiscent of braces used to prop up windows in nipa houses.

Boac town proper (notice the braces used to prop up roofs)
The Trivinio Ancestral House

Villa Carlos Resort (Boac, Marinduque)

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Once on terra firma, we boarded a jeepney at Balanacan Pier for Boac, the provincial capital, all the while hoping that there would be accommodations available at this unholy hour when everyone was supposed to be asleep. As I feared, there were none available at the town proper, it being the holiday season.  Soon all the passengers had alighted from the jeepney save for us.   

Villa Carlos Resort

Our jeepney driver suggested a beach resort and dropped us off at Villa Carlos Resort where the caretaker allowed us to pitch tents by the beach.  It was now 1:30 AM.  Jandy, Verner, Jowel and Yor slept inside the tents while Cheska and I slept out in the open, on benches at a nipa and bamboo picnic shed.

Our suite

Come morning, I had a chat with the affable resort owner, Ms. Emily Ignacio-Alaan.   Fortune smiled at us that early morning as Ms. Alaan allowed us to use, after a guest canceled their booking at the last moment, an airconditioned suite with 3 king-size beds, a small TV, compartmentalized bathroom (shower and water closet had separate compartments with the lavatory between both) and, best of all, a private balcony (with a round marble table and monobloc chairs) overlooking the sea.

The dining hall

The room was rented out for PhP1,600 a night, way over our spartan budget, but Ms. Alaan agreed to halve the cost provided we didn’t use the room airconditioner.  This suited us fine, as the cool evening breeze negated the use of airconditioning.  The resort also had a restaurant and a videoke (which gladdened Jowel).   A covered badminton court was still being built during our stay.

Cheska sunbathing by the balcony
People frolicking at Ihatub Beach

The suite’s balcony was perfect for viewing the gathering of tuba (coconut wine) in the morning, people frolicking along  the black sand Ihatub Beach in the afternoon and, come dusk, a beautiful sunset.  Cheska, Vener and Yor opted to sleep here, the balcony being cooled by the sea breeze in the evening.  With our accommodation worries out of the way, we could now explore, using the resort as our base, this beautiful-island province in detail.

In 2007, management of the resort changed hands and the resort was renamed Villa sa Aplaya Beach Resort.  It now has 11 airconditioned rooms with bath, 21″ cable TV and refrigerator plus, aside from the abovementioned facilities, a 25-pax conference room.  The badminton court is now operational.

The beautiful sunset at the resort
Villa sa Aplaya Beach Resort: Brgy. Ihatub, Boac, Marinduque.  Tel: (042) 332-1881 to 82.

Taking Chances in Marinduque

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Holy Week was again around the corner, and I was again browsing my bucket list of must-see places to visit.  Tired of mainland Luzon, I opted for some island-hopping and decided on Marinduque Island to witnessed its trademark Moriones Festival which happens only during Holy Week.  For company, I brought along my kids Jandy and Cheska, plus Jandy’s Jesu-Mariae School teachers (and my friends) Mr. Jowel Fatlaunag and Ms. Veneriza “Vener” Trillo with her son Yor.  For the short-haul drive to Lucena City (Quezon), the gateway to the island, I used my 2003 Toyota Revo.  Though not enough to accommodate all six of us, I still brought along my 2-pax tent and camping equipment (portable stove, sleeping bags, etc.).  Vener also brought along a similar tent.

Balanacan Pier in Mompog

I met up with Jowel, Vener and Yor at Jesu-Mariae School and we all left Manila by 4:30 PM, Wednesday.  The trip took longer than the usual 3 hours, with traffic delays, toilet breaks and a stopover at a gas station for dinner (packed by Vener).  We arrived at Lucena City’s Dalahican Port by 9 PM. I was thinking of staying overnight at the city and leave for Marinduque in the morning but the sight of a long queue for ferry tickets made me change my mind, so we decided to take a chance by taking the 10 PM Blue Waters fast ferry to Balanacan Port (Mompog).  After securely parking the Revo at the pier, we all boarded our ferry.  It being a holiday, the ferry was packed with travelers, from the deck all the way to the pilot’s cabin where we stayed,  sitting on monobloc chairs.  Being overloaded, the crossing took much longer.  Coupled with this, the sea during that time was rough and waves made the boat sway left and right, at one time making me fall off my chair and almost out the cabin door and into the sea.  I was lucky enough to hang on for dear life.  After this rough, wave-tossed crossing, we all made it to Balanacan Pier by 12:30 AM.