pinoymandarin

Am Back

2010-05-26T13:36:00.004+08:00

Come June, I would be teaching fulltime at the Lewis College here in Sorsogon, owned by the famous business tycoon and formerly a native of Sorsogon, Loida Nicolas Lewis. Started last sem with only three subjects to test the waters. Well, the waters proved good with eager Pinoys struggling to learn and try new things. That would test me too on my own worth... whatever that means.

Yes, am back and hopefully for good. I keep my fingers crossed. Wish me luck my countrymen.

Still trying to gain momentum yet after fourteen months in Southern California, Mid-Florida and Toronto (Torono) in Ontario, Canada.

Miss ya Bayan, my old comrade and one of the few old guards, who died when I was away.

Hello, Sorsogon Arts Council, one of the oldest orgs founded by Tootsie.

Hello to every true-blooded Sorsoganon and Filipino in this little spot of the globe who still uphold that There will be no eARTh withou ART.

Feline Culture

2009-02-07T07:35:00.024+08:00

Patricia's Luke
Nenette's Niko and me (Sorry, can't copy-paste Wes's photo here, so please see the June 2005 entry of my blog.)
Niko again below in festive attire.

Everybody loves cats.

Suyin has Checkov and Isabelle. Nenette has Niko. Manoy has Figgie. Patricia has Luke.

I once had Wes.

God, how I miss my Wes. But, since I left home last July, she also left. I know that she used to leave home often but not for long. She used to come back to me after a day or two. According to Suyin, Wes did not return anymore.

How sad. I know that she must have been so lonesome and she must have left home to look for me.

Cats are like humans. They long for their love ones. Figgie cries out loud whenever Manoy leaves home for quite a time, and Figgie would know that. Cats have always a way of knowing. Wes didn't cry when I left home, but I saw how sad her eyes were. She knew, coz she stayed away from me and climbed atop the roof. That was where she was last seen.

Cats love to stay home. Wes stayed because of love and left in search for it.

I have never stopped looking for it too.

The Spirit in St. Augustine

2009-02-01T06:28:00.044+08:00

Castillo de San Marcos

The Atlantic Ocean

Antique clothes in an antique shop

More stores and restaurants

Old house with balcony

Balconies in old abodes
Old hut turned into a coffee house
The Stogies Coffee Bar and me

There is this place called St. Augustine, just north of Florida, by the Atlantic Ocean; which transported me again into the past. My love for old places and old abodes triggered my heart again to live beyond time and space.

I dunno, but whenever I see such quaint places, my heart would seem to burst into a longing for that something and someplace where I used to live. Sometimes I want to believe that I was born in the 1500s to the 1800s and that I do not belong to this post-modern era. Is this about my spirit again in another human form, (which I once wrote in one of my blog entries)?

In St. Augustine, some old houses were restored and turned into shops and coffee bars. The first time I stepped on the first road round the bend, my heart suddenly stopped upon the sight of a shop selling antique clothes. I felt that surge of feeling when one wants to fit into a dress or an attire for just one sweet moment. The same feeling was also felt upon the sight of an old coffee house, an old balcony to watch people go by, an old table with two Baroque stools and two people face to face as seen from a window in a bar, and the narrow cobbled streets where I had this tingling effect from someone seemingly familiar and special, a touch maybe that carved a lasting memory, or maybe someone leading my way with his hand upon my waist. Feelings that seemed to open scenes that occurred sometime in the past, something I never wanted to erase from the mind.

The fort called Castillo de San Marcos struck me as something painful but which cannot be defined. Somehow, there was this deep feeling of loneliness and longing... a desire. I also felt this way when I saw the old huts of Ulm in Southern Germany in 1997.

But, that is another story.

Four Sisters

2009-01-10T05:41:00.020+08:00

Once upon a time, there were four sisters who lived in a big house in a small town. Their parents built this big house so that everybody would have space to live and play.Their Mom was a strict schoolteacher and she taught them how to read and write, to love each other, and to learn how to appreciate the little things around them. She didn't spare the rod to discipline her girls. Their Dad was a lawyer and a defender of the poor and never got paid for his services. They had very little money so toys were not bought but created among themselves. They made paper dolls with paper dresses, gathered dried leaves and twigs to cook root crops taken from the backyard, and mounted plays and dance dramas on a makeshift stage in the rice granary under the main house. They loved to gather leaves from plants to use as paper money as payment for those stage presentations.

They grew up and went to the University of the Philippines (UP) to study. They all went through the different stages in life as students, as workers, and later as wives and mothers. All of them, in one time or another became teachers. Each carrying different principles and beliefs. Then, one by one, they flew to other countries to pursue their goals in life, and to define their own successes in their own lives. Each one having a strong mind and personality, leaving her man when needed, bringing up strong offsprings as well, leaving home for ideologies and beliefs, and trying the most difficult and untrodden roads.

On one cool new year's day, the four sisters now older, drove to a place called Gulf Breeze and there they seemed to stopped time for almost three days to tell each other's stories from faraway places. They laughed and cried, talked non-stop at the top of their voices, and discussed issues till their voices cracked and got hoarse. They watched a movie and shopped till they dropped.

Then, it was time to leave again. They embraced and parted ways. Nobody mentioned about the future and if they would ever meet again.

But, who cares? Their love for each other still remains and nothing else matters.

The GAJOs on New Year's Eve 2009

2009-01-10T05:05:00.010+08:00

New Year's Eve was definitely for the GAJOs.

After almost 40 years, the Gajo siblings had come together at last.

One by one they came, Manoy (Wito), Manay (Nene), Ade, Nenette, and me. Each bringing along different memories of the past, each depicting a character, a life, a belief, and scars in feelings and preferences.

Manoy had this dream of having all his siblings around him. That wish came true and even for only 24 hours starting on New year's eve, we gathered around him coming from all different places, California, Canada, Florida, and the Philippines.

It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. I saw the rare twinkle in Manoy's eyes, the all-giving and all-loving gestures as he sang along with Nenette and Ade, the fulness of his mouth as he laughed and smiled all throughout the night, and most of all, the invisible love that was there, which I felt and which we all want to feel.

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL YOU LOVELY GAJOs!!!!

Christmas Day

2008-12-26T07:21:00.024+08:00

Christmas day usually starts on Christmas eve.

This was my first Christmas here. We had the usual opening of presents last night with Manoy and Julie and the Tolentinos as well as Pancho's family. There was also the usual poker tourney won by Pancho this time.

On Christmas morn there were more presents especially for the kids. I was about to retire and take a much needed nap when Manoy started to play old video tapes of past Christmases in Canada. It was on December 25, 1990. I saw my siblings and Mama. My tears came quickly at the edge of my eyes. Suddenly, I missed Mama so much. A sudden surge of longing overwhelmed me when I saw that familiar pout in her lips and the usual stance of arms upon her waist, the curls of hair on her head, and the sharp flash of those intelligent eyes. When Patricia started interviewing Manay, Nenette, and Manoy,we all listened; everyone seemed to be having fun. When it was Mama's turn to talk, she pounced and hit the videocam as it was focused on her. Everybody laughed coz it was so typical of her. She had a mind of her own and won't submit to other people's whims or wishes. There was a lump in my throat. I felt so intensely sad and lonely and wished all at once to be with this woman who always felt the same care and love for me and my siblings throughout her whole life. She might be hard on herself and others but she always meant well especially toward her children forgetting her own self.

I feel bad now because I was not able to show and give her the love that could have made her happy in the last days of her life. We never had the chance. I was mostly away working in Manila when she returned to Sorsogon from the US. And when she suffered a stroke, it was too late.

Come to me Mama, let me feel you now.

Deltona

2008-11-16T03:29:00.013+08:00

Deltona is a small city in Central Florida. I live here now with my brother and his wife Julie. We live in a little house full of sunshine with lots of flowers and citrus fruits around the premises. My room has a door leading to a garden with a statuette of two angels. I like it here becoz of the rain that showers the plants in the morning and at night. Just like Sorsogon.

Last night, my brother and I watched the launching of the rocketship Endeavor from our house's frontyard... a blast of fire that brightened up the sky like a conflagration. It took off from NASA base camp in Titusville 50 miles away with lots of people cheering and shouting as seen from TV screens. These are hard times so Americans love to see bigger happenings, to prove that they will overcome eventually. The rocketship was a symbol of hope and greatness.

This reminded me of Obama's winning the presidential election last November 4 with a million Americans cheering and crying at the Times Square in New York city just like new year's eve. At the same time, a throng of people was rallying infront of the White House crying out for the immediate oust of President Bush. Ya, that also reminded me of the 1986 people's power that ousted then Philippine president Marcos. The scenario was the same...people rushing out into the streets shouting as church bells kept ringing everywhere, people running out from their homes including me... the crowd physically carrying me off my feet onto the gates of Malacanang.

This is the United States of America, the land of the free. But how free? With the recession still deeply embedded into the economy, and into the minds of Pinoys... how far is the American dream...or will another cross burn again in the middle of the night?

Hello Florida!

2008-11-09T09:28:00.011+08:00

Mt. Dora's version of a "tiangge"
Me at Mt. Dora's downtown

Am new here in Florida and as usual am getting the feel of this place yet.

The glens, the lakes (both natural and man-made),the old towns, the old houses, the country houses with horses, and yes... alligators!

I miss sophisticated California and its 94.7, and hello to Florida's country songs and church music. Hello to beautiful Deland and Mt. Dora (no mountains tho) but quaint towns.

I think I will love it here. I always adapt to places especially when they strike me with something new and old. Also, unlike California, rain comes to us like morning showers here. Something like Sorsogon's cool evening rains...

I also like the people in this Obama county...aggressive and conscientious... no not laid-back, but deeply political and extremely religious but ecumenical in outlook. Now, looks like am getting near the roots of the South... not really the Deep South but quite near.

94.7

2008-10-14T02:18:00.017+08:00

Victoria Gardens at Rancho Cucamonga

Am just counting the days... two days away and I will be off to another world after my leisurely vacation down here in California.

One of the things I'd be missing is ninety-four.7... 94 what? Yes, I've been listening to this radio station for nights with my MP4 plugged to my ears and it kind of taught me the legends and trends of jazz and blues. Now, I know why Auggie got hooked to this kind of music and why the Southerners here have developed that kind of cult-following for that kind of sound. Well, just ask me who these fellas are... Louis Jordan, Chick Correa, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, Miles Davis,Bing Crosby, Ella Fitzgerald, etc. etc. and I'd be talking 'bout them non-stop. When I go deeper down South, probably to the land of the blues, hope to discover some more of that essential black sound.

Now that the days have gone deeper into Fall, the winds are chilling me to the bones. However, California is so blessed with a perennial sun that people just love to walk and bask under it. At the Victoria Gardens, people just sit around, walk or chat under the sun... as Europeans do. Now, I know why Californians are laid back, so they say.

Bye-bye Southern California!

2008-10-06T06:20:00.036+08:00

Me, Ade, Eric, and Joanna at the Tibbies

Am leaving Southern California, come October 15.

Bye-bye Moreno Valley, and Riverside.

Bye-bye to the Pinays of West Covina, San Diego, La Fuente, and Walnut.

Bye-bye to the Riverside transit and the LATC and the Filipino community of LA.

Hello Florida!

I dunno what is in store for me there in that warm humid state but surely I will miss this sunny side of the earth where I met a lot of likeable people, e.g., the accommodating drivers of Riverside transit, the beautiful people in all sizes (front, back & sideways),the strong-willed Pinays and Pinoys; helped myself to uhmm... tasty Filipino and American food, feasted my eyes with the quaint houses of LA, and lately got addicted again to the music and theater scenes in LA and Fontana.

Fontana. Yes, last night, we (Ade and son Eric,with live-in partner Joanna, and me) had a grand time at the Tibbies Center Stage Theater and Restaurant in Fontana! Actually that was Eric's birthday blowout for his Mom last September 17 which was moved to a later date to catch the theatrical production of Five Guys Named Moe, featuring Louis Jordan's songs in a musical by Clarke Peters as an homage to this musical giant in big band swing-jazz of the 1930s. Jordan became famous as one of the innovators of "jump blues," a swinging hybrid of jazz and blues. I can't help but think of the Jumpin'Jaz band we listened to in Walnut city. (Hey, Auggie, this is your music!) Last night's musical play consisted of a small band and six actor-singer-dancers featuring Smitty as Nomax and the five Moes: Andrew Johnson (Four-Eyed Moe); Desmond Lamar No Moe); Ty London (Little Moe); Sherman Mclaurin (Eat Moe); and O Womack (Big Moe). The amazing combined interplay of these actors, with lights, sounds, costumes, choreography and sets proved that shouts, (read: highly syncopated vocals) with earthy, funny lyrics,and up-tempo dances and with active participation from a receptive audience, and of course plus food and drinks could spell the difference in theater. The contagious rhythm of piano, bass and drums, sax, trumpet,clarinet, and electronic organ got us (the audience) on our feet and calypsoed round downstage and onstage. Ade, of course, with her love for dancing, led Eric, Joanna and me. Before that, we had a sumptuous dinner prepared by Chief Chef Luke, Eric's bestfriend. He later joined us at the table fronting the stage and we visited his spic-and-span kitchen after the show, then chatted at the theater lounge late into the night till we embraced and parted ways towards midnight. And wait, yes, last night was the first time of rain in this part of California after those many dry months!

Thanks Ade. Thanks Eric and Joanna. Thanks Luke. Sure gonna miss ya all!

Toastmasters' Club

2008-09-29T05:55:00.009+08:00

At the Toastmasters' Club yesterday, we (Ade and me) were able to catch the division level of its Humorous contest or stand-up comedy. In the Philippines, this sort of club is known mostly to businessmen as a sort of socialization. It is an event held usually in plush hotels and only for those who can afford the enormous fees. Here, it is just another form of activity for senior citizens usually subsidized by the government. My sister Ade was once a member and quit, but now she wants to make a comeback to "keep the adrenaline going." So we went to see the event.

The food again was overflowing, and for just $7, one can watch Stand-up comedians and evaluators' speeches. Also, coffee, cookies, drinks, and a sumptuous dinner come with that. Plus the exposure to effective public addresses. In nearby cities, different Toastmaster clubs abound such as the The Dawnbusters, the Breakfast Club, and the Black Chamber of Commerce. They convene once or twice a week to talk about being an effective communicator or how to put one's message across. And most often invite guests to expound on parliamentary procedures and to conduct speech or speechwriting workshops. And just like what my sister said, it is a good form of exercise that keeps the adrenaline flowing.

Again, I am into wishful thinking. How I wish that clubs like this could be subsidized by the local government or could be affordable to senior citizens back home, and more so to teachers and professionals who need a lot of polishing in their interpersonal and writing skills. This is also a great way to cure one's idea of "smallness" as a person, as a nation...

First Day of Fall

2008-09-23T11:26:00.026+08:00

Clean Spring Street
ECHO Park Lake
The Puras and the Escasinas family of LA

Park lake and steps to Manay Belen's home
Ade, Leslie Lewis Sword, and me
Intricately designed glass ceiling of LATC's lobby

LATC front lobby

Brick building being restored near Echo park

Penafrancia Festival at the Echo Park

LA downtown

Today is the first day of Fall as felt in the chilly crisp air and as seen in the leaves that are getting brownish as they start to fall. It is a relief from the sweltering heat of summer especially in Southern California... a wonder how it gets a temperate climate with continuous sunshine.

Last weekend, Ade and I went to Los Angeles to see the play Miracle in Rwanda that starred Leslie Nicolas Lewis Sword...Sorsogon's Loida Nicolas's daughter. It was a well-crafted dramatic monologue that showed the difficulties and trauma of eight people trapped inside a 4x3 feet toilet for three months to escape the Tutsi massacre by the Hutus. It was a one-woman show and Loida's daughter proved her worth as an actress, giving sensitive shifts in a whole gamut of emotions from different characters. The Los Angeles Theater Center(LATC) was awesome! I looked up at the LATC lobby ceiling with mouth agape becoz it was made of glass in intricate designs with sunlight pouring in. The theater too was incomparable in lighting designs as well as in the impeccable sound system. The play was actually an interplay of the actor, with the lights and sounds. How sad that Tootsie and Suyin were not by my side at that point in time.

It is the Arts, particularly the theater, that moves us to think of the people closest to us and wish to share with them that unspeakable bliss. Now, am getting to miss the theater again. On our way home, Ade remarked that she felt hungry. I seconded it and said that it was because of the play. "Why, we had just eaten a lot at Manay Lydia's," she quipped. But, a well-crafted play has the force to drain one's emotions and energy. It consumes and eats up all of the actor(s) and of the audience as well. Yes, my sister and I were drained.

Before that, we also went to see the Penafrancia Festival at the Echo Park Lake in LA too. It was a celebration in honor of the feast of Penafrancia hosted by the Bicolanos in LA. That meant free food again! And so the food flowed endlessly for all. Of course I enjoyed again the food. Just imagine me standing before one of the booths just looking around, when somebody just shoved a plate of caldereta, palabok, laing, and adobo to me. It showed how affluent the Bicolanos here are. I couldn't help but think of the poor slums where our brothers and sisters still starve to death. Hello to all Bikolnons in the US of A!

I love LA becoz of the quaint houses of olden days but still well-kempt...the big mansions... the old restored brick buildings...the flourishing arts and theater scenes... the numerous buses that ply the clean streets... the kinky stores and shops... and the offbeat people (who sez Californians are laid back?). I haven't scoured the music stores tho.

When we visited some of our relatives in the Filipino community, I was amazed how the Filipinos there didn't lose their identity and values in the way they decorated their homes with family photos, and their fruit trees that smacked well of our favorites...calamansi, suha, guava, etc. And our relatives, especially Manay Lydia, even cooked for us our all-time favorites...palabok, inihaw, sinigang, afritada, and rice, even if most of them were just then old-timers who migrated to the USA in the 20's and 40's as apple-pickers. Some never returned to their hometowns, some did just to fulfill a dream... to rest, die and be buried in Philippine soil.

