Day 4. Pete Matipid

One of the most memorable Chiquito characters is Pete Matipid, a caricature of the quintessential miserly man. "Matipid" doesn't have an exact English translation, the closest I can think of is thrifty. The word "saver" is associated with it but it connotes a banking/business context, which "matipid" doesn't have. I have often heard and used the word "saver" used together with investment, such that one saves to invest in something else, or one saves to buy something, or to keep the bottom line of a business in the black, but "matipid" is rarely used in any of those ways. I once heard somebody say that what is saved is earned,  which I think is wrong unless he's used to making double entries in his business. Neither is "matipid" used in that sense. But Pete Matipid is different. He serves fried chicken for dinner, a luxury in most Filipino  homes, but he serves it hanging on a string. And his guests are not allowed to eat it, but only to smell it, as they munch on a plate of hot rice. And after dinner, the chicken, still hanging on a string with a pulley, is hidden behind a cabinet and locked up for the next meal. Of course, nobody does that in real life, but it demonstrates exactly the absurdity of what being "matipid" means in Filipino, it is saving for saving's sake, a sort of neurosis afflicting the financially-challenged and even the successful ones too. It's not saving to invest, or to buy something, or to stretch a "budget," (Curiously, in the Filipino context, the word "budget" in fact is often used in the pejorative sense such that one who is working on a budget is poor or selfish.) I'm sure before Pete Matipid became such a hit -- it was a film and television series -- "matipid" might have meant more than stingy or the absurd meanings that Chiquito's character had assigned to it. No thanks to him for having contributed to the financial miseducation of the Filipino by making the habit of  "saving" and the "saver"  as objects of mockery and laughter.  But he's funny. 

Day 3: Rice, Nori, Egg - Done

I got this tip from Ivan Orkin, the white guy who had the temerity to open a ramen shop in Tokyo and nailed it. He was a teenager working as a dish washer in a Japanese restaurant. One day, he got hungry and asked the Japanese chefs for something to eat. They gave him a bowl of rice, cracked an egg on it (raw), seasoned it with nori and Japanese soy sauce, and boom -- Japanese comfort food. I tweaked it a bit for health reasons to make it salmonella-free by boiling the egg for six minutes. What comes out is soft-boiled with a creamy yolk, which I imagine should be close to the texture of raw egg. I added some fish eggs to give it color and depth, and hey it's nourishment like no other. The exciting part is this dish sets me back by only 141 calories broken down as follows: one-fourth cup of rice (51calories), one egg (78 calories), nori (1 calorie), fish eggs (10 calories), and soy sauce (1 calorie). This meal is barely 18 percent of the 800 calories recommended per meal for males, a good way to start a diet without the feeling of depravation. My wife said I'm beginning to act like old professors who are experimenting with their meals. I guess she's right, age has something to do with that -- when you've tasted a lot of meals in your life and you're looking for that meal that you will like which will not be expensive, will not require tedious preparation, and will not expense out your calorie goals for the day, you go out hunting for it. And I may have found it in this Ivan Orkin tip.

Day 2: Sting

Sting makes crazy lyrics sometimes. He has this song  about the seven brothers who killed the bandits in pursuit of a wife. It turned out, however, that there was only one senorita so the singer killed his six brothers so he can keep the wife for himself , and then the refrain goes "Love is stronger than justice. Love is thicker than blood. Love is stronger than justice. Love is a big fat river in flood." I mean in another context love is indeed stronger than justice, but to be singing that in a song about  sibling rivalry that ends in six murders, it is a peculiar insanity that only a rock icon can get away with. Yet, the sentence is begging to be plucked out of the Sting song, and probably to give it more dimension, substitute stronger with greater and  one should say, "Love is greater than justice." Ayan, nevermind that justice is an essentially-contested concept, because as an ethical value, it still is -- no matter what the lawyers say -- less than love. Jesus Christ said, "Render unto Ceasar what is Ceasar's" which is similar to what Plato said in the Republic, that is -- justice is doing one's role in society. But when asked what is the greatest commandment of God, Christ spoke only of love -- love for God and love for one's neighbor as one loves himself/herself. And indeed, a society that functions purely on the performance of one's duty, without the emotive value of love, is not quite the kind of republic fit for humans. Hence, love is greater than justice. It's amazing Sting manages to inject that wisdom in a song about murders. "Love is a big fat river in flood."

Day 1: Eternal Return

Before yesterday, I didn't know Singapore had a thriving writing community. I found myself in Tiong Bahru at a bookstore called, "BooksActually" holding  a poetry book called, "We kept eating expired things," and asking myself why I have not been here all my life. Of course, the question is no longer relevant, for the fact is I was there, with books of poetry and fiction in my bag, and that is all that matters now. I should go back there one day, maybe next month or next year,  maybe sooner than later. Yet, since I believe in Nietzsche's Doctrine of Eternal Return, Tiong Bahru, Singapore, is a place that I have probably been to in a past life and probably will return to over and over. I could go through the entire catalogue of fiction and poetry that the bookstore offers or line up for the famous  kopi or soya milk or the Hainanese chicken rice in the hawker center, or just walk around and wonder who takes care of the well-manicured trees and how come there are no people on the streets; it doesn't matter what reason there is to come back. One just goes back and leaves in order to come back and leave again. Returning is not about time and space, it is quite surely about the homecoming -- or should it be the home-seeking (?) -- of the soul, a state where the infinite is filled with the repetition of the finite. So, it therefore negates the question to begin with. The  question is not why I have never been to Tiong Baruh, rather why I have not remembered to come back. Aye, there's the rub -- I have returned to the place where I have not been to, and it makes perfect sense. 

