“PLIANT LIKE THE BAMBOO”
There is a story in Philippine folklore about a mango tree and a bamboo tree. Not being able to agree as to
which was the stronger of the two, they called upon the wind to make the decision.
The wind blew hardest. The mango tree stood fast. It would not yield. It knew it was strong and sturdy. It
would not sway. It was too proud. It was too sure of itself. But finally its root gave way, and it tumbled down.
The bamboo tree was wiser. It knew it was not as robust as the mango tree. And so every time the wind blew,
it bent its head gracefully. It made loud protestations, but let the wind have its way. When finally the wind got
tired of blowing, the bamboo tree still stood in all its beauty and grace.
The Filipino is like the bamboo tree. He knows that he is not strong enough, to withstand the onslaught of
superior forces. And so he yields. He bends his head gracefully with many loud protestations.
And he has survived. The Spaniards came and dominated him for more than three hundred years. And, when
the Spaniards left, the Filipinos still stood—only much richer in experience and culture.
The Americans took place of the Spaniards. They used more subtle means of winning over the Filipinos to
their mode of living and thinking. The Filipinos embraced the American way of life more readily than the
Spaniard’s vague promises hereafter.
Then the Japanese came like a storm, like a plague of locusts, like a pestilence—rude, relentless, cruel. The
Filipino learned to bow his head low, to “cooperate” with the Japanese in their “holy mission of establishing
the Co-Prosperity Sphere.” The Filipino had only hate and contempt for the Japanese, but he learned to smile
sweetly at them and to thank them graciously for their “benevolence and magnanimity”.
And now that the Americans have come back and driven away the Japanese, those Filipinos who profited
most from cooperating with the Japanese have been loudest in their protestations of innocence. Everything
is as if the Japanese had never been in the Philippines.
For the Filipino would welcome any kind of life that the gods would offer him. That is why he is contented
and happy and at peace. The sad plight of other people of the world is not his. To him, as to that ancient
Oriental poet, the past is already a dream, and tomorrow is only a vision; but today, well-lived, makes every
yesterday a dream of happiness, and tomorrow is a vision of hope.
This may give you the idea that the Filipino is a philosopher. Well he is. He has not evolved a body of
philosophical doctrines. Much less has he put them down into a book, like Kant for example, or Santayana or
Confucius. But he does have a philosophical outlook on life.
He has a saying that life is like a wheel. Sometimes it is up, sometimes it is down. The monsoon season comes,
and he has to go undercover. But then the sun comes out again. The flowers bloom, and the birds sing in
the trees. You cut off the branches of a tree, and, while the marks of the bolo* are still upon it, it begins to
shoot forth-new branches—branches that are the promise of new color, new fragrance, and new life.
Everywhere about him is a lesson in patience and forbearance that he does not have to learn with difficulty.
For the Filipino lives in a country on which the gods lavished their gifts aplenty. He does not have to worry
about the morrow. Tomorrow will be only another day—no winter of discontent. Of he loses his possessions,
there is the land and there is the sea, with all the riches that one can desire. There is plenty to spar—for
friends, for neighbors and for everyone else.
No wonder that the Filipino can afford to laugh. For the Filipino is endowed with saving grace of humor. This
humor is earthly as befits one who has not indulged in deep contemplation. But it has enabled the Filipino to
shrug his shoulders in times of adversity and say to himself “Bahalana”.
The Filipino has often been accused of being indolent and of lacking initiative. And he has answered back*
that no one can help being indolent and lacking in initiative who lives under the torrid sun which saps the
vitality.
This seeming lack of vitality is, however, only one og his means of survival. He does not allow the world to be
too much with him. Like the bamboo tree, he lets the winds of chance and circumstance blow all about him;
and he is unperturbed and serene.
The Filipino, in fact, has a way of escaping from the rigorous problems of life. Most of his art is escapist in
nature. His forefathers wallowed in the *moro-moro, the awit, and the kurido. They loved to identify
themselves as gallant knights battling for the favors of fair ladies or the possession of hallowed place. And
now he himself loves to be lost in the throes and modern romance and adventure.
His gallantry towards women—especially comely women—is a manifestation of his romantic turn of mind.
Consequently, in no other place in Orient are women so respected, so adulated, and so pampered. For his
women have enabled the Filipinos to look upon the vicissitudes of fortune as the bamboo tree regards the
angry blasts of the blustering wind.
