Pan, Nessus and Chiron

Mi Ultimo Adios (Free verse translation into English)

2011-12-26T18:39:00.000-08:00

Friend and PEN President Lito Zulueta, requested me to recite Rizal's poetic last will and testament to a group of Korean writers in the original language. My rusty Spanish wouldn't permit me. Instead, I translated the poem into English. Here it is.

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¡Adiós, Patria adorada, región del sol querida,  

Perla del mar de oriente, nuestro perdido Edén!

To you I bequeath this sad and troubled life;  

If it were brighter, younger, more extravagant,  

Even then, I’d offer it for you.  

In fields of battle, in fierce combat,  

Others give their lives, without doubt, without regret;

Whether fallen crowned in cypress, laurel or lily,

Or shot in an open field, in war or cruel execution,

If all of this is for your sake, I will not hesitate.

I die as the sky unfurles its colors

And a cape of darkness embraces the day;

If you need to jolt the color of dawn,  

You have my blood, shed it in good time

Let it be burnished by the sun’s light.  

My dreams, my ideals in my youth,

My dreams, even now as a man

Were to see you, one day, a jewel of the Orient sea.

Dry those sunken eyes, raise your forehead high,  

Leave no mark of sadness, no burden of age

or stain of shame.  

My life’s dream, this deep burning desire,  

This soul that will soon depart cries out: Salud!  

To Life! Oh how nasty to fall so you may fly.

To die so you may breath,

To die under this sky

To enter the mysterious country and find eternal sleep.

One day if you see upon my grave

An insignificant flower among the wild grass

Pluck it so you may know my soul

And in the cold tomb below, I shall feel your kiss.

The moon will gaze with tranquil light

The dawn will warm with a fleeting radiance. 

Let the wind moan in a low murmur,

And should a bird rest on my cross, 

Let it sing in peace.

Let the sun usher the rains

To calm whatever trouble I’ve left behind

Let a friend mourn this early departure

And in praying for me

My countrymen, pray, also, that I find rest.

Pray for the unfortunate dead 

For those with unbearable suffering

For bitter mothers left in grief,

For orphans and widows, and tortured prisoners.

And pray that redemption finds you.

In the cemetery’s dark night, 

There, where only the dead remain

Disturb not their rest,

nor the mystery of their death, 

And if you hear a melody

It will be I singing to you.

When my grave has been forgotten

The cross lost, not even a stone to mark it.

Let the farmers come to plow the earth

Before my bones come to nothing.

Let my ashes blanket the earth.

Then…

nothing will matter, I will be nothing

But air that runs freely in valleys.

To your ears, I will be a faint whistle in the wind

I will be the smell, the light, the color,

the hum, the

pleasure,

and the song

That repeats only one thing:

my conviction,

my faith.

My muse, my country, sorrow of my sorrows, 

Querida Filipinas, oye el postrer adios.

I leave you all,

my parents, my loves. 

I go where there are no slaves,

butchers nor dictators, 

Where faith is not a cause for death.

Where the one who reigns is God.  

Adios, padres y hermanos, chards of my soul, 

Childhood friends and my home, all lost

Be thankful there is peace after this wearisome day; 

Adios dulce estrangera, mi amiga, mi alegra.

My loved ones, adios,

to die is to rest.

Pusong Wagas

2011-11-25T05:14:00.000-08:00

Paul Morales, friend and Artistic Director of Ballet Philippines, asked me to write a libretto based on the legend of the founding of Mandaluyong.

In my story, there's a princess in a dysfunctional relationship with her father, the King. One night, her friend, the Anino ng Buwan, invites her to galivant outside the palace--a thing she has been expressly forbidden to do. But the promise to swim in sparkling rivers and to run barefoot on a carpet of smooth grass is too much for the princess. Riding an "uwak's feather", the two friends venture into the green and throbbing forest.

There they meet an ascetic man who tends to the big trees. The princess senses his loneliness as he whistles a song about the forest. Cloaked in invisibility, she watches him. And he senses her. When at last, the Anino ng Buwan reveals the princess, the are drawn to a kiss. And, despite the initial resistance, they fall in love.

But a Journeyman from afar arrives in their shores bearing shiny gifts in exchange for the people's gold. When the young couple avoid dealing with the stranger, a war is declared. The Journeyman sends three warriors to raze the forest and kill the couple. The princess and the man fight the warriors with all their might. They're last stronghold is by the river. Not wanting to surrender, and promising eternal love, they vow never to part as they drown in the waters.

The King discovers them gone. And his kingdom is reduced to men and women wearing sunglasses, blind from shiny but useless things they bought from the Journeyman.

By the river, a huge tree starts to grow. And at night, a large moon keeps it company. Right away, the King recognizes the tree as the man. And the princess has come back as the moon. As he sheds tears of repentance for having believed the journeyman, the Anino ng Buwan sings of the three hearts that each of us have--for our love, for our family and for our country.

Here are the lyrics to the three songs in the ballet. Music will be composed by Cynthia Alexander.

1. Anino ng Buwan

Kasintada ko
Ang hardin at puno,
Kalaro ko minsan
Ang buwaya sa ilog.
Kaibigan ko ang malamlam na puso
Ako ang Anino ng Buwan.

Aanhin mo ang buhay na tahimik
Sa luklukan dinadakila
Walang taong iniibig
Isang bato’ng
Walang awit o imik.
Magsayaw ka. Pagbigyan ang hilig.

Ihakbang mo at naroon ka na.
Maalat ang dagat, madawag ang gubat.
Maningning ang ilog. Humahalakhak.
May sipol ang dilim
Nanunukso ang pahamak.

Magsasaya tayo. (Echo: Magsasaya tayo!)
Magsisisi tayo. (Boses ni Prinsesa Manda: Patay tayo diyan.)
Kaibigan ko ang malamlam na puso.
Ako ang Anino ng Buwan.

Buksan mo ang bintana
Nandito na ako… (Encho: Engkanto…Engkanto…)
May pasalubong. (Boses ni Prinsesa Manda: Pakpak ng uwak?)
Maglalayag tayo (Boses ni Prinsesa Manda: Maglalayag tayo?)
Hanggang sa dulo ng mundo.

Ihakbang mo at naroon ka na.
Maalat ang dagat, madawag ang gubat.
Maningning ang ilog. Humahalakhak.
May sipol ang dilim
Nanunukso ang pahamak.

2. Init ng Halik

Araw-araw, sa lilim ng sanga
Kay lawak ng gubat sa aking mga mata.
Paggising sa umaga, paligid humihinga
Tumitibok, lumilingkis, namumunga.

Ang buhay na payak, aking ninanais.
Umiiwas sa lahat, di naghahanap ng labis.
Pero sa gabi, gumagapang ang lumbay
Sa buong gubat ako lang ang sablay.

Paroo’t parito ang mga paru-paro
Nanghahalina ang mga bulaklak
Sumisitsit ang mga kuliglig
Ang lupang darang, nangangailangan ng dilig.

Alagang punong-kahoy, sa kamay tumatamis
Makatas ang bunga, walang kahati
Buhay na payak, aking ninanais
Mabasag man lang minsan, sa pagdalaw ng kapangis.

Mag-alaga ng buhay, yan ang turo ni Bathala
Halaman, hayop, kapwa.
Ituro mo ang tanim na may samyo ng lambing
At didiligan ko nang walang mintis.

Alagang punong-kahoy, sa kamay tumatamis
Makatas ang bunga, walang kahati
Buhay na payak, aking ninanais
Mabasag man lang minsan, sa pagdalaw ng kapangis.

Ipakilala mo siya, aking Bathala
Ang kahati ng aking buhay
Ang buwan sa aking araw, ang dilig sa aking darang
Kaputol ng hininga. Tanging pagsinta.

At biglang buhay ko’y lalawak sa dalawa
Ang mga araw mamumunga ng wagas
Kamay sa kamay, labi mo sa labi ko
Init ng halik. Init ng halik.

3. Pusong Wagas

Huwag bibitiw
Aking sinisinta
Labi mo sa labi ko
Magpakailanman.

Tutumbasan ko
Ang sakmal, sapot o lason.
Ako ay puno at
Pag-ibig ko’y apoy.

Maglaan ng halik
Aking sinisinta
Tutubusin
Sa aking pagbalik.

Ihehele ko
Ang sakmal, sapot o lason
Ako ang Buwan
At pag-ibig ko’y apoy

Bawat isa
May pusong wagas
Tatlong pusong walang kamatayan
Pagsinta, Pamilya, Bayan.

Lulupigin ang bulkan
Tatawid sa talim ng bato
Susuko ang ilog
Sa paglunod sa iyo.

(Pero) Walang kamatayan
Ang pusong wagas
Pagsinta, Pamilya, Bayan.

Inamorata

2011-09-19T01:31:00.001-07:00

Amar Como El Mar

A Man is

spit out

of the sea.

Playing

with the waves,

it is summer

in his memory.

A woman appears.

Their kiss

tastes

like brine.

When a stone

is hurled

in the water,

meteors

fall

from

the

sky.

Time turns

everything

sand.

Every speck,

the

dried

skeleton

the

sea.

Mangoes

2011-09-17T19:13:00.000-07:00

I begin with a wonder:

That I am buried neck deep;

That in these parts, I only used to grow in India

From a soil no different from

the loam you are familiar with.

When you look out the window where you live,

our view is the same.

Under the umbrella of sky:

A cycle of sun, clouds, rain, moon, stars

parade in the field of vision.

The scenes seem captured in ordinary supermarket-bought refrigerator magnets

arranged daily,

In a random sequence,

before breakfast

by somebody,

perhaps the master of the house

or maybe, a whimsical child.

In my youth, the green leaves on my head seemed fragile

But needed no special care.

Brown branches spurted, were broken, spurted again.

And then my trunk, scaly, hard and handsome,

bore my eyes slowly

Up the ground and beyond the horizon.

In this ancient hill somewhere in India.

In what is to be known as Kashmir, Goa or Calcutta,

it does not matter,

I see fields and trees, brooks and rivers,

Flying things both great and small

Sorting themselves into a view.

Look, the Ganges snakes peacefully towards the sea.

In this promontory, I only have a yearning.

That one day I will grow to reach

That thing beyond my reach.

I have no legs, no wings.

And really, honestly—who has?

In the vastness of a universe

that many physicists say, swell and distend

like a slowly inhaling balloon

What does it take to get from one place to the end?

One step.

that seemingly simple act

of putting one foot before another.

Placing one person in that place of need.

One giant stride.

To say yes,

To not be afraid,

To forsake everything else,

To simply say, “I do.”

I have shed my leaves in many seasons,

Bore the fruit that I was destined to spew

Some as big as one’s pride,

Others as small as a cancerous node,

But always, a bright yellow sun of incomparable sweetness

Fragrant like a heart before it is broken

shaped like the skull of a baby, or

the muscular bicep of a man we knew.

My children have travelled to terra incognita.

Loved or bruised, it has found its place

Growing uncomplainingly

Springing from the earth,

To table, to food.

I feel it all.

The warm palm against my cheek.

Or a lover’s undressing of my skin

The lips pursed,

the sweet sloppy slurping

taking of what the earth has to offer.

There are yellows still.

But there are other colors, too.

Green, red, orange.

Named after the sturdiness of the carabao

Or relatives in Hawaii.

I am proud of them all.

In place of arms, my roots dig into the earth,

yearly inch into the unknown

in search of other roots to grasp.

In the damp subterranean, the darkness does not matter.

The fumbling yields a touch, a caress, an embrace,

An intertwining of roots from other trees,

in places as strange as I am

and as far as it is strange—

Kerala -Quiapo, Lisbon-Lipa, Belgium-Butuan, Sevilla-Cebu.

Versailles-Valle Verde, San Francisco Delmonte, New York, Cubao

I will share with you a secret:

The earth is held together by these clutches.

(Maybe gravity, too.)

In the future, they say, the earth will disarray,

But not today.

I say to you,

To you,

To you:

Never let go.

When Culture Attacks

2011-07-31T19:49:00.001-07:00

Kaibigan,

Good intentions mark the passage of the National Cultural Heritage Act of 2009, but legal fester points abound.

With not much fanfare, Republic Act 10066, also known as the National Cultural Heritage Act of 2009, was signed into law on 26 March 2010. The law has, since then, taken effect. But even before it’s full implementation, certain sectors are already pointing out, at least two areas that need discussion and clarification.

For a long time, cultural conservationists have decried the seeming lack of a legal mechanism to save tangible expressions of heritage from being unduly modified or demolished. The Jai Alai building, for example, was torn down on orders of a local government chief despite a loud and strong clamor for its conservation as an architectural jewel and a visible reminder of the rich history of the city. The building was demolished to supposedly give way to a public school. Many years after its destruction, the lot on Taft Avenue where it stood remains vacant.

Buildings, churches, bridges, natural formations, even street names serve as visible historical and cultural markers for a people. The destruction of these structures literally erases our collective consciousness of the past which they symbolically represent. The disappearance or unconsidered modification of these heritage signifiers is—in the era of globalization and cultural homogeniety—equivalent to cultural amnesia.

The NCHA was seen as a way of fighting back at wanton destruction of dwindling cultural resources. The underlying spirit of the law is to arm the cultural agencies and advocates of cultural preservation with a system of legal remedies to help preserve, restore, and maintain cultural heritage in its many forms.

But some sectors are pointing out that some of the provisions are vague or unimplementable. Moreover, that the protective measures provided by the law are restrictive and may even encroach on the Constitutional right to hold property. Consider, for example, the restriction under the new law pertaining to the sale of cultural property.

Article III section 5 which identifies what the law considers important cultural property by presumption. This includes, among others, the works of a Manlilikha ng Bayan or a National Artist.

The subsequent section 11 of the same chapter states that all such cultural property cannot “be sold, resold, or taken out of the country without first securing a clearance from the cultural agency concerned. In case the property shall be taken out of the country, it shall solely be for the purpose of scientific scrutiny or exhibit.”

