Talaga bang pangangatawanan na natin yung baul na yan? Hehehe. Kailangang makapaghanap na tayo kung saan man yan.

Btw, I ran into Kara dun sa NCCA. Tapos sumakay din ako ng trambiya na hinihila ng kalabaw na ang pangalan ay Dao Ming Si. Naawa ako sa kalabaw kasi overworked siya tapos ni di man lang imported na damo ang ipinapakain sa kanya. Sobrang tubong damo yung may-ari ng trambiya na iyon.

Disappointed ako dahil kadarating ko lang sa UP dahil 230pm ang class ko. Walang tao sa classroom dahil suspended na pala ang klase. Lost ang beauty ko. Hmp. Sana di na ako umalis ng bahay para natapos ko ang broadcast ng Oscars. Sabi sa akin, wala naman daw surprising winners.

sayang i missed the whole things sa ncca. was in bicol from wednesday to saturday working for the old fogey. we have to go to bicol if only for their unusual halo-halo in tabaco city. i got a text from nathan regarding his wedding and i was telling arlyn we should pool our money para malaki-laki yung gift that the newlyweds will get from us. dapat magkita-kits tayo during the week. one suggestion ko is mga collection ng mga native stuff like kumot, banig, and of course, baul! may banig akong binili from bicol for them kasi sobrang mura. what do you think?

drop by nga pala sa site ni ian casocot at muling nabuhay ang TIN essay ni Jol.

I haven't been blogstalking much in the last few days, so I didn't know that Butas na Chucks was out of town. She mentioned the trip before, but absent minded me was, well, absent minded. Late afternoon, I was in a state of mini-panic because it would mean crossing the city all by myself, during rush hour on Quiapo day, and then sitting in a strange theater with no one to make running commentaries with about the movie. Then I remembered a bunch of us was supposed to go to Malate, so is all good. For added security, I panhandled my brother into coming with us, since his school is but a stone's throw away. But no, my brother bailed out at the last minute. He was at the Light and Sound Museum and then disappeared without a cellphone signal trace. He resurfaced later in the evening to inform me he went home because he was hungry. Duh, as if the offer didn't include dinner.

The matinee said 7pm, and we all gussied and worried that we wouldn't make it by then. We crawled in and there was only a smattering of people. They were showing a documentary on Philippine Cinema which was made by Mike de Leon. It traced the history of Pinoy Cinema from the time some friends cajoled Do?a Sisang to make a movie, Giliw Ko, the very first from LVN's several decades of movie making. I couldn't recognize all the movie stars in the clips because I'm not familiar with all of them. Rosa Rosal was a cigar-toting vamp in stilletos and Charito Solis was very pretty and imperially slim, a far cry from the plump Ina Magenta that we knew as kids. Sad really. It reminded me of the Pinoy Hollywood exhibit at the CCP lobby and I could barely make out the more familiar faces.

The LVN Studios made movies from 1939 to 1961. Do?a Sisang had stopped making movies by the time the Second Golden Age of Pinoy Cinema came, when the gloss and glam had been replaced by the gritty social realism of Brocka and Bernal. Mike de Leon would be part of this wave, although I've always thought that his movies existed in some kind of vacuum, an indeterminate time and space warp where people were haunted by ghosts and memories, and there were secret societies and singing

Kung Mangarap Ka't Magising

Uuy parang gusto kong hulaan kung sinong old fogey. Kaya lang baka pati ako mawalan ng trabaho. Nyahahahaha. Shhh!

Btw, nagshift gears din ako. I'm reading Alex Garland's The Beach kasi parang ang tedious basahin ng Sa Malamig na Dugo (with matching sago at gulaman).

