THE DAILY IF
article 06

Lost in Maluku - A very strange case of alien abduction? -
(story contributed by Mr. Luis Fernando Alva, Second Secretary/ Cultural Attache, the Embassy of Mexico, Jakarta)

Mexico City, May 15, 1594

Mexico city, the city of palaces awakened the 17^th October 1593 with the very strange case of a man yelling and crying: Where am I? Where am I? Where’s my boat? Where’s my captain? Is he dead?

Most people felt bothered and disturbed by the cries of this man, while others felt compassion and took him to rest in a nearby church. Someone noticed that his uniform was not New Spain’s and gave told the Holy Inquisition which arrested this poor man.

In the so called by locals “Black Palace” in Santo Domingo Plaza, this poor man was asked his name, origin and means to arrive to this kingdom of New Spain.

He said that don Gómez Pérez Dasmariñas was his commander in the Philippines, and that they were sailing to Maluku, where they found a tempest and then mutiny. Don Gómez died in the revolt, he said, while the soldier got hurt and fell unconscious, only to awake in this extraordinary City of Mexico.

The Inquisition debated largely whether hang him or bonfire him, but one patient priest suggested to wait a few months until the Spanish Fleet, the “Nao de China” arrived to New Spain, just to know, first hand the authenticity of this story. His colleagues accepted and only put him to jail.

Eight months later, in May, 1594, the Spanish fleet arrived to the port of Acapulco. There the Inquisition lawyers were waiting for the news about Don Gómez Pérez. The captain of the fleet told the Inquisition the same version of the mutiny and death of Don Pérez, and many more details about the sad event.

When confronted by the truth, the Inquisition only apologized to its prisoner and sent him back to the Philippines, where wife and daughters waited for the abducted soldier.