Pedo speaks of disaster
that elements bring in response to human misbehavior, e.g., “Onpedo kono’y
mengi-ngi-an ira’y sibibiag’ga kompormi.” (trans: Making fun of any living animal can cause
disaster) or “No mapkes i shagem’ma ayshi’y oran, shaka ikowan, “Pinmedo emo.”
(trans: If there is strong wind, without
any rain, they would say, “It’s probably provoked by what Tokshol did.”
(Ibaloy, 2011). In Dr Pungayan’s Baguio Midland article (July 7, 2013), when the powek (typhoon) goes beyond its "regular" behavior, it is already called pedo. Pedo has more rain, stronger
wind, and longer duration than the powek, resulting in floods, slides, etc. as it
sometimes lasts for weeks, or even months. The Pedo is interpreted as an ‘expression of anger’
by the Unseen One over some misdemeanor committed by children (or adults!) in
some games; or while playing e.g. ‘cruelty’ to a captured rat, laughing at a
pitiful cat, ‘setting-to- combat’ two innocent spiders, etc. To this,
adults would say, “Karajo ngi-ngi-ngi-an ga! Onpedo!” (Don’t you laugh at it,
onpedo!).
A farmer
somewhere in Benguet has a farm where some of his not-so-good neighbors steal
some of his organic produce. He did
everything to shoo away the thieves but to no avail. One thing he did was to put snakes into his
farm, but the snakes later left one by one either in search of a more forested
area, or the neighbors ate them, too! Pulutan! So he thought of other ways. One day, when he went mountain climbing and
saw a cave of skeletons, he got some of it and placed them in a sack and
brought them home. He hang the skeletons in his fruit trees and in other inconspicuous
areas. True enough, while one of the neighbors tried to pick some oranges one
night, he saw a skeleton staring at him and ran for his life. The skeletons succeeded in driving the
thieves away. However, not many days passed when it started
to rain in the area, then it rained some more, then the rains lasted 3 months,
non- stop. Pinmedo. The farmer got scared to death as well so, he
returned the skeletons into the cave where he got them. Some Ibalois would have set a canao to express
their apology but anyhow, the rains stopped.