This provision needs careful clarification since a direct implementation may give rise to absurd situations. When it talks about monitoring the sale or exportation of works of a Manlilikha or the National Artists, does the provision apply to all kinds of work? Clearly, it does apply to works of art, such as painting or sculpture. And it can also apply to the original manuscript of a book authored by a National Artist. But does it apply to each subsequent print of the book? What about if the cultural property is in the form of a movement, dance or a chant? Will performance royalty payments be considered a “sale” so that performance of a dance or a chant original to a Manlilikha require a clearance? What if the work protected is a house or building by a National Artist for Architecture, will its subsequent sale or modification also require the same kind of clearance from the cultural agency?

Will the transfer of the work by any legal means other than sale, such as lease, donation or inheritance, exempt the parties from this clearance requirement? Does this option defeat the purpose of protecting the cultural property?

Another protective principle found in the law involves structures “dating at least 50 years old”, which Article III, section 5 states, can only be modifed or demolished upon the clearance of the National Historical Commission of the Philippines. A pressing concern is the manner in which this principle will be implemented if the structure is privately-owned?

There are ancestral houses still standing in Quiapo or Sta. Ana that can fall under this rule. By neglect or lack of resources, a lot of these grand houses have fallen into disrepair or sold to new owners not interested in maintaining the old structure. Can the cultural agency impose upon the owners the obligation to maintain the structure’s historical authenticity?

The law, in Article VII, section 26, can obligate the owner to repair the house by serving “on the owner or occupant of such property, an order to repair or maintain such site. If the owner fails to comply with the said order within thirty (30) to forty-five (45) days, repairs may be undertaken by the appropriate cultural agency for the account of the owner.” What is the practical consequence of this provision if the owner, like the house, has fallen into hard times?

A clear and more complicated fester point arises in the case where the owner is interested in demolishing the structure to give way to a more profitable enterprise where the heritage house stands. Extended to the profit mandate of real estate developers, this matter can escalate into an interesting development in the jurisprudence on art, culture and private property.

Everyone agrees that a major part of nation-building is to accord protection to cultural resources by way of restrictions and controls. Under the new law, the cultural agency is given substantial control over the disposition of art objects and buildings. And as one can see, the clash becomes more apparent and complex in cases where the object or building sought to be protected is privately owned.

Hence, the question on everyone’s mind is: Can government interfere in the disposition of private property? And if so, to what extent?

Even in conservation instances where the spirit of cooperation between government and private owner is strong, there are other provisions in the law that need to be carefuly operationalized. A clear institutional framework needs to be laid out to determine the following key issues: What should be required to ensure that the process for de-listing of protected property adhere to democratic processes without being unduly litiguous? What basic standards shall be used for ordering conservation measures? How will disputes on conservation measures, such as adaptive-reuse, be resolved? What is the prioritization process for state support for conservation?

It is understandable how the affected sectors are breathlessly waiting for the law’s implementing rules and regulations. Can this law be implemented effectively without fostering dischord among the various members of the cultural sector? Will there be a way of respecting property rights without diluting the authority of the cultural agencies over our cultural heritage?

For sure, the cultural agencies cannot disregard the concerns of art owners, gallery operatros and real estate developers. At the outset, a balance must be achieved in the light of the Constitutional provision stated in Article III, section 9, which states that “Private property shall not be taken for public use without just compensation.”

Therein lies the big challenge.

IF POQUE-POQUE IS ON THE MENU, WHERE IS THE KABATITI AND UTONG

2011-03-04T19:37:00.000-08:00

These innocent vegetables, otherwise known as eggplant, sweet gourd, and stringbeans form the staple in Ilocano vegetable cuisine. Throw in the slimy saluyot, the leafy marunggay and its eat-by-your-teeth fruit (the green stalk that bears eating resemblance with the artichoke), slice some bitter ampalaya, mix in some tomatoes, pound a few slivers of ginger, drop a teardrop or two of bagoong to flavor the broth—and you will have covered what it takes to do a pinakbet or a dinengdeng. Green when harvested, these vegetables turn dark and wrinkle-y when cooked; as dark and lined as the farmers who harvest them.

The land from which these vegetables sprung is one of the most punishing landscapes in the north. Ask any old timer in Hawaii and most likely they will agree.

The place can have excruciating summers. The sun oppresses everything to dust. While inside, the earth heats at the core. And soon the land cracks open. Even the towering churches of Paoay, Sarrat and St. Williams with its massive, muscular buttresses tremble when earthquakes make their unannounced visits. On the other hand, summer’s spouse, the monsoon rains, can lash hard and heavy like a cigar-smoking Manang Biday dressed in an inabel saya poised with a kalesa whip. In any given year, there is no telling when the wind and rain will conspire to turn into a rampaging typhoon. When that happens, the Ilocos loses its moorings. The land mass floats like a sinking ship into the angry China Sea. Howling wind. Water surging everywhere seeking the lowest plain. Vegetables are uprooted, farm animals drown, the water sweeps away verything in its path including (in the olden days) one or more of the wooden bridges that connect the towns to each other.

Despite the regularity of this occurrence, the Ilocos—unlke the Titanic—never sank. What always happens is that, like the enduring sun, the Ilocano rises again and again and again.

Growing up Ilocano, pinakbet was not my favorite dish. Almost always looking murky to dark on the plate, the pinakbet and dinengdeng was too much of a connection to the hard work that was needed to coax life out of dry soil. I demanded something livelier and more colorful from my food. Happily, that requirement was not hard to find.

When the summer is just right, the backyards bear fruits. There is always something pink, orange, or rust-colored to crack open, bite into or slurp on. Or to dip in salt, sugar, vinegar or anchovy. From the earth, there would be other red, yellow and purple things to boil or roast. Or dry under the sun and save for a rainy day. Or marinate in earthen jars as an insurance against an unforseen drought. And from the sea that ran along the coasts from Currimao to Pagudpod came a bountiful rainbow catch that one could even eat raw.

Visiting the sea, we would buy ar-arosit from fishermen fresh from their diving. This sea weed looks like tiny green grapes that make happy popping sounds as one bites down on it. Its cousin, the gamet, the black sea weed closer in appearance to the Japanese nori, transforms elegantly when bathed in hot water. Like the men in a barrio dance standing under a string of weak bulbs and the stars, the gamet softens, glides and dances a slow waltz with the slices of red tomatoes that go with this dish. Whatever the sweet Manongs and Manangs of Hawaii say, Ilocos to me, in the summers that I spent there, was a reminder of harvests.

Obvious, too, is the people’s deep connection to protein. When the occasion calls for it, the Ilocano—having been taught well by the vagaries of nature—grabs the opportunity and dines royally on meat in its many forms.

The Ilocano longganisa comes first to mind. Garlic and lots of it are mixed with minced pork marinated in black vinegar, pepper and salt and stuffed into long undivided intestine coils. The absence of divisions is a detail that sets this apart from the sausage concoction of other regions. One can slice the sausage to suit the length of one’s appetite. It also underscores the Ilocano penchant to save on the proverbial string.

Other meat dishes, like adobo, igado, dinardaraan, for example share culinary provenance from various influences. The Ilocano adapts and is no stranger to fusion. Yet, the predominance of garlic in the cooking identify these dishes as Ilocano-made in the same way that the use of coconut milk and chili distinguishes the inclination of another region.

But to me, if there is only one meat you need to eat. Bagnet it is, the King, the one meat that will lord over all.

Innocently sitting on a plate, it whispers: “Eat me… Eat me….!!!”

And one replies after the first bite: Apa unay iti imas nan!

How can it not land at the top of a carnivore’s love list with its crest of golden crunchy crust that oozes with the delictable fat? And that’s just from looking at it.

The bagnet has been enjoyed in Ilocos since God created the pig, the repository of all things cholesterol. The habit of eating bagnet on birthdays, weddings, baptisms and all ocassions in between predates the heart surgeries pioneered by Dr. Christian Barnard. It will continue even after the discovery of the aerobics exercise. Diet fads may come and go but this dish will remain a national and extra-territotrial culinary favorite.

Bagnet is seldom eaten alone. The lechon, it’s variant famous in some other region, is flavored with tanglad or eaten with liver sauce. But the bagnet emerges iconic and triumphant with the troika of kamatis, bagoong, and lasuna in attendance. That the initials of the side dish spell KBL (echoing the most powerful political party headed by Apo Marcos, the most powerful Ilocano of the time) is telling of another facet of the people. Nationally profiled as frugal, the Ilocano people are never dull. Their tongue-in-cheek humor, similar to a double-bladed knife, can simutaneously rib and pay homage to authority.

And more importantly, as basi is my witness, we certainly know how to imbibe. Ilocanos love their tipple and will defend their right to enjoy it. When Spain, in 1807, decreed a monopoly on the production and drinking of wine, including basi, the whole of basi-producing Ilocos protested and rose in arms. Others may look on this event as a juvenile exercise in defense of the right to party. But scholars of recent vintage have posited a new way of looking at this event.

In certain civilizations, the scholars postulate, wine—being more than a drink—was a bridge to an altered state of consciousness. Inebriation was a means to enter the spiritual realm; a venue of communion with God similar to the ritual of the Catholic Mass. The prohibition to produce basi was more than a threat to livelihood. It was a repression of a set of spiritual beliefs and practices that were held by the ancient Ilocanos even before the Spaniards came. In short, the Ilocanos, in declaring war, were more than just being troublemakers for its sake. They were trying to uphold their right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

(By the same logic, the Ilocano practice of eating dog meat in ancient times had a spiritual significance. But let me reserve that for another essay.)

The chain of events that led to what historians would eventually refer to as the Basi Revolt of 1807 has been memorialized by Esteban Pichay-Villanueva 14 years after it occurred. The painter is genealogically connected to me by name. And to my Tatang by his profession: a fisherman.

How he, who only worked with boat and net, managed to manipulate oil with a watercolor brush to paint 14 scenes upon the request of some patron remains a delicious conundrum. Sad that no other paintings made by him survive. The aknowledged great Filipino painter before my Lolo Teban is, of course, Juan Luna, another Ilocano from Badoc. He of Spoliarium fame had years of art training under reknowned teachers and at the Escuella de Bellas Artes de San Fernando in Spain. On the other hand, when asked to paint, Lolo Teban, barely knowing the language of perspective and proportion, simply painted. When you look at the paintings as it now hangs in the Burgos Museum in Vigan, it becomes obvious what an excellent naif art it is. How did he do it? Some people attribute the feat to some inate spirit that spurs the Ilocano to grab at an opportunity and give it his all.

But also, there is a strong animo that guides the Ilocano to pack bags and ride carabao to settle elsewhere in search of a better home. Since the beginning of the 19^th century, Ilocanos have been re-settling. First, to other parts of Luzon. And like my Tatang and Nanang in the late 1940’s, farther south in areas such as Zamboanga and Cotabato. Then in the 1950’s, to venture by boat to the pineapple plantations of Hawaii. It is said that at the recruitment line, the farmers only had to show their thick calloused hands to get the job. Those hands helped jumpstart the US pineapple canning industry.

Driven by need, the Ilocano is ambition personified. They maximize whatever skills they have and make sure they come out of a game better than when they started. And because they have been born to harsh surroundings, they are used to working harder. And more importantly, amidst set-backs, they endure. Maybe they turned out this way because of all the meat that they eat. Or the basi in their gene pool. Who knows?

On the subject of drinking, the dish du jour is the imbaliktad. Back in the day when farmers celebrated, a cow was slaughtered in a clearing near an open field. Within minutes, a chunk of red meat would be sliced and thrown in a very hot skillet to be quickly turned over (imbaliktad) and taken out of the heat to be sliced and dunked in black vinegar to be enjoyed by all.

As for the serious mam-martek of old, men who took to heavy drinking and their machismo seriously, I understand that the pulutan of choice is dinakdakan, grilled pig’s face, ears and fatty bits shopped finely into squares, mixed with onion and smothered in creamy pig brain. Take that, Mr. Bourdain. Eaten on a regular basis, dinakdakan can shorten a life span faster than you can say heart attack.

My grandfather—who I recall, was referred to respectfully by others as Don Cleto—ate everything meat. Chicken, pig, goat, deer, rabbit, bird, monitor lizard, snake. Did he eat dog? I don’t recall. It could be safe to say that, domesticated or wild—just like any other Ilocano—he ate them all. And following the French—he may have tried everything at least once.

I grew up in the 60’s a Manila Boy. I lived a childhood supervised by aunts who served as my mothers—characters all from an Almodovar movie—in a house that my grandfather owned in the old district of Quiapo. We had a smattering of Ilocano neighbors. But the real Ilocano enclave in Manila in the 60’s was on and around the streets of Dapitan.

My Lolo Cleto made sure that he built a strong house of many rooms to better accommodate the growing clan. And so it was that cousins, close or distant, sought temporary lodgings in the house by Pax Street as they finished their studies in Manila.

Almost every month, a cousin/lodger would receive a pao-it from his or her parents from the province. Even then, the Ilocano already had the extraordinary penchant and persistent need to send and/or receive balikbayan boxes. The care package of medium size, sent from Laoag the night before, would arrive in Manila the next morning always looking travel-weary and dishevelled. Most likely than not, a corner of the cardboard box would be seeping oil betraying the riches within; Or reeking of vinegar that announced the breakage of the bottle containing the mukhasim-inducing inartem. I would get the knife, cut the string that held the karton in place, flip the soggy top open and see Ilocos reflected by its bounty. Fried meat, vegetables and fruits galore. When a town fiesta was celebrated days before, I would open a box and find myself face to face with the head of a pig. Around it would be a necklace of chewy tupig wrapped in banana leaves, the loot encrusted with rounds of golden bibingka, quivery dudol. It is not hard to imagine these same rice concoctions were shared by our early ancestors with the Spanish platoon led by Juan de Salcedo when the military contingent from Intramuros first marched into Ilocano territory in 1571. There is pleasure in knowing that these foods, just like the Ilocanos who made them, have not only travelled in space, but also in time.

In the early days, air travel was like going to the moon. It was restrictive even to really rich people. And even the Ilocano folks who had the means—always frugal with their luxuries—took to flying only when it was absolutely necessary that they reach Laoag in a hurry. Otherwise, everyone , including my Tiang Caring and I, took a 12-hour overnight bus ride to get to Laoag from Manila—an adventure that one can take even up to now. In those days, half-fare for children was determined by a height marker on the bus. When it was time to be measured, I always slouched low to save on the fare.

