LXX. How Saint Martha Became Part of the Family, Part Four: To See Beyond Our Humanity

(Continued from Parts One, Two, and Three.)

When we last left Saint Martha in Part Three on Saturday, March 27^th, 2004, eight days before Palm Sunday, she was already mounted on her spanking-new carroza, which was parked inside the equally new "Casita Marta" (a fancy name for "garage").

As the previous photographs showed however, this was not quite all ready for bringing out in procession, as it still had to be decorated. We saw this as a bit of a problem, as no one in the family had any experience of any sort in this field.

Fortunately, my aunt had the good sense to ask Ka Celing Ople, the owner of the Barasoain Santa Marta that we had just visited, for leads in carroza decorating. It turns out that his relatives and next-door neighbors in Barangay San Agustin, just a block away from Barasoain Church, spouses Brian and Lisa Mendoza, were quite experienced and much-sought-after carroza decorators for Holy Week. My aunt promptly booked them, and made specific arrangements to have them come over the following week.

In the meantime, Mr. Kiko Vecin had called on his own in-house carroza decorator and image dresser, Mr. Dardo de la Cruz, to accompany me to his usual sources of the best silk flowers in Divisoria. (It is currently customary to use silk flowers for Holy Week carrozas in most parts of Bulacan, in contrast to the old days, when paper flowers were the norm. Fresh flowers were and still are seen as wasteful and impractical given the summer heat.)

So on Saturday April 3^rd, just a day before Palm Sunday, Dardo and I showed up in Divisoria early in the morning – the shops were just opening when we got there – and, with photos of the Saint Martha carroza in hand, shopped for silk flowers. In less than an hour, we had everything that we thought we needed, and managed to source all of that from just two neighboring flower shops.

The next milestone was Holy Monday April 5^th, when I fetched Brian, Lisa, and Ka Celing from their homes in Barasoain, and took them to Casita Marta in Violeta Village, Guiguinto. This was the big day for decorating. Before leaving Barasoain, I got to take a look at our old friend the Barasoain Santa Marta, still standing in Ka Celing’s living room, but now all dressed up for her annual public appearance.

She was dressed in a pink tunic and silver metallic vest, which is also how I remembered her from the previous year.

And Ka Celing’s magic trick was finally revealed -- to highlight Saint Martha’s face while in procession, a small spotlight lurking among her buns of bread.

Out in the driveway, her carroza was all decorated as well, ready to receive her.

The metal appliqués and the virinas had been reattached.

And the pink and white flowers had been fastened to the lamp holders all around.

Now it was time for me to take the decorating gang to do much the same thing for our own Saint Martha in the next town. Soon enough, Brian was perched on our carroza, fastening the long garlands of small white silk flowers onto each of the four lampposts.

Lisa joined him in attaching large yellow silk flowers to the tops of the posts, just under the lights, and onto the single lights around the perimeter.

In what seemed like a very short time, the entire carroza had been completely decorated. The final step was the putting on of the blue “skirt” (usually referred to as the "sayal" by the carroza crowd) to conceal the chassis. This had been provided by Mr. Vecin as well, so Ka Celing and crew simply had to string it through and tie it down in place over the metal armature.

And whether without lights on

or with

the decorations certainly enhanced the whole set-up extremely well. Credit goes to all involved – not just Ka Celing, Brian, and Lisa, but also Dardo who was able to intuit when we were in Divisoria what sort of silk flowers might work with this carroza, and Mr. Vecin who made sure that everything would come together in the best possible way.

It was therefore time for the obligatory documentary photo with all present – our three decorator guests, our driver, and my aunts. (Not in photos: the photographer, myself.)

And this time, with lights on.

Just two days later, it was Holy Wednesday, April 7^th, 2004. A most important date, as this marked the first ever processional participation of “our” Saint Martha. Needless to say, the entire clan came out in force, and it was a good excuse for a get-together, as well as an opportunity for the designation of roles to all able-bodied family members.

Starting with my brother the doctor, who now adds “carroza puller-steerer” to his long list of professional (processional) qualifications.

I must say that my brother's relative size makes both Saint Martha and her carroza appear positively puny.

Our family's staff members were on hand to attend to the vagaries of electrical generation. And pushing.

For this all-important first ever procession, we put together a special stampita, with cover artwork from Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675), thankfully in the public domain. Here is how the back and front pages of the stampita look:

The text of the novena prayer itself was something that we ourselves had composed, cribbing together various existing Saint Martha prayers in English found both online and offline, and adding our own devotional insights into our family’s patron saint. Then we took the whole thing and translated this into Pilipino.

The inside pages of our single-fold stampita have the English prayer on the right and the Pilipino translation on the left. We were pleased to note that both English and Pilipino versions were well-received by devotees who obtained copies of this stampita.

We had several thousand of these printed, and assigned a couple of my cousins to distribute these to devotees along the processional route, both mobile and stationary.

As for other family members, they were cheerfully up to the challenge of walking the entire two-hour-long processional route within and around Violeta Village and various neighboring residential subdivisions, cutting through the Tabang cloverleaf, and even hitting the Tabang Toll Gate tangentially.

But throughout it all, Saint Martha was the epitome of grace and confidence.

After the procession, it was appropriate for the family to emulate its model in the form of a couple of formal group photos.

Two days later on Good Friday April 9^th, 2004, it was time to regarb Saint Martha in her mourning cloak, as is traditional with processional images of Holy Men and Women in the Philippines. My brother and sister-in-law volunteered to undertake this, and even though we all obviously have much to learn in the proper draping of garments for processional images, they managed somehow.

Fortunately, changing Saint Martha's headdress from beige to black, also part of her mourning wardrobe, was much more straightforward.

Just a couple of hours later, it was time to hit the road again, with my brother in the lead as before.

A cousin took charge of the bamboo pole, on hand to lift low-hanging wires and push away unruly tree branches.

And even greater numbers of family members and other relatives were in enthusiastic attendance than two days previously.

These included the young

the even younger

those needing to be carried occasionally

as well the merely youthful.

Despite her artlessly draped mourning cape, Saint Martha went through the entire processional route, slightly longer in distance and duration than two days before, with her usual grace, and found herself ensconced inside Casita Marta at the end of the evening just as it began.

And of course it was another golden opportunity for a couple of group photos.

And thus came to pass Saint Martha's first ever Holy Week in our midst.

Next in Part Five: "Subsequent Events" and "Continuing Operations."

Originally published on 7 February 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:

jamaica1ph wrote on Feb 23, '09 thank you continuing the saga..... awaiting the next installment!

arcastro57 wrote on Feb 23, '09 First time to see the mourning vestments. Very nice and appropriate outfit. I am considering the same style of dressing for my Veronica, but I think Ramon has other ideas.

jolotamayo wrote on Feb 23, '09 Congrats Mr. Cloma! Well done! A very nice sequel! :P

rally65 wrote on Feb 23, '09 arcastro57 said First time to see the mourning vestments. Very nice and appropriate outfit. I am considering the same style of dressing for my Veronica, but I think Ramon has other ideas.  We just need to learn how to drape them properly, with the use of Mr. Vecin's recommended 1,001 pins! Much more difficult to do than one would guess, unfortunately.

jeromz wrote on Feb 23, '09 I was inspired with the saga! Thank you Mr. Cloma! =)