Day 22: My Wife vs. The iPhone

She threatened to throw it to the trash

Once

it refused to turn on, having been 

Dropped

repeatedly from high places like my 

Heart

of a rock that wouldn’t budge to tell 

Hers

is not a problem of force but of

Understanding 

if she’s not keen on reading the manual

Might

as well listen and accept there is 

Nothing 

on my mind but her struggles, and the 

Time

I spend on duties are things to 

Fill

the open space of being like the 

Gadget

when it chokes because it's sending 

Email

and many other things

And

in this fight against the iPhone,  

We

are rooting for no one else but 

She.

Day 21: Tatay's Lesson

He asked me one morning 

as I rushed a paper for class

why I haven’t learned to type,

growing up in his shop 

with typewriters that arrived

missing letters, rigid strokes, 

that needed fixing

in a corner of his house in Pola, 

a town of bankers, lawyers, and clerks

who begged their babies 

jumped the line

for theirs were texts that needed to be set, 

filed in court, or sent far away.

He counted 

how many learned

from his machines

in the afternoons

learning rtyu’s to fghj’s

soon after they’re chasing the quick brown fox, 

the rhythm of clickety clacks and bings 

replacing the stoccatos in which a beginner starts,

That was thirty years ago

and Tatay left;

how would it fascinate him to know 

Liquid Paper is gone

with auto-correct.

Yet on a Macbook,

God bless his soul, I worry 

about letters on the

screen neat and clean, and

regret it might be late

to learn where the “z” is

without looking

a written word

on a moment’s thought

just by touching.

Day 20: Riddles for the 21st Century

1. Twelve numbers 

you need to handle me or

you know not what I will be
for when I have flown and you didn’t see, you regret it and you miss me.

2. What it is the end 

of all that begins,

and begins at the very end,

like a river with no sea,

the end that never ends?

3. “You say potato and I say potatoh

you say tomato and I say tomatoh

potato, potatoh, tomato, tomatoh

Let’s call the whole thing off.”

Answer: 

1. Time 2. Death 3. Sec. Andanar and the Press, or Pres. Duterte and Sec. Yasay

Day 19: Wika nga ni Neruda

(Halaw at salin mula sa Soneto XVII)

Di kita mahal gaya ng rosas na asin, topasyo, o hilera ng klabeles na nagsasaboy ng silab:

Mahal kita tulad ng pagtangi sa mga bagay na madilim,

palihim, sa pagitan ng anino at diwa.

Mahal kita parang halamang hindi bumubukadkad at bitbit ang liwanag ng bulaklak, kipkip, sa sarili lamang,

at salamat sa iyong pag-ibig

mula sa lupa ay nabuhay sa aking katawan sa lilim ang

masinsing bango ng rosas.

Mahal kita ng hindi alam kung paano, kailan, at saan

Mahal kita ng tuluyan, walang ligalig at yabang

Mahal kita pagkat hindi ko alam kung anong paraan ka pa mahalin

kundi ganito, walang ikaw o ako 

sa digkit ang iyong kamay sa aking dibdib ay akin

sa digkit ang iyong mata ay pikit sabay ng aking pangarap.

Day 18: To Throw

off a troll, 

start with a big word 

like “supine,”

he’ll be wondering 

how it’s pronounced, 

and, too lazy to lift

his fingers and Google 

how to say it, he won't 

read any further, 

not knowing in English it means

— the acceptance

of an immoral situation 

due to selfishness or 

indolence

like when people are killed openly on the streets by state agents and 

no one protests because only drug addicts get killed and bystanders are mere collateral damage.

Also means 

— the position of body lying down and the face is looking upwards like when the drugs addicts are killed and they are made to lie facing the sky as the policemen put a gun on their hands to make it appear the corpses were involved in a shoot-out.

Sa Tagalog, “supin” syort por

sumisipsip na Pilipino kaya

kahit patayan ng patayan 

walang nagrereklamo kasi hapi-hapi tayo.

Supin supine in the face of murder.

And he, friendly neighborhood troll,

might even  click “like" and "share” 

if you end with

 👊 👊👊👊!

Day 17: Subic Rhapsody

You can tell

in this January afternoon

the gods 

have blessed us 

the way the coconut leaves sway 

to the direction of the sea

the chill swirling around the nape

whisking salt in the air

as the smoke scatters 

in this bayside bar;

we could have been 

in an air-conditioned room

on the 52nd floor in BGC,

away from the elements,

pampered by modern man’s facilities. 

Yet time and space have crossed 

and willed us to be here

as the sun descends

the wind upon our faces.

 

Day 16: That Lecaroz Painting

of Francis M.

was done in half a day,

one June 12 afternoon,

when boredom struck

and we had money to burn

on canvas, paint, and beer,

with splashes and shades

of the Republic's flag

Kaleidoscope World repeatedly 

played "Every color every hue is

represented by me and you."

