When I got home in 1994, World Cup fever was in the air, recalls Fr Bernard Steed. Jack and his men were heading for the US boosted by a great wave of enthusiasm and hopes of glory from the entire population.
It was then that a young relation, having a summer job with a drinks company, presented me with a sports shirt, compliments of his employer, emblazoned with a Tricolour and the Stars and Stripes. It was a beautiful green colour with the logo of the donor embroidered on it. I could not but be infected with the spirit of the time.
That World Cup came and went and even another and the same shirt was still in use. The shirt itself was made from some everlasting synthetic material but alas after many washings and tropical sun and rains on the island of Mindanao the original colour had faded into many different hues – it could be truly called 40 shades of green. While it was still serviceable, it could be passed without any great regrets, to a more deserving party. Nothing, even if half usable, was ever thrown away.
Enter Behis, the only name she was known by. A widow who was wretchedly poor with little or no means and sadly with no great reputation for honesty – the price of her impoverished state.
The mercado or market building, which is a big tin roofed building to keep out the sun and rain and with many rows of stalls, is the centre of life, news, rumour and gossip in the towns and communities. Most shopped every day because refrigeration was not widespread. All domestic needs could be purchased here from clothing to fish, from meat, veg and household goods – and there was always plenty of haggling.
The market vendors, mostly women, can be very charitable and helpful to the needy but are also a shrewd lot and can size up a prospective customer instantly and anyone they perceive to be a little light-fingered they keep an eye on. Poor Behis fell into this category, so it was after a fruitless trawl through the market one morning she arrived at the parish office.
It was the wet season and while not cold, it was overcast and a bit clammy and Behis just stood there saying nothing looking absolutely miserable and a little shivery. My first thought was that the world cup shirt could be taken out of retirement. So, I fetched it and with delight in her eyes Behis put it on over her threadbare dress.
With the glass door of a cabinet serving as a mirror she admired herself and primped herself with a few helpful suggestions from the secretary and with a lightness of step and head in the air went straight to the merkado to parade her good fortune for all to see.
But on entering the market building and in spite of the best laid plans disaster struck. Behis came face to face with her nemesis – no other than Baricuatra the labandera, washerwoman, who prided herself with having the parish washing among her clientele for her laundry services.
Recognising the shirt that was being paraded, she immediately went into the attack. The words “kawatan ka” – “you’re a thief!” rang out like a pistol shot. Immediately all activity stopped and a deathly silence pervaded the market building while the two combatants faced off. Not being present myself at the altercation I had to rely on several different eyewitness reports as to what ensued.
All this was happening during a time of certain fear and insecurity because of the situation in the area with neighbouring places experiencing armed incursions. So people were ready for some entertainment and diversion and what better opportunity than two of the local ladies engaged in a shouting match. A crowd gathered around.
By all accounts Behis stood her ground and did not back down before this assault on her new-found dignity, rejecting such insinuations on her character loudly proclaiming to all that the garment in question was an unsolicited gift. How long the parley went on for I do not know but eventually after a few more insults were traded, and no doubt egged on by the audience, Baricuatra announced that she was going straight to the parish office to check the story at source.
But when she got to the office she learned that the shirt in question had indeed been donated to Behis who was a worthy recipient. Baricuatra now had a problem of her own, namely, how to achieve the recovery of “lost face” – embarrassment at making a fool of herself. A loss of face in that culture can be difficult to overcome, so all this good woman could mutter was something to the effect that Behis would have stolen it given half a chance.
No more has heard about this affair and normal activity resumed in the market building – radios were switched back on, bargaining resumed, news and gossip traded. Life went on as before in spite of an underlying air of unease about the bad things that were happening in places around them.
Since that time several more World Cups have come and gone, and I am sure that shirt is still giving service and I can only guess what colour it has graduated to now! That dispute is long over and chances are the two people at the centre of the row are now the best of friends. Greater difficulties that arise in life have a strange way of healing hurt feelings.