Reading 'The Reader'

It's been long that I've read a novel of such theme. Because it is not that that thick at 218 pages, I grabbed it from Manong Jay-AR's room assuring him I will return it before weekend. I was unprepared upon readig it.r I have immersed myself on the world of LOTR lately or must have swayed away that much by Sheldon's (blessed be his soul) that I have to buoy my feelings. The realities presented in The Reader is of different exhilaration than those previous reads.

Set after the Nazi regime, the book is repeatedly erotic, highly philosophical, guilt-laden, very moving. A story of a 30-ish female bus conductor turned Nazi camp guard (aka murderer) who was nameless for good numbr of pages and a sickly 15-year old boy (she call him 'Kid') and their tryst... showers, making love, lying together, him reading her a book and the repeatition of those actions. It's an 'in your face' experience on how emotions can be tricky, as if you've known someone totally but realizing how strange she could still be. It's like you know her next moves and yet, you are caught by surprise at everything she does. It's the inconsolable thought of how lovers make love for countless times (and loving it) and yet stand as strangers, seemingly univolved with their individual lives after meeting a number of years after. I remember that feeling of reading Elie Wiesel's 'Night' or Camus' ' The Stranger', that same electrifying depression, detachment from human feelings, strangeness of beings etc, etc...

I could almost hear Simon and Garfunkel's
"in the naked night I saw, ten thousand people maybe more.
People talking without speaking, people hearing without listening..."

It is hopeful anyway, and redeeming....highly edifying.

The Odd Popularity of Mafia Wars

The Odd Popularity of Mafia Wars

The Odd Popularity of Mafia Wars

By Lev Grossman Monday, Nov. 16, 2009

Good evening. Please, don't be alarmed. You may call me ... Don Grossman. You might know me from such Facebook status updates as Don Grossman won a fight with your help! and Don Grossman sent you a gift in Mafia Wars. Yes, that's right. I'm in the mafia. Uh, wars. I'm in Mafia Wars.

Make Me a Channel of Your Peace

Make Me a Channel of Your Peace | Music Upload

The 'real' Jacque Bermejo stood up

OFW 'abused' after mistaken Facebook post on Ondoy

A controversial statement allegedly made by a Filipina overseas worker in Dubai that mocked Filipino victims of tropical storm Ondoy sparked negative reactions among many Pinoys here and abroad. Click here for more.

2009 Miss Universe Result

Too bad, Miss Philippines did not make it even to Top 15... and a triumph to Miss Venezuela for bagging the crown two years in a row. Here's a rundown:

Miss Universe: Miss Venezuela
1st Runner Up: Miss Dominican Republic
2nd Runner Up: Miss Kosovo
3rd Runner UP: Miss Australia
4th Runner Up: Miss Puerto Rico

Miss Congeniality: Miss China
Photogenic: Miss Thailand (buti nalang di Pinas ulit)
National Costume: Miss Panama

10 Questions for Thomas Friedman

10 Questions for Thomas Friedman


*i will be a year, almost... it's nothing really only that it is not everyday that you got to ask a question to one of your revered author and got to see your name on TIME magazine.... wwheeeeeew!!

Nang Dahil sa Tuyo

NY nuns sue Pinay over 'tuyo'
By Cristina DC Pastor Philippine News Updated January 15, 2009 12:00 AM

NEW YORK – It may be a cultural thing, but when you’re up against a congregation of nuns and your neighbors in an apartment building in Manhattan, a lawsuit would make an interesting anthropological study in ethnic tension.

The Missionary Sisters of Sacred Heart (MSSH) in Manhattan has filed a complaint against a Filipino-American couple, Michael and Gloria Lim, over a Filipino delicacy called tuyo (dried fish), and its funky cousin, the tinapa (smoked fish).

The case is now with the Manhattan Supreme Court.

Reports say Gloria was smoking fish outside her apartment window when the smell – noxious stench to the nuns, divine aroma to the Lims – of the salted fish wafted throughout the Gramercy apartment building.

The “foul smell” was too strong the nuns suspected it was coming from a decomposing body and called in the Fire Department.

According to reports, the firemen searched every unit of the building and were able to trace the source of the smell to the Lims’ unit.

They knocked, and when no one came to the door, the NYFD came barreling in.

Gloria, a nurse, found her door knocked down and was obviously peeved.

It appears the MSSH leases the unit to the Lims and may have authorized the assault.

“I cook dried fish,” Gloria defiantly declared to the NY Post.

The average American may find it puzzling how one can derive pleasure of the palate from dried fish. Foodie Andrew Zimmern, who has been to the Philippines and braved balut (fertilized duck egg with an embryo) and Soup No. 5 (bull’s rectum and testicles soup, believed to be a powerful aphrodisiac), might be able to share the gustatory experience.

Gloria was referring to the tuyo, a Philippine staple usually eaten with steaming hot rice and fresh tomatoes. Some eat theirs dipped in vinegar and crushed garlic paired with fried rice and sunny side up egg.

Dried fish is not a Philippine exclusive. It is an essential in the traditional Chinese and Malaysian fried rice along with chopped spring onions, garlic and chili. Sometimes, it is pulled and sprinkled on chocolate porridge or champorado.

Food with a strong salty taste like tuyo or tinapa might be too intense for the morning stomach, but many Filipinos would never leave for work in the morning without having it for breakfast.

In the lawsuit filed by the nuns, Gloria was even more adamant. She was quoted as saying that “she is causing the smell by cooking and/or smoking fish, and she is going to continue to do it.”

The complaint appears to divide the apartment tenants, some finding themselves squarely on the side of the sisters who find the smell “potentially dangerous to life and health,” and some defending the FilAm family’s right to eat their own ethnic food in the privacy of their home.

“This is plain racist,” comes a shout-out from a supportive blogger.

The complaint says some tenants closer to the Lims’ unit have moved out, and that the Lims have been warned repeatedly about the smell emanating from their 16th floor apartment unit. Gloria, a 30-year resident of the US, denies this.

Which side to take, undecided tenants turn to what’s stated in the housing rules: Cooking smelly food is not allowed.

The nuns are seeking $75,000 in damages. They made it clear that they have nothing against Filipinos as a people.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

It was out of curious case of mine to take a peek (and consumed by it eventually) at a movie whose bland posters are not objects enough for curiosity at all, save for its curious title. Yep, with Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett on it might be enough assurance that one will not be remorseful the moment he steps out of the movie house. But I learn not to typecast a movie by the line of actors they assembled, neither from its directors, nor its Hollywood-ness or Indie-ness or local-ness (I enjoyed watching Marian Rivera’s Nieves episode in this year’s MMFF’s Shake, Rattle, and Roll).

Brad Pitt is Benjamin Button. Unwanted at birth, he was brought to a nursing home (a home for the aged) by his father and was taken cared by her charming ‘mama’. Benjamin Button, a child born to have the typical appearance of a eighty-six-year-old man, inflicted with arthritis, has advance form of cataract, inability of hearing, and was commented to be in a state of deterioration. Benjamin Button, a man who grew younger and younger everyday. Benjamin Button, a man who was born old… and died an infant.