As we left LA to go back to our suburbia home, my tears were at the edge of my eyes again.

Live Jazz Band for Senior Citizens in Walnut

2008-09-17T11:35:00.015+08:00

Senior citizens are being pampered down in Southern California becoz the county government here provides for most of them great entertainment and activities, i.e., monthly buffet dinner, great live jazz sounds, and dancing for only $10 each.

As usual, I tagged along my sister again last Friday during the monthly senior citizen's night at the plush government subsidized Senior Citizen Center in Walnut City. For $10, one gets access to the sounds of the '20s-70's in a joint with free coffee and drinks, food, and of course ballroom dancing with free DIs.

Yeah, I enjoyed the music so much especially the fox trot, charleston, rock and roll, and twist since I missed all that when I was young. The band got its native cowboy beat and belle singers with pizzazz! I also didn't learn how to dance during my time but I learned the basics during that single night alone. It was fun.

And wow! the food again. It was an American dinner yet I loved the mashed potatoes and the chicken... and the fruits. I didn't miss my favorite dinuguan and palabok anymore coz I was transformed into a Southern belle at that point in time (Hehehe).

How sad to think of the senior citizens and retirees back home where nothing is done for the enjoyment or interests of these people who were once productive and who also contributed once to people's welfare. Nothing is done for them anymore once retired from work, leaving most of them sitting before a table with cards in their hands, unmoving and speechless.

Riverside Transit

2008-08-30T09:53:00.019+08:00

Guy in hooded jacket in the sweltering heat of California summer

Almost empty bus seats

At last Ade and I found a busline that covers some main thoroughfares in Moreno Valley - the Riverside Transit.

At first glance, the streets of Moreno V. seemed never to have experienced public transportation becoz as wont to be, suburbia people go around in their own cars. But since I was so in dire need to get around this place, and also becoz I do not have my own car, I called up the city hall and found something about this obscure transpo.

Learning about the schedule, the bus (one for every main street) comes around after every hour at designated bus stops, a kilometer apart. A ride costs a dollar and 25 cents and 60 cents for seniors. One has to pay an exact fare coz you'll never get some change for your $2 or more. The nearest bus stop to our place is also a kilometer away, and to get there one has to trek Nason street amidst empty open spaces under a heat wave with fierce winds blowing. What a sight I might have been with my umbrella being shaken and the muscles of my legs getting almost numb (galit na galit na yung mga muscle sa legs ko).

Unlike the buses of Metro Manila, the Riverside Transit has so few customers. One can even walk or dance along the aisle without disturbing anyone. And most of the passengers belong to the minority groups around Southern California... Hispanics, Africans, Asians (like me) and poor Caucasians (weirdos, hip-hops, crackpots) who are probably jobless too like me and yes, who are most likely of my kind, (hehehe). One big white guy walked down the aisle greeting everyone in the vehicle "a good day," at the same time hopping in his worn-out rubber shoes. Bob Dylan's Mr. Bojangles suddenly came into my head with his "clicking heels." Then another Hispanic guy boarded the bus in a thick trench coat amid the sweltering heat at 92 degrees, complete with dark glasses and an armful of books.

I could not help but smile at all these little people of this huge country where all the people seem to be so fast and furious to make it big. These small guys who go about unnoticed in the streets are the same people who brought this country into being... Martin Luther King, James Baldwin, the black runners, jumpers, etc. who garnered golds during the recently concluded Beijing games...and maybe, including the black presidentiable.

Another Pinay Story

2008-08-25T09:55:00.015+08:00

"eavesdropper"

Romana (left)

Yesterday was another event that happened at the Marine Corps Air Station in San Diego.

My sister was invited to a picnic party by a former neighbor here in Moreno Valley, named Romana. As usual, I tagged along to listen to some more stories. This time, it was about a woman with a daughter who got a philandering husband (again). Of course, again it resulted into a divorce for the daughter with two children. The husband never supported the family he left behind, thus Romana took charge of the kids...bringing and fetching them to and from school, taking care of the kids' special diet becoz of allegies, etc. Her daughter then was able to go back to work as well as to move on with her life. And also to enter into another relationship.

Romana did not have any qualms to shoulder all the responsibilities supposedly not hers. This might be a difficult task to do, but very Filipino in style and value... the extended family and a mother's unconditional love.

Of course, I enjoyed the party and the food... very typical Filipino with bestsellers dinuguan, palabok, lechon, inihaw na baboy, ginataan na puso ng saging, pinakbet, and cassava bibinca; and the soooooo Pinoy na Pinoy na pinutos na pabaon. The aluminum foil wrappers were all ready to fill with your fave baon anytime you felt like leaving. But what really filled me was the storytelling from Romana, who unabashedly reopened her wounds even to strangers and up to how many times... I would never know.

Stories never end here.How many more stories will I have to listen to before I write my own?

Pinays of Southern California

2008-08-20T12:35:00.006+08:00

This is just one of the photos I took during one of the gatherings hosted by a Pinay and attended by Pinays who had stayed in this state for almost 40 years now, my sister included. I came just to eavesdrop.

I enjoyed the food (dinuguan, bagoong) and the stories. And what stories they did tell!

All their stories told about how they dumped their philandering husbands like shit. And how they raised their children as single moms. One whose name escapes me at the moment told that God punished her husband through the 9/11 disaster because her man chose to be converted into Mohamedanism so as to justify his many wives. He was to follow her but failed because of his Muslim name that made him a terrorist suspect. Etcetera... Etcetera...

Could it be true that only strong women leave their homelands to land on the shores of California and bring along their husbands and children like Spartan warriors going to war? Could it also be true that the men just leave everything to the wives and play around in wild abandon because they believe that women are stronger?

I dunno. Am I strong enough like these women? Am I brave enough to face the winds of change in my life?

West Covina

2008-08-11T08:43:00.006+08:00
A good neighbor here at the Moreno Valley invited me to West Covina, a Filipino community. Just an hour drive from Moreno, the place looked to me as some place in the Philippines... Jollibee, Red Ribbon, Chowking, etc. But the Philippingest is the sweet sound of Tagalog. In stores, you hear songs by Filipino singers like Christian Bautista's Hari ng Sablay, sellers help you by "ano ho yung hanap nyo?" and cashiers "salamat po." Filipinos get to talk freely in Tagalog in restos and even in sidewalks and parking lots. I cant help but be teary eyed just listening to these people who must have really missed their hometowns so much.

I also miss my hometown in Sorsogon. I also miss Manila and Glorietta, Greenbelt, and even the SMs. I love the screaming crowds, the jeepneys, and the tricycles. The accessibility of public transpo and even the smart-aleck taxi drivers. I miss my friends from TESDA...Butch, Tess, and in Sorsogon...Judith.

I miss Suyin, my ever loyal daughter, CJ, Ian, and Wes, my sweet cat... who'd follow me wherever I'd go. And Tootsie.

Until now, am still jobless. I dunno if I would be able to cope with the high demands of the culture here of the Northern Americans but I will. I will.

Hello Southern California!

2008-08-03T01:51:00.004+08:00

Am here now at the Moreno Valley in Southern California to try my luck.

A totally different world now, so much different from what I left behind. I don't want to look back now since my eyes are focused on the road before me.

Yes, everything is big here... the empty open spaces, the huge freeways, the voluminous cars, the barren dry mountains...even my sister's house where am staying at the moment.

To tune me up, am reading Bob Dylan's autobio Chronicles, his first venture into the music world of frozen New York:

"When I arrived, it was dead-on winter. The cold was brutal...I didn't know a single soul in this dark freezing metropolis but that was all about to change - and quick."

Oh ya, he really changed that by scouring the streets of New York and into its subterranean caverns and cafes, and met with all the small and big musicians.

Like Bob, I must build myself up into this unknown world of the fast and the furious.

Hello Bob!

rediscovering bob dylan after 40 years

2008-01-28T10:23:00.002+08:00

During the early 60s I was in high school and during the latter part, in college. I was at the UP in Diliman, Quezon City, when student activism was at its peak that culminated in the Diliman commune - the time when UP beloved was under siege by the studentry.It was also the time when politics was the turning point in every student's life. For me, everything stood still including music... which was then dominated by the Beatles. Actually, I was so immersed with my political activities that I forgot the music of my times. I never listened to the radio. I didn't buy records. I didn't go to concerts.

Forty years hence, a good friend from Iloilo, sent me copies of his CDs including BB King, Bob Marley, and Bob Dylan. What bawled me over was the music of Bob Dylan particularly Mr. Bojangles, Pianoman, Times they are A-changing, and his own renditions of Somewhere over the rainbow, Yesterday, and Like a Rollin Stone which hit me like a boulder.

Ya, this genius of a man rebelled against the psychedelic rebellious music of the 60s. His was the music of the working class during the time when he hibernated in the Catskill mountains in Woodstock amidst the simple ordinary workers and Indians and fellow artists, who like him, are "like a rolling stone."

Haller 2008!

2008-01-14T09:51:00.000+08:00
Today, as I enter this, my ears are plugged to my MP4 (tnx to u suyin 4 giving me this new gen techno as a gift) to the sounds of the 60s (Bob Dylan & the Rolling Stones), and the tunes of the 2Ks - Feist (suyin's fave and mine as well) who gives me a new force.

I love the 60s and 70s - the golden era in music and the arts and politics becoz that generation produced the best artists and freedom lovers (Bob Dylan, Andy Warhol, and the Beatles after Revolver.) It is also the great era of psychedelia and kaleidoscope statements. Most of all, this generation stood for its rights and statements - Sorbonne in Paris, Woodstock in the Catskill mountains in New York, protest concerts in the hippie hills of San Francisco, USA, the Diliman Commune at the University of the Philippines... all these initiated by the youth and students of that era. That era also fought to stop the Vietnam war that dragged on till the 70s and won. I did not see that at the onset of the Iraq war that has been dragging on till now.

But I also love the 80s till the 2Ks becoz of such amazing technology - CDs/DVDs, the computer... my blogs, the email and the internet, and of course my MP4! What diverse eras with amazing experiences! Wish I could live to a thousand years! Just like Lestat the vampire who went through several eras and generations and actively participated in each. Wish I could live and breathe in through all those times. That could be a wealth of unbelievable experiences!

When I leave here, my solo wish is for the youth of the next generations to continue the legacy of that golden era... to trek that lonesome road which is freedom.

here i go again

2007-12-04T14:17:00.000+08:00
It was harder when I sat before a PC the first time after that storm but now there is something from the words of other people that perk me up and tell me that life is good. Some words came from an old friend named Auggie and then lately from someone I do not know yet but might be one I've known before. He or she never gave his real name in my blog, just Sikres of Germany?

From Auggie- cheer up, soon there would be sunshine... and from that someone who I do not know yet... you are a gift to the world.

Thank you my friends. Life is good and tho my plans and hopes have changed, there is that flickering light within me that says... la vie est belle.

When I just look back and think of the wonderful ways of enjoying life like going to visit Kathmandu or Chungking or Xiamen, my heart sinks back a little and tears come at the edge of my eyes because I might never see those places before I die.

The other day, I played Tootsie's fave song I'll Be Seeing You being crooned by Rod Stewart and my tears came again at the edge of my eyes because I found Tootsie singing along with the CD player.

Then when I was watching small girls in their preschool uniforms, tears came to me again because I might never see my dream school for the indigents here in our place.

Tears just come and go. They seem to bring out the pain from within and wash out all the bad elements that come with it. Sometimes, after a good cry there seems to be nothing left anymore except your sanity. Crying is my therapy. I become whole again after being crushed into bits.

Simone de Beauvoir once said in her novel The Mandarins that women are so amazing because they can shed a lot of tears.

And of course my dear Han Suyin said in her novel A Many Splendored Thing that we must let our emotions and feelings grow like a slowly growing tree as we learn from our deeply embedded roots.

Those words go to my head because they are sharp rays of sunshine that cut into the dark clouds after a storm.

Charlotte's Web

2007-09-24T09:59:00.001+08:00
My world was at a standstill for almost three months.

I thought I won't be able to get out from my hibernation since I've tried so many times to sit before a computer at a cafe (I don't have my own PC) and feel my blogspot. All that in vain. But now, here I am again, in a cafe of course, trying to feel myself.

Hello world!

I am now jobless and just one of the statistics re the unemployed... just one of those figures that enumerate the data regarding unproductive females.

My daily sked consists of the mundane tasks assigned to females: checking my mail at a cafe, going to the market, grocery, and drugstore. Then rushing home to cook lunch and attending to a sick spouse.

I dunno if I'd ever fulfill my mission in life (preschool for the indigents) at all being a trying hard copycat coping with all the responsibilities now upon my little shoulders. Sometimes, I just lock myself in my room and listen to the blues sent by a good friend from Iloilo and another one from UP Diliman so as to keep my mind afloat. To date, going to mass and saying my novenas help me relax since I just close my eyes and say my prayers silently as a stream of consciousness fills me. Yes, i do see in the dark corners of my mind a whole gamut of images cavorting before me with open arms and with wings on fire.

am leaving my job

2007-06-21T10:10:00.000+08:00
Come June 30, I would have definitely left my job.

After many years of contemplations whether to leave or stay in my present job, it took me only an hour to finally decide that my career is over or I have to develop a new one.

That crucial hour came when Tootsie was confined at the Sordoc Hospital because of a stroke causing a blood vessel in the brain to bleed. His condition was already stabilized but he has to remain for awhile at the ICU for round-the-clock monitoring and later therapy.

When he was first admitted two years ago for IBD I just felt that I was facing a life of regular check-ups and hospitalizations. But not too soon.

Well, this is life and I have to face it headstrong.

Thanks to my sisters and brother and tootsie's family for the support. Thanks to Suyin and Ian for the moral support and love. Thanks to my friends, Judith, nening, and my colleagues here in TESDA-Sorsogon and the Central Office, and our union ACE. Thanks too Auggie for the music that definitely help me soar into space, helping me feel weightless.

Thank you everyone. See you in the next stage of my life!

TNX 2 U PRE

2007-05-24T16:15:00.000+08:00
I hated the hiatus when time stood still due to the unbelievable glitch in web history.

I lost track of everything... my time, my blog, my friends...

Now am trying to gain them back but time seemed to slacken all events... my mind's a wall.

Thank you Auggie. You saved me from all that crap with the amazing collection you sent me. The dazzling albums in the sixties were really beyond me! I just thought then that the world was just meant for the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, the Supremes, and the Monkees. I learned all about fusion jazz and reggae (Bob Marley) and Bob Dylan through those CDs. That's a lot. I remember also some soulful songs from the collection of one of my closest friends, Apo, who sent me too copies of his fave music mostly from the seventies/eighties such as different versions of Both Sides Now (my fave is Joni Mitchell's though) as well as from the classics like Bach's Air in G and the unbeatable Mario Lanza's Danny Boy. I wasn't really listening well during those times, did I? Thank God for CDs! Thanks mga pre!

The internet has been restored though not really. This blogpost is a test to see how far I can go without any meanderings.

49th Militant Killed in Sorsogon

2007-04-24T16:25:00.000+08:00
The internet here had the glitch for over a month now and am posting this just to fill in the news gap. Hope the glitch won't piss this off...

Willy Jeruz, 44, was shot by an unidentified gunman in front of his house in San Juan, Sorsogon City, last April 16. He was a member of the Samahan ng Magsasaka sa Sorsogon and the 49th militant leader killed in Sorsogon.

Kagemusha+EL CID=Apocalypto

2007-03-02T10:41:00.000+08:00
Auggie lent me his copy of Akira Kurusawa's classic film Kagemusha. Since I was not able to attend the Book Sale in Legazpi last Feb 16, he sent it through LBC along with a dozen more of films and songs from the sixties such as Santana, Blood, Sweat & Tears, & Bob Dylan. Thanks friend.

Kagemusha was reminiscent of Spain's epic film EL Cid with legendary warriors forced to be resurrected to win a war. In El Cid, the people won their war when they propped up the dead body of El Cid upon a horse to march along with his men towards the enemies who were so scared of the great Cid they just scampered away. Kurusawa employed a live double who looked exactly like the dead great warrior Shingen. Of course he also scared the enemies and won the war but because of jealousy his identity was revealed by one of his own men. And that also became the crucial end of the clan. I love both films. They both enshrined the virtues of heroism and idealism. Both tackled the power of faith and hope of the people. Just like Dream in Neil Gaiman's Sandman and Beowulf.

I also love Apocalypto by Mel Gibson. This film shows that the goodness in man can be transformed into violence when outside forces encroach into its realm. The film starts with the invasion of a small tribe by another tribe and ends with the discovery of the coming of the "conquistadores" in Mexico from another land. And as the last family of the tribe retreats deeper into the forest, the dream for peace diminishes.

As everybody knows, Mexico was conquered by the Spaniards and the Aztecs and Mayan tribes were driven further into the highlands. Their civilization lost, these Mexican tribes are now like the Agtas and Lumads in this sad country of ours who never got their lands back from the invaders.

Just wondering...

2007-02-27T16:03:00.000+08:00
Am just wondering why Sorsogon hits the headlines only during days of calamities and killings.

Consider these events...

- Bulusan Volcano erupts leaving the towns of Casiguran, Irosin, Juban, Barcelona, and Gubat covered with ashes and sulphur and crops destroyed,

- Gringo's house in Bulan raided by military men but didn't find the renegade former senator,

- Lafayette Mining Co. in Rapu-Rapu, Albay poisons the seas of Sorsogon,

- Typhoon Caloy in May last year causes thousands to be stranded in Matnog,

- Super typhoon Milenyo lashes at Sorsogon causing severe destruction upon crops and infrastructure,

- Super typhoon Reming lashes at Albay and Sorsogon causing great destruction to homes, crops and lives,

- Sorsogon is declared top priority province in war, and

- Military batallions rush to Sorsogon to heed PGMA's call to stop insurgents...

