The Ubi Festival in My Mind and Knowing the Purple Root that Made Us Who We Are
When the ubi is taken care of, harvest will be bountiful.
Close your eyes. Can you still smell it? Not perfume. Not anything from a bottle. But that warm, sweet, earthy perfume that rises the moment a fresh kinampay is broken open — fragrant, violet, almost like it remembers the rain.
That smell is my childhood. That smell is Baclayon.
Once upon a time, when my parents and grandparents were still with us, ubi was plenty. It was not a delicacy. It was life itself. The Eagle Line and the Ford Fierra were the workhorses of Baclayon Trading. Four times they climbed the hills of Cambanac and Laya, groaning under sacks of ubi, bringing down our share — one-third of the harvest.
The rest came from Kanggining, where Iyo Usting, my grandfather’s brother, farmed with his hands in the soil.
People then did not just plant. They tilled — slowly, reverently. Because to them, ubi was sacred. My Lola Danday told it plainly: ubi sustained them during the war.
When rice was gone, when stores were empty, when fear sat at every table, it was ubi dug from the dark earth that kept families alive. Mothers boiled it in silence. Children ate it and lived another day. That is why ubi was never thrown, never wasted, never taken for granted.
It was stored in a clean and airy place — in the hanggerahan and in the silong, beneath houses built on stilts. Duna pay silong. Mahulog gani ang ubi, pahawkan gyud. Yes, if an ubi fell, you picked it up gently. You honored it. Because you knew what it had cost to grow, and what it had saved.
There are many kinds of ubi, but I grew up knowing four by heart, the way you know the names of your cousins:
Kabus-ok: round, clean-skinned, heavy and honest in the hand; – Balagonon: long and sturdy, for lagatlaton ug bungoton; Tamisan: purple, but without aroma; Kinampay: the queen of them all, with an inviting aroma like no other
There was no weighing scale then. Kay wa may timbangan. Sharing was classified according to the type of crop — by eye, by feel, by trust. And no one felt cheated. Because everyone knew: what you held in your hands was not just food. It was someone’s sweat, someone’s season, someone’s survival. That was the product of old times: not just ubi, but honesty. Not just harvest, but pakig-ambit — sharing.
Nothing tastes best among the crops, except ubi.
Six towns are famous for ubi in Bohol: Panglao, Dauis, Baclayon, Albur, Tagbilaran, and Corella. Do you know why? It is because of the an-an — that lowly black berry that nobody cares about at present. As children, we went to the interior barangays of Baclayon, picking wild berries in abundance, carrying a Tanduay bottle full of ripe berries. We shook the bottle to drink the juice before eating the thin meat.
Those seeds cannot germinate until eaten by birds, passing through their stomachs. The waste of the birds scattered and germinated. That is what makes our kinampay different. It is not just soil. It is not just seed. It is a whole world working together — bird, berry, forest, farmer, and faith — for generations. When we lose the forest, when we lose the birds, we do not just lose a plant. We lose the taste itself. We lose the story.
Planting Season for the ubi
Sa panahon sa kalag-kalag, panahon sa pagtilaw. All Souls’ Day was not only for remembering the dead. It was for tasting. For bringing out the best ubi — boiled, steamed, made into binukag — and sharing it with family who came home, with neighbors, with the souls we loved.
But that tradition is slowly vanishing. Kay gamay na gyud ang ubi. Wala nay mga nag-uma and most lands are converted into subdivisions.
Today we plant ubi right in our own backyard, using binhi from the harvest of previous years and one kilo bought from the tabo. It is so expensive now. The demand is high and the supply is low. What was once abundant is now almost a luxury. What was once given freely is now counted by the kilo.
Ang eskado napuno ug binukag ubi duol sa timbangan. The stall filled with binukag ubi near the weighing scale. Binukag ang ubi atubang sa copras duol sa timbangan.
That was not just a market. That was our town square. Our meeting place. Our classroom. There, children learned the names of crops, the honesty of trade, the stories of their elders.
Now the Taboan group is gathering together with Bahandi and the Greeners of 1995, sharing our dreams of a Green Baclayon. The young generation of Bahandi and Greeners are sharing the dream of preserving the mercado and the traditions and culture that go with it.
We can dream of ubi festivals and other festivals showcasing the crops and crafts of old Baclayon.
This is such a small voice and a small dream — to be free to dance and sing to the town we so love.
To the Young: This Is Yours Now
To the youth reading this, listen with your heart:
Do not let ubi become just a flavor in a cake mix from somewhere else. Do not let it become just a word in a history book.
Ubi is our cultural heritage. It is how our grandparents survived war. It is how our town learned patience, gratitude, and sharing. It is a living bridge between the bird in the sky, the berry in the forest, the farmer in the hill, and the child in the market.
You do not need a big farm to begin. Plant one in your backyard. Save one binhi. Ask your Lola how she cooked it. Visit the tabo and buy from a local farmer. Learn the names — kabus-ok, balagonon, tamisan, kinampay — and say them like a prayer.
Because if we do not plant now, there will be nothing left to taste at Kalag-kalag. Nothing left to dance for. Nothing left to remember. But if we plant now — even just one — the aroma of kinampay will return. And with it, the Baclayon we once knew, and the Baclayon we still dream of.
Let us not be the generation that let ubi disappear. Let us be the generation that brought it home.
Ubi is a source of life and abundance.