What Does It Means When September Ends?

If you hear that "ber-months" is coming, probably the first thing that will come to your mind is the long celebrations of the Christmas Holidays. It is the days where most of the people look up to since this is where people got some time to celebrate as a family and gather together to strengthen the bond after such a long time of just working and setting up priorities in our daily lives. When the cold breeze of the ber-months caresses our faces, it signals the upcoming joyful memories that is yet to be made and cherished, and the arising excitement is evident in the quiver of every people's voices or on how their eyes shines from learning the news.

Perhaps, even if you're alone on this holidays, you'll still be smiling as you get reminded of the essence of the celebration. Thanking God and giving glory on to His name is enough to achieve the sense of fulfillment in your hearts. It is still worthy just to know the real essence of it even if you can't throw a grand party with your friends or anyone else. The fact that the idea is preserved and was carried out well is the important among all of the grandeurs all around us.

Anyway, going back to the topic, while the aforementioned above is applicable to some, in our case the end of September in the countryside, it only signifies that the blessings will keep on flowing until the new year. The end of September means that October will starting in a moment and that will be the specific starting date of the openings of all of the Sugar Mills here in Negros. It symbolizes hope for all planters and laborers in the place for they can finally make a profit out of their hard work of growing their crops and they can also delegate some loads of works to the laborers who have long been waiting for it.

While it is not known to all, Sugar production is the main business here at Negros since most of its land are used for its plantation. The season for the milling would always start at October and will end in March. Opening of the milling season only means more profit for the planters and also for the laborers for their hard work in helping the maintenance works for the crops and during the harvest. For some, this is where they can only have a stable income since work are coming simultaneously during the milling season but when it ends, that would be the start of their problematic life since sugarcanes only requires low maintenance. The work isn't implemented regularly and that would be depending on how vast do your Planter's lands are to provide more work for everyone.

If you're not lucky to find a big time planter to work for, then the kind of work that you can find is only for part time. It can't sustain a family nor yourself during the closing season if you don't have another kind of work aside from it. One of the techniques that laborers would do is they would shift into working in the rice fields from planting, maintaining, and harvesting. This is more beneficial since the cropping season is every three or four months unlike from the sugar which is only once a year.

Anyway, that is how life in the countryside works. If you're familiar with the famous line in the history of Negros which says, "Ang kwarta sa Negros gina-piko kag ginapala." (The money in Negros is raked and shoved.) The one that I was saying above is where this statement was derived from. The money is raked and shoved because the people need to rake and shove the sugarcane fields just to make the sugarcane grow and make money out of it. It is where their earnings comes from that's why they are treating the sugarcanes as money.

It is what the end of September means to us planters and laborers on the countryside. How about you?

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