Changing times
I often have to remind myself that my present freshman students were born after 2000. Martial law and the 1986 People Power Revolution are as ancient as dinosaurs and cavemen. Nothing brought this home more clearly than the Edsa conference at Ateneo the other day. Ricky Jose, chairman of the National Historical Institute, had one of the 1986 yellow pins on his Barong Tagalog. He did not do show-and-tell, but underneath the embroidered piña was a yellow shirt from the rallies of the time. Sister Mary John Mananzan, OSB, grizzled veteran of many rallies, greeted me with a question: “Hindi ka pa tao noong 1986 ano?” I looked at the sea of students in attendance and realized this was an older generation passing on the stories of their time to a younger one.
When I went through my post-Edsa notebooks in search of a column for today, I came across profiles of prominent people long gone and citations for books, articles, artifacts, and places for further research. I had a number of pages on moles and the different meanings Filipinos attached to them over time. In 1987, young people defaced the P5 bills, drawing shades and a mole on Emilio Aguinaldo to transform him into the comedian Randy Santiago. There was a note on the papier-mâché dolls of Paete representing the “dalagang pilipina” dressed in a Balintawak and fanning herself with an “abanico.” These dolls have a mole on the cheek that was not there before the rise and popularity of Nora Aunor. After Aunor, the mole on the cheek was later made popular by former President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.
In post-Edsa times, the police and military took moles to mean membership in the outlawed New People’s Army (NPA). If you had two moles below the left eye or had a mole between the left and right eyebrows, you were a suspected NPA courier. A mole in the middle of the chin was the sign of an NPA lecturer. A mole on top of the left eye was the sign of an NPA intelligence agent. Moles on top and below the left eye, plus a third mole below the right eye, meant you might be an NPA hitman or “sparrow”!
Growing up, I had aunts with “nunal na buhay,” or a mole that grows on their faces. I was told that these could be cancerous and were removed surgically by a dermatologist, or, like warts, “strangled” with a strand of hair until they fell off. Moles were not always unsightly. In the French court of King Louis XIV, people who didn’t have moles sported painted ones at royal balls and functions to blend in. Known as the “grain de beaute,” it was most popular during the reign of the ill-fated Louis XVI and his wife, Marie Antoinette. The reason for sporting these artificial moles was quite strange, as these small dark (meaning black or brown) spots were applied to the face for contrast and made the adjacent skin appear more white!
In the past, Filipinos believed that a mole, or “nunal,” was a physical feature that foretold one’s future, temperament, or habits depending on its location on the body. A mole on a woman’s lips would make her talkative or “madaldal.” Perhaps today we can add that the loose tongue was also a carrier of gossip. Today, we would call her “Marites.” I don’t know if this also applied to a mole on the lip of a man, but a mole on the nape of a man meant he would be a woman magnet or “habulin ng babae.” In contrast, a mole on the nape of a woman meant she would be loose with her morals and could be a floozy.
A mole anywhere on the feet meant the person would be footloose. The 1976 Ismael Bernal film “Nunal sa Tubig” (A Speck in Water) has a character who references a mole on the feet that leads to wanderlust. A mole near the eye of a woman was a bad sign that pointed to widowhood. A mole on the cheek where tears flowed meant the person would have a miserable or unhappy life. A mole on the shoulder was an omen of a problem-ridden life, because it marked the spot where one bears their cross—literally and figuratively.
If I follow up on these notes and look at current tattoo practices and beauty spots, I will surely find more material on how moles can have different meanings to different people at different times. For example, the mole that Aunor made famous is different from that on Arroyo’s campaign material, and even more different when it was used in the parody of them by the actor who played “Ate Gay” and “Ate Glow.” Filipinos today will find the “pamahiin,” or superstitions about moles and their placement, silly, but in 1987, the police or military reading of moles on suspected NPAs was more than absurd. These God-given moles could lead to arrest, interrogation, jail, or worse, extrajudicial killing. Moles were understood in olden times differently from the vigilante hysteria of the post-Edsa Philippines.
When we look back on Edsa and the meanings we attached then to colors, like yellow for Cory and red for Marcos, we see how the world turned full circle when Duterte trolls painted yellow as a negative color. We saw the rise of pink that represented former Vice President Leni Robredo’s unsuccessful bid for the presidency, and a backhanded compliment given by the victor, Ferdinand Marcos Jr., who wore pink socks at their recent meeting.
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Comments are welcome at ambeth.ocampo@inquirer.net
