WITHIN AND BEYOND THE SEA OF COUDS

Humanity is the Middle Kingdom, a thin place caught between the collision of the Divine (heaven) and the Material (earth).

Such is Binuangan where at 850 meters above sea level, the celestial waters break through the firmanent, copulate with the terrastrial ecosystem, and ejaculate an overcast layer of stratocumulus clouds over the Caraballo Mountains. 

It was this Sea of Clouds that parted to finally expose the mystery of Belance, 823 meters above sea level, a place so often heard in Almaguer where heavy duty upland-designed jeepneys passed through once a week before the paving of the Malasin-DM Junction Road.    

There was Muta (774 above sea level) and Antutot (706 above sea level) in Kasibu, erstwhile lair of communist insurgents, a pensieve that kept the memory of a young boy crossing a stream with his father to a sawmill, to a carinderia that is also a pondahan, once upon a time in Bambang before the emergence of the Edralin Falls. 

And there was Malico, contested by Nueva Vizcaya and Pangasinan at 1,248 meters above sea level, that claims to be the Home of Clouds --- clouds that were absent at Salacsac Pass and the fields that bore strawberry-flavored ice cream at the box office of the M4 Sherman Tank curio.

SNR-Cabanatuan is the Mother House, the crowd that squeezed out a merlot and a camembert from Mariwasa ceramic tiles to incubate prosperity with 12 round fruits, 100 pieces of newly minted 20-peso coins, a red salted egg, and two versions of patatim.  

No, the baked pork ribs and chicken for 2026 were not reheated like the lumpiang shanghai and crispy pata of 2025: it represented the Phantom Biker riding away from the old year to greet the new one but without the usual fireworks.  

After the clouds have cleared, blood was drawn to rinse the inbox of a nuclear imaging test that revealed the severed heads of soured mahi-mahi and red snapper from Goshen, a place where the Israelites lived in Bamban that is indeed "little" but does not resemble Rome at all.

This was the keynote address delivered at the 19th installation rites of the Craft where beer and wine tasted like the delayed serving of lechon baka.