Despedida!!

Part of the Filipino tradition is to have a party for any member of the family or community that is going away for an extended period of time. This tradition is called the Despedida party, and in the Visayas part of the country, it means lots of coconut wine, a heap of rice and shrimp, and a ton of laughter. This past Sunday, I hosted my Despedida party at the guardhouse for fisherfolks and others here whom I have worked with over the past couple years. Despedida parties are usually on dry land in a big barangay hall or somebody’s house, and although it made logistics a little more tricky, I thought that it only made sense to have the going away party at the place where the men and I have worked together tying bamboo and chatting and feeding fish for the past couple months. (It also cuts down on random freeloaders coming by to eat to have the party in the middle of the ocean on a floating platform.) The party was scheduled to start at 9:00 a.m. but it just wouldn’t have seemed right to start it on time, so, as usual here, everybody began rolling in at about 10:30. Most of the association members came about that time, holding a gallon of coconut wine in one hand, a Tupperware of rice in the other.

 One friend of mine from the local high school brought a bowl of eel cooked in coconut milk that his wife had sent for me. Several of the members who didn’t bring their own food began fishing with a piece of nylon thread, hook and nail for sinker when they arrived, and by 11:30, they had caught several more fish, one of which was over 3 pounds, to add to the food for the day. The weather was nice, and all day we talked and ate and drank as the guardhouse gently rocked on the current. My supervisor, Nimfa came around lunch time with a couple other women, a large box of rice in tow, along with shrimp, Kamote, and Cooked Pork. In all, we probably had around 15 gallons of coconut wine between the 40 people at the celebration as well, all of which was consumed by 5:00 p.m. when most of us went home. One really neat thing that I saw was everyone talking. We had persons from the local government, the regional government office, the high school and the fisherfolks association all at the party, all talking and eating together. I feel that in this place, people from differing socio-economic background aren’t accustomed to ‘hang out’, but at the Despedida, they did, and they all seemed to enjoy it.

Amongst the spread of food and wine was a huge case of coke, 12-1.5 liter bottles for the celebration, which I found out later had been a contribution of the fisherfolks themselves. Each man gave around 25 pesos to purchase it. When I asked a couple of the guys about the big case of coke, some of the fishermen just smiled, and didn’t say anything, winking. It really struck me as special that these guys who make less in a month than I will be making in a day put in for such an extravagant gift. Twelve bottles of coke isn’t a big deal in most situations, but it was to me at the Despedida. They all know by now that I am returning next week to wealth that they will never experience, and comfort that they will never have the privilege to feel. The men ask me when I will return and if I can come back to harvest fish with them. They want to send coconut wine and dried squid back with me, along with coconuts and pineapples. They get it. They know I’ll probably not be back, at least any time soon, that we’ll have sparse correspondence if any at all, but they still ask, just making small talk.

As an afternoon wind began to blow and the guardhouse platform began to rock a bit more, most of the guests stumbled onto boats and headed back to the mainland. Some of the fisherfolks stayed at the platform until 2 a.m. the next morning, laughing and singing and drinking more coconut wine.