MINIATURES

  Chances are if one hasn't been in the 1970s, there is a big possibility that one might conclude the photo was taken a few years ago. Nope, the image is more than 40 years old. The most striking in the scene perhaps are the sidewalks, gutters as we know them, our only connection to foot travel in the Metro -- And they haven't really changed. But lo, I must say the street sweeper takes center stage right away. Don't you think so? Aling Otik? Who remembers Aling Otik? That comic strip character of a "Mangwawalis"- Whose true essence, many say is masked in that perfumed term "Metro Manila Aide", a regime trying to put all the dirt under the carpet. I remember its creator Nonoy Marcelo whom I felt struggled to put his social critique in those strips. Often becoming too ironic. But I like it. Remember the motto, Metro Manila City of Man? Once a storm with names such as: Cedeng, Ebeng, Asing, Kading whatever raged for days, roads were devastated-- Metro Ma...

 French comic series called "Vigor", published by Artima (France).  Last weekend, I spent two quiet evenings with my boys watching the Netflix anime series “Trese”. We finished all six episodes but now and then I have to do some explanation as the boys wanted more backgrounders on the featured Filipino mythological creatures. Once my youngest had to click the “pause” button laughing at me and saying how my explanation had become too academic ( way too “Austronesian” perhaps) especially when I mentioned the connection of the “Tianak” to the Malay folklore “pontianak”. In the end, they had to calm me down: “Dad manood ka na lang” The Netflix anime series reminded me of the art of "komiks" and the culture it spawned in the Filipino consciousness. Somehow I recall my elementary days when you have to fight your way in a group of classmates who were crowding around reading a DC Comics. We used to do science experiments at school with the aide of comic strips. I still reme...

Not many Pasiguenos  still remember the once vibrant duck industry of Pasig. Perhaps others,  like the younger generation, don't even have an idea about it. In a distinct time, when much of the town then was agrarian, duck raising and the production of duck eggs were a source of livelihood for several families of Pasig. In the early 1980s, the industry began to wane, until it was all but gone in the 1990s.  Pasig duck farms along the Pasig River. The enclosures "puyahan" were located along the river banks. The ideal environment for the domesticated duck to produce eggs. Early Spanish chronicles discuss the different customs, traditions, and way of life of the natives of our islands -- Duck raising was mentioned as one unique industry which many agriculture and animal husbandry scholars also believe, was brought by the Chinese many years before the hispanization of the Philippines. One extensive description of the duck industry in the Pasig River during the Spanish times w...

  I recall the works of Ignazio Silone — Last night I was going through my old files and found the notes I have taken in a lecture about exiled writers in Zurich. They were somehow accommodated by Swiss writers two of which were giants: Duerrenmatt and Frisch. It was through old newspaper and magazine interviews of the two that I came across Silone. That was in the 1990s. Silone the anti-fascist then anti-communist, anti-Stalinist — He was an attractive study in that distinct time when totalitarianism of the right and the left were being revoked. Funny, but I even went to visit the cafés and restaurants where Silone and the likes of Frisch or Duerrenmatt frequented if only to fill the gaps brought by questions that will never be answered. Suddenly, news detailing Silone's early collaboration with the Fascist regime of Mussolini came to light. Then followed by more revelations about his relationship with the American intelligence (OSS- precursor of the CIA). The writer a political m...

  In India where the number of Covid-19 cases rose in the last months, it was reported that certain people started smearing themselves with cow dung and urine. They believe it will boost their immunity, the cow being sacred in the Hindu religion, revered and protected -- The symbol of life itself. Of course, Indian doctors quickly discouraged what they label as outrageous. I am reminded of another Bovine incident two centuries ago that of an English doctor named Edward Jenner, who came up with the idea of introducing the virus of Cowpox (Variolae vaccinae) to the human body in order for it to develop antibodies against the said skin disease, seen first in cows and to other related pathogens such as deadly smallpox. "Vacca" is the Latin term for cow, obviously where we also get the Tagalog "baka", as influenced by Spanish which in turn was brought about by the maternal role of the Latin language to many European tongues. Thus Jenner's method we also know now as: ...

The first question that comes to mind is: Why did Humabon and the Cebuanos plot against Magellan’s crew—their supposed allies? It had not even been a week since Magellan fell at the hands of Mactan warriors under Lapulapu, yet suddenly, their foremost friends—and somehow also benefactors—the Cebuanos, turned against them. It was actually the Austrian writer and Magellan biographer Stefan Zweig (1881–1942) who was among the first to explore the angle of rape and abuse of Cebuano women as a trigger for the Cebuanos’ anger, which subsequently led to the massacre. Zweig cited as his primary source Martin of Genoa, a survivor of the expedition, who claimed: “Violation of women was the main trouble.” Zweig elaborated: “Despite his best endeavors, Magellan had been unable to prevent his men—sex-hungry after so long a voyage—from raping the wives of their hosts; vainly did he try to put an end to these acts of violence and lubricity, even punishing his own brother-in-law, Duarte de Barbosa, fo...

Ferdinand Magellan by Charles Legrand (Biblioteca Nacional de Portugal) I n one aula discussion, I was asked to describe Spain's "Siglo de Oro" -- Spain's golden age. I mentioned the achievements in arts and letters and of course the great age of discovery that of Magellan et al. There is also Cervantes and the romantic idea of chivalry being reawaken into the said "Siglo". Being a musician, I also spoke about Spanish music of that time, particularly the character of the early "rasgueado" which I describe as different patterns of strumming the guitar (vihuela) that somehow imitates the galloping of horses. Yes, the quixotic character of the time of medieval knights and adventures, Zeitgeist, could even be deciphered in their music. The men like Magellan were knights or horsemen in a romantic quest for glory and gold (and greed) with their converted horses fashioned out of wood-- Galleons that sailed and ventured upon seas, coming like a Trojan h...