BANNERED BY the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) Season 80 first semester championship teams, the Ateneo community came together for a night of celebration and school spirit at the bonfire ceremonies on December 9.
The last team to grace the stage and receive the honors of the Ateneo faithful was the Ateneo Men’s Basketball Team, who headlined the first half of the season with their first championship since 2012.
With the celebration of a basketball title, the bonfire reflects its roots in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), when basketball was the sole pride of collegiate competition. Over the years, the bonfire has grown to symbolize more than just the glory of one sport alone.
Rekindling the flames
While bonfires in medieval tradition are synonymous with the burning of witches, and contemporary school bonfires symbolize new beginnings, the case differs for the Blue Bonfire despite its underpinnings in Western tradition. A prominent face in the crowd and a long-time Ateneo sports fan, Fr. Adolfo Dacanay, SJ says that contrary to popular notion, Ateneo’s bonfire is uniquely down to earth. “To us it is really just a celebration,” he says.
History reveals that the bonfire dates back to the early 20th century, when Ateneo still competed in the NCAA. Inspired by the American Jesuits and the campfires of the popular Boy Scouts, a torchlight parade that stretched from Padre Faura to Lawton and Intramuros spontaneously ensued when the Ambrosio Padilla-led Blue Eagles won the NCAA title in 1929, says sportswriter and former journalism professor Rick Olivares.
Emmanuel Fernandez, Director of the University Athletic Office, recalls early informal gatherings of several Ateneo supporters who would bring their cars back to campus after the games. “They would bring beer and have a platform at ‘yan yung pinaka-stage (and that would be their stage),” Fernandez says. “Some of them would just have extra wood and burn them.”
The tradition continued following the move to the UAAP, resuming its role as an avenue of celebration in both victory and defeat on the athletic battlefield. The bonfire in ‘70s and the ‘80s remained a close-knit affair, with supplies and drinks brought by the students themselves, but by that time had already established itself as a university tradition.
Win or lose
Over the years, several bonfires have earned a special place in the hearts of the community. One example was the 2002 bonfire, which marked the end of Ateneo’s 14-year drought. Olivares recalls how that year’s celebrations began on the night of the championship itself despite the official date being scheduled for the following week to make way for preparations.
“After the game, three people went to Mass at the Gesu, and the grounds was filled with people,” he says. “Bellarmine Field was muddy, but people didn’t go home—everyone stayed.”
The Ateneo trophy cabinet expanded to include the 2008 basketball championship that marked the start of the five-peat era, and most recently, the 2017 bonfire which celebrated another title taken at DLSU’s expense.
“Basketball ‘yung talagang pinaghahandaan noon (The bonfire was really prepared for the basketball team),” Olivares says.
The ceaseless demand for a post-basketball-championship-bonfire was the onset for a massive event. The basketball community, including sports fans from across the country, joined in the 2017 celebration.
“We could not postpone the bonfire until the end of the year,” Dacanay says. “We just couldn’t wait to celebrate.”
Not all bonfire celebrations, however, pack Bellarmine Field in the thousands. Fernandez recalls that there have also been smaller bonfires that occurred to celebrate sports that receive less attention. Olivares notes that the 2006 bonfire for the Ateneo Men’s Football team’s three-peat as the first to be celebrated without a basketball championship.
Nevertheless, Men’s Basketball and Women’s Volleyball remain to be crowd favorites. The immense crowds inevitably drawn in, however, are used to recognize the efforts of all athletes, especially teams that are often overlooked. “We use the popularity of these sports to introduce and recognize the other sports,” Fernandez says.
While the recipients of the bonfire honors may have increased in number, its celebratory roots remain the same. Nowadays, a well-planned event that draws in thousands of attendees has risen from the roots of a spontaneous parade, still embodying the same spirit of decades past. Corporate sponsors have even taken advantage of the celebration, hawking their brands to attendees in every way possible.
Returning to the hill
The bonfire has become a celebration meant to encompass the achievements and service of all athletes, to salute their victories, and to give them a chance to “pat oneself on the back,” as Dacanay puts it.
Besides being anticipated due to its unconventional celebratory rituals on campus, the bonfire asserts itself as more than just a postseason festivity. “It is a way of bringing people together, families, parents and their children, alumni, grade school, high school, college,” Dacanay says.
The bonfire symbolizes returning to a place that all Ateneans, young and old, once called home. Fernandez further describes it as a platform for Ateneans to reminisce on the sweetest of memories, and to remember the struggles that have shaped a student body and a community into men for others.
Amid the tensions met through victory and defeat, school sports have shown that the Ateneo community stands together and rises for one big fight. “At the end of the day, it is a unifying factor, regardless of the political aspects, on- and off-season,” says Benjo Afuang of the University Athletics Office.
Decades past its humble beginnings, the bonfire lives on as an annual affair. Every year, after the second semester closes, a bonfire is organized and remains to be the perfect season-ender, commemorating victories of all championship teams and immortalizing the emotions brought upon the Ateneo community, telling new stories of the Blue and Lady Eagles as the years go by.
