How to Tame Your Tikbalang Ch. 14

Tapa (Tah-pa), - Thinly sliced meat strips (usually beef, but sometimes pork or horsemeat) marinated in soy sauce and the juice of small, round Philippine limes called kalamansi (kah-lah-mahn-si), or in a dry rub of salt, sugar and fresh-cracked peppercorns, that is fried crisp and sauteed in caramelized onions and simmered in the marinade (slightly thickened to make a savory gravy) if one does not use the dry rub version. Also, spiced and thinly sliced dried meat, kind of like jerky.

Tapuey (tah-poo-wey) - A potent but deceptively sweet rice wine made in the Cordillera Autonomous Region (CAR) to the north of the island of Luzon. It tastes like a cocktail, but three shots of this stuff is like six shots of tequila.

Tikbalang (tick-bah-lang) - A creature that has the head and hindquarters of a horse (usually a warhorse like a destrier), and the muscular torso of a human male, with an unusually large male member. It is believed that plucking the golden hairs off a Tikbalang will bring the daring adventurer uncanny good luck and immense wealth.

Terno (ter-noh) - Traditional formal dress worn by Filipinas. It is a long sheath dress with large, "butterfly" sleeves that clings to the body, reminiscent of the peasant garb called baro't saya (bar-ot say-ah) that literally means "blouse and skirt." The baro't saya was the everyday garb. The terno its glamorous sister.

Tiyanak (tia-nak) - A monster that disguises itself as an abandoned but beautiful infant.

The tiyanak targets humans for food and entraps them by crying like a hungry or distressed human baby. If the Tiyanak is picked up by its human target, it will attack the human, reverting to its real form while doing so. The Tiyanak is said to look like a demonic infant, with black voids for eyes and the gray, ashen skin of the dead.

A Tiyanak comes to be when a mother is distressed over or resents her pregnancy enough to passively or actively cause a second- or third-trimester abortion/miscarriage.

Lore from the Chritstianization period of the Philippines onward says a Tiyanak is made when a stillborn infant is buried secretly, without benefit of blessing or baptism.

Zapatillas (zah-pah-teel-yas) - Spanish for pointy-toed, open-heeled mules, usually made with a half-inch to one-inch kitten heel. Zapatillas uppers are usually made with a rich fabric, like silk or satin over leather and embroidered with silver or gold thread or encrusted with paste gems/costume jewelry gemstones.

* In case you are not Filipino and don't know much about the Philippines, we are a people who experienced 400 years of colonization, first by the Spanish, then by the United States (we were sold by Spain, along with Cuba and Puerto Rico under the Treaty of Paris just as the Philippine Revolution was gaining victory).

Hence the strong Spanish influence in our genetics, culture and history—and the Spanish words we use in everyday speech.

We also traded with the Chinese and had thriving Muslim communities as the Spanish colonization of our islands began.

Sadly, much of our old religion and lore has been lost and I've found mere fragments that hint at a much larger, much more complex body of lore. So I did what any writer will do: I filled in the gaps of my country's lore with fiction. :)