The Filipino is eminently suited to his romantic role. He is slender and wiry. He is nimble and graceful in his
movements, his voice is soft, and h has the gift of language. In what other place in the world can you find a
people who can carry on a fluent conversation in at least *three languages?
This gift is another means by which the Filipino as managed to survive. There is no insurmountable barrier
between him and any of the people who have come to live with him—Spanish, American, and Japanese. The
foreigners do not have learn his language. He easily manages to master theirs.
Verily, the Filipino is like the bamboo tree. In its grace, in its ability to adjust itself to the peculiar and
inexplicable whims of fate, the bamboo tree is his expressive and symbolic national tree, it will have to be, not
the molave or the narra, but the bamboo.
“GESTURES”
by Bernice C. Roldan
Someone knocked on the door this morning, and I opened it, still brushing my teeth, automatic as a robot. I forgot to
look through the peephole to see who it was. That’s what I do when there are too many kids singing several off-key
lines caroling two weeks before Christmas and banging on the door as though my house were burning. Or when people
on my doorstep badger me into buying the most amazingly useless household contraptions, or wave IDs and certificates
probably crafted along Recto, asking for money. I’m not proud of it, but sometimes I plunge the room in darkness and
wait by the door for the insistent knocking to stop, a fugitive in my own apartment.
So today, a gray Tuesday, I was rendered mute with my mouth full of minty foam. A long-haired girl stood there. Big-
boned, generic black blouse, faded slim-fit jeans, open-toed sandals, the heels of her shoes an inch high. She could
have been my little sister. I watched her hands began tracing the air, her face coming alive, no longer that of a stranger’s.
She was speaking in gestures. A deaf-mute.
She tried handling me what seemed to be a white envelope. Empty, I suspected. I stepped back, still brushing my teeth,
the slightest whine escaping my lips. She caught me. Forgetting to look through the peephole, I couldn’t act like nobody
was home to give money.
It didn’t look like she was going away. She raised her eyebrows and nodded, waving the envelope at me. A sound
issued from her throat, almost as if to say. You know this is good for you. She seemed taller, almost imperious. As
though she were my mother bidding me to come closer because my hair was asked and my shirt wasn’t properly
tucked.
So I took her envelope and shut the door. Beneath the dining light’s glare I saw that it wasn’t an envelope but a letter.
I scanned it, my gaze carelessly wheeling down the page and catching words: handog, deaf-mute foundation. Grumbling
around my toothbrush, I went to my bathroom to fetch a crumpled ten-peso bill.
She was still waiting when I opened the door again. Looking away, her mind someplace else, I stood there for a moment,
waving the letter and my worn bill, feeling silly. I didn’t tap her on the shoulder. I was still a stranger. I wondered what
she was thinking.
That was when I saw a slight cloak of raindrops on her shoulders, giving the slightest shimmer to her black blouse when
she moved. I realized she didn’t even have an umbrella. She turned seeing me at last. Mutely, I handed her the money,
almost ashamed for not giving more.
Now that I think about it, she could have been a fake. Maybe she can talk and hear as well as I can. But it doesn’t matter.
Because at that moment before I shut my door, I realized we were the same. We said goodbye in her language of
gestures. With her open palms, she touched her chest, as though her fingers wished to find something within her heart
to share with me. I forgot that my toothbrush was dangling from my mouth as my smile mirrored hers. From her heart,
she offered something airy and unseen in her hands and I tumbled to do the same.
“DISASTER ALERT”
Floods continue to wreak havoc in Thailand yesterday, with the capital Bangkok facing a serious threat of inundation.
For many Thais, it is the worst flooding they have seen in their lifetime. The flooding is threating to devastate tourism
in the capital, one of the biggest sources of revenue for Bangkok.
Thailand, however, was not the first in the region to experience record catastrophic floods. Two years ago, stunned
Filipinos watched as floodwaters spawned by typhoon “Ondoy” rose in a matter of hours throughout Metro Manila
and the Laguna de Bay floodplain, sweeping away not just the usual shanties straddling waterways but even vehicles
in the streets and houses made of sturdy materials. Elsewhere in Luzon, the flooding was aggravated by the release
of water from swollen dams, with evacuation turning into another disaster because of poor coordination among
concerned agencies. Recently, another freak flood hit western Metro Manila as a storm surge combined with a high
tide in Manila Bay brought the bay front under several feet of water.
