The House of the Unholy

Merceditas

When the morning breeze fills the spacious room through the ventanillas; Teo is awaken by its bite. From his bed he rises and leaps through the sliding windows and pulls them open. From afar he sees the rice fields; its fragrance greets him carried by the breeze; earthy and moist. As Teo draws in more air, another scent glides playfully through his nostrils; a familiar scent coming from the kitchen; saline, grassy and tangy; the aroma of a luscious food being prepared

“What a pleasure to wake up to an appetizing scent,” Teo retorts as he draws in another air

He makes his way out of the room and passes through the main living room, it's neat and odorous; and its wooden floor is polished. He then reaches the upper main hall that leads to the staircase. The kitchen was built from stone bricks to prevent fire; and is separated from the main house. Fire always start from kitchens and the logical way of keeping fire reaching the main house is to have it separated. Right below the brick dwelling is the kitchen, above it the servants' quarters. Teo has to sensibly hop through large stones protruding from the muddy ground leading to the separate kitchen to keep mud off his sandals and trousers.

From where he is at he hears whispers coming from the kitchen getting more audible as he gets closer. These whispers turn to chuckles which erupts to laughter, all women voices with one distinct cackle croakier than the others

"Nanang Ditas!” Teo intrudes standing from the doorway, “I could hear your laughter from miles away,” he cracks impishly

“ Aye! , let Don Lorenzo creep out of his grave!”, Ditas retorts discharging another contagious laugh, “he used to say that my laughter always wake him up more than the roosters crow do every morning,”

Teo reclines to a wooden chair beside the head cocinera which hurries to attend to him pouring hot coffee to a cup. At the table lay suman in a bamboo stem; rice cakes puto and bibinca for breakfast; across the hardwood table lay leafy vegetables; a squash, some green beans; coconut husks and a bucket of snails; all waiting to be attended to.

Ditas holds the jar of hulled rice and fills water in it with her left hand and rub the rice inside, washing it. Once the water turns starchy, Ditas strains the water from the jar, then pours fresh water again in it

“Fray Luciano once said, ‘man cannot live with bread alone!’ Ditas imitates the friar, “I say, we indios can live with rice alone!” she yelps as the other servants laugh with her

She walks towards one servant and hands the jar. The pale maid rushes towards the wood burner stove and puts the jar on the right burner; while another jar sits on the left with boiling mixed vegetables in it. The head cocinera then scrapes salt with her hand from a salt bowl and sprinkles it to the boiling vegetable soup

Teo sits quietly as he sips from his coffee cup and takes a spoonful of suman

From the doorway he sees Diego, carrying dried mangrove wood walking through the wood burner stove. He unloads the firewood to the ground and stretches his back

"Good Lord! He knew I needed a hand for these,” Ditas declares as she hands a coconut husk to Diego

"Your brother is not here," the head cocinera interrogates.

"He complains an upset stomach, Nanang Ditas," the boy exclaims, "he could not rise from his bed”

Ditas clouts her left hand to the wind as he hands a bolo to the boy

"Tell your mother to soak Utoy’s clothes from the day before to a boiling water,” Ditas pauses, “did you come along a stranger last night on your way home?,”

"We did," the boy reluctantly answers

“Aba!, then ask the stranger to rub his thumb with his saliva on it to Utoy’s forehead or abdomen,” Ditas declares, "then he will be well”

Diego blushed and silently assesses the room and fixes his gaze to his segnor across the table confusingly. He recalls him as the only stranger his brother and him came across last night. Ditas catches the boy’s sight and nods her head in disagreement;

“Just ask your mother to soak the clothes in boiling water!” she finishes

The boy cracks the husk open with a bolo as another servant readies an empty jar for the coconut’s juice. Diego picks up another husk and did the same until the jar is filled with its water

Ditas picks one of the open husks up and prepares to grate the marrow with a spoon while the pale servant attends to the cooking rice which now begins to boil. Another servant, an old lady, busies herself slicing squash into cubes, as Teo, from the corner of the hard wood table sips another coffee from his cup

“The Palm tree in itself is a marvel” Ditas ponders as she continues grating the coconut marrow, “from its bark we were able to build our houses; with its leaves, the roof,” she pauses, “but the real wonder is its fruit,”

Ditas gestures to the old lady to hand her a large bowl; she exacts the shredded marrow inside a cloth as coconut milk flows freely into a bowl. The pale servant now holds the cooked vegetable mix jar and sets it aside as Diego leaves the kitchen giving a nod to his segnor.

