Surprisingly, bocayo turned out to be a prime trading commodity in summer camp. In those days before import liberalization, most of the foreign kids rarely tasted coconut. Bocayo was an unusual and exotic treat, and we were able to make advantageous trades. We were ecstatic that everyone was eager to trade our cheap coconut candy for licorice sticks, cinnamon bears, salt pastilles or even those Finnish chocolates called fazers. In summer camp, we happily discovered that bocayo was definitely not for geriatrics.
Perhaps, it is this happy memory that makes me experience an occasional craving for bocayo. However, it is not the hard, jaw-breaking variety peddled along the highways of Villasis or Carmen, Rosales, Pangasinan, or the various public markets that I yearn for. Rather, I look for the freshly made and chewy variety with a faint smoky aroma. For this, I look for "Belinda’s Special," a bocayo sold at either the Lingayen or Binmaley, Pangasinan public markets.
"Belinda’s Special" is what Mamerto and Imelda Victorio of Pangapisan Sur, Lingayen, Pangasinan call their product. Belinda is their eldest child, and the Victorio couple learned bocayo-making from their parents. "Sicato la yay abangonan ko (This was what I grew up with)," says 58-year-old Mamerto. A third generation bocayo maker, he learned the business from his father, Eliseo Victorio, who, in turn, learned the business from his own father.
Mamerto relates that his father used to tell him the story of how bocayo saved the Victorios from Japanese persecution during World War II. The Japanese camp was nearby and the soldiers showed up whenever they smelled the cooking bocayo. Lured by the aroma of caramelizing sugar, the soldiers would fill up empty coconut shells (lapis) with the coconut confection. Otherwise, however, they left the family alone.
With 12 children, Eliseo Victorio relied on his offspring to help him in his coconut candy enterprise. Although he already helped his father as a child, Mamerto was 17 years old when he started working full time at bocayo-making. Tasked to prepare the coconuts, he was required to manually grate at least 100 coconuts each day. This is a vital step in making the perfect bocayo. Mamerto shuns the use of a machine, preferring that the coconut be grated manually using what the locals call an igar. "No masyadon fino so impan-igar na niyog, anawet so bocayo (If the coconut is grated too finely, the bocayo will be tough)," he says.
Another vital component of bocayo is the sugar. Instead of just brown sugar (called bagas in the area), molasses or polotipot is added to the coconut. The talyasi or cast-iron pan containing the mixture is then placed over a wood fire, and a managkiwal or mixer is designated to constantly stir the bocayo until it reaches the correct consistency. Stirring the mixture to make sure it cooks evenly, contends Mamerto, is the most difficult part in bocayo-making process, as the mixture gets progressively heavier as the sugar thickens.
With the supply of coconuts dwindling in Pangasinan, the required coconuts have to be delivered from as far away as Quezon Province. To this day, however, the Victorios buy sugar and molasses from the Godoy clan of Manaoag — the same family that supplied the sugar requirements of their bocayo-making antecedents. They employ workers as the need arises and the peak seasons for bocayo are All Soul’s Day and Holy Week. These are when sales of bocayo in the market increase as holidaymakers buy pasalubong.
The bocayo is made in the lower floor of the Victorio’s house. There is a small sari-sari store that sells colorful, small packets of assorted merchandise. A shed of rusty galvanized iron roofing covers a small yard, and a clay chimney extends to the ceiling. There is a pile of coconuts in one corner, and coconut husks are stacked neatly in another. The blackened and hardened earthen floor directly under the chimney is apparently where the wood fire is built. However, it is a Sunday, and the family and workers are resting from their bocayo-making chores.
"Mairap ya traho, balet anos labat (It is hard work that requires much patience)," contends Imelda Victorio. "Daiset labat so tubuen, balet aanosan (There is little gain, but we persevere.)" Through their bocayo-making enterprise and much sacrifice, Mamerto and Imelda Victorio are proud to have been able to send all their children to school. This, they believe, is their measure of success. Making bocayo is difficult and tedious work. However, recognizing that there is no substitute for hard and honest effort, they persevere.