Echoes FromBY JOHNNY DAYANG
The Aklan Ati-Atihan
The famous Ati-Atihan of Aklan, declared by President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo as the mother of all Philippine festivals, has its “turmoil of sight and sound” in progress in Kalibo since a few days ago. The noisiest, gayest and craziest annual celebration ends Sunday, January 17, 2010.
With participants and spectators coming from distant places – including foreign tourists from Europe, South and North America, Japan, China, Korea, aside from Filipinos living abroad – Ati-Atihan 2010 can literally dwarf the New Orleans and Rio de Janeiro mardi gras in many respects.
Devotees and Aklan natives residing elsewhere make yearly homecoming to Aklan to participate in the celebration named after the Sto. Nino (Holy Child), also called Ati-Ati, a simulation of the Aeta (Ati), the black-skinned abrogines of Panay, the original celebrants.
Noted Aklanon writer and historian Roman A. dela Cruz, says Ati-Atihan which has survived through centuries, has become a byword for its “uniqueness in form, revelry but observed with piety, zeal and enthusiasm.”
Ati-Atihan participants garb themselves with colorful costumes – from the ragged to the regal, from oriental to western, and from primitive to modern,
Some of them even look like “unidentified creatures, half-naked with soot, or red with almagre, or painted with different colors – blue, green, brown or even violet.”
They perform various dances, shout, jog on the streets and plazas; beat drums, cans and pans; wave placards, blow whistles, and play musical instruments and other sound-making contraptions their ingenuity can instantly invent.
As dela Cruz rhapsodizes: “It is an eruption of the human spirit, and Kalibo, the site of Ati-Atihan, is the only place in the world flooded with humanity in Technicolor during Ati-Atihan.”
There is equality, fraternity and freedom in the celebration and when the participants meet, they simultaneously greet one another with shouts of “Viva Senor Sto. Nino or Hala Bira.”
Kalibo Mayor Raymar Acevedo Rebaldo, the festival’s principal host with Aklan Governor Carlito Marquez, Congressman Joeben Miraflores, former Congressman Allen Salas Quimpo, now president of the Northwestern Visayan Colleges, are upbeat about the success of the 2010 Ati-Atihan. Kalibo has well prepared for it.
I congratulate, however, the men and women of the Kalibo Ati-Atihan Management Board (KAMB), a coordinating body I organized in 1986, for their efforts in insuring the success of 2010 Ati-Atihan.
With participants and spectators coming from distant places – including foreign tourists from Europe, South and North America, Japan, China, Korea, aside from Filipinos living abroad – Ati-Atihan 2010 can literally dwarf the New Orleans and Rio de Janeiro mardi gras in many respects.
Devotees and Aklan natives residing elsewhere make yearly homecoming to Aklan to participate in the celebration named after the Sto. Nino (Holy Child), also called Ati-Ati, a simulation of the Aeta (Ati), the black-skinned abrogines of Panay, the original celebrants.
Noted Aklanon writer and historian Roman A. dela Cruz, says Ati-Atihan which has survived through centuries, has become a byword for its “uniqueness in form, revelry but observed with piety, zeal and enthusiasm.”
Ati-Atihan participants garb themselves with colorful costumes – from the ragged to the regal, from oriental to western, and from primitive to modern,
Some of them even look like “unidentified creatures, half-naked with soot, or red with almagre, or painted with different colors – blue, green, brown or even violet.”
They perform various dances, shout, jog on the streets and plazas; beat drums, cans and pans; wave placards, blow whistles, and play musical instruments and other sound-making contraptions their ingenuity can instantly invent.
As dela Cruz rhapsodizes: “It is an eruption of the human spirit, and Kalibo, the site of Ati-Atihan, is the only place in the world flooded with humanity in Technicolor during Ati-Atihan.”
There is equality, fraternity and freedom in the celebration and when the participants meet, they simultaneously greet one another with shouts of “Viva Senor Sto. Nino or Hala Bira.”
Kalibo Mayor Raymar Acevedo Rebaldo, the festival’s principal host with Aklan Governor Carlito Marquez, Congressman Joeben Miraflores, former Congressman Allen Salas Quimpo, now president of the Northwestern Visayan Colleges, are upbeat about the success of the 2010 Ati-Atihan. Kalibo has well prepared for it.
I congratulate, however, the men and women of the Kalibo Ati-Atihan Management Board (KAMB), a coordinating body I organized in 1986, for their efforts in insuring the success of 2010 Ati-Atihan.
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