This is a story told to a young boy, 3 years old, by his 30-year old father just before they went to sleep.
(da mother has some cameo appearances here somewhere, so beware, don't lose focus.)
Once upon a time there were two warring groups near the Valley of Elah ---- (the mother suddenly says, Oh! that movie, is it related to that somehow? Father: Yes. The Tommy Lee Jones movie. Mother: I forgot what it was all about. Father: Somebody stabbed Tommy Lee Jones' son to death. Mother: Oh, yes. his boy was sent to some war and he died. The war was in Valley of Elah. Father: Yes) --- the Palestines and the Jews.
The Palestines, the father said, was headed by a really big man, a giant named Goliath who must have measured 3 meters in height and weighed a lot more than you could imagine.
One day, Goliath announced to the Jews that he would stop terrorizing them if they could defeat him in a one-on-one battle: the battle of the best Jew soldier and Goliath, the Palestine. The battle would be held at the Valley of Elah where both groups could openly witness it.
(Son: and the rescue pack and the backpack. Father: you listen a while, there will be a rescue pack and backpack chapter later.)
These clever Jews taunted David to volunteer and being there is nothing he can do, being an underdog to a underdog group, he gave it a try. (Here comes the twist to the story). So David brings in the rescue pack. The rescue pack asks him what he wants him (the rescue pack) to become, as the rescue pack can easily transform itself to anything (Mother: a nuclear warhed.)
Father said that the rescue pack gave David three transformation choices: a bag, a slingshot, and another thing i forgot. David chose the slingshot and with an abracadabra he rescue pack turns itself to a slingshot.
David has been practicing target using a slingshot for the past days, following Goliath's announcement. He held on to the slingshot, clutched the ends tightly with his right hand, and slowly but carefully, he placed a (Mother: NUCLEAR WARHEAD! you have to have a nuclear warhead somewhere!) large nuclear warhead, bearing the spray-painted tag: United States Army, at the tip of the slingshot.
With all his might, David swings the the slingshot with the nuclear warhead weapon and whooops the nuclear warhead goes to the side of the Palestines. It was a perfect target. The nuclear warhead hit Goliath right in the middle of his eyes just directly above his nose and Goliath was pulverized to nothing.
Father to son: Do you know the moral of the story?
(in the background Son was muttering: Waw. I want the rescue pack to turn itself to a helicopter. Father replies: It will later. The US Army has lots of it)
Mother: If you fought with the Jews they'd send you a nuclear warhead.
Father: NO.
Mother (in disbelief): You mean they'd send something else?
Father: Do not fight with the Jews because you will surely lose, no matter what. That is the moral of the story.
The End.
03 June 2010
Exhibit A
Keith and I attended the opening of exhibit for the National Artists for Architecture at Museo Iloilo last May 28.
I was quite excited to see the exhibit as i have been diligently digging the goldmine that is pushpullbar (pushpullbar.com) for more than a couple of months now. The thought of this exhibit set off the excite button in my head: Filipino architect hero post. In pushpullbar. Which I'll coerce Keith to do because I don't think I'll manage (meaning I lack credibility?).
I have always admired the Museo Iloilo. It is probably one of the first (and true) modern buildings in Iloilo City. The architect, I heard was a big fan of Neimeyer, and named his son Oscar. Designed to conform and use nature to its advantage its door opened to a mini amphitheater, landscaped with mini-rolling hills and mini-rinks that both board and inline skaters loved. Large canopied fire trees provided shade to the grounds and cooled the air that enters the Museo. When the firetrees bloom in summer, the Museo looks like a building on fire, postcard perfect. Few years back, that amphitheater was demolished to give way to a parking space. The landscape drastically changed following the construction of the Iloilo Provincial Capitol. During the construction of the Capitol, rumors about the Museo being on the list of structures to be demolished circulated and we could only hope the people concerned reconsidered their decisions. One firetree after another also gave way to disease and eventual deterioration, the last, fallen by a tropical storm.
