Philippines

Diwata

caitlin — Tue, 28 Sep 2010 16:00:00 +0000

As a librarian, when I’m asked for a recommended read by someone thirsty for tales, I instinctively direct them to the fiction stacks. I forget how poems, too, can be rich with narrative. Barbara Jane Reyes’ Diwata teems with stories. Exploring subjects like the creation of human life on earth, the phenomena of thunder and lightning, the violence that war and occupation inflict on women, and the complexity of the sea’s color, Diwata contains so much imagination and vision it’s hard to believe it’s just eighty-two pages long.

Reyes, a poet born in Manila, Philippines and currently based in the San Francisco Bay Area, takes the title of her book from a word in Tagalog. The back of the book defines diwata as “a term for a mythical being who resides in nature, and whom human communities must acknowledge, respect, and appease in order to live harmoniously in this world.” Diwatas make numerous appearances in Reyes’ poems, in some cases as the narrator, in others, as one situated in a temporally or spatially remote place, or one residing close by, implored by the poet to speak. In “Crossing,” a diwata visits a hunter in her sleep and helps her to cross a bridge between herself and her ancestors.

Among the themes that run through this book are the complications of human intimacy. The title of the first poem, “A Genesis of We, Cleaved,” uses a word that has two opposite meanings: to come together and to separate. Reyes writes in cleverly lyrical language in “Eve’s Aubade”: “Here I shall weave a selvedge of we.” In fiber art, a selvedge is an edge that keeps a work from fraying. This implies a woven-togetherness between the speaker and the beloved. And yet, a selvedge also suggests an edge, a deliberate marking off of where one ends and another begins.

The poems in Diwata are written in a range of forms, with some longer pieces like “The Fire, Around Which We All Gather” exploring a prose poem structure, and others, like “Polyglot Incantation,” juxtaposing lines in Tagalog, Spanish, and English. “The Villagers Sing of the Woman Who Becomes a Wave Who Becomes the Water Who Becomes the Wind” cleverly employs a braided pantoum pattern, mimicking the shapeshifting of the poem’s subject.

Reyes ends her collection with a stark and striking short poem, “Aswang,” presumably in the voice of a diwata. The speaker names herself “the bad daughter, the freedom fighter, the shaper of death masks,” and in the last line, says, “Upend me, bend my body, cleave me beyond function. Blame me.” Here, we are confronted as humans who all too often use myths to perpetuate violence. We are left with a voice that insists against the misuses of mythology, a voice that will haunt us. This is an outsider voice of a deity misunderstood, a woman misunderstood, whose stories we must try harder to hear.

Written by: Vani Natarajan, September 28th 2010

Ilustrado

admin — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 00:00:00 +0000

Miguel Syjuco

Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Miguel Syjuco’s Ilustrado is the novel made for re-reading. There are continual twists and turns and questions about the nature of fiction writing that immediately attune one to the constructed nature of the textual landscape. Indeed, Ilustrado is a metafiction, as it involves a character by the name of Miguel, a writer living in New York who is researching the life of a Filipino expatriate writer named Crispin Salvador.

At the beginning of the novel, the readers discover that Crispin has died under mysterious circumstances. Miguel, having been acquainted with and impressed by Salvador’s work and life, goes about trying to find out what might have happened to Salvador, especially as he embarks on writing Salvador’s life story. The novel is written with this main storyline, but scattered throughout are excerpts from Salvador’s many creative writings, both fictional and nonfictional in scope. There are also various interviews and blog excerpts that continually provide more context and more complexity to Crispin Salvador.

The other major narrative involves Miguel’s own life, one marked by the tragic and premature death of both his mother and father. Miguel and his many siblings are raised by his grandparents. Perhaps, not surprisingly, the novel takes us to the Philippines where Miguel is both haunted by the tensions that have disintegrated his family and looks to discovering more about his esteemed Crispin Salvador.

