Hun 22, 2004

Cradles

Supposedly, a rest day. Took the chance to haunt a cat show, a championship round. I ran my fingers through the cream fur of a Persian longhair in the uncrowded end of a line.

Merchandise greeted the spectator: cat-food, shampoos, soft stuffs, key chains, attention-testing feathers, and other nick-knacks. About a hundred cats sat still in their cages. People noisily cramped and pointed where the big, pretty longhairs stayed. They ignored the less spectacular wirehairs and tabbies. Within the grid of cages, you could see a motley swirl of yellow, cinnamon, black, and sienna, hues of gray and white. Tried to catch the cats' eyes, but could only do so with difficulty; the cats kept these to themselves, maybe guarding a final secret from the ubiquitous fluorescent lights, pervasive air-conditioning, the adoration of humans.

My own eye roved, but occasionally it rested on a sphynx somewhere in the inaccessible center. She sat quite erect—how Egyptian of her—the grays and pinks of her body, I know, repelling most gazes successfully. She is the only sphynx present, a breed I know as the test of either an extreme catholicity or utter peculiarity of a cat-lover's love. See, her nigh-hairless skin arrayed her like the wrinkled young of rodents, sinewy albinos, rejects. Whoever loves her either embraced all cats or allowed no other.

The main judge was a fifty-something lady we'll call the Brit. She looks and sounds British, but who can be sure. What did the people think of her fashion, her all-black attire topped with leopard spots? Kitschy or apropos? I found her face appalling, and maybe most of the other lovers did too. Let me explain.

See, this was how she passed judgement. A Filipina assistant with thick make-up on her face would take a cat off the cage and put her on a small monobloc table that another, rather well-built Filipino assistant moved along as the Brit went from one cage to another. The assistants were in whites. The Filipina also wore a green apron with pockets for certain paraphernalia: a sprayer, a long feather, other things. The Brit sprayed her hands before she lifted a cat and stretched her out (all the cats were pliant, entirely domesticated, no struggle whatsoever). She frequently mumbled something to the Filipina who always replied by nodding knowingly. The Filipino tried not to look too jaded, but the expression on his face would often betray him. The Filipina annoyed me because she always managed to shield the cat from my view with her nondescript back (the dimensions of which I somehow committed to memory as one does a pop song that would later block all efforts to remember a beautiful tune). Truth be told, her back seemed just fine, shapely actually, but I also despised it for what it failed to conceal—the face of the Brit. Now, the Brit's face fell into an open-mouthed grimace whenever she examined, as if the study of beauty imposed an immense burden on the truly 'well-bred'.

Maybe that face was nothing more than the Brit's natural scrutinizing expression. How I wished she kept it to herself, or that the Filipina kept it from me.

I also much desired to see the feline eyes, the fur off them. Were the fuse accessible, I'd have shorted it to allow for the warm darkness where the glow of their eyes would be all.

I visited on the way to the second week of my second school year. I took a front seat on the commuter van to have a better view of rain, windows, lights, and rhythmic wipers. Thoughts fell on fur in those blanks between naps and the composition of lessons. I was uncomfortable. At first, I didn't know why I tried so hard to remember everything I saw. Near the end of my trip, I understood how it wasn't spectacle but absence that disturbed me.

Two hours among hundreds of cats and not a single meow. Not even a purr.

Hun 12, 2004

Mapalad ang mga makalimutin: sapagkat nalalagpasan din nila ang kanilang mga katangahan.

Friedrich Nietzsche


Sipi Bago Mag-Lunes

Pumisat ako ng ipis bago ko sinimulan ang siping ito. Siguro kaya ko pinatay kasi inggit ako sa kanya. Mabubuhay siya sa kabila ng nukleyar na digma, ayon sa mga siyentipiko. Iyan lang ang maisusulat ko tungkol sa araw na ito na Araw ng Kasarinlan.

O Kalayaan. Para sa akin, ang araw na ito ay ekstensyon at rurok ng isang mahabang preambulo bago ang unang araw ko ng pagtuturo sa Lunes. Oo, pang-apat na unang araw ko na ito. Ngunit marami pa rin akong mga nagsisirkong saloobin at kumakalabog na ideya. Siguro walang ibang paraan para sa akin na magsimula ng isang semestre. Sabi ng kapatid ko, ikatlong tao na raw akong kakilala niya na adik sa pagtuturo.