170. Letter to my 21 Year Old Self

You worry too much about the small things. The years ahead have so much to give you -- a career, a spouse and a family, friends and relatives who would support you, and wisdom only time and space can teach you. It is the hand of God cradling you every moment,  gently and constantly. You have been loved from the day you were born, and this love would stay with you especially in times that you need it most.

Ateneo Alumni Homecoming 2016, College 91 #TatakAsul

Your worst reaction to this love is fear and pride, the sins of your youth. Yet, what is there to fear when everything is given to you out of love? The unknown must be met with enthusiasm and hope like a baby learning how to walk. And the far extreme is to think these things are entitlements and not gifts, to compare what has been given to others to what you have received, and to fail to see through the eyes of others who struggle in the darkness and light of this love.  Receive this love with all humility and gratitude, and you would understand the greatness and splendor that is for all to share. But still, you would need time and space to understand these words. Soon, you would be happy -- far happier than you have ever been. Love is all there is. Worry not about the small things. God is all there is. 

169. Power to the People

Plato warned about tyranny. It is the inherent weakness of the democratic system that the people can be manipulated. He was right about that. But people can also be enlightened. When people realize they have been taken for fools, that their emotions have been pricked to advance an agenda far from the common good, and that they have been misled by rhetoric devoid of logic and full of fallacies  -- people learn and realize that they do not need a philospher king or enlightened tyrant, because they can be philosopher kings in their own right -- that Plato missed. And the first manifestation that they have been enlightened is when they go out on the streets -- bomb scare, rain and all -- to express their grievances against the powers that be, to remind them that the power comes from the people, and if power is abused, the people will take it back. 

168. Gen. Bato and the ideal police organization

I caught a clip of Gen. "Bato" dela Rosa weeping on national TV the other day after the testimony of Kerwin Espinosa who testified that Espinosa's been bribing high ranking policemen to maintain Espinosa's drug business all these years. If the allegations of corruption are true, I'm sure Espinosa is not the first, the last, or the only drug dealer paying off policemen for protection. And Gen. Bato would continue to weep at this ghastly thought that the police institution is corrupt. I think the mistake is in believing that the police organization, or any government institution tasked to enforce the law with the power of the gun, is ever going to be close to its theoretical model of being the protector of the people. Gen. Bato notes that the police are also human beings subject to temptations  and full of  needs and desires that may not coincide with their sworn duties. Thus, the institution, as in any human organization, is wired to be corrupt and bound to be corrupt. This brings us to the oft-quoted question, who will police the police? Assuming there is such police (sort of a super-police), will it not be as corrupt? Oh, there are more things to cry about, Gen. Bato. Yet, the problem of the Philippine police is not unique. Many nations suffer the malady of corruption in their police institutions; each corrupt in its own way, betraying the ancient precepts  of the warrior class, and  some more corrupt than others. And this is so not for any spectacular reason but simply because they are human beings. And if we begin to view the world of politics from the premise that every person who wields power is a human being, predisposed to corruption and bound to be corrupted, then we should be thinking twice on whether someone should wield power on the rest of us at all. 

167. MVP channels Mephisto

Manuel V. Pangilinan (MVP) is looking for a new president who will replace him in PLDT, known as the crown jewel of Philippine business. What is telling, however, is how MVP described his criteria. 

“He has to be ready to die for the job, give up his family. Those are my strictures. Work over family. Period. If I could see that in that person, you’re it. You know, there is always a price you pay for the life you choose," says MVP. 

I mentioned in a comment on a friend's Facebook page that this is a Faustian Wager. And the vacancy is perfect for the forty-something's known as Gen X who would have the experience and energy fit for the job. The compensation package is tops. If it's any indication, MVP has been donating buildings in his name to his alma mater and has bankrolled college basketball teams. He once brought the NBA all stars to play with the locals, even fetched Kobe Bryant on a jet for the games. In other words, it's the money dream. But the fun ends there; work over family is his number one criteria. There is no balance. I have no doubt many will be ditching their families for the MVP life, and at one point in my life I had the same mind set. But this Faustian Wager always ends in regret. The  legend goes that Faustus bargained with the devil Mephistopheles --  service from the devil on earth in exchange for service to the devil in the after life. Faustus is initially satisfied with his chosen life, but ultimately finds the emptiness of the powers of the world. Soon as the clock marks the passing  time, Faustus sinks deep into despair. The devil appears to take his prize and,  amid thunder and lightning, carries Faustus off to eternal damnation. I'm sure the PLDT job vacancy is not a Faustian Wager; somebody has to make the Philippine internet work. But when its outgoing president couches the job summary in those terms, you can be sure, he fell into it, which is probably why he's done a terrible job. 

