RIZAL PARK, THE PEOPLE'S OWN
 

They say that city living is often just a matter of survival. But not for the Filipino who seems to possess an uncanny knack for turning mere existence into an adventure. Always a person of good cheer, the Filipino never lets the nuances of choking city life bog him down. Instead, there is always a palliative to refuel his spirit, to distract from the harsher realities, to temper the daily tragedies with.

For Metro Manilans, one of the best tonics is still a visit to the Park. The Rizal Park or Luneta, 58 hectares by the sea, is a relaxing oasis for urban Filipinos who take eking a living and the right to beauty, happiness and leisure with equal sobriety. Like a magnet, Rizal Park draws in thousands of work-torn bodies from Manila and the outlaying suburbs.

From an empty wasteland, Luneta has blossomed into a radiant fulfillment of a people’s dream. The wide tracts of tall cogon and parched grass have been replaced by soothing green. Three-lined walks, manicured wide lawns, pools and multi-hued flowers perpetually in bloom provide a welcome breather from the otherwise jarring urban landscape. Luneta is truly an oasis in the heart of cosmopolitan Manila.

The Rizal Monument is its focal point. Inscribed on the monument itself and on plaques embedded in stone walls which surround it are translation of Jose P. Rizal’s hautingly beautiful poem, Mi Ultimo Adios (“My Last Farewell”). Written on the eve of his death.

A Chinese garden and a Japanese garden, complete with moats, bridges, stone lanters, gurgling brooks and arches, offer austere Oriental serenity. The formal Chinese garden was built by the Filipino Chinese community and reportedly cost P1.2 million. Rizal Park is also reputed to be the only one with a separate garden for the blind.

Around the park periphery are snack bars operated by girl scouts, boy scouts and even rehabilitated drug addicts. The snack shops have recently introduced the sugar cane juice (transplanted from Chinatown) which is now a popular drink among regular park-habitues. A sidewalk café run by the Philippine Association of the Deaf is another unique feature. First-time customers feels something amiss, not experiencing the usual café chatter and clutter, until they are asked for their orders in sign language. Then they sit back and, like other curiosity-seekers, watch an interesting choreography of hands as the waiters exchange friendly banter, sometimes to the tune of the tasteful “canned” music wafting from the Open Air Auditorium at the opposite side of the park.

At the Luneta, concerts, stage plays, musicales, fashion shows and other cultural presentations are brought within the people’s reach. Quality production are held, for free, at the open-air auditorium. In the same area is a splendid man-made lagoon. Sky-rocketing fountains temper the fierce sun rays in the daytime and are illuminating sights in the evenings.

Not far off is a huge clock mounted on a bed of flowers. Contrasting green and red cucharitas highlight the numbers. The time, radio time, is, of course, accurate. At the opposite end, on Agrifina Circle, is a skating rink encircling a globe fountain. This is one of the most popular spots. In early evening, park promenaders get more than an eyeful of rollerskate “ballet” performed by the rink experts.

Also on this side is the most ambitious project in the park – the giant topographical map of the Philippines which was said to have cost P1 million. Correct to scale the map delineates the country’s territorial boundaries and shows all 7,100 islands in full color.

The Park is essentially a play area for children. But still there’s a special Children’s Playground with various features to delight children of all ages. Giant sculptures of prehistoric animals area also discovery tunnels, slides, swings and play houses.

All admission fees charged by the park administrators are minimal and do not even represent upkeep costs. But as every contributor agrees, whatever funds come from the public represents an investment for tomorrow’s generation.

Luneta is “one of the safest parks in the world”. There are muggers in Central Park, New York and Ueno Park in Tokyo is not recommended at certain hours of the day. With its independent security force and an additional detail from the Manila Police Department, Rizal Park boasts of the best security in the Metro Manila area. Common crimes seldom happen, serious ones almost never. It is said that there has never been a successful bag-snatching attempt within the park.

Spotless surroundings are another source of pride. People appreciate the park and want to keep it clean.

The park has over 30 comfort rooms with live-in attendant. There is also a first-aid clinic with a doctor, nurses and a ready ambulance.

Luneta, as seen today, was painstakingly built by thousands of unknown citizens who gave time, money and sweat to translate the vision of a beautiful park into reality. It is the product of a whole nation’s conspiracy to build a beautiful sanctuary where one can be relieved of the harassment of the city.

The people continue to carefully nurture it because they know that in their need for it, they had shape up something from practically nothing, and now own it. Rizal Park is the people’s park.

