Amaaaa
Amaaaa
Amaaaa
Pangingisda ang pangunahin nilang hanapbuhay. Gumagawa rin sila ng mga vinta at
mga gamit sa pangingisda tulad ng lambat at bitag. Ang mga kababaihan ay naghahabi
ng mga banig na may iba't-ibang uri ng makukulay na disenyo. Magaling din silang
sumisid ng perlas.
The Sama people can be quite hard to classify. Due to the nomadic nature of the
Sama they can be found in several countries (especially the Philippines, Malaysia,
and Indonesia). In Malaysia they are called Bajau by the Malaysians. In the
Philippines, other Filipinos call them Badjaos or Samals, depending on which
subgroup of the Sama they belong to. To complicate things further Sinama/Sama
is the name for at least four language groups of the Philippines which are then
subdivided into numerous dialects depending on what island a person is
from. Speakers of Northern Sinama, Central Sinama, and Southern Sama are
unaware of these language names given them by the linguists, because they
identify themselves by island and region instead of closeness in language. (For a
better understanding of the Sinama languages and dialects please refer to an
academic paper presented at the 2018 ICONBajau Conference under the
title: Language Features and Simple Methods to Help the Non-Linguist Navigate
the Sinama Languages and Dialects.) The Sama Dilaut have a tendency to answer
questions about their identity based on what they believe the asker will respond
most positively to. Sama Deya on the other hand will sometimes classify the
Sama Dilaut as being completely different from themselves.
With all this in mind, it has been quite confusing for outsiders to understand the
Sama and to find reliable information about them. As far as we can tell, this
article will be the most reliable information that you can find on the Sama, the
Samals, the Bajau, and the Badjao. It is an important starting point for any
research you might undertake on the Sama or their subgroups. It will only feed
your curiosity about this fantastic people group from Southeast Asia.
Sama is the all encompassing term for this people group. This includes the tribes
the Filipinos call Samals and the Badjao. This includes the seafaring Bajau of
Sabah, who are only known to Malaysians as Bajau. According to the Ethnologue
there are 84,000 Northern Sama (sse), 90,000 Central Sama (sml), 34,000 Sama
Pangutaran (slm), 319,000 Southern Sama (ssb), and 42,470 Sama Mapun
(sjm). That totals 569,470 Sama people. We suspect that this number to be more
realistically over 1,000,000 but politics as well as the difficulty of obtaining
reliable data make the Sama people impossible to count.
The Sama are native to the Sulu archipelago, including Tawi-Tawi and the
coastlines of Sabah, Malaysia
There has been a high migration of Sama from Sulu towards Sabah over the last
50 years. Most of the migrants are joining family ties that already exist over the
national borders. They are more aware of their identity as Sama but readily
adopt the term Bajau because of the political benefits that it provides them.
An important distinction to understand is that the Bajau with a sea based culture
are indeed Sama and are different from the Bajau with a horse culture, the West
Coast Bajau.
One of these distinctions that is often confused is the distinction between the
Sama Dilaut (Badjao) and other Sama of the Sulu seas. The term “dilaut” refers
to the ocean. They are the ocean going Sama. The Sama Dilaut are traditionally
sea gypsies and houseboat dwellers. Recently they have been semi-nomadic,
often living out at sea for days, weeks or months, but gradually adopting the
lifestyle of their Sama brothers and building their homes on the coastlines of the
Philippines and Malaysia.
The term Badjao has become the famous term for the Sama Dilaut in the
Philippines. Badjao are often depicted as beggars. They are described by the
government as depressed, deprived, and underdeveloped.
Among themselves the Badjao primarily identify themselves as Sama and this
should be the term used to identify them. This has been our personal experience
as well as the conclusion that Harry Arlo Nimo makes in his book, Magosaha: An
Ethnography of the Tawi-Tawi Sama Dilaut, after decades of researching the
“Badjao.”
When asked about their identity a Badjao might readily describe himself as
Badjao. For indeed this is what is better known. Some Sama might embrace this
description desiring to be viewed as worthy of pity. It offers him a higher chance
of receiving the welfare of the person he is approaching. This is true in both
begging on the street as well as in regards to government programs.
Sama Dilaut identify all other Sama groups as Sama Deya. “Deya” is the Sama
term for “inland”. In modern times this name can be somewhat laughable as it is
not uncommon to find the Sama Deya building homes out on stilts over the ocean
while many Sama Dilaut have built homes on the land right next to the ocean.
The other Sama refer to the Sama Dilaut as either Sama Dilaut or Sama Palaˈu,
meaning the Sama that live on boats (see myth on meaning of Pala’u).
Sama Dilaut tend to identify themselves more with traditional belief and the
religion of offering to their ancestors (Mag’mbo’) over Islam. You can find
Muslim, Animist, and Christian Sama Dilaut.
Linguistically all Sama Dilaut that we have met, whether in Luzon, Mindanao,
Sulu, or the Malaysian Sama Dilaut who trace their roots back to Tawi-Tawi are
part of the Central Sinama language. Badjao may refer to the Central Sinama
language (sml) as speaking “Bajau”.
Neighboring tribes and conquering world powers have historically identified the
Sama as Samals or Siyamals. The Maguindanaon account as recorded by Najeeb
Saleeby mentions the Samals as the boat people who brought Sharif Kabungswan
to Cotabato. The term Samal Dilaut can be found in various writings, but it is
most common for the Sama Dilaut to be called Badjao and the other Sama, the
more land based Sama to be called Samals. One of the distinctions is that
“Samals” are considered more Islamicized than the “Badjao”. Also their culture
discourages begging out of shame.
