The Burial Beat

I ended the year covering the Bersamin murder in Abra. During our last day there, I told Andy, Why do all my coverage in Abra always end in the cemetery? He said, that's all we need to cover here. Which is unfair to Abra and its wonderful people except for some hideous ones. Now I jsut covered the simultaneous burial of the 12 teenagers in Beckel.

Here's my story:

LA TRINIDAD, Benguet -- Seventy-eight year old Juanito Maranes, a mambunong or indigenous spiritual leader, invoked the gods to watch over the parents and siblings of Arnel Marino, 18, and his sister Jessica , 17, who wewre among the twelve "kabarkadas" who died when their jeep smashed into a trailer truck in Bauang, La Union during the dawn of January 3.
The 12 were simultaneously buried moments before noon yesterday in sitio Obulan here in Beckel barangay, except for Alex William, Jr, who drove the ill-fated jeepney. William was buried later in the afternoon.
Maranes was unusually stoic considering that he is the great-grandfather of ten of the 12 victims. The other great-grandchildren are Jay Boy Dudun, Reggie and Hazel Antonio, Arlene and Manilyn Sapitula, Rick Tomas, Lea Bastian and William. Neighbors Roby Jean Javier and Reynaldo Anuran were also buried near their houses in Obulan.
"I prayed that whatever good luck they have left be given to their parents and siblings," said Maranes.
The dead were all buried in the traditional Ibaloi burial rites, Maranes said.
"If the dead is young, he should be buried at about 10:00 am till noon," he said.
The old people are buried at about 2 p.m. The Marinos are also buried in solid pine wood. Upon burial, the nails were pulled out with a crowbar because it is unfortunate to leave them in the coffins. Maranes even had the coffins reopened after entered into the tombs because the death blankets on their chests were not properly set down.
Pigs were butchered for the dead while two chickens were sacrificed later for the living, said Maranes. Plates of rice and pork with cups of broth were offered separately for those who died peacefully and those who died violently.
Days later, a canao would be held for the parents with the butcher of two more pigs and five to six months later, a tayaw would be again be held.
The burials here in Obulan seemed to have been taken from Atom Egoyan's movie, "The Sweet Hereafter" about a town similarly devastated with the death of 20 youths in a bus crash. But unlike that movie were the people are angry over their deaths, the relatives here are more frustrated and helpless.
The teenagers came from a beach outing in Bauang, using the money they earned from caroling here in Beckel.
"Maybe dome of them were a bit drunk but let's not take that against all of them," said a former high-school friend of Jessica.
Jessica was transferred by his parents from a high school here to a school in Nueva Vizcaya because of barkada problems, she said. But because it was the Christmas break, she came back and unfortunately she died.
Two of their 13 friends who survived attended the burials.
Benguet Gov. Borromeo Melchor said that the famileis were automatically given a sack of rice and they are now preparing to give them financial assistance worth P180,000. The local government is also paying for the hospitalization of the survivors. They have also set up a fundraising campaign for the victims, Melchor said.
Melchor said that he will also consult with the other mambunongs if it is necessary to have a ritual to stop the spate of vehicular accidents that occurred at the start of the year. 12 hours after the Bauang accident, a jeepney along the Marcos Highway in Baguio turned turtle. Fortunately, the 14 people on board were not seriously injured.
On New Year's Eve, Cone Cosme was killed and four others injured when their vehicle fell into a 100-meter ravine along Halsema Highway. Two days later, a pickup carrying vegetables also turned turtle near the Lion's Head along Kennon Road injuring the three people on board.