“From the outer green husks we can create ropes from its fibers; from the marrow we get its milk which then can be turned to wine once fermented. The desiccated marrow can then be used to make our oil,”

Ditas contemplates as she looks up at her audience nodding their heads in agreement.

The old servant then hands the jar of washed snails to the head cocinera; inspects it and once satisfied, pours the coconut milk in it

"We call these laghan,” Ditas calmly declares as she finishes pouring in the coconut milk, “my father and his brothers used to kill whales for it” she pauses as she adds salt to the mix

"They killed whales for snails?" Teo asks, stunned

Ditas nods in approval as she adds herbs to the snails jar

“You see segnor, whales swallow these poor snails alive,” Ditas claims while holding one snail closer to her inspecting eyes, “once inside, they would crawl out of their shells and devour the whales' heart. Later when the whales are killed, these little monsters can be found still alive near the dead whale's heart,” she finishes as she places the jar on the left burner

As she turns around to face her audience, she sees her segnor puzzled and she chuckles at this sight and reaches for the cloth hanging on her shoulder to dry her hands;

“The Spaniards had the same reaction when my father told them what they just ate one evening. I was so little then but I still remember their disgust and their terror,” she says in mid laughter, “but they later admitted the snails tasted good!” she concludes

The sole daughter of a fisherman, Merceditas grew up self-adequate. At the young age of ten, she was taught to traverse the wild seas in bamboo rafts. In the morning, she would trade her garb for a trouser; as an aide to her father who was known as a deep sea diver, for the rarest variety of fish are found in the abysses. In the evening she would put her skirt back on to reap vegetables from their backyard to prepare meals. She was the only female in a small lodge of four men

One stormy evening, her father encountered a misfortune as he was making his way back to the shore. A tidal wave upsurge subdued his raft and he stumbled through the ocean, his head hit the corals and his back slamming on the rocks causing him to be invalid for the succeeding weeks. As her father could no longer provide, Ditas ended up working as a lavandera in the monastery. Her thorough service earned the approval of Fray Matias, the head priest at the time. Then she was referred as a criada to the stone house, a personal maid to Donya Alejandra; Don Lorenzo’s mother

“But they squandered whales for small snails!” Teo exclaims from across the table to the head cocinera who just shrugs her shoulders with a huge smile gesturing to the pale maid;

“The rice is cooked, Jimenal”

The pale maid steps in front of the wood burner stove, with a pair of rugs on each of her hands, lifts the rice jar and sets it beside the vegetable soup. Ditas then hands the snail jar soaked in coconut milk to Jimena, who quickly rests the jar on the stove. She bends her back to pick up dried mangroves chop and reloads the wood burner stove with them.

“But that’s just the way it is, Segnor” Ditas continues with a smile, “a huge sacrifice has to be done for the sake of the smaller few”

She then lifts the lid off the vegetable soup and with a spoon she takes a sip of its broth. From the look on her face she seems satisfied with the taste;

“The death of the whales make way for a very sumptuous meal. What makes the laghan tastier than other snails is the fact that it endured the terror of being devoured by a whale which size is a hundred of times bigger than them,” Ditas continues; “when one eats these snails, it is as if they are privileged enough knowing what these poor creatures had gone through and they feel like being part of its triumph against the huge whale”

Teo just finished his coffee but still gripping the cup tightly; his face is still in disagreement with Ditas

“But a whole whale was wasted for these small snails. Imagine the meat that can be had out of it” he turns stubborn

That’s when Ditas releases a loud cackle as she turns towards his segnor

“What? You thought we did nothing with the whale after we got the snails?” she pauses, “everybody also want some whale meat, Segnor”

Then the snail jar starts to boil, its lid is pushed over by an overflowing froth.