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MHC Board Member, recipient of the Order of Orange-Nassau Knighthood
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AYALA MUSEUM, MAKATI CITY, Two days before Dutch anthropologist and Mangyan Heritage Center Board Mermber Antoon Postma marked his 80th birthday, a surprise royal recognition from the Kingdom of the Netherlands was held on March 26, 2009. It was a day of revelation for Bapa as called by the Mangyans, who received the Knight in the Order of Orange-Nassau.
Representatives of different embassies, private and public organizations and institutions, were witnesses as His Excellency Robert G. Brinks, Ambassador of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, clipped the Chevalier in the Order of Orange-Nassau medallion on Bapa's balukas - traditional shirt of Mangyan men. But the
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night would be incomplete without the presence of Bapa's whole family, who secretly left their home in Panaytayan, a mountain village in Oriental Mindoro to surprise him and celebrate the momentous night with him.
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Adding heart and wonder to the night was Anya Postma's recitation of the ambahan (Mangyan poetry) that she personally wrote and dedicated to his father. Through it, she was able to express her love, appreciation, and gratitude for her father.
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| Father we love you so much
And our wond'ring hearts are touched
That you chose us mountain people
And for this we are so grateful.
Though our cultures aren't the same
From a distant land you came
We are happy and so glad
That you are our dearest Dad.
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The celebration did not end on the night of March 26. Rather, it continued until the day of Postma's birthday on March 28, wherein a surprise tribute and thanksgiving were held for him in the mountains of Panaytayan. Over 250 members of the Mangyan community joined in the celebration.
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Likewise, prior to this prestigious and memorable event which at the same time was the launching of the Mangyan Heritage Week, the Mangyans of Mindoro Photo and Artifact Exhibit commenced the affair on March 23 at the European International School. A lecture entitled Philippine Halo-Halo: The Mangyans of Mindoro, conducted by Lolita Delgado-Fansler, MHC, President also graced the festivity.
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Since 1959, Postma has lived and dedicated his life to researching, preserving and promoting Filipino history and culture, especially that of the Mangyans. Some of his works include the documentation of two Mangyan script namely the Hanunuo-Mangyan and Northern Buhid, and the Tagbanua and Palaw'an paleographies of Palawan which were declared as National Cultural Treasures in 1997 and inscribed in the UNESCO Memory of the World Registers in 1999, the recording and translations of the Mangyan ambahan, and the deciphering of the old Philippine document - the Laguna Copperplate Inscription (LCI), which shows the legal system in the Philippines during the olden times..
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Indeed, Ambassador Brinks was right when he ended his speech in saying that, " For an indigenous group that has long been marginalized and discriminated against, the Mangyan and the Filipino people owe Mr. Postma a debt of gratitude for ensuring that a rich traditional and written culture are still alive today."
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The Order of Orange-Nassau is an award given to exemplary Dutch civilians who deserve appreciation and recognition from society for the special ways in which they carried out their activities.
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