Summer Reminiscence

For some, besides Christmas, summer is the best time of the year to meet up with old friends, to travel, to learn new skills, to complete unfinished projects and to do business.

Now that summer for me has become a time to laze around and listen to good music, I couldn’t help but remember the summer days of my childhood. I used to play bay-bay, shato and gira-gira with my boy neighbors. I also climbed trees. There were countless games that children play during my time (kids before were so ingenious) but I settled for the more familiar and sensible games.

Sustaining Heritage: A Glimpse Into the BACH CODE

An hour late, a robust discussion was already ongoing inside the Garcia Hall of the Provincial Capitol when I arrived. It is an informal consultative meeting on the proposed tourism code attended by women and men from different sectors passionate with sustainable development; a loose group with an open membership for all interested which now is dubbed the Bohol Advocates for Sustainable Tourism.

The Music that is Loboc

The pale moon serene on a still night is unmoved by the glare of neon lights that greet our entry to Loboc. Its quiet glow foretells nothing of what awaits us in this province’s most musical town.

A crowd of the seemingly curious already milled outside the Loboc Children’s Theater as Sonieta and her kids, Paul, and I wormed our way to the entrance. The sight that greets our entry is that of over forty kids filling the theater stage each holding a musical instrument that to some looked too big for their size.

Buwad, Ginamos, and the Filipino

They’re mainstays in the typical Filipino diet, along with rice, and are bound to be among the top three things most overseas Pinoys miss when they think of home. They come in many varieties and preparations and are savored in every household of our archipelago from Batanes to Sulu, Siargao to Palawan.

Ang Pusó Mo!

The Philippine countryside is crammed with coconut trees. Even our neighborhood, Katugasan, which is so named because tugas (molave) used to be thick in the area, is overrun with towering coconut trees. Of course, we don’t bewail this fact.

Eskrima: More than just sticks

It is said that concealed in the absolute darkness of moonless nights, with only the bright, red, glowing embers of the tips of their sticks as signs of animation, they would practice and pass on their arcane skill in an esoteric art. But only to those who they deemed worthy to learn.

Law-uy sa Ting-uwan

My lola has rain-sense.

Or weather sense, for that matter. Like every farmer who has acquired clairvoyance to everything related to the earth and their crops.

Sun-kissed!

Summer 1990. The whole family would pile up in a tricycle and head towards Kainggit Beach. As soon as we’d enter the Kainggit Drive, and then the glistening blue waters would come into view, all the kids would point at it giddily: Ang dagat! Naa na ang dagat!

My Sweet Fiesta Platter

Fiesta last year, I was treated with some of the most delectable, calorific fiesta dishes ever – over the phone. For the first time, I wasn’t home during fiesta and I had to content myself with hearing our family’s fiesta menu that 1st of May while I was moping around an overcrowded waterfall resort in Laguna. My over-the-cellphone lunch: lechon baboy (ribs only please), dinuguan (sour and spicy, just the way I like it), inatayan, embutido, humba, carabeef steak (Filipino style), lumpia, meatballs and some other lip-greasing dishes. My sister, on the other line, was about to hang up after doing her deed when I opposed: hey, how about, dessert?