The legend of the White Mangyans

Episode on January 28, 2008 Monday late night after Saksi Howie Severino travels to Mindoro to investigate the legend of "lost tisoys," a tribe of Mangyans called Olandes, mountain people in Mindoro descended from shipwrecked Dutch sailors. Various people give conflicting accounts, including a scholar who proclaims that the "white Mangyans" are a myth, along with other popular beliefs such as Mangyans with tails. But are the white Mangyans really a myth? In the remote town of Bait, Howie is told of Mangyan tisoys in the local high school. He finds them there and learns they come from a mountain village called Panaytayan. But what follows is not what he expected. Descending not from Dutch sailors from centuries ago, the tisoys are four children of a Dutch priest who married a Mangyan and has lived in splendid isolation for four decades. He is now among the foremost experts on Mangyan culture. In the village, he has set up institutions designed to teach and preserve ancient tribal practices such as the script, music, and weaving. His daughter Anya is a 23-year-old tisay who proudly calls herself a Mangyan and is following her father's footsteps in championing the Mangyan while presenting a new face of the tribe to the outside world. She accompanies her bahag-clad, betel-chewing uncle Anheng as he ventures down the mountain to town, faces of the old and the new Mangyan. As Anya and her siblings age and produce families of their own, the myth of the Olandes village may yet become a reality. Howie Severino’s I-Witness documentary airs this Monday late night over GMA 7.

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Ngayong Lunes, samahan si Howie Severino sa paghahanap niya sa mga “lost tisoys" ng Mindoro. Olandes ang tawag sa grupo ng mga Mangyan na nagmula raw sa lahi ng mga mandaragat mula sa Holland. Lumubog diumano ang barko nila mula Europa kaya napadpad sila sa dagat ng Mindoro. Marami ang nagssasabing alamat lang ang tungkol sa mga Olandes. Ngunit sa bayan ng Panaytayan makikilala ni Howie ang apat na mestisong namumuhay na animo’y mga Mangyan. Natagpuan na nga kaya ni Howie ang mga “lost tisoys" ng Mindoro? Abangan ang kakaibang kuwento ng pagtuklas ni Howie Severino sa I-Witness, Lunes ng gabi pagkatapos ang Saksi sa GMA 7.