The Museo still stands today though multi-colored (it used to be just white), dwarfed by the 8-storey Iloilo Capitol. It used to look so proud and inviting with the firetrees abound. The former site of the amphitheater was not as bad, good thing they planted trees but it could be better.
Urbanists would have loved the Museo grounds since it was not gated and it was blanketed in grass. Open-air concerts used to be held there sans the very cumbersome set up of monobloc chairs, now a pre-requisite in the concrete Capitol parking lot. There's a new but very inferior stage (also in a rather awkward orientation) to replace the old amphitheater. I have never attended any concert there for more than 5 years now.
The exhibit opened late but it is not something I don't expect. After all, it is a tradition, if not an SOP, for dignitaries and special guests to arrive late. The program was however, forced to start when it started to drizzle.
I imagined the exhibit to be like browsing through the Architecture Travel forum in pushpullbar where you learn about architecture/buildings textbook-wise and, at the same time, get the feel of it from the point of view of the poster. The pushpullbar forum requires all posters to provide background about the building/architecture featured so readers won't be lost as to what is being featured in the post. Some posters would quote a page off wikipedia (properly acknowledged of course) but because people from this site are so good, they would, more often than not, add a trivia or two, a stock knowledge here and there and the background information becomes a very interesting read. Posters are also required to provide other details such as the address, opening hours, contact details, a KMZ file of the building (and if the poster isn't able to do so, pushpullbar has its own "specialist" to do that, how convenient!). The most interesting chapters in the posts are the photos. They don't even need to be Architectural Digest material type of photos. Posters here make it a point that the photo documentation would be close, if not equivalent, to their own personal experience while visiting the building. Alongside the photos which the poster took, s/he would oftentimes discuss his/her own impression of the architecture and compare what the books said and what his own senses now tell him, standing in front of this...thing. Reading through the posts is like being inside a gallery.
I'm not saying that this should be done by everyone who wants to document a building but believe me, reading about architects being chased by bouncer type security is enough to debunk the black-turtle-neck-le-corbusier-glasses-wearing-scholarly-looking myth on architects. And these things, these pieces of trivia (but not trivial information), these field notes, made the building more "human" to me, a non-architect. And I suppose this is what the exhibit wanted to do, also. Only that it failed.
What made it fail, really? Well, let us see.
First is that we didn't get to see architecture travel type of posts. But I should be entirely blamed for that – for the very high expectations. What we found were blown-up pages from what seemed to be an annual report/national artists brochure: black and white posters with low-res photographs of an angle/corner of the building, watermarked with things I can't recall.
Second, some printed posters were described using the same captions. Yes, poster #1 or Featured Architect A had the same caption as the three other succeeding posters and this to me made it a total FAIL. Imagine a Davies brochure given out during product presentation. That's how the whole thing looked to me.
I am disappointed by the exhibit. I don't think the exhibit was inspiring enough to make architecture enthusiasts want to grab a book and read about the architects featured in the exhibit. Most of them would probably forget about it the moment they step out of the museum and I don't think that is a good sign. After all, they have had their pictures taken beside those posters, in the very small museum gallery that for a good minute or so suddenly turned into one humid photo studio.
I cringed.
It doesn't really make me wonder now why so many people think the houses in Savannah are good architecture. But you architects should. You should.
I was quite excited to see the exhibit as i have been diligently digging the goldmine that is pushpullbar (pushpullbar.com) for more than a couple of months now. The thought of this exhibit set off the excite button in my head: Filipino architect hero post. In pushpullbar. Which I'll coerce Keith to do because I don't think I'll manage (meaning I lack credibility?).
