Whang-od Oggay: The last traditional Kalinga tattoo artist in the Philippines
About nine hours away from Manila, one can find Whang-Od Oggay in the small village of Buscalan tucked in the province of Kalinga. She’s known as the last mambabatok, the name given to the traditional Kalinga tattoo artists.
Whang-Od herself is covered in tattoos. Her arms, according to the Culture Trip, took a day to be inked.
“The first tattoo I got was a ladder and a python,” she says in a video from Looking for Stories. “They have no meaning they are just an ornament.”
Whang-Od learned the art from her father when she was 15, according to a YouTube video from the Matador Network. She doesn’t have a birth certificate, but people estimate she’s between 90 and 100 years old.
“There’s no school for tattooing. You either have talent or you don’t,” Whang-Od told DW Documentary. “When I was young, my friends and I tattooed each other. They practiced on my legs. My tattoos were always the better ones.”
Back in the day, some Kalinga women got their first tattoos when they were 13 or 14, according to the DW Documentary. The tattoos were a sign of beauty and right of passage that turns a girl into a woman. For Kalinga men, their tattoos were a sign of courage and strength. They had to earn their tattoos through acts of bravery, specifically through headhunting.
“When the Spanish first arrived in 1521, tattooing was widespread across the islands that would eventually make up the Philippines,” according to the New York Times. “Over the centuries, discouraged by colonial powers and Catholic teachings, the tradition faded. The Kalinga, in the inaccessible mountains known as the Cordillera Central, fiercely guarded their villages against outsiders and held on to their customs. But by the middle of the 20th century, even their tattooing practices were slipping into history.”
Whang-Od’s tools include a thorn from a calamansi or pamelo plant to be used as the needle, a bamboo stick to hold the thorn, and a mixture of charcoal and water for ink, according to the Culture Trip.
“Every tattoo has a meaning,” Whang-Od says in the DW Documentary video. “The millipede’s many legs stand for all the people here. We have to walk with the same rhythm. Then we can achieve anything.”
Thousands of tourists visit Whang-Od every year, according to CNN.
Getting tattooed by Whang-Od isn’t for the faint of heart. In the DW Documentary YouTube Video, she recounts men and women fainting while under the needle and some even wetting themselves because of the pain.
Whang-Od is passing on the tradition of her artistry, training her grandnieces Elyang Wigan and Grace Palicas Grace for several years.
“I’m proud I’m allowed to tattoo,” Palicas told DW Documentary. “I’ve learned everything I know from Whang-od. I’m going to try and be a good tattoo artist.”
Whang-Od told Looking for Stories, “I am very grateful for the visit of people from around the world who want a tattoo, because they give meaning to my life.”
“The tradition will continue as long as people keep coming to get tattoos,” Whang Od told CNN Travel. “As long as I can see well, I will keep giving tattoos. I’ll stop once my vision gets blurry.”
References
- “At 100 or So, She Keeps a Philippine Tattoo Tradition Alive” by Aurora Almendral for the New York Times.
- “Meet Apo Whang-Od, the Last Kalinga Tattoo Artist in the Philippines” by Gelyka Dumaraos for the Culture Trip.
- “Meet Whang Od Oggay: The Philippines’ oldest tattoo artist” by Kate Springer for CNN.
- “The last Kalinga tattoo artist, Whang Od” for DW Documentary on YouTube.
- “Whang Od: The Kalinga Tattoo maker” for Looking for Stories on YouTube.
- “Whang-Od: The Last True Tattoo Artist” for Matador Network on YouTube.
