| Description |
Baor-making is a unique skill of the Maranao people. With its embossed handmade and intricate designs – particularly called okir – this skill has claimed a recognition abroad. nOkir is folk motifs found in various artworks and objects, they are usually inspired from detailed and different curves and no machines involved.
Baor is a maranao translation of baul or the trunk.
Aside from the famous Darangen, a singing-like epic storytelling originally from the Maranao people as well, which belong to the top three of United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) inscribed intangible cultural heritage of the Philippines, baor-making skill is listed as an element among the other 366 under the inventory of Philippine Inventory of Intangible Cultural Heritage.
However, since the 2016 Martial Law declaration in Mindanao stricter regulations are implemented on trees-cutting that are main ingredient to produce baor. Tree like the Philippine National Tree Narra.
The absence of professional teaching also creates significant hole for the identity of Maranao younger generations. As of the moment, the only way to transmit the skill is learning the techniques by observing elders while at home.
These reasons lead to saddening thought that the Tugaya’s one of a kind skill is slowly dying because youth have now better, numerous options to survive the living over the dynamic society.
Although baor-making is traditionally originated in Tugaya, a small municipality in Lanao del Sur, there is a man who has been living so far from the root of baor-making: Abdulsamad Usman, 58, has been dwelling his fate on making and selling baor amidst the Taguig city’s uncertainties.
nTaguig is one of the urban cities in Metro Manila, National Capital Region. The gap between Tugaya and Taguig is at least one-thousand kilometers.
According to Usman, more or less a month period before finishing a medium-sized baor. He can carve designs and paint them. He, with his team, is the only considered baor maker who practice the skill in Metro Manila.
Usman strongly believes that baor-making will not vanish from the present and history because the skill has been playing a huge part for the Maranaos’ culture and identity.
n기타설명nBaor-making is a unique skill of Maranao people from Tugaya, Lanao del Sur. Baor is a maranao translation of baul or the trunk. The designs embossed in it are called okir --- detailed and different curves. They are handmade and no machines involved. Tugaya is a small community in Lanao del Sur, a province in Mindanao.
The skill is considered as an intangible cultural heritage (ICH) among the other 366 listed under the inventory of Philippine Inventory of Intangible Cultural Heritage. |
