--JURAMENTADO--
Paul's room was crowded, no other word for that. As far as I remember we counted seven or eight guys and this room was not that big at all. ..So what, it was just for a couple of hours because we ended drinking in Ermita until early hours and after coming 'home' ,to wake up only a little later. We ended up talking a lot as most of us were strangers to each other, while Paul was briefing us what to expect in this movie world. We got prepaired to what was to come and had some idea what was going on on a set.
A local Philippine production was about to film a notorious revolt of a moslem jihad during WW 1 against the christians on the southern island of Mindanao.
“Juramentado” means as much as going mad, a blind hate or as the pinoy call it themselves: running amok. But there is more behind this word. It is a holy oath with an intention to fight till death. For their religion. The Japanese have a simulair word: Kamikaze, also until death but on behalve of the emperor...
The Moro-moslems have their own motto: a juramentado ends with death. They had this device already during the Spanish domination and were still attached to it during the American occupation, for sure it took a lot a lives. Even today there are dayly confrontation between the katholic government troops and the entire southern province which is totaly islamitic.
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1983 with: Ramon Revilla, Karim Kiram, Jesse Ramos, Leopoldo Salcedo, Rosemarie Sonora, Tessa Tuazon, Johnnie Wilson, Paul Vance, Steve Rogers, David Light,Robert Marius*, Bert Spoor
Dir: Efren C Pinon.
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It was far before 6 am when we woke up and headed to a jeepney meeting point. These kind of locations, as I learned later, always were nearby sari-sari stores where all of us started our day with a fresh cup of insant powder coffee a couple of tinapai and cigarettes by the piece.. Those stores made good times when we had our stops over there. And with a three hour ride ahead of us we bought some extra to servive that trip to Lucena, south of Manila. A small barrio at the beach was our goal. A little dusty and stiff we inspected our neighbourhood and we found the locals realy colourfull and quite noisy when they gathered around our jeepney to do théir inspection on us. It took a while before I realized that they were cast and already dressed in their 'war colours'.
It looked cosy, in strident contrast to what we had to do with eachother: ass kicking headhunters, blood-smelling fanatics with no scrupules and no friendly attentions what so ever!
But for the moment we were making friends unaware of what was to come. An assist direct ordered us to hurry cause a big part of the day was spilled already by travelling and we had to show up on the set. So we went to wardrobe to get our outfit. A little greenhorn I followed the other guys to see where we would end up. Another A.D. explained us what to expect and what to do upon action. He left us some space to perform in our own vision and improvisation. Our first confrontation would be a superior power of Moro-militants. Some of us were soon to die, but everything was great footage of a distance so most of them were be raised back to live in no time. Die in a close up, it was not the real end, because in the next hot outline everyone was provided other clothing and wigs.
There wasn't much of a story I thought, but is there any story in real war that has one ? I mean a thing as war is out of any proportions, it all happens with the intention to slaughter eachother as fast as possible and under the most cruel circumstances. And that's exactly what we did, creating blood and death, sorrow and pain as brute as we could. So did the enemy, they tried to be even “badder” as we were.
But I have to mark that the Christians were the intruders, the deliverers, the bringers of civilisation...
We were doing our thing the rest of the day. I really got great respect for these decor-artists who made all kinds of different props made of polystyreen foam, couldn't see difference from real.!! And how about those make-up artists 'creating' the most terrible wounds, looking real bad. It was a lot of action for one day and I was glad when it was called a wrap. Earlier that day we already had seen our beach accommodation, we got ourselves some nice bamboo/nippa huts fitting no more than 2 or 3 people each.
The sun had set and a slight seabreese made it a comfortable 25-26 degrees centigrade. Air and water were close the same temperature, but still the water cooled us down and so did a couple of San Miguel beer. It was about time to hit the blanckets and close the mosquito-nets, and so we did.
The next morning started with overcast, no sun at all. It was windy and the color of the air had something threatening. The locals looked worried and I got this feeling that bad weather was to be expected. Oh yeah, in no time it started to drip down and coming with an encouraging wind it stagnated the takes. It started to pour down beyond imagination. Each half hour the beach had become a meter shorter at least. Half way the afternoon the tide line came as close as a couple of yards. Many of the crew and cast were hiding in a strong, two floor high, brick building a little higher on the beach. I decided not to risk wet feet and went for the second foor, well so did a lot of others !! Even as I lived in the Phils for a couple of months now I still didn't understand much of the language but I was aware of coming typhoon. But what to expect, I mean in Holland a storm once in a while reaches a 12 on the Beaufort-scale. And that's a lot of wind.