The trip was clockwork with pit stops in two places where the passengers were let out and given a chance to stretch their cramped legs and eat a bowl of aroz caldo. You knew you reached the pit stop because the conductor or the driver, as the bus halts to a stop, would rouse the sleeping passengers with “Isbu-isbu apo!” to signal the fifteen minute latrine break. If you were female, the comfort room was inside a squat shack covered in nipa beside the roadside carenderia. If you were male, the grassy side of the road would do. Remember, this was the early 70’s.

By midnight, we would be driving by La Union (the Martial Law curfew that required all transport activity to stop between the hours of midnight to 4 a.m., would still come in 1972). I could never sleep on a night trip. There were so many things to see. Outside the bus window, illluminated by the headlights, the white welcome arches of town after town would loom, whoosh and disappear. We gauged how fast or how slow the trip was by the place we had reached at a certain hour. At four a.m. if we hadn’t passed Vigan, the trip would be late arriving in Laoag. If the ride was uneventful (meaning: no flat tires or engine trouble), the dawn would break on us happy travellers in the first towns of Ilocos Norte. Soon, people would start disembarking along concrete bus stops with the names of politicans painted on its side. I would look forward to seeing the welcome arch announcing Batac. A few more minutes and I would feel the rush of seeing the sign announcing San Nicolas sincerely believing that, because of the namesake, this town was named after me! By the time I saw the top of the sinking bell tower, I knew we had arrived in Laoag.

Lolo Cleto was already in his mid-70’s when, as a child of six, I went visiting. His breakfast of champions was a dish called yusi, a flavorful concoction made from only one main ingredient. You guessed it: meat. Bite sized pork flank and liver are cooked until tender in a clear broth flavored with green chives and salt.

This is how breakfast would go. I would go to the old man seated by the head of the table and kiss him on both cheeks. He always smelled of talcum powder.

“Sino ka?”, he would say.

“Anak ti anak yo nga ni Floy.”, I would reply.

And recognizing his grandpaternity over me, he would smile and deliver a hug.

The Pichay clan of Vigan, like a majority of the Ilocanos, comes from a mix of races that spanned east and west. In that sense, our DNA was global even before the term came into vogue. The clan’s early roots were probably Chinese as our two-syllable name implies. But we had Spanish in us and probably some Tinggian blood, too. Although Lolo Cleto had almond eyes, he also had an aqualine nose like a church saint. Some of his children looked like him. But some were also dark skinned, curly haired and had wide noses. He spoke only Spanish, English and Ilocano, never Chinese. And he spoke a Tagalog that had a funny accent.

According to family lore, Lolo Cleto was a natural adventurer. When he was about to become of age, a marriage was arranged for him by his parents to a girl not his choosing. Committed to another love, Lolo Cleto eloped with my young Lola Columba. They escaped further north to Laoag with nothing but a leather suit case, raging hormones and a dream. He sired six children. Then his wife died a few years after my father was born. Lolo Cleto mourned and lived a widower’s life for a year. Afterwhich, he married my Lola’s sister, Pinang, which I was told, was not an unusual practice of the times. They had six more children. A son of the primero nuptia, Tio Goyo, died fighting the Japanese in 1945. At family gatherings, he was always remembered as a hero. In his old age, Lolo Cleto lost his teeth but not his hair. His locks only turned white. He never stooped, only became slow in gait.

At the breakfast table he would laddle the hot yusi on my plate until a sea of broth formed around my little mountain of rice. While the elders talked of this and that, I would slurp away barely talking. In those days, eating was a serious business. So serious that in the presence of adults, children were expected to concentrate on their food and not give their opinion on world events. Those mornings, seated on the wood and metal batibot chair, my feet dangling above the floor with no one to talk to, I had no choice but to commune with my yusi: big meat flavor, light and clean on the palate. The meat was light brown and tender; the liver, dark and chewy like clotted blood. Eaten with rice, it warmed my stomach. A perfect prelude to a day of climbing fruit trees, swimming by the Vintar Dam, catching dalag by the irrigation ditch or playing sha-tong by the big, leafy agarlobo tree on dusty Abadilla Street.

In my latest trip to Ilocos, the landscape is again in flux. Massive concrete houses have sprung in the middle of rice fields where nipa huts used to float. A dip in the economy in the 90’s has set another wave of migration causing many an Ilocano and Ilocana professional (public school teacher to nurse) to hold their egos in check while they work as factory workers, or chambermaids, or drivers or machinists in dollar-rich jurisdictions. Some of the architecture of these houses are bizarre, to say the least. Most look like mansions dreamed out of a doll house. And the owners seem to favor bright pink, green and blue. But the scale and grandeur of these visions leave no doubt. These are show pieces: Together with the ubiquitous stainless steel tricycle parked within its gate, to show off the owner’s humble beginnings and the his current place of stature.

In the absence of parents, in the years that they were earning, the foodie that I am makes me wonder: Who has been cooking for the Ilocano’s next generation? Driving by the highway, I see a string of insistent billboards selling burgers and fries. For me, they ruin the scenery.

By the Batac river bank, my friends and I enjoy a pleasant February afternoon walking by the food stalls. The chill of January still in the air. Around us, the Ilocano youth has adapted to digital interconnectedness, texting on phones and face-booking on laptops while munching on crunchy emapanada. The food is big as a hand, the bright orange color making it look like a fried crab. Others are blowing across hot bowls of mami.

We hungrily bite into our orders. The crisp fried rice flour crumbles into the tongue. And then the monggo, shredded papaya, longganisa and egg make their separate entrances. This is real food. The flavors flooding the coves of memory. It links me to my childhood. Like the basi of the ancients, it opens a gateway. It strengthens my identity. It clarifies the pride of my history; defines the Ilocano-ness in me.

Writing Exercise

2010-06-11T13:31:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

We were asked to choose a picture from the the Cartier Bresson exhibit in MoMa. I chose the picture of a boy going down a Parisian street cradling two big bottles of wine on each hand. We were told that the chosen picture is the second scene from a play in our head.

The exercise involves writing a prose outline of the imaginary scene before this scene in the picture. And then to write the last 4 scenes after the scene in the picture to come up with six scenes all in all to complete the play.

This is what I wrote:

Juliette

Scene 1

This is Juliette’s third summer in Avignon. She has nearly forgotten why she had escaped here. Sometimes, she resents the amnesia.

Her French has improved enough to banter with the grocer after the baguettes and cheese have been tallied up. It’s always about the prices and how her hair is a lovely shade of brown. Shall she accept Pierre’s invitation to go to the Arles to see the house where Van Gogh cut off his ear.

She carries her bags. It is much lighter than she thought it was. There were two large bottles of olive oil. And then she remembers. She quickly looks behind just in time to see the boy behind her by the aisles running with two bottles that look like small dolphin heads.

Juliette walks with a cane and can’t run as fast. Julietta asks the grocer for help. But there’s a long line and this is the only open cashier.

She shouts: Thief! Thief! She can't remember the French word for thief.

The boy has gotten away.

Scene 2

The boy zooms past people and tourists, never looking back, as if his sixth sense made him aware of losing the woman. The woman is lost. And the boy strides less hurriedly. His breath returns to normal. He walks like a prince. He meets two girls on his way who greet him. But he doesn’t care.

Scene 3

The following day, there is a commotion in the large plaza by the way to the old Pope's castle. Juliette is drawn to the scene. She uses her limp to get people to give way. She finds herself at the front of the crowd that has gathered in a circle.

In the middle of the heads and shoulders, a boy in shorts and a dark long sleeved sweater is found face down. A bottle of olive oil broken by his side looking like an ocean’s oil spill by the blood. The other bottle is unbroken in the boy’s embrace, as if like a baby.

Scene 4

At the morgue, Juliette has an argument with the mortician. In her bad French, she tries to explain that she wants to see the child. But the mortician prevents her from doing so because everything is still under investigation.

Scene 5

Juliette is lying down, her feet up in stirrups. A doctor is trying to scrape out something from within her. She feels that this is what she wants. But she also feels that in the middle of the procedure she has changed her mind. But the person scraping her doesn’t seem to understand. She talks and it is garbled. She knows she is speaking French but it sounds different. Her speech is slurred.

Something is coming out between her legs.

It is a someone.

It is slimy and fully formed. It is big and smiling.

It is the boy carrying the two bottles of olive oil.

She wakes up in a sweat. It is a dream.

Scene 6

She is by her phone. She calls long distance. She talks to her husband.

It is an answering machine.

She confesses to the machine what she did to their baby. And why she did it.The husband suddenly answers the phone in the middle of her confession. He asks her where she is.

She is speechless. She speaks in bad French. She pretends to be another woman.

She hangs up.

Plays, Plays, Plays

2010-05-22T07:31:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

I went to two play readings of the May-I Lab. One was a children’s play, performed with much enthusiasm and written with charm. It touched on the usual hallmarks of cutesy aphorisms that convince parents that this will be good for their children. Happy End of the World is about cultivating imagination and being proud to be different and all that jazz. Written from a middle class point of view makes the play’s tension a little bit more safe and slack; the lessons learned a bit more shallow, predictable and just a tad unsatisfying. Who said writing for children was easy? But its in the development stage so nothing is written in stone. I'm sure this play will find its way home.

The other play, a re-working of the Hansel and Gretel story, had an interesting premise. Alas, we knew its mettle two minutes into the play. It was all text and no sub-text. This play will begin to show its promise if the writing focused on one story, instead of dissipating the dramatic energy into several sub-plots.

But this Sunday, I also saw The Temperamentals. It tells the personal love story of Harry Hays and Rudy Gernreich and tells it as together with Hay's effort at organizing the Matacchine Society, one of the precursors of the gay political movement. Written in a kind of dula-tula (dramatized monologue) style, it captured my imagination with his technique of dramatizing the historical and compressing arguments to a clarified minimum. I particularly appreciated the first scene of Act II when the actors, donning various hats, represented Harry Hay’s torment and support from the women of his life. This would have taken two chapters in a narrative. In the play, it was reduced to a short scene. I also liked that the play was funny and sad at the same time. It gave me an idea of how best to dramatize an advocacy without sounding didactic or heavy handed. I think the secret is finding the personal, human story that threads the movement. The other thing that struck me with the play’s structure is the way major things were left implied rather than overtly stated. The love story between the two men and their breakup was more profoundly stated because it did not play to melodrama. Restraint seems more effective in these cases.

Finally, I’ve noticed that although the pacing is quick and energetic, the blocking is minimal and contained. The show eliminated all extraneous movements. The actors stand and deliver their lines with the barest of movements, usually in the face. This has the effect of maximizing the gestures (like caressing a face or a hand touching) when finally they make it.

But the reiteration I got from the production was the use of musical interludes—the song in Act 1 and the clarinet solos in Act II—which were used to bridge the narrative as well as a tool for exposition made the play soar, specially because the music was integrated into the action of the play. Dramatically, it is a surprise and a lift. And I know that this will influence me in the way I write my plays in the future.

2010-05-14T07:13:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

Went to yoga yesterday. I felt great afterwards. Then went to Jacks a 99 cent store and bought something to make spaghetti with. The kitchen filled with the smell of tomatoes, capers, garlic and more garlic. I found a day-old grilled pork chop in the fridge from a take-out. I cut the meat up and put it in the sauce. Here is how it finally looked.

Not bad, no?

Today, I’m excited to wear my new spring suit to the Verdi opera with no intermission. Will I be able to hold it in? Tony, my friend, reminds me not to drink coffee or tea before the show. I'm excited, too, about the music. Will it blow me out of my mind to hear, what my friend says, as music played by one of the best orchestras in the world?

I try to see as many operas as I can, specially when my friend is treating. Also, because opera is expensive: to produce and to see. And there are not a lot of operas being produced where I come from.

So here's to later.

Do You Pangalay?

2010-05-03T11:34:00.001-07:00

03 May 10

Kaibigan,

It is fairly safe to state that a sophisticated standard of performance has been set in the Folkloric Dance World—from Belarus to Bayanihan.

For the modern audience, the presentation of folk dances has evolved from a mere spectator sport to a venue for discourse that has raised anthropological concerns and spawned aesthetic challenges.

Serious folk dance companies have stepped up their game and are interested in discovering authenticity (with a clear intention of presenting the dances in the context of the culture where it forms part), as well as honing dance skills and improving repertory.

With regard to ancient forms, it is common practice for these dance companies to set-up dance schools in order to codify the dance vocabulary and to ensure that skills are handed down in perpetuity. In many communities in the south of the Philippines, training in the Pangalay dance tradition begins as early as 6 years old in the same way that the west has ballet classes for kids. Dance vocabulary is very important in these traditions. The correct and exact positioning of the fingers and thumb, in relation to the hands, the angle of the head in relation to the focus of the eyes, among others, are all important in the same way that the Russians place importance in the naming and proper execution of arms and leg positions in classical ballet.

To me, the works of the Bayanihan Philippine Dance Company and the Ramon Obusan Folkloric Group, as well as individual teachers like Ms. Ligaya Amilbangsa are prime examples of how folk dance have been used to serve anthropological research, heritage conservation and dance aesthetics. Their programs feature distillation of researched indigenous dances and presented with clear demarcations of a beginning, rising action, climax and denouement. They feature dancers who have received extensive training, possess above average dancing skills, and who can dance well individually as well as one body or a dance corp.

The performances of these groups enthrall because they feature colorful and authentic attire and skillfull dancing and music making. Moreover, the dances are staged to engage the mind to imagine and empathize with a culture not of one’s own. With no words and not much of a plot, the audience gets captivated in the magical way in which dance communicates through feeling.

The recent show of Pandibulan by the Kinding Sindaw at the La Mama etc. shows a digression from this tradition as it explores folk dance forms as dance drama. As led by Potri Ranka Manis, this dance theatre company, as the program notes reveal, “envisions that through the use of the ancient art forms[,] the virtue and teachings of the ancestors will be able to guide the present and future generations.”

The Pandibulan features a program of Yakan dances centering on the pangalay dance tradition as found mainly in Basilan, south of the Philippines.

