Cultured Commuters

This is a sight the people frequenting the Cultural Center of the Philippines do not get to see. Fresh from Basilan, and bearing their distinct scent and naturally-dyed hair, the young Badjao performers donning their authentic street clothes staged their performances on jeeps. The lead female dancer moved her shoulders to the beat of the authentic Badjao music drummed by her male companion using an ingenious pair of drums made of PVC pipes. The dancer alternately lifted her shoulders to also show the finger movements which were set to the heart's beat. But no applause would be heard. The young performers handed their envelopes to the unappreciative audience who ignored their appeal for donation, and then they stepped down for another performance elsewhere.

In my mind, they would have had the perfect opportunity to showcase their talent to the common folks. Much of the jeepney-riding population's cultural experience, I think, is limited to television shows and Sunday park activities and whatnot. The Badjaos, an ethnic group from Western Mindanao, was an entertainment for me, but for the rest of the passengers, they were just money-making dancing beggars. I couldn't blame everyone else for thinking this way. I have heard of syndicates using kids to solicit money. The dancers weren't at all different from other mendicants.

On hindsight, I was happy that the young ones were perpetuating their culture; Manila youth nowadays wouldn't know how to dance the Carinosa or the Pandango sa Ilaw unless taught or required by their P.E. teacher. But a more important realization would be the perpetuation of the culture of begging. Do we want to increase their tribe and populate our streets? We have the say in this; after all, we, commuters and motorists, seem to be the patrons of their cultural and economic, and even criminal causes.