166. Notes on Celeste Lecaroz's Portraits: #5 One Artwork a Day

During the heyday of the Beatles, each Beatle - or so the legend says - wrote one song a day. These songs, a lot of which could be crap, became the source of the 275 original songs that the Beatles recorded and released. It's basic math. They improved the probability of getting a good song done by populating the pool from which it would be drawn. When Celeste started considering the shift from adult coloring to full artist, I told her about this trivia from the Beatles. I challenged her to be the Beatle of art, "Do it. One artwork a day. Start now." What followed was an adventure of sorts. She geared up for it -- colored pencils, colored pens, water color, pastel, acrylic paint, oil paint, and coffee stains.

 

"Wait a minute," I told her as she painted the beautiful face of the young Susan Roces using coffee stains, "Why are using my coffee?" She told me a little story about how she overheard a comment from detractors (everyone has them) that the reason why she colors well is because she has expensive materials. "To prove them wrong, I'm using the most accessible and cheapest material any artist can get." And the resulting figure is this wonderful monochromatic image of the once and future first lady of the Philippines. "Fine, I said. That's still counted as one artwork." So. Celeste does it everyday. Paint, eat, draw, sleep, color, eat, sketch, sleep -- it's the rhythm of one artwork a day.  Sometimes, she does them in advance. And she is "getting so much better all the time." Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 

165. Apocalypse Child

I once had a dinner with a film merchant who was responsible for bringing the world the old film, "The Last Emperor." And he told us, if you're making a film, you have to  answer the question, "What are you really selling?" And after watching the film, "Apocalypse Child", I can't help but second guess what the film makers might answer. 

There are three love scenes here: one as the film opens, another as the film hits a turning point, and the third, close to the end. But this is not porn. These love scenes would take you to the whole spectrum of emotions from excitement to moral indignation to outright disgust -- at least that's where they took me. The love scenes are not going to cater to  "prurient interest" as the American legalese for porn would put it, but they are going to badger people's  mind for answers for the rest of their lives-- (SPOILER ALERT) Can you get away with sleeping with your best friend's fiancee? Can you get away with  sleeping with your best friend's mom? Maybe we should turn the questions around. Can you get away with sleeping with your fiance's best friend? Can you get away with sleeping with your child's best friend? 

These things happen  -- and I'm still deciding whether I'd be lucky or cursed if it happened to me.  Ford is  a hot male who teaches surfing in sunny Baler, Aurora. He has this sexy girlfriend, smitten, conquered, and happy to be his playmate. But his boyhood friend comes home, now a congressman about to be married to this beautiful lady, who confesses that she had a child at fourteen like Ford's mom who had him at the same age. The beautiful lady knows Ford's story about being the rumored child of Francis Ford Coppola, who stayed for a long time in Baler shooting Apocalypse Now,  and she says she wants to learn to surf. That's fine, Ford says, he won't charge. And she tells Ford that her fiance  has predicted that she and Ford will end up sleeping together. Ford deflects it with a joke -- That's fine too, Ford won't charge. But already the bar is set, how does Ford  teach surfing to this beautiful lady without ending up in bed with her? What a fine mess these kids are going to make. 

This film has the sensibility of an F. Scott Fitzgerald novel. The narrative is smooth, some funny lines here and there, almost plotless, the conflict happening in the characters' inner lives, and it leaves you wounded for the rest of your life. Not everyone would be ready for this; but surely, at some point in their lives, people should watch this film. 

Maximum Volume No. 2: #5 Woman of Sta. Barbara

Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell would have loved this tale, which is a variation of the Oedipus story. Held together by finely woven lyrical sentences, it races quickly right from the first paragraph, and it holds the reader until it goes back to where it starts. (Spoiler alert.) What happens when you find out your dead mom has a betamax X-rated film? This premise in the hands of an amateur is going to come out like a cartoon, but you have to hand it to the author for carefully navigating us through the story. We find out about the sad life of the sex starlet, who never quite made it, her affair with a married man, her child out of wedlock, unsupportive parents, and ever loyal accountant sister, whose apartment is the setting of this story. These are the side stories to the main Oedipus variation that carries the story through. Good work. 

