[Time Trowel] My cup of story

A trowel (/ˈtraʊ.əl/), in the hands of an archaeologist, is like a trusty sidekick – a tiny, yet mighty, instrument that uncovers ancient secrets, one well-placed scoop at a time. It’s the Sherlock Holmes of the excavation site, revealing clues about the past with every delicate swipe.

After nearly a decade, the Ifugao Archaeological Project (IAP) is back in Kiangan. It’s hard to overstate what a moment this is. This place — this community — gave me a career in archaeology. And now, coming full circle, I return not only with Filipino colleagues but with new collaborators from Cambodia, Indonesia, Vietnam, and the United States. We’ve formed a new kind of research community, one that crosses borders but is guided by the same questions: How do people adapt to change? What can landscapes teach us about history? And what values have allowed places like Ifugao to thrive despite colonialism, modernization, and climate uncertainty?

When I first began my dissertation work here, Ifugao was still considered a peripheral site in Philippine archaeology — celebrated, yes, for its rice terraces, but assumed to be static and ancient, a leftover from a distant past. The archaeology, however, told a different story. What we uncovered was a dynamic, adaptive, and relatively recent system. One that challenged long-held assumptions and brought to the fore the creativity and agency of Indigenous communities. The terraces were not remnants of a 2,000-year-old past, as once claimed, but rather sophisticated responses to colonial disruption, built just 300 to 400 years ago. This community did not retreat into the mountains to escape the Spanish. They restructured their landscape and economy to maintain autonomy. That’s resistance. That’s innovation.

But while our excavations brought new insights, what has always struck me just as powerfully is the set of values that continues to shape daily life in Ifugao. During my early field seasons, I used a rather expensive GPS unit: big, bulky, and essential for documenting our findings. Often, I had to leave it running for hours to get accurate data, and I would simply place a pudong beside it in the middle of a terrace field or along a trail. For those unfamiliar, a pudong is a knotted reed or branch, a cultural marker signaling that something is off-limits or protected, whether a field after harvest, a ritual space, or a borrowed tool.

Time and again, I would watch locals pass by, glance at the GPS unit, maybe pause with curiosity, but no one ever touched it. The message was clear. It wasn’t theirs. That was enough.

It’s this quiet ethic, if it’s not yours, don’t touch it, that continues to amaze me. It seems so simple, yet in many places, this value has been eroded by a culture of entitlement or opportunism. The idea of “finders keepers” has become an unspoken rule in some settings, as if losing something automatically strips you of your rights to it. That logic is not just flawed, it’s corrosive. It teaches people to take, not to return; to claim, not to ask; to hoard, not to share. In Ifugao, the opposite remains true. Community trust is not nostalgia; it’s practice.

I got a potent reminder of this just the other day.

On our long drive up to Kiangan, we stopped at Cup of Stories, a cozy café tucked along the winding roads of Malico Highway, owned, run, and staffed by members of Indigenous communities from the Cordillera. The coffee, by the way, is excellent — bold and earthy, like many of the conversations we’ve had while sipping it. In our rush to get back on the road, I left my sling bag on a chair outside the café. It had my passport, credit cards, IDs, cash, and critical travel documents. I didn’t realize it was missing until we reached Bayombong, Nueva Vizcaya.

My heart dropped. Anyone who has traveled for fieldwork knows the sinking feeling of losing everything in a single misplaced bag. But then I remembered where we had just come from, and who we were traveling with. I told Marlon Martin, the driving force behind the Save the Ifugao Terraces Movement (SITMo) and my long-time partner in this work. I didn’t even finish my sentence. Marlon had already called the café, his cousin in Baguio, and his nephew who happened to be nearby. The staff confirmed: the bag was there, untouched. They were keeping it safe for me.

Three hours later, I had my bag back, every last item intact. Marlon’s nephew motorbiked up to Malico highway to pick it up. The bag wasn’t returned out of obligation, they returned it because that’s just how things are done here. That’s what makes the story remarkable. Not that it happened, but that of course it happened. In Ifugao, this is still how things work.

We talk so much in heritage studies about what needs preserving. Monuments. Sites. Languages. Rituals. But values — these living principles of community, trust, and mutual respect — are among the most powerful forms of heritage we have. They don’t sit in glass cases or require excavation. 

They are enacted every day.

As archaeologists, we often focus on what has survived the passage of time. In Ifugao, survival lives not in stone alone, but in the quiet strength of shared values and mutual care. That’s the real story. That’s what makes this place not only significant but instructive.

So yes, we’re back in Kiangan – trowels in hand, notebooks open, and GPS units ready. But more than that, we’re back in a community that continues to teach us what it means to be stewards, not only of the past, but of one another. And if you ever find yourself driving through the Malico Highway, make sure to stop by Cup of Stories café. The views are breathtaking, the coffee is excellent, and the food is just as comforting as the values that keep this place grounded.

And for that, I’ll always be grateful. – Rappler.com

Stephen B. Acabado is professor of anthropology at the University of California-Los Angeles. He directs the Ifugao and Bicol Archaeological Projects, research programs that engage community stakeholders. He grew up in Tinambac, Camarines Sur. Follow him on bluesky @stephenacabado.bsky.social