Ritual of the Boat

A documentary blog of Mr. FERDZ DECENA (a travel photographer)

 The Yogads are animist by nature, only recently that some of them converted to Christianity. They still practice some of the traditions until now. Nanay Melba Mangadap Flores, a yogad healer, demonstrated one of the Ritual of the Boat. It is synonymous to the yogad’s journey by boat to where they live now. The banca ritual takes two days. The first day is when Nanay Melba makes a miniature of boat which they call dakit. She said that no one is allowed to create the boat rather than the healer. They can copy it but the oracion (prayer) is necessary while doing the boat.  According to Nanay Melba some have tried to copy the boat but they ended up being crazy.  The dakit is colorful to make it attractive to the roaming spirits.

There were offerings laid out as which was called panyaman.  It contains a mix of items from yellow rice topped with an egg, nganga (bettle nut), tobacco, and suman (sticky rice). The healer would do a dance with the boat while singing a sacred song, passing it on to the one with the ailment. During the ritual, the healer will fall into a state of trance. It is believed that a spirit invaded the healer’s body to diagnose the sick, heal and catches the spirit causing the disease. This spirit would then be trapped into the boat. The next day, the dakit would be sent-off to the river along with the spirit causing the disease which would eventually heal the person with the ailment. This signifies that yogads are firm believers of spirits and it was engraved to their heart the essence of respect to the spirits which they claim to be existing in the world where we live in.     

https://ironwulf.net/2017/07/13/echague-yogad-tribe/