Book #3 is also a graphic novel: The League of the Extraordinary Gentlemen Volume 1 by Alan Moore. Nope, dennis, wala akong problema sa graphic novel. I'd consider it a book dahil hindi naman ako old fogey. Genius si Alan Moore. Pinakapaborito ko pa rin ang From Hell niya na napakadisturbing noon. Kung napanood na ninyo ang film version ng LXG, wala itong binabat sa libro dahil mas okay yung libro. (Kung napapansin ninyo, mukhang puro mga made-to-film books ang natatapos ko lately. ewan ko kung bakit.) Actually, napapansin kong me attraction yata ako sa Victorian England dahil dito sa librong ito plus yung natapos kong Sherlock Holmes na novel plus yung inaasahan kong Book #4 na set din in the same era. In between book 2 and book 3, nilamon ko rin ang sangkatutak na mga reflections at annual reports ng Gurong Pahinungod. btw, isang old fogey ang bumati sa akin thru text for a job well done para sa isang raket. di ko lang masabi sa kanya na you old fogey!!! may isyu pa ako sa iyo!!! at baka bigla akong mawalan ng raket. hahahahaha.

It's Rainy and I am Lonely

I don't know if this has anything to do with my cousin suddenly dropping off dead when she's just in her early 40s, and that she's been widowed at 30 when the NPAs riddled her soldier husband with bullets, and that my cousins are just 19, 17, and 15 years old. Imagine being that young and you find yourself orphaned. On the other hand, all the grown ups shuttle off to the highlands to join the family in one big grief hug. It should have been happy, after all, my aunt just arrived. But no, I have been left with the nasty job of telling her about the sudden death, and why people wouldn't be there to welcome her, and it's really not my idea of a fun time to be there in a hotel room watching people cry their hearts out after not sleeping for 2 days. All the grown ups and the mothers are away, perhaps to comfort the poor kids. Every one is saying that they are unlucky poor orphaned kids. Oh I would have gone with them, except that my mother is worried I'll have another relapse, get too stressed out and spend another weekend in a hospital. No, stay here and look after the kids. The kids. I want to be one of them right now. I don't want to think of what to cook for dinner, of feeding the dog, and hauling in the laundry because it might rain. Rain. I hate it that it's all grey and rain and clouds right now. I want to stay in bed. I want to sleep. But I have to get up and make breakfast and make sure kids would have something to eat when they come home at lunch time and I have to go to school and maybe say a bit of thanks that I'm not one of the poor poor orphaned kids.

Well, I definitely don't want to be an elitistang old fogey.

Pareng Dennis, bakit ganoon ang segue mo? "Speaking of children's lit" pero tungkol sa graphic novel ang kinuwento. Tapos you don't want to consider it as part of the reading list kasi graphic novel?! So you mean to say hindi counted ang graphic novel kasi konti lang ang words, e paano naging novel yun? (E bakit ang "Getting Better" minarket na novel ng Cosmo e novella lang siya? But I digress...) Naku, magagalit si Butas na Chucks nyan.

Ang Superman myth naman kasi ay puwede i-apply sa lahat ng sitwasyon at kanya-kanyang interpretasyon. Sabi nga ni Joseph Campbell dun sa Hero with a Thousand Ek, it's a recurring motif in all of the world's cultures and literatures. Parang si Rizal kumbaga: May Rizal at Superman for all occasions. O di ba? Feeling PI 100, elitistang old fogey at Mike de Leon all in one? Hehehe.

Balik ulit dun sa marginalization blah: Pero in fairness ha, nung nagmeeting kami dati, mas maraming representatives ang children's lit kesa poetry at fiction. Inisip kong mabuti kung ako ba ay kunyari writing for young adults or fiction... Di lang naman yun ang marginalized eh, pati ang comics. Eh ang comic books pa naman, maraming margins...eh corny.

I'm abandoning the Life in Heavy Metal kasi chaka ung unang kuwentong binasa ko. I'm now leafing through Bright Lights, Big City. It's starting to sound like some alienation Gen X blah pero set in the 80s. Speaking of recurring motifs, feeling ko merong Douglas Coupland/Bret Easton Ellis/F Scott Fitzgerald bawat dekada. Alienation blah iniba lang ng konti.

