Minalin's Aguman Sanduk

by Robbie Tantingco

        While the country took a nap in the afternoon of New Year's Day to catch up on sleep lost from the previous night's revelry, guess who quietly slipped into a dress, put on a wig and high heels, and had a ball in the strets?  Why, it's the menfolk of Minalin, of course, celebrating their secret, exclusive tradition called Aguman Sanduk - literally, the fellowship of the ladle.

        The tradition started in 1934 when a group of Minalin men, drinking beer in front of the old municipal hall, thought of a way to end the holiday season with a bang. They cooked lelut manuk, then dared each other to do the ultimate no-no among Kapampangan men: wear a dress and parade in the street.  Someone put a pillow under his shirt and feigned pregnancy, another played a midwife and another an anxious husband; they mounted a gareta and the show was on!

        When it was over in the evening, they did what Kapampangans of yore did best: perform crissotan (verbal jousts where poets composed witty verses on the spot).  They also elected the first Aguman queen, Hilarion Serrano, who was described as the pekamatsura (ugliest), maragul atian (pot-bellied) and delanan ane lupa (literally, termite-ravaged face, or pock-marked).

        Through the years, Aguman Sanduk attracted the rich and famous to join the cross-dressing festivities, including recently retired Sandiganbayan Justice oberto Lagman, ConCon delegate Ricardo Sagmit, Jr. and provincial board member Antonio Mercado.  Town mayors were crowned Aguman queens with their vice mayors standing by as consorts.

        Today, hundred of boys and men unabashedly turn transvestites on this first day of the new year, unafraid of the superstition that what you do on New Year's Day will be repeated throughout the year.  There are ten-year-olds wearing their sisters' school uniforms, teens with clutch bags tucked under their armpits and shorts peeking below their micro-minis, and old farmers and fishermen with sunburned skin and toothless grins, their atrocious blond wigs covering their bald heads.

        Surprisingly, there are no jeers from the crowd, considering Pinoy's penchant for ridiculing transvestites; more surprisingly, there are no gays among the cross-dressers.  The womenfolk, instead of freaking out, cheer their sons, husbands and fathers and grandfathers as their freakish procession passes by.

        The fact that this tradition has endured for almost 70 years now, surviving World War II and lahar, has legitimized it as a genuine cultural heritage.  It is truly unique and original Kapampangan festival that deserves to be popularized and duplicated on a grander scale, since it resonates culturally among Kapampangans: it makes fun of Kapampangan machismo and Kapampangan pulchritude, two biases enshrined on the altar of Kapampangan values.  But Aguman Sanduk is also a protest against, and liberation from, gender discrimination and repression, which is why it's a lot of fun.

Singsing
Vol. 1 No. 2
February 2002

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