All this and more reflect the bad side of the province. But why pick on this province in its bad light? Maybe because Sorsogon is ...

- gateway to the Visayas and Mindanao, therefore strategic in location,

- opposition territory,

- people's war against the Lafayette with no less than Bishop Bastes as the Chairman of the Rapurapu Factfinding Commission, while the Lafayette is 5th in the top 23 priority mining government projects, and

- where young activists were killed in broad daylight such as Cris Hugo, Ambo Guran, and Atty. Gil Gojol by alleged armed uniformed men.

Think...

Hope in Hell

2007-02-08T10:50:00.000+08:00
The afternoon was lazy last Sunday and having tired of the moribund local TV shows, I began rereading Neil Gaiman's comics-novel Preludes and Nocturnes. Now I know why NG is tagged as the post-modern writer... his dialogues are brief and cutting, not your glammy Victorian style, and his storylines mix medieval and new millenia characters as in Beowulf.

My fave episode in that first volume of his Sandman series is "A Hope in Hell" which features also my fave character Dream or Morpheus or the Dream Lord or the Dream King. Here, Dream goes to hell to retrieve his lost helm which was stolen by the demon Choronzon, the captain of the horde of Beelzebub. But the demon won't easily give him back the helm without a challenge. Both agreed that if Dream would be outwitted by the demon then the former would remain in hell as a slave. And of course Dream would get back his helm and be allowed to leave hell if otherwise. The following dialogues speak all...

Choronzon: I am Anti-Life. The Beast of Judgment. I am the Dark at the end of Everything. The end of universes, Gods, worlds... of everything.

Dream: I am hope.

Lucifer: What power have dreams in hell?

Dream: Ask yourselves, What power would Hell have if those here imprisoned were not able to dream of heaven?

Silently, all the demons present moved aside to let Dream leave, unable to meet his gaze.

Stories of Years Gone By

2007-02-07T15:53:00.000+08:00
Got this note from Ramses Nieves, my former student at the SNHS, who wrote in response to my blogpost regarding the old houses of Almendras, Sorsogon. I didn't know that the old houses which I didn't notice before, had some stories to tell too. This one from Ramses:

I've read quite a few of your posts and was very
impressed. It seems that I share your fondness for
historical buildings that you can tell hold a lot of
stories of years past. We used to live in an old
rented house in Almendras (the one next to Mella's)
and I used to touch the bullet hole in the huge yakal
post left by a warplane in the 2nd World War. Sadly
that stately old house collapsed during typhoon Sisang
and is no more, its old but really hard timbers used
to make several small houses built on the same spot.
The Mella grandchildren were our friends and one of
our favorite activities was to dig in their big
backyard looking for Spanish Era coins. I got lucky
once and found a worn out copper coin showing queen
Isabela's bust on one side and the Spanish royal crest
on the other answering the question where the name of
the gambling game Cara y Cruz came from.

I spent my best years at the SNHS because of the students. Some, I do not remember anymore, some I still do, and some just pass by to greet me. Those years showed how pure and eager the youths were in terms of learning, and how innocent they looked at things. It was easy then to know white from black . I remember one class that hated me because I showed them a documentary film about the effects of the American bases on the Filipino people. They hated me because I showed them the said film which seemed a blatantly black propaganda against the Americans. For them, there were no shades of grey, just black and white, night and day, right or wrong. I was disappointed of course by the way they reacted but kept my cool and told them that they were entitled to their own opinions. I also told them that ideas do change, maybe not now but someday. And "when you do, please tell me whether I was right or wrong." That was in 1989. In the the year 2005, after 16 years since I left SNHS to work in Manila and was newly back in Sorsogon, I met one of my students of class '89...Felino Jazmin, Jr. I was shopping at Robertson's when he approached me and without batting an eyelash, blurted out..."Ma'am, you were right. We loved the way you taught us. You were so ahead of your times we didn't know you were teaching us something new in a different way. We loved your style. Now, that am also a teacher of Communication Arts (English) I try as much as possible to follow your style. I miss you Ma'am."

Felino is now teaching English at the Sorsogon State College and had taught for awhile at the Sorsogon National High.

Chavo

2007-01-26T11:11:00.000+08:00
Everyday, from Monday till Friday, I take a tricycle to my office. I take my lunch at home so I have to take this mode of transportation four times each day. Eversince my first day of crossposting here at the Provincial Office in Sorsogon from TESDA-Central where my post is, I have been taking a tricycle and until now I have to explain where TESDA is. Whenever I tell the driver "TESDA tabi," he would always ask me back "Haen tabi ina?" But whenever I mention Chavo, he would quickly step on the gas and no more questions asked.

Chavo is a pubhouse on the ground floor of Roda Building and TESDA maintains its offices on the second floor. When one goes up the stairs leading to our unit, one passes by this joint that opens up at night. By daytime, it remains close but a number of young girls spend their time playing cards outside. Some of them live nearby so they just come over to chat with some boys too. These girls used to stay in one of the units on the second floor so on one's way to TESDA, one could see them still sleeping with nothing on. Our PD complained about it to the owner and so the girls had to leave the unit upstairs. Well, this place had become so popular with the men that even tricycle drivers knew it by heart.

I dunno why my office cannot be that popular too. It might not be so popular but it is where I first had this blog so it has always been that important to me. That triggers me to report to this office everyday and start my day with my PC. Thus, whenever the driver would ask where TESDA is, I would always go through the rigors of a lenghty instruction, "bag-o magliko pa-Sordoc, harani sa crossing san village sa Pangpang, sa RODA building sa Maharlika Highway..."

In Bad Times

2007-01-25T11:02:00.000+08:00
Two months after Typhoon Reming, I revisited Legazpi and was greatly amazed at the ruined city. The destruction remained untouched. Most of the old buildings were not yet repaired and different signages stood as warnings for falling debris and declarations of ruins by Typhoon Reming. What are they waiting for... donations? grants-in-aid? calamity loans? I dunno.

Sorsogon looks a lot better now with fallen trees branching out with new leaves and flowers. Roofless houses got back their GI sheets too. Life seemed back to normal. Electricity had been restored and the internet also.

Except for the murder of Atty. Gil Gojol, the lawyer of fallen murdered heroes in Sorsogon, life moves on in smooth paces now. Atty. Gojol must have been a grave threat to some elements that he was better seen dead than alive.

On the other hand, Auggie sent an invitation for this book sale of Bicolano writers in Legazpi come Feb. 16. At least, a relief... probably from disasters, but definitely not from the death or dearth of arts and literature. Whenever my friends from UP and I would meet during those Martial Law days, we would spend our precious times talking not about our safety and plans for our lives, but about literature... Lazaro Francisco, the Lacaba brothers, Mirasol, MTT, Lao Tzu, Camus, Sartre, Han Suyin, Simone de Beauvoir, etc. Later, we would see each other less and less since most of them were incarcerated and some died in many instances defending their beliefs. But some died too because of starvation and chronic diseases like TB while being held as political prisoners. I will always remember them foremost as passionate literary advocates who internalized their literary sensibilities and practised them in life's real situations. They are not your armchair political activists. They are not your artists on their pedestals. They loved literature which they learned from the people they so loved and gave back their gratitude through the only craft they knew - writing, which also cost some their own lives.

In good times as well as bad times, one can always turn to the arts and literature to appease our fallen spirits, but we also tend to give everything that God has given us just to trek that lonely road which is freedom.

My Favorite Aunt

2007-01-11T11:18:00.000+08:00
(N.B.- I wrote this for my journal last December 9 when there was no electricity to post it here. After a month, I decided to resurrect it for my blog and siblings. However, I think this is for you Mama Nening.)

Mama or Doday had four sisters and one brother. From the eldest to the youngest, they were named Natalia, Inecita, Maria, and Magdalena. Isidora or Doday was the third sister. Their only brother was Vicente and the youngest who died at the age of 16 due to cardiac arrest when he was trampled upon by an herd of cattles. To us, the sisters were Mama Talia, Mama Nening, Mama Biyay, and Mama Nena, in that order. I never saw Vicente, my uncle.

They are all dead now.

I remember Ma Nening the most because she stayed with us in the old house as she remained an old maid for the rest of her life.

I was just very small then but I can vividly recall this spinster aunt of ours who was known as a strict grade school teacher at the Burabod Elem. School. She was always well dressed and hair well coiffed. She always looked smart in high heels and handbag to match the color of her clothes.

She had the most beautiful room in our old house. Her bed's mattress was the only one cushioned with crocheted bedspread. And she owned the only dresser in our house complete with pink powder canisters and matching pink hair brush and pink handmirror. Her room and cabinets (one where now I keep my CDs and CD player,and the other for my family albums)were off-limits to us children. I always thought then that her room was a fairyland complete with lace curtains on windows and door which remained close all the time. At those times when she left her door open, I would sneak in and try all her jewelry and high heeled shoes. I would go through her amazing wardrobe to try on the boleros and skirts talking to myself and acting out my favorite lines from my fave movies. I would also discover old peso bills hidden inside the folds of hems. Whenever I showed them to her, proud to be the finder of might-be lost money, she would pinch and scold me "labtanon ka talaga ha!" Doday would also scold and spank me with one of her slippers. That room had then been verboten to me. Despite all that, I would always remember her for the little things she would bring me and my siblings after work in school, e.g., biscuits, candies, balikutsa, ampaw, etc. She also kept food in bottles and cans in her room for the ants to feast on. Doday's brood would always anticipate her return from school and rush to her when she'd arrive shouting "Something! Something!" (for goodies).

When she died, Suyin, Rhea and I cleaned her room and we discovered the voluminous albums she kept all the time...sepia-colored photos of her trips to Baguio, my family and Veron's, and complete with captions and taglines in comics styled balloons. She also kept clippings of her favorite movie stars, old letters, birthday/Christmas cards, bank receipts, and old notes written in her old penmanship. There was also a note written on a piece of pad paper..."dresser is for Veronica, bedspread for Rhea, and the lot where the old house stands is mine so i give it to Tita." I was amazed... that was my name written on it! I was remembered after all.

Typhoon Belt

2007-01-09T15:00:00.000+08:00
At last my PC in the office is back to its window and also back to my blog. After less than two months when typhoon Milenyo hit us hard here in Sorsogon, typhoon Reming came lashing at us again destroying Albay most severely. As a result, no electricity again and so no internet. It is only now that we have our internet back. Yet electricity keeps on fluctuating. Our house's roof got blown off twice during the two super typhoons, Milenyo and Reming, leaving us penniless after the repairs. What a disaster! Well,this is how life is in Sorsogon and the whole of Bicol as well. From Batanes, Quezon, the Bicol peninsula, to Samar - this is the typhoon belt of the Philippines.

My most dreadful thoughts of typhoons move back to my youth, when I was in Grade three at the Burabod Elementary School. I was locked inside my classroom because of a typhoon. My teacher, Mrs. Zamar, left the room in a hurry when the winds became fiercer and didn't look back. I tried to call her but my voice was drowned by the howling winds and the heavy closing of the padlock. I tried to pound on the door with all my strength but I was not lucky enough to be heard. When I felt that nobody was around anymore I felt terrified alone and prepared to sleep on my desk. But I heard voices outside the room and heard the lock click open. Out there was our janitor and also my father, wet and chilled to the bones. I hugged my father and cried because he found me. I would never know what could have happened to me if Papa didn't find me.

Another horrendous thing happened after the typhoon... Atty. Gil Gojol, one of my colleagues at the Colegio de la Milagrosa, was murdered in broad daylight last December 12, 10 AM in Carriedo, Gubat. I remember him as hardworking and very progressively intelligent. I believe he was killed because of his beliefs. What a loss again!

HALLER TWO THOUSAND AND SEVEN - 2007!

12 rules for being human

2006-11-16T15:22:00.001+08:00
Whenever I think of us as human beings, I reiterate my belief which I once mentioned in one of my postings that we are actually spiritual beings on a human journey. Then awhile ago as I was surfing the net,I saw this passage from a blog,Life after 30, by someone whose name I can't recall; and which was also taken from another blog and now copy-pasted here. My apologies, but I just want to share this same thought of a spiritual being going through another journey into that vast school of humanity - the bitter-sweet effects of transcending all this into a new level of learning from one human to another, and strangely going beyond genetics. This genome thing makes one predictable of his origin but when a spirit goes into a human journey the events become more complex to leave him unpredictable and undaunted as in the movie City of Angels, when an angel chose to be human. And of course, the best example - the Christ who assumed a human form and who went through a painful death. Yes, I wish to believe that we are just hopping from one level of life to another by assuming a new template and evolving into a new being. To Life After 30, thanks for letting me find a clearer view, in this:

1. You will receive a body. You may like it or hate it, but it will be yours the entire period.

2. You will learn lessons. You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called Life. Each day in this school you will have the opportunity to learn lessons. You may like the lessons or think them irrelevant and stupid.

3. There are no mistakes, only lessons.Growth is a process of trial and error: experimentation. The “failed” experiments are as much a part of the process as the experiments that ultimately “work.”

4. A lesson is repeated until learned. A lesson will be presented to you in various forms until you have learned it. When you have learned it, you can then go on to the next lesson.

5. Learning lessons does not end. There is no part of life that does not contain its lessons. If you are alive, there are lessons to be learned.

6. “There” is no better than “here.” When your “there” has become a “here,” you will simply obtain another “there” that will again look better than “here.”

7. Others are merely mirrors of you. You cannot love or hate something about another person unless it reflects something you love or hate about yourself.

8. What you make of your life is up to you. You have all the tools and resources you need. What you do with them is up to you. The choice is yours.

9. Life is exactly what you think it is. You create a life that matches your beliefs and expectations.

10. Your answers lie inside you. The answers to life’s questions lie inside you. All you need to do is look, listen, and trust.

11. You will forget all this.

12. You can remember it whenever you want.

Ciao!

Cinemanila, November 3-15, 2006

2006-11-03T14:33:00.000+08:00
Cinemanila opens today in theaters of Metro Manila.

How could I ever see another CIFF film when everything is down and gone here? My mind is with Gael Garcia Bernal in Science of Sleep, the movie directed by Michel Gondry who also directed Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind . Wish also to see Spring,Summer,Fall,Winter,Spring... by Kim Ki Duk of South Korea and The Wind that Shakes the Barley by Ken Loach (Italy/Ireland/UK/Germany/Spain) as well as all the local indies. Sob...scream...because my mind is a wall and it keeps adjusting to everything after a total blackout from the rest of the world.

Milenyo Update

2006-11-03T11:07:00.000+08:00
My friend Auggie asked for a blow-by-blow account of Milenyo's wrath. Wish I could do just that, but what I remember now are only the scenes after the typhoon because all we did on the night of September 27, 2006 was to transfer all our books from the library and from the rooms that were rendered roofless to the room which was driest, i.e., the room of Doday and the corridor next to it. Everything got wet, the TV, clothes, furniture, beds and bedding, etc. Then, in the morning of September 28 (Zinia's birthday-Happy birthday Bilinginay!) we put them out to dry in the sun which shone brilliantly that day. Oh, yeah, I also remember the sounds of Milenyo - a low baritone - like the wheels of a truck grating through our roof and the ripping of it by a giant maniac. The nightmare lasted for just 5-6 hours but the horror of it was on the day after, when everything came to a standstill.

Some more photos after the attack of Big M...(from Sorsogon Web)

EVANESCENCE

2006-11-02T11:22:00.000+08:00

i almost loved the darkness that engulfed
the wholeness of me,
the ephemeral points of light and night...
of black and white.

i almost waited impatiently for day to diffuse
slowly the blinding tryst with shades of grey
and block the passing of time to bring in sleep
to steal my consciousness away into a total eclipse.

LET THIS STILLNESS SUCK AND STILL ME!

(N.B.- This is my poem in a capsule re Milenyo Aftermath. For a different version and the original, see my Rawitdawit blog.)

Milenyo Aftermath

2006-10-30T14:13:00.000+08:00
At last, a window to the world... after more than a month of darkness and being "incomunicado" when typhoon Milenyo hit hardest the province of Sorsogon last September 27.

When at last electricity was restored partially towards the end of October, the concept seemed so new and awesome that we found ourselves so used to darkness we forgot to switch on the lights, the refrigerator, the DVD and CD players. I even forgot for awhile how to open a computer. And when I fully recalled everything, I was so aghast at the wonders of a microsoft window! Yeah, the wonders of technology.

In fact, I seemed to have woken up from sleep, from a coma, not knowing the changes that happened while I was sleeping. The past month must have gone on forever without me knowing what I have missed. It did me some good actually. I was able to catch up on my readings even with just a candle or two. I also discovered the AM frequency through a transistorized radio with stations like the VOA, Radyo Bombo of Cebu and Iloilo, as well as religious programs especially from the Iglesia ni Kristo that delivered impeccable Visayan. I slept early as nothing could be seen on TV and woke up early to do some physical exercises. I went to market almost everyday since we did not store food in the ref and learned to buy only what is essential for each day. I discarded our old clothes for the flood victims. My night vision improved so that I could walk in the dark steadily even sans a flashlight. Before, I wouldn't be able to imagine myself without theaters, TV/movies, and concerts, but I think I have already lived through without them, so now let me say that I might even live on without thinking about them. I know I would be able to survive anywhere or anytime.

Sorsogon is building itself anew after the horrible Milenyo. We are online again in the net and back to this geek culture. I am reunited with my blog and my fave TV shows, my DVD movies, and my CD collection. And hallelujah, I have decided to reconcile with my books forever.