Pangalay (also known as Daling-Daling or Mengalai in Sabah) in is the traditional “fingernail” dance of the Tausūg people of the Sulu Archipelago and Sabah.[1] This dance is the most distinctively Asian of all the Southern Philippine dances because dancers must have dexterity and flexibility of the shoulders, elbows, and wrists[2] – movements that strongly resemble those of “kontaw silat,” a martial art common in the Malay Archipelago. The Pangalay is performed mainly during weddings or other festive events[1]. The male equivalent of the Pangalay is the Pangasik and features more martial movements, while a pangalay that features both a male and female dancer is called Pangiluk.

The original concept of the Pangalay is based on the pre-Islamic Buddhist concept of male and female celestial angels (Sanskrit: Vidhyadhari, Bahasa Sūg: Biddadari) common as characters in other Southeast Asian dances.

Neighboring Samal and Bajau peoples call this type of dance, Umaral or Igal, and they sometimes use bamboo castanets as substitutes for long fingernails.[2]

A modern variant of this dance popular among the peoples of Mindanao, Sulu and Sabah is called Pakiring, and emphasizes movement of the hips (kiring-kiring) more than the traditional dance. It is performed to electro versions of traditional songs and is fast overtaking the traditional Pangalay in popularity at weddings.

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pangalay)

According to a renowned researcher-teacher, the pangalay tradition has an extensive dance vocabulary that surpasses even that of classical ballet.

The Pandibulan, as conceptualized, choreographed and directed by Ms. Manis incorporates a few of the pangalay vocabulary into telling the story of a Yakan woman undergoing an interview as a caregiver in the US and is stereotyped by a white employer as being an un-complaining and submissive worker from the Third World. The story flashes back to the Yakan community where the woman is from. We are introduced to the community through a series of dances that cover the universal rituals of marriage, childbirth and death. The program also includes dance iterations of the eclipse folk tale as adapted from Yakan oral tradition and a chanting, the contents of which are not properly explained.

The night I watched, the female dancers, clad in colorful, often iridescent costumes, were a delight to watch. However, their dancing was uneven and may need more polishing specially in the parts that required unison. The male dancers were not up to par. Their dancing lacked tension. Their hand and arm placements were fuzzy and uncontrolled. One dancer failed to pick-up his spear from the ground after a plain somersault in a dance demonstrating skill.

But even if the dramaturgy lacked clarity and cohesiveness, the audience seemed to enjoy the evening. After the show, a horde of fans joined the dancers on stage for souvenir photos.

Welcome to the City

2010-04-24T10:13:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

I rested my yoga mat to tie my shoe laces on the street after a yoga class. When I was done, I picked my drink with my left hand and a notebook to the address of my next appointment in another and immediately briskly walked to the subway. And then suddenly, I remembered the mat! I literally ran to the corner where I tied my shoes. Five minutes after I left it, the yoga mat was gone!

Arghhhhhh!

Let it go. Let it go.

Yoga for Whom?

2010-04-22T08:50:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

I went to a reasonably-priced yoga place. It's website says that it was established as an alternative to to the expensive and snooty yoga culture of New York. At least, that's their press release. The yoga is by donation. But I have a system for receiving no less than $10 per class. The rates become even less if one takes the bulk classes of a month to a year.

When I got there, the hot yoga advertised was actually Bikram, a system of yoga that is the current rage where one does a series of asanas in a room heated to about two degrees hotter than the normal body temperature. I didn't bring my trunks and towel, only the mat lent by my sister Dawn. The girl at the counter, who it would turn out was also going to handle the class, was helpful enough. She lent me the trunks, gave me a towel. And the manager promptly rang me $12, including the class ($10+$2towel=$12). Seeing my small bottle of water, he suggested I get a bigger bottle for an extra $2. I declined because my yoga teacher at home reminded us to drink water hours before the class--not during class. The manager insisted I pay up front and not after class (as would have been more convenient because by then I had all my stuff, including my wallter, in the locker). And more pressing, the class was about to begin. That's New York for you. Something I want to imbibe, in a way is how their attitude towards business, always looking out for the bottom dollar sign. The facilities in this center are much better. There is no smelly socks, sweaty feet smell like that place on 8th Avenue. And the heaters can really get hot. There were plenty of NYU student types both men and women and the hall was nearly full. I noticed that in the two yoga classes I went to here, the teacher will not correct postures as much as they would at home. They don't call attention to bad posture. I don't think they even remember the names of the students. I think it's too much of an expectation with the constant change of students. I really don't mind that since in effect, it encourages a more personal focus for the practitioner. One becomes more focused on one's body. The awareness to improve on the pose is more personal, instead of showing off to a teacher to get the encouragement.

But what I did mind was that the rest of the class seem to lack discipline. A lot of the people fidgeted in between the poses. The black guy at my side kept drinking water. The girl to my front kept doing extraneous movements-- brushing sweat out of her eyes, moving her legs in places that required stillness. One can respond with the distraction with an extra dose of concentration. Nonetheless, I felt that the teacher should have brought the matter to the attention of the class. No moving between poses.

Before the class, my surrounding classmates sensed that it was my first time to join them. I smiled at the black guy beside me but he simply ignored me. The others around were busy arranging their mats.

When we reached the balancing series (one leg up, the other straight like a resting heron), the black guy was huffing. He couldn't stay in the arrow pose. By the time we got to triangle, 1/4 of the class--including the black guy was puffing. By triangle pose, the dividing line had been drawn. A few of the class lay down (not sit, but lay down on the floor. How odd!) The black guy stopped, braced himself against the wall and began gulping water. Me? I was gloriously in triangle pose with three inhales to spare. And I credit that for staying still, breathing and not drinking water in class. And I'm merely saying that to affirm the good practice habits I learned at home.

The class ended I passed through the counter for the exit. N, the fat manager who probably never did a breathing exercise in his life was counting the daily take. He was happy. He was so happy, in fact, that he told me to get any drink from the ref "on the house". And he was tireless at telling people who came by the counter that they were offering discounts to their monthly unlimited classes in a friendly but definitely business-like kind of way. Meanwhile, the pile of NYU types was thickening at the entrance as the next class was about to begin. All seemed eager to experience stretching inside a heated room no matter the quality of their poses and the ability of the guru to lead.

Situating the Center

2010-04-12T14:03:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

In visits past, this city was a daunting place of strange subway connections. My first, of a set, of realizations was that going to the opposite track did not necessarily mean returning to where one has been. Include in the list my awe at the nature of the supermarket here. I walk in any which one and the variety of goods available is astounding. But choice is illusion if one doesn't really have the means. This city--any rich city-- is cruel that way to those who only have a pocketful of coins. There are free things to try. But like the free tastings in a grocery, the sample does not satisfy. It merely wakes a slumbering curiosity and nags at the desire to acquire. In this sense, I feel that I'm a little boy in a candy store with only a dollar to spend.

They say that healthy deprivation brings out the creativity in us. No wonder, this city has the most number of artists per square inch. There must be some outlet for all these unresolved cravings. For every frustration borne of desire, there is an equal invention of a source of pleasure.

2010-04-07T09:21:00.000-07:00

2010-04-06T08:11:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

If you were given a chance to live in the center of all cities for six months, on a budget, without an income, with the sole purpose of "absorbing" and "creating", would you do it? I have been blessed to live a dream.

It is a sabbatical. A time to rest. To breathe anew. To breath new. A beginning of sorts.

This city is in early Spring.

The picture is a view from my window. After Easter, I've noticed more light in the sky when I wake up at 6 a.m. Although it is still cold, there is less imperative to use the heater. Yesterday, there was sun and I took a bike ride with Bill through parts of the big park. Amidst the population and the high rise buildings, the city is known for this valley of green that has one side of it running along a river. Underneath the city is a system of railways that ferry a thousand commuters everyday to offices, to art, to community, secret trysts. It cannot be any other city. It can only be this city.

My camera in hand, my laptop over my shoulder. It will be six months on a safari. The landscape, the food, the new tribes, strange rituals, the wildlife. Am I ready for it?

Hell, yeah! I've been preparing for it my whole life.

Fruits and Fish

2009-08-25T20:49:00.000-07:00

I like fish and fruits specially when drawn by Borlongan, Manansala and Ang Kiukok. I can stare at them for hours without feeling hungry, unlike when I watch the Food Channel.

Manansala's fish, for example are so diaphonous, I could drape them on to a young barrio lass's bodice. While Borlongan's fish don't have eyes at all. Blind, they don't know the end of their journey, not unlike the eyes of the fishermfolk (not seen here) carrying them from the dank sea. For dessert, we could have Ang Kiukok's pointy watermelons. But the black seeds embedded on the orange-brown flesh of the fruit are too precious to ruin, if eaten.

Let me complete this scene by telling you how delicately I'm sipping a glass of Chianti and nibbling on fava beans slightly sauteed in butter.

Salut!

NOT DELICADEZA

2009-08-15T18:16:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

NOT DELICADEZA

All this talk about people hot having delicadeza has gotten me into remembering my freshman year in law school when our teacher asked whether we could sue based on a person not having any such sense.

The concept of delicadeza presupposes that a society is guided by a generally accepted moral compass that points to acceptable and unacceptable behavior. The sense of delicadeza requires us to play fair and be honest in our dealings with others specially in matters or circumstances not strictly covered by law or formal rules. In answer to the question, we concluded that not having delicadeza can not be the sole basis for a civil or criminal complaint. Nonetheless, being oblivious of exercising delicadeza may have some other socially-related consequences, such as being ridiculed in public.

The practice of delicadeza is admired since it is a voluntary and conscience-driven act that moves a person to act correctly or appropriately even if it is contrary to one’s personal interest. It is, most of all, an act of spiritual honesty.

Test your delicadeza IQ with the following hypothetical circumstances:

1. In a democratic framework that strongly encourages accountability by way of checks and balances, should one practice delicadeza when one is in a position to gain advantage over others by abusing and misusing power and authority?

__Agree __No Way

2. Are we enjoined by delicadeza not to rig the results of any game with rules, whether it is a sports contest, a competition for an award or an election (specially when we are in a position to do so)?

__Agree __No Way

3 Should your sense of delicadeza prevent you from employing lies and manufacturing diversionary tactics to befuddle the issue, even as one’s hands have been caught in the proverbial cookie jar?

__Agree __No Way

3. Will you practice delicadeza by declining a position or returning an award which your recognized peers think you do not deserve?

__Agree __No Way

What your test scores say:

If you answered No Way in at least one of the questions, please check the mirror. We have our moments of weakness. There may still be time to prevent an outbreak.

If you answered No way in more than one but less than three of the questions, its time to check if you still have real friends.

If you answered No Way in all of the 4 questions, we know who you are. Just in case you haven’t noticed: Ang kakapal ng mga mukha niyo. May I suggest you get a dermabrating foot spa on your calloused faces.

First Reading

2009-06-19T20:27:00.000-07:00

They think it's a comedy.

It's the first reading of "Isang Araw sa Karnabal" a one-act play I wrote in time for the Writers' Bloc Virgin Labfest V.

There is always discoveries in these readings. When I write the script, I often have strong ideas on how the scene is going to be played. In the reading, the playwright is often amazed that there is more to what he wrote than he thought.

It helps that I have great actors-- Skyz Labastilla and Paolo O'Hara. And a very skilled director, Chris Millado. If you come to the shows (June 27 and 30 at 8pm; June 27 and July 1 at 3pm, at the Huseng Batute Theatre) we promise to share with you an intimate story about a young and confused couple dealing with desaparecidos in their lives.

Blood Extraction Junkie

2009-04-03T17:37:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

It helps that I have an HMO that covers the procedure. In days where I feel low or frustrated, or feel fat, ugly or unwanted; or I have an unexpressed rage or self-loathing—I don’t binge on fatty sisig while bathing in (as my friend, Luna Sikat, refers to as) selfpitypathos. I turn to the needle.

Before, I used to walk the black and blues away. Malate, Recto or Chinatown were my favorite destinations. But the city has become so polluted. Last time I walked, I turned—I kid you not—into a quasi-taong-grasa, in two hours. The road asphalt literally stuck on my hair, face, shirt and exposed arms. The malls don’t offer any relief, either. The Hollywood movies are bland; the sale items are stale; the food offerings starchy, oily and overpriced; and the crowds are far too noisy and restless.

So, instead of browsing the fake blue ray porno disks at Makati Cinema Square, I walk, hop and skip over to the Makati Med and get a doctor’s approval for a blood test. I am telling you, it is safer than bungee jumping.

Usually, I start thinking about the blood test on a Saturday night when the week’s frustrations weigh heavily and clear. I’m in my room thinking, “What am I doing in my room thinking? I don’t have the energy to find out where my friends are hanging out. Most often, earlier that day I baled out on an invite to play badminton.

Come Monday morning, I’m up and chirpy. I skip breakfast to continue the 12-hour fast I started at 9 p.m. the previous night. I make sure I make the early trip to avoid the parking lot glut at the hospital. Once I’m inside the hospital, I calm down. I walk briskly to the blood extraction department, settle on a chair along the narrow hallway, making sure that I don’t sit opposite the comfort room. (This is also the section where urine and stool samples are given over the counter. So please excuse my paranoia. I always imagine the whiff of piss and turd whenever the comfort room doors swing open.)

When my number is called, I stand up like I’ve been called valedictorian. I smile and acknowledge the applause from the crowd—except that it’s just in my mind. I push the door that says “Blood Extraction Patients Only”. Most of the time the room has three people sitting side by side in various stages of distress. There are times when a child will be there sitting on the lap of a concerned parent.

I wait for my turn. The medical technologist confirms my stats. I extend my arm trying not to smile too much. The flat rubber cord is tied around my right upper arm. I clench my fist. Tap, tap, tap goes the med tech sweet-talking my veins to appear. The disposable syringe is undressed from its anticeptic wrapping. A final dab of alcohol on my skin. The needle is unsheathed from the protective covering. Then my favorite part of the ritual. The prick is poised above. The instruction to take a deep breath is given. I look as the sharp point connects. The thinnest and sharpest of metals slides into my skin as smoothly as a fork tong slides into a caramel colored leche flan. A vortex of feelings rises over me.

Whereas before, I was only capable of entering into one state of sensation at a time—pleasure stored in one box, in another, pain—needle piercing skin produces a relentless barrage of information that produces all feelings, all at once.

