Memoirs of the Past: Pam Pam Falls

_{An Introduction :}

                        _{Jonathan is my grandnephew.  His mother is my niece and has since wanted some of my traits influence her eldest boy. She sent  Jonathan to the school where I am teaching and wanted him to acquire some sort of my abilities in the academics, the arts and in sports. I happen to be an academic head of the institution I used to work before my retirement. I served there as a language teacher in Filipino; the culture and arts moderator and a coach to the chess varsities.  As my ward, Jonathan tagged along with me in going to school and in going home. I monitored him most often.True enough, his mother’s  wishes  seem  granted. He performed well in the academic though she wasn’t able to witness Jonathan’s grade school graduation as she died a month earlier in his graduation day.}

                        _{In sports, Jonathan’s mathematical skill has worked relatively.  He is good at analysis and he played well in the Chess games, where analysis is a challenge.  He joined my chess team in the high school department and later became the team captain of our school chess varsity. He played well and has brought trophies to our school thru the  tournaments we have joined in our locality.  He has kept to himself one bronze medal from the Milo Little Olympics held in Cagayan de Oro City. He too become an inspiration and influence to his younger siblings. His youngest brother, who looked up to him,  was hailed the grand champion in the Secondary Schools Competition in Iligan City Fiesta Chess Tournament, representing our school.}

                        _{In the arts area, Jonathan was not a concentrated artist in drawing and in painting. Though he knows how to draw and paint, his concentration is rather with his chess games. He tried some roles in my  Drama Club,  but showed his preference  in the technical aspects of the play.  It is here where I began to notice some changes in his interests.  He loves photography, taking shots at some scenes of the play where we used for promotion purposes.} 

                        _{The influx of technology has nurtured the love of photography in Jonathan. His friends noticed the pictures he often shot were worth viewing.  I am happy of the trend.  His mother’swish were all granted. When he opened this blog and named it “Talan-awon”,  I understand he would make this as an avenue for the many things he collected as worth viewing.  When he invited me to co-author some stories in this blog, I checked at his mobile cam and I saw images that have memories strongly imprinted in my mind.  Right  there, I consented to his suggestion.   I knew I will be writing stories with pictures worth viewing from my grandnephew’s  photograph collection..}

  

My first story:        
Pampam Falls:  Beauty revisited

                                                     By: LSCabanlit, (a.k.a.: sir Boy)

                As I checked at my grandnephew’s mobile cam, a familiar image crossed my eyesight, and I exclaimed: “Where was this?”  “… It looked familiar to me.”

                “…Pampam Falls at Dalipuga, Iligan City.”- was the reply of the excited faces who were seemingly expecting to hear bedtime stories from a grand dad. One asked:“How come it looked familiar to you, when you haven’t been there?  It’s  a long trek, you know…after  our  joyride from the city.”

                “I know.   I have gone  to this place, sometime in my boyhood .  I just do not know how did it got it’s name.   At that time people call this place busay… Pampam is such an ugly  name for a pretty site like this.”- I said.  Everybody smiled and seem  to agree with me.  Pampam is a slang term in the local dialect which means, a whore…a woman of a bad reputation.

                I advised:”… next time you go to this place, ask people in the locality how did it got its name.”  They agreed but asked me to tell the story how did I get to the falls and I shared them my story.

I spent my boyhood in Kiwalan, Iligan City and at that time there was no  NAWASA  for people’s drinking water. People scoop water from the spring either in Acmac or in kalubihon.  Acmac is a village along the shore,  while Kalubihon is a highland village above kiwalan.

                One of my playmates  was requested by his mother to fetch water from the spring as their supply was about to run out.  He decided to fetch water in Kalubihon inasmuch as the water tastes better  and cooler.   He prepared  his Kangga (a bamboo  raft hauled by a carabao) loaded with eight emptied kerosene cans.  He invited me to come along with him as we bring our  kote  (top) to continue our spinning game after loading water to the kerosene cans.

 I was thrilled by my joyride with the kangga,  a very common transportation for hauling heavy materials in those days. We rode at the back of the carabao and behind us is the kangga, attached to the carabao’s  neckline , with the  eight  empty kerosene cans.

