The Cebuanos is an early Chapter From The Sign of Jonah.

by Charlie Canning

Romy was a Cebuano from Bohol who had come to Bato because none of the locals could dive. They weren’t bad fisherman with the net, but they weren’t very good with the spear gun. That had been his opportunity.

     In Bohol, there were dozens of people who could free dive. If you couldn’t go down sixty feet on a breath of air and come up with a fish or a shell, you weren’t much good. Because of this, the sea around Cebu had been picked clean. The only shells you could find in Cebu were the ones in the shops.

     Romy and his friends loaded up their boat and headed north, fishing along the way. When they found a good place with plenty of lapu-lapu and plenty of shells, they’d stay until they had either fished out the area or been forced to leave. Panay had been good but the Illongos could dive and sing pretty well too, so the gap between them hadn’t been that great. Marinduque had been better. Marinduque had been too good.

     When Romy and his friends pulled up on that first Marinduque reef, they couldn’t believe their good fortune. The big fish and the shells could be found at ten meters – they didn’t even have to use the compressor. It was like fishing before Magellan. They caught hundreds of kilos of first class fish and found shells they hadn’t seen in years. As usual, they brought their catch to a beach near the town and cut a deal with the local women to sell the fish in the market. The women came back with the money and the supplies they’d ordered. When night came, Romy and his crew made a bonfire on the beach and roasted one of the biggest fish. They got the guitars out and passed around a bottle of rum. Enrique and the others took turns singing the Cebuano songs that could bring tears to your eyes even if you didn’t know what the words meant.

     At first, the locals were happy to have the Cebuanos around. They could eat fish they hadn’t tasted in a while and there was so much seafood in the market that the price had dropped. Then there was the entertainment value. The Tagalogs had their singers too, but aside from Freddie and the blind guy from Manila, most of it was overproduced pop. And it was recorded music. The Cebuanos were the real thing.

     All seven of them could play the guitar and sing. In Bohol, this was nothing extraordinary. Like free diving, it was just something you learned to do. Enrique was exceptional, however. Everyone who heard him thought so. Soon he had a following and there were people coming out from the town in the evening just to hear him sing. Once that happened, Romy knew that their days in Marinduque were about to end.

     They didn’t have many rules on the boat but one of them was well established: No married women. It was one of the Biblical prohibitions that never changed no matter how modern the world got. Messing around with another man’s wife would get you killed.

     This time things were not so black and white. The girl who had caught Enrique’s eye was not married – she was only engaged. Close enough, Romy had told him. But the girl had come back the next night with the hopeful news that she had just broken off her engagement with a local fisherman so that she could spend the rest of her life with her one true love. That night, the Cebuanos took their wet things from the clothesline and left Marinduque at first light.

     Their next stop was Sibuyan, a large island with a two thousand meter peak called Scissor Mountain. The waters around Sibuyan were full of fish, too. The problem was the price was low. There just weren’t enough people on the island who could pay 70 pesos a kilo for lapu-lapu. Romy didn’t mind discounting when necessary – he even gave fish away on occasion – but there were no takers even at fifty pesos. He needed to buy fuel for the motor and the compressor and rice for himself and the crew and these things were expensive.

     The other thing about Sibuyan was that it was cold. People said it was because of the mountain. Scissor Mountain was so high and so close to shore that most of the eastern half of the island was in the shade by 2 o’clock in the afternoon. And that was when the sun was shining. Most of the time, Scissor Mountain was in the clouds. Deep water was cold to begin with. Water that was perpetually in the shade was colder still.

     The big news on Sibuyan when they’d arrived was that someone had found a Japanese Zero fighter in the jungle canopy of the saddle of the mountain. Everybody was excited because the plane hadn’t hit the ground. Aside from some damage to one of the wings, it was largely intact. In fact, the skeletal remains of the pilot were still at the controls. The Mayor of Magdiwang had contacted the Japanese Embassy and they’d come for the body. There was talk of the Japanese dismantling the plane piece-by-piece and taking it with them to Tokyo.

     The only people who weren’t surprised were the old-timers who’d been around fifty years earlier. The Battle of Sibuyan Sea was the last act of Leyte Gulf – one of the biggest naval battles of all time. What they’d seen on that day couldn’t be described. The most imaginative video game was dull by comparison. There were probably many more planes on the mountain waiting to be discovered.

     The locals said that the location of the battle might have had something to do with the Encantadas. Perhaps the combatants were drawn to Sibuyan by the same energy the Spanish had identified in the sixteenth century. Compass readings were erratic, so was the power of the cross. The price of fish was low in Sibuyan, it was cold, and it was haunted – three good reasons to leave.

     Their next port of call was Bato. When they’d turned the corner to enter the harbor from the north, Romy and his crew had no idea that this was to become their new home. The plan had always been to seek out better fishing grounds, put some money aside for a new boat or a house, and return to Bohol.

     They pulled up on a sparsely populated beach on one of the harbor islands opposite the lighthouse. The first ten minutes in a place were usually the barometer of what to expect – hostile, guarded, or friendly. If the people told you there was no fresh water thereabouts or immediately asked you when you were leaving, it was a bad sign. Coming to buy fish or asking when you were going to town was better. They wanted something from you, but they were willing to pay. The best was if they just came to greet you and ask your name.

     The welcome they received on the island in Bato was the friendliest that Romy could remember. Within a half an hour, thirty people had come out to greet them. Who were they? Where had they come from? When Romy said they were hungry and planned to rest a day before going out to fish again, the local storeowner gave them a bunch of bananas and a bag of charcoal so that they could cook their lunch on the beach. There was a ring of men and boys around the boat looking at it inquisitively. Children climbed on the outriggers and jumped into the water. Beyond them, mothers, grandmothers, and wives smiled and laughed. Further still were the dalagas who eyed the newcomers coquettishly and turned away whenever Romy or one of his crew looked back. It was like the whole village had come to welcome the circus to town.

     Enrique had been despondent on Sibuyan – he’d had half a mind to return to Marinduque – but now he was smiling. If this was the kind of welcome they got before they’d even taken the guitars out, what could they expect once they started singing? 

The Cebuanos is an excerpt from the unpublished novel The Sign of Jonah by Charlie Canning.