The physical self yields to the reality of mortality and eternity. I am no longer a mere human experiencing ice cream on the tongue on a hot summer day at age 6. The needle inside my skin finding its way to into the minute cavity of the vein triggers memories and realities and in all time frames. I am young and I am old; in the past and in the future. Emotions spurt and gush like blood filling the syringe. I am pulled by the hair and kissed at the same time; I am tied and let loose; I panic and cannot breath, but I also fly and am free, no longer dependent on air. You want it to stop, but you also want them to take more blood. It is penitence and charity mixed in the same pot.

And that’s what makes it addicting.

Chance Encounters at the National Library

2008-09-19T01:04:00.001-07:00

Kaibigan,

The National Library is 121 Years Old. According to Director Prudenciana C. Cruz, it was in August 12, 1887 when a Spanish Royal Decree created the Biblioteque Nacional. A slew of subsequent legislations led to the evolution of what is now known as the National Library of the Philippines, of which she is the current head.

The building of the NLP was one of the handsomest buildings in the area when it was first built in 1961. It has withstood time and the harsh earthquake of 1990. Its original elevator is still what ferries passengers and books between the floors. And if you love high ceilings, speckled marble floors, old wooden tables, and helpful librarians who know their books, you will find your heaven here. The left wing of the building is occupied by the Archives Management Office. Why it is there is another story.

The two men represented in the sculptures found in front of the National Library are not the first librarians of the Philippines, contrary to what I heard a guide once say to a bunch of Japanese tourists. Maybe he had that idea because in both sculptures, the figures are seated as if ready to catalogue a book and whisk it off to shelving. But if he had looked closely enough, he would have found out that the statues had nothing to do with the National Library and more with the streets fronting the building -- on the left is Teodoro M. Kalaw and on the right is Apolinario Mabini.

When a balikbayan cousin comes to visit Manila, you might want to use the NLP as a boasting point. The original manuscript of the Noli Me Tangere (yes, the one handwritten by the Dr. Jose P. Rizal) is part of the collection of the National Library. Understandably, it is kept in an airconditioned vault where it may be better preserved against the harsh heat of the tropics.

I don’t know about you, but I love books. I collect them like I do shoes or prints of old maps. Sometimes, I buy books for the aesthetic pleasure of their arresting covers, their content, or their age. Sometimes, I find myself very lucky to find these three elements in one book. In one of my forays to the second hand bins in a Recto bookstore, I picked-up the original language version of Henrik Ibsen’s Peer Gynt published in 1951. I bought it en seguida, even though I don’t speak a word of Swedish. What made my purchase compelling was that when I was still a freshman, I had the honor of translating this particular play into Filipino (from the English version) for Tony Mabesa’s Dulaang UP Production.

I crave handling books in my hands. Like an anthropologist with an artifact. In between reading the chapters I spend time feeling the book’s paper, admiring the binding and sniffing that weird mixture of dried ink and glue that wafts up as you open and close its new pages. With an old book, specially those which are older than me (and at my age now, I find this happening less and less), I become reverential. How can one not, when these old books carry words which have traveled through time. I begin by clearing the table of all other things before placing the book exactly in the middle of the space. I contemplate the cover while letting it breathe and become familiar in its new place. I imagine the people whose hands have handled the same book. When it is time—when the book signals me to begin—I affectionately and carefully turn over the cover and travel through its pages.

When beset with stressing deadlines, other people smoke, drink or overeat. Me? I visit the second hand book sellers along Recto. Sadly, these bibliographic forays have yielded less and less gems in the recent years, the bookstands’ wares slowly giving way to standard second hand textbooks and novelty store sex aids. My suking Manong doesn’t even sell erotic magazines anymore. The accessibility of images in the internet has adversely affected their market.

The next best thing for me is to go to the rare books section of the National Library, where many a rare book or manuscripts is just waiting for chance encounters. The last time I went there, I had a look see of Harper’s History of the War in the Philippines. As you know this book is one of the few narratives on the Phil-American War. The copy found in the NLP is book number 45 of only 550 book in print. This book was published in 1946 and reads like a fact book with pictures of the era. Here’s some of the interesting pictures between its pages.

Censorship in the Palanca

2008-09-08T03:19:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

Whatever other people might say, the Palanca is still the most sought-after literary prize in this country. On September 1 this year, the only place to be was at the Rigodon Ballroom of the Manila Pen where the literary stalwarts toasted the year’s winners. All came in what they thought best expressed their individuality. In similar social situations, the consensus among celebrities is to exude glamour, youth and sexual energy. At the SONA, it is all about power enveloped in staid stateliness. Here at the Palancas, it is—as Sting advices in that song about the queer Englishman—be yourself, no matter what they say.

There were winners who dug up gowns from their prom; A-line numbers in dainty aquamarine. While others were more experimental. One guy from the south wore a Barong adorned with a rainbow scarf pinned with peacock feathers. A fashionista who flew in from the US, wore a baby pink suit complimented with fly-away hair which perfectly suited his personality. They didn’t seem to mind being gawked at by the others. They reveled in their unique flamboyance, I could tell.

Playing fashionably safe were Ms. Debbie Tan, Tara FT Sering, Eman dela Cruz who dressed in black, except for Mr. Allan Lopez who has found his new black in fire engine red. I espied many who wore the traditional Barong (among them Mr. Dennis Marasigan and Mr. Ian Casocot, their jusi crumpled just right from all the congratulatory hugs. While Mr. Danny Untalan, who came from Ilocos, popped up the volume wearing a shiny silver version in see-through vertical stripes so popular in many a Santacruzan. Mr. Butch Guevarra was Saville Row through and through with his properly fitted three piece suit and bright pink tie. The shy types wore what they thought would be inconspicuous street clothes in brown or black paired with matching dungarees. When they went up the stage, we thought that they accidentally stepped onto the stage and were now forced to wall through from stage left to right. Instead they bashfully, almost hesitantly received their certificates or medals. The audience cheered them, nonetheless, with yelps of encouragement as if acknowledging that simple looks are deceiving.

This democratic rainbow is what I’ve always admired about the Palanca. In the years that I’ve had the great fortune of being invited to the awards, I have noted that the topics covered by the entries are as colorful as the people who claim their prize. The Palanca judges have hailed works regardless of content and never withheld a prize (as far as I know) on the grounds that it would offend general public sensibility or for political considerations. Peruse the works in the past entries and you will find a gold mine of plays, poems, essays and stories that mirror the circus of our life.

The Palanca has given prizes to writers of outstanding works denouncing political repression or advocating acceptance for severe homosexuality. Traditionally, the Palanca has been the space with no sacred cows. This, I think is the strength of this competition. More than its longevity and—some say—the inconsistent quality or reputation of the judges, the Palanca, has always been the literary Plaza Miranda, a bastion of the right of free expression; the venue for free-thinking.

I hope that people will not forget that the Palanca stands not only for literary merit, but as the symbol of freedom that continues to strengthen and encourage writers to speak of human experience and to speak out against tyranny in many forms (of which our society, alas, has not run out of).

The Palanca family has been very generous in throwing a yearly party and welcoming the family of writers regardless of how they are dressed. May that they continue to honor the writers by respecting what they have to say.

Cinderella's Midnight

2008-08-17T20:51:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

Knowing where Lea Salong has been, seeing her do Cinderella is like watching Nadia Comaneci doing the jungle gym in a children's park. It's too easy for her.

Don't get me wrong. She sings her best and reins nothing in. But the songs of R and H in this musicale were not meant to bring out Ms. Saigon’s musical bravura. There is a lack of challenging solos, interesting duets or breath-defying choral arrangements in this light musicale. I could imagine this musicale being well done by advanced theatre students of the Philippine High School for the Arts, but not with Ms. Salonga. She could have best done this role during her Repertory days when she was as young as, say, Monique Villonco. With a few exceptions, women’s bodies change after childbirth. And in her case, no matter the draping, the widened hips showed. (Surprisingly, this was not the case, though, with the Rajo Laurel gowns she wore in her in her recent Manila concert. Maybe the production should hire him as a consultant.)

The cast played out their roles as best as they could, except for the Prince Charming who delivered his speaking lines with too much tremolo. My seatmate, grandmother of five, thought he sounded like Robert Goulet in some ancient production of Camelot. Nonetheless, the children in the audience seemed taken by the set and costumes which were colored like birthday cakes from Goldilocks Bakeshop, down to the last confectionery swirl. But when the audience was let out, after a long two hours with intermission, no one seemed interested to buy the stuffed rats being peddled at the lobby. Being sold for P600, who would?

Driving home, I realized that Cinderella is, actually, the Disney version of Insiang, the movie that catapulted Lino Brocka in Cannes. Funny, no?

It's Like "Mano Po", Only Better

2008-08-11T01:35:00.000-07:00

The movie Mano Po was a watershed for Philippine movies, as it seems to be the first Filipino movie done about the Chinoy experience. The movie delved on tradition, modernization, assimilation, filial obligation and individuation. And as far as I can remember, Mano Po is one of the two movies (the other being Ganito Kami Noon, Paano Kayo Ngayon) which frames the question of Pinoy identity in terms of hyphenated terms. Mano Po became immensely popular that it had spawned a franchise, the most recent incarnation of which was the hystercally unpallatable Manay Po, a slapstick comedy centering on gay Chinoys that did not uplift the gays or the Chinoys.

I was trying to be flippant about the one line review. And all the people whom I've relayed it to seemed to get a sense of the joke but were as equally confused as to what exactly I meant. Indeed, in laying down the comparison, was I referring to the first Mano Po with all its freshness? Or was I mocking The Golden Child by ascribing it to be better than Mano Po, the deteriorating franchise? When I blurted out the one-line review to Rody Vera, he burst into a series of guffaws. Ditto, Liza Magtoto and the members of the Writers Bloc. Let me explain.

At the break after act 1, people were streaming out of the Little Theatre gushing about the set, the costumes, Art Acuna’s snappy accent as Eng Tieng-Bin, and Irma Adlawan’s perfect comic timing as the bitchy first wife. A veteran director observed that general lack of stage action. And Act 2 had more of this static blocking. Characters sit and stand in the vicinity of their original place as if they had an invisible chain attached to the table or chair. It could be that the ingenious set mainly made of gauzes and screens (divided into symbolic pavilions of the three wives placed around a courtyard) demanded a less than busy stage business. But on the whole, the scenes played well.

At the end of act 2, there was an enthusiastic response, but not gushing applause, contrary to what I expected. I went to the show determined to like the play. I have been a fan of DDH ever since I saw Behn Cervantes play Gallimard in the Dulaang UP’s production of M. Butterfly; been happy for his Pulitzer nominations, too. I’ve developed a real admiration for the sharpness in which Hwang dramatizes and dissects race relations. The Golden Child is a cleverly written play. Despite character types, it avoids the pitfalls of melodrama (although one could see it peeking in the sidelines). The repartee is crisp and entertaining. When the characters talk to their dead ancestors—a running devise in the play—the philosophical tone reminds me of scenes from the Greek tragedies. The plot points are suspensefully paced. Hwang structures the scenes evenly among the wives and the excellent actresses each claimed their star turn.

But as all of these elements are building up, the play seemed to end abruptly with the monologue of Eng soon after the death of the third wife (theatrically dramatized using Peking Opera references). After that scene, the play goes back to the present where Andrew, the grandson of Eng (also played by Acuna) is suddenly illumined by the moral lesson of the past. The play’s text sufficiently opens several platforms for discussion. But lack an emotional closure worthy of Andrew’s realization. Golden Child raised the audience’s expectations but—like a banquet that did not serve steamed crabs—it left us craving for some explanation.

Theatre Alert

2008-07-31T22:47:00.001-07:00

Loy Arcenas, stage designer and director, is deep in rehearsals for Tanghalang Pilipino's production of Golden Child. Exciting, too, is David Henry Hwang's visit to Manila in time for the premier on 08 August 2008. After watching the opening of the Beijing Olympics, rush down to the CCP Little Theatre for the event.

If you don't know Mr. Arcenas or Mr. Hwang, you're probably not from the theatre. They are famous as famous can be. Among Mr. Arcenas credits is the design and direction for The Romance of Magno Rubio, which was shown in Manila a few years back. Mr. Arcenas (who is the tall guy in the picture) is the resident theatre designer for May-I Theatre Company headed by my friend, Ralph Pena (who incidentally, is not the other person in the picture. I found the photo of Loy and friend in the internet. Send me a message, please, if you know who took it or who is the beautiful girl in black so I can properly credit the same.)

Mr. Hwang is arguably the most famous Asian playwright in the US today. Known for plays that deal with the Chinese experience of America, he has also written an interesting libretto for a muscial sci-fi, 1000 Airplanes on the Roof, with music by Philip Glass.

CCP has also scheduled a meet and greet via a a forum with these theatre mavericks on 09 August 2008. I don't know about you, but I'm looking for my copy of M. Butterfly, FOB and other plays by Hwang, thinking about two questions to ask the gentlemen, re-charging the batteries of my digital cameras and getting ready for my photo op.

Ped Xing in Ateneo

2008-07-28T23:20:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

In my experience, there have been two things that always ruined my theatre-going—a very bad production and sitting in the audience with students who have been required (read: forced) to watch the performance. That premonition was sinking into me as I lined up at the entrance of the Rizal MiniTheatre with more than a fistful of Ateneo freshmen chattering non-stop up to the last second before the anthem was sung. Like children being told to eat their vegetables, an audience being force-fed theatre, even with the best intentions, often triggers rebellious behavior. I’ve seen this before. A well placed disruptive smart aleck comment released in the height of a dramatic moment during the play could ruin everything that the actors worked for. And that’s how, sometimes, a rowdy audience can trigger a dismal performance. I was bracing myself for a rough matinee.

How lovely to have been proven wrong.

The audience stayed alert, critical, and respectful all throughout the three plays that ran to about 2 hours. More than that, they gave back in equal measure by applauding in appreciation for the truthful and generous performance by the Entablado’s roster of actors.
In part, the credit goes to the short introduction delivered before the show by the plays’ director, Jethro Nino Tenorio, for the young crowd to “listen carefully” to the plays. His reminder that, as freshmen, the audience was expected to act mature was well received mainly because it felt sincere and sensible; delivered with humor and without condescension. But most of the credit should go to the energetic and engaging performances by the young cast of Entablado’s Tarong (Tatlong Dula ng Pagtawid).

