Kalinga Living Treasure Alonzo Saclag Sr. passes away
By: Nonnette C. Bennett, photos from Awichon Cultural Village
Alonzo Suclag, Sr. and wife operate the Awichon Cultural Village.
The Municipality of Lubuagan announced the untimely demise of National Living Treasure, Alonzo Saclag, Sr. Saclag was the 2000 Manlilikha ng Bayan for Traditional Performing Arts by the National Center for Culture and Arts (NCCA).
Typical Kalinga homes are accommodations for visitors.
Saclag Sr. was a Kalinga master of dance and the performing arts, according to the LGU. He made it his mission to create and nurture a greater consciousness and appreciation of Kalinga culture among the Kalinga themselves and beyond their borders and set up the Awichon Cultural Village in Lubuagan that showcases the lifeways of the Kalingas.
Culture bearer, Suclag was excellent in music and dance.
As a young boy in Lubuagan, he found endless fascination in the sights and sounds of day-to-day village life and ritual. According to his son, he received no formal or informal instructions in the performing arts. Yet he mastered not only the Kalinga musical instruments but also the dance patterns and movements associated with his people’s rituals. These traditional dances are performed at the Awichon Cultural Village for visitors and as instruction for those who want to learn them.
To ensure his knowledge of the performing arts is passed on to others, he formed the Kalinga Budong Dance Troupe, it is said. He took the young men and women who come to him under his charge, and they learn about the music and dance of their ancestors. While many expressed a genuine desire to represent and promote Kalinga performing arts, he admits that only a handful have. Because the troupe occasionally goes on tour, joining it is, for some, a chance to see places beyond the mountains they call home.
At the Awichon Cultural Village, Saclag built five typical Kalinga cottages for accommodations. These ensure the experience of village life in Kalinga. Even the local cuisine is featured at the Village for a nominal fee.
Saclag’s efforts in preserving Kalinga’s rich cultural heritage will always be remembered. He was a popular culture bearer of the ethnolinguistic group.
