An Igorot's Journey- a review and reflections
After a long hiatus from BIBAK, I recently decided to return. I needed some "grounding" in one of my "home" cultures. And most of all, I wanted my daughter-Malaya- to be exposed to the similar mountain tribal collective of aunties and uncles that I had the benefit of being surrounded by when I was a girl. I wanted Malaya to hear the gongs and to feel the dances-to have that connection to her Apong Caesar-my father, and my Grandma Mary and Auntie Cora, and all those that preceded them in sky land.
While Malaya may not get the full context of what it could mean to be Igorot right now, what she does get is exposure to diasporic practices. She gets the benefit of marching in Honolulu parades. She gets to gather and eat camote with other second and third generation Igorot children during holiday cook-outs by Pearl Harbor. She gets to wear a tapis and have this normalized because other kids are doing it, too.
Returns to any home as an adult, however, are always a mix of romantized memories and a bracing of oneself to bear witness to complex realities. One auntie, Rosita Pinkerton, must have known the pulls of my internal longings and ambivalence for "home", because when she shared her new book, An Igorot's Journey with me, I felt a rush of gratitude. Finally, my need for a nuanced map of igorot-ness through her life story had appeared.
There are so very few narratives from Igorot women themselves. Native women from the northern mountain region of the Philippines are often written about by well intended anthropologists and scholars. These academic accounts often have the channels to recognition that Igorota voices with real lives become muted and strained.
I am touched and grateful for candid depictions of Auntie Rosita's life path from her mountain home in Dandanac to Baguio, Manila, Cotobato,and the United States. Because of the discrimination many Igorot women and men have faced in the Philippines, there can be, I imagine, often a pull to depict one's cherished heritage and peoples in the best light. While I understand the strategic necessity for this, often the following younger generations are sometimes left with neat and tidy models of success that leave out the marrow in the process of becoming.
Auntie Rosita, thankfully, does not succumb to this pressure and lays plainly on the page the struggles and challenges she confronted as a Igorot girl becoming a woman in the 50's and 60's. She provides a missing context for me and through the pages, I follow her through female territory that has often been marked private or off-limits.
That is why, I am drawn to reading her accounts of adolescence and young adulthood in the second half of her book. It is almost as if, I am there in an imagined village beb-egan (a place for females to sleep and socialize), hearing how she dealt with first loves, jealousies, interrupted formal education, unplanned pregnancies, and the choices associated with all of these things. She also speaks both of the shame and confusion of making hard life choices out of economic necessity and the disappointment. But most of all she demonstrates through her narrative, the abiding resiliency, presence, and resourcefulness she returns to in herself , despite disruptions and heartaches.
Auntie Rosita becomes a lens and guide, helping me to see myself and the women in my family in multi-dimensions. Her courage brings many of us lost and wandering women home and her honesty in conveying her joys, sacrifice, and hardship is like a long awaited gift that I believe many young Pilipina women across the board will welcome.
While Malaya may not get the full context of what it could mean to be Igorot right now, what she does get is exposure to diasporic practices. She gets the benefit of marching in Honolulu parades. She gets to gather and eat camote with other second and third generation Igorot children during holiday cook-outs by Pearl Harbor. She gets to wear a tapis and have this normalized because other kids are doing it, too.
Returns to any home as an adult, however, are always a mix of romantized memories and a bracing of oneself to bear witness to complex realities. One auntie, Rosita Pinkerton, must have known the pulls of my internal longings and ambivalence for "home", because when she shared her new book, An Igorot's Journey with me, I felt a rush of gratitude. Finally, my need for a nuanced map of igorot-ness through her life story had appeared.
There are so very few narratives from Igorot women themselves. Native women from the northern mountain region of the Philippines are often written about by well intended anthropologists and scholars. These academic accounts often have the channels to recognition that Igorota voices with real lives become muted and strained.
I am touched and grateful for candid depictions of Auntie Rosita's life path from her mountain home in Dandanac to Baguio, Manila, Cotobato,and the United States. Because of the discrimination many Igorot women and men have faced in the Philippines, there can be, I imagine, often a pull to depict one's cherished heritage and peoples in the best light. While I understand the strategic necessity for this, often the following younger generations are sometimes left with neat and tidy models of success that leave out the marrow in the process of becoming.
Auntie Rosita, thankfully, does not succumb to this pressure and lays plainly on the page the struggles and challenges she confronted as a Igorot girl becoming a woman in the 50's and 60's. She provides a missing context for me and through the pages, I follow her through female territory that has often been marked private or off-limits.
That is why, I am drawn to reading her accounts of adolescence and young adulthood in the second half of her book. It is almost as if, I am there in an imagined village beb-egan (a place for females to sleep and socialize), hearing how she dealt with first loves, jealousies, interrupted formal education, unplanned pregnancies, and the choices associated with all of these things. She also speaks both of the shame and confusion of making hard life choices out of economic necessity and the disappointment. But most of all she demonstrates through her narrative, the abiding resiliency, presence, and resourcefulness she returns to in herself , despite disruptions and heartaches.
Auntie Rosita becomes a lens and guide, helping me to see myself and the women in my family in multi-dimensions. Her courage brings many of us lost and wandering women home and her honesty in conveying her joys, sacrifice, and hardship is like a long awaited gift that I believe many young Pilipina women across the board will welcome.
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