It is difficult to cavil with earnest performances such as the one displayed by these young actors. Notable was the ensemble work of the three actresses in J. Dennis Teodosio’s Pobreng Alindanaw. I’ve seen this play—about two dragonflies unsatisfied with their looks and wanting to transform themselves into a butterfly—performed by three men in glittering make-up. You can imagine the gay sensibility piled high. Because of the fable-like setting, the snappy repartee, and the contemporary allusions, there is a tendency for this play to be performed like it was a Saturday gay club stand-up: all for laughs. It was refreshing to see three young actresses tackle the dialogue from a wider perspective. In this incarnation, Beauty, the stunning butterfly (Anne Mariel Dionisio), Chubbs, the carabao Dragonfly (Portia Marie M. Silva), and Tiny, the needle Dragonfly (Patricia Ruth Pena), were imbued with charisma. The actresses performed the physical comedy with elan (not slapstick at all); and they delivered their comic punchlines with professional precision. The fact that they didn’t portray the insects sounding like women in drag enlarged the scope of the play’s skimming explorations on beauty, identity, and peer pressure. A more unified costume from Regina Regala would have done wonders to the visuals. And the moving platforms should have remained where they were during the asides. But these small blemishes did not detract the audience from enjoying the show. If the play goes on again, watch out for the musicale numbers. They were, in the words of the dragonflies, “Faaaaabe-ulous!”

In contrast, the third play, Chris Martinez’ Baclofen, tackled violence and sexuality head-on. Tenorio’s direction was direct, unapologetic, and extremely brave in the physical portrayal of same sex couplings. There were gasps (and the young man to my left was physically squirming) all throughout that long kissing scene (1 minute 48 long seconds on my watch, to be precise) between David (Sergio Luis A. Gahol) and Jonathan (Kalil Christian Almonte). But everyone in the audience seemed to understand that it was a necessary portrayal in order to be aware of how, in ordinary circumstances, we react to the physical manifestations of sexual diversity. In several scenes in Martinez’ play, the character of Jonathan answers questions thrown at him by rephrasing his answer in question form reminiscent of Edward Albee’s The Zoo Story. The writing follows Albee’s signature ambiguity in delineating character motivations. The text does not say, for example, why David prefers Jonathan over Naomi (treacherously fleshed out by the long legged and Salome be-wigged Ariel Acuna Diccion). Is it because David prefers a straight-acting gay male over a mujerista, a transvestite? When David is unable to name his love for Jonathan, the text gives a clue as to David’s perception of masculinity. What are the implications of being Top (gay reference to the Dominant sexual partner, i.e., penetrator) as opposed to being Bottom (the submissive sexual partner, i.e. receiver)? Among the three, this play is the most tricky to direct because the themes are merely hinted at by the text. A strong understanding of the characters emotional arches is a grave prerequisite. Irony, too could have been better exploited. Surely, there were missed moments of tenderness amidst all the violence. Better picturizations would have helped clarify motivations. Extra coaching would have helped the actors discover basic truths in the drinking scene. Didn’t Naomi express his preference for sweaty, grimy, earth-smelling men? Sensory exercises would have expanded the texture and sensual nature of the scenes. How would a rough trade like David sit, drink beer, play pusoy? It would have been informational for the audience if he kissed Naomi, if only to contrast this with his kiss for Jonathan. There’s a hypnotic scene in the play where Jonathan dons Naomi’s wig after he has killed his tormentor and his would-be saviour. He looks in the mirror and then cries out in pain. What is it to be a man or a woman? If the production should go back to this scene, I think they will discover the key that will unlock the full possibilities of the play.

Compared to the complex writing of the two plays previously mentioned, Ramon C. Jocson’s Bulong-Bulongan sa Sangandaan seems too simple in its reliance on the single revelation in the end. This Palanca-awarded play may seem dated in the light of other more successful treatments of the trick employed in movies like The Departed or any of the Shake, Rattle and Roll installments. I am glad that Entablado is doing Jocson, if only to encourage him to write new material. Despite the weakness of the material, the actors did their best to flesh out human characters. The play devotes three-fourths of its length in expounding their back stories. Peryo (Joseph Anthony M. Cuadro) is longing for his departed wife; Andong (Andrie Ellison Y. Corpuz) is a farmer forced to find work in the construction site in the city; and Loloy (Jose Antonio P. Javier) is a happy boy who loves to sing and dreams to study to better support his siblings. The male and female security guards were consigned to connecting the scenes. Although, Jocson writes in a conflict about the delay of their salaries, it is rudimentary. It didn’t dove tail with the real issue of the story. It was not a real conflict: merely another aspect of the exposition. Moreover, the secret of the play is revealed too early. In the first scene, when the lights keep blinking as a prelude to the entrance of one of the pahinantes, there is no doubt that the three main characters are ghosts. Like a magic trick prematurely explained, the surprise is ruined. Too many hints can disappoint. Although Francisco E. Chung, did a great job providing ambiance and illumination to the two other plays, he may need to re-plot the lights to Bulong-Bulongan.

Coming and Going

2008-07-21T23:00:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

I’m back. To where?

It presupposes a situs of sorts: a physical home, an emotional nest, a place of security. I always think that I’m back after unpacking my travel bag, distributing the little pasalubongs to family, pasting the metro and museum tickets in my journal, organizing the pictures, finding a place for the new mementos from the place visited (which has come down recently—as a result of the plummeting peso—to refrigerator magnets and self-sent postcards), sending e-mail notes to hosts and new friends in between bursts of attentiveness within periods of jet lag. From experience, I’m never back until my clothes have come back from the laundry and I’ve checked the scales and definitely know I’ve gained weight.

I’m back to the good news that the Virgin Labfest was an astounding success with records broken at the box office and thespian heights scaled by the number of de-virginized plays. Not surprisingly, the gay-themed play set were sold out first. I’m still laughing out loud from Rogelio Braga’s play with a kilometric title about an NGO gay worker and a straight muslim in a habal-habal. I wish they’d reprise that set double billed with Floy Quintos’ Kalungkutan ng Mga Reyna, his homage to the Queen of The Good, The True and The Beautiful. Many have also been asking for additional performance dates for Debbie Tan’s Ms. Too Bright. Characteristically, Layeta Bucoy’s Las Mentiras de Gloria elicited gasps of shock. But, really, we enjoyed her affront to bourgeois sensibility. I've also been closely following Alan Lopez's works at the VLF. He's been consistently submitting plays that are experimental; almost anarchic. I'm looking forward to the day when his plays are paired with a director who will clarify the text instead of befuddling it more.

I know I’m back because of the work pile. And I’m procrastinating. Instead of working on back log and reports of the conference I attended, I’ve skidded to Cinemalaya to jostle for tickets to one of the best batches of the alternative cinema festival. I’ve wormed my way to the new Batman movie franchise, too. But just to be different, I refuse to comment on Heath Ledger’s “dark” acting. Instead, I’ve been raving about Julian Duque’s endearing performance as a boy ash-tray to his father’s sadistic hate in Boses. I am amazed how this Ellen Marfil film (written by Rody Vera and Froi Medina) managed to incorporate an advocacy with melodrama elements and high brow classical music. I’ve also been raving about Paul Morales’ Concerto. It tackles the indefatigable spirit of a family surviving the Davao hinterlands during the dark days of the Kempetai with memories of music to sustain them. Ms. Shamaine Centenera-Buencamino is, as usual, effortless grace. One of my other favorites is Ned Trespeces’ My Fake American Accent, a hilarious, almost satirical poke at the call center culture made human and accessible by the deceptively subtle direction. If you’re used to the technical polish of the other big budget indie films, My Fake…, will appear crude. But it’s this improvisational, done-in-my-backyard-with friends quality that makes this movie relevantly unpretentious and engaging. Watch out for the scene with the holdaper. I was pensively amused with Chris Martinez's 100. It was sleek and a tad product placement oriented. But Eugene Domingo is freshly comic as Lapid's chicharon. And Mylene Dizon is so cinematically alluring--so much so that I couldn't believe she, as the character, had cancer. The awards are out. And so are the catty remarks. Ha!

And finally, I know that I’m completely back, not only because I’m rushing to another meeting while outlining a report in my head, but because, more importantly, I’ve been hugged, kissed and cuddled in the right places for the past two straight nights. Groggy-eyed, but satisfied. I can truly say, I’ve, uhm, come and am back.

Scenes from Nanang's Life: Home

2008-06-22T17:38:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

Take this trip with me to Linay, Manukan, Zamboanga del Norte. After 37 years, I was going home again to where my family began to bury my Nanang. I was around 11 years old the last time I was in this dusty, sleepy town. Why I ended up in Manila living with my Tiang Caring is a story of telenovela proportions. Permit me to begin from the beginning.

In the 1950’s, just right about the time when the Hukbalahaps were being wooed by President Magsaysay with incentives and benefits to come back to the nation’s fold instead of staying in the hills to fight the government, my Tatang was awarded a land grant of a few hectares in Zamboaga. So, with my Nanang, off they went from one of the farthest towns in Ilocos, north of Manila, to this little town way down south where there was promise of copra. I imagine my parents taking the 12-hour bus trip to Manila and then taking another long trip, this time by a rusty, slow boat from Pier 14, with all of their belongings, which were not much considering that they just got married. Nanang, with her sad eyes and intelligent forehead, was a new graduate from the Philippine Normal College. Tatang was a handsome, young man who, prior to getting married at 24, was endlessly being doted on by his elder sisters.

I would like to imagine a romantic ocean voyage for this young couple whose lives were just starting then. Alas, I know well enough from stories picked up as a child (when adults think that children are not listening) that my Tatang, troubled in his youth, was not yet the good husband that he was to become. And besides, honeymoon cruises were not yet then in vogue for local ship travel. There were no private suites available where a young couple could retire and cuddle after a moon-lit walk on the deck. In the 1950’s, all ship passengers slept on identical iron double deck cots soldered to the floor. The only thing that differentiated the first class from the third is the deck where the cots were located and the number of viands available for them to eat.

If I were to write this voyage scene based on how I know my parents, I would let my Nanang take care of looking after their luggage while my Tatang striding beside her, puffing his endless smokes, is starting to complain and become difficult because of the jostle of the crowd and the balmy April heat. At night, after dinner, my parents would take in the breeze. They would talk about the frontier they were about to cross, gazing towards the dark horizon, holding hands like little children playing fearless in the dark. Deep into the night, as the air turned chillier, I can hear Tatang offer to get Nanang a jacket. And later still, my Tatang, holding Nanang close to him, might have had that naughty look in his eye. Alone in the dark with the girl she loved and a marriage license neatly folded and stuck in his wallet, he had no excuse to rein in the raging hormones of his youth. At this point, I will permit them to kiss, of course. He could even sing to her—this after all, was the 1950’s. Then I would cut to the waves slapping the ship. And you and I would know that the evening was spent happily.

In Dipolog, my parents had to take a two-hour dusty and bumpy jeepney ride to Linay. On my last trip to the place, the scene along the road had not changed much. The view unfurls an endless ribbon of tall coconuts, verdant mahogany, wide and shady mango trees, rice fields in emerald green to jade. In my parents time, one passed by several wood bridges over wide rivers that emptied into the nearby sea. The wood bridges creaked from the weight of jeepneys filled to the brim with people, farm animals and produce. Except for the asphalt road and the concrete bridges, nothing much has changed. To my mind, the road to Linay looked this way. And still does.

My Tatang didn’t carry my Nanang over the threshold of their new home, not only because he wasn’t the sort to, but mainly because there was no house. They had to sleep with a neighbor while a house was being built. Water had to be taken from a well near the school. The place had not heard of indoor plumbing. There was no electricity. The land had not yet been planted with coconut trees from which the copra was to be made. Most of all, the people of Linay did not speak Ilocano. My parents, on the other hand, did not know the dialect. By default, my parents and their new neighbors spoke to each other in English for a few months, just enough time to get my parents started on the local tongue.

Good-bye Nanang

2008-06-12T22:41:00.000-07:00

Kabigan,

Mahirap ang mawalan ng ina.

JUANITA BALLESTEROS PICHAY
( May 3, 1929- June 11, 2008)

My Nanang, died peacefully today with her children by her side. She was an exemplary mother to me and my five other siblings; a doting grandmother; and a loving wife to my father, Florencio (who pre-deceased her). She was a dedicated public school teacher and principal who was respected and beloved by her students and colleagues. My Nanang taught all her children to make use of their talents and to be the best that they can be. Her moral strength, determination, humor and practical ways during times of difficulty was always an inspiration to those around her.

Our family mourns her loss and celebrates the meaning of her life and the love that touched others through her work. We feel blessed that in the face of the inevitable she went peacefully on to her journey, without suffering, surrounded by the family she nurtured and loved. We ask that you, our friends, join us in offering prayers for the eternal repose of her soul.

Interment will be in Linay, Zamboanga Del Norte. The burial will be on 18 June 2008.

Ms. Lea's Fairy Tale Life

2008-06-04T01:10:00.001-07:00

Kaibigan,

A few weeks ago, our friends (theatre artist Norman Penaflorida and economist Joseph Lim) handed out to us several technical rehearsal tickets to Lea’s concert at the PICC. The lucky group included two of Lea’s most loyal fans—my tiang Caring and my friend (and one of the country’s leading radiologists) Cesar Co. Ever since I can remember, they’ve watched—singly or together—every Lea concert or musicale she has appeared in.

My tiang Caring’s obsession began many, many years ago when she saw Lea as the red haired, button-eyed Annie. Cesar discovered Lea much later wearing a two piece bikini. When Ms. Saigon opened in West End, Cesar was one of the first to witness her triumph on West End. He has been hooked on her since then.

It is difficult not to like Lea. Her public persona implies the dutiful daughter who made it to the big time by following her mother’s advice. Although she was in showbiz, she exhibited the commitment and dedication usually associated with “real” theatre artists. She was never associated with any scandal involving, drugs, pregnancy or even a bouncing check. She marries a regular guy--who people close to them perceive--is intelligent, humble, loving and with lots of money. Despite having started a family, Lea continues with her stage career. Everyone dreams of a fairy tale life. And in the case of Lea, we love her for living it for us.

