Seventy-one-year-old Flora
Espejo was weeping as she looked as the fire engulfed the whole
building of a portion of the Cogon Public Market last Wednesday afternoon, July
10.
She wanted to save her
vegetables, but to no avail.
 |
Flora Espejo, a popular
figure
at Cogon Public Market. Photo
by Leo Udtohan |
Cogon public market is
considered a landmark in the city and a popular place for its tabo (market day)
every Tuesday and Friday.
I felt sad for the
occupants here as I watched the fire spreading quickly and devoured the
building. I regularly buy vegetables and fish here aside
visiting my favorite Plaza Marcela. Most vegetable and fish vendors here are my
distant relatives and friends. They are Gaspara Pojas, 81, who sells native
products since 1976, Maria Porlaris who sells rice, Wilma Bangalao and her
daughter Juvy who sell “panakot” and Daday who sells the best sikwate in town.
But Flora is the most
popular figure here. Why? She is just one of the heiresses of the
lot occupied by Cogon public market before it was donated to the local
government. Original owners of the lots were my grandfather
Pantaleon Udtohan and his cousins, the Espejos and Ingkings.
If why occupants and some
residents cried when the fire reduced the market, many of them grew up here to
make a decent living. As a saying goes, some things will give way to something
new.
As vendors and kibitzers
were busy at the market, something strange happened at the Cogon High
School Evening Session that night.
At past 7 p.m., classes
were disrupted when at least 17 students were “possessed” by “evil spirits” and
began to experience chest pains, difficulty breathing, cold sweat, body spasms
and stiffening.
It all started when Grades
9 and 10 students complained of chest pains, and difficulty breathing, all of
whom were female complained of the same symptoms. After a group of students
started hysterical, students in the next classroom followed suit.
I am not an expert on
spirit possession but I have had witnessed demonic possessions in the
past. Two of our female neighbors were possessed by evil spirits on
different occasions. As the priests began to pray, the woman slipped
into a trance. She spoke in multiple voices-deep, guttural and masculine. When
someone secretly sprinkled ordinary water on her, she didn't react. But when
holy water was used, she screamed in pain. It took weeks for these women to be
completely delivered from evil spirits.
 |
Before and after: The
Cogon Public Market is a
popular landmark in Bohol province.
Photos by Leo Udtohan
|
Last Friday, July 12, I
had witnessed less than 10 students who were experiencing seizures
alongside their horrifying hallucinations. They were taken to the
principal’s office to calm down and wait for their parents to come to bring
them home.
When students were
“attacked”, I asked them what they saw. At first, they were silent for a
second. When they regained consciousness, they answered they saw strange eyes
and a black child with red eyes in the building.
The students looked liked
they were afraid of something. It’s not really that they were rowdy, they just
cried. They started to show wild behavior which led us to think that
maybe they were possessed by evil spirits.
In our Jewish and
Christian faith, we believe demons are real. They do possess someone which
serves as their “medium” that often elicits a response of fear.
In the case of Cogon High
School Night, in my humble opinion, they were not possessed. Only one was
genuinely “possessed” who served as the “medium” of the spirit
world. Other students just have contagious vision of the evil
spirit.
Anyone even faintly
familiar with mental illnesses knows that individuals who think they are being
attacked by malign spirits are generally experiencing nothing of the sort.
I spoke with psychologist
Tina Agnes Bagaipo-Dumas and some teachers who found out that most of the
students were depressed, stressed and skipped meals before going to school.
At 9 p.m., I got a call
from our cousins to help a student who reportedly fainted after school. What
was alarming she tried to cut her wrist because the spirit child at school told
her.
 |
| At least 80 stalls were razed by fire last July 10. Photo by Leo Udtohan |
To appease the worried
parents, I accompanied the frightened student who was brought to the church for
“deliverance” but the priest told us to see a doctor because the student showed
no sign of “possession.”
I just told the young girl
to pray before going to bed, eat on time and minimize watching horror and K-pop
movies and using the mobile phone.
Belief in possession
exists in many religious traditions. Some people believe that possession is
rare, but real. However, only a trained exorcist could tell if
someone is possessed.
Doctors used to be widely
skeptical and they argued that there's no empirical evidence that proves
possession is real even though many cultures still believe that seemingly
unprovoked acts of hysteria are caused by spirit possession.
Apart from spiritual modes
of therapy, those exhibiting odd behavior should seek medical help.
The Catechism of the
Catholic Church speaks to the importance of knowing the difference between
mental illness and demonic actions.
“The exorcism is
directed at the expulsion of demons or to the liberation from demonic
possession through the spiritual authority which Jesus entrusted to his
Church,” it said.
“Illness, especially
psychological illness, is a very different matter; treating this is the concern
of medical science. Therefore, before an exorcism is performed, it is
important to ascertain that one is dealing with the presence of the Evil One,
and not an illness,” it added.
As of yet, there has
been no rational or official explanation for the strange phenomenon.
***
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