A Thorn That Always Pricks

Ghaahhh!!!

You know when you're helping with you kid's assignment, and it's for Makabayan, and you see there a cleaned up/mocked up version of why Europeans sent expeditions to uncharted territory, and historians say there that they are seeking new discoveries or completing maps or something like that as if that's the only reason for it? And you wish you can just tear those pages off and to million pieces because it is not entirely true and reasons unwritten are the ones most important? And then you read there what your country learned from Spaniards...   AS IF these are the only reasons why your ancestors learn at all? They did not need to murder them, kill them, rape the women, teach them their cruel version of God and mutilate and burn everything that makes us who we are to the point that later generations say we are a country with no identity. Spaniards held us up for centuries. And we still could not shake off the lessons of corruption our government learned from their leeches. It's a thorn that will always prick until I die. And grr... I will never hear the end of it!

Those Who Save Us by Jenna Blum

This  book is a page-turner, gripping, heart-wrenching, and thought provoking. Jenna Blum is  one of a few writers starting to brave the front of using a German perspective of the Holocaust. There are harrowing scenes in the book but if you have read other books about World War II  or has watched Steven Spielberg's movie, Schindler's List , these scenes  will not likely to shock you anymore. It is also a thriller, and although Trudy's part cannot measure the grip Anna's part has had on me, I had definitely turned pages, chapter after cliff-hanging chapter, and finished the book in one sitting in a day. Err, except when I had to fix coffee and when I had to go to the loo. I can understand why it has become one of the top favorites of Book Clubs all over America or why Jenna Blum is one of Oprah's Top 30 Women Writers. As a woman's literature, this is one of the best I've read, although I still consider Herman Wouk's War and Remembrance a WWII book favorite. I hope to come across her next book, The Stormchasers, in the future. The soonest possible.

Favorite Book Quotes:

“Heimat. The word means home in German, the place where one was born. But the term also conveys a subtler nuance, a certain tenderness. One's Heimat is not merely a matter of geography; it is where one's heart lies. ”

“…she should have known better than to tell him the truth. She can never tell him what she started to say: that we come to love those who save us. For although Anna does believe this is true, the word that stuck in her throat was not save but shame.“

“… It’s like being in a sort of club, isn’t it?  A bereavement club.  You don’t choose to join it; it’s thrust upon you.  And the members whose lives have been changed have more knowledge than those who aren’t in it, but the price of belonging is so terribly high.”

“Life is so often unfair and painful and love is hard to find and you have to take it whenever and wherever you can get it, no matter how brief it is or how it ends.”

“Why should they be permitted the cleansing of conscience that accompanies confession?  It is analogous to adultery; the guilty party, far from spilling out his misdeeds and easing his mind while injuring the innocent other, should have to live with the knowledge of what he has done.  A very particular kind of torture, subtle but ongoing.”

“The death of a parent, he says to it, is a profoundly life-altering experience, isn’t it? When I was a child, I often had this feeling of God’s in his Heaven: All’s right with the world—that’s Robert Browning. An English poet. But ever since my father died in the last war, I’ve awakened each morning knowing that I’ll never again feel that absolute security. Nothing is ever quite right, is it, after a parent dies? No matter how well things go, something always feels slightly off . . .”

The most provocative scene for me is actually a mellow one, yet, a statement when one refuses to be saved-the irony that made the title of this book more powerful and profound. When Rainer is leaving Trudy, when he says that happiness isn't for someone like him, it takes the story partly home. I can only imagine the burden of carrying the guilt of a sibling's death, watched in such a young age, the kind of death as cruel as it is. I cried buckets when **** was senselessly murdered in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (ok, so it is at the other end of Lit spectrum but you will see why I picked it on the next sentence), and I remember thinking then (this was on my first reading, since I've read the series several times already) that the Holocaust must have inspired the scene and **** could be a symbolism of the Jews. Ok, so we have all the answers that could be gathered about how that blight in History happened, but something in me is still so helpless, in disbelief, and questioning. How can a sane person really comprehend how a group of many people acted like psychopaths and killed millions of their fellow men--women, children... and babies? In this day and age, it is starting to become ludicrous to so many people when one race still acts superior to others, because this is inherently… well, scientifically and everything else, false. Why? Because of the Internet, and the phone, and it is now easy to see and understand that what makes up people in one island also makes up people in other islands in essential ways regardless of color, religion and language and no man is absolutely an island--except when it is man-made atrocity that cuts islands off from us and us from them, like war and religion. But it also relieves to understand that there were Germans then who had become complacent because most of the regular ones hadn't really known what Hitler really planned for the Jews; has no inkling of what's really happening until it was too late for them to follow their honor and morals; and was only able to scramble to be able to save their families from the effects of not just the war, but also of the insanity of mad men who believed the common falsehood that one race can be better than that of their brothers. 

