Finding Mariano Ponce in Japan

By Norman Zafra

As soon as you enter the thriving city of Baliwag, it is clear that locals here deeply revere their most famous son, Mariano Ponce. His legacy is deeply woven into the town's fabric: the public high school is named after him, the local plaza uses his nickname, a major street bears his name, and his statues and markers stand tall in key public spaces in town. Yet, outside his birthplace, Ponce’s name rarely rings a bell.

Historians say that his low profile stems from the fact that he did not write or publish his autobiography. Instead, he wrote articles and memoirs for others. Although he was once part of the famous La Solidaridad trio with Jose Rizal and Marcelo del Pilar, Ponce remains the forgotten hero.

It is unsurprising that many Filipinos do not actually know who he was, what he did for the nation, or why he matters. As a Baliwagenyo myself, I only knew the basics about Ponce. While I have always proudly celebrated his heroism, I realize that I am only now beginning to grasp the depth of his contribution to our nationhood. I thought that the paradox was striking.

Ponce in Kimono

I first found out that Ponce was stationed in Japan before the end of the 19th century through a random virtual talk that I stumbled across a few years ago. My biggest surprise was that he was married to a Japanese woman and even built a family while in Yokohama. I did some digging online.

I then landed on a social media post showing an iconic photograph of Mariano Ponce wearing a traditional Japanese kimono standing next to Chinese revolutionary leader Sun Yat-sen. It immediately sparked my curiosity. The picture, I realized, put two important historical figures in one scenario.

Taken more than 100 years ago, the photo has intrigued those that have seen it circulating online. I knew that there was a story here waiting to be told.

This state of not knowing and my sustained curiosity motivated me to produce a documentary film on Ponce's time in Japan. The iconic picture eventually inspired my film’s title, Ponce in Kimono.

Armed with a portable camera and a copy of Ponce’s letters during the revolution, I ventured into a journey to Yokohama, with a mission to discover a lesser-known part of our history.

Upon arriving in Japan, I was welcomed by Akira Toyao, a Yokohama resident and a retired IT expert who had worked in the Philippines for four years. He kindly agreed to help me trace Ponce’s residence in Yokohama. Above all, he was my enthusiastic translator and a supportive co-investigator while filming. Finding where Ponce lived, I reckon, might give us a hint of his activities in Japan.

Ponce was one of the foreign envoys that Emilio Aguinaldo sent overseas to persuade the bigger nations to recognize our newly formed republic. Japan was a rising superpower already before the end of the 19th century. It was quite a strategic move that a representative of the First Philippine Republic was stationed in Japan. Given Ponce’s education and experience as a propagandist and journalist in Spain, his credentials matched the job perfectly.

We first went to Myokoji, the Buddhist temple that was mentioned in Ponce’s letters. In this temple, we were warmly welcomed by its current female priest and staff members. They too were surprised to learn that a Filipino hero lived close to the temple vicinity some 120 years ago.

I thought that the temple itself was the former address of Ponce. Until I met a local museum curator who showed me some old maps of Yokohama showing the position of Ponce’ s address and its distance to the temple. The search for the house became a preoccupation during my short fieldwork in Japan.

Footsteps in Yokohama

As a representative of the revolutionary government, Ponce tirelessly promoted and advanced the Philippine independence through his diplomatic activities in Japan. He met with government officials, journalists, and local sympathisers and even delivered public talks and wrote for local newspapers with the aim to persuade the Japanese and Asian neighbors to sympathize with our revolutionary cause.

In his Yokohama address, he wrote his book Cuestión Filipina: Una Exposición Histórico-Crítica de Hechos Relativos a la Guerra de la Independencia. It was translated to Japanese and was later published in Tokyo. Many scholars argue that it was Ponce’s most important and definitive piece of work because the book persuasively defended the Filipinos’ right to self-determination. It consequently positioned the Filipinos’ desire for independence in solidarity with other Asian countries also revolting against imperialism.

A key reflection I developed while tracing the steps of Mariano Ponce in Japan is that much of Philippine history is woven into the journeys of our heroes abroad. So, I wore my journalist hat rather than a tourist hat while visiting the port city of Yokohama. The film I made profiled the city as Ponce’s main stop over during his 20-year itinerary overseas. Historian Jaime Veneracion even calls the city Japan’s window to the world.

As I wandered around the public spaces of the city, I shot the things that interested me visually and historically. And Ponce's letters became my guideposts that allowed me to view the past through the lens of the present. At many points during my documentary production, I felt like walking on history, not through it or around it.

The importance of Ponce’s activities while serving as envoy to Japan cannot be overstated. Ponce wrote more than a hundred letters during the peak of the revolution bearing his Yokahama address. These letters, now with Filipino translation, are an important set of documentary records that revealed what was happening beneath the war.

A 1934 interview with Ponce’s wife, Okiyo Udagawa, also revealed that Filipinos and Asians visit their Myokoji house day and night. It was the ‘watering station’ of the revolutionists, according to History Professor Ma. Luisa Camagay. That is why to see a photo of Ponce standing next to Sun Yat-sen should be unsurprising. 

The two became close friends, supporting each other’s revolutionary causes, including the clandestine move to send millions of arms and ammunition to the Philippines to support the Filipino troops. Unfortunately, the house also witnessed Ponce’s lowest moment when Nunobiki Maru, the ship carrying the arms and ammunition, sank due to a strong typhoon.

The journey is the story

My journey to Yokohama began as a search for a person, but I discovered more than what I initially looked for. By documenting Ponce's diplomatic efforts in Japan during a critical moment in Philippine history, I understood what it means to cry for freedom and to establish, for the first time, our place in Asia and the world.

Next article: History through documentary