Trill and Mordent by Luisa Igloria

Trill & Mordent

Accidentals are symbols that change the pitch
with just the slightest touch of dissonance

in music— the flats, the sharps, the double
sharps’ spiked banners that appear sometimes once

on a page, sometimes in a series. Ascending or descending
they become appoggiatura— trills or mordents. The trills

are as random birdsong strewn over a field. The mordents
slip down, enough to remind me of their root in morbid

things, in falling, in death. The French, too, remind us
how even in pleasure the body dies a little: la petite mort.

The furtive kiss on the earlobe, the flick of a tongue
at the base of the throat— thin blade of a shudder that rises

to the heart and nicks it like a wound, that attaches
like a shadow. It takes so little to upset the mechanism

of everyday life, the rapid adjustment and tumbling of gears
from one set of teeth to another. As though the hand could choose

without error, the composer made these precise marks on sheets
of music. They bristle like little reports, like explosions

from the snout of a rifle angled through the window of a van,
aimed at any head smooth as the next one that steps

out on a veranda, out of a building; that stoops
momentarily to tie a shoelace, to fumble for car keys.

Now the news every day is filled with how little
it takes to ignite the blunt wick of fear.

Late in the year, the body’s fat thickens like tallow.
Ungathered fruit redden and fall in the yard,

and the afternoons descend a little faster toward night.
Who can blame the one who becomes tired of the brooding

darkness, who wants to open the window and move
toward the leaves’ quick gesturings, to see what voice

repeats her name in a way she has not heard
since childhood, to discover which room in her body

houses the accidental sound of a tuning fork
struck and echoing in the middle of her life.

- Trill and Mordent by Luisa Igloria, September 2005

On the 22nd Death Anniversary of Ninoy

"Alam nyo po, tuwing ginugunita ang kamatayan ni Ninoy, naghahalo sa loob ko ang sari-saring damdamin.

Sa isang dako, siyempre, nalulungkot ako, una, dahil wala na siya sa piling naming mag-anak at, pangalawa, dahil hanggang ngayon ay di pa natin natatanggap ang ganap na katarungan hinggil sa pagpaslang kay Ninoy.

Sa kabilang dako, napapangiti ako dahil, tuwing sumasapit ang araw na ito, may pagkakataon akong bulungan muli ang aking palabirong asawa: “Ninoy, naisahan mo talaga ako!” Basta umakyat na lamang siya sa langit at pinaubaya niya sa akin di lamang ang pagpapalaki ng aming mga anak kundi pati na rin ang kanyang di-natapos na misyon para sa ating bayan.

Higit sa lahat, napupuno ako ng galak at inspirasyon dahil sa araw na ito noong 1983 napukaw ang damdamin ng mga Pilipino—at ito’y unti-unting umuusbong bilang People Power."

"Moving forward, I appeal to banks, corporations and foundations, civic organizations, religious groups and civil society, and all patriotic Filipinos to invest in our people especially those who in spite of their poverty continue to pursue enterprising ventures to confront their problems and difficulties. In memory of Ninoy’s martyrdom, I pledge to continue to promote People Power and harness our collective support for this key strategic endeavor in our common fight to eventually conquer poverty."

- Speech delivered by former President Corazon Cojuangco Aquino,
Manila Memorial Park. August 21, 2005

Ninoy Aquino: A Hero For All Seasons

"The shot reverberated throughout the country but instead of scaring the people with the awesome display of martial law power, it freed them from their lethargic acceptance of martial rule and roused them to a fever-pitch revulsion of it.

At Ninoy’s wake, thousands of people from all segments of society – the rich, the poor, men, women, and children – paid him their last respects. And 10 days later, more two million people walked 12 hours from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. beside his bier to escort him to his final resting place or watched from the sidewalks more in anger than in sadness at what they thought was a senseless sacrifice of the life of a man who was destined for greatness."

"But was Ninoy a hero made or was he hero born?

The question may sound academic but it has a bearing on whether or not Ninoy deserves the accolades that he has been receiving from our people since 1986 when martial law was finally uprooted from the land.

Skeptics probably entertain the view that setting aside August 21 of every year is an example of an undue honor for the man who would be hero.

I beg to disagree. It is not the setting aside of August 21 to commemorate the day of Ninoy’s assassination every year that makes him a hero. To belabour the point, it is rather the sum of his selfless deeds that makes him so and gives meaning to August 21 as a celebratory occasion for the people to remind ourselves of the meaning of his life and especially of his epic death."

"Despite its inherently evil connotations, Ninoy’s assassination - as the Fates had decreed it – was, thus, a good thing for the Philippine society as a whole.

For as the philosopher Jean Baudrillard asked, “What is a society without a heroic dimension?”

Ninoy Aquino offered his life to answer the question and in the process proved the sceptics wrong. He also showed that he was right along with those of us who believed in our people: that indeed, the Filipino was worth dying for."

