‘Eruption and Exodus’

Thirty-five years ago, in August 1991, a piece of mine in the Inquirer, “Yamot is in the heart,” was used as the foreword for the book “Eruption and Exodus: Mount Pinatubo and the Aytas of Zambales.” I treasure the book published by Lubos na Alyansa ng mga Katutubong Ayta ng Sambales, a people’s organization I have kept in touch with for many years. My copy came with the signatures of Ayta leaders. The book, mainly edited by the Franciscan Missionaries of Mary (FMM), was launched at the Cultural Center of the Philippines with the Aytas attending in their native attire.

With stories and photographs, the book chronicles the lives of an Ayta community in Sitio Yamot in Botolan, Zambales, where the FMM sisters lived and worked closely with the Aytas. It tells the story of how, as a community, the Aytas survived the volcanic eruption—after some 460 years of dormancy—that changed the landscape of several provinces in Central Luzon.

Having visited Yamot several times before the eruption and having followed their journey to find a new home, I somehow feel I am part of their story.

(It has been 35 years this year, 2026, since that “world-class” eruption that was like no other in the world in modern history, but today, the event comes alive again in me.)

Here are a few excerpts from my “Eruption and Exodus” foreword with some revisions:

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Yamot is gone. Buried under a sea of volcanic ash.

Nine years ago (1982!), I stayed with an Ayta community in Sitio Yamot in Poonbato in Botolan, Zambales. It was a memorable stay. I didn’t take a bath for three days because there was no bathing water. The nearest spring was a hill away. And although “the dark, curly-haired, barefoot little people” regularly went down the ridge and up the craggy hill to fetch water, I couldn’t go because I thought I’d need climbing shoes.

I stayed with the FMM sisters, who, at that time, had been there for only about a year. The sisters lived in a grass shack, which was clean and orderly inside. We ate with our hands and slept on the bamboo floor. We laughed a lot. I sang vespers with them. I had known them long enough to consider them great friends.

There was enough water to drink, because every three days, the sisters would go to the parish convent, which was an hour away via very rough terrain, to take a bath and load potable water on a decrepit World War II weapons carrier.

I stayed long enough to photograph and write a magazine feature about how the sisters and the Aytas lived in community. I discovered how scheming, fair-skinned middlemen bought the Aytas’ bananas at rock-bottom prices. I learned how hurt they were when a government worker said at a meeting, “Sa Bagong Lipunan wala nang bahag-bahag. Kakahiya,” (in the New Society, there should be no more G-strings. What a shame) after which an Ayta stood up to answer: “Bakit kakahiya ang bahag? Kahit ako nakabahag hindi naman ako lumalabag sa batas.”

The sisters did not come to Yamot to Christianize. They taught the Aytas how to care for their bodies and keep diseases away. They taught them how to count, read and write, reason out, and not be cheated. They did not start with ABC. They started with the letter L for lota (land) and D for damowag (carabao). How much is one banana, how much should they sell 100 bananas for?

I left Yamot with a bottle of wild honey and a wild orchid an Ayta brought down from a tall tree. I also still have the bow and arrows they sent me later.

I went back to Yamot after two years, and I did not recognize what I saw. The place was throbbing with life. The huts were abloom with orchids. The surroundings were very, very clean, and the sisters’ grass shack had expanded to accommodate meetings. And a water pipe had been installed! Actually, I went there to snoop on and write about the US marines who were camped out in the area for their “war games.” An Ayta guided me through the bushes and to the camp sites.

A few days after the volcano vomited fire and brimstone, I got a call from the Franciscan sisters who asked me to come. After a circuitous trip, I found them in an evacuation center. Far from the volcano’s reach. With the volcanic debris continuously tearing down everything in its way, the people of Yamot have had to transfer every so often. They would pitch their tents, flee, then pitch their tents again. They had been to 10 evacuation centers before they decided on their final destination.

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It was the Aytas and one of the Franciscan sisters with a science background who first alerted the authorities about Mount Pinatubo’s unusual behavior. She even came to my house to tell me about it. No one listened at first. And then, boom! The Asian sky darkened for days. And the rest is history.

I still have the pumice rocks (volcanic debris) the Aytas delivered in sacks, to my surprise, for my garden.

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