Updates:

Jennifer Blum is writing the screenplay for the film adaptation of her first book, Those Who Save Us. It is going to be made into a film and I am already excited to watch it.

A Sad Goodbye The Original and Only King of Philippine Comedy

FAREWELL, TITO DOLPHY. YOU'VE BEEN A PART OF OUR LIVES AND YOUR MEMORY OF LAUGHTER, SINCERITY, SERENITY AND HUMILITY WILL LIVE ON. YOU ARE LOVED BY MILLIONS. REST WELL. 

RODOLFO VERA QUIZON, Sr.

July 25, 1928 - July 10, 2012

He is Beloved "Dolphy" to the Filipinos whose lives he has made happy for a long time.

It's been a comfort for my generation to have grown up watching your John & Marsha, your movies that have always consisted of themes of hope, kindness, responsibility, humility, and always, always of family.

How is it that only when the loss have happened, we realize how palpable or not the loss is?

In your passing, we have lost so much, yet have acquired a legacy of too many...

laughter, hope, humility, serenity, kindness, honesty, 

craft, creativity, ingenuity

a happy spirit, and above all, love.

Goodbye, Tito Dolphy.

You will rest easy to have known, as human as you are, you have done the task God gave you.

Thank you for making all of us happy.

Review: Every Last One by Anne Quindlen

Synopsis:

Mary Beth Latham has built her life around her family, around caring for her three teenage children and preserving the rituals of their daily life. When one of her sons becomes depressed, Mary Beth focuses on him, only to be blindsided by a shocking act of violence. What happens afterward is a testament to the power of a woman’s love and determination, and to the invisible lines of hope and healing that connect one human being to another. Ultimately, as rendered in Anna Quindlen’s mesmerizing prose, Every Last One is a novel about facing every last one of the things we fear the most, about finding ways to navigate a road we never intended to travel. - from Random House, Inc.

Review:

I have not cried as hard as I had in this book for a long time! I don't even remember when the last time was. 9/11 had shocked every American to the core, and its effect on Anna Quindlen as a whole was, it started her worrying about security. About safety. She felt that Americans have this illusion about being secure. This worrying affected her most because she's a parent. There are ways that security is blindsided by events that's beyond control. You can teach your child to become the most careful driver ever but that doesn't help when there's a drunk driver on the road. Still, this example is very simple compared to what she'd done with this novel.

The first half of the book drags a little, dragging because if you happen to have a steady income and you can provide well for your family, this is the kind of every day life that you get every day--normalcy, comfortable living, steady marriage, sibling rivalry and bickering, one daughter or son needing more attention than the other, that steady relationship with a man or a woman and the comfortable familiarity that provides . When the most unimaginable, horrifying and unthinkable happened to this family, this normalcy became a striking contrast that identified the second half. Unspeakable loss. Numbing grief. Days that just won't stop. Where to find strength? How to continue?

This is about consequences and judgment, middle age, teenage grief, secrets, acceptance, remembrance, and a lot of hope for the future. More than hope is love. Mary Beth's love for her family--the ones that she'd lost and the one who grieves with her and who needs her more than anything in the world--eventually showed her the way to go on living.

I have not cried this much. I'm not sure if I can read it again but it is a book I'm sure I will never forget.

Quotes: (spoiler warning)

“Every day, with few variations – snow, minor illnesses, the failure of the paper to arrive, a lost backpack, a sleepover that’s left us one, or two, or sometimes even three kids shy of the usual full set – every day is like this. Average. Ordinary. More or less.”

