Baltazar, Rich Ryan BSED 3 – English

Bumanglag, Rhaiza Mae

Fabella, Rhea Lou
Perez, Rizalyn
San Juan, Rhanz

WHY WOMEN WASH THE DISHES

Filomena N. Colendrino
In the town of Santa Rosa there once lived a couple named Hugo and Imelda. Every
mealtime they quarreled over the chore of washing the dishes. Imelda would scold Hugo if he
refused to wash the dishes. Sometimes she would become angry and call him names, and if he
talked back, she would get coconut midrib broom and chase him with it. He would run to the
house of his compadre and hide there until his wife’s anger had passed.

The neighbors familiarly called Imelda, Ka Maldang and Hugo, Ka Ugong.

One day just as they were finishing their lunch, Ka Ugong announced: “I’m not going to wash
the dishes anymore.” He threw out his chest and lifted his chin.

“Who says so?” asked Ka Maldang, holding up her chin, higher than his.

“I say so; I worked so hard in the field this morning. I’m not going to wash any dish.”

Ka Maldang stood up and with her arms akimbo, she glared down at Ka Ugong across the table.
She was at Ka Ugong across the table. She was a big woman. Her arms were stout. Her voice
was also big. “Ad who, Mister Hugo, is going to wash these dishes?” she asked.
Ka Ugong’s chest sank again. His chin also went down. He held on the edge of the table
nervously.

“You!” he said in a much lower tone. “You are the woman. You should do all the housework.”
“And what do you do?” asked Ka Maldang. “You tie the carabao to the reeds in the field and
then you lie down on the grass to watch it graze. You call that hard work? I cook, clean the
house, wash your clothes, I scrub the floor, I do all the work that only slaves should do. And
yet, you even refuse to help me wash the plate which you have eaten!” Ka Maldang’s voice
was now raised to a high pitch and her tears posed on her eyelids at Ka Ugong and at her broom.
She grabbed the broom. She raised the broom to strike him, crying, “You, you, you lazy man!”
Ka Ugong ducked under the table, “Don’t” he cried. “Don’t strike me!”

“Come out from under the table, you coward.” ordered Ka Maldang.
“Lay down your broom,” said Ka Ugong.
“All right, all right. Come out.” Ka Maldang put her broom behind the door.

Ka Ugong returned to his seat opposite her at the table.

“What have you to say?” asked Ka Maldang, wipingher eyes.

“Let’s stop quarreling over the plates. Let’s have a wager. The first one of us who will speak
after I’d said ‘Begin’ will wash the dishes. Always”
“Only that?” said Ka Maldang. “The first one who talks will always wash the plates, and bowls,
and pots and pans. Always.”
“Right.” said Ka Ugong. “If you ever say just one word to me or to anybody, or to anything
after I had said ‘Begin’, you will always wash the dishes.”
“That’s easy. I can keep my mouth shut even for a week. You can’t. You even talk to your
carabao.”
“All right, are you ready?” asked Ka Ugong.

Ka Maldang sat upright in front of him across the table. She nodded her head, compressed her
lips, and Ka Ugong said “Begin.”
They both fell silent. They sat at the table looking at each other across the unwashed plates and
bowls and spoons. They did not like to leave each other for fear that one would talk to himself
without the other’s hearing. They sat there just staring.
Soon the cat began to mew for its food. Neither Ka Maldang nor Ka Ugong paid attention to
its mewing. The cat jumped upon the drying dishes to lick the leftovers. Ka Maldang did not
drive the cat away. Neither did Ka Ugong. The cat licked the pot and pan on it, overturned a
kettle, spilled its contents, then went to lie down under the table. Ka Ugong pretended that
nothing had happened. He continues to sit still, and so did Ka Maldang.
Soon, it was getting late in the afternoon but they went on sitting mutely at the lunch table.
Their eyes were tired from staring hard at each other. Tears began to roll down their cheeks.
Ka Ugong’s shirt became damp with his sweat. Ka Maldang’s sweat gathered on her fore heat,
and trickle down to the sides of her face, and fell drop by drop to her breast.

A neighbor called, “Compadre Ugong! Oh! Compadre!”

Ka Ugong did not answer.
The neighbor called again, “Comadre Maldang! Yoo-hoo Comadre Maldang. Yoo-hoo,
Compadre Ugong, may I borrow your ax?”
Ka Maldang did not answer. Ka Ugong looked at her silently.