The title of Miguel’s novel, comes from the Filipino elite that traveled to Europe in the late nineteenth century in order to receive an education. In this regard, the “enlightened ones” speaks to the complicated ways in which the colonial subject could continue to be indoctrinated by the cultural capital devised out of the imperial enterprise. Nevertheless, the education that the ilustrados received also helped foment the revolutionary ideals espoused by those such as Jose Rizal. In this way, the novel is distinctly postcolonial in character inasmuch as it might be called Asian American.

Following Crispin’s life through the eyes of Miguel’s work and by other creative excerpts, the novel does track an impressive array of historical changes that have typified the Philippines in the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Crispin, having been raised in affluence, must come to terms with his class background and finds himself using writing as a venue to share his political sentiments. The hope for the venue of writing as a direct instigator of political activism is a vexed issue throughout the novel and we can see that Syjuco is tarrying with the complex ways in which representation, referent, and social protest collide. Miguel, too, comes from a clearly privileged background and all throughout the novel we see the ways in which class stratification details the Manila landscape that becomes a sort of “third” character.

Like the recently reviewed, A Thread of Sky, Syjuco excels at painting a picture of modern metropolitan Manila in all of its intricacies and these urbanscapes become the terrain upon which power and difference can be situated. As the plot moves directly into the homes and lives of individual characters, we see, for instance, the way in which the domestic workers are subordinated and often times flagrantly abused. In the clubscapes, individuals worry about the latest fashions and where to score a round of drugs. The profligacy of the Manila elite is meant to destabilize any deterministic trajectory of the country’s progressivism. In addition, the political ruling class is also portrayed as corrupt and ineffectual. In this general space of guarded pessimism, the novel begins to turn inward with a major shift in the conclusion that queries the entire nature of the narrative trajectory itself. It begs the question about the construction of the modern Filipino/American subject, and he or she has come to exist at hazy boundary between fantasy and reality.

Ilustrado is a consummately entertaining book, one that will have you immediately re-reading, spending more time on the many different threads that hold the book together.

Cross-posted at Asian American Literature Fans

Written by: Stephen Hong Sohn, June 3rd 2010

Intimate Encounters: Filipina Women and the Remaking of Rural Japan

admin — Mon, 28 Dec 2009 09:00:00 +0000

By Lieba Faier

University of California Press

Intimate Encounters: Filipina Women and the Remaking of Rural Japan is a culmination of professor Lieba Faier's fieldwork in the late 1990s in the Nagano region of Japan, specifically Central Kiso. For a few years, Faier lived in the area, interviewing both the Japanese natives and the Filipina women who came to Japan under entertainment visas. The Central Kiso area had a particular phenomenon: a surprising number of foreign brides from the Philippines either met their husbands at the hostess bars where they worked or through mediated marriages.

Faier discusses the two mentalities surrounding these Filipina brides: first, many Japanese thought they came from a poor and inferior country, and were looking for rich husbands; on the other hand, others viewed these brides as ii oyomesan, Japanese for “good wife.” Filipina brides who were viewed as ii oyomesan possessed “Japanese” qualities, such as being dutiful towards their husbands and in-laws. When interviewed, these women revealed that they were following their Filipina values.

Even though many of these women came to Japan searching for a better life and a way to support their families back in the Philippines, many found obstacles. While their visas were for cultural performances, the majority worked in hostess clubs, where they were expected to please men and get them to drink. Many of the women performed sexual services, though it was a violation of their visas. If a Filipina woman did marry a Japanese man, she faced the disapproval of Japanese in-laws. Faier recounts stories of Filipina brides who ran away from their husbands, working underground when their visas expired.

Faier's fieldwork is incredibly extensive, covering both Japanese and Filipina points of view. She does an excellent job portraying the different reasons these women came to Japan, and the various difficulties they went through. Intimate Encounters is an enjoyable read, not only for students of anthropology, but also for those interested in either Japan or the Philippines.