164. Notes on Celeste Lecaroz's Portraits: #4 Communication of an Emotion

It was Leo Tolstoy who theorized that art is about the communication of an emotion. If the artist is able to convey the emotion that the artist felt when creating the artwork and the observer feels the same feeling upon viewing it, then the artwork is a success. Before Celeste painted the portrait of Fr. Jose Cruz, S. J., I told her of my one experience with the man.  It was my first day in Ateneo Law School, and the first part of the afternoon was a mass by Fr. Joe. My classmates and I came from various colleges, and we all had reasons why we wanted to become lawyers. Of course, most of us wanted the prestige and power of being a lawyer, especially an Ateneo-schooled lawyer who had a heyday in the post-Marcos legal landscape. We were going to be bar topnotchers, high profile corporate and litigation lawyers who would run the country in due time. We were going to be big shots. Fr. Joe gave us a general absolution before we started so all of us could receive communion. And then, when he gave the homily, he sounded differently. He began questioning our motivations to become lawyers,  berating us for our selfish goals, and asking us, "Is there a single drop of blood in your vein which is not motivated by an appetite?" I have never heard anyone ask that question before. He said it in this diction and voice characteristic of Ateneans of his era a la Raul Manglapuz. With this background, Celeste started her work on the portrait and when it was completed, I decided Tolstoy was right -- the success of an artwork is in the conveyance of the emotion. I see Celeste's Fr. Joe Cruz, S.J. and I reminded of what he asked that afternoon in Ateneo Law School, a question so profound yet so practical that it torments me everytime I think about it. It is a unique feeling. The man is looking at you, his eyes are piercing, he doesn't seem to be pleased nor pleasing, he's asking something, and you know he won't like your answer.  "Hey you,... big shot...is there. ..?"and I utter to myself, "I sure hope there is Father. I sure hope there is."





Celeste's Fr. Joe Cruz, S. J. and other iconic Ateneo teachers will be on exhibit at the Ateneo Alumni Art Fair from November 13-19, 2016. 

Maximum Volume 2: #4 Totems by Catherine Torres

“Totems” by Catherine Torres had me rollicking in laughter and amazement at the middle-eighth, so to speak. And for anyone wanting to read this story, you have to stop now. A “totem” is a token that reminds one of his ancestry, and in this one, it is the “bolitas” – accidentally viewed by JR, the narrator, from a hidden tape of his late dad’s nocturnal adventures as a seafarer. JR turns his boring graduation film project about the parallel lives of OFW’s and Jose Rizal into a winning film called, “Bolitas: The Hidden Life of Filipino Seafarers.” Growing up as a teenager in the side streets of Project Two Quezon City, I’ve heard about bolitas, but I’ve never seen one and have always believed that the sexual powers that it provides are the stuff of myths and lies of the Filipino casanovas. This story had my long buried teen-age dreams and interest of bolitas rekindled, and it makes me wish that the prize-winning documentary that the story talks about is a Google search away. This is a well-crafted story. It grabbed me right at the first page, albeit there seems to be something missing in between pages 57-58 -- perhaps an editorial miscue, but nonetheless, there is enough to keep the story together splendidly

Notes on Maximum Volume 2: #3 Those Who Don't Build Must Burn by Brylle B. Tabora

It's 2050 and a corporation is peddling poems made by a machine called the Wellington Dollar-A-Poem Machine, which spews out 1,200 poems a day on demand. The hero, Eric Austria, ex-professor of poetry and author of a poetry book that flopped, is against it so he storms to the office of owner of the machine, Mr. Wellington, to plea for the case of the now-jobless poets. But Wellington faults the poets of 2042 for being incendiary,  writing poems that were anti-establishment which started riots and a pattern of kill, burn, kill, burn among the readers. And, Austria asks, "what about artistic freedom?" Wellington replies, "There is no freedom which is absolute." Austria replies, "But poetry, like everything, evolves---" Wellington says he'll have none of it. So, Austria sets a poem for a dollar machine on fire.  

This is the first science fiction in the Maximum Volume anthology (I don't know if there are other's as I haven't finished the book.) And it takes on the classic sci-fi theme of man vs. machine. It reminds me of the Infinite Monkey theorem, which speaks of the probability that six monkeys typing infinitely on a keyboard will churn out something shakespearian. The answer is one to infinity. But would the answer be the same with a machine, which is fed with everything that Shakespeare wrote? Will algorhytms be able to mimic the randomness and precision of human intentionality? Well, Deep Blue was programmed to speak the language of chess with a specific objective of beating its opponents. And Deep Blue beat Kasparov  in 1997. So, to reform the question, will people be able to build a machine that will conquer poetry, like Deep Blue which conquered chess? If it happens, let's take it from Prof. Austria who borrows a line from Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, saying, "Those who don't build, must burn." Good story. 

Notes on Maximum Volume 2: #2 Fly-Over Country by Ian Rosales Casocot

Fly-Over Country had me thinking which is the story within the story. There are four characters, Allan, Henry, Tony, and Yvette. Allan is the "you" of the story, an American writer who tends bars on evenings, shirtless, and he meets Tony who is a Filipino writer. They have a one night stand and as Allan flirts with Tony, Allan convinces Tony to put Henry, a fictional Filipino character in what Tony was writing. But Henry parallels Tony in Tony's writing. And considering that Allan is also a writer, Allan tells Yvette about Henry who Allan has appropriated in his own fiction. (If you've reached this far, you might need a pen and a piece of paper to keep track.) Yvette convinces Allan to kill Henry in Allan's story. Henry dies by the Asian malady known as bangungot after the brief one night stand with Allan. And in Allan's story, Yvette is the mother of Henry. So, which story is within the story, or for that matter, which story is autobiography? But Allan declares, "Everything is autobiography." and Yvette dismisses it because after a while, "it kinda becomes boring." Not in this one though,  especially because the metafictional premise is fleshed out in solid and clear prose with the second person viewpoint adding a layer of dreaminess, and the recurring image of the "fly-over country" mirroring the theme of the loneliness of the characters and their fiction as they resolve their issues of intimacy.  Allan declares in the key part of the story how the heart might as well be a kind of fly-over country, "like where you were this moment, the broken (hearts) knowing no destination, except this wilderness of so much  open spaces where no one looked, where everything was lost in some discarded cartography." You gotta hand it to the author for pulling this off. Absolutely brilliant!

