I remember the darapilan (sugar cane mill) in a Buneg farm…

A young farmer prepared a pile of harvested sugar canes for processing. He also got ready his strong kalabaw (carabao) for a half-day work in the darapilan. The kalabaw worked itself very hard so the long sugar canes could be processed and produced into what we called sinakob. When the kalabaw stopped working, the machine of course stopped. As a metaphor, the kalabaw was the lead in the success of this activity, although behind the scene one could think of the young farmer as the lead, who fulfilled that needed human intervention. Without the kalabaw, or even without the machine that ran the darapilan, there would be no products. In turn, the sinakob or the sub-products like patopat were sources of income for the Buneg farmers.

All primary entities in this activity: the young farmer, kalabaw, sugar miller (machine), and sugar canes harvested from the Buneg farm are all parts of a whole operation that contributed to success of the Buneg farmers. Their success was also factored in to a larger community, Villegas; and in turn to a much larger community – their town, Pozorrubio. This simple operation created synergies. For every activity of a community member, it impacts the larger community.

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