In Praise of Savage

I caught a portion of Fear Factor a few weeks ago and came across something that left a bad taste in my mouth. Those familiar with the show know that there is portion where the contestants have to eat things that are out of the ordinary before advancing to the final round. I’ve seen them wolf down live insects, worms, and bull’s testicles. I’ve also seen many of them gag and puke, and sometimes even refuse to touch the "delicacies" because they found them too disgusting, automatically eliminating themselves from the game. It is a lot of fun really, and I enjoy watching the show. On this particular episode the contestants had to eat our own Filipino specialty — balut.

The host (whatever his name is) clearly stated that balut is a Filipino delicacy, and as he described what it was (a half-developed duckling) and how to eat it (with feathers, beaks, legs and all) the contestants looked more than eager to get the challenge over and done with. If I never came across balut in my entire life I probably would have found it gross too. So they started eating it— the wrong way. They broke the shells and let the tasty amniotic fluid spill to the ground. They didn’t even have any salt to season the duckling with. Since it is a Filipino delicacy it should have been eaten the proper Filipino way, so there was obviously a lack of culinary research on the part of the producers, but that is all beside the point.

All the contestants made it through the challenge with none of them throwing up, so perhaps the balut didn’t taste that bad. What caught my attention though was a comment that the host made to one of the female competitors, and I quote: "She’s a savage, how could she do that?" At the end of the round he added, "Clearly you are a bunch of freaks. Congratulations."

When I hear the word "savage" I think of the time when mankind was in the hunting and gathering stage. These people made do with what they could, living off the land, not needing any of the amenities that our present "civilized" world has to offer. They lived a simple life and were able to adapt to their surroundings with ease.

The dictionary meaning of "freak" on the other hand, is: "unusual; bizarre; an abnormally developed human being." The word clearly has derogatory connotations.

But wait a minute—If by eating balut, the contestants were "savages" and "freaks," was that host implying that Filipinos were "savages" and "a bunch of freaks" too? Do I hear some condescension in that comment? Fear Factor may well have lost thousands of Filipino viewers right then and there because of what may be interpreted as a racial slur. But then I say, "Thank you very much." Put a Filipino in Fear Factor and he definitely would blow the competition away. Some aspects of our ordinary life are even scarier than those stunts they pull off on the show. Just watch those street vendors on EDSA dodge the buses driven by drivers from hell, or the kids in Baguio’s Mines View Park who used to catch coins thrown by tourists off the cliff (with some plunging to their deaths), or the minors in Bulacan who assemble firecrackers, some of them being blown to smithereens because the proper safety precautions were not followed.

Oh, and let’s not forget that Pinoys can eat anything too. Every part of a slaughtered animal is put to good use. We have Adidas, IUDs, Betamax, Isaw, Helmet, etc. as common street food (we even had a worker who ate mayflies.) We eat "weeds" like saluyot, talinum and wild ferns.

Put a "savage" on any one of those adventure shows like Survivor and watch him prevail with his resourcefulness and adaptability.

I’m going to end this piece with an anecdote:

A friend related a story that got everyone pissed off. It seems that she was hanging out in Tam-Awan, a popular artists’ village in Baguio one day, when an old Caucasian-looking man and his Filipina "girlfriend" showed up. The man brayed, "So where are the head-hunting Ee-gow-rahts in their G-strings?" His companion answered with her painful accent, "Oh, de are actually civilized now." To which the boor retorted, "We should get our money back. We are here to see those savages."

Despite the negative connotation of the word, being a "savage" is preferable to the alternative of becoming a culturally insensitive freak.

Being "savage" isn’t too bad. Look in the thesaurus and some synonyms for it are "ferocious" and "brave."