Episode Details

KacheliTV opens a new shelf: the folk tales of the Philippines, in Dean S. Fansler's Filipino Popular Tales of 1921 — stories Filipino storytellers wrote down in English before the First World War. Part 1 begins where the book begins — the two tellings of the Suan cycle — and goes on to the book's fourth tale, Suac's adventures and the three friends.

"Suan's Good Luck" is the first telling: a poor farmer's son who loses everything he earns, until one day his luck turns all at once — three pieces of good fortune in one day, the last a lost ring found in the most unlikely place, and a bride whose father had despaired of marrying her to anyone.

"Suan Eket" tells the same story at full length — the great tale of the lucky guesser. A ring is lost at sea and Suan names where it lies; a king's letter is read by a boy who cannot read; and when Suan, overwhelmed, rows out alone in a tub to end his trouble, he overhears the very words that save him — and talks his way, charm by charm and guess by guess, to a princess and a kingdom. Written down by Manuel Reyes, a Tagalog of Rizal province, who heard it from his grandfather.

"Suac and his Adventures" changes the key from luck to strength of wit. Suac hunts on Mount Telapayong with Sunga and Sacu, and three times the spirit Pugut comes down to steal the hunters' dinner. Twice he succeeds. The third time the cook is Suac — and Pugut, who got his kinky beard in a fire of his own making, meets the boy who does not run. Told by Anastacia Villegas of Arayat, Pampanga, who heard it from her grandmother.

"The Three Friends" — a monkey, a dog, and a carabao — leave the city to hunt, each in turn staying home to cook while the laughing giant Bungisngis comes calling. The carabao is thrown knee-deep into the earth; the dog is thrown down, his dinner eaten; but the monkey digs a pitfall before he lights the stove, and after that the story is his — a beehive mistaken for the king's bell, and a belt that is no belt at all. Told by José M. Hilario, a Tagalog from Batangas.

Two of the book's tales stand outside this episode, recorded plainly: the second, "The Charcoal-Maker who became King," ends in an enacted revenge of whippings and deaths and is excluded at this shelf's gate; the third, "The Story of Carancal," whose strong man burns his enemy bound and helpless, stands held for a ruling and is not read here. Within the tales read here, a few hard beats stand as told, a clause apiece: a turkey and geese give up the rings hidden inside them; the spirit Pugut and a man-eating giant fall in summary, as folk tales have always made such falls; escaping the monkey's pit, the giant kills the dog in a single sentence; and Suan's despair at sea is kept at source weight, a breath long. No completeness is claimed for this stretch of the book.

The book's storytellers, kept with honour: Macaria Garcia, a Pampangan ("Suan's Good Luck"); Manuel Reyes of Rizal ("Suan Eket"); Anastacia Villegas of Arayat ("Suac and his Adventures"); José M. Hilario of Batangas ("The Three Friends").

Chapters:

00:11 — Suan's Good Luck

03:53 — Suan Eket

13:13 — Suac and his Adventures

16:53 — The Three Friends

Source: Dean S. Fansler (ed.), Filipino Popular Tales, Memoirs of the American Folk-Lore Society, Vol. XII (1921) — the tales written down in English by the Filipino narrators credited above; public-domain 1921 edition (Project Gutenberg eBook #8299). The collectors' notes stand in the book, unread here. Our telling is a fresh in-house rendering of the 1921 text. Music: gentle instrumental bed under the narration.

Thank you for listening — Part 2 of the Philippine tales follows on this shelf.

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