Luneta, alternately called Bagumbayan, Plazuela de Isabel II, La Plaza, La Calzada, Wallance Field throughout the decades, is rich in song and story. Bagumbayan (in Tagalog “new town”) was an ancient Tagal town set upon marshy land and located 1.5 kilometers south of Maynila. Roughly, it confines cover what is now Roxas Blvd. Extension in front of old Luneta, P. Burgos St. to Pasig river down to San Luis St. (now T.M. Kalaw) to the beach which is now Roxas Blvd.

It was overlooked by the Spanish conquistadores in favor of Rajah Sulayman’s large barangay settlement until its strategic importance was discovered. In 1574, a Chinese army led by Lim Ah Hong attacked Maynila and Bagumbayan provided a natural barrier for the defense of the Palisaded city.

In 1601, Bagumbayan was mentioned in the records of the Supreme Court of Spain under the Spanish appellation, nuevo barrio. The name was later changed to Luneta, which is Spanish means a detached, cresent-shaped fort.

Bagumbayan had a church, the Church of San Juan, which was promptly demolished after the British invasion in 1762 as it  “provided too much cover” for the attacking forces.

Later the Spaniards were to develop its northern portion into the district of Parian where the local Chinese were quartered.

The marshy grounds remained a strategic “no man’s land” until 1820 when the Paseo de Luneta was built adjacent to the beach.

The spanish Luneta was rectangular – one hundred meters wide and 300 meters long – with semi circular ends and a fine, broad carriage drive called La Calzada.

Here, Manila’s elite would meet after vespers to enjoy the bracing avening air. As many as a hundred elegant carriages graced by Spanish and mestiza ladies could be seen parked in the malecon.

Henry T. Ellis, a British author who visited Manila in 1856, wrote this about La Calzada;

“The carriage-road was adorned by the monument erected to the memory of Magallanes and for a considerable distance, it is boarded with trees on either side, besides being provided with lamps which are used on particular occasions. In the center of the road, orderlies, handsomely dressed in light blue uniform, cocked hats and jack-boots are stationed, lunted on some of the largest ponies the place affords…..”

The promenade had a bandstand, a glorieta at the center and two circular fountains. The Governor’s military band played in the early evenings and all Manila came to see and be seen.

H.T. Ellis adds the romantic details:

“A band plays on the Calzada once or twice a week; on which occasions caballeros may be seen lunging amongst the carriages that have halter near the music, talking soft nonsense and whispering naughty fibs to the señoritas, their bewitching occupants, braving alike the brilliant fire of their dark, lustrous eyes and the all-enchanting coquetries of the fan, in the mysterious uses of which no ladies in the world are better versed than the daughters of Spain and her colonies.”

Bagumbayan Park gracefully hosted flirtations among Manila’s elite as well as callousedly witnessed the deaths of the disloyal citizenry. For 74 years, the Spaniards used the site as an execution ground for “rebels and mutineers.”

No piece of land is probably as sacred and hallowed. Between 1823 and 1897, 158 patriots and martyrs were felled on the square by Spanish infantrymen. It is said that the blood they shed served as a “spiritual fertilizer” which invigorated the Filipino people’s yearning for liberty.

The morning of December 30, 1896 was most memorable. Bagumbayan was gaily dressed in bunting and a big crowd had gathered along the avenue in spite of the earliness of the hour. Dr. Jose Rizal, Filipino nationalist, was to be executed by the Spaniards. Friars drove about in their carriages, eager to witness the death of the famous insurecto. Filipinos who had heard so much about him came to satiate their curiosity, to see the man  who dared to challenge tyranny.

The square was formed by detachments from the light foot regiment, the battalion of local volunteers and the Filipino mercenaries of the 70^th regiment. A bugler and drummer led the detachment which escorted Rizal from Fort Santiago. It was as if the Spaniards were taking no chances.

The march was slow, Rizal, somberly garbed in the black European suit, was serene and tranquil.

“What a beautiful morning,” he said to those beside him. “Some morning like this, I came here for a walk with my sweethearts.”

Inside the square, Rizal face an all. Filipino firing squad. He turned his back to face the bay. The officer in-charge had been ordered to shoot him in his back. As the Remingtons of the 70^th fired, Rizal veered his body to the right and fell dead, face upward.

For years after, the park was remembered as  where, the “Martyr of Bagumbayan” had died.

In 1920, during the American occupation of the islands, Daniel Burnham, architect and city planner, chose the Bagumbayan Field as the site of the proposed American Government center. Spanish Luneta was lengthened towards San Luis St. and Westward toward Manila Bay.

Burnham designed a U-shaped composition of buildings but only three were actually erected – the Congress, Finance and Agriculture (now housing the Department of Tourism) buildings.

Then the Americans set about building a memorial to honor Rizal, the national hero. The monument was built with money raised by popular subscription and with the cooperation of Governor-General William Howard Taft. The memorial is the work of Swiss sculptor Richard Kissling who cast the bronze fiqure in Swetzerland. If was completed in 1913, fully 17 years after the hero’s execution. Today, it remains the most revered of the numerous monuments honing Rizal. Here, his intered remains are guarded night and day.