And of course, that voice. Pristine like a bell. Her voice is effortlessly powerful specially in the high notes. To my musically untrained ear, she does not only sing a song perfectly, but she also sings perfectly all the time. Parang plaka (like a vinyl record) is the old phrase that comes to mind. In that evening’s concert, Lea delivered her sometimes kilometric spiels without a stutter. She always appeared coifed and fresh after all the fabulous gown changes designed by Rajo Laurel. Does she ever lose her poise or lose her confidence? To be sure, she is capable at poking fun at herself. Her angst-less narration of how Flower Drum Song flopped on Broadway was endearing, despite the almost nonchalant re-telling. And she can muster kilig moments, too. When her former love team mate, Aga Muhlach, (feigning brattiness and bravado) appeared with her on stage, they evoked natural chemistry. They were fun to watch. And the Lea and Aga fans enjoyed the romantic sparks evident in their natural banter.

But try as I might—and I say this at the expense of being crucified by Tiang Caring, Cesar and all the Lea fans all over the planet—Lea’s singing did not move me. The sad songs were slow. The fast songs were happy. The sentimental songs featured the right amount of tremolo. But, to me, that was the whole problem. There was something too mechanical about her singing. It was too technically clean; almost antiseptic. Let me say that I'm saying this purely out of preference. To be sure, there were people around me who were constantly moved by her. Tony King, Cesar's friend for example, became teary eyed when Lea sang her commitment song. But that number was accompanied by her wonderfully edited clip from her wedding. And it would take a stone heart not to be moved by the image of Lea's husband crying at seeing Lea walking in his arms.

I could be a stickler for cleanliness. But that doesn't count in art. I like it when it's less than perfect. I like it when a voice frays a bit in the edges or has a tad difficulty reaching a high note. I emphathize more when a performer breaks into a sweat rather than appearing cool and collected all the time. I will never get tired of listening to Lea, but I wish she sounded and appeared more human.

The Salt is Melting

2008-05-12T18:29:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

One of the highlights of the movie involves rain, the drying salt beds, and Ms. Gina Pareno

Rain pours unexpectedly on Cuyo, Palawan on a public holiday and poor Gina Pareno's character has no one to assist her in gathering the dried salt to safe ground as everyone, except herself, has gone to town for the "fiestivities". As I watched Ms. Pareno go hither and dither unable to save the melting salt all around her, all of the hysteria of Philippine filmdom came rushing in my mind paralleling the mighty deluge in Cuyo town. At the height of Ms. Pareno's operatics, I clutched the thigh of my nearest seatmate where my boyfriend was supposed to be sitting. So tight was my grip that he uttered a faint cry of pain. I was forced to look to my left and lo and behold, it was not my boyfriend's thigh that I was gripping to the bone but some cute, handsome boy who, judging from the faint light from the screen, was sporting a P40 haircut and nursing a growing boner beneath my palm!. Naturally, I was aghast (by the haircut) and apoligized (for my groping). To this he replied, "Sige lang." I didn't actually understand what he meant by "Sige lang." In the Visayas, the phrase could mean, "It's ok", as in "I accept your expression of apology." Or it could mean, "Sige lang" as in "Please proceed." But before I could make up a conclusion, I was again sucked into the movie.

I watched Ploning and was mesmerized by the cinematography. I was enthralled by the courage in its filmmaking. Amazed, too, by the stories and characters in the movie that spoke a unique specificity.

From the choice of language used for the dialogue (Cuyo-anon), to the time in which the movie was set (1970's), to the characters that pushed the deliberately slow plot, the producers were clearly visioning away from the template of Hollywood or Star Cinema. This movie is peppered with quaint, small town characters. Most of the performers rise to the challenge of emoting everyday feelings in an extraordinary way. No stock characters here. No pandering to the box office, either, except maybe with the choice of Juday as lead actress (and then again, she is not her "usual" self in this movie). She plays Ploning as sweet as candied kasuy, but also restrained, obscure. The fact that the movie dared to open the same week as Iron Man was, to me, an indication of : a) the producer's confidence over their work; b) the creators' commitment to their vision; or c) a grave miscalculation by both.

One could feel this earnestness from the trailer. I felt that this act of courage on the part of the producers seemed to demand a similar gesture from the movie-going public. As I write this, I hear that, mostly, the reviews have been mixed. But you must see this movie, if only to judge it for yourself. If this is any assurance, I tell you, the images are worth the price of admission.

Legislating Nationalism

2008-05-08T21:30:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

Mae Paner, a friend, great actress (you missed half of your life if you didn’t see her poignant portrayal of the squatter idiot savant in the play version of Insiang), and talented television director (her 30-seconder infomercial has singularly catapulted this politician into the Senate stratosphere) had a recent brush with irony.

Feeling in the dumps by the growing state of inertia, helplessness and confusion brought about by—among other things—our community’s seeming collective helplessness in addressing issues of government corruption, hopelessnes and general distopia, the usually happy Mae, thought of coming up with her version of Lupang Hinirang. It is her hope that her work would ignite people into seriously taking stock of the possibilites of positive change. Originally shot in video, she has offered to get this version blown up to film for her plan to get it played in movie houses as is the current practice before the first and last showings of the day.

So what’s the problem?

The provisions of Republic Act 8491 (also known as the Flag and Heraldic Code of the Philippines) prescribe, by almost exact dimensions, the manner of carriage and usage of the Philippine flag. More importantly to Mae’s case, the law also stipulates the proper way to sing Lupang Hinirang. Meaning: one must not only sing in tune, but sing in the time signature that the the song was originally written. Harking back to that first day of official independence from Spanish colonial rule, section 37 of the law states that:

“SECTION 37. The rendition of the National Anthem, whether played or sung, shall be in accordance with the musical arrangement and composition of Julian Felipe.”

How hard can that be, right? Well, that provision of the law is giving my friend, Ms. Paner, anxious days and sleepless nights.

Maestro Felipe’s original arrangement is in 4/4 time signature, a marching beat. On the other hand, Ms. Paner conceptualized and directed her version of our national anthem in a much slower tempo.

When Mae consulted with me on the matter, I offered to write to the National Historical Institute to request for a clearance. Under section 52 of the same law, the National Historical Institute is responsible for the strict enforcement of the provisions of this Act. When I called the NHI to follow up this letter, the ever-helpful Deputy Director Mely Almosara informed me that the NHI Board has taken initiatives to clarify the implementing rules for the singing of the national anthem. The NHI, she says, will be holding a public hearing to get the opinions of various sectors to agree to general principles.

Paner’s interpretation of our national anthem is encapsulated in a young boy’s determination to plant a downtrodden Philippine flag to the top of a flagpole by climbing it, slipper-less, to the top in palo-sebo style. It may sound cliché, but its just the inability of my words to exactly describe the effect of this work.

Who can say that a slower-paced rendition of the song will be less patriotic than when sung in the way the law requires? In short, can nationalism be legislated?

Take this test. Free yourself from all distractions and give this work two minutes of your time. It is important that you approximate the conditions of reverence that the anthem requires. Hey, I multi-task all the time, myself. But viewing the work while eating chips, web-surfing, having an argument with your boyfriend or some similar circumstance will not be fair to the work. Think of it this way: When the national anthem is played, arent’ we expected to pay attention?

After you’ve put yourself in the proper mode, click on the link:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=UmenrO3l88U

Write me what you think?

Or better yet, if you think that the National Historical Institute will be benefitted by your inputs regarding the issue of whether or not there should only be one way of singing our song, email them (copy furnish me, please) at : nhigov.ph@gmail.com atttention: Teddy Atienza, Heraldry Division.

Cacophony of Weddings, Part I

2008-05-07T12:00:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

Who wants to get married?

My niece, P, sprang hers on us one December evening. We knew she had a boyfriend because one day, she brought along, unannounced, this young man to a family gathering. I should have known by then that she had a penchant for surprises.

P’s parents couldn’t afford to send her to college, so my sister, D, who was working as a nurse in the US, painstakingly sent her to ten long years of college because in the middle of her first course, she decided she wanted something else. P had a younger sister who occasionally depended on us for clothes, kikay stuff and, most recently, high school tuition money. They were living in a house that my sister bought on the condition that P’s mom (my other sister) and her husband would pay the monthly amortization. But this they weren’t able to do. As the foreclosure date came nearer, P’s family trooped to my benefactor sister during her annual balikbayan visits, cried her a river and went home happy as a family bringing with them the promise that my nurse sister would take care of it.

I thought P, who was smart enough to have passed her board exam, had by now figured out the familial equation. Hadn’t she watched enough telenovelas to feel obligated to be the breadwinner of her family before setting up one of her own? She announced her wedding that evening by giving out the already printed wedding invitations. It was very clear that she wasn’t asking our opinion—not even that of her aunt who sent her to school for ten tortuous long years. D got her invitation via DHL in the US many weeks later. If P sensed my sister’s disappointment, P never let it interfere with her plans. She went ahead with her gown fittings, making church reservations, meeting with prospective photographers. She made sure to announce that she and her husband were paying for the event from their savings.

When I had the chance to be alone with her weeks before the wedding, I let out a venomous vent. At first, I let loose a wholesale tirade of melodrama staples. Words like “ingrata”, “delicadeza”, “obligacion”--Spanish terms for old-style values I’ve heard in many a soap opera found their way deliciously peppering my soliloquy. As my anger grew, I found myself declaming in longer and more elaborate sentences reminiscent of 18th century Tagalog syntax. P started to cry at this point (from the realization of her folly or from the torture of my convoluted sentences , I couldn’t tell).

The more tears she shed, the more encouraged I became in piling one on top of the other my homily on the responsibility of family, the grace of humility and honorable subservience to obligation. I was really getting into the sweet contravida-ness of my role and relishing the souring of her wedding. The scene was building on the emotional stakes thus far established and the suspense was the kind that held an audience before the network run the commercial for feminine napkins. I couldn’t stop. I felt my face heat up as it crumpled and distorted. I did not slow down to take in air as I raced from one poetic allusion to the next running down mixed metaphors in the process. After twenty minutes, I began to sound like a robot about to disintegrate. My head started to throb, my chest started to tighten. I’ve seen this in the movies. At this point the father would now be clutching his chest and succumbing to a heart attack. Luckily, I was able to step on the emotional break before the onslaught of cardiac arrest. I dismissed her even before she could wipe her runny nose.

On the scheduled date, I drove our family to church. Stood with the rest as they posed for the church photo. I’m the guy left-most in the second row. But actually, I wasn’t there. Sporting a phony smile, I was no less angry there than when I had that talk with my niece weeks before.

It’s not as if she was required to live the life of a soltera. I pleaded that she merely find a job and help out with her family before she moved to one of her own. Three years at best, I said. But, at 28 years old, she couldn’t wait. It seems like sakripisyo is another old-term value gone falling in the wayside.

I write this many months later and thinking: “If my family expectations were different from how I wanted to live my life, would I follow my heart or be enslaved by familial obligation?”

Maybe it is the nature of love that makes us stubborn. And the pride of the young that prevents taking advice from the old. Anger has a way of creeping in otherwise happy moments, like a wedding.

Stigma, Stigmata

2008-05-06T19:16:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

I felt like someone twice marked for assassination. Two days before my 45th birthday, I underwent a triple heart by-pass operation. Not even a year later, or exactly six months and two weeks after my by-pass (26 February 2007 to be exact), I was diagnosed with colon cancer.

Rare is the man or woman who receives a cancer diagnosis with calm aplomb. For me, it was like hearing an airport announcement asking me to board a flight when in fact, at my age, I was not even near the departure lounge. My mind zoomed in all directions like an independence day firecracker exploding and careening into a kaleidoscope of clichés, a series of Sisa emotions (“Basilio? Crispin?!).

At first, I noticed a heightened, paranoiac observation of the ordinary. Eating was no longer just a meal, but maybe “my last meal”. Talking was no longer just a conversation, but the possibility (in the future, with people informed by hindsight, gathered at the wake) that it was my “most important last words”. This thought pressured me into uttering pronouncements more substantial than just, “Please pass me the patis.” Waving good bye to a friend—a seemingly
ordinary action learned by a baby’s innocent act of mimicry and repeated over the years in the course of socialization—suddenly acquired spine-tingling nuances. Even a usually innocuous phrase triggered a slew of ironies. Consider the standard: “See you later, alligator”, which at other times would have been sweet and endearing. To my mind, it echoed the following simultaneous translation: “see you later…don’t forget the Mass card” (when saying it to my friends). Or “see you later…in hell!” (when addressing people I didn’t care too much about). But surprisingly, other than the morbid, I discovered that intimacy with death had another emotional but familiar effect.

Twice confronted by death’s proximity, I awoke to a world transformed into an inimitable, precious, and fragile place—what poet Rolando Tinio aptly described as a “crystal universe”—where everything takes on the nature of a very shiny, rainbow gilded, breakable soap bubble. Colors became so intense, it bled into the outlines of figures. Each day burned into my mind vivid, sensoramic, technicolor memories. I became ecstatic one moment and then sad the next. Fear and hope kept competing for my attention. And I took every opportunity to claim or reward a hug. You might be familiar with this feeling—the first time you took ecstasy… Or so they say. If people didn’t know about my medical condition, they could have sworn I was acting like a teen-ager in love and so wanting to get laid. Could this be the reason why the French refer to an orgasm as la petite mort, the little death?

Having cancer has become so prevalent in the modern age. In my close circle of friends, Mimi, Rose’s mother and I were each diagnosed with a different type of cancer within three months of each other. Much can be said about the cause of cancer. But as to its effect, I hazard a guess that if having cancer were an art form, critics would have officially declared it as an exciting genre. Like the Japanese horror movie, your favorite telenovela, or performance art, the middle class cancer story has evolved its own defining set of expectations and common narratives. For example, no cancer story is complete without the character of the doctor, with the CT scan plates in front of him who, trying to be clinical but failing, fiddles with his eyeglasses before uttering the sentence with the C word in it. A cancer narration lacks a sense of the real without that important family breakdown scene where—in the silence after the news—the lumpen cousin who lives with you tries to be helpful by asking, “Are you updated with your insurance premium payments?” I have heard no cancer story without the usual prayerful friends, doting relatives, or the incompetent resident who is unable to properly insert an intravenous needle. My favorite, of course, is the timely appearance of the mysterious donors who come to the rescue in the nick of time to contribute to the payment of, at least, the first set of medical bills. I guess they wish to remain anonymous because they don’t want to be approached a second time. All these have become the stock and shock in trade of the genre. I am pleased to have made their acquaintance, mannerisms and all.

