Parade of the Philippine Indigenous Tribes and Conference of the Philippine Monsters!
From the Presidents to the heroes, today, we will look at different tribes and monsters! Are you ready?
The Parade of the Philippine Indigenous Tribes
My favorite part of the farm was the first time for me to really see in person what our tribes look like. The Philippines is an archipelago, it has more than a hundred different languages, different cultures, different tribes, and different needs which were really amazing to learn starting with the top area of Luzon towards Visayas and Mindanao.
It is quite saddening that most of these tribes are no longer sustained due to technology and the new generation, these tribes had emerged and some if not all had been influenced by the new generation. They no longer wear their tribal costumes and most are not proud of their original tribe.
I personally don't really know my original tribe but since I am from the Visayas, I guess our family comes from the Indigenous tribe of Ati or Magabat which is in Central Visayas.
For me, the most colorful tribes come from Mindanao. Looking at the way they clothe themselves, especially the women shows great class and colorful vibrant clothing colors. They even have their own headdresses. I also see that they have been cloth properly compared to the ones from Visayas and Luzon.
This really amazed me and it took me more time reading and checking on the statues compared to the rest of the stuff to see within the farm. It awakened a different sense in me to know more of what we were doing during the old days, the ancient times. Thank you GAP Farm for making these statues and for conserving them.
Conference of Philippine Monsters
Demonyo, Diwata, Nuno sa Punso, Higante, Kapre, Manananggal, Duwende, Aswang and many more. If you have grown up to these stories, you are definitely a Filipino. The Filipino people have a lot of monsters and folklore which are either myths or just made from the fun imaginations of our ancestors.
These creatures are being used to frighten kids to go to sleep at night. Parents make up stories and tell their kids about it so that these kids won't be going out of the house at night. While they had been really scary, it was also effective that kids would just stay at home and ensure they are asleep before midnight.
Midnight because as per our parents, these creatures are eating us if we are still awake at midnight so we would ensure that we are already fast asleep by that time.
It's funny that these creatures are also available in GAP Farm. They have a dedicated area of these kinds which are used for educational purposes and for foreign tourists to also be advised of what we had been believing in and be aware of these fantastical creatures.
Let me cite some of these monsters:
Manananggal
Half-bodied monster is usually shown as a woman, young and beautiful who transforms into a half-bodied bat, flying around the village looking for pregnant women whom they'll be sucking up the baby inside her tummy.
Aswang
Comparable to evil witches. They appear to be young and beautiful as well but are also old and bloodsuckers.
Demonyo
Represented by an ugly man with horns killing children and other humans.
Dracula
A foreign guest monster. You know what Dracula does.
Duwende
Dwarves who will try to lure you and keep children imprisoned in their kingdom underneath.
Diwata
Nymphs, white ladies who are sometimes good and sometimes bad spirits. They would frighten us with their white costumes and invisible faces.
An hour or two is not enough to really explore what the GAP Farm can offer. We didn't have enough time though to roam around since it was already noon and the sun was really shining up our heads. But if given a chance, I would definitely want to go back and check more of its facilities and services.
This ends my GAP Farm blog series! Did you learn a lot guys? I hope so!
Check out my previous articles here:
xoxo,
momentswithmatti
Mother | Boholana | Cebu | Philippines | Travel | Photography Enthusiast | Calligraphy | Art | Crypto Noob
After presidents, ito naman.. Galing hehe