After losing some portions of our roof during the typhoon and resulting to the destruction of precious books in our library when they got soaked by continuous rains from a roofless house was unforgivable. However, old bookshelves with hidden termites got discovered when cleaned up so thanks to the lost GI sheets. The lush vegetation in the garden of Tootsie was washed out but replaced with new ones as in the line "hope springs eternal." Everything is new...even the old Talisay which was not uprooted by the furious winds, is now enjoying her new trimmed branches with new little leaves.

Some photos below will remind us of Milenyo's fury and how...

Century-old acacia trees that used to line the capitol grounds are now gone.

A desolate lifeless town road...

And the human victims... homeless, hungry, naked...

(photos from Sorsogon Web)

Autumn Blossom

2006-09-26T15:58:00.000+08:00
Suyin mentioned in her blog that she searched the internet and found out that her name really stood for a "low voice or sound" and not autumn blossom as once I told her or once I mentioned in one of my postings. I do not buy that. I do not believe that a staunch and an outspoken activist like Han Suyin would choose such a pseudonym. She must have chosen that name because she was born on an autumn day - September 12, 1916. Han for her ancestors and Suyin (as pinyin is also for autumn) - an unknown lone flower braving the harsh winds of autumn. Or probably a soft voice amidst all the noise and chaos of her times. A woman on the brink of unshackling herself from the bonds of stifling traditions. Or a battered wife with a soft undemanding sound from within her inner being. As she wrote in her autobiographical novel Birdless Summer, she suffered as a battered wife to Pao Tang, Kuomintang Army officer and wept silently as she went on doing her duties as a wife yet refused to leave him. She remained loyal to him even as her liberated women friends went on prodding her to join the movement and divorce her husband. She left him though and got a scholarship. Pao later died in China while she was in London studying medicine. Her adopted daughter, Yungmei, was with her. Later, she got remarried to a British national and lived in Malaysia and Singapore where she practised medicine. After divorcing her second husband, she married an Indian and lived in Bangalore, India. Then when he died, she lived in Switzerland with Yungmei, and remained there till the present. In betweeen all these events were her writings, travels to China, and lectures all over the world to talk about the Chinese people, their struggles for freedom from imperialists and her own war against xenophobia and racism. Now, at the age of 90, she remains a prolific writer and can still talk vividly on China without losing her fierce patriotism.

According to my former UP professor, Dolores Feria, "together with Simone de Beauvoir and Isadora Duncan, Han Suyin was and will always be one of the forerunners of the Women's liberation movement."

But to me, Han Suyin will always remain the brave little flower facing the winds of change.

G-bomb

2006-09-21T11:35:00.000+08:00

Today we see a nation on the brink of an explosion because on this date, thirty-four years ago, Martial Law was declared by Ferdinand Marcos. And today, the G-bomb is on the brink of another explosion with a nation preparing to counter-explode.

I was fresh from college, when FM declared ML, and was holed in my brother's house when all radio/TV networks and the printed media were shut down. I didn't dare go out of the house because of a pending case after the Charlie del Rosario Center (CDRC) Natl.HQ of the KM where I worked fulltime,was raided on the eve of the suspension of the writ of Habeas Corpus. My brother represented me then in court so I totally disappeared. Bless him! My family still believed then that all legal forms must be exhausted first before resorting to other means.

I thought I could get out of that hassle in a breeze but everything was overruled by ML and everything went dim. Me and my colleagues at the CDRC-National KM secretariat office found ourselves as goners. But some good souls from the countrysides took us into their fold, took care of us as they would to their own children. We went from place to place armed with nothing except our little bundle of personal effects. People looked up to us as saviors... as messiahs. We feared no one because we were cuddled by the masses.

We didn't take public vehicles but took transient cargo trucks. Yet we didn't fear the dismal-looking guys around us. We were always treated with respect by these supposedly bad boys. What feared us most were the uniformed CAFGU and vigilantes. These were the men who roamed the countrysides like kings and lords, who would brandish their guns and rifles anywhere. Thus we had to make sure we didn't pass their way.

To date, some of my closest friends in the countrysides would not remember me anymore because I carried then a pseudonym. I would not remember them either because I sort of erased in my mind the names of people I might incriminate. A sort of selective forgetting as in the movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind...

I can still remember the day Doday and Eyon met with Nenette and I at the house of our cousin in Binondo. They wept silently but showed no traces of remorse. They just reminded us to be considerate and to show respect to the people who accepted us into their homes. Yes, I said, because they also had their own children out there in other people's homes.

Now, a different but same bomb is on the brink of explosion - the G-bomb! It might not be in the form of ML but would exude the same features of a dictator - killings, sabotages, incarcerations, stifled media, chacha, etc. I do not know how far the new generation would react to such savage acts but surely they would do their best to deter them. In fact, they are now out there in the streets braving whatever hazards there are to stop them, militantly rallying against all forms of dictatorship.

I still have faith in the youth of this sad country of ours. If there is anything left for us now - it would always be the young radicals out there in all the purity of their dreams and ideology.

Sorsogon Hotel and Berlinas circa 1938

2006-09-08T10:29:00.000+08:00

I got this pic from my e-mail through Auggie Surtida who got it too from Ernestina Peralta, the daughter of Vicente Peralta, which was taken in the year 1938 during the wedding reception of her parents. I think it will be featured in Tracing II under the title The Berlinas of Sorsogon.

What struck me in this photo were the people dressed in white, the men in white suits and the women in white dresses. How antiseptic! I often see this kind of clothing in old photos circa 1900s. It must be the mode of fashion at that time. In an NCCA calendar, there is too a pic showing Filipino men in white suits amidst a wide stretch of meadow from a long lost era. Beautiful! Now, circa 2000s, the fashion dictates clothing in black or earth colors. Yes, I do love black and brown or any shade of mauve and burgundy but not white. White is too pristine and makes me sad since it is now being used as a symbol for mourning (from the Chinese way). Then there is too this old family portrait that hangs in Mama's room showing Papa in a white barong. We, the children, were still very little in that photo... me, Nenette, Ade and Manay in socks and bangs. Manoy in a white polo too. Mama - young and pretty in a cheongsam with her signature hair top. So white was still the color in vogue by that time in 1955 - the year inscribed in that pic.

By the way, according to Tootsie's uncle Tio Dolpo Jamoralin, there were only two brilliant lawyers in Sorsogon known and established after WWII (and even till the present...or so I think)- the unbeatable duo: Vicente Peralta and Leon Gajo (Eyon). These two lawyers were always in competition inside the courtroom speaking alternately in Spanish and English. Lawyering might have been then a lucrative career for Eyon because he was able to acquire a huge but second-hand Ford berlina (like the one in the pic above). However, we - from Doday down to Nenette dreaded to get inside it because whenever Eyon started the car it would head nowhere except to a fence or a tree. Yeah, but he was dashing in a white americana or suit or barong. Eyon was dark and handsome, no wonder Doday did not hesitate to marry him.

The Sorsogon Hotel was then located at the corner of Magsaysay and Rizal streets where big meetings and conventions were held. That was the reason maybe why all the people in that pic were all dressed in white because it was the color of elegance and formality at that time. I do not know the names of the people in that pic but am being reminded by one of those much-talked about political party conventions when Eyon was duped out of his bid for a congressional seat in favor of an Escudero icon. Thus, Eyon went independent and ran in the 2nd district of Sorsogon. He was loved by his people but as it was then and now, politics has never been a fair game, so Eyon lost the election.

Strange how a sepia-colored photo would evoke in me loads of views and memories.

Papers

2006-08-29T16:00:00.000+08:00
I just learned from Suyin's blog that her paper had won two awards - one from her college and another from another award-giving body. Wow!

Regarding papers, The second volume of Tracing will soon come out and I have not yet even started on my assignment, i.e., the theater of Sorsogon (CBTG, Sarswela, etc.) Suyin, dya wanna write for Tracing? Something about Colegio dela Milagrosa, now Louise de Marillac? Why not?

TRACING Volume II - Calling Sorsoganons!

2006-08-28T10:10:00.000+08:00
Tracing was published independently in 1994 as a collaboration of Sorsoganon views regarding the past, present, and future of the province of Sorsogon. Now, under the sponsorship of Mayor Sally Lee, it is being revived in a new perspective under the editorship of Tootsie. Thus a second volume is born.

This book will soon come out in December or early next year. Articles re life in the past years as well as present in Sorsogon are welcome. Just email them to Tootsie or you may use my e-address at puraella@yahoo. Calling all Sorsoganons, here and abroad!

Sorsogon Museum and Heritage Center

2006-08-17T14:58:00.000+08:00

Shown here is the architect's design of the Sorsogon Museum and Heritage Center. It is true to its original state when it was constructed during the American colonial period around the years 1916-1920. The old building was formerly the Provincial Hospital. Now, it will house the Sorsogon Museum and will be preserved and conserved as a heritage structure. It will also feature exhibition areas for Sorsogon artifacts, relics, and memorabilia; ecclesiastical/church artifacts; folkarts and crafts; visual arts gallery; Bikoliana Library; audio-visual room; function/performance hall for conferences, lectures, chamber music, and experimental theater. It will also offer guided tours, demos by local artisans and craftsmen re new discoveries or indigenous crafts, and research and publications.

Through donations from Sorsoganons here and abroad, this museum is finally undergoing restoration. It will soon operate and would need further moral and financial support from the people. For dollar donations, issue checks payable to Sorsogon Museum and Heritage Center, Inc. w/ account# 191-700321-2, China Bank, Sorsogon or to Ayala Foundation-USA or BPI Express Remittance FAO and for peso donations... issue checks payable to Sorsogon Museum & Heritage Center, Inc. w/ account# 191-0967517, China Bank in Sorsogon. Thanks for the support! Mabalos!

Roots

2006-08-08T09:45:00.000+08:00
I was invited by my former students at the SNHS last August 1 to a reunion held at the plush residence of Melinda Advincula now Mrs. Mathers. I said yes to Mel since I didn't attend a bigger reunion two years ago which disappointed them. At first I was not so enthusiastic but when I saw each one arriving at the door and screaming at the sight of me, I connected easily and discovered that I was not wrong in coming over. We just had pure fun - eating and chatting. Tootsie came to announce the opening of the Museum and he easily connected with them too. We talked about their former teachers and as they observed and compared the teachers then and now, they admitted that their former mentors were more committed to their duties. I also found out that they valued traditions and friendships in their lives. Take Miguel Frayna who now works in Oxford, England. He came along with his wife to visit his old classmates and stayed at the Sta. Clara Ridge Hotel (since his family is no longer around) owned by Victor Maligaso, also a Sorsoganon and now based in the States. And Mel who also works with her British husband in Papua, New Guinea. And the others who work in Manila but came over just to be with their friends here. All of them cherish their past lives and old friends. I call these roots and I admit am quite envious because I do not have roots. I was born here in Sorsogon but was uprooted in grade school,stayed in Aklan for four years with my family then transferred to Manila to finish high school and college, then came home again to Sorsogon to teach at the SNHS. Then migrated to Manila again, then back to Sorsogon again. My last remaining friend here is Judith who was my former co-teacher. I do not see my former classmates at the Aklan College and Ramon Magsaysay High anymore, nor my former UP classmates except Apo (though our friendship is beyond the physical because we seldom see each other also), and even my former colleagues. Maybe I just don't exert much effort to trace them and, like my students, cherish them.
So, here I am wishing to get rooted deeper in whatever place I find myself. Whenever I go around this supposedly hometown of mine, am always attracted to anything old and traditional because I do not have memories of the past here. And I find a little bit of the past in the old houses that are still extant around town and hopefully to last for long. My family's old house still exists but is not really that old because it has been remodeled already. And now we live in a newer house that is not really old or not even modern. A few of those old houses can still be seen including the Monje residence (see photo below) located in Bitan-o, which is undergoing renovation at present. This photo of the Monje residence (from Sorsogon's Web) is in its original form and looks so quaint:

Another old house owned by the Mella family and located in Almendras still exists and has been well-preserved to date and looks rather gothic but speaks of pleasant memories:

However, the dilapidated old house of the De Vera family located across the Pilot Elem. School and the Sts. Peter & Paul Cathedral is a sad thing. Marie de Vera, a friend, doesn't live there anymore. She stays in Bulusan now. The house (see photo below) looks abandoned but tells enough of the glory of olden days:

To top it all, the Hernandez residence, which was built in 1842, and located in Bacon, has also suffered the ravages of time but was not able to recover anymore. However, the beauty of its architecture can still be seen and old traditions felt.

Some details of the Hernandez house tell us how Sorsoganons loved to live in ornate homes paying much attention to wide spaces where children could play such as:

the big sala

and the huge windows to let the cool breeze in ...

And this is my ancestral house - neither old nor modern - a mixture of something old and something new along with sweet memories in the neighborhood of Balogo.

The pic below is a mini forest within the ancestral house's premises... a beautiful garden conceptualized by Tootsie. A little sanctuary for little shrubs and trees where one can stroll while feeling the crisp early morning air. This place would make Doday and Eyon proud of their home built from their own sweat. Actually, our real old house is now being occupied by Baby Lyn and Bambi, Veron's daughters. I was born there and spent my childhood days in that house before we moved to Aklan. Mama, out of her retirement payment, had this second house, not far from the first one, built for Papa's supposedly law practice (which never happened due to his ailment) complete with an office. They lived here without their children since all of them migrated abroad except me. It was I who returned (from Manila) to teach in Sorsogon and lived with them here. That is why this house is rather memorable and important to me. I spent my best years here. To date, my family still lives in this house minus Suyin who lives in Quezon City now and oh, yeah, minus Doday and Eyon. I miss them.

Another Sorsoganon Gunned Down!

2006-07-31T16:25:00.000+08:00

A student from Aquinas University in Legazpi City was gunned down recently by unknown men while he was on board a bus to Legazpi. A native of Bulan, Sorsogon, Ambo Guran was an active member of The League of Filipino Students (LFS)and spokesman of the LFS-Aquinas, just like Cris Hugo of the Bicol University who was also gunned down. As usual, military men are the suspects. They shoot kids, don't they?
And now doctors. Dr. Claver and his doctor wife were also shot in Kalinga. He is in critical condition, but his wife died. She became the 717th slain victim of the Arroyo regime since 2001. Both were active members of Bayan Muna with the former as Chairman of the militant organization. This year alone, 121 were killed. Out of the 717 victims, 305 were activists.

This brings to mind the Philippine debt under the Arroyo regime -P3.9 Trillion that puts an average of P46,000 per Filipino (Freedom From Debt Coalition). For this the EuroMoney has awarded the Philippines the Best Borrower's Award in Asia. That's an insult! That is not true, says Secretary of Budget and Management Rolando Andaya. "Best Borrower" refers to the Philippines as a good payer. Oh, yeah? Naturally, PGMA is the best borrower of Asia - to dump in more money upon the military, "so as to kill more of 'em damned stubborn natives."

Four Things

2006-07-31T10:06:00.000+08:00
Here's something I got in my email from my sister LV. I found it interesting so I prefer to post my own here in my blog so others close to me can tag in...

Four things about me you may not have known.....
>
> A) Four jobs I have had in my life (prior to TESDA):
> 1. English tutor to Korean post-graduate students in UP
> 2. Tagalog Tutor to Japanese Peace Corp Volunteers in Sorsogon
> 3. College instructor at the Colegio dela Milagrosa
4. Educ.Program Specialist, BTVE-DECS-Central Office (after SNHS)
>
>
> B) Four movies I would watch over and over:
> 1. Kapit sa Patalim
> 2. Before Sunset
> 3. City After Dark
> 4. Amores Perros
>
> C) Four places I have lived (aside from Sorsogon City):
> 1. Kalibo, Aklan
> 2. Sampaloc, Manila
> 3. 9th Ave., Cubao, Q.C.
> 4. Valle Verde, Pasig/Bacoor, Cavite

> D) Four TV shows I love to watch:
> 1. Gilmore Girls
> 2. Seventh Heaven
> 3. Gokusen
> 4. Meteor Garden (both Japanese animation and Chinese TV series)

> E) Four places I have been on vacation:
> 1. Baguio
> 2. Banaue
> 3. Buhang, Bulusan (Curvada)
> 4. Ulm in South Germany (part of a study-tour)
>
>
> G) Four of my favorite foods:
> 1. avocado ice cream
> 2. tomato crepe (specifically at Cafe Breton)
> 3. adobo (cpa)
> 4. bihon w/ chicken liver
>
>
> H) Four places I would like to be right now:
> 1. Bulusan peak with my music and camera
2. Siquijor - to talk with a witch/brujo and Babes Maranga
> 3. Curvada in Buhang with my music and personal journal
> 4. Ulm's river Danube in a kayak
>
> I) Four friends I think will respond:
> 1. Apo
2. Auggie
> 3. Suyin
> 4. Tootsie
>
> RETURN DIRECTIONS:
>
> Now, here's what you're supposed to do... and please do not spoil the
> fun. Copy all, paste on new email,
> delete my answers and type in your answers. Then send this to a
> whole bunch of people you know
> INCLUDING the person who sent it to you.
>
>

__________________________________________________

My Four Fave Pics

2006-07-28T11:21:00.000+08:00

Mt. Bulusan in all its glory as seen from a dry Lake Agingay in summer (it dries up during summer but transforms into a lake during the rainy season) before going up to the summit. Lake Agingay is a camper's place.

A drenched crowd with PGMA appearing as a military general in effigy. It tells all! (From Pinoy Weekly)

Paguriran Lagoon within the islet at Sawanga Beach. This is where we had the most amazing plunge during Tootsie's birthday last year. Am longing to revisit it and have a good soak again.