Most countries now realize that the planet will be seeing more unprecedented weather phenomena. The question is
how each country is preparing to cope with such natural calamities. In the Philippines, efforts have been undertaken
since Ondoy struck to improve disaster mitigation response and weather forecasting capability, but the response to
the storm surge and the recent cataclysmic flooding in Central Luzon shows that much more must be done.
In Singapore where an expo on clean energy has just been held, an environment expert based in Thailand said long-
term water management measures could include building channels that divert water away from residential and
industrial enclaves to areas that can use the water, such as certain agricultural lands. The expert said protocols for
releasing water from dams can also be reviewed so that releases can be done in smaller increments even if more
frequently to reduce the risk of flooding.
The suggestions can be taken into consideration by the “water czar” appointed recently by President Aquino, Public
Works Secretary Rogelio Singson. With freak weather being seen in many parts of the world, he must come up soon
with his proposals. Other countries are rushing to boost their
defense against natural disasters, and the Philippines must do the same.
“LIKE THE MOLAVE”
by Rafael Zulueta de Costa
Not yet, Rizal, not yet. Sleep not in peace:
There are a thousand waters to be spanned;
There are a thousand mountains to be crossed;
There are a thousand crosses to be borne.
Our shoulders are not strong; our sinews are
Grown flaccid with dependence, smug with ease
Under another’s wing. Rest not in peace;
Not yet, Rizal, not yet. The land has need
Of young blood-and, what younger than your own,
Forever spilled in the great name of freedom,
Forever oblate on the altar of
The free? Not you alone, Rizal. O souls
And spirits of the martyred brave, arise!
Arise and scour the land! Shed once again
Your willing blood! Infuse the vibrant red
Into our thin anaemic veins; until
We pick up your Promethean tools and, strong,
Out of the depthless matrix of your faith
In us, and on the silent cliffs of freedom,
We carve for all time your marmoreal dream!
Until our people, seeing, are become
Like the Molave, firm, resilient, staunch,
Rising on the hillside, unafraid,
Strong in its own fibre, yes, like the Molave!
“MR. WHITE”
by M.D. Balangue
*Excerpt from pp. 37-38, Dialogue between Teri and her gay best friend Moose
“ I remember genuinely disliking him that night at Sukiyaki Babe then I’d see him sa
corridor and he’d always look so intense and shy, and before I knew it I was nervous around
him, I liked seeing him in the hallway, ewan! Maybe I’m ready to move on and maybe
something inside me is—”
“—subconsciously looking for a papa, and Gito is very papa-ble.”
Good old Moose, Teri thought. Always there to make sense of things that left her confused and
bewildered.
*Excerpt from pp. 70-71, On Broken Hearts
What happens when someone breaks your heart?
When someone breaks your heart, first you are shocked. Someone will say you are
heartbroken and you examine the words break and heart and heartbroken and you immediately
decide that it’s inaccurate. You feel pain in the region of your heart and you think it’s your heart
breaking but one’s heart doesn’t really break, something else does- faith. You stop believing.
No, not in the big things which are most of the time irrelevant. You still believe in God or
Buddha or some Supreme Being, you still believe child prostitution is bad. You just stop
believing in the small things that you do, the small things that give meaning to your daily life,
and you begin to think everything is pointless. Why get up? Why dress up? Why breathe in and
out? What for? What for?
<…> When someone breaks your heart, you turn into a small ball of self-pity. You lie in bed, in
a ball. You hug your knees, keeping them close to your chest, like a fetus. Freud said it’s human
instinct to go back to the womb where we can feel safe.
But that’s what happens when someone breaks your heart- they steal the very thing that
makes you feel safe, whole, intact.
“ROAD MISHAPS”
by Reg Khan
Kelly hated driving home alone in the wee hours. Her paranoia worked overtime whenever she was
behind the wheel past midnight- pedestrians became robbers, men on motorbikes became hired
killers, and vans with tinted windows carried kidnap-for-ransom groups. Of course there were also
the more relevant concerns like junked-up bus drivers, drunken teenagers and irate motorists with a
gun in the glove compartment. These were the kind of encounters where you almost always expect
someone to end up dead.