Once, in the many times that I found myself waiting in a doctor’s office, I would read an article in one of the dog-eared magazines proclaiming that cancer is one of the top three causes of deaths in the world. According to the Journal of Cancer Medicine, the total number of lives claimed by all types of cancer has risen since ten years ago. Moreover, new and baffling cancers are being discovered every year. On the bright side, the advances in medical research has somewhat dulled the dread previously associated with the disease. Nowadays, there are more and more cancers thought to be curable by one drug or another.

As early as the time of Sir Isaac Newton, the human body has been viewed as a living system of cogs, levers and springs no different from any of the machines being invented during that time. Mainstream medicine’s curative philosophy has not drastically changed over the years. In fact, this view has been strengthened by the development of chemical, electronic and radiologic technology that has made it possible to read the human body down to its molecular level. Medicine has inherited the love of surgery from Newton’s view of the body as a mechanical apparatus. If something does not work, the best way to deal with it was to bypass it or excise it. In modern practice, this could easily be done through the slash of scalpels, burning of lasers, or the poison of drugs.

Sadly, most people in the third world who have curable cancers lose their life’s savings paying for the cure. More often, when given the choice of saving one’s self or ensuring the survival of a family, heroism becomes the better option as people make ultimate sacrifices. And for those who don’t have the resources to begin with, faith can be the only medicine.

Manang Celi, for example, is our neighbor’s labandera who thinks she has cancer. Six years ago, she experienced stomach cramps that she explained to herself, at first, as signs of hunger. When one has six kids and an absentee husband, skipping meals can be a daily habit. She hid her perennial diarrhea from her employer for fear of losing her job. At the instigation of a cousin, who worked as a janitress at the Philippine General Hospital, she underwent several medical tests. But the findings on her case remain sealed in a small envelope inside a bigger folder kept in a steel filing cabinet in one of the cramped offices of the hospital’s laboratory department. For lack of resources—like someone who doesn’t have enough cash to retrieve the earrings that were pawned—she remains unable to get the results of her medical tests released. She has tried every ruse in the book (from petty bribery to tears) to get the mousy attendant to let her take a peak at what the medical technologists had to say about her bloody and watery stool. But the attendant remained implacable and as cold as a surgical table: “No cash, No test release.”

To this day, when the cramps come visiting, Manang Celi still doesn’t know what causes them. She finds some blessing in the fact that her medical condition is as ambivalent as her sources of income. To her, the vagueness of the future is not a dark and strange place, but a cozy limbo where she can afford to hope. For now, the only liquid currency that she can exchange is prayer. She attributes the lessening of her pain to the six years invested in Friday visits to the Senor Nuestro Poong Nazareno, the Black Nazarene in Quiapo.

The knowledge of a possible impending death—unlike the suddenness of an accident or the vulgar directness of a coronary thrombosis—brings with it a haze, a stage presence, an attraction we reserve for the mysterious. There is an unavoidable grandiloquence about it, like the sound of a lone snare drum announcing the silent shuffling of a funeral cortege. It brings to mind an 18th Century European opera end-of-Act-II moment, say, where the courtesan, in the height of her beauty, coughs her lungs out and produces a speck of blood on her white, lace handkerchief. Instantly, she and the audience recognize this code: the tuberculosis has set in. Referred to as consumption, it was a disease as romantic then, as some forms of cancer are now.

Cancer, unlike a miracle, can be explained. Nature is sustained by a balance of death and regeneration. The human body is no different. Cancer develops when human cells divide and regenerate unhindered, resulting in the development of a mass or a tumor that upsets the balance. Passages are blocked. Internal organs are displaced. Cancer is regeneration gone haywire. The current treatment for cancer generally involves excising the over-developing cells and then nuking the remainder by way of chemotherapy. Taking chemo is like ingesting controlled amounts of poison. While chemotherapy kills cancer cells, the healthy cells are also damaged, maimed or debilitated. This is why in the process, the body’s immune system gets severely jeopardized. The body of the patient undergoing treatment literally becomes a battleground. It is like a mopping-up operations being conducted by a berserk military where the insurgent is killed along with the innocents.

The inner war is outwardly manifested by a body in decay. I’ve observed that people, after knowing that I’m on chemotherapy (instead of being mortified by signs of putrefaction) generally seem to develop an interest in the degeneration of my body. Am I losing my hair? Do I experience nausea and fatigue? They examine my extremities darkened by the burning happening in the molecular level. They raise their eyes in child-like wonder at the slow and ridged growth of my nails. They look closely at the growing pallor of my face. Cellular division in my body slows down having the effect of thinning the epidermis on my face. My skin develops a new smoothness, exposing fine veins close to the top, coloring my cheeks to a nice blush. Visitors declare that I “actually look good”. I am reminded of tourists admiring the red-orange
brilliance of the Manila sunset without knowing that the spectacular color owes itself primarily to the high level of pollution trapped in the sky.

Optimistic comments on the way I look have been repeated to me several times with so much conviction by hordes of clueless people that it has made me wonder whether my pessimism is a natural reaction. They probably think that happy thoughts will result in early convalescence. (I make a mental note that if ever I become rich enough, I’ll build a cancer hospital that looks like Disneyworld.) All of them invariably end their visit with a firm clasp, a hug and an offer to pray for a fast and full recovery. People smile as they walk out of my hospital room. Satisfied at having done a good deed, they rush back to the embrace of their normal city lives of excitement, deadlines, backstabbing, and bills. It always makes me wonder who, among those who offered, actually had time to pray.

What most do not know is that the thinning of my skin also occurs in that sensitive appendage “down there”. Polite etiquette dictates that this information be reserved to a few, such as my lady oncologist (who declined to look) and my intimate who comes to visit as often as allowed. Given the chance to be alone with me, his fingers slowly run through the straight scar on my chest, sheepishly continuing to the snake that forms around my navel and, sensing that I’m not offering any objections, boldly trace the rest of the scar that ends on my lower abdomen, close enough to where the pubic hair starts to grow into a bush (although now, it looks like a five o’clock shadow after two weeks from having been shaved for the operation.)

His two fingers, like uneven legs, tread gingerly, then turn into a light caress. The fingers amble along the keloid path, observant, respectful, but also highly charged—like walking on sacred ground with a hard-on. Was he trying to seduce me in my hour of reckoning? Or was he, like a crowd in a hanging, fascinated by the horror—and motivated by a sense of charity—vying to be my last memorable experience? I drop my robe and step back for his inspection hoping to appear—like Venus de Milo, with her decapitated arm—sublime in my imperfection. When his eyes take me in, it is half in pity and mostly half in horror. I have lost weight, my complexion is ashen and the muscle tone sags in places where previously it was taut. He notices the blisters on my penis; wondering aloud whether I can have normal sex again after it heals, to which I want to reply, “What is ‘normal’ sex”? I have to evade the question not wanting to lie. At that time, I did not know if this, or indeed, any other part of my body would heal. He says he loves me. A thought crosses my mind about how easy it is to promise anything to the terminally ill. But I catch the negative vibe before it takes root. I force myself to accept that his interest goes beyond charity.

We can trace our awe of pain from the initiation rites in our tribal roots. How much is man’s capacity to bear? Instinctively, we reserve a place of honor for those who can stand up to hardship. On the other hand, our horror fascination with sickness may come from a culture of contrition embedded by 300 years of faux Catholicism. A long suffering mother, a wronged mistress, a boxer in the ring, survivors of catastrophic events, and others who have similarly passed a test of physical and emotional endurance all share various levels of admiration and respect. Suffering, when made public, seems to serve as a magnet for sympathy and esteem.

Also, the personal battle to survive cancer has a special niche. The arbitrariness of disease marks it differently. More so, when there is no reason to be sick, no logic in the attack. When stricken with an unexplainable fate, one is crowned with glory or relegated to a room of repentance.

In my life of moderation, I never smoked; regularly ate my greens; and engaged in dutiful exercise. And yet I’ve been stricken with not one, but two, deadly diseases. Under the circumstances, the manifestation of cancer becomes a baffling, undecipherable sign, a misterio—a stigma or a stigmata? They say cancer happens for a reason. It is either God’s will or one’s just desserts. Depending on the perception, cancer is seen either as a reward for a life of blessedness or a punishment for a life of excess. Cancer leads the sufferer on the road to sainthood or to the front gates of derision.

But when one thinks of cancer as a prize for holiness, what does that say about heaven’s reward for piety? From this premise, can one make conclusions relative to the holiness of septuagenarian cardinals and popes? On the other hand, if it is were some species of retribution, how is it that people who have been tagged to various scams and scandals—whose acts have wrought havoc on the lives of powerless innocents—have not excruciatingly died of it?

We hear of trials for various misdeeds—from pre-need companies running away with their subscribers’ matriculation fees to charges of election fraud, to government corruption and military abuse—where the big fish invariably escape the net of justice. If cancer is the physical manifestation of the wrath of the giant Om, why are dirty politicians and crooks alike still living, and living well in palaces? Shouldn’t their various acts of perjuring themselves to the safety of an acquittal deserve some form of irrevocable destiny? Cancer of the tongue, perhaps?

These thoughts cross my mind as I lay sideways on a cold metal table while the doctor, with the help of a thin tube, inserts a microcamera up my ass. It is so very James Bond. Groggily, I look at the monitor and see the inside of my colon in real time. I am amazed by the technology and, under the influence of drugs, find myself on a strange trip. “Look,” I say to an imaginary friend, “A beautiful sight! The landscape of the intestines.” With its dark hues, bright reds and specks of yellow, it is abstract space. The art inside my body. The next frontier. I think other thoughts to distract me from the slow bloating inside. At this point, Dr. Jose P. Rizal, the national hero, appears as a hallucination. Wearing a white lab gown (instead of his usual black overcoat, but still with his bowler hat) he studies the development of our history since his death, as if examining x-rays held against the light. He looks up from the evidence and confirms his findings. “This country is suffering from a social cancer.” In this dream, I ask, “Has the cancer grown? Is it terminal?” And finally, “Which cancer is worse, mine or our country’s?” And Dr. Pepe Rizal answers in the manner typical of the medical community, “Who knows?”

Under heavy sedation, I transform into St. Sebastian, captured in that characteristic, charismatic pose beloved of Michaelangelo—half-naked, arms raised and tied to a post, with arrows sticking out of his white torso and leg—and despite the pain caused by the giant acupuncture needles, still looking sensuously beatific, eyes heavenward, standing fabulously contra-posto. Bravery is the virtue I am supposed to embrace as I fight this cancer into remission, although I know I am no saint, not even close to being a martyr. I look at my agony, not as a chance for heroism, but as my sweet dance with death—a many splendored thing. How else can one describe being alone on the operating table? Aware of the sharps and the clang of metal medical equipment that will be used on me. There is no escape. I welcome fear with a hug I reserve only for intimates. I anticipate the care I will receive from relatives. I bask in their love. With friends, I will celebrate each day with the joy of knowing that hope is a bridge being built everyday. And with God, I hold up my right hand, two fingers forming a V: Peace! But the best thing about being treated for cancer is the blessing that there, in the interruption of normal life, one is forewarned. Most of all, having received a notice of possible eviction, having cancer gives one the chance to write the dying scene.

Blogging Blues

2008-05-04T22:44:00.000-07:00

Kaibigan,

Starting a blog is harder than I thought.

At first, I had to contend with the technology involved of uploading, lay-outing, choosing the appropriate picture. Sometimes, I spend hours getting the fonts just right. Does it really matter whether I choose arial black over century gothic? But often, and I am irked to admit this, I miss the self-imposed deadline because of a lack of discipline. I either fail to wake up early enough to start a topic. Or, in the rare instances that I wake up to my schedule, I find myself unable to sort my jumbled, unwieldy thoughts. At the end of the blogging hour, my computer screen stares back at me looking like the literary equivalent of Dr. Frankenstein’s experiment—one-eyed phrases, crooked limbs of sentences, still-born thoughts. On the other hand, in the rare instances that lightning struck my writing, I realized that my day was clearer, my plans had a gilt-edged focus, I craved for exercise, I was able to accomplish more tasks and yes., I had better sex.

Mystics have known all along that sitting alone in a room with no one but one’s thoughts gave far better results. The act of blogging, I suppose, is my substantial compliance to communion with the Om. When done properly, it grounds the confused, multi-tasking, third world schizophrenic which is me. The white laptop screen is my mind. I am alone, the sun is just starting to warm up in the horizon. There is no one tugging at my sleeve for this task or that favor. I am confronted by the reality beneath my consciousness. And this is what emerges: “I have to bring the car to the shop why didn’t I not do it last Wednesday now I have to do an extra trip and won’t be able to save gas I should have done the to-do list no wonder I forgot to pick up my blood test results with my stress test or stress test? – shit, that was yesterday. That stupid client is such an asshole why don’t I just terminate the retainer? are you stupid? You can’t live without the monthly check to pay for food on the table and your trip to Boaracay and your sister’s cry for help for her daughter’s tuition. My mom is always looking over my shoulder always asking me when I will marry she lives with me but I feel I live with her but its ok because I love her and she’s just getting old and I hope I won’t grow old like that I am too tired no I am not I feel sad no you don’t I am happy because I will see my love later and excited we will meet later for dinner and his smile makes me warm inside and he holds my hands and I’m re-charged and everything is fine in the world.”

Wading through all that trash and finding wisdom to share with other people who may or may not come across this blog is the excuse for this confessional. Notice that I begin this piece with an address: “Kaibigan” meaning friend. I presume that the reader will, like an ally across the table, listen with empathy and find meaning with me as I gut myself in public.

Under Construction

2008-04-17T01:13:00.000-07:00

This blog is under construction,
as is its author who has been sewn
in two places within the span of
six months. There are no more
questions on the warranty clause.
Law offers no answer in interpretation.
Art ceases to be the blue print of plans--
Now, only relief in words.
These, too, will be hammered, patched and
quilted for bed or shroud; picnic basket
or altar mantle. See me assemble a shed, a home,
a leaf boat
made from fallen log. Welcome we,
who all are,
in seeking perfection--undergoing
construction.