Looking Back
Red pants for a revolution?
By Ambeth Ocampo
Inquirer
First Posted 23:19:00 11/29/2007
Filed Under: history, Personalities
Ten years ago, during a commemoration of Bonifacio Day at the Liwasang Bonifacio, I sat in the crowd amused that then-Mayor Alfredo Lim and Vice Mayor Lito Atienza had to wear historical straw hats with the top side turned up and marked with a bloody red KKK logo. As the government officials where all in formal attire, the Katipunero hat became anachronistic and ridiculous.
National Artist Nick Joaquin was in the audience, quiet and surly because he was roused from bed early and was not given the consolation of a cold bottle of San Miguel beer. He scowled. He glared. He demanded, “Where are the masses?” Nick repeated the question louder, but nobody paid any attention.
The question triggered an overflow of textbook information. I remembered “Great Plebeian,” but didn’t quite know what a plebeian was because “plebe” seems to be a word used in the Philippine Military Academy and university fraternities in a different context.
I looked at the dignified image of Andres Bonifacio standing in front of the Manila Post Office: The sculptor Guillermo Tolentino had cast him in bronze, handsome and brave, garbed in an embroidered barong Tagalog. He has shoes, and comes armed with both pistol and bolo. What happened to the man in the white camisa de chino, the shirt open to his navel revealing some very desirable “six-pack” abs. That older image of Bonifacio had the red pants folded up to reveal he was barefoot. His only weapon was a bolo, his other hand usually held the waving flag of the Katipunan aloft. Which image was accurate? Which was a representation of the man and the ideals he espoused?
Joaquin growled again, “Where are the masses?” They were not there.
Today at key points in the country -- Liwasang Bonifacio in Manila, the Bonifacio Monument in Caloocan City (now more popularly known as “Monumento”), in all the places with schools and streets and hospitals named after him, even the place outside Maragondon, Cavite where he was said to have been executed --there will be some sort of official commemoration today. The masses may be absent for the hero of the masses, but we should try and recall Bonifacio, the Revolution and our history. That is what the non-working holiday is all about.
I ask my students at the beginning of each semester to draw Jose Rizal and Bonifacio, if only to see what they have learned and retained from kindergarten. I noticed this year that many students drew our heroes to look like Japanese “manga” heroes. Rizal is almost always shown in profile because he is copied off the one peso coin. This semester because of the aggressive marketing of potato chips, Rizal looks like the man in the Pringles package. Bonifacio, on the other hand, has no iconic distinguishing physical features, so we make up with bolo, “cedula” [residence tax certificate] and flag. This year I noticed that Bonifacio was drawn with a cow, either riding it or standing next to it. When I asked my students if they meant a cow or a carabao, the students laughed nervously, realizing that since that these creatures are slow, Bonifacio would not have taken one during the Revolution.
I recall an interview with a descendant of a revolucionario that shattered my stereotype image of him in the camisa and red pants. This descendant asked me five times for the color of Bonifacio’s pants (“Ano’ng kulay ng pantalon ni Bonifacio?”). Five times, in between stories, I answered that red was the color of Bonifacio’s pants. I felt the interview was useless and that my informant was probably senile, and yet this repeated query was meant to establish a point. Asked the same questions for the sixth time, I answered politely “Pula po. Why do you keep asking a question I have answered five times already?”
Then she asked the P1-million question that changed my life. Looking me in the eye, she asked, “Ikaw, Ambeth, kung lalaban ka sa rebolusyon, magsusuot ka ba ng pulang pantalon?” [“You, Ambeth, if you were to fight in a revolution, would you wear red pants?”] Would I wear red pants to the revolution? I resisted the urge to answer, “Bakit hindi?” [“Why not?”]
She explained that the battles were fought in wooded areas, so it was logical to wear something that would blend with the foliage: green, brown, even black. But wearing those screaming red pants would make Bonifacio an easy target. He would have gotten shot during the first encounter and would not have survived to fight another day.
This made me realize that even in historical representation, common sense is not common.
I shared this useless information with the descendants of Jose Rizal during a family lunch, leading one grandniece to exclaim: “So that’s what happened! After they made the red pants, they discovered they had enough red cloth left over to craft the KKK flag!”
A swift reply came from the other end of the table: “Of course not, they made the flag first and when they discovered they had extra cloth they fashioned them into those famous red pants!”
Imagine the Rizal descendants one afternoon debating which came first, the pants or the flag?
We will never know the answer to what is yet another senseless question, but often questions can be more engaging than the answers. National holidays are meant to make us remember, to think, to reflect on an event or person who made us what we are today.
Use the holiday well before you trek to the mall.
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Comments are welcome at aocampo@ateneo.edu.
More Inquirer columns
Previous columnsf:
CAPS – 11/28/07
The Filipino who would be white – 11/22/07
Old but timely reports – 11/20/07
A visit to Rome – 11/13/07
Preparing for death – 11/02/07
A Halloween tale – 10/31/07
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