I have always admired the Museo Iloilo. It is probably one of the first (and true) modern buildings in Iloilo City. The architect, I heard was a big fan of Neimeyer, and named his son Oscar. Designed to conform and use nature to its advantage its door opened to a mini amphitheater, landscaped with mini-rolling hills and mini-rinks that both board and inline skaters loved. Large canopied fire trees provided shade to the grounds and cooled the air that enters the Museo. When the firetrees bloom in summer, the Museo looks like a building on fire, postcard perfect. Few years back, that amphitheater was demolished to give way to a parking space. The landscape drastically changed following the construction of the Iloilo Provincial Capitol. During the construction of the Capitol, rumors about the Museo being on the list of structures to be demolished circulated and we could only hope the people concerned reconsidered their decisions. One firetree after another also gave way to disease and eventual deterioration, the last, fallen by a tropical storm.
The Museo still stands today though multi-colored (it used to be just white), dwarfed by the 8-storey Iloilo Capitol. It used to look so proud and inviting with the firetrees abound. The former site of the amphitheater was not as bad, good thing they planted trees but it could be better.
Urbanists would have loved the Museo grounds since it was not gated and it was blanketed in grass. Open-air concerts used to be held there sans the very cumbersome set up of monobloc chairs, now a pre-requisite in the concrete Capitol parking lot. There's a new but very inferior stage (also in a rather awkward orientation) to replace the old amphitheater. I have never attended any concert there for more than 5 years now.
The exhibit opened late but it is not something I don't expect. After all, it is a tradition, if not an SOP, for dignitaries and special guests to arrive late. The program was however, forced to start when it started to drizzle.
I imagined the exhibit to be like browsing through the Architecture Travel forum in pushpullbar where you learn about architecture/buildings textbook-wise and, at the same time, get the feel of it from the point of view of the poster. The pushpullbar forum requires all posters to provide background about the building/architecture featured so readers won't be lost as to what is being featured in the post. Some posters would quote a page off wikipedia (properly acknowledged of course) but because people from this site are so good, they would, more often than not, add a trivia or two, a stock knowledge here and there and the background information becomes a very interesting read. Posters are also required to provide other details such as the address, opening hours, contact details, a KMZ file of the building (and if the poster isn't able to do so, pushpullbar has its own "specialist" to do that, how convenient!). The most interesting chapters in the posts are the photos. They don't even need to be Architectural Digest material type of photos. Posters here make it a point that the photo documentation would be close, if not equivalent, to their own personal experience while visiting the building. Alongside the photos which the poster took, s/he would oftentimes discuss his/her own impression of the architecture and compare what the books said and what his own senses now tell him, standing in front of this...thing. Reading through the posts is like being inside a gallery.
I'm not saying that this should be done by everyone who wants to document a building but believe me, reading about architects being chased by bouncer type security is enough to debunk the black-turtle-neck-le-corbusier-glasses-wearing-scholarly-looking myth on architects. And these things, these pieces of trivia (but not trivial information), these field notes, made the building more "human" to me, a non-architect. And I suppose this is what the exhibit wanted to do, also. Only that it failed.
What made it fail, really? Well, let us see.
First is that we didn't get to see architecture travel type of posts. But I should be entirely blamed for that – for the very high expectations. What we found were blown-up pages from what seemed to be an annual report/national artists brochure: black and white posters with low-res photographs of an angle/corner of the building, watermarked with things I can't recall.
Second, some printed posters were described using the same captions. Yes, poster #1 or Featured Architect A had the same caption as the three other succeeding posters and this to me made it a total FAIL. Imagine a Davies brochure given out during product presentation. That's how the whole thing looked to me.
I am disappointed by the exhibit. I don't think the exhibit was inspiring enough to make architecture enthusiasts want to grab a book and read about the architects featured in the exhibit. Most of them would probably forget about it the moment they step out of the museum and I don't think that is a good sign. After all, they have had their pictures taken beside those posters, in the very small museum gallery that for a good minute or so suddenly turned into one humid photo studio.
I cringed.
It doesn't really make me wonder now why so many people think the houses in Savannah are good architecture. But you architects should. You should.
26 May 2010
Mother Studies (#1): The airconditioner.
I am never impressed by air-conditioned houses.