This is Mt. Bulusan's peak where several craters are seen. My ultimate wish is to reach the summit and listen to Sibelius' Violin Concerto #1 in D while looking down into the pit.

Mt. Bulusan and Glenda

2006-07-26T11:16:00.000+08:00

(The volcano as seen from the other side... Casiguran & Irosin)

Hard to believe, but this unknown volcano called Mt. Bulusan embraced the limelight and filled the pages of the daily papers last month when it threw its ashes over the towns of Casiguran and Irosin. Could it be true that PGMA has real divine interventions (as claimed thru her dreams and visions?)- because Mt. Bulusan served as "cover-up" for the collaboration between the DENR and Lafayette Mining Co.? Despite the series of anti-Lafayette rallies which were initiated by Bishop Bastes of Sorsogon, the gods must have favored the little lady. And then, last July 24-25,typhoon Glenda lashed at the supposedly mammoth crowd during PGMA's SONA. The rains induced by this typhoon dampened the spirits of some rallyists. Classes were suspended in all levels in NCR and nearby provinces. However, the crowd that came last July 24 was not allowed to get near the Batasan premises but they held on anyway despite the rains and floods. They defied the gods.

Sometimes the gods do not listen to all our prayers. They get tired too and will soon spread their wrath to those who pray for themselves alone. Well, beware of the
Ides of March!

SONA

2006-07-24T10:12:00.000+08:00
Today, PGMA will give her State of the Nation Address (SONA) at 4:00 pm. Of course what are we to expect except a boastful litany of "good deeds" and "amazing achievements" of her administration. If true, why does she have to deploy 16,000 PNP men and suspend all classes and work in Metro Manila and nearby provinces? Is she afraid of her own people? The little lady is cowering in fear!

In My Time/In Suyin's Time...All the Time!

2006-07-20T10:27:00.000+08:00
What can I say? This is now passe but still horrendous! After my time, it is Suyin's time and the same thing is happening again and again! I got this news from my email so am posting it here because I want every sensible soul to be aware that PGMA is using our hard-earned money to kill our own kids....*#^@ U!

Press Release
19 July 2006

UP holds "Tagulaylay" procession July 20 to denounce abduction of two
students

July 20 marks the 24th day of the forced disappearance of two
University of the Philippines (UP) students. The UP community remembers
this day with a requiem procession.

UP students Karen Empeno and Sherlyn Cadapan, together with a farmer,
were abducted by masked men in Hagonoy, Bulacan last June 26. Prior to
their forced disappearance, the two students were working as volunteers
for a peasant organization.

Karen and Sherlyn are now two of the 181 victims of forced
disappearances in the last five years. Since Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo
assumed office in 2001, 705 activists have also been killed.

In this light, Tigil-Paslang UP -- a broad alliance of students,
faculty and staff formed in the wake of Karen and Sherlyn’s
disappearance -- will organize "Tagulaylay: Hinagpis at Pakikibaka,” a
requiem procession for the victims of Macapagal-Arroyo’s state terror
on July 20 (Thursday), 5 p.m. at the Quezon Hall in UP Diliman.

The activity aims to show the UP community's collective grief and
indignation over the continuing violations of the people's civil
liberties and the demand that Karen and Sherlyn be released. It
includes lamentations, protest songs and poetry prepared by faculty
members and students. A procession around the academic oval will
culminate with the laying down of 100 crosses at the Sunken Garden to
represent the growing number of victims of human rights violations.

Those who will join are encouraged to wear black and red and bring
candles.

It may be recalled that UP President Emerlinda Roman as early as last
July 3 wrote to the secretaries of the Department of National Defense
and the Department of Interior and Local Government asking their
assistance to locate the two missing students.

Nine days after (July 12), UP Diliman's University Council (UC) --
composed of assistant, associate and full professors -- passed a
resolution expressing "great concern" over the inaction of government
authorities to produce the two missing students. For their part, UP
students through their University Student Council (USC) and other
organizations have initiated a number of activities to call attention
to the plight of the two students including a rally in Mendiola which
was violently dispersed, as well as a mass and symbolic candle-lighting
at the UP Parish of the Holy Sacrifice.

Despite these initiatives, Karen and Sherlyn remain missing.

Tigil-Paslang UP is the response of the concerned constituents of UP to
the spate of killings, abductions, torture, illegal arrests under
Arroyo's Oplan Bantay Laya. Among its convenors are National Artist
Bien Lumbera, Faculty Regent Roland Simbulan, Student Regent Raffy
Sanchez, Former CSWCD Dean Angelito Manalili, Former CSSP Dean Connie
Paz, Dr. Sylvia Estrada-Claudio, Dr. Ramon Guillermo, Dr. Giovanni
Tapang, Dr. Fidel Nemenzo, Prof. Judy Taguiwalo, Prof. Sarah Raymundo,
Prof. Danilo Arao, Buboy Cabrera and others. The students are also
represented by Paolo Alfonso of the USC, as well as STAND-UP,
NNARA-YOUTH, AGHAM Youth and GABRIELA Youth, among others.

For details, please call Profs. Judy Taguiwalo, (0916) 782-9666; and
Sarah Raymundo, (0918) 693-3181.

(end)

Danilo Araña Arao
Assistant Professor and Chair
Department of Journalism, College of Mass Communication Plaridel Hall
University of the Philippines (UP), Diliman, Q.C. 1101
Telephone: (632) 920-6852, 981-8500 loc. 2672
Fax: (632) 926-3465
Email: danilo.arao@up.edu.ph
Website: http://www.dannyarao.com

Please pass it on!!!

Dubai/Walk the Line/Blue Moon

2006-07-18T10:20:00.000+08:00
Spent my weekend watching three films over my DVD player - Dubai to see Aga Mulach who won the best actor award this year and, to see Reese Witherspoon, Oscar's best actress in Walk the Line. And also Blue Moon which was nominated for Best Picture in our local awards. Well, I thought Aga wont be able to move me but he did towards the end when he embraced his estranged brother played by John Lloyd Cruz and cried unabashedly. My tears flowed copiously. Nice script by Ricky Lee. The second movie was Walk the Line. Reese was another discovery! Boy, this actress can sing! Teamed up with Joaquin Phoenix who played Johnny Cash, Reese played June Carter and how! The third movie seen in a row was Blue Moon by Joel Lamangan. It was quite an improvement from pinoy movies dealing with love a trois and relentless search for unrequited love. Good use of flashbacks. Just love the theme version of Blue Moon by Orange and Lemons.

CLEAN

2006-07-03T11:15:00.000+08:00
Thank you Suyin for giving me a DVD copy of Clean, the movie where Maggie Cheung (In the Mood for Love) won the Best Actress award at the Cannes Filmfest. Gustong gusto ko si Maggie dun sa Clean. I like her best in her role there as a mother who was hooked in drugs and lost the trust of her son. She won him back by gaining self-respect through odd jobs. In the end she won her son's trust and love and brought her kid back to their hometown. She also went back to work there to do what she really loved doing - recording her husband's songs. Beautiful dialogue by Maggie and Nick Nolte. Simple but heavy.

Rapu-rapu and Lafayette

2006-06-20T11:31:00.000+08:00

(FromPinoy Weekly/6.15.06)
The little island of Rapu-rapu in Albay can also be seen or reached from Bacon in Sorsogon. It looked good before the controversial Lafayette Mining Co. wreaked havoc upon the surrounding sea and residents. Now, the beaches of Bacon which used to be some kind of tourist attraction had been depopulated and the once famous sea which used to be abundant with fishes had been declared verboten! For awhile, this mining company had stopped operations so as to be reviewed and be investigated by the DENR but nothing happened and before long, the Lafayette was allowed to operate again.

How could PGMA afford to shell out billions of pesos for the military to wipe out the insurgents in two years but neglect the health conditions of the residents of Rapu-rapu and Bacon? How could she pretend to show concern to the victims of Mt. Bulusan's eruption by visiting remote places in Juban and Casiguran, but being blind to the effects of toxic chemicals from the Lafayette Co.? All these despite the continuous demos and mass actions spearheaded by the church and civic-minded Bicolanos backed up by well-researched papers from the UP.

Madam Prexy, please listen to your people, or better still, stay away from us forever.

Gut Feel

2006-06-15T15:23:00.000+08:00
For the past three blogposts, I remained wordless and stole some thoughts from Editorial Cartoons of Pinoy Weekly, because I felt that things were just repeating themselves day by day without any qualms and those cartoons vividly articulated my thoughts, particularly PGMA's failure to meet the people's needs and deterred them as well.

My blog is almost one year and a half now and I honestly feel that every word posted here has been from my soul. When I write, words just flow from my guts and soul. My brain is a wall that gives way to my spirit through my guts. When I go back to my previous posts, I sometimes wonder why those words were written (as in most of my poems posted in Rawitdawit,my blog of poems) and my brain would question each word, e.g., meaning, spelling, grammar, etc. Sometimes I would change some but oftentimes I just wish them to remain there. I love words because they connect us to thoughts and the spirit; and to change what the spirit has spoken is an irreverent way to do.

I am tired of working for the government but afraid of doing nothing. I wish I could go back to UP in Diliman, because it is the only sanctuary of true faith and dissenters. It is the last bastion for freedom and freedom fighters here in our sad country.

Wish ko rin na manood sa French Filmfest this week that ends on Sunday. I really wish to see "Clean." Hope Suyin finds a VCD of it (Sue, pabirthday mo na lang sakun).

There they go again!

2006-06-09T16:16:00.001+08:00

(Pinoy Weekly, Editorial Cartoon-06.01.06)

Hello, PGMA!

2006-06-06T11:15:00.001+08:00

(From Pinoy Weekly website,06.06.06)

Congrats, Mdm. Prexy

2006-05-23T16:46:00.000+08:00

(Editorial Cartoon - Pinoy Weekly/May 18,2006)

Bohol, and my fave Indies

2006-05-22T11:02:00.000+08:00
Tootsie just got back today from Bohol after a three-day international Conference on restoration of old houses.
I say thanks to the said confab because it proved that he has improved a lot after an acute attack of IBD. Though still under medication, he could go on his own way with no assistance now.
I remember Bohol with the well-preserved old houses and old churches. I also remember the quaint sanctuary with the Philippine deers in wild abandon, the peaceful Loboc river and the museum of Baclayon Church (the oldest church in the Phil.) with the well-preserved clothes of priests woven in gold thread.

I made my own list of fave Indies. Anybody can tag in their own with comments:

1. Lino Brocka (Kapit sa Patalim, Maynila sa Kuko ng Liwanag,Tinimbang Ka Ngunit Kulang, Insiang, Gumapang Ka Sa Lusak...)
2. Ishmael Bernal (Pagdating sa Dulo, City After Dark)
3. Mike de Leon (Kisap-mata, Sister Stella L.)
4. Eddie Romero (Ganito Kami Noon, Paano Kayo Ngayon?)
5. Behn Cervantes (Sakada)
6. Mario O'Hara (Tatlong Taong Walang Diyos)
7. Celso Ad. Castillo (Burlesk Queen)
8. Jeffrey Jeturian (Pila Balde)

I chose them in the light of their own impact upon the Pinoy psyche and socio-historico-economic perspective.

Summer '06

2006-05-09T11:08:00.000+08:00
Summer this year has been kinder and milder than last year. Temperature, at least here in Sorsogon, hasn't gone up higher than 32 degrees. Unlike in May of 2005 when the highest reached 37 in Sorsogon with 42 in Tuguegarao. As early as April this summer, the rains came like blessings from heaven to cool the earth. We don't have to go to the beaches to feel the seabreeze because the coolness of the air has been so generous to date.

My cats, (Wes, Tschaikovsky, and Baby Zhang), gave birth to their kittens, that is why we have, to date, 14 cats. Sobra!

Fade Out

2006-04-24T15:47:00.000+08:00
I got news from a native of Bacon who happens to be my officemate. When I asked her about the Bato Senakulo, she said that it is slowly fading out. Some of the actors had already died and since most of the young ones were not interested, nobody took the roles vacated. Some of the originals tried to take the vacant roles but their old bodies refused due to the gruelling process of rehearsals and memorization of lines. Slowly the tradition is now on its way out with just a few origs clinging to their roles. Time will come when all the actors will be gone and another folk dramaturgy will be buried and forgotten. Cry.

Spiritual Beings on a Human Journey

2006-04-17T11:12:00.000+08:00
Suyin was able to come home for four days!

Though we didn't have the time to visit the beaches or Mt. Bulusan, we had all the time to watch our favorite shows on cable that we missed and which were replayed on marathon. Thus, we watched Gilmore Girls on Maundy Thursday and Seventh Heaven on Good Friday. Also, movies, movies, and more movies! Wow!

Suyin also watched her fave shows over AXN and Crime/Suspense channels and Ian over Animax. We also ordered pizza at Greenwich on Black Saturday afternoon after lunch at Cia's.

What a relaxing long weekend with Ian, Suyin, and me glued on the TV. Tootsie had his great time in his reading station which was formerly Mama's room. Alang interes sa TV except news.

(Left photo shows Bulusan volcano in the background while Sorsoganons do their physical fitness thing at the Sorsogon "Rompeolas" or baywalk.)

In the afternoon of Easter Sunday, we saw Suyin off to her bus after a spaghetti merienda. Sad. So we (Tootsie, Ian, and me) decided to take a walk in the park and at Sorsogon's Baywalk version when Suyin's bus had left. We strolled quietly on the long stretch of Rompeolas and watched the dark silhoutte of Mt. Bulusan against an orange sky backdrop with clouds settling at its foot. (N.B.-This volcano just erupted recently so it emits some little smoke yet.) The nearby Pinakulan islet was also a dark spot against the setting orangy light. Felt that little tug in my guts for something hard to tell. It might be the ebbing fullness of the spirit in the human body. I only wish that I am not a human being going through a spiritual journey. I wish to believe that I am a spiritual being on a human journey.

Are we not all spiritual beings going through a human journey? That soon we would all join the other spirits in search of another human life in another dimension and time?

Senakulo in Bato

2006-04-12T11:17:00.000+08:00
There is this place in Bato where Tootsie, Bayan, and me visited in the '70s to watch the very personalized Senakulo in the vernacular and performed by original actors who had aged through the years but had held on to their respective roles.

Just like in Nikos Kazantzakis' novel The Greek Passion, the villagers of Bato in Bacon never left their birthplace and continued playing their roles till probably their last breath. Some of these actors could no longer speak out loud their lines because of old age so that they usually would resort to whispering. The others would bend their heads closer to their co-participants' mouth to get the lines. No one would want anyone to replace the aging actor except maybe when the human body succumbs.

I really want to visit this place again during its yearly senakulo presentation on holy week just to see if the original players are still alive to go on with their roles or if the younger ones had taken their places. However, this might not be advisable now for Tootsie's health since the road going there is bad and there is no place to eat or rest because the dramatization of Christ's passion lasts for one whole night till almost two days with the cast going from one place to another. The setting ranges from private homes to caves and rugged terrain so the audience must walk along with the cast to wherever the play brings them. The players themselves do not stop to eat.The only time to eat or rest is when their roles do not require them in the scene.The Christ player, who has to be in all the scenes; has to sacrifice and eat nothing while the play goes on. Thus, the actor actually and realistically portrays a haggard, emaciated, and downtrodden Christ.

Could it be possible to work on a mission like this defying old age and health? Could I be one of the actors till my last breath?

Wish ko lang...

Cris

2006-04-03T10:41:00.000+08:00
Another Sorsoganon was gunned down last month because he was then the LFS current chairman of Bicol University and LFS regional coordinator and because he was a true leader.

His parents tried to stop his "leftist" activities at the Sorsogon Minor Seminary by enroling him at the Gallanosa National High in Irosin, a remote town, but there he continued leading his schoolmates into demos and rallies against policies that are anti-students. Next, he was sent to Legaspi City to study at the Bicol University. There, his leadership skills flourished. He became the chairman of the League of Filipino Students of BU and LFS regional coordinator thus placing him in the National Council.

Cris Hugo was a petite activist but his mission/vision was gigantic. I am sad that so many young idealists fall prey to trigger-happy killers who target people expressing their own views. I cry for Cris who tenaciously stuck to his convictions that cost his precious life. I die for the inhuman treatment we all get from those who purport to protect us. I arise in flames to let justice reign!

Brokeback Force

2006-03-15T10:32:00.000+08:00
I was able to get a copy of Brokeback Mountain, that controversial film by Ang Lee, and was impressed by a well-crafted work of art. Loved the bigger than life scenery of Wyoming's landscape and the angsts of the main characters potrayed in subtle acting and powerful imagery.

Heath Ledger was terrific! How sad that love comes in different forms and in the same old human trait of survival. If one survives love, fine; if not, just take it in stride. Love is just one of those problems in life with several possible solutions.

Life is not simple. It is a great force that pulls you into its center and consumes your entirety. Getting out of it means pulling out of its force and out into nothingness.

Young Freedom Fighters - HOLD ON!

2006-02-27T10:05:00.000+08:00
I got this call from my email and I post it in my blog so others who didn't get my forwarded mail might see it. Last night I thought people power would emanate after Gen. Miranda of the Phil. Marines was relieved from his post and after his battalion responded by surrounding the AFP HQ in Fort Bonifacio. Also, the students of UP Diliman stood vigil in front of the Oblation and would do so until PGMA had stepped down. The Marines were pacified but not the students. To date,they are still there at the Quezon Hall holding teach-ins and discussions regarding current issues and hopefully to hold on till PGMA is ousted. To the Filipino youth - hold on!

NATIONAL UNION OF JOURNALISTS OF THE PHILIPPINES
www.nujp.org

Feb. 26, 2006

A call for solidarity

For a few years now, the global media community has acknowledged the
Philippines among the most dangerous places for journalists. In the
past two years, our country has been second only to Iraq in the number
of media killings. Philippine journalists have fought hard to roll
back the tide of violence. Today, however, the Philippine press faces
its strongest challenge.

