been reading

been reading. in the middle/beginning of something like 5 books. hmm, perhaps this contributes to my feeling scattered?

from my friend cez nunez-uhing's article, “seeds" from the philippine positive news newsletter...

"from mere thought the true human being is capable of realizing and creating. perhaps this is now how we are able to claim our divine nature when we humans choose our higher selves.

when we choose to slip past our identities in our life-roles, i think our journeys become both an interesting and painful one. we work with a thought, a fleeting feeling. and it becomes a secret for awhile that requires an understanding of time. we become gardeners of impulses. we allow a fruit to ripen, waiting, until it falls off a tree.

the challenge is to observe, to listen, and give space so that the unspoken questions behind a dream may unravel into answers. visions are in a way similar to children. they must be allowed to live out their own courses and our job is to nurture, to tend, and maybe at times, to prune."

from karen armstrong’s introduction to The Great Transformation: the beginning of our religious traditions:

"perhaps every generation believes that it has reached a turning point of history, but our problems seem particularly intractable and our future increasingly uncertain. many of our difficulties mask a deeper spiritual crisis. during the twentieth century, we saw the eruption of violence on an unprecedented scale. sadly, our ability to harm and mutilate one another has kept pace with our extraordinary economic and scientific progress. we seem to lack the wisdom to hold our aggression in check and keep it within safe and appropriate bounds. the explosion of he first atomic bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki laid bare the nihilistic self-destruction at the heart of the brilliant achievements of our modern culture. we risk environmental catastrophe because we no longer see the earth as holy but regard it simply as a 'resource.' unless there is some kind of spiritual revolution that can keep abreast of our technological genius, it is unlikely that we will save our planet. a purely rational education will not suffice…"

randolf david wrote in the introduction to Kapwa: the self in the other by katrin de guia:

"successive crises in the Filipino nation’s life have led many thoughtful analysts to suspect that the country’s main problem could be the dysfunctionality of the entire institutional system. this system, largely borrowed and imposed from without, has failed to spring roots in the soul of the people. instead of drawing strength from the local milieu, it arrogantly asserts its superiority by a system of sanctions and ideological rationalizations.

in the name of modern nationhood, it has suppressed native sensibility it continues to denigrate traditional folkways and wisdom in the name of global cosmopolitanism. what it could not colonize, however, has survived in the margins as a fugitive sensibility.

this “subaltern” Filipino worldview has taken refuge in the mystical practices of millenarian cults and faith healers, and in the ironic imagination of a few exemplary culture-bearing local artists. But, it remains elusive as a shadow.

it is the subject of katrin de guia’s book. the history of its successive escapes is written in the footnotes of many attempts to capture it by the normalizing methods of positivist social analysis. typical of the later are the various studies on values that stand on the tacit assumption that existing Filipino culture is an obstacle to economic and social progress and therefore needs to be modified if not altogether erased.

de Guia’s book proceeds the contrary view that far from being pernicious, the indigenous worldview of the Filipino is life-enhancing. it connects people to one another; it is their first and last line of defense against meaninglessness and disintegration. it is the fount of their self-esteem and moral certainty."

choice

whoa. am fascinated at how scared i am of choice. i'm here again. i wish i could cradle myself. what is it about being totally responsible for my own life that scares and thrills and haunts me?

i think that mine is a good life.
i know that mine is a good life.
am grateful for the choices that i have. that i make.

an ancient fear, one that doesn't belong to me, seizes and squeezes my core.
please. stop doing that. it hurts.
i know you exist. i can't breathe when you tug so hard. i can't rest.

who are you?

why are you here?
what do you have to tell me?
what do you want to tell me?
i don't want to hate you.
i don't hate you.

this won't last, i know.

i remember some things.

there is no wrong answer.
when i fall, i get up again.
breathe, my love.
you can do this.
you're doing this.
you are loved.
you are love.

i have momentary amnesia of these same things.
then, i re-member again.
okay.
exhale.
okay.