In the Philippines, a tropical country, where climate is relatively easier to adapt to, majority still dream of building fortresses made comfortable with at least 3 dozens air-conditioner, after which they will go around bragging how wise their choice of lifestyle is, and how moneyed they are, being able to pay monthly electric bills of at least P10,000 pesos.
What makes the choice more enticing to these people is the myth that air-conditioning makes one's skin fairer, flawless and retards signs of ageing. So these P10,000-worth-of-electric-bill-paying households would stuff their houses with more aircons hoping they could save money from not having to go to their nearby Doktora Belo. You imbeciles, don't you see, it's the lack of sunlight that made you look like the next leading matrona of the brain-numbing Twilight series.
I would not say that my family thinks otherwise. After all, my parents were raised in one of the poorest provinces in the country where the major industry is exportation of human resource, documented or not. As apparent of all other small towns with 60% of population living under the care of their family's delegated milking cows (40% remains poorest farmers), each milking-cow-reared family compete in the most intricately decorated, aircon-stuffed, floor-to-ceiling-curtained house. Usually the most baduy of them all wins. As a result, the neighbor of this most baduy house would coerce his/her child to the OFW-bestseller course in college in hopes that they too, could someday build the baduy fortress of their own that could send this reigning most baduy house in town scrambling on its footing.
They once tried to convince me, my parents, I mean, and failed. The thought of badly designed molu-modern houses made me cringe and gave me sleepless nights. And also because I do not want to be a milking cow. OF COURSE.
I almost thought my family would break that tradition. After all, all of the children dreaded being matched with a seaman but no. No no no no. We just have to fit in, conform a little bit. One apostate in the family is enough and therefore: THE AIRCON.
There, I was told, it sit oh so queenly at the western side of the house. The western side of the room used to have a mahogany door. This door led to a terrace, which also functions as a garden for the potted plants. During hot and humid summers, that door, once opened lets cool summer breeze in and allow us a view of the part of yard. Summers ago when I still lived there, we had nice breakfast in that terrace. Apparently, that beautiful terrace will be one useless piece of concrete following the permanent closure of its access door. Right now, it is still being used as a 3 square-meter plant display area but one can predictably say it will deteriorate just like any abandoned architecture.
I believe that one’s house always depicts a more graphic presentation of how a person really is, regardless of the materials used. Houses are also good examples of how hypocritical and pretentious a person is. I am not saying that houses commissioned to star architects, “starchitects”, are good because starchitects do not always make star houses. I have been, and slept, in a house, so simple but so clean and so extensively, carefully maintained I went on interviewing the lady of the house about her very, very shiny and smooth bamboo slats floor. They were poor haven’t had higher education. Both husband and wife have never been to a university but their house is in a much better state, much better designed than most educated people I know, my family included. They perfectly knew how to use the breeze to their advantage, the earth, the sun, everything. While my family, on the other hand, encases its house in concrete and stuff it with aircon. After all, who can really live in the house that is at least 2 degrees hotter and more humid than the temperature outside? Who can?
I won't. I can’t. And I don't think I would ever want a similar house to myself.
In the Philippines, a tropical country, where climate is relatively easier to adapt to, majority still dream of building fortresses made comfortable with at least 3 dozens air-conditioner, after which they will go around bragging how wise their choice of lifestyle is, and how moneyed they are, being able to pay monthly electric bills of at least P10,000 pesos.
What makes the choice more enticing to these people is the myth that air-conditioning makes one's skin fairer, flawless and retards signs of ageing. So these P10,000-worth-of-electric-bill-paying households would stuff their houses with more aircons hoping they could save money from not having to go to their nearby Doktora Belo. You imbeciles, don't you see, it's the lack of sunlight that made you look like the next leading matrona of the brain-numbing Twilight series.
