Ang monumento - public art or public squalor?
Posted by: Fats in: Fats, Vitamins & Minerals > Wika at Hirap > Media Watch
There is a Filipino joke/riddle that goes: “Konting bato, konting semento, pinatuyo: monumento” (a bit of rock, a bit of cement, let dry: monument.)
The monument (from Latin monere meaning “to remind”) is supposed to be something set up to keep alive the memory of a person or event, as a tablet, statue or other. I don’t know where the old joke/riddle above came from but it seemed to reflect a cynicism towards the modern tradition of monuments in public space.
(Photo: The UNESCO Heritage Site Monument in Vigan City, Ilocos Sur).
A few months ago I went to my mother’s hometown Vigan to see how the prestigious title of Unesco World Heritage Site has changed people’s lives. I also asked the Biguenos about the benefits of such prestige. The responses I received were all negative, cynical - from the rich families to the workers to the lowest in the economic and social class - the title simply gave funds for the local officials to squander. And in memory of this great squander, is the Vigan World Heritage Monument, a great public squalor. It was the most deplorable sight that I have ever seen.
The Monument may look grand in the photo, but that is what all these representations are supposed to do - impart that monumental feeling - but like tombstones, they actually serve as markers and covers for the corruption and death of living culture it has destroyed and buried under the ground.
For some of the Biguenos I spoke to, the death is real: they mourn it and they try to forget the grief in the struggle for daily survival. For the poor Biguenos, this is the way, and for the richer ones, they have fled to Manila, other cities in the country or overseas. They have no ambition of bringing up their families in the prestige of culture that has changed their dreams of Vigan forever.
I’m really sorry, but this is the reality of “cultural heritage.”
