Hyphenated

When we find ourselves in regular conversations in virtually any coffee shop, we would find people around us facing their androids and laptops more than engaging in a good, old chat. Gone are the days wherein we use the shops as a social space. Instead, we use this space for us to be in touch in the social web space in a private, cozy setting. Even though the digital mode of interaction gets us to accomplish more things in our lives from the comforts of where we desire to be, does it makes us connected beings as fast as our WiFi connection? Or, are we just creating a new world wherein we only connect through the translucent lens of the computer monitor aided by social media?

You see, I was hooked by social media in getting updates, gossips, and even the latest events around the Metro. It gets you to a certain level of narcissistic arousal that throws all the congratulatory confetti to yourself. Getting liked by as many as a hundred people given your rather attention-catching profile picture or humor-inducing status is now even more pleasurable than getting to your favorite local destination. Anything in your life suddenly does not become official unless you post it on any social media sit

But, don’t get me wrong, this good feeling in social media didn’t translate to me engaging people only through the social media space. I still prefer and look forward to face-to-face interaction. Chatting has never been natural and sensitive when done only through the four corners of the screen. The connection happens in real time.

Really.

Your Personal Question

As I was going through a podcast of Tony Robbins, a well-known speaker on personal impact, he said the importance of knowing your personal question. I was confused with what he meant at first. Is it a question regarding what? My personal life? My passionate pursuit?

When I stopped asking, that’s when I knew about what he wanted to point out. Ask what you want from the world. What question do you live searching answers for.

So, when I started composing mine, my mind traversed worlds, both in the certain and uncertain. From the point of passion to the point of decision, I found out more out of this than just merely going through a seed idea.

“How will I be able to become an effective catalyst of societal renewal in the world?”

This is mine. What’s yours?

Artist Think

Having been to almost all the museums in Metro Manila, I have observed that huge amount of our culture is entrenched in the arts. Though, in looking back, our timeline suggests a juxtaposition of traditions, a good look at our paintings and sculptures depict the very nature of our nationhood during these shaping periods.

For instance, Fernando Amorsolo, one of our coveted National Artists, develops through his works a facade of rural life throughout the course of history. Even though the Metro had drastically changed in terms of governance and infrastructure the last century, Amorsolo successfully communicated that the provinces have not barely transitioned to the contemporary means of sustainability. The relative difference increases as more investments are bestowed upon the main docking place of various forms of capital in the Philippines.

It can be said that the reality of Amorsolo’s art can be a positive reminder that our local and indigenous culture are still intact, but the segregation of our citizenry given the perceived economic opportunities (amongst other human capital related concerns) are not entirely captured here. Maybe other artists might have tackled this matter in a different way. Maybe Amorsolo had to just focus on this matter as his contribution to the grander message of increasing public consciousness.

Another example can be the glass sculptures of Ramon Orlina, who have mainly focused on the dynamics of human interaction through the years of his works. Through every cut and curve of his wonderful and provocative creations, each artistic work certainly captures the way Filipinos became the transformers of their own nation. Of course, this does not mean that he always have to be very expansive about his intentions. Most of the time, he focuses on the mundane to bring about his visions of the evolution of Filipino relationships, including the frequently stated mother and child bondage.

There is much to be learned from our arts. Maybe history books needs to be refined after we give this proposition a closer look.

Subject to interpretation, of course.

Published

During the times when I was still very active in writing poetry, I would remember that some conversations with my literary group circled around being published in a reputable journal or even winning a Palanca award. Other than the long history of the members being recipients of numerous awards, we take pride also in being very critical and passionate about using words as a tool to change and to reinforce mindsets of the common Filipino. Probably, just like Jose Rizal and Andres Bonifacio did.

Admittedly, I started placing my hands in writing when I found it necessary to seek inspiration through expression. It was a struggle for me to come up with a good idea that is not written in detail. Up until now, I still believe that a concept that is not properly articulated will not become a realizable proposition. Be it in the form of a free verse poem or a narrative testimony, it’s important for me to be very clear of the direction where I would like to place my writing in. Because, the satisfaction of having to place the words clearly beside each other shapes the road where I want to come across to the readers.

Being published is also an aspiration that I have to get in touch to a wider audience. But, ideally, I subscribe to the fact that every reader has their own interpretation of a literary piece. Getting across or in touch would be a personal experience to the viewer. The writer would only be given the venue to deliver a message that goes inside the sphere of the main intention. It can be in the direction of advocacy or public information.

In short, being published is not the lifeblood of writing. It is the shared purpose developed by the writer that is made alive in the text. The reader is taken through a journey to another world, where ideas are affirmed, negated or shaped. It is a personal pursuit for both the author and the viewer.

