ASIA / PACIFIC
July 6, 2015
THE ASIAN REPORTER n Page 5
Philippine ‘mud people’ festival honors saint
CUTE CUB. A panda cub born at the Chengdu Research Base of Giant
Panda Breeding in Chengdu, the capital of southwest China’s Sichuan
province, is seen on June 23, 2015. The first panda twin cubs of the
year met the public for the first time a day after they were born. (Xue
Yubin/Xinhua via AP)
China displays latest
set of panda twins
BEIJING (AP) — China has put on display the latest
twin pandas born through artificial insemination as part
of efforts to boost the numbers of its unofficial national
mascot.
Still mostly hairless and with their eyes yet to open, the
sisters were met by adoring fans at a breeding center in
the southwestern city of Chengdu.
Their mother, seven-year old Kelin, gave birth to the
twins early on June 22.
Wu Kongju, chief administrator at the Chengdu
Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding, said the twins
were in good condition based on their milk consumption
and normal body temperature.
The cubs were born more than four months after the
mother was artificially inseminated in January. Figures
released this year show 1,864 pandas live in the wild.
BIBICLAT, The Philippines (AP)
— At dawn every June 24, people
from Bibiclat village in the northern
Philippine province of Nueva Ecija
pay homage to their patron saint,
John the Baptist, by gathering in
silence in a swampy field to cover
themselves in mud, donning mud-
drenched capes made of dried banana
leaves.
The village’s Taong Putik, or “mud
people” festival, dates back to the
Japanese
occupation
of
the
Philippines in the 1940s, according
to the village chief, Norberto
Eugenio.
Japanese troops in Bibiclat during
World War II gathered many of the
male villagers in a church courtyard
for execution. The women and
children prayed to Saint John the
Baptist to spare them, and suddenly
there was a downpour, causing the
soldiers and their captives to scatter,
Eugenio said.
The villagers were so happy that
they rolled in the mud, he said, and
they have carried on that tradition
ever since.
During the festival, men, women,
and children — some covered with
capes from head to foot, eyes peering
from a cake of mud on their faces —
collect candles from bystanders along
CANDLES & CAPES. A muddied girl donning a cape made of dried banana leaves collects
candles before attending a mass to celebrate the Feast Day of St. John the Baptist in the village of
Bibiclat, Aliaga township, Nueva Ecija province, in the northern Philippines. At dawn every June 24,
people from Bibiclat village pay homage to their patron saint, John the Baptist, by gathering in si-
lence in a swampy field to cover themselves in mud, donning mud-drenched capes made of dried
banana leaves. (AP Photo/Bullit Marquez)
the village’s main street on their way
The former parish priest of the
to St. John the Baptist’s Church. village, William Villviza, said the
They light the candles and make mud also “reminds one of the lowness
wishes, expecting them to be fulfilled of one’s being” and enables one to be
because of their efforts.
“close to the earth.”
Filipino LGBT people celebrate Gay Pride, U.S. court decision
By Oliver Teves
The Associated Press
ANILA,
The
Philippines
—
Several hundred
lesbian, gay, bisexual, and
transgender (LGBT) peo-
M
ple held a Gay Pride rally in
the Philippine capital to
push for LGBT rights and
to celebrate last month’s
U.S.
Supreme
Court
decision recognizing gay
marriages in all U.S. states
as a victory for their cause.
About
500
people
marched around Manila’s
Rizal Park, many carrying
placards and streamers
saying “Fight for Love” and
waving rainbow banners.
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Some came with pets
dressed in rainbow cos-
tumes.
Jonas Bagas, executive
director of the pro-LGBT
rights group TLF Share,
said the U.S. court ruling
“will reverberate in other
corners of the world.”
The rally was scheduled
to commemorate the 1969
demonstrations in New
York City that started the
gay-rights
movement
around the world. Bagas
said the U.S. court’s deci-
sion made it more signifi-
cant.
He said that in the pre-
dominantly Roman Catho-
lic Philippines, where the
church has fiercely opposed
gay marriages along with
divorce
and
artificial
contraceptives, he expects
the “conservative majority”
to continue to block human
rights for LGBT people.
“We hope that after this
decision, the struggle for
equality can be reframed to
go beyond marriage equal-
ity so that we can address
other dehumanizing situa-
tions that LGBTs encoun-
ter,” he said.
Sylvia Estrada Claudio,
a gender-rights advocate
and professor of women
development studies at the
University of the Philip-
pines, said the decision was
also “a triumph for femi-
nism” because of the “inti-
mate connections” between
discrimination based on
biological
gender
and
discrimination based on
sexual orientation, gender
identity, and expression.
“I can’t help but note that
the three women justices
voted for marriage equal-
ity, forming a solid core in
what was a close vote,” she
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