Batad

I’d been thinking about going to Batad—a remote village only accessible by a one hour hike—for several days. Banaue, while it has its beauties, is much more urban than I expected it would be. The town is noisy with machinery, the roads stink of diesel, and the terraces remain a presence in the distance—not quite in reach. Batad however is nestled at the foot of an amphitheater of terraces, and with hardly any electricity and absolutely no vehicles, the nights are quiet (no roosters!) and spattered with vivid stars.

I met up with a friend, Joe—a 21 year-old Australian studying micro-finance (my new passion) here in the Philippines for a month—a happy coincidence. The two of us hiked down to the village and stayed at Rita’s Hotel for a night (highly recommended) where we met up with two couples, one English and one German, and their guide, Mark. Over Scrabble, and later some pan-fried pizzas (one had egg, tuna, and veggies), we chatted about tourism, the different provinces, and Mark’s childhood.

Here’s a picture of our Scrabble game, with Claudia, Mark, me, Wendy and Dave:

Mark had an interesting story to share. As the oldest child in his family, his family had designated him to inherit the family rice terraces. Yet when Mark turned 12, he began working as a tour guide when a group of Germans asked him to help film a documentary. In the following years, Mark spent a lot of time with tourists learning English. He also got exposed to western culture, which heavily re-shaped his perspective on his own.

By the time he reached 16, his grandfather pulled him aside and told him that he’d been engaged to a woman that he was to marry in a few months—which came as a complete surprise to Mark. His grandfather was very proud of the connection—it would link two expansive plots of land and make Mark a noble and wealthy man by their community’s standards.

Rice plots near Batad: “You know in the past, I would have been so lucky to inherit the rice plot,” Mark said, “but when my grandfather told me this I thought: ‘Oh no, I’ll have to take care of the terraces and never make any money. I’m so unlucky! I cannot have this responsibility.’ And I was only 16—I wasn’t ready to be married. I was exposed to tourists and I knew that no one got married that young.”

“But I married you to be wealthy,” his grandfather said.
“But I don’t want to be wealthy,” Mark said. “I want to be free.”

Mark told his grandfather that he needed to disown the family and the farm so he wouldn’t have the responsibility of the terraces or have to get married. His grandfather, who deeply loved Mark, begged him to reconsider.

“I’ll cancel the agreement, just please don’t disown me,” he said. His grandfather paid a fifteen pig dowry to the family anyway and canceled the agreement. The family forbade anyone from Mark’s family to ever marry anyone of their own.
“A few weeks after it was all settled, my grandfather died of shame,” he said, shaking his head.

Mark also never knew who the young woman was, as their custom dictates. Now 21, he said, “A few months ago, I saw this woman walking by—she was so sexy and beautiful, I couldn’t believe it. I asked a friend of mine who she was, and it turned out that she was the woman I was supposed to marry! Oh wow—I felt like such an idiot.”

“Do you regret your decision?” I asked.

“No,” he said, “Now I am free. I help my family by paying for the workers on the farm sometimes—I am very generous with them. But now I can travel wherever I want and I can actually make a living. Being a travel guide doesn’t make a lot, but it’s better than working in the terraces.”
Hiking through the terraces with Mark

As we hiked through the terraces the next day on the way to Bangaan, Mark and I talked about the subject a little more.

“Is it common that young men your age don’t want to inherit the terraces?” I asked.

“Yeah, it is.” he said. “Who wants to inherit something where you have to break your back to work and you never make any money? I just pay the workers, but I never make money for that. It just goes away and I never see it again.”

I told Mark about one of the ideas I’d heard for preserving the terraces: growing the sacred tinauan rice and exporting it to wealthier countries that can pay a higher price per kilo.

“That’s not saving the rice terraces,” he said with an edge in his voice, “that’s destroying them. The tinauan rice is the source of these people’s nutrition. It’s one of the healthiest rice varieties in the world. But we only plant it once a year and we hardly grow enough for our families. So if you take away the healthy rice to export—the rice we do ritual for, the rice we harvest by hand—and you give us a little money and less nutritional rice in return, well, you’re destroying the people. It’s not a solution; it’s like taking away gold from the people and returning silver.”

Rice and Mud

“What do you think the solution is?” I asked.

He turned around and smiled. “The only solution is for me to become president. Then I would really give some money to these people here—support them during typhoons, etc. I would give them money for their work on the rice.”

“It sounds like the people here need livelihoods in addition to the rice farming,” I said, “But what do you think they could do?”

“Yeah—they need livelihoods. They need to get paid more for their [organic] vegetables and rice. But I’m not sure what they can do besides carving idols, weaving, and being tour guides. Honestly, I think Batad will be gone in 10 or 20 years, because no one wants to stay around and break their backs working on the terraces anymore.”

We continued walking on in silence as I wondered if there was a solution to this dilemma, or if the villages I’m seeing (such as Bangaan village below) simply won’t be around in 20 years. And if so—what are the implications of that loss?