By Izah Morales
INQUIRER.net

ASK for a P1,000 bill. Browse your old Araling Panlipunan book. Surely, you will see the sketch of the Banaue Rice Terraces. Yet seeing the greens with your own two eyes would mean a guessing game on which is which. You will be surprised to see many terraces in Banaue, Ifugao.

The one sketched in a P1,000 bill is the terraces located in what they call the view deck, near the town proper of Banaue. You would not only have the chance to see the staircase-like mountain, but you may also walk directly into the rice paddies.

The view deck at Banaue View Point can be easily accessed through a short tricycle ride from the town proper.

Aside from this attraction, a bahay kubo beside the deck would catch your attention because of its unusual decoration. You might wonder why bones are used as decor.

According to the Ifugao woman living in the kubo, hunting is a way of life. Displaying the skulls and bones of animals is a sign of bravery and serve as status symbols.

Not only do the bone decors embellish the Ifugao’s dwelling place but the bundles of harvested rice grains also add appeal to the facade. They may remind you of miniature versions of Cousin Itt in “The Addams Family.”

But there is more to these grains than a cartoon show look-alike. You will know why when you visit the rice terrace in Barangay Batad.

You need to go up a steep, slippery, and stony mountain — and that is a thirty-kilometer walk. That makes 60 kilometers back and forth. Imagine how sweaty you can get. Just tell yourself that you’re burning your calories. Not only that, you’re also lucky you have shoes to protect your feet while the natives walk barefoot.

It will also surprise you to see them carrying something heavy like an LPG cylinder. It seems dangerous but to them it is not. You will notice that even children are climbing up and down the mountain.

Though exhausting, you will not regret it once you are rewarded with the breathtaking sight, and welcomed not only by the cooler temperature but also the warm hellos of the natives. It is also surprising to learn that they are very fluent in English. An aged native carrying her granddaughter on her back shared that they learned English from the foreigners who visited the place.

Beyond the greens of Banaue are the Ifugao — the people who molded and cultivated the mountain with their bare hands.