I would not say that my family thinks otherwise. After all, my parents were raised in one of the poorest provinces in the country where the major industry is exportation of human resource, documented or not. As apparent of all other small towns with 60% of population living under the care of their family's delegated milking cows (40% remains poorest farmers), each milking-cow-reared family compete in the most intricately decorated, aircon-stuffed, floor-to-ceiling-curtained house. Usually the most baduy of them all wins. As a result, the neighbor of this most baduy house would coerce his/her child to the OFW-bestseller course in college in hopes that they too, could someday build the baduy fortress of their own that could send this reigning most baduy house in town scrambling on its footing.
They once tried to convince me, my parents, I mean, and failed. The thought of badly designed molu-modern houses made me cringe and gave me sleepless nights. And also because I do not want to be a milking cow. OF COURSE.
I almost thought my family would break that tradition. After all, all of the children dreaded being matched with a seaman but no. No no no no. We just have to fit in, conform a little bit. One apostate in the family is enough and therefore: THE AIRCON.
There, I was told, it sit oh so queenly at the western side of the house. The western side of the room used to have a mahogany door. This door led to a terrace, which also functions as a garden for the potted plants. During hot and humid summers, that door, once opened lets cool summer breeze in and allow us a view of the part of yard. Summers ago when I still lived there, we had nice breakfast in that terrace. Apparently, that beautiful terrace will be one useless piece of concrete following the permanent closure of its access door. Right now, it is still being used as a 3 square-meter plant display area but one can predictably say it will deteriorate just like any abandoned architecture.
I believe that one’s house always depicts a more graphic presentation of how a person really is, regardless of the materials used. Houses are also good examples of how hypocritical and pretentious a person is. I am not saying that houses commissioned to star architects, “starchitects”, are good because starchitects do not always make star houses. I have been, and slept, in a house, so simple but so clean and so extensively, carefully maintained I went on interviewing the lady of the house about her very, very shiny and smooth bamboo slats floor. They were poor haven’t had higher education. Both husband and wife have never been to a university but their house is in a much better state, much better designed than most educated people I know, my family included. They perfectly knew how to use the breeze to their advantage, the earth, the sun, everything. While my family, on the other hand, encases its house in concrete and stuff it with aircon. After all, who can really live in the house that is at least 2 degrees hotter and more humid than the temperature outside? Who can?
I won't. I can’t. And I don't think I would ever want a similar house to myself.
21 May 2010
On Richard G.
May 14, 2010
I don't really know how to begin this as I haven't written like this in a long time, but the news of Richard's passing away triggered some distant memories my friends and I have of one of our favorite band figures here in the city. No, we were not very close to Richard, we barely even knew of his personal life. I'm not even sure if he remembers our names. We only shared a short time together in some concerts here around 1996-1997, just laughing over some silly stuffs. I remember us calling him "Tita" because his acting out gay was our favorite antic. But of course, there were interviews with his former band Souls of Leash (SOL) for our former do-it-yourself zine, La Puztizo (LP), so I thought of going over my old stuffs to see if we had a long interview with the band just to remember how Richard was before.
Surprisingly though, there was no long interview with SOL. The feature on them was just a short section, but highlights the question "Why SOL (as name for band)?" to which their answer was, "Ambot kay Richard! Islan tani namon amon ngalan galing kay too late na." Richard's name, though, can be seen repeatedly in some small sections of several other issues of the zine, like in a gig review, "Richard says Unan (a song of SOL, FYI to those who forgot/don't know) is about an unwashed awfully smelling" and in another article called Skeletons in the Closet, we wrote, "We used to label SOL as no. 1 in our list of bands we would love to send to Pluto (Chard, forgive us) because... we don't know." Yeah, no offense to Johann, Kim, Tata, and the late Scott, but Richard was our favorite SOL member it seems. ;) And Richard was one of the few band figures who still greeted us even after almost a decade of not seeing each other.
