January 2000 - How's the weather in Batanggas?? Hot as usual. Here are some examples of some current FHMs in the market back in the land of the flying blade.

# Brass bolstered, sandwiched handles with Narra wood inserts. One of the more 'expensive' (relatively) current Balisongs in the market that sports the AGILA (Eagle) tang/finger guard. This is the only Bowie blade I was able to find - and incidentally the nicest ground blade I have seen. The last of it's kind in the last 3 barrios in Batanggas I visited. Whether the Eagle head can open bottlecaps is yet to be tested. The blade is 5 icnhes long and measures an overall length of 29 cm - this is what is called a Bente Nuebe (Viente Nueve).

# A fine example of a long discontinued GUTMANN ORIGINAL BALISONG. It sports a 4 inch double sided spearpoint blade and has dark BUFFALO HORN inserts. Incidentally horn inserts are hard to find now so if you have one it's a good buy (that is if you are into FHMs). Unlike the Bowie blade above the spearpoint is a blade for all seasons. Relatively hard to find but not as hard as the bowie (or the weehawk - I only found ONE example of it but it looked HORRIBLE)
This knife belonged to my Dad, and he promptly hid it from me when I was a kid because of my dangerous interest in it ^_^. It's 13 years old and running.

# Another fine piece. I had to haggle BIG TIME for this bad boy. Just cause I was Chinese and didnt have a Batanganista accent they gave me a hard time. The bastards. Still this is a remarkable piece because it sports Buffalo Horn inserts two toned with STAG ANTLERS. Another hard find nowadays compared to the more common HORSE BONE inserts. There were only a few in the shop I went to and it was only available in one shop. The blade however is of the more common utility shape. This type of blade is called BEARING (as in Military Bearing?? not to be confused by Ball Bearing.) It is a damn thick blade and before you buy it the shopkeeper will stab it into a Piso (a coin say as big as an American Quarter) it will penetrate without any damage to the tip. A nice little demonstration. That is why you usually see a pile of holed coins in a display cabinet next to the knives. This seems to be long out of production, and a harder find than the bowie above whic seems to be just recently discontinued.

# A very common piece, and thesecond most common blade shape in the market. Another Bente Nuebe. It has a bottle opener on the tang, and I quote "rambo holes". Ideally those holes were supposed to introduce air bubbles into a stab wound as Gollnick noted, there are also slits on the holes to act as reverse serrations to tear at he wound - but in reality it is only for decoration or to strip wire. The upper spide on the blade has a sligght swedge with yet more reverse serrations but are actually quite dull and in reality is used to scale fish. This is what should properly be called a 'Filipino utility'.