THE QUIAPO MARKET

For the adventurous traveler, a trip to Quiapo will provide a taste of the third-world surreal and fringe, a merging of Filipino religiosity and the commerce of the alternative.

Surreal and fringe. But in some distant past, Quiapo was an complex of intersecting rivers, canals, and marshes. thriving as a fishing village, abundant with the water lily Kiapo, from which it derived its name.

By the latter part of the 16th century, Quiapo had become a flourishing center of commerce, awash not merely of water lilies, but also a profusion of crafts and trade stores, theaters and movie houses and open markets, attracting the elite, the 'illustrados' and the new rich who came to build their luxurious homes and mansions.

Part of the boom and burgeoning commerce was attributed to the Black Nazarene. Brought to the country by the Recollect Friars in the early 1600s, the Señor, the endearing name for the Black Nazarene, finally found permanent residence at the Quiapo Church, relegating its patron saint, St. John de Baptist to a permanent status of obscurity and lessened reverence.

But time and change have ravaged Quiapo of that historical past. Now it stands transformed, a shadow of its gentrified past, its sole vestige, the Quiapo Church, razed many times by fires and earthquake, but always arising anew from those recurrent calamities, now grand and resplendent over the miasma of third world commercialism that surrounds it.

And housed within, is the Black Nazarene, the main draw to the Quiapo Church. A wooden image that has spawned a culture of devotion and idolatry unlike any other in the Philippines, drawing countless devotees, mostly from the 'masa', but also from the ranks of the desperate professionals, crowding the church every friday, paying homage in all piety, some in open humility, walking on their knees to the altar, for a favor, for a miracle, for penance, for giving thanks.

And around the church, an enclave of commerce prospers; an outdoor market that caters to the masa seeking bargains for its mundane, spiritual and alternative necessities. The market under the bridge - "sa ilalim ng tulay" - is still a popular draw, where with right kind of haggle, everything is cheaper than anywhere else. Carriedo is now a street market that stretches from end to end, blaring deafening music, mongering all sorts of "branded" imitations and pirate DVDs of current theater fares. Beggars invariably materialize, drawn to the tourist-, charitable- and rich-looking visitors. For the appetite lined with fortitude, there is a wide choice of sidewalk and push-cart cuisine.

And immediately abutting the Quiapo church, there is the commerce for the devotees and the dabblers in the alternative. Rows of palm readers and fortune tellers. Flower vendors hawking stringed sampaguitas for altar offerings. Make-do stalls with their dizzying array of wares for the faithful. Candles in a variety of colors for specific spells and counter spells. Incense, tawas, lotion and snake oils. Colorful icons of the Sto. Niño and the Virgin Mary in laminates, wood or plaster. Anting-antings, pendants and talismans. Rosaries in all sizes and prices. A profusion of leaves, twigs, sprigs, seeds and roots of herbal medicinal plants — fresh, dried, powdered, bottled or decocted.

Fridays bring the multitudes of devotees paying homage to the Black Nazarene, but almost any day finds the prayers, hymns, litanies, and novenas spill unto the streets, and amplified into the edges of Raon's electronic commerce.

It is in January that the annual procession honoring the Black Nazarene is held. A week-long festivity that starts with a novena on the first of January, culminating on the 9th of the month with a massive and multitudinous procession in the frenzied fervor of a sea of men escorting the 150-pound image of the Señor, all straining and struggling to touch the statue, for a hope, for a wish, for the desperate miracle.

For the traveling heart with a little daring, for the flavor of the fringe and a fascinating window to a culture, any Friday is worth that half-day trip to Quiapo.