Treasures from my past

I would like all my friends who come to visit my blog, to click on over to ProbeTV.com, Probe Productions Inc's online database of its programs. This is a great project because people will get to view segments from years before, without having to pay for a copy.

The treasure I am talking about here is the recently-uploaded segment from the show where I used to work: 5 and Up. The episode featured here is the very special episode we did on the EDSA II Phenomenon that was taking place -- People Power II: Ruled by Kids! We took three of our senior reporters out to the streets and kept vigil with all the other students like them, and made them experience "politics of the people" in action. (I remember how I, and my co-producer, Marj were so pooped from editing the day befire, and in a sort of stupor suddenly talked about doing a story on EDSA. It was all so spontaneous, but it worked. This remains one of my favorite segments ever.)

There are two segments in the show: the first (Part 1) is an exposition or explanation of the events that led to EDSA II, and the second (Part 2) is an analysis of the political situation, by the young people who were there, and augmented by political experts. The 2nd segment was, and still is a superbly-done piece. I think we won the awards we won because of this segment (which was written by Marj Mosura). So I hope y'all have the patience to go on watching the second installment, which is also uploaded. :-) I would really, really like it if you catch the winning question our reporter, Oly, asked one of the Fortun brothers in the interview. Only 5 and Up can deliver such a cutting-edge segment in the children's programming genre.

I have the hubris to say this because it won an award at the Prix Jeunesse (the Oscars of children's programming), the Asian Television Awards, the Catholic Mass Media Awards and the Star Awards for Television. :-)

Too bad the networks and the advertisers didn't believe in us.

At World's End

Thanks to KarenKuna, myself and about 50 other friends of hers were treated to a screening of Pirates of the Carribean: At World's End last night. Benc and I went--rather, persevered--through the absurd, preposterous, inconceivable 1.5 hour traffic from our condo unit to the Podium and my cough-cold-upper respiratory tract infected condition. Hehehe.

We got to the mall with barely 30 minutes to spare. (I was fantasizing about taking some hot lentil soup at Cafe Med but thanks to the traffic, nodice). We had a couple of subsandwiches at Subway then, filed into the moviehouse. Some of our friends were in Pirate costume, Karen had her hat, and Will Turner turned up. They were a sight to see.

So the nearly-three-hour movie unfolded. I was waiting to be blown out of my seat, but I guess I know better next. Expecting that much from a third-installment story will not always come to pass. (Except ROTK maybe, hehe) I wanted to roar with laughter the way I did in the first and second movies. I wanted gripping fight scenes and edge-of-my seat stunts like the swordfight-in-the-wooden wheel scene, or the hanging-over-the-cliff-in-a-rope-net scene. I was waiting for the ironic lines and Jack Sparrow-isms but they came in the second half of the movie already. It was a long wait.

Mostly the movie was about resolving Davy Jones's (after) life decisions, how Will and Elisabeth would turn out, who Tia Dalma really was. Most of the movie was about resolving planted story lines in the second Pirates movie, and many pirate myths and legends were into the third movie. This was both interesting and a bit frustrating for me because I felt like the movie was jamming too much information into my brain.

Don't get me wrong, I love stories like these, it's just that I felt they were presenting the lore as if everyone was familiar with it already. Since the lore of the sea is very rich, I would have appreciated a better exposition flowing from one character to another. Here, bits and pieces were mentioned all over the movie, and one had to be quick enough to catch them, store them top of mind and tie them up with the next factoid. This was quite a lot of work for someone who just wanted to be entertained (and who was feeling under the weather). Imagine having to do all that and wanting to react to the funny lines, gaze at Johnny Depp and Orlando Bloom and take in the great cinematography all at the same time.

Like all part-three movies, this one wanted to accomplish so much that it almost became too much. ALMOST. Good thing they were able to relax in the end. I liked the fact that it wasn't an out-and-out happy ending. I like that there were compromises, and the heroes of the story accepted the consequences. I liked that Asians figured in this movie, even if they were just treated like a big, expensive cameo role (read: Chow Yun Fat). But I wondered why they chose Singapore, when there wasn't a Singapore during that time. The pirate haven then was Indonesia--known in antiquity as Java/Sumatra/Surabaya (I think). I would also have loved to see more of Calypso the goddess. I felt like she came and went, when her release was in fact one of the quests of Captain Barbossa and the Brethren.

There wasn't much Jack Sparrow the character did, til the end of the movie. The stuff I was waiting for came in the last 45 minutes. But it was all good. At least it was still there. Nobody can do Jack the way Johnny does it.

May 14

I remember I shared my birthday with another girl in my highschool--a really brilliant math wizard named Ernestine. Where she was a whiz with numbers, I was crap. I did excel with words though. And literature. It was all good.

Last Monday, I shared it with the nation, as registered voters trooped to the polling precincts to get their thumbs smudged and their index fingers inked. I think this is the 4th or 5th time the elections fell on the 14th of May. While it's a novel thing, it can be annoying that more people forgot to greet you (or maybe they just decided not to, hehe).

So to celebrate my 32nd, I decided to be a good citizen and vote. I only voted for 8 senators, a congressman, a mayor and vice mayor. I had lunch with my dad and brother then went home to rest from the oppressive heat. In the evening I had dinner with my other siblings, the Hubby, my dad. Then we went home. This was also the first time my mom wasn't around on my birthday. (She was busy managing --and winning-- the mayoralty elections in her home town with my uncle as mayor.)

It was a rather quiet celebration. I guess you get more of that as you get older. I was hoping to give it a kick by announcing I was pregnant...but I wasn't. Baby test came back negative. So I will try again. Maybe it will work the next time.

If it does, and I do get pregnant say, in August, I may be sharing my next birthday with my baby. :-) Now that would be a blast!

