Deep in the mountains of Kalinga province, on the northern edge of the Philippines, live the Butbut tribe. For centuries they had little contact with outsiders, but over the last decade they’ve attracted widespread attention for their traditional tattooing techniques. That’s thanks largely to Apo Whang Od, a 102-year-old woman who for the last 87 years has practiced the art of batok, or hand-tapped tattooing. Now she’s transformed the tiny village of Buscalan into a mecca of sorts for travelers seeking unique tattoos.

Buscalan is a 14-hour drive from Manila, the final three hours of which are endless hairpin curves on roads cut into the steep Cordillera mountainside, overlooking seas of fog. It’s perched near the top of a towering mountain and surrounded by rice paddies for subsistence farming. The road ends before it reaches the village, but construction crews inch closer every day. The final stretch has to be hiked, down a valley and up a steep incline, past the carabao water buffalo that are guided up the narrow paths by their horns. On our last day, an excavator causes a landslide—a common occurrence, even without the construction—across the path between the village and the road. But it’s a brief interruption, and the villagers simply walk over the dirt to create a new, equally temporary path.

Given this terrain, it’s no wonder that the Spanish colonizers left villages like Buscalan undisturbed. The Kalinga remained relatively isolated until the US took control of the Philippines at the turn of the twentieth century. Under the pressure of an increasing Western presence, their tattoo culture seemed destined to be lost. Whang Od was the last Kalinga batok artist in the region, and her village had no plans to teach a new generation.

In the past, tattoos were given for a specific reason: men received them for acts of bravery, while women received them for beauty, fertility, or the valor of male relatives. Whang Od gave the last of such tattoos in 2007, when she tattooed her brother-in-law for killing an opponent in a nearby village. But the Kalinga had long ago begun losing interest in tattoos commemorating violence, and their craft was on the verge of extinction.

When Lars Krutak, a self-described tattoo anthropologist, visited the village in 2007, his encounter with Whang Od changed everything. Krutak’s Discovery Channel show, Tattoo Hunter, brought international attention to Buscalan village and the Kalinga tattoo tradition.

These days tattoos are given simply for their beauty, and visitors make the difficult journey by the dozens to meet Whang Od and a fresh crop of young artists. Traditional Kalinga tattoos are made with a simple wooden stick threaded with a plant thorn, which is dipped into soot water and then repeatedly hand-tapped into the skin with another stick, creating a mark.

Sounds drift easily through the village and across the silent mountains around it. In Buscalan, wooden homes on stilts are packed tightly together, separated only by skinny concrete paths and stairwells. Families of pigs and chickens wander freely while children bathe in frigid water piped in from streams above. On weekends, the tapping of tattoos reverberates all about the village, while young artists work on the skin of tourists wherever there’s a free corner.

There are now 20 new artists, ranging from 9 to 28 years old, all women and girls except for one boy. (Traditionally, they were often women as well.) Everyone in this younger generation has learned on their own simply by observing Whang Od, without any formal training.

The village overlooks a vast canyon, and on the opposite slope a distant line of identical vans can be made out bringing a constant procession of visitors toward the village. With this view, Emily sits beneath a thatched-roof hut pasted with graffiti stickers and photos of tourists, while a long line of customers awaits her attention. The oldest of the new generation and the granddaughter of Whang Od, she works with a deep but comfortable focus, oblivious to the crowd.

In another part of the village, a crowd of locals gathers for the funeral of a 105-year-old man who has just passed away. They dig a hole next to his home and bury him there in casket. Flat gravestones lie directly in the paths that criss-cross the village. The man’s death leaves only Whang Od and one other centenarian, who still works as a rice-wine maker.

Whang Od continues to work as well, although she says her right arm gets tired and her knees ache now. Work is practically all she does these days, aside from rest. Her own crowd gathers around as she squats and hammers her signature three dots. She works sporadically, taking breaks and smiling happily for photos and making jokes in her native Kalinga.

As the sun sets and work comes to an end for the day, Whang Od sits at home with a blanket covering her weathered, tattooed skin. She’s pleased with the popularity batok tattoos have found: even if they’ve lost most of their traditional and spiritual significance, their beauty is still appreciated.

Whang Od’s favorite design is a snakeskin pattern, which she says is one of the oldest. “I’d be happy if all the kids today got tattoos,” she says, noting that tourism has created a livelihood for everyone in the village. Her earnings go to daily needs like sugar and rice, as well as the education of her grandchildren. Instead of farming or searching for work elsewhere, villagers can earn a living in Buscalan, making tattoos, selling souvenirs, or working as tour guides or homestay hosts. “When I stop tattooing for good, I hope tourists won’t stop coming to our village. If they do, my efforts will have gone to waste.”

Contributor: Mike Steyels
Photographer: Martin San Diego