Riding with Legends

What to do when face to face with deities?

Light votive candles? Prostrate at their feet? Do a Kris and pull their legs, telling them they’re the best? Or bite your tongue, all the while hoping they acknowledge you exist and talk to you first? Put simply, how do you comport yourself in the presence of an ethnic fusion god and old school rakenrol goddess? In short, what do you do when you realize you are riding in a van with Lolita Carbon and Joey Ayala?

This is star-struck 101. This is the slip of idol worship. This is what happens when you are overwhelmed with amazement. But this is just in medias res.

It starts three weeks earlier. I come to Bohol to visit familiar faces, check out hyped places. My friends and I drive around, look around, weave stories, trade gossips, reconstruct memories. I get to know who’s doing what and who’s with who. Then I learn one friend is the editor of a local lifestyle magazine. She invites me to write a feature, I promise to return.

So I come back like MacArthur. As I get off the Ocean Jet, eyes still bleary from lack of sleep, I get my instructions. My friends are either sick or busy, they cannot come, I go alone. Someone will pick me up at a place called SLAO. I am bound for Danao.

The van arrives and I jump in, fingering my pockets as the door closes. Cellphone, check. Digicam, check. Wallet, check. I stretch my legs, close my eyes, pray that sleep is quick. I hear voices, snippets of conversations, muffled laughter. I try to ignore, I toss and turn, I turn around. Then I see them. They, too, are headed for Danao. They are the guests of honor, main acts of the free concert for the launch of Danao’s latest attractions. I am just a lucky hitchhiker.

Joey Ayala

Joey Ayala is talking about cultural relativity and the hegemony of Western values. He wonders why we adopt traditions and ways of thinking that are foreign and contradictory to our own. He argues that what may be evil to some is good to others, so that while Westerners find the giving of “tong” a form of corruption, Filipinos traditionally regard it as a practical manifestation of one’s appreciation for a received favor. Aside from being an icon of musical innovation, Joey Ayala is also a champion of thinking outside the pre-formed socio-cultural restrictions. My fascination grows by the minute.

During the concert later that night, Joey takes off his shoes. Filipinos should not wear shoes, he quips, because it’s so humid in our country wearing shoes only makes our feet sweaty, causing them to stink. He says he’s not normal, that something is askew with his brain. But it’s okay that he’s a bit loose in the head, he jests, because it’s partly the secret of his talent. In between songs he tells stories about the common folks he’s met, and at one point expresses his wish that the people of Danao will not be corrupted by the vices that plague places where tourism has gone out of hand. He even asks, ever so subtly so as not to ruffle sensibilities, whether tourism is indeed a good thing. He ends his set by playing the song “Agila” as a cautionary tale.

rakenrol goddess

Inside the van, while Joey is talking, my mind keeps drifting to Lolita Carbon. She doesn’t say much, but every time she speaks her husky voice commands attention. Hers is the voice that rocks the world of the masa. Hers is the voice that says rakista. Hers is the voice I have fallen in love with, the very voice that immortalized my favorite OPM.

The moment Lolita and her band take the stage, they remind everyone what rock and roll is all about. Forget about the newfangled woozy bands that dominate the airwaves nowadays, forget about the poseurs that pass themselves off as rockers. Lolita Carbon is the real thing, her band is the real thing, and seeing them play live is the ultimate experience. Lolita growls like no other, her guitarist (Jazz Almonacid) does licks that are reminiscent of the antics of guitar heroes of yore, and her drummer (Ammi Maranan) bashes the skins like Armageddon is just around the corner, hitting with abandon everything within reach, including the amps, the floor of the stage, the posts of the makeshift tent, even the trunk of the nearby coconut tree.

drummer extraordinaire

As Lolita begins to sing “Himig ng Pag-ibig,” the world around me runs to a standstill. I sit mesmerized, hanging on to every word, every note. This is the love song of all love songs, a love song for everyone. The lyrics speak of a longing as timeless as it is poignant, of sentiments that can only spring from a heart whose love is pure. It is so melodic mothers can sing it to their babies, yet it is this very simplicity, Lolita earlier tells me, that belies the intricacy of its composition. When at the end of the song she mentions my name, saying she hopes I like it, I feel like kissing her feet.

In the overall scheme of things, we are but specks in the vastness of an indifferent universe, a presence so close to absence we come and go with nary a trace, save perhaps for a name on a tombstone and a faint recollection in someone’s reminiscence. But some of us loom larger than everyone else, filling up the empty spaces, showing us there’s more to life than the prospect of nothingness, telling us it’s possible to break out of our paltry selves and aspire for greatness.

In the end, great artists like Lolita Carbon and Joey Ayala are there to remind us that deep inside we really are gods and goddesses.