Be free, then read. Feel the freedom, then write.

The Switch

Dense. Just dense.

Recovering from a situation wherein you were doused with hesitation the entire time was a huge relief. Though the core learning that it had presented was priceless, I can now confidently that I can now move on for the better. This might not reflect in my other social media account, but, yes, I have faced several tough moments in my life the past three months. My patience was tested to the brim, my courage was stretched to its limits.

I was fortunate that He enabled me to muster my strength enough to stop my instinct from telling me that I will not be able to make it. Well, here I am, finding time again to write an entry and waiting for that special day when the living Creator was made known to the Universe. I am grateful that this highly anticipated moment came with a great stride. It had blessed me with not just a scholarship, but also with a big consultancy opportunity. Praise God!

Light. Just light.

This hunger that has just been released after the tough times is one way how He prepares souls to receive. I mean, not just exactly blessings, but even criticisms and failures. This enables people to see each moment in a different light, that it can be forgiving, it can be for your own improvement, for your own training. We can say that what the future holds for us never becomes linear. It is a complex series of mazes that even the Minotaur will not be able to cope up with. Walls can’t be easily destroyed. Paths can’t be easily carved.

Life has never been easy, but the process by which you are being prepared for both the best and the worst will make it more manageable to navigate. Such hunger can’t be replaced by any gift that you will receive this Christmas. Our hunger for that Savior took us awhile that made us even more steadfast and resilient when facing tough times.

Given this, I would like to recommend that the world will be able to experience that same hunger this season. Though it may not be possible with all festivities that will stuff us all with food, may we be able to contemplate that we should all continue to yearn to become better in life by being tested by fire. Like glass, we are shaped by the heat by His kiln.

We are meant to excel. We are meant to stay hungry.

Make your 2015 your way of giving your best and bringing out the better in others. Just like I am committing to you right now through this post.

Tomorrow

When situations seem to not go my way, I am guilty of always looking ahead to what the next days will bring. I would never admit that I need to take control of my now to make a different tomorrow. But, the promise of a better condition through an upcoming circumstance or event is an unrelenting proposition worth taking especially in feeling more optimistic about life in general.

To be specific, if the love of your life suddenly said that you have to be apart for a while with a year’s promise,
I feel that the vision becomes an aspiration worth longing for its arrival. Okay, maybe I am becoming too personal.

As my work in development continues, tomorrow also becomes the aim of the shared response and action by the community of change. The buy-in of tomorrow is crucial in developing a group of loyal constituents in ensuring that the plans happen. After all, without tomorrow, no one will ever see the vision.

Tomorrow is such an important word to me at this point. I hope that it will arrive soon as I make my now’s count.

People Change as the Climate Change

The arrival of consecutive typhoons in our country had proven, even made apparent and sensationalized by the local media, to be humanly destructive in nature. Since the wrath of the typhoon Ondoy, it is now believed by common rational thought by any citizen of the world that the weather system has now been erratic with expectations also rising in disastrous levels.

From Al Gore to Leonardo DiCaprio, environmental evangelists have now been prominent in the public eye with their pulsating urgent messages to humanity on the perilous immediate future that we are about to face. They might say it might be right at this time that we should act to prevent a larger global catastrophe, but, for many weather analysts, it might be a little too late given that the implications of our actions since the 20^th century is already in effect.

We, as humans, have the capacity to change the way the world works even up until its innate nature. But, once the living Earth feels that it already had enough, it will strike back to the fullest extent that may cause the obliteration even of the entire human race. A preview of such wrath may just be simply viewed in the YouTube with the depressing video account of the arrival of the large tsunamis in the Japanese coast.

The viewing experience might get into us as a scene taken straight from an octane-induced Hollywood disaster film, once we get to interact and be in the destroyed grounds in the aftermath, we would all be compelled to be overwhelmed of the unbelievable, unrelenting situation our eviction of responsibilities had gotten ourselves into.

With the materialistic cultural trend of the world, we tend to skip introspection as a way of reflecting and assessing our actions further consciously relative to our human environment. It is for this reason that we serve as curiosity slaves of modernity by which we have been blinded by false achievement compromising the sustainability of the rest of the world we live in.

Even in the larger context, the industries continue to exploit our well-preserved natural resources as a sign of the pursuit of “running with the flow” with respect to the global economic drivers. These acts are being done with all the fiscal growth in mind undermining the very source of our lives. What would happen if all we see are the benefits of acquisition rather than preservation? Satisfaction should be the contentment of what we already have. This is what each urbanized citizen should think about well and hard.

