05.03.07 kulturnatib

Cavemen and women

Had a bum stomach not intervened last Saturday, I would have had my first initiation into the small group of cavemen and women in this city. I would have been able to join them on a cave mapping exercise at Baombil Cave in the mountain barangay of Lusaran. But, my abdominal caves had a different agenda.

This, however, would not have been my first time inside a cave. The first time was years ago when, on an improperly considered invitation, we went inside the underground river that is the source of Kawasan waterfalls in Alegria. Also, that could have turned out to be our last.

That was the worst possible way to get into a cave. We only had one plastic bag wrapped flashlight wielded by this crazy German whose name I now forget. He was our host, guide, the self-appointed guardian of the waterfalls and he went so far ahead of us that we were in complete darkness as soon as we cleared the mouth of the cave. We didn't have a line, no helmets and no shoes; only had a fool's appreciation of the danger we put ourselves in.

That was foolhardy, bravado caving. That was the proper and potentially fatal introduction to how NOT to do caving. It was scary enough that since then caving was not up on my to do outdoors list.

That is until JumpOff Point, an outdoor specialist company set up shop, and I became friends with the cavemen and women of the Cebu Speleological Society. Many of them were part of that group last Saturday as well as staff of JumpOff Point.

Ursulo 'Dondon' Dimpas, Jr., was in that group. He works with a computer company to earn his living. But, he works with nature to live his life. While we were climbing Mt. Kanlaon last Holy Week, he was vertical caving with another group in Mabinay, farther south from where we were in the same island of Negros.

Also in that same group – both the Mabinay group and the group last Saturday -- was Gelena Asis. She is the president of the CSS. She teaches sustainable tourism subjects in a local university while pursuing a Masteral Degree in Environmental Science. Her Masteral thesis proposal is on the conservation of Cebu's caves which was reportedly turned down by her professor for being such a pioneering study. None in the faculty had enough competence on the subject to adequately review it.

Dondon, Gelena and the CSS – about 20 or so members half of whom are active -- are exemplary representatives of our modern cave people. They are professionals committed to exploring, conserving and protecting our caves as a unique biosphere that is important for our larger environment.

This, especially for Cebu that, even with severe forest denudation, continues to have water from caves and pools that is characteristic of its geological formation which is mostly limestone or karst.

Aside from increasing our knowledge of our cave system, of which Dondon says less than 10 percent have been explored and an even lesser percentage mapped, the CSS does an immediately appreciable service of helping to pinpoint water supply sources.

Being able to do thus, they are able to advise residents especially in the mountain areas on whether their water supply is clean or contaminated depending on its source. They are also able to better explain to these same residents and students in general how it is imperative that water sources are protected from becoming contaminated or polluted by showing how this happens as, indeed, it is happening with pesticides and other ground water pollutants.

In both the Mabinay and the Baombil explorations, there were representatives from the US National Speleological Society, Glen Malliet and Charles Festersen, who were in the country on a familiarization trip. They, as well as other foreign groups – a British team did some pioneering cave exploration and mapping in Toledo and elsewhere in the early 90s – are interested in our cave systems and, especially with the NSS, being able to help develop local expertise and experience and, most immediately on this trip, sharing some equipment with the CSS.

Caves are beautiful. But, they are also very fragile and susceptible to damage. A hundred years worth of accumulated formation at a few millimeters per year can be damaged just by the touch of our normally oily hands. And then there are the unique dark-adapted organisms.

This beauty and also its utility is at the same time the dilemma most serious cavers face. To call attention to this beauty is also to run the risk of its destruction.

Yet, as the experience in Lamak shows only the concerted effort of the community with the help of groups like the CSS and government agencies like the DENR in regulating access, extraction of resources and then the education of people in general will ensure the continued existence of caves in their natural state.