In June, a wooden plank vessel set out from Taiwan’s Orchid Island to Batanes in the Philippines. The vessel, named the Ovayan – meaning Golden Friendship – was a type of traditional vessel known as an ipanitika used by the Indigenous Tao people of Orchid Island.
Carrying 20 rowers at a time – accompanied by 40 other members of the Tao community on a support vessel, who helped take turns rowing – the Ovayan took about 24 hours to reach Batanes, the Philippines’ northernmost and smallest province. The Ovayan will remain in Batanes on display for six months before a delegation of rowers from Batanes sails it back to Orchid Island.
The voyage, retracing an ancient trade route, was meant to renew cultural and historical ties between Orchid Island and Batanes, said to have been disrupted 300 years ago by a misunderstanding.
The residents of Batanes are closely related to the Tao people. In fact, upon arriving in Batanes, the travelers remarked on the similarity of local cuisine to their native Tao food. The language spoken by the Tao is the only Indigenous Taiwanese language that is not classified as part of the Formosan grouping of Austronesian languages. Instead, it is classified as Philippine, and specifically part of the Batanic language branch of Malayo-Polynesian.
