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Sunday, January 31, 2010 BULALACAO: The Mangyans in the central Philippine island of Mindoro have struggled to keep their tribal culture alive amidst massive modernisation. With a growing number of Hanunuo Mangyans migrating to cities and adopting modern ways, ancient traditions are fast disappearing - like their ritual for the dead, called "kutkot." "Kutkot" is a Filipino word for "scratch" or "unearth." The ritual entails digging up a loved one's remains and dressing it up like a human being, to bring him back to the land of the living. It is an obligation that tribe members must perform, in keeping with a family's practice or following a dead relative's request. A year after Hulyong Antonio was buried, six of his children and other relatives from the Hanunuo Mangyan tribe traveled to his grave and retrieved his coffin. "This man told his children, 'Whatever happens to me, you have to do the kutkot ritual, in th...

Monday, September 07, 2009 MANILA: Two people died and more than 800 were rescued as a ferry carrying more than 900 passengers and crew capsized early today before sinking off the southern Philippines, coast guard and police officials said. The Superferry 9, owned by Aboitiz Transport System Corp., listed at about 3:30 a.m. local time at the vicinity of the Zamboanga Peninsula while on its way to the central province of Iloilo from General Santos City in the south, Commander Armando Balilo, the coast guard’s public information officer, said in a telephone interview. The ferry’s captain immediately ordered passengers to abandon ship, he added. Some 830 people have so far been rescued by three onsite rescue vessels, Balilo said. The ship sank at around 8 a.m., Police Chief Superintendent Angelo Sunglao, Zamboanga Peninsula’s police director, said by phone. Authorities are still investigating what happened. The focus is now on getting all the passengers to safety, Caroline Ballesteros, as...

Monday, August 10, 2009 BEIJING: A powerful typhoon killed eight people, toppled houses, flooded villages and forced nearly 1 million people to flee to safety on China's eastern coast before weakening into a tropical storm Monday.Named Morakot, the storm struck after triggering the worst flooding in Taiwan in 50 years, leaving dozens missing and bringing down a six-story hotel. It earlier lashed the Philippines, killing at least 22 people.Morakot, or emerald in Thai, slammed into China's Fujian province Sunday afternoon as a typhoon carrying heavy rain and winds of 74miles (119 kilometers) per hour, according the China Meteorological Administration. At least one child died after a house collapsed in Zhejiang province. By early Monday, the storm packed winds of 52 miles per hour (83kilometers per hour) and churned at about 6 mph (10 kph), it said. Hundreds of villages and towns were flooded and more than 2,000houses collapsed, the official news agency said. About 1 million peop...

MANILA: Two European tourists and nine Filipinos were killed from flooding and landslides triggered by heavy rain north of the Philippine capital, police and officials said Friday. In addition to the two dead, a French tourist is missing after 12 European and South Korean hikers were caught in heavy rain after scaling Mount Pinatubo volcano on Thursday, said regional police official Chief Superintendent Leo Nilo De La Cruz.De La Cruz said the two fatalities were French, but Belgian embassy official Ivy Weisz later said that one of the dead was Belgian.However, six French nationals and three South Koreans were rescued by an air force helicopter.French embassy consul Arnaut Rayar said he had spoken to the French survivors earlier in the day but "they were too shocked to go into details."The foreigners had hiked up the volcano, about 100 kilometres (60 miles) northwest of Manila, but after they descended were caught by heavy rain that mixed with volcanic ash on the slopes to fo...

Saturday, August 01, 2009 MANILA: Former Philippines president Corazon Aquino, whose "People Power" revolution toppled dictator Ferdinand Marcos and restored democracy to the nation, died Saturday after a battle with colon cancer. "Cory" Aquino was propelled into the political spotlight in 1986, leading millions of Filipinos in protests against the corrupt regime of Marcos, who jailed thousands of dissidents during his brutal 20-year regime. President Gloria Arroyo declared a 10-day period of mourning and ordered a state funeral for Aquino, whom she praised as a "national treasure." Aquino's family announced her death early Saturday. "Our mother peacefully passed away at 3:18 am, August 1, 2009 of cardio-respiratory arrest," Senator Benigno Aquino Jr, said in a statement outside the Makati Medical Centre in Manila, where his mother had been hospitalised. "She would have wanted us to thank each and every one of you for all the prayers an...