Ang totoo riyan, kinakatakot at kinamumuhian ko ang araw na magsisimula ako ng semestre na walang kabog sa dibdib. Palagay ko kapag nangyari iyon, umpisa na ng katapusan ko bilang guro. Kung hindi pa siguro bilang tao. Huwag sana akong madatnang buhay ng araw na iyon! Kaya naman kahit papaano, may saya ako sa aking pagkabagabag. At natutuwa akong kada semestre, iba ang aking kinakanerbyusan.

Gayumpaman, kailangan kong lagpasan ang ganitong malalimang kati. Kaya tuloy maligaya ako sa mga nangyari kahapon. Hayaang ipaliwanag ko ang biglang pagbaling sa kahapon gayong paharap na nga ang inestablisang oryentasyon. Maraming magandang nangyari kahapon sa Diliman. Marami rin akong magandang nakasalubong at nakasalamuha, ngunit ang ilang pangyayari lamang ang tututukan ko. Baka kasi magreklamo ang mga taong mapapapangit lamang ng anumang kaugnayan sa akin.

Ilang kabanata pa lamang ng librong Bukod na Bukod ni Isagani Cruz ang aking nababasa pero ipinangangalandakan ko na ito sa halos lahat ng makasalubong ko. Sa wakas, isang kritika tungkol sa kritika na sang-ayon sa sarili kong tibok! Sa librong ito, nagtatatag ng panibago at pasulong na muhon si Cruz sa larangan ng kritikang pampanitikan sa Pilipinas. MakaPilipino at Makatao ang pagkakahilig ng gawa, pinagmamalaki ni Cruz. Wala na raw siyang paki sa mga MakaKano at makahayop na oryentasyon.

Ibinida ko ang libro maging sa aking Propesor, ang tagapayo ko sa aking undergrad tesis. Ngunit hindi lamang iyon ang aming napag-usapan. Idinulog ko rin sa kanya ang aking mga pangarap para sa klase (natalakay ang ilan sa nakaraaang entri). Ibinigay niya sa akin ang kanyang payo. Malugod ko itong tinanggap at itinapat sa mga estilo ng ibang gurong kasabayan niya, nagturo sa akin, at mga nabasa namin. Dumalo siya sa aking ehersisyo sa kabila ng kanyang maraming ginagawa at nagalak naman ako.

Kinumusta niya ang pag-usad sa postgrad. Sabi ko ngang tinatrabaho ko ang larangan ng epiko. Siyam na lang ang natitira kong yunit at pinagsabay-sabay ngayon para komprehensibong eksamen ang matitira sa susunod na semestre. Hindi ko pa nagagawang magsiyam. Paanim-anim lang ako dahil sa byahe. Ngunit palagay ko, dapat kong pangunahan ang aking inip. Sapat na sa kabanatang ito ang tatlong taon sa aking palagay. Bahala na kako. Labinglima pa rin ang yunit ko sa Los Banos.

Sinabi ko namang naintriga ako sa kanyang salin sa God of Small Things ni Arundhati Roy. Babalik akong may ipapapirmang kopya, sabi ko. Tinalakay namin si Roy, ang kanyang pahayag hinggil sa Iraq, at syempre ang hirap na dinaanan ng Propesor sa pagbuno sa tila simple ngunit malalim na kasalimuotan ng wika ni Roy.

Sa kurso ng pag-uusap, nadaanan ang ideyang pag-aralan ko at gawan ng artikulo ang salin. Mahabang panahon ang kailangan ko para mabuo ito dahil nga sa tinatapos kong pag-aaral. Kapag nagkataon, handog ko sa aking ina ang unang postgrad. Sa Propesor naman, ang anumang isulat ko tungkol sa kanyang trabaho, una na itong salin. Sa larangan ng pagsasalin ang gawang ito, akademiko ngunit malamang na nasa labas ng aking kurso sa Sentrong Asyano.

Namaalam ako, nangakong ipagpatuloy ang ugnayan. Napuno na naman ako ng maraming ideya, isasaalang-alang, at alanganin. Ngunit, sa halip na lalong bumigat ang munti kong daigdig, mas gumaan. Malakas at malusog pa rin ang tibok, pero mas kampante, mas may ritmo.

Pagkaraan nito, nakasalamuha ko ang ilan pang magagandang tao, mga kaibigan sa loob at labas ng tatlong kwarto sa Bulwagang Rizal. Naghapunan ako sa Katipunan kasama ang dalawa sa kanila, tinalakay ang mga subtitle ng pagkain, tinaasan ng kilay ang eksibisyon ng matulaing dugo at basag na lampshade, at minwestra ang mga bagay na 'groovy' at 'cool'. Makalipas nito, sinalubong ko ang nagliliwaliw na mag-anak sa Makati.

