It's a recession when your neighbor loses his job; it's a depression when you lose yours. — Harry S Truman
In 2021, last year, when I choose to become a timawa, a person in between the tumao (the nobles) and the uripon (commoner or slaves), by choice and aggravated by the pandemic.
In the rural villages of the Visayas, the ancient social hierarchy (or caste) is pretty much still alive, where people still continually live by the invisible rules. The tumao, now downgraded as 'datu' (now colloquially means rich or wealthy) are the ones who owns properties and employ people to work for them or to serve them.
Reliving the Past in the Modern Times
The uripon can now be a derogatory remark, since it literally means a slave, but it encompasses all those who work for a master or those as a saup who works for a landlord.
The timawa, on the other hand, is not a free man, he is still bounded to a master and is still required to pay taxes and to render military work when needed. In modern times, the timawa status can be acquired through choice or by circumstances, and it doesn't mean anything good.
The uripon class, can directly serve a master or just work seasonally or momentarily, some may also live in the house of their master or build a house in their master's property, though not always.
Though seemingly derogatory in speech, but technically the uripon class are the ones who have a stable income and sometimes they share a portion of the spoils of their masters, through bonuses and gifts. They can even choose to save up and buy their way up into the tumao class (and yes they are now lawfully allowed to, by buying properties and investing into businesses.
The tumao class, they are the real free men--they just have the wealth, status, fame, and respect that comes after it.
The timawa sub-class that I am referring myself as, is the bottom-feeders, our parents may not need to work for a master or a landlord and we the children may have the spoils of our parents, but personally I will not be able to feed or fend off myself alone. You may call me as a estambay, from the word English word standby, it locally means being idle or a person who does not actively find a job.
Maybe everyone aspires to become and stay as a tumao, but I'm still here finding a master to become a paid uripon as soon as possible, but if I don't get have the favor, I'll might receive my grandma's offer to become a saup.
Well, all of these are just a reliving of the olden days, but should not mean to offend anyone.
In modern times, the tumao and timawa classes by blood had long dissolve into the uripon class, by law. I personally was an uripon by blood, and we are all mandated to obey and pay taxes to public serpents servants, as we stare at their faces on the tarpaulins, saying "this is where your taxes go" and praise them for building farm to pocket roads.
Tugged Between the Old and a Post-Modern Life
Folk songs are sung for a good reason.
Back in the days, there were no smartphones or even radios.
People sang together to mellow down sadness or celebrate joy, but sometimes to honor deities as they work communally.
Compared to people of the older generations, we can now open the refrigerator, cook packed goods, turn on the faucet, or use the microwave.
Farmers work tirelessly under the indiscriminate weather, they go about the monotonous day as their norm. The kids help their parents gather water from distant springs, feed the farm animals, manually mill rice, cook food by fire, and other things that the modern man will probably not understand.
Right now, people live life to prove something or to be praised, but life before was different. It was practical and economic by nature.
Newly weds, live in Pajag or Nipa Huts, and it was normal, no neighbors will judge you. Once the family grows, they build a bigger hut. Usually, the wealthy ones opts for a house made of stone and woods, but the commoners don't copy by envy.
When I built my house, I was criticized as it was a tiny house, but mind you it has everything in it, and it was what I can afford. The community is just plagued by envious and devious people who misjudge anyone because they enjoy it.
Maybe the world is broken now, but it is promising. We just need to redefine humanity again, away from the brainwashing and consumerism upbringing. This post-modernity that I am saying may not be for everyone, as many might succumb to the looming war.
But the post-modern technologies are hinting for a new world, I may be close to nature and the old rural living, but I am still tugged into the post-modernity. And if I get have the chance to be part of the workforce again, I want to help steer the world closer a solarpunk future and not to a dystopian and fatalistic one.
Singing the Nipa Hut Song
For more than a year, I have turned the orchard into a food forest. From being a place for seasonal fruits and citrus into a place of year-round sustenance.
If you're in the Philippines, you may have heard the Bahay Kubo song, singing about a bountiful backyard garden.
Bahay kubo, kahit munti,
ang halaman doon ay sari-sari:
singkamas at talong, sigarilyas at mani,
sitaw, bataw, patani,
Kundol, patola, upo't kalabasa,
At saka mayroon pang labanos, mustasa,
sibuyas, kamatis, bawang at luya.
Sa paligid-ligid ay puno ng linga.
It probably is a dream of some to live off simply and be sustainable, well I do, but the world is different now, if you're wealthy, they you could choose a life, if you are under the poverty line, you cannot complain and just be thankful, the modern middle class blurted.
I did have a record of the crops and the varieties I have sown and grown, it is over a hundred now, but it isn't that of a happy song like Bahay Kubo, only a few grew well.
I do have some new plants not on the song like the native plants that I propagated from my dad's collections. Recently, I also added more mangoes of different varieties.
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The Kalabasa vines survived multiple floods this year and the Sikwa vines with ready-to-harvest fruits.
My goal next year to make the raised beds more resilient by transforming it into a Hügelkultur instead. Just a little bit more wood and some more soil and it will be completed.
So far, I have seven raised beds and three plots to grow vegetables, during the flooding season, which is ongoing now, it it frequently tested, but is better versus directly growing crops on bare ground.
In about two years, the fruit trees should mature and will replace the wooden barricades that I used to slow down the undercurrent of the flood while also collecting plant debris and soil into the property.
I also continue planting pest-deterrent flowers and both non-native and native weeds to outgrow the annual grasses. The soil do need weeds, but we should should the ones that benefits the soil better, especially when the are is still unused.
I am also spreading seeds of papayas, chilis, and other herbs and plants, so they can grow anywhere if the condition permits. It's good to have volunteer plant here and there as they grow better than cared-after and transplanted ones.
It is what it is, it is flooding season right now, I wont complain, but I will continuilly rebuild a more resilient permaculture garden and food forest every after the storms, so that when it matures, the strength of multiple trees and roots will overcome the future storms.
I may have deviated again from my usual topics, but the truth is, my ideas simultaneously fill my brain, all can be disconnected and connected at the same time, sometimes these ideas can be out of nothing, but mostly from the frustrations of the reality being far from ideal.
How about you, how's life going?
Weather Forecast
NOAA: HIMAWARI-8 West Pacific Weather Satellite SOURCE
2022-11-20 3 PM Mostly Cloudy 30°C / 96% H W 5 km/h NNE P 50% 2mm UVi 3
Weather Forecast by Weather Atlas
PINNED POSTS
 | Clearing the Damage After the Storm Instead of falling into anxiety, I took time to make use of what the storm had given. |
 | Building Abundance with More Fruit Trees Amid the Economic Turmoil This year, I planned to initially plant 100 trees wherever possible until the year ends. |
 | Using Saltwater and Fire to Heal a Permaculture Garden Plant debris becomes natural mulch and organic matter. |
 | Harvesting Cucumbers After a Year of Labor As crops mature, harvest season began as well. |
 | Fermenting Fish Amino Acid for the Garden Crops It would be a sin to throw away such things, even the food scraps I turn it to compost now. |
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About Me
@oniemaniego is a software developer, but outside work, he experiments in the kitchen, writes poetry and fiction, paints his heart out, or toils under the hot sun.
 | Onie Maniego / Loy Bukid was born in rural Leyte. He often visits his family orchards during the summers and weekends, which greatly influenced his works. |
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