by Ralph C. Lumbres
This article was originally written as a contribution for TRAVELING CIRCUS OF URBANISM VOL.1 I WAS THERE published in July 2020.
I was there, in Dingalan. I wanted to go back before I had to leave the country to move to Japan. I was there to be at peace, to revisit a memory. I was in search of something.
It was October last year when I went back for a short visit to this town, a 6-hour commute northeast from Manila. I took an air-conditioned bus from the capital. After the two-hour ride, I arrived at a terminal where I had to transfer to the local bus that would take me to Dingalan. The bus is old, equipped with wooden chairs, with no air conditioning. People carry all sorts of goods, like vegetables or sometimes even live chickens. The driver might even stop the bus to have a quick chat with a friend who happens to be passing by. It’s here that friends from different villages of Dingalan catch up. Gossip mixes with real news. It feels as if the people are in their own neighborhood.
Dingalan is a coastal municipality located in the northeastern part of the Philippines. It is squeezed between the Sierra Madre mountain range from the West and the Pacific Ocean from the East. It is a place where the mountains meet the sea.
The bus entered the town from the Northwest, transecting several villages until its usual stop in the town center. It then continued to travel South from there. Along the Southward route, the air suddenly shifts. You can start to smell the breeze of the sea, and then you start to see the vastness of Dingalan Bay. The warm wind greets you. The road beneath the bus shifted to dirt as we continued traveling along a winding cliff. It felt dangerous, but the view eased the worry. Down below, I saw strong waves crashing into big rocks. On my right were mountains where the waterfalls of Dingalan can be found.
It was a cloudy afternoon when I finally arrived. I got off at a remote village called Cabog. I was greeted by Ate Diana and Ate Nalyn — “Ate” means “big sister” in Filipino. They’re both from the indigenous group in Dingalan, called Dumagat. They’re my friends from when I did a project there a few years ago, but now, I’m not here for work. I came here to find something.
Ate Nalyn welcomed me into her home and showed me a room she had prepared for me. I gave some sweets to the kids in the neighborhood, as a pasalubong－a customary gift from someone who arrived from a faraway place. Later, Ate Diana and her husband joined all of us for dinner. I brought a famous pork delicacy from a pit stop, and they cooked an indigenous variety of rice that Ate Diana had harvested just weeks before.
Dingalan boasts unique landscapes and natural features. Aside from the beaches, waterfalls, and rock formations, it also has several caves and some hiking and biking trails with scenic views. It is because of these spots that the mayor of the town decided to shift some of their industry into tourism. Dingalan used to be a logging town, but the logging ban in 1995 and a series of typhoons in 2004, which caused numerous landslides, forced the people to shift their local economy. The series of typhoons wiped out most of the town, killing hundreds. Thousands of giant logs from the mountains came down with the rain, filling up the shores of Dingalan Bay. The catastrophe even made the national news.
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I first came to Dingalan in April 2017. A friend who leads an art organization* there, invited me for a week-long artist residency to make a public art installation. Around that time, I also received a small grant from a fellowship program to implement a project related to disaster preparedness and environmental education. As I came to know Dingalan more, I became inclined to do my project there, and later that year, I decided to go back. With the help of my friend’s art organization, I implemented the project Ligtas PAD or Light-based Participatory Three Dimensional Mapping. It was the first community-based project that I spearheaded**. It was then when I met Ate Diana, Ate Nalyn, and others who eventually became my friends.
Ligtas PAD was my exploration of what my art practice could develop into. I have always had a dilemma about the purpose of art in society. Deep down I knew that art could be so much more than paintings and sculptures. Through experience, I saw glimpses of other possibilities. A lot of artists in the Philippines and abroad are tied to some form of social practice, and ‘non-artists’ also use art and creative approaches in their line of work.
When I did my project, I was personally interested in how spatial thinking affects our behavior. As a sculptor and a designer for the stage, I think in space, and I was curious as to how this certain perception affects how we live our lives. I eventually learned about participatory mapping practices. I then wanted to find a way to integrate art into these kinds of placemaking practices.
Ligtas PAD*** was a two-year product of trial and error, of consultations with the community and collaboration with other artists, geographers, and community workers. It was one of the greatest achievements of my life, as well as one of the greatest challenges I’ve ever faced. The realities of the place — the logistics, the infrastructure — only added to the difficulty. Right before the end, the core team developed personal issues as fatigue dawned on us. There was a point when I felt that I didn’t want to go back.
After finishing Ligtas PAD and other engagements in Dingalan in March 2019, the team had to decompress. Some of us eventually began to reach out to each other. The community in Dingalan became a reason for us to become hopeful — we stayed in touch with them, and they encouraged us in return. This was one reason why I wanted to go back to Dingalan before leaving the country: I wanted to see my friends because I wasn’t sure when I would be back. I wanted to visit the place where it all started.
I am deeply grateful to Dingalan and all the people who helped with what started out aiming to be a small project. This engagement grew into something I couldn’t have imagined. In a span of two years, we piloted this project with a few people in Cabog, then we were able to take it to other countries, collaborating with people from around Asia. As my engagement with the people of Dingalan evolved, so did the nature of working in this place. The relationships I built there became a significant part of my life. I realized that the trust that the team and the community gave me had enabled me to grow. The challenges and struggles I faced strengthened me.
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Before I ended my visit, I was able to meet Manoy, a friend from another village. He was also a volunteer for Ligtas PAD. We went around town on his motorcycle. I took pictures and videos of Dingalan. I visited his house near the sea and shot a portrait of him with his son and father. Behind them is a boat that his father was building.
Before dark, Manoy gave me a ride back to Cabog. He joined us for dinner and we shared some brandy with Ate Nalyn and Ate Diana. We ate at Chieftain Sonny’s house together with his wife Ate Jenjen and their children. All of them were part of Ligtas PAD. We exchanged stories and talked about our lives. Ate Diana was her usual animated self when she was telling stories. Chieftain Sonny made some jokes about the Dumagat. We shared laughs and hopes for the future.
The night was about to end. They told me to come back any time I wanted to, or if I needed to. They knew how I felt and why I came there. There was melancholy.
I left the next morning.
In a few months, I leave for Japan to make a new life there for a few years. I had a new memory of Dingalan to bring along with me. This was what I was searching for.
* This art organization is called Aurora Artist Residency Program and Space (AARPS) led by artist and University of the Philippines professor, Roselle Pineda.
** The project was implemented together with Prodjx Artist Community, an interdisciplinary collective founded by Ralph Lumbres.
*** Ligtas PAD was supported by the Japan Foundation Asia Center. It was then scaled-up through a grant from TUKLAS Innovation Labs. Ligtas PAD is in partnership with the local government of Dingalan, Philippine Geographical Society, and AARPS.
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