IT’S been a while since I’ve seen Supreme Grandmaster Diony Cañete, and I got to touch base with the martial arts icon during Friday’s dinner for the Wekaf championships delegates at Hotel Fortuna. As usual, he was as spry as ever, with a ready anecdote to tell about his numerous travels abroad to spread the Filipino martial art of eskrima.
SGM Diony was ever generous in his description of me but of course, us writers have nothing to write had there been no guys like SGM Diony who kept the flame of eskrima alive through the decades. I was with a group of delegates when the talk shifted to that tumultous period in Cebu arnis when SGM Diony and another late icon of the art, Cacoy Cañete, got into a much-publicized spat that had both of them issuing “fight to the death” challenges.
It got to a point when they had a confrontation at Baseline and a brave pretty lass stepped in. That brave girl I met last Friday, when she asked me, “You were also there at Baseline?”
I asked, “You were that girl who stepped in between them? No wonder you looked familiar.” We both had a good laugh recalling those times.
Sir Diony kept referring to me as the “best writer” in Cebu but that reference really started when years after that incident—when the feud with Cacoy was all but forgotten—we got to talk about it during Doce Pares’ anniversary at their Sto. Niño headquarters over a decade ago.
He said, “It all started when this writer asked one of the masters for his reaction on what Noy Cacoy wrote in his book. Noy Cacoy didn’t like it. That guy really started it all.”
I smiled when he said that and he saw me.
“Ikaw to?” And there began the “best writer” reference.
Of course, whenever you see SGM Diony, he always has a new anecdote. His latest was his trip to Korea, when he was invited to do an exhibition in front of their Congress because it turned out his counterpart in Korea was also a member of Congress.
While a lot of Filipinos have taken up taekwondo, in Korea, he was told, taekwondo is treated as a sport, not a martial art. There is a martial art version of the sport, whose name escapes me at the moment, and he was told it had many moves inspired by arnis and eskrima.
He was also told the grandmasters in Korea, who travel to the Philippines regularly to learn from our local grandmasters, live comfortably.
“Filipino grandmasters, no money, why?” he recalled the conversation.
And he said,”Because Filipino grandmasters, very busy thinking of new moves, inventing new techniques to kill other grandmasters,” before breaking out in that trademark laugh of his.
Of course, these are just anecdotes. Arnis in the Philippines is no longer under that state, thanks to the Philippine Eskrima Kali Arnis Federation (Pekaf), of which SGM Diony and his son Gerald are a part of.
Part of the goal is to have arnis included in the Asian Games. It’s still a long way from that, but at least Pekaf is taking steps towards that. Also, for the next two Southeast Asian Games, there are assurances from the hosts that they will include Arnis.
Now that’s an arnis story I’m looking forward to.