Peace--through the eyes of an Isnag woman.(peace and culture)

I once thought, I was cursed for being born an Isnag. I grew up in a place where my kind was marginalized and misjudged. We were seemingly branded with infamy--and I was a firebrand to many. Every streak of anger, which came through me, was an allusion to my Isnag badge of ferocity. Those times, I wanted to deny my heritage.

But it was during those times that I knew I could not. There was no way out of it. The distance did not spare me from the tribal wars, clan clashes, family feuds which were brought to our doorsteps by Apayao kins to bring us the news. Sometimes, it felt like the upshots were being served on a platter for us--especially when kiths and kins were involved. At times, our home became a hideout, and my father a counsel for the disputes, I would not forget the taste of violence right inside our home, among our clans during those troubled times. I would have believed the presumptions of notoriety were not just overstatements. There was no way to discredit the loss of lives among my bloodline, the bloodletting among some tribes and the threats posed on the security of my own people then. Peace was like a far-out word to talk about during those times, while I was torn if I had to even call it my home, my heart land.

But my folks were invincible, for love of the Isnag heritage. Not a mile was missed inside our home. They have woven every strand of such tradition through our very core, through our soul--even against the odds of our disillusions and displacement. Amidst a home they painstakingly built away from their heartland, stood a crest of a typical Isnag family bound by the birthright beliefs and practices of their ancestry. In their eyes, I came to see beyond the imperfections, which were closing ...