I
read this interesting piece today about our National Hero. I never knew
he did some comics too. He created the first known Filipino comic strip.
Another reason to admire this guy. Thanks to blogger Dennis Villegas.
While
Rizal was staying with the Ullmer family in Wilhelmsfeld, he created a
comic strip called “The Two Brothers,”which he gave Friedrich "Fritz"
Ullmer as a gift. Fritz was the young son of his friend and host Pastor
Ullmer. These comic strips, along with several other drawings and
sketches done by Rizal during his stay with the Ullmers, are intact to
this day. The Ullmer descendants kept these precious mementoes and were
eventually discovered by Mrs. Paz Mendez (of the Jose Rizal National
Centennial Commission), while she was traveling to Germany to retrace
Rizal’s footsteps.
You can read the entire blog by clicking the link below.
I spend most of my time staying at our apartment's kitchen these days. That's where I can usually be found when I'm not at work. I'd be sitting there facing my laptop, tapping the keys when I'm writing something or chatting with people. Most of the time I can be seen watching clips on YouTube, where I find videos I refer to as precious gems. Below is just one of those that I found recently. Aside from the genre, and the late Amy Winehouse's voice giving life to it, its lyrics is beautifully honest. I've listened to different versions of it already.
Listen to this song and get addicted to Amy with me.
So I haven't posted anything here for months. I found something I like doing and it has been taking much of my time. It's a secret I might write about on my future posts. And yes that was an excuse. The real reason I disappeared was that I got lazy. I haven't even been sharing my thoughts on facebook which I used to do a lot. Is this a sign of aging? That must be it. I'm getting old.
So how have you guys been? Come here and have some coffee with me.
I just saw the official music video of the song "Call Me Maybe" by Carly
Rae Jepsen and I found myself not liking it so much. Yeah the guy was
cute but the concept wasn't original. It reminded me of this 1995 music
video of a French singer named Zazie, which I discovered a couple of
years ago. This still remains to be one of my favorite clips on YouTube:
I haven't heard of Frank Ocean before the news of his coming out last week. All I knew was that he did it through Tumblr. Since he was unknown to me, then, I ignored the links and updates about him even if they seemed to be on all of the blogs I visit frequently, and on my Facebook feed.
A couple of hours ago, since I got nothing better to do, I checked one of the links about him just to finally know what made this guy's coming out so special. I got my answer after one of the links led me to his Tumblr page. And suddenly it felt as if this guy has been a long- time friend who wrote to me. It was a post entitled “Thank You’s.” A note so familiar, that I involuntarily made a short pause after reading it. It’s the kind of thing I usually do after realizing that finally, there’s another human being who felt exactly what I did. A great part of its contents was composed of happy and painful thoughts the younger me used to have. It’s sad and beautiful at the same time. Just what I’ve always thought this life has been, for me, at least.
Here’s the post that made me an instant fan of this guy:
It's been more than six years since I last wrote a poem. The life I found as an adult in the big city, the new people I met, and the internet came into my life and, it's as if I have forgotten the art that has been my companion growing up. It saddened me to realize this, especially knowing how much poetry, as a form of expression has helped me survive the most difficult times of my life as a teenager. Good thing I got to reunite with Athena Garcia and Rey Carlo Sajulan, two of those people whose mere presence, not to mention, poems. reminded me of what it is that I lost and that I have to regain.
Here's a poem I wrote recently as an attempt to resurrect the little god in me by creating a little world, through the power of words and imagination.
Poetry and I
When I think of poetry, I think of a precious gem, Teasing me from a place so high and too far for me to reach. It's an uphill climb, A foggy mountain top Which chokes me as I raise a foot And move towards it. Veins in my eyes get visibly bold, Glowing like neon lights in downtown whorehouses And on otherwise dark alleys with dancing and flying candy wrappers, Flattened cigarette butts, Corners that reek of the smell of old and dried urine. Places, I think, you'd cringe even at the thought of visiting alone. And those veins, they're lights that grow bigger and bigger And then burst. Blood splatters And flow like lava from the angry volcanoes which are my eyes, I'm blinded. I can't see my paper Nor feel the presence of my pen.
It's an uphill climb Every word, seems to give more strength To that hand that pulls me down Tightens it's grip in every attempt to conceive A line that contains both truth and beauty at the same time. I haven't gone that far 'Cause I am being pulled down. My own shadow, my past, pulling me down As if preparing me to drown And die from that quicksand below Where my doubts, my feeling of hatred towards myself Are calling me, asking me Begging me to join them in their misery After I buried them deep on the ground Not too long ago.
Quicksand, tomb of my past. It's filled with thumb- sucking, jackstones, magazines under the bed, used rubbers, Crucifixes hidden in the drawer, dusty, untouched rosaries, dried tears on my pillows Forming dead shadows of that world that exists only in my dreams.
I am being pulled down, blinded and out of breath My hands, shaking My feet, groping the floor for the pen And where it went, after it fell, I don't, anymore, know
So here I am together with the sound of the crickets And spirits that watch me from afar Making sounds that seem to celebrate my failure Snickering at the thought that the art of poetry Remains distant to me. I give up. I can't touch it. It's a mountain I can't climb.
I joined a singing contest for the first time, in third grade, with my Kuya Angelo. It was in 1993, a year when almost every girl was taught to sing a Whitney Houston song. I was a boy, but that didn't stop me from having my mom teach me Whitney Houston's "Run to You." It was not an easy song to sing, I tell you. Wait, I don't have to tell you, at all.
It's just that I was an ambitious little girl --I mean-- boy, so I chose it, 'though just a few hours before the contest began I chose another song, instead. I remember the reason for the change was the "Ooohoooh" part which made me sound as if I was having an early puberty. My problem would have been solved if not fot the medley part of the contest. And in the medley, I had to sing the dreaded "Ooohooh" of Whitney's song. The rest is history. Don't ask me what happened, when I finally sang it.
That was in 19 years ago. The adults at that time were amused at the thought that it seemed all their children wanted to be Whitney Houston. I'm sure many of those children being referred to are feeling a certain loss now. I do. I was one of them.
Whitney Houston's career went downhill in the 2000s. She lost her singing voice and it seemed everything we heard from her were, if not about her drug addiction or her relationship with then- husband Bobby Brown, it was her failed attempts to make a comeback, due to the voice which has obviously deteriorated. Now that she's gone, these are not the things I'll remember when I think of her.
I'll remember that beautiful woman who touched my young heart with the greatness of her voice. And the things I learned from her, especially the way she expressed emotions when conveying the message of a song she's interpreting, will always remain with me.
Here I am again, playing with fire as if my wings were never burnt before; and chasing after dreams that are as fragile as bubbles in the air. Will I ever learn? I don't know. It's just that there's something about the roller coaster of emotions they bring; the moaning, groaning, screaming and the feeling of pain I get once I hit the ground after the fall, that makes me feel more alive; and that makes me clearly see the beauty of these genuinely valuable things I fail to, at least, acknowledge, most of the time.