The hazards of driving alone after dark doubles for a woman. Biologically, women are easier prey for
those with evil intentions. While Kelly was contemplating the myriad of evil intentions she could fall
victim to on a deserted road, she noticed a car with no headlights drive up behind her. She was
suspicious at first but, when the car passed her, she just figured it was some idiot who didn’t realize
his headlights were off. When she watched the car zoom past, she got to think she was better off
driving with one other car on the road… even if the driver was an idiot. Kelly sped up to keep pace
with the car. As she was driving alongside it, the car with no headlights suddenly slowed down and
trailed behind. Kelly decided to maintain her speed at 90kph. Pretty soon, the car was out of her view.
Kelly’s vehicle was the sole car on the road again.
As she was cruising, a cat suddenly crossed the street. Kelly stopped on the brakes and swerved to
avoid the cat but she hit something else. Her car jolted toward. Shaken, Kelly reoriented herself and
assessed the situation. Behind her was the car with no headlights. A man got out of the car. He went
towards Kelly with furrowed brows and crooked lips. Kelly’s heart was beating fast as the man
approached her. He was mouthing off expletives and flailing his arms. Kelly stayed inside her car but
the man banged on her hood, ordering her to come out. She needed to defend herself from this
enraged man. She reached down her seat slowly till the tips of her fingers felt the baseball bat she
kept handy at her side. The man banged on her hood again. Kelly opened her door, and as the man
came towards her, swung her bat hitting him in the stomach. The guy bent over and she hit him at
the back of his legs. He fell down on his knees, still cursing. She heaved once more and hit him on
the head. He fell to the ground, prostrate, unconscious, blood trickling from his ear. Kelly just stared.
This was one of the encounters where you almost always expect someone to end up dead.
BACK-BRAKING
by Martine de Luna
No, that isn’t a typo in today’s title. I have a point. It has to do with (1) my back and, (2) the art of
“braking.” I suppose this type of blog post is what they call a “brain f**t” but I can’t bring myself to
call it that. So let’s just call it another “study” in the art of making things blissful. OK? Ok.
I pulled my back the other week, see. It all began when I had a meeting at a cafe nearby, and had to
bring Krista with me. I was alone, and waited for my husband to pick me up after my meeting was
through. And so I carried Krista around in my sling, maybe for a good 40 minutes. I didn’t notice it
of course until we got home and my shoulders ached. So I scheduled the home service masseuse to
come and work on me that night, to relax me a bit.
Well, turns out I will never ever hire that masseuse again, because while she was massaging me she
manipulated a nerve in my lower back, causing a small tearing of the muscles. I only felt it keenly,
however, when I reached down the next day to pick up Krista from her high chair during Sunday
brunch. Immediately, I felt this piercing pain course through me. It was awful, enough to keep me
hunched over. I hated it!
For the next few days (well, whole of last week, actually!), I was mostly hunched over and wincing in
pain. I couldn’t do anything around the house, and I felt so utterly useless. Thank God I had no
important matters to attend to outside the house, but even doing the daily chores was torture. Here’s
a glimpse into the mess in the kitchen, sigh!
What’s worse is that I couldn’t take care of both kids a hundred percent of the time, with my usual
faculties. I was instructed by my physical therapist to not lift anything, especially the baby (who now
weighs a hefty 18.7 pounds at 6 months old). You can imagine how hard this was for me and her,
being attached at the hip almost every day. (She is a high-need baby.) When it came to nursing, the
only way to safely do so was to lie down on my side and nurse the baby that way, but everytime I’d
go on my side, my back would twitch in pain. I seriously had no comfort, whether I sat down or lay
down. It was awful!
———
I received an email from my friend Maricel during the middle of the week, which gave me much
comfort. She related the same kind of back problems that she used to have, and her empathy made
me feel a lot better. Part of her email mentioned taking a rest, catching up on reading and just really
slowing down and waiting for the healing to happen naturally, in time.
I back-read on some of the blogs I’d written in the past, like those about slow living and being less-
hurried. Of course, the posts spoke keenly to be because it was like the injury pulled the brakes on
my life, forcing me to just stop and be injured. What a weird thing to say, but it’s true: It’s like who I
was in that moment was saying to just “be” in this state of helplessness and dependence on my loved
ones and caregivers.
So that’s why I say it’s been a “back-braking” week.