In declaring a "state of national emergency," President Gloria
Macapagal-Arroyo made media among her main targets. She and senior
aides warned of government takeover of media facilities considered
friendly to the political opposition.

Police have already raided the offices of the Daily Tribune, a
national daily. Armed men in civilian clothes have gone around the
offices of Abante, the country's biggest tabloid. Police had earlier
arrested Randy David, a columnist of the Philippine Daily Inquirer,
holding the award-winning journalist and sociologist for five hours
prosecutors said there was no ground to charge him with any crime.

The government deployed troops to the compounds of ABS-CBN and GMA-7,
the country's largest television networks. The government's claim was
that the soldiers were protecting these stations from a potential
takeover by destabilizers.

Police have also declared that they would not hesitate to takeover
media entities found "aiding" the administration's enemies. The police
also said they would soon release "standards" or guidelines that
journalists must follow and that investigators and prosecutors were
monitoring the news.

By the government's definition, providing aid to Mrs. Arroyo's enemies
includes interviewing opposition parties. In simple terms, the
administration wants media to present only the side of the embattled
government, using force and coercion to bend journalists to its
wishes.

Filipinos, journalists included, fought a long, hard battle to regain
democracy after two decades of tyranny. That Mrs. Arroyo timed this
crackdown on civil liberties with the anniversary of the Marcos
dictatorship's fall only highlights her break with the democratic
aspirations of Filipinos. Even as she warns enemies of feeling the
full force of the law, Mrs. Arroyo flaunts constitutional guarantees
to free speech and _expression and press freedom.

Leaders of Philippine society have spoken out against the government's
iron-hand tactics. The Philippine journalism community has also moved
fast to unite against this grand assault on press freedom. Today,
(Sunday, Feb. 26), the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines
will lead various organizations and individual journalists in
protesting the crackdown on media. The Philippine media community
intends to send Mrs. Arroyo a strong message: We will not go gently
into the night.

We call on all our colleagues in print, broadcast and digital
journalism worldwide to support Philippine media in this dark hour.
Please add your voice to our protest. Let us collectively condemn the
crackdown on Philippine media and remind Mrs. Arroyo that no country
can be free to prosper if its media is silenced and cowed. You can
send protest letters to the government through the Office of the Press
Secretary at osec@ops.gov.ph, with facsimile number (632) 735-6167 or
deliver these to the nearest Philippine embassy and consulate. You can
send solidarity messages to the NUJP through its email address,
nujphil@gmail.com or post this on our website, www.nujp.org.

National Union of Journalists of the Philippines

HAPPY BIRTHDAY SUYIN!

2006-02-15T10:17:00.000+08:00
Today is Suyin's birth anniversary.

Suyin, la unica hija, feliz navidad!

Suyin was named after my fave author Han Suyin (Autumn blossom) who wrote the autobiographical trilogy Crippled Tree, Mortal Flower, and Birdless Summer that spanned the whole stretch of pre-revolution till the cultural revo times of the People's Republic of China and how the author personally coped with those times. Han Suyin was also the author of Eldest Son (Chou En Lai's bio) and My House Has Two Doors (China's reconstruction times). All these books are my faves until now because Han Suyin narrated all those events honestly including her own traumas in liberating herself from racism and xenophobia (discrimination against everything foreign) as well as women's rights. Together with Simone de Beauvoir (Mandarins, The Second Sex), she became the forerunner of women's lib.

During my college days at the UP, I happened to listen to Han Suyin's lecture at the cramped Abelardo Hall that was filled to the max.A long line of students stood waiting outside just to get a glimpse of her. I came early so I was able to enter but still all seats were taken. I still remember her as lean and tall and beautiful in a cheongsam. Her talk was short but her sharp replies and comments to questions from studes often brought the house down.

I was so enamoured by her that I promised myself that I'd name my future child Suyin.

Thus Christie Suyin Ceres - after Christ too and the goddess of the earth, Ceres.

TNX on Valentine's

2006-02-14T09:49:00.000+08:00
Happy Valentine's day to all!!!

This is one appropriate moment to thank all of you lovely people who helped tide us over during Tootsie's darkest moments. Without your financial and moral support, I wouldn't know how we could have possibly pulled through.

Thank you Cia for being with us faithfully during the whole duration of Tootsie's stay in the hospital and post-check ups, Melette who patiently cleaned the house and fed the cats when nobody was around, Ian who was the best runner in our search for blood donors and medicines, Bonay and Edith who helped financially and emotionally, Judith who also helped financially and morally, Loway in USA, Leny,Jo,& Totep for the visits,Gerard and Ralyn Mirandilla, Fr. Momoy's spiritual assurance, Msgr. Monje's prayers, and Minda Gerona's call for prayers and financial help, and who offered her shoulders for me to cry on... When I just arrived from Manila and saw Tootsie helplessly lying down on a hospital bed, I felt sick in my guts... as if somebody tore me open and spilt out my bowels. But I had to appear strong and in control of the situation. I realized then that the human body was so frail... Tootsie who pulled through all those tortures as political prisoner just surrendered readily to an unseen bacteria. That behind all the lofty ideals man could muster, the human body would always be vulnerable to the invisibles... Thus, upon seeing Minda who was Tootsie's co-worker in the National Democratic Movement during the pre-martial law era, my guts sent my entire being cramped and I burst into tears not because I dreaded that particular situation but because I feared that one of the Old Guards of the Movement was fading out.

Thanks too to the doctors of Estevez Memorial Hospital and SMMGHSSC especially Dr. Joey Yap who patiently enlivened the heavy atmosphere with humor and a politically correct attitude. To the dedicated nurses and even to those mediocre and lazy ones... thank you so much. Special thanks to Pipo and also to Dr. Alexis Escultura who helped bring Tootsie to Legaspi.

To Suyin who took time out from her studies and gruelling work at the ABS-CBN to be with her Dad...also Rhea who took time out from work to drive Tootsie to the hospital for his regular checkups... to Shy and Director Santos for the prayers... to Veron and children... to Manay for the encouragements... and to the many others who just escaped my mind at this moment in time... thank you... gracias... salamatonononon!!!

Have a nice Valentine's Day!!! Luv ya 'ol!

IBD

2006-01-24T16:15:00.000+08:00
Tootsie is still under medication because of fatigue, weight loss, rectal bleeding,and loss of body fluids and nutrients with slight dizziness. He was into endoscopy last week by Dr. Yap with a new diagnosis - inflammatory bowel disease or IBD. I searched the internet and discovered that there is no known cause or cure for this rare disease which is common to Caucasians or for Northern Americans. The symptoms might be treated but it will flare up from time to time.

Am already anticipating a life of givens, e.g., hospitalizations, medications, lab tests, etc.

Is this a kind of retribution for my long absence from home? This reminds me of Mama who also had a sort of payback after leaving Papa alone in Aklan. Papa got sick with Parkinson's and later died. Or can it be that women are stronger than men?

I do not believe that I am stronger. Am just a slow growing tree that clasps the earth tightly to get strength. I still wish to grow firmer, wiser, and stronger.

Hello Life!

2006-01-17T16:18:00.000+08:00
Tootsie and I were supposed to meet in Manila last December. But he called me up that he could not make it because of LBM. However, I got a message that he was rushed to the hospital.

When I got home i rushed to the hospital and thought he would be out the next morning. But his eyes were red, his gums bled and his speech was slurred. We thought he got the dengue but when the doctor told me that he had to be brought to Legaspi, I felt suddenly weak.

The next moment found me, Cia, Ian, and Dr.Alexis Escultura inside the ambulance bound for Estevez Hospital in Legaspi. I was still in daze. I didnt know what to do with only P5,000 in my wallet.

Upon reaching Esteves we were met by Dr. Joey Yap. He looked stern and grim. Tootsie was brought into the ER and I followed Dr. Yap. He examined him and said, "Hindi ko gusto ang nakikita ko. But we will try our best." At that moment, I wanted to get down to my knees because they were wobbling. I just said nothing and looked at the doctor straight on his face. "Blood is oozing from his gums and his eyes are red...he has seizures..." Those words were just swimming in my head but were not absorbed.

We stayed in the hospital for two weeks and then transferred to SMMGHHSC in Sorsogon where Tootsie was operated. He was diagnosed with chronic liver disease, infectious diarrhea, and low albumin, hemoglobin, and protein.

Finally, he was released on the 24th of December.

I also returned to work last January 16 when my former helper Vacion came back.

Everybody said that I was so brave but deep inside I was the first to break down.

mediamen as targets again

2005-11-22T11:00:00.000+08:00
After what happened to a Sorsoganon small mediaman and Bayan Muna coordinator Ding Uy who was gunned down last Friday in his own home, who's next? This editorial from PW voices out the current situation of our journalists and what our prexy has done so far...

Editoryal
Bait-sa-Balita

MASELAN na ang krisis sa katinuan ng Pangulo. Masama ito para sa bayan. Wala nang magagawang mabuti ang lider na wala-sa-hulog ang ulo. Praning na ang umuupa sa Malakanyang. Na-praning hindi dahil sa droga, kundi, dahil sa kapal-ng-apog na itago ang totoo sa mga usaping kagagawan mismo ng pangulo.

Nabulgar sa bayan ang krisis sa katinuan ng Pangulo nang aminin nito ang kapalpakan (lapses in judgement) sa umalingasaw na iskandalong-Hello Garci. kaugnay nito, katotohanan ukol sa Eleksiyon 2004 ang nilamon ng laho sa makinasyon ng Malakanyang.

Animo itinaga-sa-bato, ibaibang usapin ang nakakulapol sa pagkatao ng Pangulo.
Kamakailan, nilitis si Pangulong Arroyo sa hukumang bayan. Dahil kapos na nga sa katinuan, hinagkis ng Pangulo ang midya. Sa patutsada, lumilitaw na iresponsable ang mga tagapagbalita/mamamahayag. Binigyang-diin pa ng taga-Malakanyang na mahilig ang midya na ibalita ang mga talunan….

Sarisaring alingasngas ang umuusok, kung saan-saan, kaugnay ng ngitngit ng Pangulo sa midya. Bagaman magkakaiba sa punto, magkakapareho sa diwa-ang kalayaan sa pamamahayag-kapag pinanghimasukan ng kapangyarihang pulitikal ng liderato sa serbisyo publiko-katotohanan ang masasaktan.

Sabihin pa, ang pakikialam ng Malakanyang sa hindi nito alam ay malinaw na krisis ng katinuan (good sense).

Para maintindihan ng Pangulo-may bait-sa-balita-sa madaling sabi, magkasama ang ganap at halaga (facts and values) sa anumang balitang nilalaman ng dyaryo, ipinapakita sa telebisyon o ipinaririnig ng mga radyo.

Naging sensitibo ang Pangulo sa dami ng masasamang balita sa pamamahala nito sa kapakanan ng mga mamamayang nagbabayad ng mga buwis. Ang masama sa taga-Malakanyang, siya mismo ang gumagawa sa mga ibinabalita lamang ng mas midya. Muli, ang pagiging sensitibo ng pangulo kaugnay ng masasamang balita (daw!) ay tahasang manipestasyon ng kakapusan sa katinuan: tama na maging sensitibo pero dapat ding maging sensibol. Masakit ang totoo pero nagtuturo. Ang ayaw matuto tiyak mapeperwisyo.

Sa totoo lang, hindi biro ang propesyong peryodista sa kalagayang pulitikal na demokrasya elitista. Sa opisyong ilantad ang totoo, na totoo lang, tiyak na tatamaan ang kalintikan ng mga lintik naman-isa na rito ang Pangulo.

Ang bait/katinuan sa isip ng mga tagapagbalita ay nakatuon sa kabutihan ng lipunan at kagalingan ng bansa. Sa wisyong ito ng pamamahayag-kinikilala ang midya-na 4th estate. Kaipala, sa manda ng katotohanan, kinikilatis ng mga tagapagbalita yaong mahahalagang datos sa pangyayari-ayon sa kapakanan ng lipunan o kabutihan ng bansa-at hindi sa kagustuhan ninuman, lalo na silang mga TRAPO sa pamahalaan.

Sa lengguwahe ng mas midya, yaong mga nagaganap sa gobyerno (pambansa o lokal) kapag matalas at malinaw sa mga datos na pogi ang pulitiko, ito ay “envelopmental journalism”. Isinasakripisyo sa envelopmental journalism ang katotohanan na tahasang nakatuon sa kapakanan ng sosyedad. Kapag kuwalta ang giya ng mga salita sa balita-puta ang nagbabalita.

Kapag wala nang bait-sa-balita, ang mga opisina ng mga pahayagan ay tahasan nang putahan. Ang mga balita na lihis sa totoo ay pawang lason sa makatuturang talino ng bayan.

Upang hindi na maging tampulan ng pagbabalita ang Pangulo, baka mas mabuti, umalis na siya sa Palasyo. Kasi, sa bawat eksena ng pulitika na makabuluhan sa buhay ng mga mamamayan, likas na may balita. Sa komunikasyon (balitaan) nagkakaintindihan ang bayan sa masama o mabuting takbo ng gobyerno. Kapag masama ang nasa Malakanyang, sagradong karapatan ng sambayanan na palitan ang pangulo.

Sa umuupa sa Malakanyang, alsa-balutan na ang isinisigaw ng bayan. Ibinabalita lamang ng mga dyaryo, radyo at telebisyon.

Partners

2005-11-18T11:30:00.000+08:00
Last October 3 to 12, my colleagues and me as focal person, administered the first career assessment or YP4SC for graduating senior students in five public high schools in Sorsogon. My team gave me full support despite lack of funds. We pulled through the program and evaluation successfully getting praises from the regional office.

TESDA-Sorsogon's YP4SC team

I thought it would be a lonely uphill struggle for me knowing that I am new here in this office. However, the cooperation shown by my team lifted my spirits and realized that working with a group is not a lonely task. I wish to express my thanks to my team and I post here a photo of us.

Am being reminded by my Anonymous group that has gone low these times but am sure it'll resurface soon. I keep my fingers crossed.

Rizal Beach

2005-11-15T16:35:00.000+08:00

Ian with his closest friends from his college celebrated his birth anniversary last Nov. 1 at the Rizal Beach. Tootsie and I brought them some food (chicken and spaghetti) and for the second time saw this famous beach after a lot of years. The first was last October 12 with my colleagues from TESDA after a gruelling YP4SC test administration at the Gubat National High. (I post here that pic of the beach with my colleagues.) However, I was quite disappointed with what I saw. I remember the beach with the clean white sand. Not anymore. Vendors ply the beach selling food and shells. Residential houses line the beach in all types... nipa huts for rent or a table with an umbrella for P100, as well as old private hotels and houses. Palm trees are rare. Garbage has piled up. The sand is no longer pristine white but dirty white or gray. The restrooms are bad you would not dare enter. Only the sea remains there with the huge waves in deep blue shimmering in rainbow colors.

Vive le Francais!

2005-11-09T16:45:00.000+08:00

This pic which I got from the internet by Reuters shows smoke coming from a mall in Evreaux, Paris which was burnt by protesters against unemployment/discrimination in France.Our rallies here in Manila pale in comparison to the French riots with over 1,000 vehicles already burnt. The Filipinos are a lot tamer than their French counterparts although the sufferings of the former are a lot gruesome. A Filipina, raped by 6 American VFAers, becomes the "prostitute" who "deserves" what she got. Filipinas abroad even condemn and blame her for what happened. French-born immigrants demand fair treatment while Filipinos choose not to speak out for themselves.

We get what we deserve.

SAVE THE CHILDREN

2005-11-09T11:40:00.000+08:00

The pic speaks for itself. With the imposition of the e-vat and the perennial hike of fuel and commodity prices, with no wage hike, is there anything more left for our children?

I usually get my pics from Pinoy Weekly, my fave paper, because they always speak more than words... pics that hit me strong.

There is a lump in my throat. God! Wala akong maisulat...

Scenes of ML

2005-11-03T11:15:00.000+08:00

Remember Martial Law? These pics are reminiscent of the 70's including the pics I posted last October. The only difference is that PGMA is enthroned there instead of Marcos. However, the same scenario is there... rally dispersals with water cannons and truncheon wielders, a.k.a., calibrated preemptive response or cpr instead of "maximum tolerance" which was the term used three decades ago. According to Press Sec. Bunye, it was done because of traffic obstruction. Or because it puts that lady in Malacañang in bad light?

Who needs another ML declaration? It is there!

BECAUSE IT IS THERE

2005-10-21T17:05:00.000+08:00

Dreams and Cinemanila

2005-10-11T17:00:00.000+08:00

Suyin brought me Preludes and Nocturnes by Neil Gaiman from Toronto, a comics book with fantastic illustrations and customized for Canadians.This is the first volume of Gaiman's Sandman book of dreams and I really want to own all of them. I just love the metaphors of Dream and Death.

Cinemanila opens tomorrow and I feel sad that I won't be there to watch the films of Ang Lee, Wong Kar Wai, Kielowski, etc. including Pinoy Indies. My first problem is money for my fare followed by my job. The former is of course the crucial problem.

BITCHOLOGY

2005-10-10T16:05:00.000+08:00
My sister, who I fondly call Manay (eldest sister), sent me this poem which I only got today because of my heavy sked last week going the rounds of high schools and administering career assessments to at least 1500 senior students.

It is her birth anniversary today (Canada time) so I wish her many happy returns of the day. The poem aptly describes her and the many women out there who stand up for their rights. Women, who defy conventions and traditions, and who dare change the world we are in.

Here goes:

BITCHOLOGY

When I stand up for myself and my beliefs,
they call me a bitch.

When I stand up for those I love,
they call me a bitch.

