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Celebratethe Flame Tree Festival of Intramuros as the
huge trees—once only saplings planted way back in 2008—color the
craggy adobe battlements with a leafy crown of vermillion and
verdant green. Share a romantic evening walking atop its walls under
a string of tasteful lamplights that trace the outlines of the
Walled City like a string of pearls in the night. Savor the historic
cobblestone streets of Intramuros riding on faithful recreations of
the horse-drawn street railway of the Compania de los Tranvias de
Filipinas. Taste authentic Spanish period cuisine and travel to a
lost era on an epicurean adventure with your palate. Cherish the
fine commemorative china and baroque bookends patterned after
genuine relics of Intramuros. Marvel at an astounding collection
ecclesiastical artworks at the reconstructed San Ignacio Church and
Convent.
These can be the cherished
memories of our children and our wizened selves. This should be the
future for the 500-year-old citadel. These are the dreams of Anna
Maria Harper for eternal Intramuros.
Still fondly called “Bambi”
despite her argent stature, Harper became the chief of the
Intramuros Administration on March 24. Her name may sound foreign to
the unread and her skin too fair for the common man. But that
fateful pledge to take command of what was once a bastion of
colonialism was nothing less than the return of a native and the
triumph of an insurgent.
She reveals, “I have a
grandfather who was incarcerated in Fort Santiago and eventually
executed in Bagumbayan. And now his granddaughter takes office where
the Governor General gave the order for his execution.”
In an article Harper wrote for
the current issue of the Gaceta de Intramuros, she details her
origins: A hundred eleven years ago on February 27, 1897, Apolonio
de la Cruz—Harper’s grandfather—was marched off to his own
execution in Bagumbayan (modern day Luneta Park). National Hero and
incendiary novelist Jose Rizal had been felled by a firing line on
that same field 59 days before. Like Harper, herself a newspaper
columnist, her grandfather was a vanguard of Filipino journalism.
History notes that de la Cruz was
a foreman at Diario de Manila which secretly published the Kalayaan
(Freedom), the underground newspaper for the secret nationalist
revolutionary organization Kataas-taasang, Kagalang-galangang
Katipunan ng mga Anak ng Bayan (Supreme and Venerable Society of the
Children of the Nation). He was one of the first to be arrested
after a traitor who had feuded with de la Cruz exposed the existence
of the Katipunan. It was this discovery that quickly led to the Cry
of Pugad Lawin on August 31, 1896, marking the start of Asia’s
first armed struggle for independence.
Harper also notes that her
widowed grandmother worked as a housekeeper for the Vizmanos
household in Calles Santa Clara fronting Fort Santiago in Intramuros.
Now, Harper holds office at the Palacio del Gobernador overlooking
the street where her grandmother once humbly toiled. But she lets
not a drop of vitriol stain her blood.
Harper clarifies, “I have not
conquered. I have prevailed. First your persevere, then you
prevail.”
She sees her work today as but a
continuation of our forefather’s struggles: “If we—the
Intramuros administration, the staff, all of us—can make something
of this place, then we will prevail for everyone.”
Ironically, this feisty
independent lady—best known as the driving force for the privately
owned Filipino Heritage Festival Inc. which organizes the highly
successfully yearly month-long nationwide cultural event—now has a
government job co-terminus with the current administration. A woman
who has savored antiques, studied history and stalled the hands of
time in preserving national heirlooms all her life, Harper is now
rushing to beat the clock. She has but 16 months to make her vision
for the Walled City come to life.
Her job as the Mayora of
Intramuros—previously the seat of entrenched corruption and
ineptitude, has not changed her; instead she has radically changed
the job. Step into Harper’s office and one will literally see how
much she treasures our culture.
Every nook and cranny is occupied
by colonial hardwood altar frontals in folk baroque filigree and
religious paintings with their centuries old pigment still vibrant,
period furniture that fuse Chinese craftsmanship with Spanish
traditions, tropical Art Nouveau picture frames and ivory-encrusted
dividers. On the corners and ceilings amid floral cornices and
ornate lattices, roost a flock of cherubim. The collection inspires
nothing less than rapture. Amassed, these artworks astound and
demand adoration for our rich cultural heritage.
“There was no place to put
it,” she reveals. She has made her office a halfway house for this
homeless treasure trove—former Central Bank Governor and
Intramuros Administration’s first Chief, Jaime Laya’s collection
of more than 6,000 pieces procured nearly three decades ago.
“It’s worth over half a billion,” she confides, adding, “It
was then P35 million already.”
Harper, an intrepid antique
hunter and bona fide history lover, wants to rid her office of such
beauty. The Intramuros Administration currently shares the building
with Commission on Elections (Comelec) and shares their security.
“Are you kidding? They just burned down their building. It’s so
scary,” she exclaims. The Palacio del Gobernador sits across the
street of the fire station. But then, so was the former Comelec
office next door. It is scary indeed.
These artifacts, sacred to both
the pious and the nationalist, ought to be in a museum for all to
see. And they will be, if Harper’s will be done. “It belongs to
the people,” she declares.
Chief among her plans is to build
the San Ignacio Ecclesiastical Museum where the Clamshell now stands
and where the church and convent of San Ignacio once was. Her many
other ambitions for Intramuros include lampposts to make the walls
safe at night; an immersive music and lights shows on the intrigues,
the murderous conspiracies, the scandalous lives and ghost stories
of the Walled City; museums shops, cafes and bookstores integrated
into historical sites where one can buy tasteful merchandise,
informative cultural coffee table books and eat authentic cuisine.
