To me, the name DAMPA evokes the Filipino’s ability to turn a small thing into something big, something humble and lowly into one that calls attention and draws a crowd; especially, when it concerns something that is very important to most Filipinos – such as, dining.
Back in the late 60’s, when the construction of the Cultural Center Complex was being rushed on the newly reclaimed land from Manila Bay, a couple from the perfumed and well-dressed set told their weekend cronies about this carinderia near the construction site. The seafood dishes served there were pinoy na pinoy, absolutely delicious, and merely cost a penny. Their chauffeur had sworn to this and they had gone one day and found that it was just as he had told them.
In no time at all, everyday at lunchtime, a beeline of cars and other vehicles could be seen near the site. Corporate executives in their barongs or shirts-and-ties, along with high-heeled office ladies, made their way on the soft sandy floor to an oversized lean-to, which served as the carinderia or fast food restaurant.
Barkers led them to simple tables with batibot chairs laid out on the sand. Copies of a menu scrawled in large letters on pieces of cardboard were tacked onto the posts of the lean-to in strategic places, where they could be easily read. Smoke constantly curled from the rows of stoves, where cooks in dishevelled attire and sweaty faces, took the orders quickly and kept the food coming.
Guests preferred to roll up their sleeves and eat with their hands, gobbling up the sumptuous meal over animated conversation. Then they lined up to several earthen jars with water and soap to wash their hands, ambled back to their cars and got to their offices hopefully on time.
The place came to be known as the Dampa, which, in the vernacular, means a hut. It was such a big hit that, soon after the CCP was completed and its environs cleaned and tidied up, the carinderia entrepreneurs looked for another site to ply their food business.
They found one in San Dionisio, Paranaque, just a little distance from the international airport and adjacent to a small public market. Thus was the Dampa born in Paranaque.
Like the original, it was a modest structure that was built on the earthen floor. It had ordinary tables and sturdy but movable chairs. It looked more permanent than its CCP predecessor, better lit up, and was open for both lunch and dinner. To lighten up the atmosphere further, a jukebox and iceboxes filled with chilled bottles of beer and softdrinks became regular fixtures.
The stall owners in the nearby public market were either friends or relatives. So, the restaurateurs drummed up a related business for them. Clients were encouraged to buy the ingredients for their chosen dishes fresh from the public market. This was a subtle but unmistakeable assurance that food that was served was literally fresh from the market and the kitchen.
The menu of local delicacies was also expanded beyond the seafood varieties, to include meat and other basic menu ingredients. For openers, different varieties of native pulutan or appetizers whetted the appetite of the diners.
Prices were kept low. The profit margins were to come from volume and the droves of clients that would come noon and night.
As late as the mid-90’s, it was not unusual for a birthday or graduation celebrant or some newly promoted employee with a modest budget of less than PHP 3,000 (about US$ 100) to give a blowout for more than a dozen people with a basic menu of sinigang, baked clams, hipon or sugpo, pinakbet or chopsuey, grilled porkchop or milkfish, fried chicken, lumpiang shanghai, and leche flan or halo-halo for dessert. Included in this modest budget was flowing ice-cold beer or soft drinks to water down the gastronomic delights.
This Dampa formula soon moved beyond the confines of the modest carinderia. The name began to connote a bigger area, dotted with small restaurants, all featuring the same basic menu and marketing-cum-pricing strategy, including social amenities like cable TV or the popular videoke or karaoke for the music-loving Filipinos.
In Baclaran, it expanded into a veritable subdivision of small restaurant malls, each one bearing a distinctive name, but all referred to with the generic name of Dampa.
Nowadays, the Dampa has transcended the boundaries of Baclaran. It counts its enclaves in various parts of Metropolitan Manila, such as BF Homes in middle-class Paranaque, Bicutan in Taguig City, or the ritzier Libis in Quezon City, Gateway in Pasig City, or Macapagal Boulevard near the Mall of Asia in Pasay City.
The Dampa is no longer merely a modest and inexpensive place to dine. It now connotes a definite style and ambience for dining that is distinctively Filipino, yet world-class in its uniqueness. ###
