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Taba-Taba

The name, almost sing-song, had haunted me for the last several months. Taba-Taba. ta-BA-ta-BA. It intrigued me, it scared me, it frustrated me. This one barangay name had become a proxy for my research project and everything that excited and worried me about it. It had become a marker for my tension with ISO staff, a sign of our differences in approaching coastal management. It had become a reminder of how headstrong, yet inexperienced and unsure, I really was. Taba-Taba.

Taba-Taba is the name of a barangay, the smallest government unit in the Philippines. It's something like a neighborhood or a small village, though neither word is quite accurate, especially in rural but well populated areas like Camarines Norte, the province in which Taba-Taba is located. In truth, Taba-Taba is little more than a couple of clusters of houses at the end of a long, poorly maintained road. There is a fork, and on the left side lie a small cluster of farming houses. On the right, the road goes down a rocky hill and ends in a larger grouping of several dozen houses, mostly hybrids of concrete and bamboo—a simple room or two on a concrete pad, thick roof of layered reeds, and space between the floor and roof that is likely to be either woven bamboo, cinderblock, or open air. They have electricity—and therefore TVs—but no plumbing of course; seat-less, tank-less toilet bowls that flush into the ground are the norm, as in most rural communities. The water comes from one of a few pumps; faded lettering indicates that they were donated by “Camarines Norte, USA,” presumably an organization of Filipino expatriates who were good enough to think of their former neighbors while living in the land of indoor plumbing. The road separates the houses from the beach, where a dozen outrigger bangkas are pulled up above the high-water line, their sterns suspended over the sand. A “videoke” machine stands by an open-air pool table and a sari-sari store, but it is bizarrely shrouded and silent.

It is, on the whole, a fairly normal-looking fishing community. Poor, but not destitute. And quiet.

This, I have been told, is the lair of the illegal fishers. Taba-Taba is the problem barangay for ISO's Camarines Norte program. It is outside of, but adjacent to, our program areas, a thorn in the side of ISO's efforts to stop unsustainable fishing. For this reason it intrigued me. Taba-Taba presented a problem in need of greater understanding and new ideas.

This is the same reason that Taba-Taba scared me. From what I had been told, the fishers here were brazen and unrepentant in their criminality and resistant to outside intrusion. Their interaction with ISO-sponsored Bantay Dagat (volunteer fish wardens) was tense and had occasionally escalated to violence. I was advised that as research subjects they would be uncooperative and dishonest at best. At worst, they might rob me or chase me out of their barangay with machetes.

For the past several months, I had struggled to understand the real risks of going to Taba-Taba and to figure out how to approach it. Dishonesty, I was prepared to encounter; physical danger, I was not. As I tried to gauge which of these I was facing, my plans hung in limbo. I felt like the risks were being exaggerated, but I wasn't interested in testing them. Then, in mid-December, as I was planning a field visit for early January, reports came back from the field staff of a violent clash between the Bantay Dagat and Taba-Taba fishers. A boat was rammed, shots had been fired. For the moment, it seemed that violence was a real possibility, and I readily agreed to put off visiting Taba-Taba in January. I would go to safer barangays instead, where ISO was well established. From there I would feel out the situation and establish contacts. A visit to Taba-Taba would come later, if at all.

With that understanding, my research assistant, Karen, went to her hometown in Camarines Norte, and I left for some Christmas travels. Since her home was so close to our field sites, she agreed to set up some of the logistics during the holiday. We planned to communicate occasionally in the universal Filipino way—the text message. Other than that, I planned to meet her on January 2 nd in Camarines Norte, and we would go from there.

Her earliest text messages indicated that all was well, but I'm not really sure what happened after that. In my typical style, I forgot to waterproof my cell phone on a daylong hike through the rain, turning it into a slightly waterlogged paperweight. By the day after Christmas, I was all but completely out of contact. When I bought a new phone to rectify the situation, my budget replacement turned out to be faulty and useless. As far as communication was concerned, I was a mess.

Consequently, my first substantial contact with Karen was when I returned to email access in Manila, less that a day before my departure to the field. She had sent a lengthy update on our logistical arrangements, and reading it made me wonder if she had actually understood the decision to delay a visit to Taba-Taba and approach the issues more delicately. I had tried to balance my strong interest in the barangay with repeated statements that I was completely unwilling to put myself or anyone else in physical danger. But after stopping by the police station, where they agreed that there was some danger and offered to accompany me when I arrived, Karen contacted a cousin with relatives in Taba-Taba, and simply wandered in, unannounced. Apparently she left with an invitation from the Barangay Capitan to do interviews in his barangay.

