The road is badly deteriorating as we continue towards Kabayan. The wheels nudge the edge, and when I look out the window, I don’t see the road but rather the tops of trees and a sheer drop down the mountainside. This gravel journey is frightening.
However, as I reflect later, it’s nothing compared to the jeepney to Tinylayen. At least here I’m sitting inside the dusty public bus, not clinging to a roof and at least here, there’s a relatively sane driver instead one of who’s harbouring frustrated dreams of F1.
Nonetheless, the journey is not for the faint hearted as the bus bumbles around corners like a drunkard, slowing frequently to slosh through streams or across smoothed over landslides.
It may be for this reason, the small jewel of Kabayan, with its incredible mummies, is relatively unknown to the backpacking and travel communities, or it maybe that without trekking up and over the Timbac Caves, then down another 1 hour or so to the roadside, travelers have to either backtrack to Baguio (braving the road a second time) or take their chances on an even more frightening road leading north to Abatan.
Whatever the reason, it seems Kabayan beckons only those with a little more time, a little more hunger for adventure and a somewhat unusual penchant for the dead.
The small village settles snugly halfway down a valley in the Cordellia in North Luzon. The mountains behind stand protectively over it, and below lie rice terraces that extend to the valley floor are etched into the hillside. A single main road runs through the centre of the village and there’s a single guesthouse for those who have found themselves alighting from one of the 2 daily buses.
When I arrive I’m greeted by Nila from the Kabayan Coop Lodge. Nila, a slight woman with wide dark eyes and a welcoming smile, will become my de facto guide, and good friend over the next two days.
At the Visitors Centre, I register my presence in the town, and enquire about guides to take me to Timbac caves. Here I meet Kenneth – Ibaloi descendent, mummy expert and environmental advocate and guide.
Kenneth is a good talker, and we soon strike up a lively conversation about the town and the mummies. I book a guide for 2 days time, and soon it’s 5pm. The Visitors Centre is closing. Kenneth invites Nila and myself to his café for tea later that evening where we can continue our conversation.
The café is rustic with wooden tables and chairs, and red table clothes. A huge grey basalt rock forms the left hand wall of the café, and whilst overall it’s a little bare, there’s an ambience in which it seems appropriate to talk about history and culture.
We talk long into the night, and much of my understanding of the Ibaloi and their mummies comes from Kenneth.
There are three tribes in the world that are known to intentionally mummify their dead. Of the three, two are well renowned – the Egytians and the Incans. What makes the Kayaban mummies truly amazing is not only their relative anonymity but also the tropical settings in which they’ve been preserved.
There are 3 – 4 sites in the surrounding hills where the mummies are open to the public although it is said there are many more caves of which only the Ibaloi elders know the locations. Of these public caves, Timbac Caves is the most impressive.
Whilst the details of the Ibaloi mummification process have long been lost, a general understanding remains, passed down orally from generation to generation.
As the nearly-deceased lies dying, a large quantity of salt water is ingested. Once dead, the body is then undressed and bathed and seated. The deceased’s forehead is bound with a scarf and tied to a chair to keep them upright and erect. A death blanket is then draped over the legs and a low fire is lit under the chair to dry the body and preserve the tissues. When the body begins to bloat, a jar is placed underneath to catch the fluid which is considered sacred. As the body dries, the outer layer of skin is peeled off to assist in the drying process.
Juices from the pounded leaves of Diwdiw, besodak, kapare and native guava are rubbed continually on the body and tobacco smoke is blown through the body to help preserve the internal organs and drive out worms. When the body is dry, it’s moved into a crouched position, and carried to the caves - its eternal resting place.
Kenneth tells me mummification of the dead ended when the Spanish came to the Philippines however in the 18th and 19th century, there was an attempt to revive the practise, Sadly, too much of the art had been lost, and the attempt was unsuccessful. The mummies deteriorated in the tropical heat and humidity.
The next day, we start out early for Timbac Caves. I’m joined by two porters, a guide, and a Belgium couple who had come in later that evening on the second daily bus. The clouds drizzle and then fade periodically as we start walking up and we’re often soaked to the skin as we walk through the clouds.
Higher up, the rain is cold, and the wind gusts against us. It’s the first time since I’ve arrived in Philippines that I truly shiver. But it is precisely these conditions that help preserve the mummies against the corrosive humidity.
We discover later that the winds and the sleeting rain we experienced is the edge of a typhoon that will drench and drown manila, and cause a tourist ferry to capsize killing over 800 people.
The two caves housing the mummies are quite close to each other, separated by rock staircases and locked with an iron gate to prevent looters.
Our guide unlocks the gate to the first cave and fading into the darkness we glimpse wooden coffins stacked one upon the other like in a game of jenga. Our guide gently moves one from the top, then another, opening their lids and we gingerly take turns entering the tiny caves to peer at these centuries old remains. The mummies lie in their wooden deathbeds, their bones rusted and yellow, their skin flakey and peeling like an onion.
Said to be over 700 years old, the mummies are incredibly well preserved and our guide tells us, the internal organs are still there. But my lack of anatomical understanding means all I see are bundles that look more like shopping parcels wrapped in brown paper bags than dried livers, uterus’ and intestines.
On one, dark hair sprouts from a white skull tilted questioningly to the side. There’s a baby in the foetus position with an oversized head. Another uses one hand to shield its eyes and another to cover its mouth, as though someone has turned on the light and too quickly extinguished the dark. Yet a fourth draws its knees to its chest and both hands to its face, screaming with a gaping, teeth filled mouth a chilling, neverending cry.
As I gaze into their faces and at their curled up bodies, I wonder who these people were, who they loved and how they lived. It seems to me a curious way to honour our dead. In no way are they alive, yet neither are they allowed to completely die. We cast them into a nether region between the two, and remember them by the poor and brittle remnants of a bodily shell longing to return to whimsical dust. In some ways I pity them.
Why Did This Take So Long?
3 years ago