Hun 10, 2004

I have discovered that I cannot burn the candle at one end and write a book with the other.

Katherine Mansfield
Diary entry
June 10, 1919


DRAINPIPE DREAMS
Or, How PoMoPrometheus Rodinthinks on Coming Classes While Waiting for Bigbreakfast



1 Convoluted Can-openers

Ma shook me from the formulation of next semester's writing class to open a couple of cornedbeefcans for the bigbreakfast. While I sped through them with the opener, I remember the more complex can-opener that I broke to pieces last month. I didn't do that on purpose, mind you. I might as well have though; it bugged the hell out of me. Nice, sharp discs and some well-placed spokes and gears. And the damned thing breaks down at the instant of my grip. Pinions loosed. Down discs, down gears! Something so sophisticated yet inutile!

It reminds me of me, a goodfornothing, intricately convoluted head. I can't say there's supposed to be pride in all this muddle. 'Intricate' and 'convoluted' just fancyterms confusion, addleheadedness, scatterbrainedeadness. It sounds more sophisticated, that's true. Pretty at times, well, pretty if you can consider the network of Les Miserables sewers lovely.

Useless, really. Oh, and I can't even open a can with a knife. Actually, I can, but not in the usual, smooth way most other people do it. I pound the forsaken knife in, round every inch of the way. Thank goodness for this simple blade and lever construction Ma handed me. I consider it somewhat like a kiddie bike with those two wheels on the side so you can get from pt.A to pt.B without falling over.

It got those cans open, didn't it? Why mull over the more complicated construction or the simpler one, neither of which helped the cause of bigbreakfast at the moment? One way's as good as the other, you might dismiss. That's true too, with them clearriverrunsthroughit minds. I admire them minds too, happyhappyjoyjoy binaryoppositionary AisnotBneitherisC systems. Still, I don't have the luxury of fantasizing; I must work with what I have. All I've got are these ratfecesinfestedpipeshit for brains. And I have another semester to teach! Oh boy.

Let me spill what I'm going through right now.


2 On Contradiction

I'm not your usual progressive thinker.

Hell, most other progressives will disown me if I were an ounce worth disowning! I don't have that ounce so I'll drop 'progressive'. Out with 'thinker' too, just in case it's in the way. I'm not 'your' anything unless you want me to (and I can't go around assuming you want me to be anything, can I?), so I'll trim that off as well. How do we begin then?

I'm not usual.

For me, later does not mean better. Everyday in every way, it's getting better and better, they croon to the next generation of beautifulbeautifulbeautifulbeautiful boys. These things have to be said, I know, expressions of faith in hope. However, when I'm downdirty trying to begin something, such tidbits of autosuggestivedeceit won't cut it.

Whatever doesn't kill me makes me stronger, hesaid, and I profess belief. Although stronger doesn't always mean better, I respond, trying my best to unlearn him. The next semester will not necessarily be a better sem. At least, it won't be, just because it's the 'next'. And I can't make it any good with merely the plain belief that it will be.

I won't necessarily be a better teacher. They're a differentriver, and I'm a differentriver. And you can't predict the sameriver on the basis of two differentrivers converging. Still I must take stock and make measures. Movement is the only way to articulate hope.

Hope belongs to the realm of the future, and a friend of Lu Hsun told him that one cannot ever contradict hope. It is impossible to refute something that hasn't happened yet. It makes sense too, I figure. In my narrowview, if you can still contradict anything at the moment, then there are still remaining possibilities. In those spaces, one can find hope. Or generate it.


3 Desktop Deserts

I smell the mightymeaty bigbreakfast coming; I wonder how this outpouring will churn out with such wonderful morning odors and themusicwhodied's Imagine demanding my senses. To focus, I must digress from the sensual to the sensible (for now). The desk is a dangerous place from which to view the world, another hesaid. Was that 'a dangerous' or 'the most dangerous'?

Well, from this desk in Makati, I view their Los Banos desks as these would appear on Monday and hence. What do I see? Danger, naturally. One cannot expect much from desks rooted to the establishment, eh? Someone with desktop visions out front, now there oughtta be some friction, right? Not when the desktop visionary will keep everything on the surface of immobile desks. Then, there'd only be entertainment.

This is a case among my cases. I desire for the first module of my writing class a discourse on space (time would come second, and I might share this later). I went wild first, letting ideas and selections swim their way into a tumormass that's been clogging my system since Monday.

