Cantaub kids immerse into

creative writing in Eskaya

CANTAUB, Sierra Bullones, Nov 19 (PIA)—Twenty one pupils from Grades 1 to Grade 6 of the Cantaub Elementary School (CES) joined the Philippine Information Agency in a creative writing workshop using the strange Eskaya language, in an effort to help the community perpetuate what many would believe as an invented language that kept the community safe during the war.

Coming in as a part of the Services Caravan which the National Commission on Indigenous Peoples (NCIP) and select government frontline services brought in for the community, the PIA’s writing workshop, was also an effort to help the outside community understand the intricacies of the language that not only sounds strangely like Java, or some quaint middle eastern, but is spoken in the hinterlands of Bohol.

Acclaimed as the secret spoken language of the revolutionaries who resented the coming of the Spaniards and the imposition of religion, the Eskayan features not just a strange script that is accordingly finding its traces from human body parts, it also features a basic 'alphabet' of 46 characters which accounts for most of the common sounds and syllables.

Said to be a rediscovery of the old language used by Eskaya elder, it was Mariano (Sumatra) Datahan who reintroduced it in his utopian community in these hinterlands of Bohol.

Now being taught in the schools in informal classes every Sunday, the Eskayan language is now slowly making a comeback in the consciousness of the kids.

Whether this is a legitimate or an invented language, NCIP Bohol field Officer Emmilou Gonzaga believes it is worth preserving.

With Eskaya elders and teachers also called sundon, giving classes in the language, the next goal is to get more kids speaking of the language, thus the need to get to their literature and make it as the entry point, Gonzaga said.

Handled by the PIA in Bohol, the workshop started with basic word appreciation and skipped on to expressing these universal concepts in the Eskaya in perfect or slant rhymes, patterns, alliteration, poetic devices, similes, metaphors, personification and idiomatic expressions.

The workshop eventually churned out a four-line measured stanza with slant rhyme and a message of the interconnectedness of the balanced ecosystem.

In the end, the poem which is in Cebuano, is then translated to Eskaya, given a beat and then sung with the class providing the hand clapping beat. (PIABohol)

SERIOUSLY? Elementary kids learn to craft verses into a stanza for a poem in the Eskaya, as the PIA attempts to help the community kids perpetuate and preserve the language many believe is invented, nut has since been an important communication medium in the lives of the mountain tribes. (PIABohol)

SERVICE CARAVAN. The PIA brought in the Barangayan sa Bagong Pilipinas: an information service caravan to the IPS, ending it with a poetry writing workshop using the Eskayan language , in an effort to help the community preserve their culture. (PIABohol)