I only wanted to see her work

half-expecting she'll get it; half she won't.

It mattered not so long as the barbeque 

came out tender and flavorful.

But she painted

like a mad woman, 

twisting and turning,

the brush landing on the canvas

followed no patterns 

but those in her mind.

She was on his eyes when she paused,

changing brushes as she worked,

her hand barely moving in its stance.

I left to check the grill and let her be.

Then she hanged it on the wall for it was done

And I, 

whelmed by what transpired, 

declared 

genius that was once cloaked 

has been found.

 

Day 15: To Bato's Cop

”How many criminals has incoming Philippine National Police (PNP) Chief Ronald "Bato" Dela Rosa killed? Dela Rosa seemed stumped by the question during a radio DZMM interview Friday, saying only his priest knows the answer… He also revealed that he sometimes weeps in church when he is asking for forgiveness from God. "I am no cold-blooded killer," he said.” http://news.abs-cbn.com/nation/06/10/16/bato-i-am-no-cold-blooded-killer

Who doesn’t need

poetry under a crescent moon

on a white-noised night,

and urine-stenched air,

to kill and put a gun on a 

dead man’s hand

before the radiomen

get to the bloodied street?

You have been assured,

a price for every head

and pardon, if you make a mistake.

You never had it so good in your prosaic world.

It's hard to live you say

when people are  rollicking in 

kaleidoscope dreaminess 

the way that grass

fools the mind of the 

lightness of living

when there is work to do

like build roads and

people do their tripping.

It is your job, in fact, 

to strike out an item

from a list

the way a butcher knocks off a

cut from the carcass of a hog

on a manifest.

Please take a second

to see that the words on the list

are not ribs, hocks, or tails,

but somebody’s name 

who might have been your dad 

or wife from another life,

a fellow human with a face. 

Yet, counter-factuals, you say, 

are irrelevant to your work.

It is easier for a man like you,

bemedalled soldier of the state,

to go home to your real wife, 

tell her how you survived the shoot out with the man, 

who came like the pied piper to take 

people's kids away, he with the evil laugh,

breathing fire as he struck, he was dead

before he could shoot -- 

a little spin here and there 

and you, 

with the heart of a rock,

declare shouldn't we be happy to be alive?

Who doesn't need poetry?

Day 13: Notes on the Cross-Examination of Pilate

How long were you the 

ruler of Judea?

And isn’t it so that your mandate is to 

keep the ruled at peace,

make things predictable —

food for the hungry,

work for the unoccupied,

penalty for the wicked?

And this man who spoke about the 

law of loving God above all

and loving others as one loves oneself,  

what balance did he tilt 

to merit the punishment that you meted?

He did not incite any one against Rome, you will agree? 

Or rally Galilee to secede?

When he spoke, in fact,

of giving to Ceasar what is Ceasar's, 

or loving one’s enemy, he might have implored the province to embrace your dominion — 

weren’t you, after all, the enemy?

The truth, Mr. Pilate, is that you are a coward, correct? 

You stand for nothing but the erection in your loins, 

the food of your feasts, 

the palace where you sleep, and 

the servants you order around?

And violence you can take,  

as long it’s not you they attack? 

Better he than you, 

a footnote to the bankruptcy  of your politics, 

where you trade the easy for the just and 

deny what is due?

You’re an ordinary man in an extraordinary time? 

You know history would not be kind, 

Answer me yes or no — 

You were oblivious  of your 

chance to prove 

the prophecy was wrong —

That man is rational

That man is free

That by doing what is right, 

man could break 

from the empire of expediency?

There are many like you 

who lived and died,

simpletons

with amoral hearts?

You are excused.

Day 12: To be

They said the dead can't write

And there is no internet in the afterlife

John Lennon's soul once complained to a medium

That the genius songwriter that he was in the yonder

was a goner, having left his guitars, pens, and paper

in the portals of heaven and hell.

Poor James Joyce, 

having written in the smithy of his soul 

the so-called uncreated conscience of his race,

cannot come back to revise what he wrote 

or unwrite what he has writ.

The old man is dead, 

mute as the marble on his grave.

So, this is my plan for life,

write, write, write, 

A Descartian variation 

I write therefore I am,

For there is an "I"

That writes 

still kicking and alive, 

a reason why living is 

better than dead.

