Francisco the Filipino

by Burtis McGie Little

Coconut Grove

Owners of coconut groves take great pains to keep thieves from climbing their trees and stealing their fruit. If a man’s grove is far away from his house, where he cannot keep close watch, he makes notches in the trees about fifteen feet from the ground and inserts pieces of broken glass all around the trunk; then if any one tries to climb past this barrier, he is severely injured by the sharp glass and is forced to return to the ground. Sometimes, instead of glass, large thorny branches are fastened to the trees for the same purpose. When the owner wishes to get his crop of nuts, he either carefully removes these obstacles, or he climbs a near-by tree and crosses over from the top by means of a bamboo pole as when getting tuba.

Francisco’s grandfather, who owned a tienda (tï-ĕn′-dä), or small store, in Camalig, used to tell him a very interesting story about a coconut. “A long, long time ago,” he said, “many years before my grandfather was born, there grew a very tall coconut tree, far taller than any you have ever seen; and the fruit that grew on this tree was so large that you could not even see round it. One day the largest of these nuts fell from the top of the tree, but instead of striking the ground, it remained floating about in the air. The fibers changed, and instead of being brown and coarse, they became soft and green and slowly grew into grass and flowers and trees. By and by, God put people on the outside shell of this large nut to use and enjoy the vegetation.

“The milk which was inside changed into a terrible fire that sometimes burst through cracks in the shell of the nut, causing what we call volcanoes. Demons and various kinds of evil spirits began to inhabit this inner fiery region, and they have been known to come out through the craters of volcanoes to trouble the people who live near by. The smoke and gases that are so often seen coming from volcanoes, or from cracks in the ground, are from the burning bodies of wicked people whom these demons have caught and carried away. And so, Francisco, if you are wise, you will be a good boy and do just as your father and mother tell you, or you may be taken from the outside to the inside of this wonderful coconut.”

CHAPTER VI

FRANCISCO’S PLEASURES

You must not think that Filipinos spend all their time in planting rice, harvesting abaca, or climbing coconut trees. On the contrary, they are fond of amusements, and they find many ways of gratifying this very natural desire. There were several boys of about the same age as Francisco, who lived close by, and they played together most of their spare time. The American soldiers and teachers had shown the older boys how to play baseball, and the game had become very popular. Pablo and José both played well, the older boy having developed into an excellent pitcher before he went to Manila to enter college. Francisco and his companions were not large enough to play a real game of baseball, but they found much fun in their efforts to imitate the older boys. Of course their native tongue, which in southern Luzon is called “Bicol” (Be͞e′-cōl), had no words for this foreign game, and so the English terms had to be taken bodily into their own language and used as native words. If you had watched these small boys playing, you would have heard Francisco shout as he struck at the ball and missed it,—“Sarong (sä′-rōng) strike!”—“Duang (du′-äng) strike!—Foul!!” “Tolong (tō′-lōng) strike!” “Aco (ä′-cō) out!” sarong meaning one, duang, two, tolong, three, and aco, I.

Filipinos have a game of ball, quite different from baseball, that is much enjoyed by young and old. The ball is of woven rattan, about four inches in diameter and very light. As many as wish to play form a ring, the ball is thrown into the air, and as it comes down, some one sends it flying upward again. The game is to keep it from touching the ground, and the players show much skill in striking it with hands, arms, or feet, from various positions and without getting very far away from their places in the ring. Old men often watch the boys awhile and then get into the game themselves, showing surprising agility and seeming to enjoy fully the brief return to boyhood.