Pinoy-Hapon United Foundation (PHUF), a non-profit organization, Honorary Chairman Takeshi Asanuma
＜The previous installment (33) was an unfinished manuscript. The completed version is here, but because there are many changes, we have left the published (33) as it is and made this (34), Part 2. Editor＞
In the 1940s, “Manila” was a beautiful city known as the “Pearl of the Orient.” The sheltered inner reaches of Manila Bay, where the “Pasig River” flows in, formed a quiet delta and a natural “harbor.”
During the Age of Discovery, “Spain” regarded the “East Indies and Luzon region” as a relay point across the Pacific linked to the “Central and South American regions” under its rule, and sought to govern it directly.
In the mid-1500s, the King of Spain dispatched his subject “Miguel Legazpi” to the “East Indies and Luzon area” to bring this land under control and colonize it.
He advanced to “Luzon Island” and, from 1571 onward, built “Intramuros” (a walled stone fortress district) from which “Spanish rule” over “all of Luzon,” with “Manila” as its capital, was carried out, and established the powerful military stronghold of “Fort Santiago.”
This land came to be called the “Spanish East Indies” or the “Philippine Islands.” The Philippines was governed through the Viceroyalty of New Spain in Mexico City until 1821, and thereafter directly by the central Spanish government in Madrid.
He pursued a “policy of evangelization and conversion,” teaching the local inhabitants the “Catholic faith” and that “loyalty to God is loyalty to the Spanish Crown,” erecting fine “places of worship” in every corner of the country, and succeeded in converting more than 90 percent of the inhabitants to “Christianity.” Even today, the “Republic of the Philippines” is the largest “Catholic nation” in Asia.
In 1898, the “Spanish-American War” broke out in “Cuba.” The “United States” won, and as a result the “United States” purchased the “right to administer this land as a colony.” In 1899, the “War of Independence (Philippine-American War)” led by “President Aguinaldo (of the Malolos Republic)” began. It is said that 300,000 to 400,000 local people lost their lives, but in April 1901 “President Aguinaldo” surrendered to the U.S. forces, and in 1902 “American colonial rule” was established.
”Spanish rule,” which had lasted nearly 300 years, had become a “system” in its own right. The “United States” inherited it, did not hurry to impose American-style rationalism, gradually advanced “political reforms,” and left in place the “privileges and landholdings” of the “mestizos (a small mixed-blood ruling class).”
As “Spanish rule” continued for centuries, a consciousness spread even among the “mestizos,” who carried “Spanish” “blood,” that “this is not ‘Spain’; this is our ‘country.'” A sense that “this is our own country” also began to emerge among the “Malays and other common people,” who had never been granted “rights,” and under “American rule” these feelings slowly spread. This was the wellspring of “independence.”
”Manila,” richly influenced by the “Southern European culture” of the Spaniards, became a beautiful “capital.” The government quarter of “Intramuros,” lined with majestic stone buildings in the “neoclassical style” adorned with “white round columns,” was the center of “colonial administration.” The “Supreme Court” and the “National Assembly building” also stood serenely, a scene reminiscent of ancient “Rome.”
Adjoining it was the “city district,” where reinforced-concrete buildings stood in rows and “streetcars” and “public buses” ran along paved roads. Passersby were fond of the “kalesa (small horse-drawn carriage)”; “gentlemen” wore “white linen suits” and “boater hats,” while ladies strolled in stylish dresses with slightly squared shoulders, holding parasols. The bridges spanning the “Pasig River” were elegantly decorated. The cries of street vendors gave the city its color.
The broad seaside avenue later known as “Roxas Boulevard” was paved and ran wide and straight from in front of “Fort Santiago” to the west side of what later became “Manila Airport.”
The old city of “Manila” was called the “Pearl of the Orient,” but as noted earlier, it was utterly “destroyed” in the “Battle of Manila” in February 1945.
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