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Showing posts from November, 2006

Public transportation

I have no car here in Roxas City, my new (old) home. I have to depend on relatives to take me around the first week I was here. But this gets old so I am learning to take public transportation. There are two choices: a tricycle which is a Nazi type vehicle with motorcycle and side cab and there is the minicab. I am not tall but here in the island, I tower over people's heads. When I get inside the minicab, I must bend very low so I do't hit the roof. This small cab fits about 12 tiny local residents. One day I was pushed all the way inside the cab. I couldn't see my stop because the windows were below my eye level. When I saw the blur of my cousin's blue house next door, I realized I was way past my stop. Imagine getting out of this cab! When I asked the driver to stop, it was all too sudden, the people around me were taken by surprise with the unexpectef stop and my loud voice asking the driver to "Para" (stop). Then as I tried to get out of this cramped, mod

Pioneers in Philippine Art

When I first heard about this exhibition, I was disappointed to learn that the works of Carlos “Botong” Francisco would not be part of the show. That said, the 38 paintings and sketches by Juan Luna, Fernando Amorsolo and Fernando Zobel, now on display at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco, is an impressive collection spanning 100 years of Philippine Art. Each of these three artists studied and honed their craft in Europe or the United States. As such, their works reflect Western art trends of their respective periods. Juan Luna lived both in Madrid and Paris. His Woman with Shawl (1880-1890) and Lady at the Racetrack (1880-1890) show influences of the Impressionist style of painting. Impressionism had burst into the art scene in France in 1884, precisely the time Luna won the First Gold Medal for his painting, Spoliarium, at the Exposicion de Bellas Artes in Madrid. Luna’s later sketches of Ragamuffin and Study for People and Kings show his foray into the social realism genre

Back Where I Started

On my first day in Roxas City, my cousin took me to the appliance center where I bought a bed, an airconditioner, a fridge, a TV set, an electric fan and a stove. I had been traveling for 24 hours and wanted so badly to get some sleep. I asked the store owner to please deliver the bed to my apartment by noon so I could get some sleep. The delivery truck arrived as we had arranged. Rain was pouring heavily as the workers unpacked the crates of new appliances and installed the airconditioning unit and connect the stove to the gas line. By 3:30 p.m. they were done. I took a warm shower using the new pink, plastic pail I had just bought. My "butler" made some hot water and mixed it with the water in the pail. That was my warm shower. Shortly after I fell asleep in my air cooled room and woke up momentarily because my cousin came by to make sure all was well. The sound of the sea roaring as it lashed against the breakwater in the backyard woke me in the early morning hour