‘Barangay Torotot’ keeps it loud but safe

Carmen Vinoya minds her family’s torotot stall which has been a holiday fixture for the last 70 years on Gabriela Street, Tondo, Manila. NIÑO JESUS ORBETA

While factories and mostly ramshackle shops in Bulacan province get busy churning out firecrackers for New Year’s Eve revelers, a neighborhood of small-time entrepreneurs in Tondo, Manila, sticks to making much safer noisemakers that by now should have earned them recognition from health and public safety officials.

Barangay 53 is long-known among locals and patrons as “Barangay Torotot” (Trumpet Village).

Producing cone-shaped cardboard horns that double as party hats—made more colorful with feathers, ribbons or crepe paper —has been a tradition and not just a backyard industry for the residents who have been making and selling toy torotot for decades.

The late Remedios Vinoya is regarded as the first in the community to make it a year-end business, starting out over 70 years ago and passing it on to her 10 children when she died three years ago at age 90.

While they are engaged in other businesses like selling food and selling clothes, their torotot workshop on Gabriela Street is now run mainly by Remedios’ 50-year-old daughter, Vivian Vinoya.

Unlike firecrackers which seem to get more dangerous and devilish each year, the fun-filled torotot will always be there for children of all ages, she said.

Vinoya noted, however, that many of her fellow trumpet makers had gone silent over the last decade due to the rising cost of materials.

A bundle of cardboard, for example, cost only P400 per 170 pieces 10 years ago but now cost P1,500, noted fellow entrepreneur Elvira Ferrer, 59. The whistle now costs P1 each, whereas it used to be only P0.40 to P0.50 apiece, she added.

“There used to be torotot makers in almost every home here. Now there are only a few of us left because materials are so costly,” said Ferrer, who recalled how the sidewalks of Gabriela Street practically bristled with torotot displays during the holiday season.

The flood of plastic toy trumpets—cheap imports—has also left a dent on Barangay Torotot. “If you go to Divisoria now, you’ll see on Ilaya, Tabora, Recto [streets] loads of plastic horns being sold wholesale,” with the smallest noisemakers going at P6 each.

Hoping to compete, Ferrer and the Vinoyas try to improve their designs to attract children, they put stickers of famous cartoon characters or come up with unusual designs like the Suman, which is thinner and longer that the regular torotot.

On the bright side, the Vinoya family has been finding bulk buyers even outside Metro Manila—like in Palawan and Pampanga province or Baguio City—from resellers to business establishments like hotels that have torotot among their giveaways.

“Firecrackers will always be patronized—even those considered illegal. It would be safer, though, if people just used the torotot to greet the New Year,” said Ferrer, who happen to be a native of Bulacan, but who in her teens already learned how to fashion a loud but child-friendly noisemaker. “The whistle, for example, should be fixed securely so it won’t get detached and get swallowed by kids.”

Even the Vinoyas admit that Ferrer has become an “expert” in making safe whistles.

Production starts as early as August, when Ferrer and the Vinoyas start buying materials in Divisoria. The whistles, which are actually small bamboo tubes, are bought in Rizal province. By November, they put their other businesses on hold just to focus on torotot-making.

“We’ve gotten used to doing this every year,” said Ferrer. “It has become part of who we are as a family.”