With all the horrible statistics presented in the various reports, this next step of ours as a nation should also be again the “one small step for mankind”. This step should mean multi stakeholder engagement in creating a greener future, heightened awareness in making the world a cleaner place, and empowered inspiration to involve everyone in the battle of the world’s survival.

To Write is To Unburden (and To Flow)

Due to my recent erratic sleeping patterns, comprehensiveness of expression in writing suddenly became questionable to me as most of my narratives deal with speech preparations and technical documents. Be it a proposal for a research visit to a draft of a public presentation, my former prolific nature in this portal has been disrupted by the sheer amount of mental clutter that I have in my various works.

The treatment that I had before when I became stuck in this mind trap was to instinctively write in this blog. To carry the burden of the idea and expressions became the sole purpose of this digital medium. It has become more and more personal as time passed by when I have to splatter word paint for my satisfaction as a writer.

This behavior that I am experiencing right now is also a common pattern for the typical artist today. The struggle to produce meaning is challenged by deliberate expression. The focus or the emphasis of the artist becomes the end product of any emotional release when no clear idea guides the person as of the moment. A compelling vision can be the sole motivation of the artist in his/her work, but the flowing instinct becomes the fuel that just simply gets the artist going despite not being inspired by the moment.

I admit that I am not really writing today for anyone, but, dear reader, I challenge you anyway to take this writing gamble as a means to get the next thoughts or ideas going given the fact that you have just ignited that narrative protege inside you. 

Where Life Takes Me

In the first three months of the year, all I saw were islands and smiling faces, those who have taught me how live a different kind of life. After the destruction brought about by the  typhoon Haiyan, I went straight on a work mission to Northern Samar and Tacloban to pilot the creation of community-based risk assessment and disaster risk reduction convergence programs. In the duration of this activity, I was generally out of the circulation to the other works I have been involved in Manila and the greater Luzon areas. It was difficult to let go of those blocks of activity during that time.

After several days in the area, the initial thought of longing for the air in metropolis watered down to the satisfaction of feeling the winds from the white beaches. The pride of the people for their culture and way of life in the communities I visited overwhelmed the tragic situation they were in. I still can’t believe that they were still able to share all that’s left with them to us, not just food, but also the vibrant energy they have to be able to work during those days. They said that what made them have that attitude can be attributed to how their kin had been treating all the visitors in the area. I was also never a hassle in our working relationship with their apparent dedication and commitment to serve their community.

Going through each amazing chapter in both the fishing and farming areas I have visited unfolded several realizations that made me see my self and the world in a different way. My personal insecurities towards my less knowledge of the rural life was rewarded with the experience of having to actually go through the phases of understanding each and every facet of such a lifestyle. As a self-proclaimed Manila boy, I had my share of bruises and failures in the simple tasks that would just take a Samareno just a couple of moments to accomplish. I was even compelled to dance for six straight hours just to keep up how the locals celebrate the induction of their newly-elected officers.

Now, as I write this, I look back at those moments life bright stars shining in the night sky. I found fulfillment in the fact that the works I did in the area such as the unity of the provincial stakeholders and the creation of local disaster committees. I learned gems of insight from each personality I interacted and lived a couple of weeks with. Never shall I forget them.

The magic of life can be found in how it can transform you through your journey each step of the way.

Ambiance and Meals

In the past three weeks, food trips have been a common sight in my schedule given the sheer amount of people who wanted to try a different cure for their occasional hunger. From Italian pasta to American steaks, the quality of each trip so far has been an assault, not just to the taste buds, but also to the iris. It has been interesting to note how that one street in the Diliman area had literally changed the way people see restaurants. That one street called Maginhawa.

One of the street’s very first establishments is apparently a food variety store called Nanette’s. I can recall the many times we have ordered almost a hundred pieces of their delectable grilled pork on a stick for significant occasions since my elementary years. Also, their unique blend of spices in their Mexican burrito is simply delectable with the fine addition of their trademark tartar sauce. Though they did not have a very fancy ambiance, the outdoor exposure enables each customer to feel the winds of the cars that pass by and the trees from the nearby University of the Philippines to plow through one’s head. Well, as compared today, Maginhawa was less populated given that Nanette’s was the only reputable food establishment back then.

Art, in its various forms, inspired mostly the creation of Leona’s Art Restaurant and Van Gogh is Bipolar. Entering these two places is just like going inside the wardrobe container in the Chronicles of Narnia. The external look might be very ordinary but the interiors would make you instantly be transported to the worlds of their creation. The food even reflects consistently how such art is presented and represented in the entire meal experience.

More stories would be crafted in this place everyone considers as the home of their appetites.