163. Duterte's Wager

Blaise Pascal must be turning in his grave. Duterte just mangled Pascal's wager and re-stated it to support the reimposition of the death penalty. "Let's impose the death penalty just in case there is no god." says Duterte. Yet, Pascal encourages us to take the win-lose nothing bet, which is -- there is a God, rather than the lose-lose nothing bet, which is the case if there is no god. The win-lose bet takes our interest to mind, as we win if we believe there is a god and act accordingly, and indeed there is a god, and lose nothing if there is no god, as all is lost anyway. The lose-lose nothing bet, which is there is no god, loses if there is a god -- "Oops! There is a god, damn" and loses nothing if there is no god -- "I was right but I'm still dead". But Duterte --  he's asking us to reconsider the lose-lose bet. And he's saying the lose-lose bet supports the death penalty. Jeez, non-sequitur. It's really another way of saying, there is no god, let the State kill if it wants, and never mind if it turns out that God exists. 

162. Notes on Celeste Lecaroz's Portraits: #3 They are not "portraits"

They are abstract art, she declares as I point out to her some lines of the face in her work which diverge from the reference.  To abstract from reality is to cut from the real world and paste it on the canvas. To expect that it is an exact graphic representation of reality is futile, because it is neither its intent (if it has an intent at all) or its means. Instead, this kind of art uses the language of colors, shapes, forms, and lines, which are pure abstractions. Thus, to appreciate Celeste's art, one has to expect the colors, strokes, lines, shapes, to speak louder than the image of the face, which does not have to be a perfect copy. But the face is central to her art. It is what makes the pieces accessible to the untrained eye, the shock of recognition that shows the subjects in colors which represent who they were, who they are, and who they would ever be. I read somewhere that it was a tongue in cheek blessing to tell someone,  "May you be painted by Picasso," as Picasso's paintings of faces have displaced eyes, ears, and nose. It takes a lot of education  to actually like a portrait by Picasso. But, it's abstract art -- just like a Celeste Lecaroz portrait, which a portrait it is not. 

Notes on Maximum Volume 2: #1 "The Auroras"

Two gentlemen, Dean Francis Alfar and Sarge Lacuesta, venture in a project to publish the best Filipino fiction and they nail it. Rather than engage the blogosphere in the polemics of Dutertesism, why not engage these gentlemen and write about their fine harvest? Just a word of caution, every reading is an opportunity for misreading, but never mind as long as we enjoy it. 

1. The "Auroras" by Sasha Martinez is about arrivals, departures, welcomings, homecomings, lost loves, found loves, destruction, and reconstruction with a post-war historical cast of characters who lived through it all. I labored all afternoon, Google in hand, finding out the characters who had a modern-day online presence: Armi Kuusela, the first Ms. Universe from Finland who married a Filipino banker, Gil Hilario -- albeit Gil is not in this story as it ends just as Armi is about to go to Baguio where she would subsequently meet Gil in a blind date -- and, Colonel Manuel Nieto, the be-moustached aide-de-camp of Pres. Manuel L. Quezon, subject of teen-ager's crush and a sort of forbidden love by Aurora, the narrator, yes -- he's real too. Celebrated personalities come to an afternoon tea party to welcome Ms. Universe and I was fully convinced this is a record of the actual event. Just then, the unabashed congressman who declared himself the only one eligible among the Filipino gentlemen smitten by Ms. Universe, makes an appearance close to the end of the story. A few clicks and I learned this is the same guy who faked his war medals and looted the bureaucracy.

2. Of course, as a work of fiction, the story has to earn its merit without the aid of external elements — and it does so beautifully in a language that is often hypnotic. Yet, this is part of the fun in historical fiction, recognizing how the written points to the unwritten and delighting at how the written shows the world lurking beneath this lyrical tapestry. The story understates much of the historical detail, making it all the more intriguing. I'm particularly fascinated with Colonel Manuel Nieto's story about the bear, the last one in Luzon said to have hidden in a cave at the edge of Intramuros. The bear raged as the Spaniards partied and prayed each night. It is the story within a story, a metaphor for what was once native to the island, hopelessly and foolishly resisting the inevitable excursions of and intrusions to the Filipino soul. Yet, the bear is gone and Aurora, the narrator, declares herself to have become the woman of the world. Having married Jakob, the brother of Armi Kuusela, Aurora will bear children who "will be most assuredly blonde, and not improbably blue-eyed.” And close to the end, she muses about her lost love, the Colonel and his story about the bear with things having gone full circle. There are four Auroras here: the wife of Manuel L. Quezon, the flowers named by the hotel gardener after her, the narrator named Aurora, who leaves an old love and brings home a new one, and the Roman goddess of dawn who layers this fictive world, as it starts and ends, with the colors of a new beginning. Ganda! 