This was all really encouraging news, but phrases like “dangerous place,” “might be a victim of hold-up,” “[do] not to wear anything that might attract those offenders,” and “mga pasaway” (ones who do not obey norms and do whatever they want) gave me reason to pause. Karen's ground work made it sound like there was real potential to enter the barangay, but it also looked like there were some issues still to be resolved. I texted my thanks, told her to use her judgment (thought that seemed a bit late), and packed my bags to leave.

Maybe the rush to get ready kept me from reading the email as carefully as I should have, or maybe I just assumed—based on the agreement before break—that we would not be going to Taba-Taba on this visit. Probably both. Regardless, I packed my bags, hopped on a bus, and 10 hours later was whisked through introductions to Karen's family and sent to an aunt's house to “take my rest.” Details and logistics would have to wait until morning.

In the morning, it became clear that I should have read Karen's email more closely. Despite any decisions we might have made in Manila, Karen had arranged for us to visit Taba-Taba for all of the next four days. The barangay that I had almost given up on was going to be our first research site. This was what I got for leaving town and destroying my phone right before going to the field. I just wasn't sure if that was a good or a bad thing. Either way, people were expecting us. I remembered the “victim of hold-up” line and looked down at my bags: a couple of T-shirts… and about three grand worth of computer and photo equipment. Nice, Brian, real nice. But there was nothing to be done about it now.

A few hours later, Karen, her cousin, and I stood in Taba-Taba. I didn't see any machetes, so that seemed like a good sign. In fact, people seemed welcoming and even eager to greet me. A good portion of the male residents had gathered in the yard of the house we had been led to. Either our arrival had coincided with some sort of community event, or—just as likely—we were the event. Introductions were made and a meal quickly appeared with stacked plates of fish and freshly steamed crab. Somewhat awkwardly, we sat and ate as many of the fishers looked on and waited for us to finish before themselves beginning to eat. I protested briefly, but to no avail. Still, compared to the chilly reception that I had worried about, excessive hospitality hardly seemed an issue. But then again, I hadn't started my questions either.

For the next three days, our home was in the “tree house,” a sort of raised bamboo gazebo about six feet off the ground. It was whimsically built on top of a large, blown-over tree, so that one had to walk up the curved trunk to enter the seating area. It seemed to be the de facto town hall for Taba-Taba, situated next to the water pump and in the front yard of our host's house. Our host—referred to as “the Chairman”—appeared to be one of the more prominent members of the community. Because of his work with Mormon missionaries, he and his wife were the only community members who spoke any English and who were familiar with hosting Americans. The Chairman wasn't old, but his hair was white, and he no longer went out in the fishing boats. He was a member of the barangay council and had served as chairman of a now-defunct community organization. As seems common in the personality-centered politics of the Philippines, the title had all but replaced his name, even if it no longer had any real meaning. In this case though, it seemed appropriate in an informal sense as well. He spoke as though he were speaking for the community and seemed to be genuinely concerned with policy issues, repeatedly talking with me about sorting devices that he hoped might make the nets less biologically destructive (and perhaps therefore legal).

Soon after lunch, we relaxed in the tree house while the men met in the yard. Karen told me that it was a regular barangay meeting, though I suspect that my presence comprised most of the agenda. Whatever they did or didn't discuss, it worked out well for me. As soon as our focus group discussion began, it was clear that people were very willing to talk with me. And though they clearly were presenting their own version of things, they didn't seem to come to the interviews with a strong agenda. A few people asked if I could help get livelihood assistance for their communities, but were happy to talk with me, even when I confided that I could not.

I had planned to delicately approach questions of legality, but no such kid gloves were necessary. Without exception, fishers told me that their style of fishing—a hand-operated boat seine they called buli-buli—was illegal. When asked about their greatest concern for their community, the answer was equally clear: the Bantay Dagat. Many described personal confrontations with the Bantay Dagat that resulted in having their nets confiscated or their boats shot at. Most felt that they were not harming the fishery and that their nets should be legal, but others felt that the nets were rightly banned, that they caught small fish that should ideally be left to grow. But many noted that they had switched to using regulation-size mesh, and several described the annual practice of creating nurseries for the fish to lay their eggs. This didn't sound much like short-sighted or unsustainable. All agreed that the chief complaint against their nets was that they harmed reefs and that this was baseless. Dragging a net across the reef would also destroy the net, they said, so they don't fish there. As one fisher said, “the only things the nets destroy are our hands.” Everyone also agreed that whatever their impact might be, far more damage was done by intruding commercial fishers, who operated their trawls and machine-winched nets with virtual impunity.