-Privilege Statement of Sen. Nene Pimentel at the Senate
August 13, 2008

The Filipino-American Kitchen: Traditional Recipes, Contemporary Flavors

The Filipino-American Kitchen: Traditional Recipes, Contemporary Flavors

"How do you prepare yourself and your kitchen for a Filipino meal? Naturally you start with the building blocks; the sauce, stocks, flavor bases that form the backbone of a cuisine... A Filipino meal is hardly complete without an array of potent and vibrant dipping sauces (sawsawan), which add zest and balance to each bite..."

"Filipinos are vinegar junkies, in fact,vinegar tops the seasoning hierarchy as number three, after salt (soy or fish sauce are salt equivalents) and black pepper as a way of simultaneously flavoring and preserving many cooked and uncooked foods..."

"With over seven thousand islands making up the Philippine Archipelago, the seas surrounding the islands are the veins through which the lifeblood of the Philippines flows. It is only natural that seafood plays a primary role in the Filipino diet and is enjoyed with zeal and creativity..."

- Jennifer M. Aranas (Author), Brian Briggs (Author), Michael Lande (Author)

Oscar B. Tan: "Like Wine in the River, Like Citizens of the World"

"As for me, I come from the Philippines , a former American colony best known for Imelda Marcos’s shoe collection. I remember being a six-year old watching my parents walk out of our house to join the crowds gathering to depose the dictator Ferdinand Marcos and form human walls against tanks. I remember being a twenty-year old in a different crowd deposing a different but equally corrupt president."

"I cannot deny that our generation’s issues will be complex, but I can guarantee that they will never be abstract, not after having a classmate who was an Israeli army drill sergeant, not after having a Chinese classmate with a Taiwanese girlfriend, nor after having a classmate chased by gunmen out of Afghanistan . In fact, when George W. Bush’s speechwriter visited, my Iranian classmate introduced himself, 'Hi, I’m from an Axis of Evil country.' "

"Friends, my most uplifting thought this year has been that the more we learn about each other, the more we realize that we are all alike, and the more we inspire each other to realize our most heartfelt yearnings."


"How do a mere 700 change the world, even with overpriced Harvard diplomas? Before a great battle in China ’s Spring and Autumn Period, the legendary King Gou Jian of Yue was presented with fine wine. He ordered his troops to stand beside a river, and poured the wine into it. He ordered them to drink from the river and share his gift. A bottle of wine cannot flavor a river, but the gesture so emboldened his army that they won a great victory. We of the Class of 2007 shall flavor this earth, whether we be vodka, wine, champagne, pisco sour, pina colada, caipirinha, tequila, sake, jagermeister, raki, Irish stout, Ugandan Warabi, or Philippine lambanog.

-Oscar Franklin Barcelona Tan,
Harvard Law School 2007 Student Commencement Address

[ Read the entire graduation speech. ]

Philippines: a Quick guide to Customs and Etiquette (Culture Smart)

Philippines - Culture Smart!: a quick guide to customs and etiquette (Culture Smart!)

"Filipinos don't need an excuse to have a party, but they welcome the opportunity to celebrate a variety of occassions, a number of which have come through American influence."

"A Filipino's sense of self is derived from his or her family: "I am who I am because of my family; their success is my success, and my shame is their shame..." The Family (pamilya) is the most important social unit in the Philippines, a core value, and the ultimate safety net. A Filipino would find it almost impossible to refuse family requests or ignore family obligations."

"Airports in the Philippines are always crowded with well-wishers so such extent that at Manila International Airport only passengers are allowed to enter the terminal. Employees prefer to incur the ire of their boss rather than miss going to the airport to say good-bye to a relative who is leaving the country to work abroad. it is a recognition of the sacrifice, a cementing of the relationship, a giving of face, and a tacit way of saying, "when I am in need, I may call on you."

-Philippines - Culture Smart!: a quick guide to customs and etiquette (Culture Smart!) by Graham Colin-Jones, Yvonne Colin-Jones, Published in 2004 in Great Britain by Kuperard

The Filipino Writer in English

(By the thirties) "The Filipino writer in English may be said to have mastered the language well enough to enable him to observe the life around him without the language interfering... he felt he had sufficient control of it to be able to look at his material with a clear vision, unobstructed by language only partially possessed."

"The writer is a writer exactly because he sees with language, not just with his eyes: only that has been which has been verbalized. The harsh truth is that the writer is a writer exactly because he lives with words: until experience is transfigured into words, it is not experience."

-Francisco Arcellana, Period of Emergence: The Short Story
Hailed as a National Artist of the Philippines for Literature in 1990.

This short biography is lifted from the: Philippine National Commission For Culture and the Arts (NCAA) website.

Francisco Arcellana, writer, poet, essayist, critic, journalist and teacher, is one of the most important progenitors of the modern Filipino short story in English. He pioneered the development of the short story as a lyrical prose-poetic form... Arcellana's published books are Selected Stories (1962), Poetry and Politics: The State of Original Writing in English in the Philippines Today (1977), The Francisco Arcellana Sampler (1990).

Some of his short stories are Frankie, The Man Who Would Be Poe, Death in a Factory, Lina, A Clown Remembers, Divided by Two, and his poems being The Other Woman, This Being the Third Poem This Poem is for Mathilda, To Touch You and I Touched Her, among others.