“This is how I learn most of what I know about my children and their friends: by sitting in the driver's seat and keeping quiet.” 

“Here is one of the worst things about having someone you love die: It happens again every single morning.”

"Sometimes I remind myself that I almost skipped the party, that I almost went to a different college, that the whim of a minute could have changed everything and everyone. Our lives, so settled, so specific, are built on happenstance.” 

“I sit on the sofa again, Ginger's head on one of my insteps. I finger the long scar on my shoulder and think, Glen is gone, Ruby is gone, Max is gone. It's the way I used to memorize poetry when I was younger. It's like I am trying to teach it to myself so I will understand.”

“I am. Every day I am trying.

I am trying for Alex.

I am trying for Ruby.

I am trying for Max.

I am trying for Glen.

It's all I know how to do now. This is my life. I am trying."

Filipinos Are Worth Dying For, and Here's Why

Why do we have legitimate heroes who had willingly walked to their deaths--tied or not--for the Filipinos?

Rizal's last walk resulted to a legacy of courage, dignity, and grace. Bonifacio led a life of constant war for Philippine autonomy. He was Rizal's opposite in the style of fighting, but they died for the same cause -- a leviathan Rizal had accepted could not be killed by the tabak but by education, but Bonifacio tried anyway. Ninoy's stubborness in fighting the same leviathan and eventually dying for it brought us to the world's map of Firsts after his death resulted into the first peaceful Revolution ever in the history of the world.

They weren't fighting a visible enemy. They fought for what we've lost after our identity had been wiped out by a conquering powerful nation. They fought for a legacy we might have lost by being blind of what we can be.

So let's see. A long time ago, before the Spaniards came, we were a race of community-loving people that enjoyed prosperity through active trading. We fiercely protect our islands and our kingdoms by willingly taking on the responsibilities of our social status. We are known to be generous and friendly to those we welcome to our shores. Our warriors and mercenaries were lauded as fierce and ruthless and the best in this part of the world. Our men protect our women. Our women teach our children of their future roles in the community. We have our elders, our explorers and traders, our royal elite, our rulers. We have our own mini-governments ruled by Rajas, Sultans or Datus. We have gold and silver and other precious metals, spice, ivory, pearl, nuts, bamboos, and clothes for trade. We consider Chinese trading brothers and men from imperial Japan propose marriage to our women so they could trade freely in our islands. During those days, being an archipelago protected us. Our watchers could see ships from miles at sea and could get ready before they even came near our beaches. Can you imagine that?

What we didn't have, though, is unity. Having small kingdoms/states in main islands that were independent of each other meant the Philippines before colonial times were divided. We don't have one government, one language, one religion, one system. Early visitors noticed that we didn't have a king that rules all. We, essentially, was not one nation.

Imagine what it was like before electricity and cellphones and the Internet?

ancient Philippine jewelry

When Magallanes landed in Cebu, he wasn't the first European the early Cebuanos have seen. The Portugeuse had visited the island before Magellan, who happened to be a Portuguese but carried with him Spanish men. He was welcomed by then Rajah Humabon, who immediately embraced the Catholic faith. Humabon then convinced Magallanes to fight Lapu-Lapu of a neighboring island because he disliked him. It was a poor judgment because he died there in a description that made him out to be a martyr and a hero and Lapu-Lapu and his men like heathens who slayed him in a scene that that is like those low-rated cannibal movies shot in Brazil which depicted the cannibals like ungraceful savages. The chroniclers happened to be Spaniards.

From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferdinand_Magellan

When morning came, forty-nine of us leaped into the water up to our thighs, and walked through water for more than two cross-bow flights before we could reach the shore. The boats could not approach nearer because of certain rocks in the water. The other eleven men remained behind to guard the boats. When we reached land, [the natives] had formed in three divisions to the number of more than one thousand five hundred people. When they saw us, they charged down upon us with exceeding loud cries... The musketeers and crossbow-men shot from a distance for about a half-hour, but uselessly... Recognizing the captain, so many turned upon him that they knocked his helmet off his head twice... A native hurled a bamboo spear into the captain's face, but the latter immediately killed him with his lance, which he left in the native's body. Then, trying to lay hand on sword, he could draw it out but halfway, because he had been wounded in the arm with a bamboo spear. When the natives saw that, they all hurled themselves upon him. One of them wounded him on the left leg with a large cutlass, which resembles a scimitar, only being larger. That caused the captain to fall face downward, when immediately they rushed upon him with iron and bamboo spears and with their cutlasses, until they killed our mirror, our light, our comfort, and our true guide. When they wounded him, he turned back many times to see whether we were all in the boats. Thereupon, beholding him dead, we, wounded, retreated, as best we could, to the boats, which were already pulling off.