161. Notes on Celeste Lecaroz's Portraits: 2. Spontaneous Realism

The first time I thought this project of large colorful canvas portraits by Celeste was worth a serious second look was when she painted Fr. Roque Ferriols, S. J., the well-loved professor of philosophy from Ateneo. The portrait captured that classic Fr. Roque stare who was my teacher back in the 90s. Known for his temper and tireless drive, coupled with his mastery of Plato, St. Augustine, and Teilhard de Chardin, he'd look at you at certain occasions as if saying, "I expect you to have done the right thing." which in those days meant studying and thinking; and you would melt, if you didn't. Yet, Celeste bathed Fr Roque's portrait in colored lights, and the effect is magical, if not, mystical. This is good art. What makes it so? It starts with this massive four feet by four feet canvas which is an imposing size for an artwork. It summons attention. Then, the under coloring on which the face is painted acts as the base where all the action happens.  The strokes, varied in size and twisting and turning here and there, seem isolated from one another at close range, and appear to be spontaneously assembled. But the mind assimilates these elements and recognizes the sum of all parts. Then, the seer notices the colors that seem to have no logical reference to reality save for shades and its values which are correponded with color.  But the mind is tricked into imagining that these colors are different lights beaming  at the subject. The effect is out of the ordinary. Of course, if you do this painting on some guy from the street, it might not have that same cathartic effect on the seer. But to someone who has known Fr. Roque Ferriols, S. J., especially during the crucial years of college education, this portrait is loaded with meaning. This is real as it can be -- Fr. Roque Ferriols, everything he has written and said, everything he stood and fought for -- in a beautiful picture. I told myself, I just gotta have this on my wall. 

159. Davao

Every bombing is a repetition of another. In June 12, 1978, there was a fire at the market of Bankerohan, Davao City. As people came to help put out the fire,  a grenade exploded, killing a number of those who came.  This much we learned from Joey Ayala's song,  “Bankerohan,” which came out in his 1991 album, "Panganay na Umaga." In March 4, 2003, the airport terminal in Davao City was likewise bombed. At least 21 people were killed and another 148 were injured. Yesterday, I woke up to hear of another bombing in Davao, this time at the Roxas night market. I'm familiar with his place as often I stayed at the Marco Polo Hotel right across Ateneo de Davao, near the site of the bombing, which killed at least 14 people and injured at least 61. The logic of these bombing attacks were obscured, but I gathered it was often politically-motivated, a vicarious attack upon an authority channeled through  the helpless civilians, whose fault it was to be at the wrong  place at the wrong time. During martial law, the Light-A-Fire Movement was notorious for bombing several establishments. I found a book by one of its leaders, Ed Olaguer, in a book store, read some chapters, and set it aside for good, regretting the time I wasted reading that book. Olaguer was never made a hero of the Marcos years, even as Olaguer tried peddling his exploits. Digging further into our history with bombers and terrorism, Jose Rizal knew how history would judge terrorists like Olaguer. In Rizal's El Filibusterismo, Simoun's plan to bomb the wedding reception of Paulita Gomez and Juanito Pelaez was foiled by Isagani, Paulita's erstwhile love interest, who threw the lamp where the bomb was hidden to the river, after a tip from Basilio. Rizal could have changed the plot, and let the bomb explode instead, which would have been the first terrorism scene in Philippine literature, but he did not do so. Rizal knew it then as we know now,  the bombers are never endeared to the authority they seek to overthrow or to the society they seek to change, or to the human race for that matter. History would always be unkind. Nobody would get a monument for killing helpless innocent people, regardless if the bombers succeed,  and no matter the nobility of the cause. The means, not the ends, is how all will be justified. Every bombing is a repetition of another. But the bombers -- they never learn.

158. Notes on a Trip to Taal: #9 Mariano Aceron

My Aunt, EAV, sent a message after reading these notes and related the story of her dad, Mariano Aceron, who was born in Taal. My aunt said, 

"According to Papa, life was difficult then that Papa had to sell newspapers wearing "bakya" (wooden clog slippers) as they could not afford to buy shoes. They moved to Mindoro, as most Batanguenos did, to find their luck. Lolo Amboy (Pablo) worked in a farm.  He worked hard that he was able to buy the land where we get the copra share from his boss.  Masinop daw si Lolo.  Lola Abe (Isabel) was in her small panutsa-making business. Papa was telling me this when we were talking about diabetes, thinking that the panutsa was the reason why he had diabetes. Ulam daw nila at baon nya pa while they were studying in Manila to earn a degree.    Si Papa lang ang nakatiis that's why, he was the only one who earned a university degree." 

