Buklog Festival – Subanens perform religious rituals and ceremonies

The Festival

In Zamboanga del Sur, a group called the Subanens perform religious rituals and ceremonies as a part of the Buklog Festival, held every 16th to the 20th of April. Subanen, believed to have derived its name from suba, a local term for river because these people prefer to inhabit a land near rivers and mountain streams.

Buklog Festival is an ancient spiritual rite to offer gratefulness, and to honor the spirits, specially the spirit of the water they call malengma, the spirit of the forest called mamanwa, and maninising palingkitan, the spirit of the mountain, to whom they pray for sufficient food and other things for everyday living, and to protect them for ill luck.

The annual event is held in support to the natural resource management projects of various agencies and organizations, expressing gratitude of the whole community for the blessings that they receive.

A number of months do the people took preparing for the once a year event.  A dozen fowls, five hogs, and ten sacks of rice have readied for the offering to the spirits.

The celebration of the upcoming Buklog is announced through the beat of the agung or the gagong. Strategically located on top of a hill, the sound of these gongs travel hundreds of kilometers away, reaching settlements.

A timuay, Subanen’s term for community leader, sends formal invitations to fellow timuays of other settlements made of strips of palm leaves during the sounding of the gong. Receiving timuay would cut one knot every day until the day of the celebration arrives and all the knots have cut off. They would travel on foot through mountainous terrains until they reach the place where the celebration takes place.

Community elders perform rituals that pray for the blessing of the spirits three days before the event so they could freely gather materials to be used for the festival. Constructing the buklog are built with trees such as white lauan, baktikan, bagasuso, babalud, and tanguile.

Another ritual is held a day before the festival, called the gempang, near the river bank.This practice is done to ask the spirits of the water to protect the community from illnesses. Three sets of lukay wooden posts were erected to hold the offerings, consisting of uncooked rice, chicken or pork, eggs, and sliced betel nut. The wooden posts vary in sizes depending on which spirit they would pray for. The tallest reaches about six feet high while the shortest, about two feet or less. The blood of the slaughtered hog was taken downstream, a symbolic representation that bad omen were washed away. The hog is roasted unsalted and cut into pieces for offering while two chickens are offered to please the gods.

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