I made a quick trip to Baguio last weekend. I mean I went up for the day for an event and came back right after it.

Nueva Ecija and Pangasinan (the eastern side) were busy planting another crop of rice. Perhaps their third this year maximizing the good or rather non-lethal weather in that part of Luzon at this time of the year.

On the way back passing MacArthur Highway, which I do not usually take except from Binalonan, there was a distinct holiday mode going on. Urdaneta City had its cow (or carabao) statue, symbol of its being a cattle market, decorated with a red holiday ribbon. The fastfood restaurants were jammed and people were scurrying about with food purchases as well as shopping mall goods. All towns along the way have malls.

Villasis has its wholesale or “bagsakan” market apparently in operation 24 hours a day. It was full of activity, lights, and people as night fell. They weren’t going home, they were going to market.

Tarlac is heavily populated with belens (the Christmas crib). A belen competition has been going on for some years now and towns outdo themselves in size, lights and of course artistic renditions of the Nativity scene. It catches the attention of townspeople and passersby. It is also full of vehicles coming and going and obviously they are busier with the Christmas rush.

After San Miguel, Tarlac, where we had a meal, we took the SCTEX and then the NLEX to Manila. In a way, it was an ordinary trip except for a surprise in my house in Baguio.

Not quite two years ago, I had to cut down a dead pine tree in my garden, victim of the Ips beetle that has been attacking pine trees in the Cordillera. It was a huge tree and I had considerable lumber from it, so much I could not accommodate it in my house. So, we secured the wood in the garden covered with a sturdy canvas cover that was not airtight because according to my gardener, the wood should be allowed to have air or it will develop mold.

It seems this woodpile has attracted some “squatters” who have made it into their “house.”

They are two reticulated pythons (according to my caretaker ”magasawang sawa”). The news
was somewhat unnerving as I am not quite attracted to reptiles and while I wish them well, I would rather not have to live too closely to them. But then again in this world of vanishing wild life and extraordinary indifference to creatures that share the planet with us, I know it would not be right to hunt them down. I remember a visit to the London Zoo with my young granddaughter who was attracted to the snakes for their color and shape. I think she has since become un-attracted from the bias that most of us carry against snakes. The snake department of the London Zoo had a title “Snakes need friends.”

I was quite pleased to hear my gardener say that we should leave the pythons alone as they do not bother anyone. Snakes need friends, indeed. My son tells me that they do not attack people only “cats and dogs” which is small comfort to me. My daughter said they can be caught to be let loose in the wild.

It has been noted that when pythons are caught and put in a cage, many of them commit suicide. Unless they become someone’s pet though that may not necessarily be a choice they would opt for. But as wild animals, they must be treated with caution. A Thai laborer who found a python and decided to bring it home to cook and eat it (as reported by his fellow laborers who last saw him carrying it on his shoulders) was found dead, apparently strangled by the python. I guess the python discovered his intention and went on self-defense mode. I declare here I have no intentions of harming the pythons but I wish that someone would take them somewhere else.

And that is the news of my latest trip to Baguio.

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