He is one of those who make available a carabao-drawn sled as a transport facility. It is in the waiting shed that the passengers from Buringal wait for the motor vehicle that will take them to their destination.
municipality. From this kind of work, he is paid Php15 per hour. Since he only works for five hours, he usually takes home less than a hundred pesos to his family. Four-hour trek
There are only three available public utility jeepneys (PUJ), however, that commonly provide alternate trips every week. When the weather is favorable, though, there is available trip every day.
With this meager income, he can barely sustain his family’s needs, thus, to augment it, he decided to venture as a carabaosled transport facility ‘driver’.
Such is the situation in that part of Paraceli. That’s the reason why the carabao and the sled are valued as much as the land. Without it, it is really a challenge to traverse by foot the tenkilometer tortuous route with ease and assurance to catch the rare trip bound to the city market.
Every day, he wakes up at 3 a. m. to prepare the carabao and sled for an early trip. He waits for passengers who have with them their harvest of vegetables and fruits to be sold at the city market. Oftentimes, when there is bountiful harvest, only the commodities are loaded onto the sled while he and the owners of the goods walk with the carabao.
Ramos said that in Sitio Cassag alone, there are at least 30 carabaos, about ten of which are used for public transport. The rest are used for contour farming in the hilly or mountainous areas. In other places in their barangay, there are carabao owners who utilize their animal as transport facility. And they get paid for it. Ramos has two children, aged three and six. He has to work triple-time just to feed his family and send his children to school. When the cropping season is on, he tends his neighbor’s cropland. He usually works up to 10 hours a day but only gets paid for Php30. Sometimes, he is hired for a construction work in other barangays or even to the neighboring
In sitio Limmubong at barangay Mapalad Centro in Isabela province, Narciso Dunuan regards his carabao as his only faithful ally in transporting his rice produce since motorized vehicles are also next to impossible like that in barangay Buringal.
Most often than not, the walk would take four hours up to the waiting shed in Bacari, in time for the first regular trip of the jeepney. Certainly, the trek is a stab to the still dark surrounding and to the muddy road. It is only at the middle of the trip that the trail is lighted by the morning sun.
Nelson Dulliyao (left) and Lorenzo Ramos reading a PCC Balita publication while waiting for their passengers to arrive and trek back to Buringal. back to their village. “Nu nakaluganen dagijay pasaherok, agurayak inggana alas-dos ti malem manen ta diay nuang ku met lang ti pangiluganan da dagijay marketen da pasubli idjay Cassag (When my passengers ride on the jeepney, I will wait for them because they have to load the goods bought from the market on my sled for transport to their homes),” Ramos said. Big help
Since the road and travel time are unforgiving, the sled can only load up to 180 kilograms. Each kilogram-load is exacted with a Php5 transport fare.
“Even if my job is tough, especially that I need to wait for my passengers the whole afternoon, at least the carabao brings bigger help to my family,” He continued.
When he’s lucky, he would earn Php200 at the minimum and Php300 at the maximum per trip. As he doesn’t own the carabao, the amount is divided between him and the animal owner.
He added: “I earn bigger income in this kind of work than tilling other’s land. In this job, what I do is only to maneuver the carabao on the road and feed it with abundant grass.”
After unloading his passengers’ goods, Ramos would sit under the wood and galvanized iron-made waiting shed for six to seven hours. There, he would wait until the arrival of the jeepney at around 2:30 p. m. and take on passengers
Ramos said that he is thankful that his kind of work, though difficult and requires much patience, give him a kind of livelihood to sustain the needs of his family. “But of course, I thank my partner – the carabao. Without it, I wouldn’t be able to do it,” Ramos said in Ilocano.
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