LXXXVI. Tall Tales from Taal, Part Three: The Apacible and Goco Houses

In my second visit to Taal in December 2006, I went to the sala window of the Ilagan House (see previous article), and viewed this:

Later upon exiting, I looked out diagonally across the street, and saw it again.

What an interesting structure, I thought to myself.  I must visit this later today, I said.

And indeed I did.  And when I did, I realized that I had been here before, on my previous visit to Taal in September 2003.  This was the venerable Leon Apacible House, originally a 19^th century Spanish colonial mansion owned by Maria Diokno, then inherited by her granddaughter Matilde Martinez.  Matilde married the revolutionary and ilustrado Leon Apacible, who was lost at sea in 1901, but left an only son, also named Leon, and also gave his name to the house.

Later, the widowed Matilde married the much younger Vicente Noble, who was Governor of the Batangas throughout the 1930’s.  It was during this period that an anonymous architect from neighboring Lemery transformed the erstwhile 19^th century Spanish colonial to become a thoroughly Art Deco American colonial mansion, completing the work in 1938.

And I realized too why I did not clearly remember having already visited – because photography was forbidden inside.  The house, now officially referred to as the “Pook Pangkasaysayang Leon Apacible” (Leon Apacible Historical Landmark) is now administered by the National Historical Institute, and as with perhaps all of the NHI’s administered properties, does not allow indoor photography.

In fact, on my 2003 visit, the only photographs that I was able to take were of the façade, over the roof of my parked van

and of a small sign on the front door, that was also adorned with a fancy brass knocker.

To see how the inside looks, the diligent heritage enthusiast will have to turn to his Filipiniana library and take out his much-thumbed copies of Filipino Style (Archipelago Press: Singapore, 1997), pages 78 and 79, as well as Batangas: Forged in Fire (Ayala Foundation: Manila, 2002), page 54.

Unlike this amateur point-and-click shutterbug, those books’ professional photographers were obviously able to obtain NHI permission to document the unusual ambassador living room set, the Art Deco light fixtures, and the recurring motif of three interlocking triangles that appears on everything throughout the house, including the embossed ceiling panels, the parquet hardwood floor, and the furniture.

So on this second visit to Taal, the last of my only three shots of the Apacible House is yet another one of its façade, well beyond the reaches of the NHI’s photography-allergic enforcers.

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Just a short distance away, on a parallel street, is the far more welcoming and photography-friendly Goco House.

As the marker on the façade of the house shown in the above photo indicates, the owning family took the proactive step of registering their ancestral home with the National Historical Institute in 2000.  However, the house continues to be administered by the owners, happily avoiding the photography ban usually encountered in NHI-administered properties.

A brass marker right after the ground floor entrance provides more information.

Because my camera was misbehaving (or my hands were simply unsteady from clicking fatigue on this Visit Taal Day), the photograph that I took of it was too blurry, so let me transcribe its contents for you:

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GOCO ANCESTRAL HOME

This house was built more than a century ago, around 1876, by JUAN CABRERA GOCO and LORENZA DEOMAMPO.  Juan was known in a folksy and endearing way as “ANTO KUKOY”: “Anto” for Juan and “Kukoy” for Goco.  Juan was a small landowner of modest means who lived frugally.  But he was recognized for his honesty and proved it when he accounted for all the funds and contributions entrusted to him as Treasurer or Ingat-Yaman of the revolutionary forces operating in this part of Batangas against the Colonizers.  The couple raised seven children, namely, daughters TOMASINA (Encarnacion), MARIA (Asinas), CIRILA (Villamin), EMILIA (Mangubat), JOSEFA, and sons ELISEO (Physician, married to Elisa Ilustre), and JOSE (Dentist, married to Josefa Punzalan).

This house was restored in 1999, preserving its original structure and appearance, and in line with Taal having been declared a National Heritage Town.  Its restoration was initiated by grandson RAUL, son of ELISEO, and his wife MARIETTA PRIMICIAS.  Raul served as Solicitor-General (1992-96), Philippine Ambassador to Canada (1996-98), and is the first Filipino elected to the UN International Law Commission (1997-2001).  Marietta served as Undersecretary and Chairperson of President Ramos’ Presidential Commission to Fight Poverty.  They dedicate the restoration of this house to honor the memory of Juan Goco as a shining example of accountability and integrity and to perpetuate this inspiring legacy for present and future generations of GOCOs to cherish, emulate and follow.

The whole GOCO CLAN welcomes you to their ancestral Home.

January 1, 2000.

