(With apologies for disrupting traffic flow when I was taking photographs)
In my recent solo drive to Manila (January 30, 2022), to look into the kids that have recently acquired a house in Cainta, we decided to take another route from Pagbilao to Cainta to avoid the expected heavy traffic at San Pablo, Santo Tomas, SLEX, and C-5.
Thus we diverted from AH-26 to Lukban, Lumban, Paete, Pagsanjan, Pillilla, Morong, Tanay, up again to Antipolo and down to Cainta. (A mechanic friend has already suggested the route a long time ago but it was only in January this year that I tried it.)
During my flight when it was put on hold for almost an hour over Lopez Bay and Laguna de Bay, I was thinking of the young boy from Calamba as I looked down on the greenish waters of the lake that shimmers in the noontime sun.
Whether true or not, the story lives on that the young Jose Rizal accidentally dropped his slipper on the lake, and he threw in the other pair for the reason that a pair will be of better use to whoever a son of a fisherman that happens to pick them up.
Fertile minds may attempt to connect the stories supposed to be occurring during the early life of our National Hero, where Pepe dropped his slippers on the lake on their way to Manila via Laguna de Bay and Pasig River, thereby making a stopover in Cainta.
Some writers may have written that the young Pepe was carried on a hammock when they passed by Cainta, probably motivated by the custom then of taking a hammock in going up to Antipolo, which is adjacent to Cainta.
I am inclined to believe however that Rizal and her mother, most probably, were en route to Manila from Biñan via the Bay and Pasig River which is navigable all the way to Manila Bay.
Whatever, in the stop-over in Cainta, Rizal was said to have commented that "Ang iitim pala ng tao dito sa Cainta (the people of Cainta are dark skinned)", which I guess a grandson of Ilocano descent would fit in.
I've read about this observation of Rizal during my elementary days in the '60s, particularly when we studied the life and literary works of Jose P. Rizal, and I played the role, luckily at times that I get to play the part of Rizal, I guess not only because of my wavy hair.
Not everyone I believe takes the study on Rizal, "Asia's first apostle of nationalism", as Gregorio F. Zaide refers to him, seriously or remember it past scholastic terms, how many know that the young Rizal's horse was named "Alipato", meaning flying embers in the Tagalog language, or that his dog was named "Usman", which means "faithful companion".
Yes, Rizal may have been chosen by the Americans to be our foremost national hero, over Andres Bonifacio who the former find to be "too radical and aggressive".
Going back to the dark skinned natives of Cainta, it has become a moniker in the past, the same that Bicolanos are called "mga uragon", or being from Tondo, which is impolite to mention here. I've heard those in TV comedy shows.
I had once a good officemate from the place who is I recall to be dark-skinned but I never do notice it.
What's the origin then? FilipiKnow, in History and Politics, has one of the most plausible explanations, thus:
"In the conquest of Manila, the British expeditionary forces were boosted by the arrival of about 500 Sepoy soldiers from Madras (now Chennai, Tamil Nadu). "Sepoy" comes from the Urdu word sipahi, derived from the Persian sipah, meaning "army" or "horseman."
'In one major skirmish with the British, Anda's men displayed such aggressiveness and ferocity that a great number of the British soldiers fled and deserted their leaders.
Most of these were disgruntled Sepoys who had been forced into service by their British masters, with meager pay and few privileges. Rather than suffer under their master's employ, they preferred the uncertain fate of deserters—and so they fled to the wild frontiers of Morong province and settled in the towns of Taytay and Cainta.
'Here, the Sepoys mingled and lived with the natives, taking common-law partners as marriage with Filipinas would not have been permitted due to religious differences (the Sepoys were mostly Brahmans)."
So the dark complexion of the people of Cainta owes it to the Indian race, which I might also fit in as people, particularly in Indonesia, I am mistaken to be an Indian because of my eyes and skin that's far from being fair, also the reason maybe of the apparent conflict of the sound of my family name and appearance that I made it difficult to go past the immigration line in Osaka.
Note: I am not aware of having any Indian race in me. An aunt said however that her maternal grandmother is of Malaysian descent, and married my great grandfather who is from Xiamen, China.
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