I mean, what the heck? 49 Spaniards attacking a community with 1,500 (approximately) men led by a datu who had the reputation as a fierce leader? That's just stupid. So no, Spanish colonization did not happen when Magellan came. It started when a much ruthless conquistador came in the name of Miguel Lopez de Legazpi, a.k.a. El Adelantado. And it did not happen when he first landed in Cebu in Feb. 13, 1565, (actually, they just anchored at sea because pre-modern history Cebuanos did not welcome them), or when he landed in Samar, or  Limasawa, or Bohol where he'd done blood compacts with their datus. The colonization started after Legazpi went back to Cebu in April 27, now with men from the islands he'd befriended, and overpowered the datu who'd challenged them in the first place, then named the first colony "Villa del Santisimo Nombre de Jesús" (Town of the Most Holy Name of Jesus) after finding the Sto. Niño left by Magellan to Humabon's wife. (I wonder if there's a story there. Oh well, lost in time, as well.) I can't help but notice how their use of religion somehow made their conquests romantic. I can't help but not be subjective or not treat this as something personal instead of a history of this part of our world which we can't do anything about. They had just started an era of greed, injustice, death and they were about to erase our history, our story, our identity. Doesn't that make my teeth grit dirt? Oh, yeah. Major major po. Hurr.

OK, be warned. Major ranting next. I've been out of practice but...

How can our pride, our quality of being hospitable to visitors, started our downfall?! While growing up, history books (our own history books) made it seem that when the Spaniards came, our ancestors are like indigenous people who knew nothing about trade, had no cultural roots, had no semblance of education, dirty, used prehistoric tools, uncivilized, and virtually like savage monkeys. Since leaving school I have learned that pre-Spanish Colonial Filipinos were educated, neighborly, good in trade, fierce warriors, industrious, honorable, and civilized. Of course there should be the scraggly ones, as there always are two sides to a coin. But there was a time when I thought that when the Spaniards came (technically, since Magellan was a Portuguese), we're like an archipelago that had existed separate from other nations and had been living in an era that preceded the dinosaurs.

Since then, I have learned that there were royal bloods, the datus who had familial ties to the Maharaja, sheikhs, English royalty through inter-marriages. That our islands, before we became the Philippines, had relations with other countries near us from the Muslim side (because we used to be Muslims), had traded, and inter-married with China, Japan, Saudi Arabia, India, and Malaysia. That because of the monsoon winds, ships that sail followed the silk trade route or the spice route that had been a secret to the Europeans that are geographically far away than the Muslims. That Magellan and his crew weren't the first Europeans who had landed in Cebu because when Magellan landed in Malhou, residents there told them they had already seen men like them before. We weren't isolated from other countries. Our history of trading pre-Spanish colonization might have perished in fire and blood, but accounts of what we had been survived in the annals of these neighboring countries. We had an identity. We had a story. And it has started emerging, slowly, in the present day.

On the other hand, I can make up a story. Remember that this is just a story conjured up by my overactive imagination after trying to read/research about the subject.

foreign merchants visiting zabag

Magellan and his crew came. They obviously need help, sailing that long in turbulent seas and getting "lost" here looking for the Spice Islands. Humabon welcomed them, dined with them, drank with them, changed religion for them. Their stories of this god, their kingdom, their opulence, their warriors, their women, their king and queen, might have put the "natives" into a state of wonder. Or Humabon might have a hidden agenda cooking up his sleeve, like pitting the foreigners with the pesky Lapu-Lapu? Maybe the visitors have told stories about their bravery, their glory, like when ancient European countries rape, kill, and pillage each other for gold and a piece more of muddy land -- which is a kind of trend during the time. Anyway and anyhow, I see two people getting friendly because of ulterior motives. And the story goes.