When I speak my mind, think my own thoughts or do things my own way,
they call me a bitch.

Being a bitch means I won't compromise what's in my heart.
It means I live my life MY way.
It means I won't allow anyone to step on me.

When I refuse to tolerate injustice and speak against it,
I am defined as a bitch.

The same thing happens when I take time for myself instead of being
everyone's maid, or when I act a little selfish.

It means I have the courage and strength to allow myself to be who I
truly
am and won't become anyone else's idea of what they think I "should"
be.

I am outspoken, opinionated and determined. I want what I want and
there
is nothing wrong with that!

So try to stomp on me, try to douse my inner flame, try to squash every
ounce of beauty I hold within me. You won't succeed.

And if that makes me a bitch, so be it.

I embrace the title and am proud to bear it.
B - Babe
I - In
T - Total
C - Control of
H - Herself

B = Beautiful
I = Individual
T = That
C = Can
H = Handle anything

Happy Birthday Manay! I love you and am so proud of you! You are BEAUTIFUL! And I love your being "bitchy."

Two Pics

2005-09-28T17:01:00.000+08:00

This pic posted on Suyin's blog was taken at the Ottawa University in Canada with young people from all over the world during a training (Suyin is in violet blouse in the first row). How nice to see eager-looking faces that look up to say to the world that they will change it. How good it is to see faces that do not lose hope.

On the other hand, another pic shows faces that do not lose hope too. They are not-so-eager-looking because they sense danger but they dare say to the world that they will change it. The only difference between these two pics is that the former is on higher grounds while the latter is buried in the bowels of the earth with no hopes of redemption.

Bantay Impeachment

2005-09-06T17:55:00.000+08:00

The Yes's had it! Gloria's Yes cohorts are jumping with glee while the No's are now in the streets even while the voting is still going on at the moment. One thing for sure, the impeachment complaints will go on year after year since PGMA's crimes will never stop. Prices of oil and other basic commodities continuously rise and people are just hoping that their lives will end soon. Some who are sick do not care to see a doctor anymore because of high consultation fees and medicines.

Suyin has already arrived from Canada. I haven't talked to her yet but am sure she had a much-needed breather from all that is sad here.

Blow-up

2005-07-29T11:57:00.000+08:00

These editorial cartoons are from Pinoy Weekly(7/28/05). They speak so much about what is happening to our country now that I post them here.

PGMA is seen being cornered by her people and she cowers in fear. This reminds me of Marcos in 1986 before he fled the country. He was a then prisoner of Malacanang because he refused to leave his post until he was forced to flee with his family. Now, it is Gloria's turn to keep herself from people's sight. The last time she left Malacanang was when she delivered her SONA (State of the Nation Address) in Congress amid throngs of protesters who were not allowed to get near the Batasan. Before that, her thousands of hakot-rallyists in Luneta were paid and fed just to attend, unlike the Makati protesters from the provinces who were intercepted before entering Metro Manila. And her presscon was canned only for "friendly" mediamen. Her SONA was delivered robot-like just to get it over with, which sent the Chinese community up in protest to her claim that she was able to thwart kidnappings. Sabi nga ni Suyin, who writes for ANC's Dateline Philippines, mas maganda pa raw ang speech ni Ate Glow (her impersonator)

The other cartoon shows the status of her impeachment case that cannot even get through Congress due to manipulated moves by PGMA allies. Her desperate move to form a Truth Commission was even rejected by her choice members unless she resigns first from the presidency. And now, she attempts to change the constitution to make way for a parliamentary form of governance... for what? A graceful exit?

PGMA is really in deep shit!

Dreaming

2005-07-27T17:25:00.000+08:00

Am reading Neverwhere amid all the problems of the nation to set my mind in a stupor-like aura, in other words, dreaming. Neil Gaiman's characters, e.g., Dream, Anaesthesia, Door, have placed me in a sort of stupor in the same effect as Hermann Hesse's Steffenwolf. This is the story of a man, an alien in the underground or underworld... a man who accidentally meets the invisibles. Like Steffenwolf, half-man, half-god, we all consume our minds into the unknown because we want to forget the blunders of those living in the above-world. That is why other people misinterpret the Steffenwolves and the Doors, and the other creatures like Lestat. A door is enigmatic because it turns into darkness. We look at several doors and enter one not knowing what is in store in that darkness. As Richard said, one could feel Darkness as it envelops you. It touches you... even carries you. Here
is an excerpt from Neverwhere...

" ...And then they set foot on Night's Bridge and Richard began to understand darkness as something solid and real, so much more than a simple absence of light. He felt it touch his skin, questing, moving, exploring, gliding through his mind. It slipped into his lungs, behind his eyes, into his mouth... It felt not so much as if the lights were being turned down but as if the darkness were being turned up." (pp.102-103)

Whenever I feel my tears at the edge of my eyes, I readily grab this book to immerse myself into the unknown just to forget how hard living is. And, it works at least for me. Sometimes, the most effective cure to all our pains is to be in a dreamlike state or in a near catatonic condition. I do not recommend this to all, though. I dunno what would happen to our people if they walk along the streets like zombies.

Dreamcatcher

2005-07-22T11:25:00.000+08:00

At last Tootsie arrived from Manila and brought me this book Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman, cult author of comics, graphic novels and books and Suyin's fave. Actually, I became curious about him when Suyin mentioned the phenomenal booksigning affair at the Rockwell which was described by Neil as loud like a wall of noise. To be honest, I haven't read his books yet or even the comics novel The Sandman. When I was in high school, I wrote for my group's secret journal a comics story Monica complete with ilustrations by me of course. I also bought all the itutuloy Pinoy comics in the stores. My fave illustrator then was Vincent Kua. Now, that same interest was revived upon seeing the illustrations of Kaluta over the internet who also did some of the interpretations of Neil Gaiman's novels. Well, I haven't opened the pages yet of Neverwhere but I will during the weekend. Am sure the book will create new images in my mind without the artist's help.I first browsed the internet on info re Neil G. and found this illustration of him by Kaluta showing an amazing aura of a brooding... not human... god. I liked the effect so much I posted it here. Then I clicked some more info from the net and read that he wrote for the pure joy of doing so, to please himself above all others. I quote from his blog... "when I sit down to write, I'm allowed to do one of two things: I'm allowed not to do anything, and I'm allowed to write. Sitting there not doing anything gets so boring that in five minutes you're ready to write." This might be the start of my new affair with a dreamcatcher. I liked the metaphors Dream as the brooding god and her sibling Death. After Anne Rice of the Vampire Chronicles, Neil Gaiman would be my next guide into the dark underground or my darker side? Didn't we all wish to be like Lestat who lived through all the ages and witnessed the evolution of the earth's creatures? Well, would ya believe, talo ko pa ang mga sixteen year-olds kasi ngayon pa lang inaabangan ko na yung MTV interview sa kanya on August 5. And I haven't even read him yet! Ganun ba sya ka-magnetic?

Thanks to you Suyin for opening another door into the unknown. Siguro ganito na ka-grabe ang trahedya ng ating bayan kayat gusto ko nang maging invisible, and to explore the world underneath us.

Finding Nemo

2005-07-18T11:45:00.000+08:00

Sorsogon is the last place from Northern Luzon before crossing the San Bernardino Strait towards the Visayas. It is the first stop in Luzon from Samar. It is the gateway to Luzon from the South (through the ferry) and the gateway to the Visayas and Mindanao.

When I first crossed the San Bernardino strait on my way to Balicuatro School of Arts and Trades in Allen, Samar to meet and discuss with the school faculty and mayor of Allen on an ADB loan as part of my job at TESDA-Central sometime in 2001, I looked back to see the receding tip of Luzon and the prominent tip of Mt. Bulusan. For the first time, my view of Sorsogon was seen from afar and I felt like a stranger looking at a distant shore. For awhile, I seemed to be sailing away from home alternating with that feeling of not knowing where home was and where I was heading... not knowing whether I was leaving home towards another strange land or leaving a place unknown towards home.

How many times did I search for that place called home where once my childhood began and where my first ideas came? Where is actually home? In Sorsogon? Aklan? Manila? All these places left in me lasting memories that whenever I leave there would always be that pain inside. But, definitely, there will always be none left to go home to. When I went back to Sorsogon many times (from Aklan & Manila), I always felt something gone and lost... the old house, Doday & Eyon, my siblings, old restaurants, my moviehouses. Then when I revisited Kalibo in Aklan in 1982 during a presscon along with my best high school writers who competed in the NSSPC (Arlene Mirandilla won first in newswriting), I tried to look for the house where we lived along Lopez Jaena St. but saw that it was already demolished. Next, I went to the Public Library where I borrowed my fave Pearl Buck books but saw that it was gone too. Then, Aklan College, where I first met the few friends (Lourdes Barrios, Ruth Macogue, and Leonila Mirto) who formed our Literary Circle and together wrote for our secret journal. I wrote a novelette The Humanization of the World and several poems that my co-members read with tears; Lourdes and Nila wrote columns or newsbits, while Ruth, essays. We loved Louisa May Alcott's Little Women, Little Men, Jo's Boys, etc. And we laughed at our classmate Peter Kimpo who'd eat plenty of mangoes till his shirt was soiled yellow. We were inseparable and spent our vacant hours in the park talking, laughing, playing... Aklan College was still there but bigger than before. The antique library building which was rebuilt from an old wooden convent was demolished and replaced by a modern structure. Our quaint park's old benches, huge stone pots, and see-saw were also gone. I still remember Lourdes singing I'll Be Seeing You... or something like "in old familiar places..", while going up and down on the see-saw with me. And sweet Manila of course was Diliman (discussions in classes, fora, symposia on burning issues; and the papers to write; and the long walks in the campus with friends particularly Apo, the main libe, and the listening center which is gone now where I used to sit studying while listening to my fave classical music, and the stageplays at the Guerrero Theater), the old Luneta of course, Mendiola, Plaza Miranda that shaped my convictions, and Roxas Blvd. that stood as witnesses to the rallies and demos that filled those days before Martial Law, and also the three-storey Charlie del Rosario Center - the National KM HQ on Kamias Road in Quezon City where I worked fulltime and where my friends and I spent many nights working, especially one particular night after a group discussion not knowing that the writ of Habeas Corpus was already suspended by Marcos, we woke up at dawn with the military all over our place.

Despite all those memories, there is just one line that holds true for all my beloved hometowns...in Thomas Wolfe's words... "one can never come home again..."

I never found home again...

The Mission

2005-07-11T11:56:00.000+08:00
This is just to divert myself momentarily from Gloria, who up to this moment, refuses to come down from her throne, despite being abandoned by her ten most loyal subjects in the cabinet (Boncodin, Dinky Soliman...), and her staunch supporter since EDSA II - Cory Aquino.

At last the Anonymous Inc. has finally launched its first activity by having a consultative meeting with the mothers and children of Little Mahingan with matching Goto snacks last June 25. Yes, the Goto attracted both old and young. The moment actually turned into a children's party but the most amazing thing was that the children were really thin and infested with wounds on their bodies. Despite their wounds, the children enjoyed the affair by singing their songs in Bicol and counted in Spanish (uno, dos, tres, cuatro, sinco, seis, siyete, etc.). Am beginning to believe that my theory is right, i.e., children must learn their first lessons in their first language. How they enjoyed singing in their own dialect and how they murdered the English language when they sang "ap tu de seling, dawn tu de plur." The Anonymous group decided that maybe the next best thing to do was to conduct a medical mission first by inviting willing doctors to give free consultations plus medicines and to give the mothers advices on sanitation. Then, maybe give informal lessons in the form of storytelling in Bicol to children. One thing is sure, the children, despite their unpleasant conditions, are so willing to listen and learn in their own language.

How can Gloria forget that these people are her own responsibility?

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

2005-07-08T16:18:00.000+08:00

On the night of my birth anniversary last June 27, while i was watching ANC, PGMA's face came full into the TV screen after almost three weeks of silence over the juetenggate and gloriagate controversies, saying in a robot-like style that she was sorry for talking to a COMELEC official over a phone as a way of protecting her votes. I suddenly sat upright wondering about the next step she'd take. But alas, she didn't say anything more than sorry for "lapse of judgment" and that she never intended to cheat. Then she begged the nation to support her. I was dumbfounded. Like Cate in the movie Heaven, I felt the urge to pull the trigger of a gun and say Heaven! She was praised for this by Frank Drilon and Mike Defensor saying that hers was an exceptional courage to humble herself before the nation and to beg for forgiveness. As Conrad de Quiros said, "What courage, gentlemen?"

Yes, what courage? The whole show was just that, a show. But this time she didn't do well. Imelda must have done better, with all her tears and laced hankies.

Did she not know that by admitting that she really called up this COMELEC official when all the votes were not yet in, she committed a very grave unforgivable sin toward her own people?

And all that happened during my birth anniversary! When I thought I would set aside first all my wishful thinkings and clear my mind with all the cobwebs that cloud my convictions, when I just thought that I was finished with all my tears, my angsts...
here I go again.

I got several calls, texts, e-mails, greetings re my day and even a visit from Judith bringing me fruits and halo-halo before I saw PGMA's expressionless act of contrition on TV. Thus, my short stint of would-be celebration of my own aging became a nightmare of all ages!

Cory asked the nation to pray. To date, the Church is still deliberating on what is right or wrong (sa pula, sa puti) or whether the Lord was wrong in putting her there as the leader of this nation. The students are already out there on the streets shouting for Gloria's ouster. Gloriagate, Juetenggate, napupuno ka ng grasya, ipagadya mo po kami sa mga nagbabadyang panganib... sa abang lahi na ito.

What a way to celebrate aging!

Heaven

2005-07-04T11:30:00.000+08:00
At last! Am here again after more than a week of darkness away from my blog and the world! My computer bugged down due to a defective hard disk and am still waiting for a replacement. I couldn't find an appropriate PC to blog on till now 'coz Dante (my officemate)is not around so I sneaked into his window. HEAVEN!

Speaking of heaven, I saw this great movie Heaven with Cate Blanchett and Giovanni Ribisi by the German filmmaker Tom Tykwer who also made one of my faves Run Lola Run, on the Lifestyle cable channel. However, I didn't know that he just completed it for the Polish filmmaker Krzysztof Kielowski who died before finishing that film in 2002 in a supposedly trilogy: Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory. Am looking forward to see Kielowski's film Decalogue (10 short films) at the Cinemanila filmfest come August (wishful thinking). I also learned from my e-group that Kielowski has another trilogy: 3 Colors - re the French flag with Blue (1993,Liberty) that won the Golden Lion, White(1994,Equality) that won for him the best director award in Berlin, and Red(1994,Fraternity)which was nominated for the best director award in the Academy Awards.

Heaven is also watching Before Sunset through a borrowed VCD that has Ethan Hawke and Julie Delpy. I just love the beautiful dialogue of that one-moment film and the subtle yet powerful acting talents of Julie and Ethan.

Heaven is also knowing that at last, Suyin was able to get me a VCD of Babae sa Breakwater! Thank you Suyin! Mwah!

Paguriran Lagoon in Sawanga

2005-06-20T17:18:00.000+08:00

Sawanga Beach during high tide with the rock islet seen from afar.

Paguriran Lagoon within the rock islet in Sawanga

2005-06-20T17:02:00.000+08:00

Lake Bulusan, my church, (L-R-top)- me, Cia, Boots, (below-R-L) Ian, Melette, and LV.

2005-06-20T16:30:00.000+08:00

This is Wes or Wes-Wes or Draculita who just gave birth to three kittens last June 15.

Chaplin's Kid

2005-06-17T11:01:00.000+08:00
I got this original pic of Chaplin with a kid in tow in an obscure bookstore in remote Ulm near the Bavarian border in Southern Germany sometime in 1997. I also bought a pic showing workers engrossed in reading the papers. I gave the worker pic to Tootsie (Suyin got it instead) and this Chaplin pic to Apo since it reminded me of him and his daughter who is also named Suyin. This summer, Apo e-mailed me this pic and so I was able to post it in my blog and also thought of having it for Father's Day on June 19. HAPPY FATHERS' DAY TO ALL!

Happy Father's Day!

Amores/Perros

2005-06-17T10:25:00.000+08:00
Wes gave birth last Wednesday, June 15, to three kittens.

One has her beautiful stripes of black, white and grey, while the other two are completely dark grey. Just like Cinderella and her two ugly sisters. They don't have names yet to date but they will soon have. It is really hard to describe them yet when one can just refer to the pretty one and the ugly ones.

Come June 19, this Sunday, the world will celebrate Fathers' Day! Hello to all the fathers out there!

And I wish to greet my only brother Happy Father's Day and Happy Birthday too! BTW, June 19 is also the birth anniversary of our national hero Jose Rizal, thus my brother was named after him with Papa's name Leon added to it. Come to think of it, our lives are composed of anniversaries, tributes, festivities, ins and outs, entrances and exits, arrivals and departures... just to probably remind us of people and days gone by...

Thirty years ago, my brother Wito and his wife Julie with little Pancho left the country for Canada amidst all the unrest of the tumultuous seventies and Martial Law. He told me just before he left that he would come back after ten years. For me those were ten long years, since Manay followed soon with Eddie. Zinia and Karen stayed with us in Sorsogon for awhile then followed their parents too. It was Ade first who migrated to the US and Nenette was the last to get there. Before that, it was Nenette and I, with Mama and a sick Papa. Soon Mama went too. Since then it was only me. I just thought that life must be easier there at the other side of the world because somehow nobody ever came home for good. Mama did, only to leave again forever. I do not hold any grudges. I am through with my tears because I have long accepted that ours is a sad country.

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JOSE LEON!

Holy PILI!

