BAGUIO CITY—Walking down Session Road, filmmaker Ferdinand Balanag bumped into a friend who assured him, “We are supporting and promoting your film.”
Balanag is one of two Baguio-born and bred filmmakers—the other being Kidlat Tahimik—featured at the recent edition of the traveling Sineng Pambansa festival here in the country’s summer capital.
He feels it’s important, Balanag said, to show his documentary, “Walking the Waking Journey,” to fellow Baguio residents.
The docu tells of Tibetan Lama Tenzin, now 36, and the 11 children, now 9 to 13 years old, that he rescued from abject poverty from their remote mountain village in Upper Dolpo, Nepal, seven years ago. He’s been sending them to school in India.
Harrowing
“Walking …” captures in harrowing detail the kids’ 30-day trek to visit their families for the first time since they left home with their intrepid benefactor seven years ago. Lama Tenzin made his wards promise they would someday go back home for good to help other children.
In the docu, Lama Tenzin explains, “These children seem to belong nowhere, living near the borders of India, Nepal and Tibet.” Not one of the three governments seems to want to take responsibility for them. “They have to be helped to help themselves.”
Lama Tenzin has been a monk since age 14. He chanced upon the children when he got lost on a trek to his mother’s Tibetan village. He was appalled by the kids’ apparent hopelessness. In a previous interview, he was quoted as saying, “I could stay in a monastery, close my eyes and meditate; or I could open my eyes and do something.”
The docu was shot in 2008. Producer/narrator Ilonka Harezi, an advocate of children’s rights, led Balanag to the story.
Our story, too
Balanag said the plight of the Tibetan children made him realize “the value of education [and] empowering people through education.”
He noted that the film could in fact be about Igorot children who still walk for miles daily to their schools in the Cordilleras. “It happens everywhere,” he said. “It is also the story of our people in the interiors. It’s just that life in Upper Dolpo is made much more difficult by nature itself.”
Baguio audiences have been responding positively to the film. Balanag recounted, “I noticed that the audience became more and more quiet as the film climaxed. I always feel their emotions in the silence. Some end up in tears. With this docu, I am sharing with the viewers the awakening I experienced during the shoot.”
Ultimate reward
He said the film’s Golden Ace Award from the Las Vegas Film Festival last year was a bonus. “I think the best award, the ultimate reward that I’ve received from making the docu is really the experience.”
The complete title—“Walking the Waking Journey: An Epic Voyage to Awaken Humanity and Open a Door to the Future”—reflects the filmmaker’s own journey. He recalled: “It was tough. We would have only one bowl of oatmeal for breakfast, then walk for six to 10 hours. It made me realize how lucky I’ve been, and taught me to transform compassion into action.”
Despite their preparations, he said, he and his crew—cinematographers Regiben O. Romana and Jordan Arabejo and production assistant Pusongbughaw Romana—got close to being intimidated by the gruelling shoot.
When the group reached the trek’s highest point at 18,000 feet above sea level, Arabejo wanted to quit, Balanag recalled. “He started crying from sheer exhaustion. He asked us to leave him behind.” Balanag refused and held Arabejo’s hand until he recovered.
One of the children got sick, too, as did Lama Tenzin’s sister, Penpa, who went along to look after the kids.
Pure faith
“We had only two weeks for preproduction,” Balanag recalled, adding that the only thing that sustained the crew was “pure faith” in the project.
He proudly pointed out that postproduction was done in Baguio, with Arabejo and Kidlat de Guia (son of Kidlat Tahimik) as editors. Screenplay is by Padmapani Perez, daughter of Butch Perez, who directed “Mumbaki” (which was shown in the “Sine ng Masa” component of Sineng Pambansa here).
“We are all childhood friends,” Balanag said. “I was part of Kidlat Tahimik’s ‘Magellan’ film.”
Balanag has kept in touch with Lama Tenzin and the kids via Skype. “I spoke with Lama Tenzin just two weeks ago. We are shooting another docu in May.” His memories of the harsh trek are still fresh, needless to say, but Balanag is raring to scale the Himalayas once again.
He said, “We are shooting some footage to continue our ‘Waking Journey.’ This time it will be about disabled women living in Upper Dolpo.”
Talk about commitment.
E-mail: bayanisandiego@hotmail.com