Then I wonder about the glory of the gold mines that was rumored to come from the kingdoms of Zabag and Sanfotsi, (purported to be the lost ancient Malay kingdom Srivijaya), and Tarshish and Ophir (another location in the East where the Egyptians, and then Solomon and Hiram traded for spice and precious metals). There is a spice route during the ancient times that became possible because of the winter monsoon winds (remember, ships then sailed, which meant they needed wind to be able to go somewhere) that enabled trade ships to follow a route to China and back to Africa via the Philippine corridor in the South China Sea. The secret about the monsoon trade winds had been jealously kept by the Arabs to control spice trade. When the Italians first learned of the monsoons, religion had been a powerful tool in keeping them from using it, meaning they couldn't pass through Muslim territories because Catholics and Muslims had been leery of each other since, well, forever. So it is logical that ancient trading of spices coming from the East should reach Pakistan, Africa, Persia, Greece and Egypt first, before Italy and France, England, Portugal and Spain which was on the other end of the landmass.

According to the annals, Arabs from the East travel the monsoon winds to trade for spices, ivory, and precious metals. Before the Arabs, Egyptians also sent expeditions to the East for same products. Then, of course, there was King Solomon of Israel and King Hiram of Tyre and the mysterious Ophir where they get the same Asian products of spices and precious metals. Their success in trade had ushered them into their respective golden age, while the Europeans were suffering from the dark ages. Asian spices, gems, plants, silver and gold mysteriously appear in Africa from somewhere in the East. If Europeans had heard about the gold mines, they couldn't try to find it by land--they'd be passing Arab/Muslim territories which they couldn't touch. There was a rumor persisting that Magellan was obsessed on finding "Tarsis" and "Ofir" before he finally found a way to sail with a Spanish crew via the other way (Pacific Ocean, discovered after Columbus found the Americas, which he initially thought to be Asia when he was trying to find a way to get to "spices" and  "gold") that landed him in the Visayas. So I wonder, of those who had survived and was able to get back to Spain to report of their journey, what stories had they told?

900AD

Legazpi has a clear vision of his mission. After conquering Cebu, he sent  Goiti to explore the Northern region. He followed with 100 something of his own men, and again, about 600 of Visayans from Panay and Cebu. They arrived in Batangas, and after further exploration, found Manila Bay. After befriending Sultan Tariq Suleiman (Raja Sulayman III), he "asked" to use the bay to establish trade with China, which basically says "I'm going to take your business away from you." Of course, the sultan, who was a vassal under Sultan Bolkiah of Brunei, refused. And with the ruthlessness of a snake, Legazpi now did not ask. He attacked  Manila Bay together with Ilonggo mercenaries and colonized Cebuanos. And here I thought Manila Bay was conquered by a force of Spanish fleets, when actually, it was Visayas who'd conquered Luzon. It's just that Spain took credit. If these two factions only united and faced Legazpi... well, but that's how the story went.

After that, a series of revolts to overthrow the Spaniards and reclaim land and property and sovereignty followed. A number of traitors, too, ran parallel with the revolts. There was Rajah Tupas in the Dagami Revolt, a Filipino woman married to an Spaniard in the Pampanga Revolt, Antonio Surabo of the Tondo Conspiracy -- and oh wait, there's the Magalat Revolt, wherein after being defeated by the Spanish troops, Magalat was executed/assasinated by his own men. by this time I just stopped this direction in my reading.  To make the long story short, the Spaniards used the technique of divide and conquer, and they splendidly succeeded, thank you very much.