Throughout the interviews, fishers spoke of their situation with resignation. They didn't like breaking the law, but they saw no viable alternative, and didn't expect things to change. They noted that neighboring communities hated them but saw the situation as intractable. At great length, fishers explained why alternative livelihood projects had failed, and why other fishing methods were insufficient alternatives. Barring legalization or the miraculous creation of alternative sources of income, they saw themselves stuck with the Bantay Dagat. The statements I heard suggested a sort of battle mentality—if they were going to be outlaws, they wanted to be pursued fairly, or to have the opportunity to fight back. Many of the complaints didn't even seem to ask for justice, but simply more tolerable injustice.

The way they tell it the fishers of Taba-Taba are trapped. They are biased, of course, but they present a very sympathetic situation. Their defenses are reasonable and their complaints seem largely legitimate. They do seem concerned with sustainability if their nets are causing destruction, but the reasons have not been effectively explained. It's impossible to know what they mean by “no alternative livelihood,” or how much they would suffer if they gave up using buli-buli. But they seem no wealthier than fishers in other communities, and the fact that they all continue to break the law despite serious enforcement suggests that they really are without other options. Their accusations that the Bantay Dagat focus on them may be overblown, but in other interviews, much friendlier sources also suggest that this may be the case.

No matter what, it's clear that when it comes to coastal management, these fishers have gotten the raw end of the deal. The way ISO's programs are set up, it should be helping the fisherfolk in two ways. By reducing unsustainable fishing, it should be looking out for their long-term good; with micro-finance, livelihood projects and even community organizing, it should be softening the blow or compensating for the short term pain that these changes create. Taba-Taba though, lies outside of ISO's official program area. So while it feels the pressure to change from the Bantay Dagat, it enjoys none of the short-term benefits. Under the best of circumstances, a place like Taba-Taba will only get the long-term sustainability benefits and will pay a cost for that in the short term. But even for that to happen, the Bantay Dagat would have to be effective in changing fishers' behavior, and that doesn't seem likely to happen any time soon.

In a few weeks, I will be doing interviews in other “friendlier” barangays, ones where the Bantay Dagat come from. I will be talking to the people that Taba-Taba fishers are “hated” by. There I will surely hear the other side of the story, and will have to make sense of the two. But to a certain degree, I already know the other side of the story. I work with them. I know the people at ISO who are deeply committed to making the lives of fishers better and who feel that the Bantay Dagat operations are central to that. They struggle to be effective in a world of poverty and resignation and corrupt, feudal politics. They have devoted their careers to community organizing and management. They have their biases and their blind spots, but they care deeply and they are fighting the good fight.

But it certainly doesn't feel that way for the fishers in Taba-Taba, and it's easy to understand why. As I wandered around Taba-Taba toward the end of our visit, the whole situation seemed tragic and ironic and emblematic of how complicated and difficult this work can be. The same sentiment seemed to hit Karen, as we talked in the evening after our interviews. Karen, in many ways, is one of those people on the other side. She is one of ISO's most active volunteers, constantly involved in one fundraising effort or another, many of which are explicitly to fund the Bantay Dagat. Yet as we looked over the interviews, she told me that she felt for these fishers, and saw how they had no options. We sat at dinner and turned the situation over and over, I could see the conflicted feelings on her face. I at least had the consolation of being the outsider, the researcher. For her, the contradiction runs deeper.

I don't know what will come of my research. My initial field report at ISO came right before our yearly assessment, and it seems to have stirred up the conversation and provoked a little bit of soul searching, so I am hopeful that it will have real impact. But as I watched Karen thinking about our interviews, I realized that I was already having an impact, independent of any conclusions that I might draw. It was a satisfying feeling, if also a painful one. I believe in asking the hard questions and facing the answers, but I wondered if it was fair to thrust all of this ambiguity on Karen. When I'm making reports I am diplomatic, mixing criticism with suggestions and qualifications, choosing who I present to and how I present. In the field, as we struggle to make sense of each new conversation, there are no such buffers. I was worried that I was putting Karen through more than she bargained for.

The next day, I saw how she was dealing with it. As we celebrated a resident's birthday and our “despidita,” or going away, Karen sat with a teenage girl from Taba-Taba, recruiting her to the “Coral Reef Champions,” the volunteer branch of ISO. It was a strange situation, recruiting the daughter of an illegal fisher into an organization that funds the fish wardens he despises. At first, it seemed contradictory to the point of incoherence. Did Karen not also see this contradiction?

I don't know for sure, but I think she saw it. And then I think she saw past it. I view that bizarre recruitment as a statement of hope. It is a statement that the cause is still worthwhile, and that we can sort out the places where it has gone awry. It is a recognition that at the core, ISO is out to make fishing communities better, and that in this sense, there could be no more logical recruit than the girl she was talking with, even if that was obscured by the current situation. It seems to me that Karen's recruitment was a response and a commitment to working things out for the long-term.