I am teary-eyed as I post this story. And I am imagining how it was for the young Mariano Aceron to be walking around Taal in wooden clogs selling newspapers as a kid. I am thus urging every Aceron descending from Mariano, let's honor Papa every year on his birthday, August 29 (today is his birthday), by walking the streets of Taal in wooden clogs, after all this is how we all began. It will connect us to Taal  as it will connect us to him, wherever he may be. 

157. Notes on a Trip to Taal: #8 Orosa

In the movie, Memento, Christopher Nolan's lead character wakes up without a memory of his past. I have often questioned the plausibility of this premise, because a man with no memory should have no words, for our memory lives on our words. At the doorstep of the Orosa ancestral home today, I tried to recall where I stood exactly forty years ago as a kid one late morning to join the Orosa reunion.

As I went up the stairway, I saw the picture of Agaton Orosa, who was the brother of Isabel, my great grandmother. 

Why did our side of the Orosas leave Taal? Isabel left with her love, Pablo, and settled in Pola. But why did we never come back? The geologist in our tour mused that the volcano, temperamental as ever, was a natural adversary of the Taalenos. To live in this place is to live in constant danger. The volcano was active every ten years except in the last fifty years, but no one could tell when it would erupt again. Pablo and Isabel established their home in Pola, a bayside town in Mindoro island far from the volcano and its tempers. They tilled the land and prospered. But, they never left Taal. They brought with them their language, traditions, food, and stories. These stories are what filled the gaps of memory that separated me from Taal and the house that Agaton built. And so unlike Nolan's lead, as I stood there at the exact spot where I stood forty years ago, I am fortunately a man who carries the memory not only of my past but also of my family's roots. 

156. Notes on a Trip to Taal: #7 Taal Church

Taal Church was originally built in 1575, destroyed by the 200-day eruption of the volcano on 1754, rebuilt in 1755, destroyed by the great quake of 1849, rebuilt anew on 1856, and completed in 1865. The church is known as the biggest church in southeast asia. We toured its rich baroque interiors and got fascinated with its great altar. 

The churchyard is charming too. There is a repository of water where fish swim and  buckets are placed for people to throw coins after making a wish. Rizal's Padre Salvi in Noli Me Tangere was Augustinian, a political snide remark against the friars who built this church, but it is the mark of the congregation's founder, St. Augustine,  that I could feel here in this massive basilica, a great love for God. Pio Goco said, the church's story is also the story of the town that prospered by the fruits of the fertile land, but was empoverished by catastrophes of the earth as well, a boom and bust, the human spirit dominaring the earth and being dominated by it, a monument to the human faith in himself and in God. 

155. Notes on a Trip to Taal: #6 Hai Bing

Hai Bing was a Chinese settler in Taal who once vowed to build a church for the virgin mother of Caysasay. After the Sangley Revolt, a time when the Chinese settlers rebelled against the oppression  of the Spaniards, the Chinese were rounded up, brought to Taal Lake, and massacred. Hai Bing was one of the victims; his body riddled with holes and his head almost decapitated. But the story goes that soon after Hai Bing appeared in Caysasay on the shrine dedicated to the Virgin Mother. The waters of the shrine were known to heal any ailment, and its waters flowed through Hai Bing's wounds. 

With his resurrection, Hai Bing continued his work in building the Church of Caysasay, which was subsequently completed.

 Hai Bing died later on by the thorns of his carabao, an undramatic ending to an otherwise amazing story, but our tour guide said, it was probably because he broke his vow and became a bad person. Nonetheless, this is the first time I heard the story, but apparently, it is a well-known myth and the kids selling candles at the shrine could tell it from memory. The massacre of the Chinese, which brought about Hai Bing's first death, was the reason why Taal's participation in the revolution was downplayed, the Taaleno's obtaining a reputation of being the Spanish Khmer Rouge. 

154. Notes on a Trip to Taal: #5 Backroom Heroes

Taal was home to revolutionaries who were second-tier leaders, the guys who did the janitorial work, figuratively-speaking, for the stars like Rizal and Aguinaldo.

A paragraph is too short to mention their deeds here, but their biographies are a Google search away. Nonetheless, we found ourselves in the house of Gliseria Villavicencio, the godmother of the revolution, in the words of Emilio Aguinaldo himself. She supplied the logisitical needs of Aguinaldo's army and her house was  a frequent site for revolutionary meetings. Proof of this was the escape hatch that we found in their dining room, which was supposed to lead to a network of tunnels in Taal.

We watched a film of Leon and Galicano Apacible, compatriots of Rizal.  Galicano was President of La Solidaridad once. We also saw the oldest house in Taal the 18th century home of the spouses Marcela and Felipe Agoncillo, known as the first Filipino diplomat. Marcela is one of the ladies who sewed the national flag. 

Pio said Taal was a major player in the revolution but something happened that hushed the town's participation, known as the Sangley revolt, which happened to be a significant story in our next stop. 