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If only most other families around were as conscientious of their heritage and as welcoming to others.

As might have been expected from a famously modest and frugal couple, the home of Juan and Lorenzo Goco is simple, unpretentious, and decidely on the small end of the scale, even compared to other ancestral houses in Taal, which themselves tend not to be too palatial in the first place.  The façade is made up of just two bays (not the usual three) of equal size, one of which accommodates the main entrance.

The main door is a practical affair of wood planks, with wooden bars in the upper panels to let air and light in, and a postigo (cut-out pedestrian door) with a charming ogee (Moorish-inspired) arch.

This leads directly to the main staircase, which is neither grand nor wide.  Its first couple of steps are of tile, and the rest of the ascent is handled in a straightforward manner by simple wooden planks.

There is no antesala to speak of, since the stairs lead directly to the smallish sala, ventilated and illuminated by newly-added antique-style ceiling fans with built-in lights.

Like the Ilagan House and many other houses of its time in this part of the country, the second floor features wrap-around capiz windows that gracefully curve around the corners.

In truly modest fashion, the one bedroom that I could make out was furnished very simply, with more recent furniture from the first half of the 20^th century.

Perhaps the best perspective of this house is in fact seen from the window of the much grander home across it.

But no matter how small, simple, or modest, congratulations are definitely in order to the Goco Ancestral Home and to its owners not only for thoroughly restoring it but also for welcoming the public to visit it free of charge, and for allowing visitors to photograph it.  (Did I mention that they allow photography here?)

Here's hoping that more families – including yours and mine – may “cherish, emulate, and follow” their example.

[Continued here.]

Originally published on 23 August 2009.  All text and photos copyright ©2009 by Leo D Cloma. The moral right of Leo D Cloma to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted.


Original comments:

antigualla wrote on Sep 9, '09 Yes! I believe it is not the size of the house that matters, but the history of the people who built it, and most of all, how it is lovingly cared for and preserved even to the third and fourth generations. Thanks for sharing, Leo.

enm1031 wrote on Jan 7, '10 my sister edna nable robison is coming back to philippines with her daughter and son-in-law this february 2010. we will be roaming around in some beauiful spots of philippines. so, i got a very good idea now i will bring them in this ancestral home of Goco in taal, batangas. i've been passing in that place several times not knowing that there is a goco heritage house to visit in taal. now, i will be promoting this to all my relatives and friends. i am proud there is one like this that was loved, respected and preserved. mabuhay ang goco clan!.

LXXXIV. Tall Tales from Taal, Part One: The Taal Basilica

If there is any place in the Philippines other than Vigan that deserves to be better known as a heritage town, it has got to be Taal in Batangas province. While not as old or as large as the Ilocano Spanish colonial settlement whose structures go as far back as the 17^th to the 18^th centuries, Taal’s 19^th century wealth, founded first on cotton, and then on sugar, and also on shipping from the nearby port of Lemery, allowed it to build rather fanciful Art Nouveau and early 20^th century Art Deco ancestral houses that are probably not found in as close proximity to each other anywhere else.

A genuine Akyat-Bahay Gangster must therefore visit Taal. Which is why I have myself gone twice, in 2003 and in 2006. And I’d go again, if I can manage it, before 2009 is over, to make this a truly triennial habit.

Because it’s a fairly lengthy land journey southwards from Manila of perhaps as much as three hours, depending on road conditions, one must leave the city early. And one must thank God for a safe arrival, by first visiting the venerable Taal Basilica. Here is the very wide five-bay façade, as viewed from the extreme left side and across the street.

This huge structure, sometimes billed as the largest Christian building in Asia, or the Far East, or South-east Asia, or the Philippines – reliable Guinness-Book-worthy statistics are difficult to come by – is definitely the biggest structure of any kind – in Taal. The original church was built in 1755, but was heavily damaged in an 1849 earthquake. The present church was begun in 1856 and was completed in 1865. The historical marker on the façade is the reliable source of this information.

The main doorway, in the middle bay of the five, is supplied with a pair of tall door panels, of which this is one.

Inside, the width of the structure is put to good use in the provision of four wide rows of pews, and proportionatey wide aisles everywhere that had also made available more than enough space for its generous and wealthy patrons to furnish it with numerous life-sized religious images, starting with this crucifix towards the rear of the nave, near the entrance.

If I’m reading the much-darkened brass plate on its base correctly, it was endowed by a Miss Julia A. Buck on June 22, 1941, and was blessed the following August.

The length of the structure expectedly allows for a full set of evenly-spaced wall-mounted Stations of the Cross, only one of which I was able to photograph given the lack of time (and more interesting subjects to pay attention to).

