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By Go Bon Juan
Editor’s note: The Sixth Dr. Jose P. Rizal
Awards for Excellence awarding ceremony will be held at 7 p.m., June
14, 2008, at the Kaisa-Angelo King Heritage Center on Anda and
Cabildo streets, Intramuros, Manila.
There is a street in San Nicolas, Manila, named
“Mestizo.” It is located along San Fernando Street near Madrid
Street in front of the Pedro Guevarra Elementary School, where the
Spanish colonial government once established the eighth parian or
settlement for the Chinese in the Philippines.
The eighth parian was also called Alcaiceria de
San Fernando. This explains why there is an Alcaiceria Street beside
Mestizo Street.
Mestizo Street was obviously so named because of
the many Chinese mestizos living in that area then. But what is more
interesting is that in Ilocos Sur, in its capital Vigan City, there
is a river called Mestizo River.
According to “Villa Fernandina, Ilocos Sur”
of Ramon Ma. Zargoza (Budhi, a Journal of Ideas and Culture, volume
4, number 3, published by the Ateneo de Manila University): “On
May 20, 1571, Captain Juan de Salcedo, a young Spanish conquistador,
left Manila with 45 men to explore the coastal areas of Northern
Luzon all the way up to the Ilocos Region. He landed on the coast of
Los Ylocos, and set up camp on the Isla de Biga [now Vigan], on the
shore of the Mestizo River, a prosperous colonial trading post where
seafaring Asian merchants and locals traded or bartered goods. On
June 13, 1572 he renamed the settlement Villa Fernandina, to honor
Crown Prince Ferdinand, son of King Philip II of Spain.”
Since mestizo is a Spanish term for people with
mixed parentage, we can assume that the Mestizo River of Vigan was
so called after Salcedo lived there. We can also infer that many
mestizos—Chinese mestizos—were living and trading in the area,
the offspring of Chinese married to Filipino women.
In fact, Zaragosa wrote about “a prosperous
pre-colonial trading post, where seafaring Asian merchants and
locals traded or bartered goods” on the shore of Mestizo River.
Many, even majority of these Asian merchants, were presumably
Chinese.
Moreover, as early as the 17th century, Vigan
was already mentioned in one of the Chinese ancient classics in
Southeast Asia, Dong Xi Yang Kao of 1617, that constituted part of
the eastern trade route from China.
With this Mestizo River, one can just imagine
how close the relation was between Vigan and the Chinese.
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