2005-06-14T17:55:00.000+08:00
Indeed ours is a lonely country with people leaving en masse leaving behind their loved ones. Most of my colleagues have already left the country to earn the much coveted US$ and they all promise to return after six years. But those years become ten then forever. I cannot blame them. They only wish a better life for themselves and their families... away from garbage, pollution, poverty, miseducation, mediocrity, murders, diploma mills, graft & corruption, electioneering, poll cheating, illegal gambling, high prices, low wages, hawkers, etc., etc... and now we see another People Power in the offing because of some "juetenggate exposes" involving the first family and the COMELEC scam that stars PGMA.

I feel so sad. How pathetic for a country that has so much to give with so many people willing to learn and work. This sounds petty but I sometimes feel that am being shortchanged when I cannot even watch some Chinese and French films that are currently being shown in Manila because I cannot afford the transpo fare. The theaters have already closed down here so I just get my share of movies and Korean telenovelas from cable channels, and from my old VCDs.

Anyhow, I welcome the coming fiesta here on the 29th when the great Pili will take centerstage in its very own festival. Until then!

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

2005-06-09T10:35:00.000+08:00
Thanks to Alexander Pope who gave us the lines "eternal sunshine of the spotless mind" and "blessed are the forgetful because they get the better, even their blunders."

Thanks too to the HBO channel for screening yesterday the said movie while I was nursing a cold and thus stayed at home. I must say thanks too to the cold for giving me the chance to see this movie which I missed seeing on the big screen. If I didn't stay at home I must have missed it since Suyin didn't find a VCD copy making me more resigned to my fate of missing out on better movies.

Well, what can I say about the movie? The movie filled my entire mind with Pope's poetry... the beauty of being unknown and the right to select one's memories. Jim Carrey as Joe was unbelievable... boy! can he act (a relief from the usual boring big-mouth antics); and Kate Winslet as Clementine was in her usual best. Both characters went through the process of erasing memories from their minds but realized that they didn't want to erase each other. Joe and Clementine went through the battle of remembering versus forgetting as they tried to resurrect deep-seat moments in their lives which were better left unknown.

Are we not all like Joe and Clem... forever wanting to live other lives because we wish to forget our blunders in the past, but on the other hand, wishing to be forever immersed in the minds of those we love?

Celebrating Aging

2005-05-31T11:50:00.000+08:00
Tootsie turned 60 last May 28!

We (Cia, Lowie, Melette, Madam, Minda and Romy,Belen with daughter Lani, David, and two others from the Imprenta; Tootsie, Ian, and I) spent the whole of Saturday at the Sawanga beach talking, eating, and swimming.

The place was fabulous! The beach has powdery white sand with a gorgeous view of nearby islands and rock formations. At around 2:00 pm, the sea was gone and it looked like a long stretch of desert where one can trek towards the little rock isles. After lunch, we walked leisurely towards the nearest and largest islet.

The largest islet will surprise any first-timer because it looks like just a huge slab of stone from the beach. However, upon setting foot on it, one will see a marvelous lake in the middle. Actually, it is still water from the sea coming in through the rock's crevices. The "lake" teems with colorful fishes ranging from shades of orange to black and the water crystal-clear and calm. We didnt bother to change into our swimming attires. We just plunged into the water and had a good soak.

This place reminded me of the movie The Beach where a paradise was discovered behind rock islets and formations away from prying eyes of beachcombers. A place where no one can intrude... a sanctuary.

After almost three hours of soaking in the "lake" we proceeded back to the beach before high tide or else we had to swim our way back. At the beach, we had another round of bihon, broiled meat, fried chicken, rice cake, and cucumber. Then, at around 5:00, we boarded our van to return home still in our wet clothes.

What a way to celebrate aging!

Scent of Rain

2005-05-26T18:11:00.000+08:00
Whenever i think of life lived, there is always that dread that i might never get there. The things that i loved to do and the places i wanted to visit might never come to reality. Life is always different from what we wish for... just a soft whiff of breeze that consoles us because we refuse to accept what we are not. There are little hidden wishes stacked in our selves waiting to jump out into the open. More often than not "they just lie there and they die there."(Lines from a ditty)

Rainer Maria Rilke said it more vividly in his two poems -

No one lives his life.

Disguised since childhood,
haphazardly assembled
from voices and fears and little pleasures,
we come of age as masks.
Our true face never speaks.
Somewhere there must be storehouses
where all these lives are laid away
like suits of armor or old carriages
or clothes hanging limply on the walls.
Maybe all the paths lead there,
to the repository of unlived things.

And here is another by Rilke to the same tune - though others would interpret this as unrequited love, i see it in the same plane as the poem above...

You who never arrived

You who never arrived
in my arms, Beloved, who were lost
from the start
I don't even know what songs
would please you. I have given up trying
to recognize you in the surging wave of the next
moment. All the immense
images in me--the far-off, deeply-felt landscape,
cities, towers, and bridges, and un-
suspected turns in the path,
and those powerful lands that were once
pulsing with the life of the gods--
all rise within me to mean
you, who forever elude me.

You, Beloved, who are all
the gardens I have ever gazed at,
longing. An open window
in a country house--, and you almost
stepped out, pensive, to meet me. Streets that I chanced upon,--
you had just walked down them and vanished.
And sometimes, in a shop, the mirrors
were still dizzy with your presence and, startled, gave back
my too-sudden image. Who knows? perhaps the same
bird echoed through both of us
yesterday, separate, in the evening...

- Rainer Maria Rilke

Peach Pleasure

2005-05-25T18:10:00.000+08:00
If there is one last town on earth that boasts of simple honest humans, it is Gubat here in Sorsogon. It is where the quaint BU campus building is located, it is where Ian will attend college, and it is where they sell original crispy doughnuts at P2 each only. I think I chose the right place for Ian. Unlike Legazpi which is a bigger city than Sorsogon, Gubat is a a very small coastal town where people still tend to greet one another in jeepneys, and tricycle drivers do not ask for extra charge if you go beyond the usual route. When Ian and I went to a restaurant to take our lunch after that gruelling enrolment day, we asked the tricy driver to drop by a store where a xerox machine was installed so we could photocopy some documents needed by BU, then back to BU to submit the papers, and then off to the jeepney terminal on our way home. Would ya believe, the driver just charged us P5.00 each! Here at the Sorsogon City, we might have been charged P30. And the fare from Sorsogon City to Gubat is still P10 for 19 kms. while going to Bacon from Sorsogon City proper costs P11.50 for just a short stretch of 9 kms.

Being citified is not at all my idea of progress.

Goto with Puto

2005-05-18T11:22:00.000+08:00
I just read Kenneth Guda's (Pinoy Weekly) reaction to Sheila Coronel's (PCIJ) article Perverse Effect through Suyin's blog (On PCIJ,5/13), and my instant reaction was, "nabayaran kaya ito (Sheila)?" And to Kenneth and to all journalists as well, my advice is: "Do whatever you think is right for the people. Write and say what is true because you owe that to the public. Oppose whatever is wrong because that is your responsibllity. Act immediately because it is everybody's task."

There is so much to say but Kenneth said it all succinctly so I decided to copy/paste in this blog his reaction in its entirety and also to be fair, Sheila's post in full.
____________

Picking a fight with the "great" Shiela Coronel?

I don't like confrontations and I don't like picking fights, especially when I'm the disadvantaged one (I am like a mosquito, no, a mosquito egg, amidst a dungeon of dragons in this business of journalism). Pero di ko talaga magets kung bakit sinabi o sinulat ito (allegedly, kasi finorward lang sa egroup ko ni Chairman Mong) ni Shiela Coronel ng the "esteemed" PCIJ. Gumawa ako ng "jolog" na sagot sa kanya. For the sake of fairness, ilalagay ko rin sa post ang orihinal na sinulat ni Coronel.

*****

Reaksiyon ito sa pahayag ni Shiela Coronel hinggil sa media killings.

Napaka-problematic ng sinasabi ni Shiela Coronel. Mahirap patunayang dahil sa mga protesta sa killings kaya nagpapatuloy at tumitindi pa ang killings. Kung sina Rep. Alfelor ay sinisisi pa ang mismong media sa pagtindi ng killings (masyado daw sensitibo ang mga Pinoy sa kritisismo), si Coronel naman, isinisisi pa ang killings sa NUJP at iba pang umaalma. Ibig ba niyang sabihing mas mabuti pa sanang nanahimik na lang tayo sa killings para hindi na lumala pa?

Hinalintulad pa niya sa suicides at kidnappings ang media killings. Pero napakalayo ng suicides at laluna kidnappings. Pagpina-publicize ang suicides at kidnappings, habol lamang ng media na i-sensationalize ang mga krimeng ito. Pero sa pag-publicize ng media killings, inevitable na maiuugnay mo ang krimen sa sinulat o sinabi niya.

Sa media killings, malinaw na may mga pulitikal na motibo – para patahimikin ang isang kritikal na peryodista o brodkaster. Ang pangunahing tumutulak sa isang politiko (halimbawa) na papatayin ang journalist ay dahil out of convenience, hindi dahil nakakuha siya ng ideya na uso ngayon ang pagpatay sa mga journalist.

Ang hindi magets ni Coronel, kailangang iugnay ang media killings sa buong politikal na klima ng bansa. Mayroong isang gobyerno na nag-eemploy ng violence sa sinumang kritikal sa kanya (activist killings), na ang tanging alam na pagsugpo sa rebelyon ay militarisasyon. Hindi malayong isipin na pati mga lokal na politiko, ganito rin ang magiging aktitud sa mga lokal na mamamahayag na kritikal sa kanila.

Papaano ba ang relasyon ng militar/pulis sa mga lokal na political clans/trapos? Diba madalas na nagsisilbing mersenaryo at protektor ang militar/pulis ang mga politiko? Mahirap ba para kay Coronel na isiping napakadali ng mga politiko na makiusap sa mga mersenaryo nila para "patahimikin" ang isang kritiko? Hindi ba repleksiyon ang pagkakasangkot ng mga militar at pulis sa media killings ng mismong oryentasyon ng AFP at PNP ("mercenary tradition" ika nga ni JMS)?

Parang may ini-imply pa si Coronel na hindi "responsible enough" ang midya (tulad daw ni Jun Pala) kaya pinapatay ang mga ito. Pag-toe ito sa mismong line ng estado na in-express ni Rep. Alfelor! Tingin ko, kabaliktaran pa nga ang dapat na pagtingin: kaya nga maraming pinapatay na mediamen, kasi maraming umaaray na politiko! (Hindi naman sila aaray kung walang katotohanan ang mga sinusulat/sinasabi ng mga mamamahayag) Dahil ginagawa mismo ng mga mamamahayag ang trabaho nila kaya sila pinapatay!

(Ngayon, bakit community journalists lamang ang pinapatay at hindi mga Manila-based journalists? Dahil ba may mas tendensiya ang community journalists na maging tapat sa propesyon nila at hindi madiktahan ng demands ng komersiyo?)

Sa totoo lang, hinog nang maiangat natin ang media killings sa lebel ng politikal. Ipinakita ng pagpatay ng militar sa mga aktibista kung ano ang polisiya ng pambansang gobyerno sa mga kritikal sa kanya. Ipinamalas na ng pagdawit sa NUJP at PCIJ sa talaan ng "enemies of the state" na may ganito ngang pagtingin ang gobyerno sa midya.

Tama si Coronel sa isang bagay - na hindi na lamang sasapat ang "exposing and opposing" at "castigating an indifferent government". Isyu na ng karapatan para mag-"expose and oppose" at karapatang mangastigo ng midya. Isa itong isyung maaari lamang ipaglaban sa pamamagitan ng pag-iingay at pagprotesta laban sa estadong tinuturing nang kaaway ang midya.

*****

The purported Sheila C. post

"Do we need to refocus our strategies? Is "exposing and opposing" enough? Will merely castigating an indifferent government yield results?"

Perverse effect

May 11, 2005 @ 2:07 pm
Posted by Sheila Coronel
Filed under Media Issues

IS all the noise about the impunity with which the killers of journalists are able to get away with their crimes having a perverse effect? By railing against the killings, are we also not sending the message that since the murderers manage to elude justice, then it is alright to go ahead and shoot journalists?

These thoughts crossed my mind as I read with horror about the coldblooded murder at midnight last night of yet another journalist, Philip Agustin of the Starline Times Recorder, in Dingalan, Aurora. The killing comes a week after the fatal shooting of radio broadcaster Klein Cantoneros in Dipolog City.

Nearly one journalist a month has been killed this year. This is cause for alarm, especially because all the protests made by journalists so far do not seem to have made a dent. In fact, the effect has been perverse: despite the high decibel level of the protests, the killings have not stopped, instead they continue at an alarming rate.

Could there be a copycat effect? Just as the publicity of suicides encourages more attempts and the coverage of kidnappings have in the past given out-of-work criminals ideas about diversifying their operations, could the current uproar about murdered journalists also be prompting more killings?

There does seem to be an element of perverse opportunism in all the media murders. Most of those who have been killed so far were the most vulnerable journalists, some of them almost on the fringe — those in the employ of small radio stations and small community papers. Many are blocktimers, meaning they are not paid staff but buy airtime for airing their commentaries. The big media names, the big networks, and the Manila papers have so far been immune. At most, those who work for big media in big cities get threats, because the risk of shooting any of them are greater (the police just might do its work). Just as criminals bully the weak and the silent (kidnappers target Chinoy businessmen because they pay up and keep quiet), hitmen target those journalists far from the center of power and influence, where law enforcement is weak, the courts are compromised, and the citizens are cowed.

For almost three years, the PCIJ has been involved with the Freedom Fund for Filipino Journalists, which raises money to help the families of victims and for the legal defense of journalists in trouble. We have held dialogues with the police, sent fact-finding missions, written investigative reports, followed up cases with the courts. But the killings continue and the level of our frustration rises by the day.

Although the police is more responsive now than it was in 2003, when the Freedom Fund was formed, the swift arrests of suspected journalist’s killers in recent months have also not discouraged more murders. Certainly, the slowness and incompetence of the courts which are currently trying some of the cases has not helped as well.

The fact that it is not just journalists who are being killed, but also politicians and activists provides poor consolation. Besides, it is not consoling we need so much as an end to all these murders.

Do we need to refocus our strategies? Is “exposing and opposing” enough? Will merely castigating an indifferent government yield results? Aside from pressuring the police and the courts to pursue the killers, should we also be providing protection to the most vulnerable among our ranks? Should we likewise be educating the public on the ways in which complaints against journalists can be immediately addressed and strengthening the mechanisms within the media to address those complaints and to provide redress to those who have legitimate grievances against the press?

Take the case of Davao City broadcaster Jun Pala, who had been repeatedly reprimanded by the Kapisanan ng mga Brodkaster sa Pilipinas for his insulting and incendiary commentaries. Pala’s reputation in Davao was that of a “mouth for hire.” He was banned for life twice by the Davao City KBP chapter but the national KBP caved in to pressure from powerful politicians and reinstated him. Pala had no trouble finding a forum because his was a toprating program in a a very competitive radio industry. He was killed in 2003 — and while we protest his murder, we also cannot help thinking that maybe, if he had been properly disciplined then, he would still be alive today. (See an account of Pala in Sun-Star Davao).

Should we therefore also be doing work to raise the standards of journalism? Should part of the protection work include fortifying the quality of journalism to make it less vulnerable to violent attack?

As the Freedom Fund said in its pamphlet, Staying Alive, “Journalism is a dangerous profession. Responsibility can be our best protection.”

Ginseng Brown Rice Tea

2005-05-17T11:00:00.000+08:00
I was included by the Cinemanila Group in its circle of cineastes that aim to discuss articles and reviews regarding films through the internet. Maybe they got my name through a note I submitted re feedback on a film I saw in last year's cinemanila filmfest. Now, I get to read letters from modern and traditional directors in the likes of Mark Meily (Crying Ladies and La Visa Loca) and Siegfred Sanchez (brod of Suyin's friend Meyor). I can forward these cyberfora to my sisters and friends too. The 2005 cinemanila filmfest is scheduled this August 4-16. I can hardly wait for the final list of movies to come out soon. Surely, August will be my time to enter a movietheater again (after all these dry months here in Sorsogon where all the moviehouses have gone extinct) and watch my movies on the big screen! Viva Cinemanila!

Hopefully, I would like to watch my fave directors' films like Innaritu (Amores Perros), Almodevar, Wong Kar Wai, Cuaron, and even the puzzling Francois Ozon, or the classic Herzog and Truffaut (hello apo, sino ba yung favorite mong Spanish filmmaker?), and to try some novel films as well. I even love Hideo Nakata's Dark Water and The Ring trilogy and Korea's A Tale of Two Sisters (hanep ang images especially the bright colors and wide landscapes that remind me of David Lean's Ryan's Daughter...kaya lang gloomy). And would ya believe, I really dig Korean telenovelas like Lovers in Paris, Save the Last Dance, Memories of Bali and Stained Glass (the last two are still ongoing late at night over ABS-CBN). The Taiwanese Meteor Garden was also once a favorite (it is having a replay in the afternoon on the same channel). Truly, Korean telenovelas are now "in" and how. With concise and compact storylines that run for only four to six months during weekdays, these drama series are more like lengthened movies. Pwede ngang talunin si Lav Diaz, and other Pinoy directors in the way the plot unfolds no matter how simple or gasgas na gasgas, i.e., love triangle, poor girl meets rich boy, etc.

However, am optimistic yet for the Pinoy movies. I like Jeffrey Jeturian. And as always, I love and do miss the dead Pinoy filmmakers... Lino Brocka and Ishmael Bernal! Gusto ko ngang magtatag ng Dead Filmmakers Society, eh (sorry to the maker of Dead Poets Society) and resurrect their films in a sort of interactive workshop or filmfest re the Pinoy psyche.

I love you Lino! I miss you Ishma! Mwah!Mwah!