153. Notes on a Trip to Taal: #4 Lunch

Pio Goco prepared an excellent lunch buffet for everyone in the tour. Bulalo soup to get started. Appetizers: green mangoes and salted eggs with tomatoes. The main entrees were chicken adobo with turmeric, pork tapa (known as tapang taal because the normal tapa was made of beef), and sinaing na tulingan-- mackerel braised in vinegar. There was a side dish of vegetables known as "bulanglang".  

For dessert, they served us suman with chocolate, and ice  candy, a delight that brought memories of my childhood days.

 

Culinary-wise, I'm happy to note that I am well-connected to my Taal roots. I've been served this food in many family homes from Mindoro through the years, albeit the yellow adobo they serve in Pola was yellow due to annato seeds or food coloring and not turmeric, as I never came across turmeric in our kitchens before. 

152. Notes on a Trip to Taal: #3 The Gocos of Taal

As it turned out, Pio Goco is the brother of Robbie Goco, the famous chef who owns Cyma,  a batchmate from San Beda High School. Pio gave a short introduction to Taal's long history, how the Taal volcano's temper shaped the town (200 days of eruption, the longest ever, in the 18th century)  and shrunk the mythical Pansipit River, the ilog referred to in "taga-ilog" later known as Tagalog,  the language on which Filipino is based. Pio is the son of Raul Goco, erstwhile Solicitor General of the Philippines. The house exhibits Fidel V. Ramos's scribblings on a draft letter to Mr. Goco and follows it until it was signed by the president. 

I mentioned to a fellow tourist that this memorablia validates Fidel V. Ramos's reputation as a hardworking president. But aside from Mr. Raul Goco, the house shares the memory of an even older Goco, 

Juan Cabrera Goco, who happened to be the Katipunan's Treasurer. He built the house of the Goco's and it resembles the Aceron house in Pola, Or. Mindoro, in material, lay-out, and design. 

The Goco house feels a lot like the house of Pablo and Isabel, the Taalenos who brought Taal to Pola. 

151. Notes on a Trip to Taal: #2 The Road

The trip would take three hours. Our host, Pio Goco, said the Tagaytay route is under construction, so we had to take the Talisay route or the Nasugbu route. Further research and a Waze search made us choose a different route -- South Luzon Expressway, exit Lipa, Laurel Highway, through Cuenca, Alitagtag, Sta. Teresita, Taal- Bauan, Taal-Lemery, two lefts, and two rights, and then Taal. By 10am, we arrived at Lipa City. In the seventies, Lipa City was a good one hour away from the SLEX Tanauan exit. The Star Tollway shortened the trip with beatiful view of Mt. Banahaw. I put on my Spotify playlist of baroque songs (my wife complained my rock songs were too noisy), and was surprised as my data connection was seamless. Except for a few kilometers of patched-up asphalt roads, the trip was a smooth ride. It went a little windy from Lipa to Tagaytay. As we entered Taal from the Taal-Bauan road, a big sign by the gas station said, "Gutom ka na ga? Kumain ka na dine Itaalian food." Alright, that made me laugh. My wife pointed me to a billboard that said "Aseron Funeraria." That made me laugh harder. We arrived at the Goco House at around 11am. As Jose Garcia Villa wrote, "have come, am here." 

150. Notes on a Trip to Taal: #1. Homecoming

I am Marvin, son of Edmund, son of Mariano, son of Isabel, daughter of Basilio, brother of Guillermo and Santiago Orosa. I should memorize that to introduce myself to the Orosa ancestral house and its occupants in Taal, Batangas.  The first and last time I set foot there was in the seventies, a year before I even started going to school.  It was a grand reunion of the clan, a day of song and dances, food, laughs, games, and a dip in the lake in the cauldron of the volcano. I remember a big house that resembled the one in Pola, Oriental Mindoro, which my great grandparents, Pablo and Isabel built a hundred years ago -- big staircases, high ceilings, capiz windows,  majestic with the whiff of history in the air. I came to Taal then with my parents; today,  forty years hence, I'm going back to Taal with my wife and kids,  a repetition of an event, a return from a descendant of Isabel,  the one who eloped with Pablo to Pola.  But maybe, Isabel never left Taal or she probably took Taal with her, for here I am, a great grandson  and a century away, on the road, with  bare memories of a happy event, anticipating that it would be just like coming home. 

149. Libingan ng mga Bayani at Diktador

The dead deserve to be buried -- that much we learned from Antigone. Whether we label the cemetery as the burial ground for heroes is a matter that does not matter to the dead. Only the living are concerned about where to bury the dead, but the living would soon be dead, and so in the end, no one would remember whether the dead were buried in a place where heroes or villains were buried. It only matters that the dead were buried. In the case of Alabang cemetery, where a mall was erected, they even unburied the dead and buried them someplace else where the bones would not get in the way of corporate profits. They re-buried the dead nonetheless. So to the proposition that Marcos be buried in the Libingan ng mga Bayani, I pose a qualified consent. Bury him in the ground, save us some electricity, finish this Antigonesque drama, but label it right. Call it Libingan ng mga Bayani at Diktador. And to the President who is advocating this move, pwede ka na rin dyan sir.