She fervently works hard to make
all these dreams come true and come true her way. Imagine how easily
it could all go wrong in the hands of others.
Look at the mish mash of horrible
disco-inspired and kitschy floral streetlamp and bridge lighting
designs that cut across Manila. Note the number of historical
landmarks demolished under the various city administrations. Amado
Bagatsing, Representative of Manila, filed House Bill No. 2571 on
May 14 seeking to return Intramuros to the local government of
Manila. Mayor Alfredo Lim has stated that Intramuros will not be
fully developed until the city takes over. He plans to allow the
construction of yet another shopping mall on the Intramuros golf
course.
Recall how the previous
Intramuros Administrator Dominador Ferrer Jr. was charged “for
committing acts punishable under the Antigraft Laws” according to
a decision signed by Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita on August
13. Note how slums were left to teem with drugs and prostitution and
how billiard halls and other places of vice were allowed to take
root beside universities. These entrenched interests’ opposition
to Harper’s renewal campaign has led to mobs picketing her office
and to death threats against her person.
Observe the garishly painted Ten
Commandments cement slabs that sit outside every church and the
inconsistent use of architectural themes that has our places of
worship resembling UFOs, warehouses and theater widescreens. Note
the destruction and disappearance of antique church items under
various parish priests. Harper confesses that the Catholic
Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines still shuns her offer to
educate seminarians on ecclesiastical art appreciation and
conservation.
It’s all very scary. And it’s
all the more reason why Harper is the woman for the job. She can
wisely shepherd Intramuros from the ruin of bad taste, corruption,
neglect and ignorance. The lady is cultured. She is steeped, not in
the rarified air of high society, but in earthy realm of the
scavenger.
Cultivating taste
To plot the course of Intramuros,
one must know the origin of Harper passion for the past. A
connoisseur of all that is authentically Filipino, Harper recalls
the halcyon days when antiquarians were called mambubulok
(scavengers). “These were all dilapidated things. People used to
laugh at them. It was a different time. Filipino stuff was just not
popular,” she explains the years following the Second World War
when the country confused modernity and westernization with
progress. Collecting was an odd hobby of uncovering what lay behind
the veil of cobwebs and the mask of patina. But even then, she was
not alone.
“I grew up with sisters who
were really in love with it. She was a real collector,” she
explains. Harper was the youngest of 10 siblings. She has fond
memories of rummaging through Gandara Street in China Town.
She recounts an archeological
excavation in the late 1950s in Santa Ana that unearthed artifacts
from Sapa, the capital of 12th century Kingdom of Namayan, “There
was also a lot of porcelain that came out that became part of the
Locsin Collection. The Fantastic thing about it was that Mabini was
full of porcelain. It was all on the sidewalk. You could find a
chocolate-bottomed Ming saucer for P5. It was a lot of fun. Those
saucers my sister used to use as ashtrays. She bought 10 of them.”
But it was also those Ming Dynasty saucers that later signaled the
end of innocence for the troupe of mambubulok.
“She had a party one evening
with the Ming saucers used as ashtrays. Two of them disappeared.
After that, the antiques came under class cases,” she remembers.
Heritage had become expensive
enough to steal. Exciting finds became secrets. What had once been
part of daily life was closeted away. The young woman’s hobby
became a high stakes investment for big-time movers.
“I thought, ‘This is not fun
anymore.’ It looses something,” she recalls. As things became
serious, so too did Harper take things seriously.
She went on to take her
master’s degree in English Literature in Georgetown University,
Washington. But after she came back and taught for eight years, she
realized that her vocation lay not in the classroom. “I teach
better if I write,” she explains. She adds, “Every seven or
eight years, you should reinvent yourself.”
During 1970s, she established her
own antique shop, coming back to her first love. “Things weren’t
still that expensive. It was still fun. That’s when the interest
started. When you go around selling these things, you have to be
able to know your material. When you look at the furniture, you have
to find out if it’s kamagong [ebony ironwood], if it’s narra
[rosewood]. It’s self-education. You can’t go anywhere for it.
You have to ask. You have to know when it was bought. Then the story
behind the things come out,” she explains.
If each antique has a detailed
piece of history to tell and Harper has heard thousands, then she
has enough to assemble a mosaic of our national character and gain
intimate insight into our culture.
In 1994, a classmate from
Assumption since kindergarten who owned a newspaper asked her to
write a column. Having chosen culture, she began to read intensely
archival materials and history books as a basis for her writing over
a span of 12 years. “You learn from primary sources—the
archives—and then you read the interpretation—the history books.
That’s when I learned that if you want to learn history, you have
to know how read in the original [language].”
In 1987 she became a member of
Council of Monuments and Sites, which led her to become part of the
National Commission for Culture and the Arts (NCCA) and Filipinas
Heritage Foundation.
After former Intramuros chief
Ferrer was sacked on August 13, Cecile Guidote Alvarez, NCCA
Commissioner, casually offered the position to Harper. She confesses
thinking nothing of it.
Harper was taken aback when at an
informal reception at the Malacañang Palace, President Gloria
Arroyo asked about her new job. Harper had to ask, “What job?”
Her appointment, signed months before, had been misplaced.
Now after with very little time
and inexhaustible vigor, Anna Maria Harper finally makes history
restoring the walled city of Intramuros into the jewel it once was
during the Galleon Trade. She knows many of her plans will only come
to fruition after her tenure. But Intramuros and Bambi Harper’s
dreams are destined to survive us all. The Flame Tree Festival of
the future awaits.
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