Kay Butas na Chucks naman: Nung Sabado pinanood ko ang Pinoy version ng Notting Hill, ang Pedro Gil Pangarap Ko'y Ikaw pala, starring Regine and Robin at directed by Binibining Joyce Bernal. Gusto ko lang magpasalamat kay Rustom Padilla dahil siya ang wardrobe at image consultant ni Robin ng mga panahong iyon, at salamat na rin sa Muntinlupa prisons dahil gumanda ang skin niya. I realized na mas cute si Robin Padilla nung kanyang romantic comedy phase kesa nung kanyang Baby Ama phase. Then again, Hindi ako mahilig sa kalbo. Anyway, balik sa Pedro Gil. Kilig nga siya in a Hugh Grant/Julia Roberts at Richard Curtis kind of way. Ang nabasa ko lang ay yung Notting Hill script, at in fairness kilig talaga siya.

Sige bago ako magkilig overload, sign out na ako. Kailangang umalis ng maaga dahil sabi ng nanay ko, lumarga na raw yung mga tagasuporta ni FPJ dun sa may slum area. May mga dala silang plakard na "FPJ pa rin kami, at hindi kami hakot." Traffic ever na naman.

Kasi tanga ang mga elitistang old foggies.

Speaking of Children's Lit, my number seven is an Elseworlds graphic novel written by Mike Millar. Superman: Red Son is premised on the baby of tomorrow landing in Ukraine instead of Smallville. Cold War gets below freezing point! I didn't like to count this in our index at first because of its sparing text, but I did anyway because I went over the damned thing thrice! Ang galing! The commentator who introduced the volume thought he was clever by reading Millar in the light of Orwell (think Big Brother with x-ray vision and super hearing) and Kafka. I say, read and recall the Foucauldian focus on Panopticon and enjoy all the implications of the Borgesian wink at the ending! In my current excitable state, these things more than make up for some narrative inconsistencies and political and scientific oversimplification.



Wala lang. Natuwa lang ako. I thought that wouldn't be possible with me, as I've always believed in the possibilities for narrative depth in the Batman pathos rather than Superman's boyscouting.

Anyway, let's never get to be elitist old foggies okay?

nag-aangas ang mga fellow kutings ko tungkol sa pagiging marginalized ng children's literature. ipaliwanag nyo nga sa akin kung bakit mababa ang tingin ng mga elitista old foggies sa panitikang pambata? nalilito lang ako.

Book number two ko is About A Boy which was an easy read. I think I'm in my Hugh Grant phase. In the middle of reading the book, Pepper and I watched Nottinghill which I really love for the six month sequence. Spolier for those who haven't read the book, it has a slightly different ending from the movie and which felt quite dated because a plot point in the story centered on the death of Kurt Cobain. And Ellie had a more significant role in Marcus's life. I feel quite conflicted whether I like the book better than the movie because I watched the movie first and I really had no complaints. Reading the book, of course, I already had in mind Hugh Grant as Will.

Number four is M.O. Percival's A Reading of Moby-Dick. He intertexts Melville's sea-bound obra with Milton, Goethe, shakespeare, Dante, Blake, and even Hesiod. He even employs Kierkegaard, Freud, and Jung. Galing-galing. Pati Taoism, Mysticism, atsaka ancient Persian duality of good and evil ginamit. Sa lahat-lahat, natutunan ko sa librong ito ang tunay na kahulugan at kahalagahan ng mahusay na kritisismo. Good criticism makes you feel good, justified, and righteous that you slaved over a very long book.

