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LAST
Friday I was with a group of journalists invited to
cover the first voyage of Cebu Pacific to Kota Kinabalu,
the capital of Sabah. Trips that connect the short
distances between two countries are always disarming as
they are disorienting. Less than two hours away and you
are a foreigner in a land that looks like your own
hometown but is really different after all.
In that
a city of more than a million people, it is interesting
to note how the English language and the technology and
cultures that go with it are spread all over. There are
newspapers in English and they have news that offer the
sophisticated side of this frontier territory. That week
the front page carried details about the sodomy issue
that involves Malaysian opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim.
The police denied that the politician was asked to strip
in order for the DNA test to be done. Indeed, as talks
about the test were becoming lurid, another politician
expressed disgust at how the investigation on the
alleged crime of Ibrahim was becoming the focus for the
week. This voice stated that even before the court had
rendered its judgment, the manner by which the news was
being relayed with such obsession had already, in a
sense, tainted the person of the leader. To cap this
discourse, the critic said the gods will punish us for
destroying other people.
Kota
Kinabalu, however, holds more surprises for the Filipino
traveler. History is all over the place. In the Sabah
Museum, I realized how connected we are, Filipinos to
Borneans or Sabahans. In our museum and other cultural
displays, we talk about products and artifacts coming
from different places. In the museum of this capital,
the flow is pleasantly reversed. It is perhaps naïve for
an anthropologist like me to say that it feels good to
know that there are many things in this huge island
identified as coming from the Philippines. A kampilan
(long sword gracefully curved) and sundang
(shorter type of kris) are coded as coming from
the Philippines. Ethnic communities in Borneo are
connected to our own ethnic groups. The dances seem to
be versions of our own dances, with theirs a bit more
frenetic than ours.
At the
airport, a travel agent, friendly and fun, introduces
himself as a Filipino. He mentions having cousins in
Nueva Ecija and Kamuning. For the first time in my life,
such rural-urban settlement that we take for granted
like Kamuning, an area that is a few minutes from where
I live, has assumed the function of identity-giver. For
this young man, a district in Metro Manila is where he
can find his roots.
In a
hotel at the center of the city, the lady at the counter
notices my accent and asks if I am a Filipino and I get
a better exchange rate for my yen. At the magnificent
Shangri-La Rasa Ria where we stayed, three wonderful
ladies remind me of the times when hotels in the region
were managed by intrepid young ladies from the
Philippines. Cathy Nepomuceno, the director for
marketing, and Ester Marcaida, the resident manager,
serve as reasons why migration always has two faces.
There are those who made good and prove to be the best
PR for the country they come from. And yet, there are
those also who remain unwanted—when we were in Kota
Kinabalu, the issue of illegal migrants was a hot
button.
The
Shangri-La’s director for communications, Regina Lain-Sulit,
is a second-generation Filipina, who describes herself
to us as having a mother from Malolos, Bulacan, and an
engineer-father. She sprinkles her conversation with
Tagalog phrases. If Cathy and Ester miss Chocnut, Regina
craves for cornicks. Regina looks forward to her visit
to the Philippines and to days of shopping. All three
are proud of the long stretch of white beach and the
baby gibbon they take care of and the orangutans they
help preserve.
The
young men and women of Kota Kinabalu are looking at us,
regaled by the stories of how huge and massive are our
malls and shopping centers. And how excellent our
musicians are.
The
small band that was playing in the hotel lounge talked
of how they admired Filipino musicians. The lead singer
in the group sang in Tagalog and confessed that she was
studying many Pilipino songs. She has plans to come to
Manila so she could listen more. They are not, however,
interested in covers of English songs. They are
interested in our OPMs. Finally, here is a market
waiting to be tapped.
Music is
not the only product that will allow us to reclaim
Borneo; our films and telenovelas are making their
presence felt. In shopping centers, salesladies know
Pangako Sa ’Yo and giggle at the mention of Jericho
Rosales. In Malaysian television, Filipino movies are
being shown with subtitles. I get this feeling they look
up at us. It is a good feeling, but it makes me also
guilty.
Kota
Kinabalu has this sense of order that is almost lacking
in our cities. And yet, the people I talked with seem to
hold us in awe.
In the
Museum of Sabah, there is a time tunnel that explains
the growth of Sabah until its declaration of
independence. I almost forgot that it was only in the
’60s that Sabah’s search for its identity began to be
articulated for the world audience. With Singapore and
Sarawak, Sabah (then British North Borneo) formed the
Federation of Malaya. A photo in the museum showed a
placard calling Diosdado Macapagal and Sukarno of
Indonesia “gready.” We had a role in the difficulties
that Sabah underwent in its search for independence,
once more a link—negative perhaps—to this “land beneath
the wind.”
On my
way back from the museum, with the heat of the sun a bit
too strong for me already, I hailed a blue cab.
“Fourteen ringgit,” the driver said, from the museum in
Penampang to the Gaya Market. That was our second day
and I was getting used to people being introduced as
belonging to this or to that tribe. People in Sabah are
conscious of their ethnic territories and names. One is
a Murut or a Kadazandusun, or any of the more than 70
ethnic communities in the area. I asked the driver to
what group he belonged. “Bugis,” he said. Indonesian.
We were
both foreigners. It felt good. |