I was about to give up on my search when in the second to the last issue of LP I looked in, in a section entitled Mushy Mushee (our different take on Valentine's), I caught sight of Richard's name again. There was a poem written in Joy's handwriting and at the end was the caption "By Raymond Ja_____, ah, uhm (Chard, ano to gani ah? Nalipat kami)." I remember Rej saying that he did give us something for the zine, but how he came to give it to us, if we coerced him or what, I can't remember anymore. I do remember him saying not to put his name as the author, but to put his cousin's name, Raymond Javelosa (if I remember it right, Rej? Joy?). When I read the entire poem, well... I was looking for something and this was not what I expected, yet it seemed to be the exact thing I needed to find. I don't know if I'm just overreacting because the news of Richard's demise is still fresh, but you be the judge. So I'm sharing this with everyone who knew him in some way or another... this poem deserves a better place than hiding in my old and dusty shoebox, don't you think?
Written by Bles Garachico
I don't really know how to begin this as I haven't written like this in a long time, but the news of Richard's passing away triggered some distant memories my friends and I have of one of our favorite band figures here in the city. No, we were not very close to Richard, we barely even knew of his personal life. I'm not even sure if he remembers our names. We only shared a short time together in some concerts here around 1996-1997, just laughing over some silly stuffs. I remember us calling him "Tita" because his acting out gay was our favorite antic. But of course, there were interviews with his former band Souls of Leash (SOL) for our former do-it-yourself zine, La Puztizo (LP), so I thought of going over my old stuffs to see if we had a long interview with the band just to remember how Richard was before.
Surprisingly though, there was no long interview with SOL. The feature on them was just a short section, but highlights the question "Why SOL (as name for band)?" to which their answer was, "Ambot kay Richard! Islan tani namon amon ngalan galing kay too late na." Richard's name, though, can be seen repeatedly in some small sections of several other issues of the zine, like in a gig review, "Richard says Unan (a song of SOL, FYI to those who forgot/don't know) is about an unwashed awfully smelling" and in another article called Skeletons in the Closet, we wrote, "We used to label SOL as no. 1 in our list of bands we would love to send to Pluto (Chard, forgive us) because... we don't know." Yeah, no offense to Johann, Kim, Tata, and the late Scott, but Richard was our favorite SOL member it seems. ;) And Richard was one of the few band figures who still greeted us even after almost a decade of not seeing each other.
I was about to give up on my search when in the second to the last issue of LP I looked in, in a section entitled Mushy Mushee (our different take on Valentine's), I caught sight of Richard's name again. There was a poem written in Joy's handwriting and at the end was the caption "By Raymond Ja_____, ah, uhm (Chard, ano to gani ah? Nalipat kami)." I remember Rej saying that he did give us something for the zine, but how he came to give it to us, if we coerced him or what, I can't remember anymore. I do remember him saying not to put his name as the author, but to put his cousin's name, Raymond Javelosa (if I remember it right, Rej? Joy?). When I read the entire poem, well... I was looking for something and this was not what I expected, yet it seemed to be the exact thing I needed to find. I don't know if I'm just overreacting because the news of Richard's demise is still fresh, but you be the judge. So I'm sharing this with everyone who knew him in some way or another... this poem deserves a better place than hiding in my old and dusty shoebox, don't you think?
Written by Bles Garachico
co-Honcho of LaPuztizo fanzine and Tattletale
14 May 2010
memoir-ing
After party crashing at RACI's post-polls party and finishing the last remaining pages of The Tender Bar (Wide White Spacers (April 2010), you should get this), getting home around 11pm, i still amazingly found time to stay up till one 1am to write write write drafts for the long overdue assignment.
i am terribly past deadline but not quite shaken. Alfredo will understand. Recalling the pasts is as difficult as a kindergarten trying to learn the linear equation. It is to me.
The next day, i surrendered to Keith the Book (The Tender Bar) because he "expressed" interest to read and "and maybe also do some writing" and join the workshops. (Oh, yes.)
