Salaza Fiesta

I still remember how Salaza (Palauig, Zambales) of my youth celebrated its fiestas. The main celebration falls on the 15th of May, but on the eve of the fiesta called "bisperas", out of town guests begin streaming into the barrio. Try-V-Tran after Try-V-Tran busses would stop in front of the main sari-sari store to bring guests from neighboring towns. (Note: "Try-V" stood for Teodoro R. Yangco-Verzosa, the families that owned this bus company. The Victory Liner that didn't exist then would later put the Try-V-Tran out of business). Preparations for the fiesta were really elaborate and took months to plan. Barrio folks would go all out to celebrate this important day. They would break open their piggy banks hidden in bamboo tubes that served as the nipa-hut trusses that contained their year-long savings accumulated since the last fiesta. They would spend their hard-earned savings on food, brass bands from Kapalangan to Ti-ti-on, and on pretty laced mantillas for the table and fine curtains for the window. "Lechon" (suckling pig roasted on a spit) was the main entry of choice, but there were also the usual complements that consisted of "suman" wrapped in palm fronds, sticky rice cakes made with brown sugar, "tinodok" and "patutpat" dipped in a boiling cauldron of sugar cane juice.

Botolan Brass Band

The Botolan Brass Band

Festivities begin on the day of the fiesta with the arrival of competing brass bands in homes that can afford to hire and feed them. The homes are decked out with their fineries, their best linen and their best china to welcome guests from neighboring towns. Children run around in their spotless Sunday best, and backyards are scenes of many "lechon" roastings. While the women chop, slice and prepare the condiments, the men gather round a table drinking "tuba" (fermented coconut juice) while keeping an eye on the slowly turning golden brown roast dripping with grease. Over at the plaza in "laod" in front of the Aglipay Church, the young and old are entertained by puppet shows (Kiko, the ventriloquist) and other attractions. The plaza is lined with various entertainment, gambling, and vending stalls. However, it is the "kalo-kalo", a casino type gambling that features a pair of dice shaken in a tumbler, that draws the largest crowd playing for centavos.

The "palasebo" contest held at the plaza was one event I remember well. Perched atop a tall bamboo pole buried in the ground is a pouch that contained the prize. The pole is greased thick with lard (from lechon drippings) and therefore slippery. Boys, sometimes men participate in this contest. They would attempt to climb the slippery pole and reach for the prize tied atop the pole amid loud cheering and much laughter from the spectators. To watch the contestants climb up only to see them come tumbling down on top of one another was fun. Eventually, someone who was as creative as coating his arms and legs with ashes would reach the top and claim the hard-won prize.

Out of town visitors to the Salaza fiesta would invariably notice a stately house across from the plaza. Situated directly across the street from the old Salaza plaza and the Aglipay church, this ante-Philippine Revolution house is no longer occupied because of structural deficiencies, but is lovingly preserved by the heirs as a memento of such bygone days as when an aggrieved Maria Clara would write an erring Crisostomo Ybarra in classical Tagalog, "Quinapopootan quita, yrog co" (I hate you, my love!). The thatch roof belies the clearly European influence of the house’s architectural lines, while stressing unequivocally that this is a house of the Orient.

The Mestizo House of Salaza

The "Mestizo" House of Salaza

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From another perspective, the structure is also evocative of old-world elegance, Victorian if you will, when Salaza’s landed gentry would, in the cool evening hours before Angelus, promenade around the plaza in spats and high-collared shirts, curtsying to and tipping their hats at each other.From the house’s window float the piano notes of "The Blue Danube" or the "La Cumparcita" to the enjoyment of the promenaders below.

On "bisperas" night, a candle-light procession featuring the image of Salaza's patron saint, Sto Niño (?), would wind through the darkened streets of the barrio all the way to the "karayan" (river) and then back to the church. As a kid, I participated in these processions, enduring the hot wax that dripped in my tiny hands and even stepping onto some still-warm carabao dung. It was all in good fun, as we kids would play hide-and-seek along the way and flirt with the little girls. Back at the plaza, a beauty contest dance would be in full swing. The contestants, usually the barrio's prettiest, whose escorts were also usually the Spanish mestizos from the "ili" (Palauig) would dance continuously to the music of the Kapalangan band. I kept hearing the master of ceremonies announce "pers kambasing", "sekon kambasing" and so forth, but never knew what it meant until later in life realized it to mean, "first canvassing", etc. It was a series of tabulation of the amount of money pledged or pinned by supporters on the dress of each dancing beauty contestant. The beauty that garnered the most money was named the Princess of Salaza until the next fiesta.

If you get tired of watching the dance, there was always the "Komedya" and "Eskrima" - a stage play straight from Shakespeare, whose Renaissance-costumed actors carried wooden swords. There were plenty of shouting in sing-song verses and a lot of foot-stomping by the actors to emphasize a point.

Those were the good old days in Salaza of my youth, perhaps like they were in the days of Jose Rizal in Spanish Philippines.

John Reyes

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