Tubâ

Tubâ (tʊˈbaʔ) is a Filipino alcoholic beverage created from the sap of various species of palm trees. During the Spanish colonial period, tubâ was introduced to Guam, the Marianas, and Mexico via the Manila Galleons. It remains popular in Mexico, especially in the states of Colima, Jalisco, Michoacán, Nayarit, and Guerrero. Tubâ was also introduced to the Torres Strait Islands of Australia in the mid-19th century by Filipino immigrant workers in the pearling industry. Tubâ has existed in the Philippines since pre-colonial times. It was widely consumed for recreation as well as having played an important role in the animist religious rituals presided by babaylan shamans. Heavy consumption of tubâ and other alcoholic beverages in the Philippines was reported by early Spanish colonizers. Social drinking (inuman or tagayan in Tagalog and Visayan languages) was and continues to be an important aspect of Filipino social interactions. A peculiar and universal drinking custom of the islands is the sharing of a single drinking container. During tagayan, one person (usually the owner of the beverage) becomes the tanggero who fills a cup with a serving of alcohol (a tagay). A person in the group then drinks the cup and passes it back to the tanggero for a refill. The tanggero fills the cup again and passes it to the next person, and so on. Another practice is to drink from the same container at the same time using drinking straws made from hollow reeds or bamboo. Tagayan was usually accompanied by a shared serving of food known as pulutan. The ritual and terminology of tagayan was recorded in the Bocabulario Tagalog manuscript (1630) by Fray Miguel Ruiz, and they remain largely unchanged today. Tagayan is also related to the ancient Filipino practice of sandugo (blood compact), as both reinforce camaraderie and social bonds among participants by drinking from the same vessel. Tubâ was first recorded in European records by Antonio Pigafetta of the Magellan expedition (c. 1521), who called it uraca and mistakenly assumed that it was distilled.