Day 11: Rizal in his 40s

Rizal died when he was 35 and so that leaves middle-aged Rizal fans like me without a model on how to grow old gracefully. We know he lifted weights and left behind some cement dumbbells in his Dapitan home before that fateful trip to Cuba, which was turned back to Manila where he would eventually be executed. Yet, we can probably project how he would have been in his 40s. He was a sportsman and was into fencing in the days before basketball was invented. I have yet to see a picture of Rizal with a ball, albeit balls were probably around in his time. But the dumbbells are telling. If he were alive at his 40s, Rizal would have maintained his buff physique, probably bulging a bit in the belly, but physically active despite his intellectual pursuits. In his time with Los Indios Bravos in Spain, Rizal got drunk every now and then. We have that picture of Rizal in a restaurant about to throw an apple on Trinidad H. Pardo de Tavera who passed out because of drunkenness. I doubt it if Rizal would have kicked his drinking habit, but he lamented this propensity for revelry and hedonism among the Filipino expats in Spain who drove him to leave and carry on his cause back to the motherland. Without his friends, Rizal would have probably settled for a glass of wine every meal, if he could afford it, and avoided binge-drinking, because there was no one to get drunk with. Besides, Rizal would have been conscious of what his students in Talisay would think if they saw him in public drunk and wasted. Rizal would have been a healthy 40 year old then,  but the Spaniards and the pesky Katipunan members (who used his name as a password) would have given him hypertension.

Day 10: Prayer Poem

The strategic adversary is fascism... the fascism in us all, in our heads and in our everyday behavior, the fascism that causes us to love power, to desire the very thing that dominates and exploits us.

Michel Foucault

Your kingdom come,

but I’m sorry to rain on your party. 

I think we need new metaphors and rituals for accession to office. 

Your will be done, 

Yet, perhaps we should destroy the Palace 

and build it elsewhere 

on earth as in heaven?

Should we rebuild it on the same level as the ground?

Give us our bread (and butter)

Maybe rebuild it lower — 

to signify that assumption to office is not a booty,

a prize one rises to 

and seizes for one’s self

but a lowering of the self to service?

Forgive us who trespass

But we should have a ritual similar to the "washing of the feet" in the Christian bible

Or maybe a ritual as vulgar as the

Chinese bride whose breasts are mashed by guests for cash?

We forgive them who trespass against us too.

After all, submission to the people’s will is a tricky thing — the vilest and most ill-mannered collective unconscious on the planet 

and you, 

a puny creature with the huge ego to fill it.

Do not take us to test.

It is not easy to understand what is happening, 

you have been chosen to work on a task

and you’re throwing a party.

Deliver us from evil.

Amen.

Day 9: Define "___tard"

1. the acceptance of the mephistophelian wager and surrender of mental faculties in the service of a maniacal politician pretending to be a god

2. thinking 'my master right or wrong' for lack of a better thing to do or a better way to make money to sustain  one's mendicancy or stupidity

3. mga taong pakamatay at nakalimot nang mag-isip para sa sarili nila at mahilig sumunod lang sa dikta ng mga naghahari-harian at diyos-diyosan

#asingbols4ph

Day 8. Sunday Morning

 

Nobody watches TV anymore. An old portrait of one's self  hangs on a wall. A box with pastel colors neatly laid out lies on the bed. The red door closes and opens; and the blue dumbbells roll to the sides near the wall. The road outside is quiet.  These are some of the things one observes inside the house when one is not in a hurry, some inconsequential facts and happenings with no purpose but to be there. But it affords the mind a glimpse of Descartes's insight about the one thing that cannot be doubted -- there is a self that thinks. There is a self that observes. There is a self. On a different day, some of these observations would still be the same and some would be different. But nobody would care because the events of the day take place outside the house and the mind is adrift somewhere already busy before things would happen. This leads to the question: what if there were no days like these and the mind is adrift always, busy, adding, subtracting, communicating out there with the world? Surely, the self would get lost, get scattered, and worn down, perhaps it won't even recognize itself. That self would find no home, even if that self has a mansion of a house. There is truth in the adage, remember to keep holy the Sabbath day.

Day 7: Dreaded Things

10.Undercooked chicken, 

9. Running out of gas in traffic, 

8. The judge whose watch is ten minutes early, 

7. The check that is being sent but is never received, 

6. Eb on the guitar, D#m7 dim on the piano, 

5. The iPhone on 2% power, 

4. The wife when she's hungry, the wife when she's angry, 

3. The  7th floor courtroom and the elevator is down,

2. The 31st floor office and the elevator is down, 

1. The 12 midnight phone call, the 12 midnight meeting. 

"When the dog bites, when the bee stings, when I'm feeling sad, I simply remember my" list of dreaded things, "and then I don't feel so bad."