Recently the term Samals has caused quite a bit of confusion in terms of
identifying the Sama people due to the fame of the Island Garden of Samal. It is
very possible that this island was named after the Sama people who have visited
Davao for centuries, however currently there are only small populations of Sama
(Samals) existing on the island. The name for this island may be over 400 years
old as Pigafetta makes mention of passing an island that natives identified as
Zamal. The Najeeb Saleeby account mentions the Samals that took Sharif
Kabungswan continuing on to Davao.
The term Siyamal is taken by many Sama as an offensive term, only used by the
Tausug to degrade them. The term Samal is also only used by outsiders. If you
call a Sama Deya, Badjao in the Philippines you may very likely offend them in
this distinction. If they migrate to Malaysia they may very likely adopt the term
Bajau for themselves. Still, the most respectful and accurate term that can be
used is Sama. For the Badjao, Sama Dilaut. For other Sama: Sama Siasi, Sama
Banguingi, Sama Tawi-Tawi, Sama Pangutaran, Sama Sambuwangan etc.
Badjao or Bajau means man of the seas, this tribal group is known as the Sea Gypsies
because they move with the wind and the tide on their small houseboats called vintas,
they can be found in many coastal settlements and inhabit the waters and shores of the
Sulu archipelago.
A legend tells that these boat dwellers came from the shores of Johore in Indonesia,
Princess Ayesha of Johore was betrothed to a Sulu Sultan but she really wanted to
marry the Sultan from Brunei. One day, a large fleet of war boats escorted the Princess
to Sulu, the fleet was intercepted by the man she really loved, the Sultan from Brunei,
who kidnapped her and set sail back to Brunei. The escorting fleet could not return
without the Princess and kept on sailing the seas, only mooring at uninhabited islands;
some of them turned to piracy and roamed the seas to search for fortune and glory.
Others only searched for food and became fishermen, the Sulu Sea had an abundance
of fish that helped to sustain their livelihood, most of the daily catch was bartered with
other tribes that lived along the shores and beaches. The Badjao still live in houseboats,
clustered near the coastline of Southern Mindanao. But they also built stilt houses near
fertile fishing grounds; these houses are a temporary refuge during times that these
boathouses needed repairs. These wanderers of the Southern seas are born on the
water, live on their boats and say they will only set foot on land only to die.
Although that their ancestors were once feared by many in the Mindanao region, the
Badjao are primitive and friendly, they are believed to be world's most peace-loving
people and consider themselves as a non-aggressive tribal community. Conflict with
other tribes is often dealt with by fleeing to other places like the sea. Other tribes looked
down on these fisher folk and did refer to them as palao or lumaan (God forsaken), the
Badjao were influenced by Islam, but the continuous pressure put on by other Muslim
tribes forced them to move to the sea, which gave them greater chances of escape in
the case of an attack by hostile tribes. Eventually the sea molded the attitude and
appearance of the Badjao, this rough environment and way of living shaped their typical
physical features, the bronze coloured hair and dark brown skin clearly distinct them
from other tribes.
The native religion from these water people is a form of ancestor worship, spirits,
deceased ancestors and other relatives are asked for favours during frequent cemetery
visits. They offer cigarettes and food and sweet smelling tonic is used for sprinkling the
corners of the graves. These spirits are still part of the family; the seafarers of the
Philippine South want these sprits to be as happy as the living and will therefore comfort
them as much as they can. Some of the traditional pre-Islamic beliefs are offerings
made to the God of the Sea, the Omboh Dilaut, whenever a large catch of fish is
brought in and by setting a "spirit boat" adrift in the open sea, , mediums are also called
upon to remove illness causing spirits from this boat-dwellers community in times of
epidemics
By tradition, the hardworking and proud Badjao people are sea nomads, travelling by
boat from one island to the other in search of fishing harvest. This pagan tribe have
sailed the seas for more than a thousand years, but because of over fishing by other
groups using everything from high-tech fishing trawlers and even dynamite fishing,
threatened by soaring costs for fuel and repairs, their life in the open waters is drying
up. These Bedouin of the sea no longer live on boats, they live in thatch-roofed houses
on bamboo stilts on a small strip of land that nobody else wanted, somewhere along
the coastline of Sarangani. With small, family owned bancas they continue to roam the
waters, fighting the current to follow schools of fish, hunting for the bounty of the ocean,
trying to make a living and find refuge in the vastness of the deep blue sea.
Despite the romantic portrayals of the tribe, the Badjao never really had an easy live,
when they were still living at sea, they were at least free from the everyday rejection and
hardship brought upon by other tribes that live on land. These guardians of the sea
have experienced themselves that times are tough on the water, but worse on land. At
present the Badjao are the most marginalized ethnic group and one of the poorest tribes
in the Philippines, a Muslim tribe that is shunned by almost everyone, still gypsies, but
also named tramps and thieves. Their vibrant nomadic lifestyle, the way of life
bequeathed to them by their ancestors has vanished in most parts of Mindanao.
For centuries the Badjao have been a resilient tribal group, they firmly pushed away
modernity with both hands, but tossed by modern winds they will have to find ways to
maintain their unique lifestyle and culture, otherwise they will remain Godforsaken.