As of this paragraph, I’m much better. It’s been almost two weeks since the stupid strained muscle
and nerve-pinching, and I am doing well. There is still a bit of back strain whenever I forget to stand
up for a time, which explains the short spurts that I’ve been writing this blog post! I also have to go
back to doing my back stretches to avoid sciatica, stretches that I’ve been lax about, hence, the injury.
(OK, ok, so the masseuse isn’t to blame for my out-of-shape #mombod. I have no excuse for it!)
Being injured and unable to do my usual tasks is always humbling. It was like a force beckoning me
“halt!” and step on my brakes abruptly. It wasn’t just about schedules being screwed up and
conveniently ordering take out. It was really a wake up call for several things, like slowing down (again,
forever!) and getting back in shape (mea culpa!). I’ve actually been tapering down on work and on-
location meetings in the city (too stressful to go through the traffic in Manila), but I realize that balance
with the working athome also needs some “braking,” some thoughtful “stops” to our current
methods. With every change that happens for the kids — Vito needing more attention in his
homeschooling (despite how intentionally relaxed we are about it), Krista needing more attention
now that she is on solids and starting to crawl —, changes also need to happen for Ton and me and
the way we work and run the household.
Braking, when it’s in a moving vehicle, prevents, safeguards, protects. I’m seeing the parallel in our
home and family and work life, too. My forced brake because of the back injury was protecting things
like our family dynamics, the quality of rest that I needed. Now that I’m out of that hellish pain, I can
look back at things with some kind of gratitude.
OK, now that I’m recovered, it’s time to get down to the real deal of strengthening my core again,
working on my exercises again, and adjusting to the pace of life right now. I’ve had time to think and
take stock. Now it’s time to live my next stage of normal.
Has an injury or illness ever forced you to “brake,” too? What insights did you have? Let’s talk about it
in the comments, maybe?
WORDS OF THE QUARTER
Emancity (noun) - fondness of buying things or desire to
spend money.
Assiduous (adj) – showing great care, attention and effort,
diligent
Paroxysm (noun) – a sudden explosion of emotion.
Zephyr (noun) – a breeze from the west; a gentle breeze
Defile (verb) – to make unclean or impure
Kismet (noun) – destiny; fate
Enigma (noun) – someone or something that is difficult to
explain.
Gnomic ( adj) – characterized by aphorism.
Prodigious (adj) – very impressive; amazing or wonderful.
Whinge (verb) – to complain fretfully.
Faze ( verb) – to disturb the composure of.
Totem (noun) – an object (such as an animal or plant) serving
as the emblem of a family or clan and often as a reminder of
its ancestry
QUOTES OF THE QUARTER
“ Only in the DARKNESS you are ABLE to see the STARS” –
Martin Luther King
“ You can not pull hair from the bald.” – Unknown
“ If you STUMBLE make it part of the DANCE.” – Elmer Sayson
“ Your body can stand almost anything. It’s your mind that
you have to convince.” – Unknown
“ Don’t let yesterday take up too much of today.” – Will
Rogers
“ It’s not what goes into your body that defiles you, you are
defiled by what comes from your heart.” –Mark 7:23
“ Behind every successful man there’s a lot of unsuccessful
years.” –Bob Brown
“ We’ll never see the best version of ourselves in our comfort
zone.”
“ Life has no CTRL+ Z.”
“ Even a log soaked in water will burn if place near a fire.”
“ It always seem impossible until it is done.” – Nelson Mandela
Flash Fiction & Creative Non Fiction
Flash Fiction
• refers to stories told using minimal number of words more
than or equal to six words but less than 500
• this genre may require the reader to put in details or elements
that the story leaves out
• this lesson contains a set of Filipino six-word stories and a
short-short story entitled "Gestures"
• sometimes called micro-fiction, short-short stories, sudden
fiction, postcard fiction.
Examples:
1. Gestures
2. Six-word story
Creative Non-fiction
• a branch of writing that employs the literacy techniques
usually associated with fiction or poetry to report on actual
person, places or events.
• the genre of non-fiction (literary non-fiction) includes travel
writing, nature writing, science sports writing, biography, auto
biography, memoir, the interview and both familiar and
personal essay.
Examples:
1. An American Childhood 4. Dokota: A Spiritual
2. The Genesee Diary Geography
3. The Wild Places 5. Wind, Sand, and Star