Day 6: Waiting

I'm a lawyer, but I spend more time waiting. That's not exactly how it's supposed to be, but apparently that's how it has been. The court sets a date and time for a hearing, and counsels put it on their calendars, and on the hearing date at the appropriate time, the court room is closed. So the counsels sit outside the courtroom in a suit or barong, perspiring from all the heat, and finding a way to pass the time. If it's a big case and the counsels prepared for hours, all the adrenaline rush would be dissipating with the ticking of the clock. If it were simple motion to be heard, the waiting is easier, but the pressure of the "to do" list back in the office would be gnawing at the lawyer's disposition. When I was younger, I used to carry a paperback novel to keep me amused, but John Grisham could only amuse me once, and I soon resolved that any Grisham book is not worth even my court waiting time. When internet phone browsing came of age, and blogs became popular, I enjoyed waiting more by going online as I wait for my cases to be called; but I soon got alarmed by the increase in my phone bill, so I decided to get a Sudoku puzzle book, which was a cheaper alternative. But Sudoku puzzles became boring as well, so I went back to reading. I had magazines, comics, recipe books, short stories, novels, and history books in my briefcase, my main arsenal to put to some use the time waiting, which could be for various reasons, legitimate or otherwise. I once complained about it to my boss who lectured me instead about time management and suggested I should do my board minutes while waiting in court, which was unrealistic,  considering board minutes were a serious matter and other lawyers could he peering at the company secrets discussed in board meetings. Lately,  I tried praying the rosary, listening to a playlist of all the Ave Maria versions in Spotify, and reading the daily gospel, but these activities take away my focus from the task at hand. So, I decided the best way to deal with waiting time is to wait -- pure thoughtless, unfeeling, and blank-staring at the empty chair of the judge. It's an exercise in patience and mindfulness. Sometimes the judge arrives, sometimes the judge doesn't, but I wait nonetheless. It is in one of these instances that it came to me, we should be thankful for these moments. Before Solomon, Cain just killed Abel.  To find poetry in the waiting is the inevitable life of the legal advocate.

Day 5: What this Duterte Apologist Didn't Get About the Law

This post is a reply to this article, which came out in the Inquirer today: http://opinion.inquirer.net/100563/lawyers-dont-get-duterte

Assuming I did not misread him, which is always a danger when reading the apologetics of the powers that be, what the author is saying is that Duterte's actions against the drug menace is compelled by necessity. And law has no bearing in that. And to the author, this is what lawyers do not get. 

Of course, I get it. When someone is shooting a drug addict in the head while the poor guy is hogtied, the man with the gun is not reciting some Latin phrase like "Dura lex sed lex." He's just shooting, probably enjoying it, and telling himself this is a necessity. 

Nonetheless, I think these are the things that this Duterte apologist and the rest of them do not get: 

1. Necessity is relative.

What is necessary to us might not be necessary to others. Even the degree of necessity is dependent on the subject and the object of necessity. In addition, necessity is also a function of time and space. So, nobody is absolutely right or absolutely wrong about the necessity of things. I'm sure Duterte's argument about the necessity of curbing the drug menace is compelling. But, it is not absolute. His own confession about his use of Fentanyl already cracks the argument about the evil of drugs. Hitler thought killing the Jews was a necessity. Marcos thought declaring martial law was a necessity. General Smith felt it was a necessity to create the harrowing wilderness in Samar and Leyte during the Filipino-American War. The "N" word is such a cliche.

2. Power is a mania.

People who rise to power are not in it purely for lofty intentions. Nobody becomes President, because he/she is in love with the Philippine Constitution. There is in each of us earthlings,  a will to power -- an impulse to subjugate others, an itch to be the alpha male or queen mother. Of course, education helps us to tame that mania. The monks make a vow of obedience. St. Therese the Little Flower proposed that we aim to be like a child. But not everyone is religious. And not everyone educated is aware of this will to power. Some even go to yogis to ask for a mantra, which can be prayed over and over to make the ambition become a reality. Some actually become presidents, aware  of this will to power, and they want more of it. Why this rage with the drug addicts? I can understand PNoy's rage with the Marcoses, albeit I'm not all for it. But Duterte's rage with the drug addicts? If this were a novel, Duterte's character would be criticized for not being round enough. There is no explanation why he has this rage with the drug addicts,  except that he is using it as a ruse for more power. Killing is the ultimate act of power. Some people are addicted to killing, because it is the act of ultimate power.  Nietzsche and Foucault -- they've written about this before. 

3. Due process  is an absolute.

If you look back at history, which is essentially a history of power, things only became humane when due process was recognized by the powers that be. When people were killed at the whim of a king or queen, it was savage. And we judge it as savage because we evaluate it with the value of "due process," which at its core is fairness, power that listens before it strikes, power that recognizes no absolutes, but the absolutes of fairness and frailty of the human capacity to know. For that reason, we have constituted ourselves into a nation. We put power at the service of law, so power and the mania that inflicts those who have it in our system, can be tamed and put into the rational service of every citizen.  Yet, this due process is not the ultimate. Our aim is justice. We have to get it right. The only way to get it right is not to use absolute force; we have to arm force with knowledge and insight, and there is no way we can get that if we shun law and due process. And all this raucous will pass, but our nation  will only be judged, now and forever, by our adherence to the value of due process. Did our State listen to the 6,000 before they were killed? 

Tell me I don't get it.

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