“Perhaps nobody is at home,” they heard the neighbor say to himself. “But why did they leave
their ladder at the door? They usually remove the ladder when they go away. Well, I’ll just go
up get the ax and return it later.” The neighbor went up.
When the neighbor went u the bamboo ladder, he was surprised to see Ka Maldang and Ka
Ugong sitting silently at the table where the plates had dried up with the leftovers. He hurried
toward them.
Ka Ugong nether moved nor talked. The neighbor repeated his question. He shook Ka Ugong;s
shoulder. Ka Ugong let him shake him, closing his lips tighter.
The neighbor turned to Ka Maldang. “Speak, Comadre! What happened?” He shook her
shoulders, too.
She pushed him roughly aside but did not speak.

“Did you eat something poisonous? Some food that has made you dumb?” He shook each one
alternately. But still neither stood up nor talked.

The neighbor was alarmed. He did not get the ax but ran out to the rest of the neighbors, He
told them that something terrible had happened to his Compadre Ugong and Compadre
Maldang. The neighbors gathered at Ka Maldang’s dining room. They took turns trying to
make them speak. But the two continued to sit staring at each other in silence. Ka Maldang
looked at her husband threateningly for a moment then closed her eyes. Ka Ugong knew
that she did so to avoid looking at the neighbors, He also closed his eyes and ignored everyone
who had come up to his house. Ka Maldang was very angry with her Compadre’s interference
but she dared not to speak her mind, she pretended to be asleep.
The compadre was very much worried. He ran to the village herb man. The herb man came and
when he saw the motionless, silent husband and wife sitting at the table, he declared that they
were bewitched. He spread a woven bud mat in the center of the sala and asked the “bewitched”
couple to lie down. Ka Ugong obediently lay down and closed his eyes. He curled up and went
to sleep. But Ka Maldang refused to get up from where she sat at the dining table
The herb man said “Ah, the spirit that has taken possession of her is very stubborn. I must break
its spell.”
He turned, then produced from a small bag which he always carried nine pieces of betel leaf, a
piece of areca nut, and a little lime from a tiny bottle. He examined the leaves closely to choose
those which had veins running in identical arrangements on each side of the midrib. He cut the
nut into nine pieces. He spread a little lime on each betel leaf, rolled them and wrapped them
around each piece of areca nut. He now had nine rings of the leaves.

“This represents the lost spirit of the couple,” he said.

He chewed the leaf and nut. When he had chewed it he spat it on his palm, dipped a forefinger
of the other hand into the nut colored saliva and marked with it a cross on the foreheads of Ka
Ugong and Ka Maldang. Ka Ugong did not seem to feel the old man’s finger on his forehead.
Ka Maldang caught the man’s forefinger and twisted it. The old herb doctor cried “aray” and
pulled back his hand. He moved toward Ka Ugong who was lying down. Calling his name
softly and slowly several times. “Come, Ugong, Come back, Ugong!” Ka Ugong did not move
nor speak.

“Come Maldang…come home to your body now…come. Maldang…!” chanted the old man.
Ka Maldang did not answer.
Evening fell on the frightened village, frightened because the herb doctor said that the spell
might be cast on some other villagers besides Ka Ugong and Ka Maldang. He called to the
bewitched couple softly at first, and then louder, but became tired so she reclined against the
bamboo wall.

The old her man said, “This is the first witchery of its kind that I have met here. By their silence
I believe that they are dead. Their spirits, driven away by the witch, have left their bodies. The
only thing to do in order to keep their souls in peace and to prevent this witchery craft from
spreading among us is to bury them.”
The herb man ordered some of the men to look for boards and make two coffins immediately
before the malady would go to them. In no time, the two coffins, made of rough planks,
hurriedly nailed together, were finished.
The women began to weep for Ka Maldang. She had leaned rigidly against the back of her
chair, closed her eyes, and shut her lips tight. The herb man asked the men gathered around to
lift the couple into the coffins.

“We shall bury them at sunrise. Some of us have to stay to keep the wake for the dead,” he
said.

The man easily lifted Ka Ugong and places him inside his coffin. Surely, he thought to himself,
he would win the wager. He would not be afraid of being buried. Why, he would just get cut
of the grave when the neighbors were gone. He thought everything going on was great fun and
he was enjoying himself. How he would frighten them all when he returned from his grave!
The herb man approached Ka Maldang. Although her eyes were closed, she had been listening
to his directions. She was afraid that he would surely force her into the coffin if she did not tell
him to go away. But she did not want to talk. She hoped her husband would object to the men’s
lifting her into the coffin.

