Baklas, Calaca, Batangas: Historical Data
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| Historical data from the National Library of the Philippines. |
Full transcription of the so-called “Historical Data” for the barrio of Baklas in the Municipality of Calaca, Batangas, the original scanned documents at the National Library of the Philippines Digital Collections not having OCR or optical character recognition properties. This transcription has been edited for grammar, spelling and punctuation where possible. The original pagination is provided for citation purposes.
[p. 1]
PART I. HISTORY AND CULTURAL LIFE OF BARRIO BAKLAS
The present official name of the barrio is BAKLAS.
The popular name of the barrio since its establishment in 1941 is Baklas, which means “Baklas,” a Tagalog term meaning eroded.
Only one family originated in this place. It is the Casanova family. The teniente of the barrio from the earliest time to date is Dionisio Casanova.
This place was still a wilderness during the Spanish occupation and was the hideout of the Filipino Insurrectos. During the American occupation, the place was still uninhabited, except in 1941 when the Casanova family settled in the place.
During World War II, the barrio was made the headquarters of the guerrilla unit under Capt. F. Gagalac. The people helped the guerrillas by supplying them with food and clothing together with the neighboring barrios. At the latter part of the Japanese occupation, the Japanese soldiers looted the people’s belongings.
PART II. FOLKWAYS
It is the common practice of the barrio people to call for “quacks” when a mother delivers a baby, that is, when the mother and child are doing well. The baptismal party, which is a grand one, is given by the parents when the baby is baptized. Oftentimes, parents interfere with the courtships of their sons. The parents usually arrange for the marriage and often, without the knowledge of the bride-to-be.
The common belief is that the world was created by God, so with the trees, animals, rivers, moon, stars, lakes, etc. According to their belief, lightning and thunder, rain, wind, storms and other natural phenomena are under the care of God and San Lorenzo. The first man and woman were Adam and Eve. It is the belief that Adam was created alone but he felt lonely, therefore, God created Eve as Adam’s wife and companion. The birth of twins, especially when one is a boy and the other is a girl, means good luck to the family. Sickness such as headache, light fever and other minor sicknesses are created by persons possessed of powers called “ungab” or “gaboy,” and the person with such power is called “manggagahoy.” They believe in witches and “anting-anting.” Many influential men of the barrio are said to possess “anting-anting.”
The Tagalog folklores, called “Palasintahan” are the popular songs. Softball is very popular among youngsters, while cockfighting is the favorite amusement of the old folks.
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Riddles are very popular in the place. One of their favorite riddles is the following:
Butas-butas ang ding-ding.
The people indulge also in proverbs and sayings, such as
Buti pa ang kubong nataha’y tao, etc.
The people still follow the method of measuring time by the position of the sun. Most folkways and ways of living of the people are similar to those living in Living na Matanda.