Finding your heart

SO who’s writing the things you have been writing about now?” a friend asked referring to my solo coverage of mountain villages, their stories, difficulties, and successes through the years.

“None that I know of, so far,” I replied. That’s because those solo coverage were not organized for the media. I simply tagged along and wrote the stories I found there. It’s something I chose to do most of the time during my days off or vacations. These are the stories that would have otherwise not found space in mainstream newspapers not unless it’s hyped up by some big companies doing corporate social responsibility projects or organized to highlight the plight of the indigenous peoples for maybe the indigenous peoples month or because there is a festival going on that the local government unit or the tourism department would want to drum up.

“Don’t you see anyone doing that?” she persisted. “There will always be, but it takes time to find your heart. The kids are still in the writing stage,” I replied referring to the young writers who are now manning the frontlines.

There are writers and there are writers who will move heaven and earth to see what’s happening out there in a world that is most of the time hidden from view. But in those hidden views lie the stories that tug at the heart and I have been finding my way in remote villages whenever I find someone to tag along with through the decades as a journalist.

As you read this, I have just returned from a faraway village in Maguindanao Province, not to cover conflict as many journalists are inclined to do and associate with Maguindanao, but to be with the Tedurays as they weave baskets, that is their heritage.

There’s a certain calmness that rests in the soul as you watch the people of faraway villages just be themselves. There is a different aspect of peace that you experience when you see them do what their ancestors have been doing.

Four years ago, I was in a Teduray village named Romonggaub in South Upi, Maguindanao.

Romonggaub is the Teduray word to describe the sound of a falling tree in the forest.

It’s said that language reflects the values and beliefs of a culture; the words that you have in your dialect reflects your people’s consciousness. There is no one word in Tagalog or Bisaya that specifically describes the sound of a falling tree in the forest. You then imagine yourself back in the days where there was nothing out there but the forest and the Tedurays and how it was a long time ago when even the sound of a falling tree was found worthy of a word.

These mental images draw me time and time again to those far villages as they whisper about the peace that bound the people as one long before individual interests and agenda of greed broke us all apart.