I saw some people carrying a bag with all their belongings and civilian clothes. I didn't have anything on me.All my stuff was in the nippahut.Coconuts were flying a horizontal way as did the rain that didn't seem to come from above.. I didn't care too much about my clothes, toothbrush or haircomb. I was also strongly adviced not to go outside.
“Heavy storm”, I came with to a Filipino whom I spoke before, “Not yet”, he declared and looked at me with a significant smile.
One moment I had the feeling that the rest of the world was in a vacuüm cos all the air came our way. The solide building reacted with cracking sounds and a shivering every now and then. Sometimes it seemed to be jerked from its foundation all night long. But it hold. Lucky for us there were no mosquitos, they probably found a better place to hide.
I used someones bag to put my head on but couldn't catch any sleep. It was just too noisy. Sometimes it seemed to slow down, just to return with all its strenght adding even more power and hurly-burly.
By morning most of the storm was gone. It was still pretty windy and almost dry. I couldn't believe my eyes when light broke. The beach seemed to be 2 or 3 feet higher. The cabines were all crooked up and halfway burried in the sand. I couldn't help but getting this Pompeii-feeling. The stone building still stood, but everything on the beach had changed. Most of the coconut trees were down. Nippahuts built with inferior materials didn't make it either. The whole scene: it was an indescribable mash. So was the set.
It was less than 200 yards to the hut where Paul and I had been staying. I hesistated wether to walk to the huts or do such later. It looked pretty scary. One moment the seawater was as far as it used to be, only to roll back the other minute again ,even passing the cabines by meters. I couldn't even make it ten staps towards the huts. The sand sucked me in over the knees and I got that feeling that my live was at risk. Never mind that stuff. I returned to the building were other people also were astonished by the result of this powerfull storm. I was told that low tide was due in some hours. By that time everybody was to be evacueted before hightide came in again. Nobody had seen Paul...
I saw some people grouping up and leaving the beach. I still was looking for Paul but couldn't find him. So finaly I joined a team about to leave, when a guy from wardrobe told me to return me clothes before going. He didn't care a shit that I was to stand there in my boxer shorts. I was about to tell the idiot to fuck off, when this friend of Robert Marius handed me a t-shirt, short pants and a pair of slippers.
Nobody had seen Paul. I got worried more.
I stopped asking around and left the area with some of the people I knew. Water was rising again.. The path we had to follow was under water, sometimes a couple of inches then all of a sudden over 2 feet deep. Pretty tough to walk cos one can't see were to put ones feet. I didn't mind at all carrying short pants. Sometimes the water seemed to catch up with us, creapy feeling...But after a while we faced ground and could walk a lot faster. We had miles to go. Fallen trees often blocked our way forcing us to re-route and enter the water again.
I haven't any idea how long it took us, it must have been hours. Everywhere people were cleaning up and repairing there places, chasing their chickens and goats. Finaly we reached a road having traffic. Busses, jeepneys all loaded to the limit and no way to board one of them. We hung around there for an hour or so, but our chances to get anywhere were zero. At last a filipino guy from our team decided to take action. He left to come back within a quarter of an hour including a jeepey to our transportation. Good news,bad news as well. We couln't go the regular way to Manila, because the roads were blocked by trees or powerlines and if not most likely to be flooded. Bridges were damaged and secundary roads jammed by traffic. I'm not sure but I think we went all the way around Laguna-lake the eastern way to reach Manila.
Manila was chaos as well. Large areas of the lower city were flooded not only by the rising seawater entering the Pasig-river, but also by the rainwater coming down the other way from the lake.
I was surprised by the speed and imperturbable commitment by which the damage was repaired. Back to normal live.
It was late in the afternoon when we reached the Manila boundry and it wasn't untill seven before we reached Ermita. The recepcion in the Mabini hotel told me that Mr. Vance didn't pick up his key to his room.
I didn't feel much like going out in this outfit and these weather conditions. I booked a room and enjoyed a good sleep.