Do you know why Pampangueños learned to eat bugs in the forests later on? Spaniards made use of the men to build more ships and more weapons, leaving the women to tend the fields. Employment system and wages were introduced and the bayanihan system became obsolete as a practice because labor now needed to be paid. With women tending the fields, fields yielded less and less crops, reulting into an outbreak of disease and hunger. You can't buy crop when there is no crop, can you? Therefore, bugs.

pre-hispanic map of Philippines

Our system that worked fine before these foreigners came collapsed and died a horrible death, almost without a trace now. Our records, mostly written in dried leaves and barks of trees, and many of our ancient ways have perished in the fires and ransacks, leaving only a few contracts and financial transactions embedded in silver, and gold. Other trademarks and accounts can now be read in annals of ancient Chinese kingdoms that used to be our ancestors' allies. We are the only nation in the world living in a cluster of islands. We are the only nation in the world with many kingdoms located in main islands in this archipelago. This used to protect us from conquering races in the East because they couldn't approach us in stealth--they'd be spotted long before they land. Our junks would have met them on sea, and would sink that ship with everyone on board, including women and children, killed. This was how famously fierce warriors were in ancient Luzon and Visayas. Magellan's ship was an unfortunate event in our history. Following events exposed the very weakness of a divided country, its division unique because we were divided not only due to geography but also of religious beliefs. Legazpi was able to exploit the Visayas because the Rajas had a dispute with the Sultans even before the Spaniards came. Our division led into three hundred years of slavery and total brainwashing that resulted into us without identity, or dignity.

Twenty years ago, I was in college, and Filipinos were then looking for their identity. Twenty years ago, a lot of us still believed that when the Spaniards came, all we were were natives, uneducated indigenous living off of what we get from the forests. Noone really believed pre-Filipinos constructed the ingenious Banaue Rice Terraces, it was easier to believe that visitors from the East came and did them. Ancient kingdoms were considered myths, and pictures of a royal prince and princess wearing royal finery in gold threads is just that, a picture. Noone would really believe our royals were that luxurious.



But now, facts were coming out. We have an identity, an honorable heritage. We weren't just indigenous people living in the forests, mountains and hills but a mixed race of wanderers, traders, missionaries, warriors, engineers and explorers. Though colonization stripped us of our identity and dignity, centuries of suppression did not strip us of our spirit. We remain one of the best colonized nations in the world, wherein we've made use of the good things offered by our conquerors to emerge competitive in the next era that followed after rampant colonization and conquering of territories were phased out. Being exposed to different cultures and races made us flexible when we step out of our country to find greener pastures or to provide better opportunities for our families. Majority of us do not blindly follow religion or priests. We have arrived in a spot wherein much still can be changed for the better. After all our trials, after being purged, we did not emerge the best. We've survived, yes, and not the least.

The best thing is, we are constantly evolving and learning. United, we were able to manage the first, ever, bloodless revolution in the whole world. Millions of French perished in the French Revolution. Millions of Russians perished in the revolution after the fall of the Romanovs. But in our history, millions of Filipinos perished not in the hands of fellow Filipinos, but in the hands of conquering nations. But put the Filipinos to work and they accomplish something luminous. Something that proved what kind of people we are.

We are a nation of children ready to become what Rizal, Bonifacio, and Ninoy see us to be. We are in the dawn of our own enlightenment. We are a race of survivors. We have conquered the conquerors, and now, we are in a race to conquer our internal disease -- not religion, not the machinations of the US (though they're still a shadow in the horizon we must face one day), but our corrupt government, crab mentality, the belief that we're not worthy.

That's what Rizal knew. He knew that given time, education, and rediscovery of what we were, we would be an unstoppable force--a good force that will not waste our time in conquering and owning what others owned but enriching what we already have. We are not perfect. But always, always, we do our best, and improvement has always been marked by unified, collective steps. We stumble from time to time, but you can  never get a good race down.

And that is the truth.

The Filipinos are worth dying for. We're at work forming a new identity. We are a passionate people who will smile in the face of challenges and plow on even when the going gets tougher than tough. We are a universal nation who could get anywhere without losing our home. We are a beautiful race whose beauty lies in innate grace.

We are not perfect, and we make mistakes, but the learning child in us will always save us from disgrace.

Most of all, we are a race who do not go to maim, kill and hurt. We have little depth to pay to the universe, and so much more to collect. We are a nation of today, a citizen of the future. And we will look on to the new world with the enlightened eyes and the ancient understanding of always, an indomitable spirit.    

suggested links for more stories about pre-hispanic Philippines:
http://sambali.blogspot.com/2009_05_08_archive.html
http://www.asiafinest.com/forum/lofiversion/index.php/t217224.html
http://www.asiafinest.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=200263
http://pinoyexchange.com/forums/showthread.php?t=437263