Happy birthday Me!

First and Greatest

The saying "women will always turn out to be their mothers" has always sounded like a curse to me. The context in which I would usually hear it would be negative. They would be criticisms about mom's point of view, how she never seemed to understand, the physical features we inherited, or the "outdated" look she never seems to give up, sometimes even the "twisted" way we think.

I for one am fearful about the "bad" habits I may have inherited in her, and which may unknowingly manifest themselves as I grow towards her age now. I remind myself not to think like she does, to be less high-strung and uptight, to be more forward-thinking, more prudent in decision-making, but more adventurous when going for opportunities. It's so much easier to think about the things I Don't want to be, because that's what my mom is. It's much more difficult to think about the things I must be emulating.

And why is that? I think it's because I am simply afraid to do so. And to do so means conceding. I will concede to the person who stands as the first moral authority I have ever known, but with whom I do not always agree with. It would mean I will eat my words and lose face (to whom?). I would give in to the establishment, and I feel that acquiescence will leave me trapped forever. It's always easier to find fault because it makes you feel more superior, makes you feel like a better human being than others.

And yet, it is mom who taught me to be a human being in the first place. And as the years wear on, life's experiences hit you from all directions, and I slowly, carefully tread the path that leads to motherhood, I realize why it was much easier to see everything wrong and ignore what was right. I think it's because I am afraid. I am afraid because I feel I may never measure up to the things she has accomplished. I think I don't need to enumerate the things she has done here because everyone else will have a story to top the ones other people have about their mothers. But suffice it to say the things she has done for our family have as yet not been topped by anyone I have ever met in my life, to date. And I wonder, for all the wrong things I would perceive her to be doing and thinking, would I not have thought or done the same? Or, could I really have done better? I wouldn't know, because I wasn't her. But because of her decisions, our family has pulled through so much, and remains in tact, after all those years.

It's been said that to be a mother means to decide to forever have your heart go walking around outside your body. And how my mom has decided cut up her heart five times is beyond me. It must be a daily struggle to see and hear things from your own children that hurt you; and yet these are things a mother will never tell her children she feels. The loneliness must be stifling, the darkness unabating. But my mom, like all mothers, persevered.

Will I be able to bear that? Will I be able to set aside the selfishness and ego that is required when a female becomes a mother? Will I live through the heartache and longing, absolute happiness and despair that comes with motherhood? People (friends who have become moms) say there is a deep well that rises in place of the void left by the amniotic sac. This is where all women draw their strength, love, patience, compassion and fierce protectiveness for their young. This is when you realize you become more than you ever think you could be. This is when women become the most powerful human beings in the world. And this is when mothers become the first and greatest loves of our lives.

I have since found that the quote at the beginning of this post actually has a continuation. It turns out, it's a quote from Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Honest. It goes:

All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does. That's his.

Mothers will always be mothers and all other women can do is to hope that one day, the can be as great as their own moms. I know I want to. And I happily await the day that I can start calling myself a mother. Happy Mother's Day, Mama.

The Lusty Month of May

Eversince I saw Vanessa Redgrave as Gueneviere frolicking in the movie version of Camelot as she sang this song, I instantly decided I loved my birth month, and that I wanted to grow old as gracefully as her.

I'm partly glad the month has come. There are quite a lot of things to look forward to, aside from turning 32: more work, more opportunities, the possibility of travel, fixing the home, and even -- dare i say it?--enrollment! (I am targetting that I will finish my MA this year).

Not that the past few months haven't been uneventful. We travelled to Samal Island recently to attend a wedding. It was a simple, elegant ceremony that was very heartfelt and familial. It was the best kind, really. You felt more welcome. And your presence is really felt. I can't wait to have the photos developed, and I'm planning to have them framed and give them to the newlyweds.

Samal wasn't too bad, but I felt like the stay was incomplete, since we weren't able to explore the town at all. We arrived by ferry (10 minutes, P150.00 for a special trip) from the Davao Insular hotel and got to the island a little after lunch. Time was limited, and public transport was almost non-existent. We couldn't risk walking outside the resort either because there weren't any streetlights (in fact, there were no real streets...just dirt paths) and hardly anybody on the road when we peeked out of the resort gates. We pretty much stayed in our room and read/watched TV.

We stayed at the Blue Waters resort. It was ok. The accommodations were rudimentary. Two beds,a tv and a bathroom. There wasn't even a phone to call housekeeping. I don't even think that service existed. The amenities were very basic, but they were enough.

We had to order food from the front desk. Then "waiters" brought the food up to your room--piecemeal. It was funny actually, because it took them 5 trips to deliver a simple meal of fish, gulay, rice and fruit. The food wasn't all that spectacular. It was standard lutong bahay fare, but only slightly more expensive. Still the prices weren't so bad: we spent a total of 1,800 on meals for two days and two nights. I think they're more used to the day-trippers who rent out the small kiosks overlooking the seaside while they have their lunch. It was quite surreal for me to see the set-up still existed: it had been ages since the notion of a picnic/day trip with your own baon entered my consciousness. I was slightly pleased the practice still remained with the locals.

The beach was just a tiny pocket of sand, about 6 yards wide and 3 yards long, before your feet touched the water. Though it did have an infinity pool, I would not recommend wading in it on a Sunday afternoon because of all the muck that builds up from the people who keep spitting and dragging in mud from the grounds into the pool. Wait til they get it cleaned up, which falls on a Monday I reckon, and then you can soak it up then.

I wish I did have something remarkable to say about Samal, but I really don't. The local government should introduce some sort of shuttle for the resort visitors so that they would be able to explore the island more. This in turn will give the city impetus to develop various spots on the island for tourists to visit. Make it accessible, and everything else will follow.

I guess that gives us another reason for to go back and rediscover Samal, sometime in the near future.