I am posting in my blog with the writer's consent selected ethnography penned creatively by my students to contribute to the emerging sub-discipline of anthropology called 'Virtual Ethnography'.
Basically, virtually ethnography is also referred to as Webnography. We cannot deny the fact that with increasing use of technology and the Internet, there is now a demand for online spaces on various ethnographic accounts.
By Lianne Kristel Belamide
A Trip to Laguna
This year’s holy week wasn’t any different from the previous holy weeks in the past years of my life. Having been raised in a non-Catholic church I didn’t grow up observing the Lenten Season. Nevertheless, living in a Christian country like ours, people’s activities during this season is ubiquitous.
I spent the ‘Holy Week’ In Manila because of the summer classes. As soon as the holiday started, together with my closest friends, we hit the road and went to Laguna. The traffic was horrendous but after an almost two and a half hours of traveling we got to Pansol where different resorts are adjacent to one another. It took us another half an hour to look for a resort because most of them are already crowded. We decided to go a little farther and were glad enough to discover this resort right at the foot of a mountain.
The place was wonderful. There were three swimming pools. Blooming colorful bougainvilleas were everywhere and the air was simply and undoubtedly fresh. The view was breathtaking.
After settling in, we decided to explore the place. Groups of families where everywhere in the cabanas and benches. There were lots of kids running around. The smell of inihaw na isda was lingering in the area. This somehow brought me back to my usual itinerary every summer.
When I was young it has been a tradition for my family to visit my grandparents every summer. It always happens that it was during the holy week. Whenever I visit my grandparents I somehow became aware of the activities that they practice during this ‘special’ season.
It’s wonderful how my family doesn’t really argue and talk about how different our religions are. My grandparents didn’t ask us to join them whenever they go to masses. I was aware that the holy week starts with Palm Sunday which honors the beginning of Christ’s suffering.
In the Filipino Catholic tradition people make palm branches and wave them as they sing songs of praises. My grandparents would also go to Triduum Masses all week long. During twilight of every day, my grandmother, together with a group of people, would chant the Christ’s passion until Black Saturday. It is amazing how they do all of these religiously. For the whole week, I have seen people lashed their backs with rods and let it bleed as they walk under the scorching heat of the sun. Others are busy making floats for the procession of their Saints for Good Friday. There are also SENAKULO being played in the town plaza where my grandparents would watch on Holy Wednesday and Holy Thursday. One of the most spectacular events during the holy week is the crucifixion of those people who think they have committed so many sins that they believe they need to be crucified just like Jesus.
We only spent two days at the resort and hurriedly went back home to Manila before Good Friday because we thought there would be no buses anymore. After that, my weekend was silent.
Reflection
As a believer of the Church of Christ, I don’t practice the traditional Holy Week.
However, in our church, we believe that in the bible Jesus asked us to remember Him and how He saved us from our sins through the Holy Supper (Banal na Hapunan). We celebrate this only once a year. We prepare ourselves before taking part in the Holy Supper by means of repenting our sins and renewing ourselves from our sinful life. The Holy Week is a tradition which became a part of people’s lives and the lives before them for thousands of years. This simply tells us how powerful influencing tool religion is. If we go back in history, was the holy week the same as it is now? I stumbled upon an internet article from Zenit, an international news agency which covers issues from the Catholic Church, where a posted script of the Interview with Father Juan Flores Arcas on The History of Holy Week was posted. When asked when Holy Week has been observed as such since the beginning of Christianity, he stated the following:
“The most ancient original core of Holy Week is the Easter Vigil, of which there were traces already in the second century of the Christian era. It was always a night of vigil, in remembrance and expectation of Jesus Christ's resurrection.
To it was soon added the reception of the sacraments of Christian initiation: baptism, confirmation and the Eucharist, so that it became in turn the great sacramental night of the church.”
Arcas (2006) also added that the Easter Vigil was extended in time and transformed into the triduum of the Lord's passion, death and resurrection, which St. Augustine already mentioned as a very generalized celebration. This triduum added to the existing vigil other important moments of the celebration, specifically, the memorial of the Lord's death on Good Friday, and Holy Thursday. The latter involved no fewer than three very different Eucharistic celebrations.
He mentioned in the interview that the importance of Holy Thursday was transferred to the Easter Vigil. In the present-day liturgy, Holy Thursday is when the Easter Triduum starts. It is then followed by the first day of the triddum which is Good the Friday of Passion of the Lord. A day of fasting is then followed for the Holy Saturday where there is no Eucharist on that day. And lastly, the third day of the Easter triduum begins on Sunday which is the Lord’s resurrection day.
Evidently, the celebration of the Holy Week was an evolving holy day. How people manage to keep it makes it apparent that religion really is a powerful tool in shaping a society. It is not only through the lent season that we observe how true this is. In our society, it is apparent that most people are programmed to follow and obey whatever the church says. Whatever the religion is, people comply with its system.
References:
Collins, Ken. Holy Week. Retrieved April 25,2011 from http://www.kencollins.com/holy-05.htm
Origin of Holidays – History of Easter. Retrieved April 25, 2011 from http://www.information-entertainment.com/Holidays/easter.html
Zenith daily dispatch. (2006, April 6). History of Holy Week. [Interview wih Father Juan Flores Arcas]. Retrieved from http://www.ewtn.com/library/liturgy/zholyweek.HTM
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