Up front towards the altar, the breadth of the structure is again in evidence, with a deep sanctuary space holding a rather oversized stone retablo of a relatively miniscule image of the Risen (or Ascending) Christ, and a trompe-l’oeil-painted apse overhead.

Expectedly, the dome over the transept, right above the front part of the nave, is very high and induces either vertigo, or fear that the heavy-looking wrought-iron chandelier is going to crash down on the congregation.

The patron of this parish is Saint Martin of Tours, an early Christian Frenchman who was Bishop of the self-same town in the Loire Valley.

His personal story is interesting, because earlier in his life he was a soldier, who in an act of charity (or maybe chivalry), gave his cloak to a beggar. In a subsequent dream, Christ appeared to him wearing the same cloak, providing confirmation that, “Whatsoever you do to the least of My brothers, you do it unto Me.” Here is a processional tableau parked in a side altar of the Basilica, depicting Martin mounted on his horse and giving his cloak to the aforementioned beggar.

In a side aisle is also parked a Holy Week processional tableau of the Crowning with Thorns.

And beside it is a fully-carved image, in glass-and-wood urna, of Saint Jude Thaddeus.

In another side altar is a small image of an anonymous saint.

He is difficult to photograph well in his glass case, but he can be seen exposing his wounded breast and clutching his Bible or breviary.

I’ve consulted a number of santo experts online and off to determine this saint’s identity, and their suggestions range from the Jesuit San Francisco Javier (exposed breast representing heart inflamed due to intense love for Christ) to San Felipe Neri (heart threatening to spring out of chest due to ardent love for Christ) to the Franciscan San Pedro Bautista (but where’s his usual iconography of a spear, the instrument of his martyrdom?), or the Capuchin Saint Fidelis of Sigmaringen (though perhaps too obscure for Taal).

But because of those wounds on the feet and hands and the brown habit, and despite the somewhat unusual (to me) baring-of-breast depiction and the absence of his usual skull iconography, another santo expert posits that this must be the stigmatist and founder of the Franciscans San Francisco de Asis. Any other suggestions?

In another aisle is this unusual tableau depicting a mother offering her newborn infant to the Blessed Virgin Mary.

And the suggested prayer to be said by the devout parent is clearly displayed in large font.

A church this large and so well-endowed throughout its history would be incomplete without an image of the Dead Christ. Thanks to “Kap. Domingo Sanches,” we are not found wanting.

And, appropriately, a life-sized processional image of the Most Sorrowful Mother is not far away, rather anachronistically holding a purple rosary.

If there are many processional images holding court in the aisles of this basilica, there are at least as many processional floats parked in whatever vacant slots are still available. Here, for example, is an unusually lean hammered-metal carroza, ready for trotting out at the next processional occasion.

Strange-looking carrozas seem to be all the rage in Taal. Here is a boxy all-wood carroza, really just a box, that dispenses with such niceties as cloth skirting and light posts.

And if having one of this kind is unusual, two of it in the same location is near-apocalyptic.

This one must be even more strange-looking (or not) that it decides to cover up and hide.

The generous patrons of these endowments over the past century and a half are still in evidence, via their memorial stones set into the floor and walls, presumably with their bones beneath or behind. Here embedded in a wall is Doña Micaela Reyes de Agoncillo, who appears to have died in Manila on 13 March 1901.

Antonio P. de la Rosa died on 11 August 1921 at the relatively young age of 27 years and three months. His bereaved parents and siblings set up this memorial for him.

And here set into the basilica’s tiled floor are the remains of Don Domingo Ilagan and his wife Doña Maria Martinez who died just two days apart in August 1903, aged 47 and 38 respectively.

A basilica this large, and with most of its original benefactors now decomposing (or decomposed) beneath the floors, is a real challenge to maintain and keep in tip-top shape in the 21^st century, as the observant reader might have noticed from scrutinizing the details in the previous photos.

Imagine if the pious Taal-based sugar barons and shipping magnates of over a hundred years ago were still around, these would not be white-painted pipes pretending to be candleholders in this last photo but silver-plated-brass or even cast-solid-silver candlesticks, the wall in the background would be really white and not just “dirty white,” and the tile floor would be clean, uncracked, and unpockmarked.

We set out for the town, and see if the rest of it is just as well-endowed and hopefully better-preserved.

(Continued here.)

Originally published on 30 July 2009. All text and photos copyright ©2009 by Leo D Cloma. The moral right of Leo D Cloma to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted.