It's Binirayan time!

Buri hat from Cadahug, Lauaan, Antique

At about this time of the year, our office is bustling with activity and every available space is littered with posters, brochures, costumes, souvenirs, knick-knacks, event proposals, etc. It means only one thing: It's Binirayan time!

Binirayan Festival 2008 is here again. It will officially open on April 13, with the showcases of young theater artists from Bacolod, Iloilo, Capiz, and Antique. The regional Kampo Kabataan 2008, a summer theater arts camp to be held at Madrangca, San Jose closes on that day, giving the Binirayan launch a regional flavor. The EBJ Freedom Park will witness presentations by these young performers, ending with a party with the San Jose's S.O.S. (Satisfy Our Soul) band. Guests of honor are Governor Sally Perez and National Youth Commissioner Raul Dominic I. Badilla.

Other activities in Binirayan are the Cultural Caravan in Barbaza on April 16, Search for Mr. Antique 2008 on April 18, Senior Citizens Night in Patnongon on April 19, Lin-ay kang Antique Talents Night in Bugasong on April 20, Children's Festival in Hamtic on April 21, Komedya Valderrama at EBJ Freedom Park on April 22, Lin-ay kang Antique prejudging in Pandan on April 23, Pasundayag Expo & Food Fest opening on April 24, and the three-day highlights on the 25th to 27th.

April 25
Biray kang Barangay from Pantalan to Malandog Beach

Lin-ay kang Antique press presentation
Torch Parade from Malandog to San Jose
Bugal kang Antique Awards
Fireworks Display

April 26
Binirayan Confab at The Pinnacle Suites
Dog Show by Antique Kennel Club
Search for Lin-ay kang Antique 2008 Coronation Night

April 27
Parada kang Lahi
Malay-Ati Competition
LGU & Employees Fashion Show
Fireworks Display

Visit Antique in Binirayan. For inquiries, email birayfest@yahoo.com.ph, or call 036-5407343 or 09275830174. Kruhay!

Goodbye, Sid

Sid Gomez Hildawa, 1962 - 2008

I woke up at 4:00 a.m. today, and found two text messages bearing the same sad news. One from Roel Hoang Manipon, the other an unknown number. Our friend Sid Hildawa is dead.

I could not go back to sleep. It's two more hours before my regular walking schedule, so I tried to pass the news to other friends.

Sid was an architect, painter, and poet. I have always admired his dedication to art. Last week, I learned from Elvert Bañares that he was sick. I tried to contact him but he could not be reached. He must be at the hospital, recuperating. But today I got the news he has passed away. I learned from another blog he died of typhoid and dengue.

My first encounter with Sid Hildawa was at his exhibit at the old Ayala Museum many, many years back. I did not know him. He did not know me. His show was just right after the Tiananmen massacre, and his works looked to me like enlarged graphing paper painted over thinly by white, so that one could barely see the drawings underneath.

His second show that I went to was the ode to Mona Lisa at the CCP. It was his statement on the duplicity of art offered by the xerox technology, so that even Da Vinci's obra is no longer safe from reproduction/modification. To a probinsiyano like me getting an introduction to Manila's post-modernism, the huge artwork looked like a giant gift-wrapper. I would learn later that Sid had been given a 13 artists award.

As artist, Sid was indeed way ahead of me, or of the many.

I first met him at an NCCA meeting for the National Committee for Museums and Galleries (NCMG). That was around 1991 or 1992, when I was still with Nayong Pilipino. I admit (as I have admitted to him) I had a crush on him. He had a religious aura then. He was wearing a white shirt and looked like a seminarian. Precious Leaño introduced me to him, but I knew he would forget me just as soon as the meeting started.

In 1995, Sid and I met again at the 2nd Iligan National Writers Workshop. Our friendship started there. We worked out together at a nearby gym. At the workshop he became a hit with his "Wind)ow to the wind" poem. But in a trip to Marawi, all of us fellows discovered something about Sid. He snored. And how he snored. No wonder his roommate Roel Hoang Manipon preferred to stay out late at night to early morning in Iligan. Where we spent the night at Mindanao State University, no one wanted to sleep beside him. Good thing he had such good humor to accept all the ribbing.

After that workshop, Sid came up with a publication called "3ng" an anthology of poems and artworks in limited edition. We had to submit 30 copies of our work and he bound them. We had a launch at Penguin Cafe in Malate. Later, that same year (1996?) we would both find ourselves teaching part-time at the Philippine Women University. He taught painting; I taught Theater Arts.

Then he seriously pursued literature by taking an MFA in creative writing at DLSU. He would always text everyone whenever he had a poem published in Sunday Inquirer, Starweek, or any publication. He would invite everyone to a poetry reading he was in. He won his first Palanca with his play "Heartbreak Motel," and later for his poetry.

He visited me in Antique in 1999, when I organized the Antique Arts Festival. Came back again for Binirayan two years ago. He was here last year at about this time to monitor our museum project for the NCCA. Sid and I had nurtured a friendship that was genuine enough to bridge our distance from each other. Our text messages to each other were sparse, our meetings rarer, but we knew we have a friend in each other everytime we would meet and hug, or exchange news about each other in his office at the CCP.

This morning after I received the message from Roel and I couldn't go back to sleep, I took out the book "What the Water Said," which he gave me on September 3, 2004. He wrote on the frontispiece: "To Alex, from many waves ago till now, Sid." I used to kid him that the book's title must be "What the waiter said," referring to our private jokes about attractive waiters whenever we had a chance to go out for dinner together.

In "Cleaning" he wrote: "age is determined by one's/surrender to soil." But I am sure Sid did not surrender, because all his life he was defining his own space. In "God explains space to His angels" he said:

"....Space is the disposable
furniture of a mind
enmeshed in its own
metaphors, brandishing
a meter stick under
our immeasurable
sky.

You'll need wings."

By now I am sure Sid has his wings.

I will surely miss you, my friend.

An Orange Evening

It was another of those long meetings, where you keep going back to the buffet for coffee. But this time it was in Bacolod. The evening was more than gratifying though.

After the meeting, we were invited to Manny Montelibano's exhibit at Orange Gallery, owned by one of Bacolod's pride Charlie Co. We were told Charlie himself would be there to entertain us. I met Charlie at the Philip Morris Art Awards last year; he gladly posed for my photo collection of local artists, which I show to my Humanities class. I also have a good collection of pics of his works - the Madonna series in the collection of Tita Inday Pefianco, who was herself a very gracious host to us when we visited Bacolod in October 2007.

But this was Manny's show, not Charlie's. Manny is a multi-media artist, and he sits in the Committee for Visual Arts, representing West Visayas. I sit in Cultural Education, and that was an inter-committee regional meeting, another innovation at the NCCA. That's how I got to his show.

The show was titled "Poasa" (Fast). The gallery facade greeted us with a cross made of incandescent bulbs and a smiley. Initially I wondered if we were being brought to the Victory Christian Fellowship prayer meeting. But I have been to the Orange Gallery before, so I was sure this was the place, at the second floor.

At the entrance we were greeted by the tarpauline poster showing the cross outside, so I was assured I was not lost. The second floor gallery was fully carpeted in red, with matching red curtains. The hall was a shower of "Dear God" letters written by kids on intermediate paper. The visual was stunning: white paper swaying on strings from the ceiling against a background of red. One had to go through the delicate maze of prayers, and that alone was a spiritual experience.

The upper gallery was a video installation. The main video showed the Santo Intierro, and devotees trying to reach the glass case, wiping ther white handkerchiefs as an expression of faith, but foregrounding the main video screen were smaller screens showing various scenes of gospel sharing by various religious sects. We didn't hear what they were saying, but they were very distracting. At first there seems to be no connection at all between the lower and upper galleries, except that the video screens were also predominantly red, and white paper were scattered on the floor. The upper gallery, however, was enveloped by darkness, unlike the lower's deep red.

Manny Montelibano's "Poasa" is a pun on the words Po, a Tagalog expression of respect or reverence, and Asa (hope). The artist challenges one's faith (prayers, Santo Intierro) against popular icons - the smiley, the preachers on TV, the cross as a Broadway marquee. The skeptic might ask, where do these prayers go? Who would read them? But the devout would not be bothered, because between them and their god, they know there is no difference between the white paper pads and the white handkerchiefs, for it is in their act of faith (writing the letter, wiping the Santo Intierro) that they are healed.

The better part of that evening was meeting Bacolod's artists Charlie Co and Dennis Ascalon. Both artists are exhibited at the Singapore Art Museum. In fact, SAM curator Joyce Toh flew in that day just to - according to Dennis - "check how we are doing." Also present that night aside from Manny, Charlie, and Dennis were Milton Dionzon, actor, artist, event organizer, etc., Aklanon writer and post-modernist/post-colonial critic John Barrios, and Florence-based Wena Diaz. Poet Ricky De Ungria was there ahead of us for dinner, but he left earlier.

Manny took us back to our hotel at past midnight. He was asking if we wanted to be anywhere else in Bacolod that night, but I thought his show and meeting so many creative people were enough to call a day.

(Photos from top to bottom: Charlie Co's Chinese Madonna (Inday Pefianco's Collection), Manny Montelibano's "Poasa", John Barrios reading through prayers; Milton Dionzon, Charlie Co, Singapore Art Museum curator Joyce Toh, Manny Montelibano, and Wena Diaz at the gallery for a funshot; Dennis Ascalon posing solo for my collection.)

Lola Masing musical

A group of Japanese activists and theater artists are producing a musical on Lola Masing, the comfort woman from Antique. Rie Arima, lead actress, visited the Lola Masing Center for Culture and Peace at the Museo Antiqueño and other sites relevant to Lola Masing's life, including my ancestor's house along Gobierno Street, believed to have been used as a Japanese headquarter during the WWII.

Susan Macabuag of the Asia Women's Rights Center-Malaya Lolas, our partner in putting up the Lola Masing Center last year (hey, there's a story on this at the Inquirer of March 8, 2008), who accompanied Rie Arima in this trip to Antique, the Lola Masing musical will be a big production in Japan, with three separate productions in Tokyo and two other cities, and each production having a cast of hundreds! Lola Masing is a star in Japan, actually. It seems the Japanese activists are using the Lola Masing platform to advance their cause for charter change, so that the Japanese government would acknowledge war crimes. I'll have to get more details on this production, and I hope we get to see it too, even from DVD.

In photo is Rie Arima, who is playing Lola Masing. She dropped by my office, although we did not meet because I was in Manila at the time of her visit, and left for me a t-shirt of the Lola Masing musical. The sewing machine (Lola Masing was a seamstress), was used as the central metaphor, which brings in a lot of texture in the play: Lola Masing sewing together pieces of her life, as she tells her story as comfort woman, and ironically, the machine as the mechanical metaphor of invasion and oppression experienced by Lola Masing.

Thanks for the t-shirt, Rie. How flattering that you would think I would fit in an XS size! Will raffle this off to the staff on Christmas, if I don't shrink at all.

Massacre, assassination & gout

Nine days in Manila (Quezon City and later Pasay, actually but they're all Manila to me) was an awful lot of time to be away from home. I attended the Komedya conference at the UP Diliman, and later moved to the Orchid Garden Suites along Vito Cruz for a three-day marathon planning meeting for the National Committee on Cultural Education.

But I will not talk here about the conference and the meetings. I would rather talk about the extra-curricular activities. They were much more fun.

Orosman at Zafira

At the UP Diliman, we had a chance to watch the hit dance-drama Orosman & Zafira by Dulaang UP. It was my second time to watch the play, so I knew more or less what to expect, and I was prepared to sit through more than two hours of excitment going on stage.

The first time I watched was on February 17, when I took some of my cast of the Komedya to an exposure of sorts. Afterall, we don't get to watch a play like this in Antique. Cris Villongco was playing Zafira then. On February 28, it was Maita Ponce. I must say the latter was the better actress. Or maybe because I was seated in the rear the first time I watched, that I could hardly feel Cris's intensity. The second time I was in the third row, giving me a good view of the actors. Or maybe I was more aware of Cris Villongco as the singer, so it was a different view altogether.

"Orosman and Zafira" is world-class Filipino production. The Wilfrido Ma. Guerrero stage, however, was quite small for such a spectacle. I wish they would have a rerun at the CCP or a bigger venue. Dexter Santos's choreography was so intense, without let up the moment the play opened until the climax. It was a very demanding play, that at some point I wished there was respite from all the movements and massacre. Or maybe that was the whole point of the play. Pinikpikan's live music added to the overpowering energy that filled the venue.

Evelio Javier at the CCP

I paid hard money to watch this play. I could have used my CCP connection, but I did not bother because I was to watch a musical on Evelio Javier. I did not regret it. Not that the musical was something to rave. It did not give me the kind of lift from "Orosman and Zafira". I was only too happy to hear Kinaray-a spoken by actors in the first part of the play, and Antique mentioned several times (of course!). If only for that, I could have gone home happy.

The play, which purports to be a rock musical (although 'musical' would be enough) was a parrallel play on two lives: governor Evelio Javier of Antique, who was assassinated at the provincial park in Antique on February 11, 1986, and the militant leader Edgar Jopson (Edjop), who was killed during a military raid in Davao on September 20, 1982.

There was no interface between Evelio and Edjop's lives, thus the device that the two met in heaven, or wherever assassinated political leaders go, engaged in a debate (rather small talk) on the opposite approaches they took as political leaders. The play also banked on the two's being Atenista as a unifying thread. The use of Jun Yango's character hovering around in all scenes also helped in stitching the two narratives, but this poetic character's production numbers however were wacky scene stealers, and undoubtedly took the limelight from both protagonists. His scenes as Ferdinand Marcos tied to a chandelier of dextrose, and as the trigger-happy general alluding to Fabian Ver were the most remembered.

Edjop's scenes were more visually exciting than Evelio's. The China sojourn scene, for example was very witty, not to mention the striking sea of red in the background, and the interrogation scene was hauntingly disturbing. But Evelio's scenes were rather contrived, except for that Kinaray-a scene about the sakadas and that scene where Evelio and Precious walk on benches, creating a very rustic scene in the imagination. I wished that the Binirayan scene was more "maximized" instead of the caricature with the white paper fans, which to me trivialized Evelio's brainchild. Enamored with the Binirayan as a kid, and having listened to Beloy's Binirayan speeches, I must say that the Binirayan says all of Evelio's vision.

As for the music, I am not very keen on the music of the Dawn to really say that it has captured the (musical) texture of both lives, except that when they sang "Salamat" my mind automatically volunteered San Miguel Beer.

Like all plays, though, we see only what their playwrights and directors have envisioned for us. "EJ" was a very entertaining play, but maybe a play on Evelio (and similarly on Edjop) is yet to be written and staged.

The Kite Runner

I had a bout with gout. Thanks to the hotel's airconditioning and the fatty foods (which I did not resist) served at conferences and meeting. So I had to ask my friend Insoy to join me at Robinsons Ermita. I wanted to have lunch at Penang Hill, because I felt a little nostalgic. Actually the choices were Secret Recipe, Old Spaghetti House, and Penang Hill. But I figured that Secret Recipe's to die for lamb stew would only make my pain twice unbearable, and Old Spaghetti House was Insoy's nostalgic place, and since I am footing the bill I must have the privilege to feed my nostalgia.

Penang Hill, of course, is none other than Bukit Bendera in Penang, where Eduard and I had a wonderful stroll in 2006. (Read my poem "Bukit Bendera" dedicated to him). It's also a restaurant serving Malay, Thai, and Asian fusion cuisine. We had Hainanese (Singapore) chicken (Insoy has a secret fixation with Singapore), Indian rice (we had a little argument on the spices), and oyster omelet (my favorite hawker's food at Chulia St.), which were very close to authentic. It had to be a long dinner, while waiting for the painkillers to take effect. The Penang Shake (cucumber with lemon) was also very refreshing.

After the late lunch-early dinner, I managed to amble down to Cinema 3 to watch "The Kite Runner." This Asian film capped that Asian dinner. It's about a boy who witnessed the rape of his best friend (who would later turn out to be his half brother), and faced his own guilt by pushing away the best friend. I think there are enough reviews of this film, and I suggest you read them. I like the film very much, if you ask me. But I will not waste my time reviewing it here.

After watching this film, I bought two bibingkas from Bibingka House (one salted egg - oh the gout - and one cheese), and went back to Orchid Garden Suites. I switched on the Asian Food Channel, and watched Riyusi Rusi (the feature was on Chang Mai), and another feature on Scandinavian food (roast breast of duck with artichokes and garlic mayonnaise). Yumyum.

I slept dreaming of home. The next day, the gout was gone.

(Photo credits: www.gibbscadiz.blogspot.com for Orosman & Zafira, Tanghalang Pilipino website for EJ, and wikipedia for The Kite Runner poster.)