Manay Coring's Journey to the Land of the Perfect Suman Latik

When she passed away, she was far, far away from the island of her birth, Ticao. But no matter, Manay Coring always managed when she was alive to link us to that land with her suman latik, a type of suman the preparation of which was long and tedious. The glutinous rice had to be soaked overnight in water before they were wrapped in banana leaves. The leaves themselves had to pass through a scrutiny as regards its age - not too old and not too young. The young leaves would leave a taste; the old ones would be brittle and prone to breaking when they were passed over the flame.

There were two toppings to be prepared: bukayo the young shredded coconut cooked in brown sugar or in kalamay, as the molasses cakes are known in Ticao; and the latik, the fried coconut solids that come with the most delicious scent of burnt coconut oil. The latik had to be spread first, the extra oil dousing the entire body of the suman. On top of the latik the bukayo became the dominant color, red and arrogant but easily tamed by the fastest native tongue. There were many reasons why we so loved this delicacy. In the hands of Manay Coring, suman latik became an unpredictably charming enterprise. Sometimes, the recipe worked and sometimes it did not.

The size of the suman itself varied. In good days, they were as manageable as the palm of a two-year old child; in bad days, they were as big as an adult man's hand. But the taste - in bad or in good days - of the suman latik was always a heady mix of all the lovely possibilities in a coconut: memories of the pure coconut juice whispered willfully together with the arrested desires of a native wine. The rice, sticky and soft, embraced the unabashed sweetness of the bukayo, each grain cuddling the mushy but sincere saltiness of the latik.

Death can be such a killjoy. Yet, in her death and, perhaps true to her interesting character, Manay Coring's memory remains delicious.

During her last year, Manay Coring remained mostly at home. She would go out only to feed her two huge dogs and then she would go back to her favorite sofa by the porch. She, however, remained our connection to the world outside, to the road that led to a growing population of informal settlers behind our home. She knew the people going out of that tiny paved road. She managed to know who was pregnant and who was getting birth. Sometimes though, she resembled the weather bureau: her social weather reports were inaccurate. Or so, we thought.

In her death, we learned one thing about those inaccuracies. She was imagining. She was telling us to look at the world from a different side. Two men running became a tale of revenge. Add a woman and Manay Coring would spin a crime of passion. At the end of the day, we would find out about the true story. But it did not matter what the truth was. The events had engaged us. And it did not matter. We all enjoyed the rush of the news, the fun in the gossip, and in being tricked out of our own wit.

Only one aunt was brave enough to cross the Ticao Sea perilous this time of the year. But in the small crowd that accompanied her to her last journey were friends of her grandnieces and grandnephews, family friends, neighbors who would miss the food she cooked and delivered to them free, a representative of the grand universe of all those who have sampled this simple woman's suman latik, the food that she always prepared to tell us the story of the island of her birth, so far and so distant this time of the year when the "waves are as big as the old municipio building." As in her stories and her imagination.

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