i just remembered another thing.
i feel this way before my life changes.
again.
and again.
and again.
and...

wait.
yes.
i re-member this feeling.
it's the speed that scares me.
it's not even the direction.
it's the speed.
Universe, i know better than to question too much.
and there must be a reason for going so fast...
and, i realize that i don't really know what fast or slow means anymore.
or even comfort or discomfort.

just familiar and unfamiliar.
so often, i am in these unfamiliar places trying to cope with familiar techniques.
hmmm.
is that it, then?

so, now what?

got back from Sagada the other day. amazing. Banaue. Batad. hiked and hiked. and hiked. these places are magical methinks. went spelunking in Sagada. waded in waist high underground rivers. marveled at underground waterfalls. saw bats and slipped and slid on their guano. saw amazing rock formations. and hanging coffins positioned precariously high on limestone walls. (tabi, tabi po.)

and sadly, lots of graffiti. what is it with us hu-mons? must we literally and figuratively piss on everything? what propels us to deface even the most sacred places? it's almost like we need an outside reminder that we exist, that we count. we exist! we count! quit scrawling on everything!

i'm back in metro manila, and i feel restless. Tagalog on Site Summer 2007 officially ended the other day. most of the participants have flown back to the states. for the first time since june 9th, i haven't got a schedule. phew. and holy shit. so, now what?

history

my head is spinning...again.
attended a lecture given by dr. ricardo jose.
he is a history professor at UP Dilliman and a damn good one.
he is a storyteller.

i am redefining my relationship with history.
i used to hate it. what did it have to do with me? a bunch of old white guys wearing wigs and waging wars.
i distinctly remembered stopping paying attention to history in 5th grade, where i learned that "ferdinand magellen was eaten by cannibals in the Philippines."

not a peep about the Philippines in my whole school "career," and THIS was the first mention?!?!

being the only brown girl in my class, i remember sinking lower and lower in my seat, face hot with shame and embarrassment.

from dr. jose's lecture i learned that the vine of colonization took its strongest foothold in the Philippines between 1945-1946. it was the last year of the Philippine Commonwealth. the country was in shambles after WWII, and americans would finally grant Philippine independence.

any advances made before the war towards sustainability, a national identity, infrastructure, stability, inner agency were completely destroyed.

great timing for independence, di ba?
the country was split between completely trusting the US (give them anything they want, MacArthur came back didn't he?) and completely mistrusting the US (get them out, they lied and basically we traded one colonizer for the next)

seems like this is the time when the Pinoy penchant for imported goods began.
children learned that they could get chocolates from american GI's by greeting them with an emphatic, "Hi Joe!"
in the provinces, GI's, tired of their army rations of SPAM, traded for fresh chicken, pork. Pinoys gladly traded their fresh eggs for the army ration powdered eggs, as powdered eggs were viewed as so modern, so american. just add water!

i think about the balikbayan boxes that my family in the US send here. they are full of chocolates and SPAM. i think of how those canned goods are proudly displayed in locked glass cabinets in my relatives' homes, perverse indicators of status. i think about how my lola will only eat "american corned beef." (isn't it from argentina?) and how a tito of mine has placed a bottle of Lee Kum Kee oyster sauce as decoration on the only shelf in his living room.

i think about parity rights and trade agreements during that period of time in history. of course, they favored the US. these agreements allowed the rape of Inang Bayan. rampant logging and mining... industrialization poisoned the Pasig.

american products were tauted as superior, and so many Pinoys preferred Colgate and Dove over locally made toothpaste and soap. goodness, isn't this literal and figurative whitewashing? brainwashing?

how many boxes have i seen my mother pack that contain Colgate and Dove soap nestled amongst the cans of SPAM, chocolates, old clothes, and toys? how do we unwittingly contribute to reinforcing the colonized mindset in sending these things?

ugh. my stomach feels tight.

my mother was born in 1946. perhaps the vine had cradled her in my lola's womb.