Life in these mountains

Eva grew up in a mountain barrio. She and her four siblings maintain a house there, and weekends find them making the trip over mostly rough, winding roads. She keeps trying to take me along, although for the life of me I can not see the appeal. There is no Internet connection and mobile coverage is spotty at best. The place shuts down by seven in the evening and there is virtually no nightlife to speak of. At least there is no need for air-conditioning because nights get pretty cold up there.

“You know why I like it there?” Eva says. “Somehow, when we’re in the city nothing is ever good enough for my kids. Serve them one thing, they want something else. ‘Can't we have chicken instead?’ ‘How about corned beef?’ ‘I want hotdog!’ They can be so demanding.”

“That’s because you’ve spoiled them.”

“Well, they know better than complain up in the mountains. It’s eat what’s on the table or go without. Boiled bananas with bagoong never looked so exciting for breakfast.”

“Oooh.”

“Let’s hear you say that after a week. Not that I’m complaining. You don’t want to know what the neighbors are having. I swear, we are millionaires by comparison.”

Of course I want to know what the neighbors are having, but Eva’s moved on. “I was once at a classmate’s home — I must have been ten, eleven then — and her grandmother called us to lunch. It wasn’t much, just kamote and lansang, typical mountain fare. Anyway, I took my seat at the table when the lola turned to me. ‘Jesus,’ she said, ‘where are your manners? You were supposed to say ‘No, thank you. I’m full.’”

“Damn.”

“Exactly! It wasn’t like we were going hungry at home. Maxie — God bless her soul — she was a good cook.”

That would be her mother, Maxima. She had Alzheimer’s, and late in her life had to be restrained from any more cooking (she would sneak salt and sugar — fistfuls — into every dish). But while at the top of her game, she left Eva’s cooking in the dust.

“Now there was a resourceful woman.” If there’s one thing Eva likes to talk about more than food, it’s her mother’s cooking. “She could cook cassava twelve ways, all good. And when we had nothing to cook, she would take me into the forest to gather pakó, dalilí — anything, really. I’d stuff my skirt with wild guava…”

I’ve heard all this before. She makes it sound like an adventure, but I know better. The idea of foraging for your own sustenance remains quaint until you have to do it as a matter of survival. I tried it once and found that I had neither the patience nor the stamina for it. “Are we there yet?” I asked my guide.

“Oh, it’s just around the next bend,” he replied, pointing with his snout.

“But that’s what you said an hour ago!”

You know what’s worse? Getting there and discovering that someone else has beat you to your meal. Or, as happened on that trek, pure and simple wrong timing. In the forest no one can hear you scream. Even if someone could, what good does that do you? You can’t nag at a tree to bear fruit, or cajole some plant into sprouting shoots. The most you’re likely to achieve is attract unfriendly fauna. You’re still down to that can of corned beef you brought along — you know, just in case.

I tell you, these people are masters at making do. And I thought I knew all the culinary applications of canned sardines. Or buwad/daing. Speaking of which, dry-roast dried anchovies in a pot. When fragrant, add water. Allow to simmer for five minutes before throwing in tomatoes, spring onion, and lemongrass (leaves and all). Season with salt. Let come to another boil, and now you have fish soup, bukid-style.

Of course, you see none of this during fiesta time. These people break the bank when it comes to celebrating. Eva’s first cousin is also the barangay captain, and when we went there during the eve of the big day, he ushered us past a monster of a pig roasting in the front yard and into his modest home. There was a constant stream of people in and out of the house. Just how Kap managed to feed them all, I had no idea.

First out of the kitchen were steaming bowls of pakdol or carabao soup. A squeal of delight from Jenny. Unlike in the northern (Waray) part of Leyte island, here carabao meat is festive fare, although some people (like Eva) refuse to eat it. The soup was served alongside a platter with oregano and basil leaves freshly picked from Kap’s own garden. It was enlightening for Jenny to taste how much basil cut down on the richness of the pakdol. In fact, that made me have more of the dish than I had intended, leaving me woozy afterward.

Or was it because of the humba (braised pork)? Man, that was goood, with just the right balance of salty and sweet. And it was properly fatty; I even took the skin and fat that Eva had moved off to one side of her plate. Lean humba is for sissies. Of course I went into the kitchen to compliment the cook, and even though she managed to look up from her chopping board to smile and thank me, I could see she was far too busy for chitchat, so I made a mental note to get the recipe some other day, even if I have to torture it out of her.

I didn’t take photos of the rest of the spread, preoccupied as I was with the humba. Sated, I went out for a smoke, then decided to check out the local gardens. Tucked among the ornamentals was the occasional herb, except the owners usually had no idea of its culinary usage — or its English name. “Aaaah,” said a kindly old lady. “So this is what they call mint. I just know it as yerba buena.”

In another, some Chinese chives. I wanted to ask what it was called locally, but no one seemed to be at home. I should have taken one. (Kidding, but of course.)

I was on the lookout for a spectacular stand of dill that I remembered from a previous trip, but I couldn’t locate it. Instead, I found several basil cultivars, some growing willy-nilly on the side of the road. Below, a purple basil (or at least semi-purple — perhaps a result of cross-pollination between a purple and some other cultivar, same as the one in the topmost photo) in the yard opposite the auditorium.

And some sweet basil along a drainage canal, doubtless insect-pollinated. Needless to say, I went about removing the flowers from each plant I came across, telling their owners that that was to prevent the stems from drying out and getting woody. “So what?” asked one, so then I had to tell her that the flower sucks up the aromatic oils from the stem and leaves.

“So?” came the answer. Indeed, what do these people care? Basil to them is just another ornamental plant. Besides, the flowers are beautiful. I ought to tell them how much basil and other herbs sell for down in the city. But not now. They are too busy entertaining, there is a talent program later on in the evening, and the circus comes to town but once a year. Such is life in these mountains.