                As we move through the rough road, the empty kerosene cans were making  so much noise as they  banged each other due to the bouncy rough road.  The noise scared the carabao, that it ran as fast as it could to a direction where it thought to be safe and free from the frightening  noise. My friend in the maneuver controlled the speed of the carabao thru the rope used as a reign connected to the nose of the animal. It slowed down and later, we passed thru a cogon grassland  where the noisy sounds of the kerosene cans ceased. The speed become normal,  but we kept avoiding the rough road and used the trail along the cogon grass as we went up to a  place called panaghoyan .  This was the spring  site and it amazed me. The water  sprout from the stone ground at the foot of the hill of sitioPanaghoyan . This forested  place belonged to barrio Kalubihon.    Bamboo poles were used as aqueduct to allow the waters run to a distant away from the spring source for sanitary purposes. No one is allowed to pollute the main source.  There was a bamboo pole to serve as shower for bathers to enjoy  cool spring water to fall onto the body.  It can be used to load containers like empty kerosene cans for a household water supply.  The excess water that fall onto  the ground formed  a  shallow brook which has became a tunaan - a pit for drinking and bathing animals like the carabaos,( the Philippine buffalo.)

                As we load water to our kerosene can, I can’t help but be mesmerized by the beautiful sight I have just behold.  My playmate told me it’s an enchanted place. It never go warm, he said. Even at the dry season, the place remained cool. If ever the climate  gets warmer, people will just hear sounds  of a whistle (taghoy) and it summons the breeze to fill the area and the place remained cool. That was how the place got its name Panaghoyan. My playmate asked me to try whistling to summon the breeze and when I did,  I feel the breeze moved the leaves of the trees  and the  air turned cooler.

                We brought the carabao to the tunaan and decided to continue our kote game but  I lost my mood to play.  Instead, I  continued asking more questions of the beautiful place. This ignited an  idea to my playmate’s  mind to bring me to another sight which he believed will surely amaze me like the Kalubihon’sPanaghoyan spring. I welcomed  the idea to see another body of landwater cascading down to the lower part of the territory. We left the carabao enjoying the cool mud at the tunaan as it was tied to a tree nearby  and we started our  trek along a trail that my playmate only knew and true…I hear a cascading water from a place he called busay.  It was a waterfall which is so beholding to human eyes. I cannot understand my feelings.  I love the verdant herbs and trees in each bank and wanted to jump off to the clear water from the brook as it cascaded gaily along the bank.  My playmate cautioned me that the place is also enchanted.  Fairies and other spirits took care of the place and we should not disturb them. If we wish to take a bath on its water, we will ask permission by saying: “Tabipo, maligoko!”  I chilled at his warning and looked  around if there were other inhabitants. I found no other human except me and my playmate. I saw different colored dragon flies at the verdant herbs I appreciated a while ago and I suspected they must be the fairies and spirits that owned the place. I slowly murmured: “Tabipo…tabiapo…”  My friend noticed my face and said:  “You turned pale…Why?”

                I gave an alibi: “My parents must be looking for me now…we better go.”

              He said:  “Okay… let’s go!  We’ll see the other falls next time.”

He told me there were two waterfalls in that water line that must have come from one water source in the  high lands above Kiwalan.  The one we saw isbusaysaibabawand the one below is called busaysaubos. He hinted that we will revisit the place sooner.  I agreed.

                The “sooner” did not happen. My family moved to the city and we were stuck to the pressures of a city life. Adjusting to new life made me forgot the place and the plan we made.  I was already a college graduate when I met my playmate again.  His interest is no longer  on our Kote game. This time he was courting one of my niece who was then  a young  teacher in the public schools above Kiwalan. Eventually, he married my niece, who is the  mother of Jonathan.

                Seeing the place that once mesmerized me,  drew my interest to revisit the place. This time, not with my playmate,  but with Jonathan and his  gang of trekking  enthusiasts,  who had brought him to the place for the  love of beauty. They took pictures and posted  them in the internet. His parents have died long before he finished his Engineering course.