Number five is The Epic of Labaw Donggon from Central Panay. I'm just beginning to appreciate our epics. This one made me feel for the villain, Sarangayan, who protects his wife from the philandering hero, Labaw Donggon. Our villain, sensing his doom at the hands of the hero's heir, asks permission to say his last words to his wife before the conclusion of the battle. The hammock scene is the most poignant farewell I know in epic lore. Sarangayan whispers his last instructions to his wife, rocks her to sleep with his charms and tunes, and then departs with a command to the attendant uripon to keep the flies from their mistress. He then re-engages the heir and receives an arrow between his eyes.

Kilala naman 'nyo ang lolo, melodramatic.

Number six is the second book of Don Quixote as translated by William Starkie. I read part one before our countdown then the books listed here. I only got to finish part two. Anyway, there's a decade between the volumes, and it feels better to read second after a nice break. I will leaf through another translation some other time. I'm eyeing Samuel Putnam's. I don't know if that will count for the purpose of our index though. I'll just see when I get there.

Then, after the translations, I'll read the critics! Harhar.

I'm da bomb, baby.

And I exploded spectacularly yesterday in my other class, I think. The White Elephants discussion went well, but we'll have a part 2 for that one. Tomorrow we'll be taking on Fran Ng's answer to Ernest Hemingway, White Elephants Like Hills. Hopefully that'll be a good discussion and everyone will do their required reading and homework.

On the 50 book thing. I finished FastFoodFiction (#2) and Twisted Flicks (#3), my commuter reading fare. I might start on My Life in Heavy Metal (#5), another short fiction collection which I got from Gwen. Hindi ko pa rin tapos ang Life After God. I don't know why.

Kahapon nga pala, Arlyn, Rod and I went to the UP Press booklaunch at Cravings. Walang SexBomb Girls. Pero may sumayaw ng New Age (?) version ng "Bakit Papa?" Da bomb yung sound system at nag-skip to death yung cd, but the dancer was well armed with her own cd player so she did her dance and that's it.

This week in an alternate universe (aka observation week), I'll be Teaching Hills Like White Elephants.

shuckers! Book number 4 ka na?! Book number 1 pa lang ang natatapos ko which is Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's The Hound of the Baskervilles na binasa ko dahil na mention ito sa isang libro na binasa ko naman during the Christmas holidays. Oh well, got to catch up.

I must tell my students here to do Ophelia. We'll hold it in Makiling with the full sanction of the fairies. And no peeping toms save for me, harhar!

Anyway, Le Citta Invisibili may have had nothing to do with Benedict Arnold but I've been told that it inspired Roland Barthes's study of Tokyo in The Empire of Signs. Calvino, like his countryman Eco, has the semiotic streak.


Anyway, book number four is something got for ten pesos at Diplomat bookstore here at LB. We have constant booksales here. Offhand, I'd say there are six discount places outside of the campus and within walking distance. An interesting find is this very thick volume of dirty limericks for a hundred bucks.

Book number four is The Night Thoreau Spent in Jail, a play by Jerome Lawrence and Robert Lee. The play wove in and out of prison, encompassing most of Thoreau's career ending in the abandon of prison and, more importantly, Walden pond.

I especially like the tense scenes between Emerson and Thoreau. Emerson was Thoreau's god and there was this exchange first:

Emerson: Henry, what are you doing in prison?
Thoreau: What are you doing out of it.

And later we go deep into the dynamics of subversion via the two roads of Emersonian strategic compromise and Thoreauvian individual integrity. Of course, the student is valorized over the master. Emerson considered Thoreau his 'walking ethic', what he lectures and writes about but never truly can be.

Pssst! There's a naked guy outside my office window. Promise, true siya. Meron ba sa LB niyan? Hehehe.

Invisible Communities

Parehong IC ang initials nila? Ayon nga kay Joey Ayala: "Ang lahat ng bagay ay magkaugnay; magkaugnay ang lahat." Hehe. Joke. Actually, wala masyado.

yehey! pwede ako kid's books! wala pa akong book number one or two or anything. ayoko ng buko pie! gusto ko pastillas! yung kinukutsara. o magkita-kits tayo. kelan ba?