Falling in love suggests a loss of control, just as a fall, synonymous with tumbling, toppling, collapsing, is often a form of giving in to greater forces, such as gravity WRAPPED IN LOVE A playful update on the iconic symbol of affection, the Fall in Love bracelet by Louis Vuitton is a charming...
And I’m hungering for the sautéed onion in my breakfast omelette or the rings of medium red onion in my pork chop steak a la bistek “…Eat no onions nor garlic, for we are to utter sweet breath; and I do not doubt but to hear them say it is a sweet comedy,” says the weaver Bottom to the...
The Very Extra Book Club starts the year with generous helpings of the scandals that broke this author and his New York swans apart THE VERY EXTRA BOOK CLUB From left: Rajo Laurel, Pauline Suaco Juan, Marielle Santos Po, Alicia Colby Sy, Stephanie Zubiri, Rocio Olbes Ressano, Jae de Veyra Pickrell,...
The plastic problem What we use for just minutes Will last a long, long time Something glints at sea I squint to see what it is It’s only plastic All the fish gagging Panic at the sea bottom Mass death soon follows Plastic everywhere Microplastics in our drink In what we eat, breathe How is the...
A metaphor for human greed and self-destruction Zombies are no horror genre, they’re a social commentary, maybe a study of hunger or greed. Food is an underlying, if not a central, theme to any zombie story. Like a shadow, it follows every character or, to be more precise, every character follows...
Cheers to the best of this year’s Ternocon—grand winner Yssa Inumerable and runners-up Gabbie Sarenas and Gladys Rose Pantua Images NOEL PABALATE KERCHIEFS AND APRONS Balintawak by Yssa Inumerable. The designer received the highest citation, the Pacita Longos Award Vladimir Nabokov would have...
This obsession for youth is old. As Pablo Picasso once said, “It takes a very long time to be young.” We might have been obsessed with youth since the beginning of time, or at least on record since Herodotus wrote about the fountain of youth in the fifth century BC, but as a cultural...
FIRST TIME IS THE SWEETEST Clockwise from top: Lifestyle personalities and first-timers trying authentic La Paz batchoy are Tim Yap, Tessa Prieto, and Karen Davila As a sidelight to the just concluded Dinagyang Festival over the weekend in Iloilo, SM City Iloilo, this year’s main supporter of...
SM Group throws massive support behind Dinagyang, the mother of Philippine festivals MERRYMAKING ON CALLE REAL Contingents from different tribes of various barangays in Iloilo City presenting their dance in the Dinagyang Festival 2023 celebration at the Freedom Grandstand (Juan Carlo de Vela) Over...
In the spirit of Dinagyang, that concluded over the weekend, here’s a reprise of something I wrote a while back on Iloilo’s signature dish. THE SWEET SIDE Popoy's batchoy at the Iloilo Central Market Some sophisticates might harrumph, “There’s got to be more to Iloilo than batchoy.”...
Or why we can find answers in feng shui RUN, RABBIT, RUN An artwork that depicts The Year of the Water Rabbit, which begins today, Jan 22, 2023 and ends on Feb 9, 2024 I used to be a feng shui extremist. I didn’t think of it as a science or as an art. I didn’t...
Make room for good writing even when the times make bad sentences seem good enough “I am a complexly horizontal author,” says Truman Capote. “I can’t think unless I’m lying down, either in bed or stretched on a couch and with a cigarette and coffee handy.” It’s never...