Late again for office, but has managed to find some time for facebook, i came across Blesela's message, a very long thread of our private, personal chitchats. the final entry was: "Shyet, napatay si Richard!!!" which was totally out of topic because 1.) the thread wasn't about him; 2) the thread was about manila people 3) the thread has mutated into a discussion on zynga-facebook rift and the horrors it will bring to facebook gamers like Blesela. So Richard died -- rich--WHO? Somebody we knew. Not our friend, but somebody we knew. and somebody of our age range.
Last April 12, my friend, and fellow graduate student Cornelio (Kune) also died. he had congenital heart problem and apparently died from heart attack. He had been suffering from "lain pamatyag" few days back but i don't think he really was expecting he'd die from "lain pamatyag". But he did and it shocked me. (just like somebody actually dies from pasmo...pasmism)
(I didn't fo to his wake. I don't like going to wakes. I even avoid attending the wakes and funerals of my relatives.)
It';s sad, how, it seems, that every month a friend, an acquaintance, an ex-friend, fellow varsity player, a schoolmate, dies as if 30-ish has become the average life span of a Filipino.
30 is the new 70. now that's scary.
(do i look like i'm 70??!)
In late March of this year, a fellow UP schoolmate died from cardiac arrest as a result of lymphoma. more than a year ago, we also thought my sister was gonna die from a rare, malignant and aggressive breast tumor, Phyllodes. But she probably is a "masamang damo" and everything turned out fine as the tumor hasn't yet metastasized. Just as her daughter turned 4 months, she had her mastectomy.
So this May, Richard, the polio-tic drummer of some college band i liked, well, we liked, my friends and I, died of heart attack. he's not so much older than i am, also 30-ish. I remember their guitarist, Scott, also died in a motorcycle accident some years ago. Then there was Benjie, not their band member but some close friend of theirs (who became one of my friend's friend in the university) who also died from a vehicular accident. Some more years back, in the late 90's another one of their friend (or maybe he was just their acquaintance, who knows?), Sym, died from massive brain hemorrhage after he crashed his head on the pavement when their motorcycle collided with the center island. They were just coming home from a gig in a fiesta somewhere, lacking sleep and apparently still groggy from alcohol. They didn't know they were overspeeding and life stopped when their bikes crashed.
i was excited to come to office and write about the rest of my drafts after the writing frenzy last night but apparently this death thing changed it all and i can't concentrate anymore. Over the election vacation i dug through my old journals (found tickets of a river maya concert i attended in 1995, nostalgia galore), brought the more recent notebooks/journals back to Jaro hoping that i, in the mighty glory and power of the journals i'm beholden to, will be given enough memory to write. But no, richard died and all the 90s memories came rushing in and i have no material! gaddamit, no material to write on. so the drafts, the writing flow had to be revised because my brain wants to recall things from another decade.
(who was i with in my first Sigabong..clash what??--1994...noreen? WHat concert did i first meet you Bles? Last concert i went to in UPV grounds...what Sigabong was rained on--was it even sigabong or some other band. ANd why was i not able to attend the The Youth concert? something whent wrong with Dodong Cruz's strings in the middle of the song, supernova. Who came first, eraserheads in west of rivermaya in San ag? GRRRRR. pi-ang pa si kitoy sang nag tambay kami upod ni mokie antes sang what fucking concert or battle of da band was that again???)
I will get my materials this weekend, from Bles, apparently who, without telling me, burned all the letters from her correspondents during our zinester days. how are we -- am i -- supposed to write about it now then? because i don;t want to write fiction. No. No fiction.
(my sister said: mabait na kabayo, madaling mamatay." that's why she survived, because she's not a kabayo -- i mean, she is not mabait.)
and meanwhile, recalling my aunt's house form the 2005 visit, there seems to be a big wad of envelopes in one corner of her house. and those letters were mine. and now they are probably gone also. she probably threw them out. after all, only the crazies like me and Blesela keep them yellowing decade-old letters, the concert tickets and the posters we stole weeks before the gig actually began. so now how am i gonna know who i wrote to being reji tattletale?
projects...projects.
this weekend. will start one. and finish two.
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