I dream of teaching stories of Borgesian infinite and Calvinoesque infinitesimal space. The guiding principle would be a space as labyrinth and combinatoria as language. Something like this would pique hmmminteresting curiosities at the least and explode vavavoomGarciaMarqueztornado wonder at the most.

Of course, in such a space, here is there and everywhere is nowhere all at once. That's dangerous stuff right there. Such visions can induce sweet paralysis, and without movement, there won't be hope where I desire hope. Immobility is the curse of dealing with the language of God, the combinatoria where, in the alphaomega, everything and nothing are synonyms.

This is where dialogue comes in, and I hope to seduce them back to the world where languages (if not literature) could be of some use. Dialogue should be fair, so I'm not allowed to use silvertongue. I must speak the words of the earth and spew ragsratsandfeces saliva about balloondrowned seals and hungerconsumed men. If this has ceased to appeal to them, then I'll be damned. I'll give them the writing skills they need for the callcenters, multinationals, massmediamoguls and othercountries that they expected in the first place. Then I end with the gladiatorquestion, are ye not entertainedtainedtained? If they weren't, then I failed, handsdown; if they were, then at least there's room reserved for wonder. That room is more conducive than any cubicleearphonescreendesk to hope.

However, if the undergroundvoice still appeals to them, then we meet halfway; the elitetranscendentseraphs come down, and I give them the badnews. Man is born free but everywhere he is in chains, another hesaid. I continue the discussion.

"You have one semester with me, and I'm inching toward a discourse that is more involved and open than what I can now offer. To get there, I need your help. The postulate of the coursediscourse is that we aren't free. If you agree, then welcome to the classdesert of the real. If you think you are free and thatsthat, then go back to the heavenorjungle you came from because dialogue won't be possible. Try getting out of the university first, let's see that freedom, shall we? If you think you are free but believe my maybeyouarenot is worth looking into, let's communicate.

"And I mean speakwith not talkto."


4 Find Fire with Fire

Preach, preacher! I rapped to myself to keep my gut in place, and ignore the calls and the setting of the bigbreakfast.

The study of space begins with light. Let there be light another he said, or rather the first. And whether that was the first thing he invented or the seas and the earth and the firmaments (or even humans), it wouldn't matter. To us, it will always be the light first. That's how we came about seeing it, an eyelightmindcoordination. Therefore, a study of space is necessarily a study of optics and senses, how the inner space approaches and apprehends the outer. We need light. Fire.

If they think I'm going to give them fire, they're in for a surprise! I'm giving nothing. Fire freely given will be effectively extinguished. I'm not even giving the conditions for fire, no, no driedleavestwigscoalsliquefiedpetrogas, no nada. I'll ask them for fire. If they say they have it, we go and examine each other's combustion in each other's light. If they say they don't have it, I'll ask what they know of it (because they might have it after all, without realizing it). I'll lend mine in the meanwhile, while they look for it. When they do, see if it's any better. If it's not, we'll work on it. When it's much better than mine, they'll extinguish me. Obsolescence is the purest dream of the teacher, if you ask me.

Let's illuminate our spaces then, our writing desks, our living areas, railways, our private musicalballerinaboxes, our classrooms, our cafes, carinderias, shops, sukingtindahans, dojos, chapels, where we defecate, where we throw our trash away.

This is my problem. I can risk myself all I want. I've been taughttaut enough for such adventures. Let me take one concrete plan among my manifold objectives to discuss this problem. In my heart, I want to throw them into the greatshittingbowl itself, the great Payatas. I'll allow distance. The smell of it first, the feel of the feet on heat-infested ground next. I won't allow them on top of it, don't worry. Not close to the people working there, not yet. Don't worry.

It is I who worry, Mrbigtalknospine. What if something happens? I learned the field. I know the issues and the mishaps even with a mere sanitized fieldtrip. One mentor once failed to control a disastrous trip of amateurs. The best way, I fathom, is to bring them there in small groups in plainclothes, in nocellphones and nohandsanitizers mode.

Still there are too many risks, too much to list here in detail. Therefore I immerse myself in the process of examining my own space.

Where I am, I believe in expanding the hermeneutic horizon (the interpretative background, a perspectiveworldviewstandpoint, if you may) by putting it in danger. This involves risks. Without it, there is no further knowledge of the qualitative sort. Without approaching a state of fear, uncertainty, and definite anxiety; we will not write beyond harlequinhorizons and millsandboonsbounds.

I call such a place of risk as an event horizon between illumination and depth. This is such the threshold I'm in, a liminal phase, an upping of the ante. Now though, I will not merely put myself in potential danger, I will involve my charges. And I must strip them of false securities to reap the perceptual benefits of dread. Fear makes the eye keen, see?

