Abstract
Ang taong walang kibo, nasa loob ang kulo is one of 1592 proverbs from different regions of the Philippines in D. Eugenio’s Philippine Proverb Lore (1967).1 It has been translated variously as: ‘The quiet person hides a capacity for mischief,’ ‘A person who is outwardly calm has anger raging inside’ and ‘A quiet person has anger boiling inside.’2 The proverb’s antiquity cannot be determined for certain, but it was among the 876 Tagalog proverbs, epigrams and idioms collected from the areas of Tanay and Pililla, Rizal by two Spanish friars. It was published for the first time in 1890.3 Eugenio classified the proverb under her sixth categorization, ‘those expressing general truths about life’, particularly on the human idiosyncrasy that quiet people have a lot to hide. She translated the proverb as, ‘A person who is quiet boils inside,’ and offered the interpretation, ‘The quiet person hides a capacity for mischief.’ The proverb also appears in other Philippine languages: the Bikol, An matinao; May itinatagong milagro, and the Hiligaynon, Ang tao nga mahipos; Sa sulod ang dumot. Another idiosyncrasy of the quiet person is they are ‘slow to anger but terrible when aroused’, expressed in the Ilokano proverbs, Ti saan a matimtimec; Nauyong no macaunget, and Annadam ti pungtot ti tao nga naanus (Beware of the anger of a patient person). Thus, not only mischief, but anger too can be what the quiet person is hiding. Twelve other sayings in the Eugenio collection allude to the proverbial quietude of the natives, which may have pleasantly surprised the colonizers. The quiet person also hides and boils, brews or percolates intelligence, creativity and deep secrets.
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© 2012 Narcisa Paredes-Canilao
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Paredes-Canilao, N. (2012). Sa loob ang kulo: Speaking the Unconscious in the Transformations of a Filipino Proverb. In: Gülerce, A. (eds) Re(con)figuring Psychoanalysis. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230373303_5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230373303_5
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