The park area east of the Rizal monument was renamed Wallace Field. The area where the memorial stood was called Old Luneta and the part reclaimed from the sea, where the Quirino Grandstand and New Luneta are now, was known as Burnham Green.

Wallace Field had an athletic field often used for rodeo events, and military parade grounds. For years, it was leased as the site of the gay Philippine Carnivals the country’s much-awaited social event. In 1953, Wallance Field was the site of the first Philippine International Fair. After the event, the site was abandoned and the whole area generally neglected.

In the late 50’s the late President Ramon Magsaysay reserved the Luneta Park exclusively for park purposes and had trouble resisting consisting official pressure from groups who wished to exploit the park for their own pet projects. One group strongly lobbied to use the site for a National Cultural Center and envisioned the construction of a National Library, National Museum and National Theater.

Not few persons decried the plans to mar the huge, open park, one irate sympathizer said; “Luneta has been ruthlessly butchered, cut up to small, useless areas assigned for incongruous uses.”

The arguments went on, silenced only by the death of the major protagonists. For a long time, the park was bare and unkept. The people’s hearts sank everytime they passed Luneta which, by that time, had turned into a seatbed of crime and immorality. In the daytime, the park was visibly a wild and unruly tract of land. At night, the whole place was shrouded in complete darkness except for some scattered lights. The park was a disgrace to Rizal whose own monument had become a public midden shed, muddy in the rain and surrounded with tall cogon in the summer.

In the late 1961, there was an attempt to improve Luneta by modernizing Rizal’s monument. A pylon was added to make the statue look tall. This was bitterly attacked by Teodoro Valencia, a well-known newspaper columnist who had always successfully used the written word in crusading for what were originally lost causes.

Valencia asserted that one never tampers with a monument because it is a work of art. By 1962, the infamous pylon has been removed. There arose a clamor for improving the monument then disfigured by the disposal of its artificial “top hat.” It was at this point that the original beautification efforts started.

Valencia announced publicly that he would try to give the monument and the surrounding area a facelift. “The original plan was to clean the monument itself, put in a few flower pots to give it some respectability,” he said. “But money started flowing in. it was totally unexpected.” In one week’s time, P30,000 was easily collected from the civic-spirited.

Valencia and a handful of fellow sympathizers were stuck. They had to go ahead and spend the amount accumulated. The approach to the monument was cemented, lights were installed and few trees were planted. Valencia got the Philippine Army to put an honor guard.

Then came official support. The National Parks Development Committee was organized and there was no more stopping for the project. First came the beautification of the seawall. Then the grandstand was improved and completed. The development of the raised portion facing the grandstand was rushed.

When the First Lady Imelda Romualdez Marcos took over as chairman of the Committee (Valencia was and still is vice-chairman), the heart of the project was in earnest. The area behind the Rizal Monument started to shape up. It was as if the last few pieces had been found to complete the beautiful giant jigsaw puzzle.

By 1966, the pace of the work was fever pitch. Some half-a-million pesos was being eaten up by the project every month. News about whatever little improvement being done spread quickly until the whole nation stirred with the desire to see the park improved. Cash donations continued to pour in until, P60 million had been spent for the beautification of the entire park.

“The money that went into the development of Rizal Park came from government corporations, private business houses, individual donors, taxi drivers, cocheros, students and plain citizens,” Valencia recalls. “The money came in centavos, pesos, hundreds of pesos, hundred of thousands,” he added, overwhelmed by the unexpected response of the Filipino people.

What was visibly obvious was that an empty, dusty wasteland had metamorphosed into a beautiful park. But the sweeter success was the fact that Madame Marcos and Valencia had rekindled a dormant bayanihan spirit. The spirit which holds up rural life was successfully transplanted to the city. Rizal Park dispelled beliefs that city folks were selfish urbanities.

The bayanihan spirit is still evidence today. Many professionals and businessmen continue to volunteer their free services and private contributors continue to chip in. the park is helped by budgetary appropriations from the national Government. The Government corporations are still heavy contributors. The city Government of Manila shoulders the electric bills, provides a 42-man security details and helps with the maintenance costs. Various sectors are still galvanized into one and the spirit of civic concern has not flickered.

Today, as in yesteryears, Luneta is still where “Manila airs herself every afternoon".

The park throbs with life, heavy with footsteps throughout the day. It is a park of people, attracting health buffs in the wee hours of the morning office workers during lunch hours, families, tourists, strollers, children, lovers. The park is generous to any soul. -- By Sylvia D. Altomonte