I must consider this. More difficult than that, I must consider this with them.

I am afraid.


Pedagogy Peddler

Ma already left for her elementary school tasks. The food is covered. I eliminate the sound. I sing my sales pitch still. Teach, teacher!

I am not free. If you ask me to read the spaces, that would be what I'd yield. I'll see aluminum soda cans, plastic palm trees, frowning passersby, lovers with four arms and four legs, two spines and two heads. One of the hands holds the other's nape. If you ask me, you aren't free either.

Is freedom an ideal? If you ask me, that's not something you ask in front of a desk, the erudite poses on tv, or from the inscrutable English of the American on the other end of the callcenterline complaining, denying he payperviewedporno. Maybe nobody should ask me either because here it's just a fancyterm. Yet I'll prick my ears if I'm promised true dialogue. Because then it'd be a meaning we can decide.

I'm not saying that dialogue is the only venue for emancipation. But it is a venue with its own unique dimensions. This is the only venue that I can introduce to the traditional classroom, and this too, only on the sly. The powersthatbe shouldn't see.

Freedom, from where I stand, from where I see you and the allcluttered space between you and me, draws from dialogue something basic. We've abused this word and many are already allergic to it. Awareness.

The best substitute for freedom is an illusion of it. Only awareness will indicate freedom. Awareness (believe me, I know) is painful. Softened by the illusory in a spectacleworld, our thresholds for pain are nothing to be proud of. So we sit, comfortably in couchpotatocertainties and watch the world go by with the choice between hungrywrithingEthiopian and syphiliticlovemakingKrisAquino a matter of pushbutton numbers. Tv, the first thing to be learned, is the undisputed center of the living room. Is it worthy of this pedestal? There, liberation is merely an image. We've trapped it inside a celluloid dove for further reference.

The last and major point of the class is this, maybe freedom is not discovered. It is achieved. It is generated in the space between you and me (where our arms end, where our noses begin). It is furthered by a redefinition of space, or at least a liberation of the eyes that see the space. The function of freedom is to free others, another poor somebody said. Few listened, everybody else was enslaved by the thought that function and freedom precluded each other. Yet in the class, let's see where such an onerous word as 'freedom' can take us.

The class could start from desks, but the dream is that it doesn't end there. I must have breakfast. The gut says so. At this moment, before I surrender the dream to scrutiny, I must say that the gut itself is a labyrinth, a tortuous smellysewerpath to each other. With active compassion, its coils could extend through all the world, penetrating and encompassing all its peoplepotentialities. Pain and satiation transcend the illusoryindividual.

You will know, this way, that everything (even and especially freedom) must begin with everybody else's breakfast.

Hun 4, 2004

Word Between Us

"Well, am glad yer there, hangin round, lookin, peerin, wearin those wonderflly human eyes of yers and wastin' away at the sight of my lil goings-on. Find some interest in me weavin hands eh? Well ye werent first and - Ive authority to tell - ye wont be last.

"Am glad. Am glad? Rather, Id be glad if I had the capacity for them happy stuff; Id be grateful too, if I could thank. Seein ye there - readin, readin - kinda reminds me of me in those wee lil pockets of time when I get the chance of remindin myself of me. Otherwise, theres always ye to look at - ah beautiful - mreader!

"Most customs of yers, I find strange. Atop themre those apologies ye give; as if momentsre trinkets that can be taken back willynilly. Maybe at some points, dear observer, ye think I owe ye one? A sorry I mean? Fer bein a meanie, weavin darkness atimes, spinnin brightness atimes, bein plain dull most atimes? And excitin only some of the times? Fer bein such a bitch?

"If I could be sorry, say sorry, become that word sorry - oh well, hell - lets jus say Id rather not. There must be times ye were angry, eh? But would ye know yer own hands without gropin in mstinkin dark? Would ye know the bounds of those eyes werent I too glarin? Would ye lazily - luxuriantly - ruminate - think at all if I werent dull? Would ye be anything werent I jumpy at times? Would ye even be born if I werent didnt come off as such a bitch?

"My time of tellin is over, fer now. Over, jus as it tells here, woven in me yarn. Over. All that should be said, I said unto ye. Ive spoken as Ive spoken to those who came afore ye, and I shall wag mtongue much the same way to the others whod come after. Its been awflly nice speakin a bit. Back to our businesses - now - then! Ye go right ahead and write me down a bit. I will just go on, weave ye some more.

"Jus a wee bit more."

- A Fate (or all three of them)
adresses an historian
(or all generations of them)