HANSEL AND GRETEL IN LEYTE

One of the areas in my research on traditional healers was Leyte. Somehow I managed to coax my good friend and former classmate, Vic,  to serve as my interviewer/translator. 

I used the snowball technique in locating healers. All interviews and observations went well until we went to see Mang Teroy…

Ours was an unannounced visit, but Mang Teroy agreed to be interviewed after Vic explained our purpose. He was about 5 ft. tall, about 65 years old, a bit on the squat side, with dark skin and balding head. His neat bamboo and nipa hut lay at the center of the yard which was, to my estimate, more than 1,000 square meters. There were mango trees, papaya, and coconut trees. There were loose but friendly dogs and some chickens. 

We were invited to enter his house and were led past the small living room-cum-healing area to the veranda.  Though I could speak only a few phrases in Waray, I could understand the dialect. 

Towards the middle of Mang Teroy’s story-telling, a woman in her 20s came with her son who was about 5 years old. What luck! We would also get to observe his healing technique. He told the boy to sit on a bamboo stool in the living room. Then he started to light the charcoal which he placed in a coconut shell (bao), sprinkled some dried herbs on it and waited until there was smoke. He sat in front of the boy to start his rituals… and my heart almost stopped! Horror of horrors! He made an inverted sign of the cross, starting from his solar plexus to his forehead, to his right shoulder and finally to his left. He was using “dark forces” for his healing!

“Vic, alis na tayo. Ngayon na! (Vic, we have to leave fast. Now!), I frantically whispered to him.

“Baliw ka. Di pa tapos ang interview” (You’re crazy. The interview isn’t over yet), Vic answered. His irritation was obvious. “May toilet naman siguro dito (There might be a toilet here), he added, thinking that I just needed to use the bathroom.

“Now na! Bilis! Sabihin mo, babalik na lang tayo” (Now! Hurry! Just ell him we’ll come back). My hands were getting clammy from fear.

Mercifully, Vic got up, as if exasperated with a child, approached Mang Teroy and bade for us a hasty farewell and thanks. It took a lot of effort for me not to break into a run once we reached the bottom of the bamboo stairs.

After a few meters, I told him what I saw. He said something in Waray which to me sounded like an expletive. He made the proper Sign of the Cross, reached for my hand and practically dragged me to the road on a half-run half-walk. We probably looked like overgrown and over-aged Hansel and Gretel running away from the wicked witch!

        We hailed a tricycle and told the driver to bring us to the jeepney terminal. The driver must have thought us eccentric because once we were seated, Vic and I started laughing our fears away.