The Coconut Brothers

About the legend

Being

Modern Family Adventure

Cultural meaning

In the Philippines, the coconut palm is often called the tree of life, puno ng buhay, because almost every part of it can be used, from the water and meat to the shell, the husk and the leaves. Much of that know-how is passed on at home, the way Marco and Paolo learn it from their parents and grandmother: by doing the work together.

Fun fact

In the Philippines, half a dry coconut with its husk still on is called a bunot, and it is used to polish wooden floors until they shine.

Cultural notes

In this story, buko is a young green coconut, with sweet water and soft meat, and niyog is a mature brown one, whose firm meat is grated and squeezed for gata, coconut milk. Dried mature meat is called copra, and it is pressed for coconut oil. The hard shell becomes bowls, ladles and cooking fuel; the husk fiber, coir, is twisted into rope and made into doormats and brushes; young leaves are woven into pusô, little pouches for cooking rice (pusô means "heart" in Cebuano), and the stiff leaf ribs make the walis tingting broom. The Philippines is one of the world's largest coconut producers, and millions of people in the big producing countries make a living from the palm. On Camiguin, copra was long the largest source of income; today the island is best known for its sweet lanzones.

About this retelling

Modern educational story A modern educational family story about the many practical uses of coconut on Camiguin.

Marco, Paolo, their family, their neighbor and the coconut challenge are invented for Filipino Tales; this is a modern story, not an old legend. The coconut uses, the foods (gata and pusô) and the Camiguin setting are real. For children's safety, only Dad, an experienced adult, climbs the tall palm while the boys wait behind a row of stones, and only he handles the bolo.

Sources

• Philippine Coconut Authority, "Coconut Non-Food Products: What You Need to Know" (catalog) (Philippine Coconut Authority, Internet Archive)
• FAO, "Coconut - Tree of Life." (FAO)
• Wikipedia: Uses of the coconut palm (young and mature meat, copra, shell bowls and ladles, coir, walis tingting, bunot floor polishing) (Wikipedia)
• Wikipedia: Camiguin (setting, copra as the long-time main income, lanzones as today's main crop) (Wikipedia)

Themes

• Family
• Teamwork
• Resourcefulness

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