Bayanihan Spirit

It all started on a Friday evening about two years ago. My dear sister in law Marla and I were sitting at
the island in my kitchen having a glass of wine discussing the goings on of the week. I noticed that she
was more animated than usual and wondered what was going on. It wasn’t long before she pulled from
her purse a very old worn diary. I was instantly curious. She told me while going through her
Grandfathers WWII memoirs she found his war diary. The diary revealed this poignant story.
While serving with the USAFE 2 nd lt. Albert Baccani was captured by the Japanese just weeks prior to the
Bataan Death March. Baccani was beaten and tortured. The Japanese soldier who was in charge
demanded that he give up everything in his pocket but when Bacanni offer up the rosary that his mother
had given him before going off to war, the soldier folded it back into his hand and told him to keep it.
By some miracle, that his writing doesn’t disclose, he escapes from his captors and is rescued by a
Filipino rice farmer and his wife. By the time that he made it to the stoop of their thatched hut, he was
dying of malaria and dysentery. Despite the fact that he had contagious diseases and if caught by the
Japanese for harboring a fugitive they would be executed on the spot they made the courageous
decision to bring this stranger into their home and nurse him back to health. Because of their unselfish
decision to come to his aid, Baccani went on to live to the age of 102 years old and was the first Filipino
World War II veteran to receive financial compensation he so richly deserved.
I was completely captivated by this amazing story and knew immediately that I needed to capture the
of the essence of this epic in sculpture form. I immediately went to work. I had done figurative work
before, but this would be the first time that I would attempt 3 figures in the same vignette. My goal was
to capture the split second that the rice farmer and his wife made that pivotal decision to save Baccani’s
life. I worked on this piece almost on a daily basis for four months. Throughout this process, I
researched Filipino culture and the role that the Filipino’s played in the war. Initially, I thought that what
the rice farmer and his wife did was extremely unusual but to my great surprise discovered that for
Filipinos to take in perfect strangers during the war was in fact not uncommon. What this rice farmer
and his wife did, like so many others was demonstrate the epitome of the Bayanihan Spirit. Stay tuned
in another blog to find out step by step how this piece was brought to life.