IT WOULD take us four hours from Tagum to travel to what I have been calling for the past two months as "bukids."
Four hours on a four-wheel drive to a place after the infamous Laak, four hours on roads where there’s more red mud than grey cement, more trees than people, and more motorcycles than 4-wheel vehicles. On record it’s called Kapda/Capda and just that because whether it is a barangay or just a sitio is still being contested at Loreto, Agusan Sur. The last time I asked, its leaders were hoping that it will be recognized as a "special barangay." What made it "special," I did not bother to ask lest I get more confused in the politics.
But finding Kapda was a lot easier than finding documents about the place. It is not even on Google map and the most telling data about Kapda is the 2015 CBMS Census that says that the barangay has only 77 households and a population of 405. But this unmapped place has been home for the Manobos and where I found narratives that tug at my sleeve.
Keeping Kapda a home has been difficult for the Manobos as life in meant without running water, electricity, and being witness to the 50-year-old battle between the NPA and the government forces. One of the residents in Kapda, Alex, has become my favorite storyteller every time I visit the bukids. However, his lengthy winding narratives have never been fun listening to. It would always be about hunger, poverty, treachery, death, and the woes of illiteracy in this digital age.
Alex does not really know his age and assumes that he is somewhere around 50 or so. But he knows that maybe around 8 or 10 years old, he already joined the NPA. And why? He blames "the neglect of the government and the seemingly denial of their (Manobo) existence" as the main reason. Roads were created to Kapda and its neighboring areas like Marang and Melale.
However, Alex relates, this did not lead to development but instead it lured large logging corporations to denude the forests of Agusan Sur and threatened the lives of the Manobos. "We thought the roads will bring us schools, health services, jobs. It did employ some of us for a while but they also took away our trees, denuded the forest cover and eroded our land. The roads that the government built then was not meant for us, but for the logging companies that destroyed us."
But Alex has long left the NPA because he felt he was getting "too old for the hikes." Aside from age, he felt that his dozen children needed a father. "I have never been taught how to read and write and still could not. I wanted it different for my kids." At the same time, Alex felt that at some point, the government began to take notice of the people at the "bukids" and fighting no longer seemed relevant. So Alex took serious interest in farming and used techniques taught to him by the left, by the teachers of his children, and even by some church workers.
The last time I saw him he asked about the Peace Process and was hopeful about it. Days after I returned to Davao, the talks at Norway turned sour and Martial Law was declared in Mindanao because of the war in Marawi. It will take much longer to tell him what is going on in the "syudad" the next time I see him at the "bukids." But I did promise him some "lubid" for his "lit-ag" and "bugas humay." I am hoping that could soften the blows.