“Surely, Hugo will not let me be buried tomorrow. Uh, I’m afraid to sleep in that coffin tonight.
No, I’ll not let them lift me into it,” she thought to herself.
But she did not hear Ka Ugong speak. She opened her eyes just as the herb man, aided by two
other men, put his arms around her to lift up from her chair.
Ka Maldang pushed the men, got up to her feet, and shouted, “Don’t touch us! Get out! Get out
of my house. Shame on you for coming here, meddling with our lives!”
Ka Ugong leaped to his feet. He also shouted, “You talked first!”
He jumped about clapping his hands and saying to the astonished neighbors, “She talked first.
We had a wager. Now she will always wash the dishes!’
Ka Maldang lifted up the lid of Ka Ugong’s coffin to strike his head with it but he ran out with
his neighbors, still shouting happily and saying “I won, I knew I would win! Now I’ll never
wash dishes.”
Filomena N. Colendrino
Filomena N. Colendrino was born in Quezon City. She was a prolific short story writer, and
"Home to the Rice Fields" is a collection of her work. It was also mentioned that she received
her training in the UK, back when most travel was done by boat and very little by airplane.
Filomena had a scholarship grant to attend Cambridge after winning multiple honors for her
fiction writing, the best of which, believed, was for the tale in question.

1. The Dreamer
- The first one scene that I want to experience in my life is when Ka Ugong and Ka
Maldang are arguing about the one who needs to wash their dishes, because even
though that they are arguing with something they still not leave each other, I want
to have parents like them that even though that the life is full of challenge's and
arguing and fighting each other is normal in a life of husband and wife, unlike in
my parents are both separated and choose to left their children. The second scene
that I want is when ka Maldang started to speak first of "Don’t touch us! Get out!
Get out of my house. Shame on you for coming here, meddling with our lives!”, I
want to have a wife like Maldang that willing to stand and speak to anyone who
want to get through or want to mess with our lives. The last is the scene when Ka
Ugong didn't move or speak even though they're neighborhood is trying to buried
them alive the manly character of Ka Ugong is being shown, the dedication to
remained silent even if it may cause his life just to achieved his goal, I want to have
this strong kind of dedication to pursue and fight for my dreams until I achieved
them.

2. The Soothsayer

- If I would change anything in the story, it would be that Ka Ugong ran away from
his wife just because he was washing you. which is very easy to do, right? because
all the chores are done by his wife. Yes, Ka Ugong works, but what the H is it that
he only washes the dishes for his wife? The second is the last one, the one where he
didn't really beat his wife. He didn't really say a word, so he couldn't just wash and
let his wife be put in the coffin. It's also funny because you will just wash the dishes;
it's not a heavy task. because I realized in the story that he would not even be the
"Man of the House." Because, as a husband, you should help. What's the point of
being your partner if you point fingers at who will do this and that? If I were Ka
Ugong, I would be mumbling so that my wife wouldn't have a hard time because
 first and foremost, she does all the household chores. And as the saying goes, a
happy wife is a happy life.

3. The Game Changer

- For this part, the game changer, there is a story that is presented and that is a
marriage story, there is similarities with our topic but not totally related. I can say
that there are similarities between the two, first in a marriage story a couple have
their problems or consequences to argue and for the assigned topic for us have also
a something that they are arguing. For these two stories, if we look and understand
the deeper meaning of this, there is a lesson in every couple that will happened, it
is to reminds that no relationship is perfect, and in everything in a marriage life
there is always encountered different struggles and differences between the couple.
It will explain that the dishes symbolizes as problems. And of course, fault of
finding counting, contribution, and complaining are the factors of going to
separation if it is not settled immediately. As my own perception, I think that having
a quarrel or arguing between couple is the main reason on how to be strong the
relationship as long as you know how to handle the situation between the husband
and wife. There is many differences and similarities that you have to know when
you are going start a family and settled down and that is the big problem that you
have to experienced. That is the starting point that you have to know each other
everything, you can out all who you are and what you are. So, at the end, the moral
lesson for this is, always be calm, be open minded and give your best to settle your
problems that every one of you will not hurt and please don't have making physical
damages.
 4. The Meme Finder

I choose this meme because according to the story the couple are arguing in washing the dishes.
they are even counting their chores and they even compare it.

5. The Lyricist
- What caught our attention here is that there was a scene where the neighbors gave
a helping hand to the couples. And that is what our song is all about, the title is
Count on Me by Bruno Mars. From the lyrics below, it shows how someone or your
friends are there when you’re in need, a helping hand as I said earlier.
We'll find out what we're made of
When we are called to help our friends in need

You can count on me like one, two, three

I'll be there
And I know when I need it, I can count on you like four, three, two
And you'll be there
'Cause that's what friends are supposed to do, oh, yeah
Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh
Ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh, ooh, yeah, yeah