Written by: Elizabeth Stannard Gromisch, December 28th 2009

Things Fall Away: Philippine Historical Experience and the Makings of Globalization

admin — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 16:32:00 +0000

By Neferti X. M. Tadiar

Duke University Press

Things Fall Away is a scholarly book, not composed for easy reading or comprehension. Tadiar writes as an expert in the areas of political science, anthropology and economics. Consider the following: _Refurbished as well as unreconstructed nationalism and transnationalisms, battles for state power and civil liberties, identity-based claims to political and economic enfranchisement, liberal-democratic ideals of civil society—such are the familiar trajectories of world-historical agency in these times, trajectories from which all other manner of human and parahuman lives, pasts, presents, and futures, cultural imaginations, and virtual realities are jettisoned. These things fall away…_Yet Tadiar writes poetically at times and offers beautifully detailed and researched explanations of the dangers and losses we face as the world undergoes a new transformation: globalization. Given the current economic and political struggles we face, Tadiar’s examination of the post-colonization period of the Philippines and the knowledge it offers about the process we are undergoing is particularly timely as well as brilliant. She brings heart to her explanations as she illustrates the role of literature and poetry in providing a picture of effects of these changes on the subaltern.

She views global politics and economics through the lens of feminist theory. Her description of how Philippine women, since the beginning of the military dictatorship in 1972, became the primary economic asset of the country is eye opening. In chapter one, she offers a joke that circulated in the Philippines in the 1980s: “Gas, rice, sugar—everything is going up! The only things coming down are panties!”

While lamenting the misogynist view, the author describes the role of prostitution as a prospering industry for the country. Tadiar sees a parallel in the Philippines being a hostess nation, servicing the needs and desires of her clients.

The author writes graphically about the effects of economic and political transformations. She will not let that history die or disappear and she warns of the consequences of building a culture on human wounds.

Tadiar offers the concept of global tragedy, a general feeling that there is no hope and efforts to change the world of the subaltern have failed. She also speaks of divine sorrow and the hope that change is still possible.

Written by: Karyn Hall, October 15th 2009

Lonely Planet Southeast Asia: On A Shoestring

admin — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 22:42:00 +0000

By Lonely Planet

Published just two months before the cyclone disaster in Myanmar (Burma), questions of safety regarding whether or not to go to the politically and ethically wrought country are best answered on the Lonely Planet website. Along with Myanmar, this impressive 14th Edition of the Southeast Asia on a Shoestring travel guide addresses the Southeastern kingdoms of Brunei, Cambodia, East Timor, Indonesia, Laos, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam. If you are off on a backpacking trip, and are strapped for cash, this small, but heavy gem of a book is what you are looking for.

Southeast Asia on a Shoestring is written by a group of experienced traveller-adventurers and covers a range of ‘need to know’ material on each country. These include what to see, quick facts, and recent events, which is followed by historical and cultural information, religion, arts, environment, and transport. The rundown of each kingdom’s historical background is outstanding; the authors have done a great job in compressing thorough accounts of the past and present in such limited space.

Splayed across double pages at the beginning of this paperback is a coloured map of the continent with helpful descriptions of top sights to visit or activities to do at particular destinations. Local maps mainly of central cities too are provided—good eyesight however is recommended as street names are printed in what seems like microscopic fonts. Scams to avoid are also highlighted and there is a section for women and gay travellers with useful notes on dangers to watch out for.

The guide’s humorous approach throughout makes it an amusing and light-hearted read. Some pages though may invoke a slight annoyance owing to a repetitive moral tone in such sections as "Responsible Travel" and "Do’s and Don’ts" and other 'should or should not' language that suffuse the writing, most of which is common sense practice—like telling western women not to bathe topless in Islamic-run areas.

The Southeast Asia directory wonderfully summarises toward the end of the book what you should expect from your stay abroad, with information offered on climate, accommodation, toilets, electricity, activities, courses, and volunteering – all of which are given greater attention in earlier chapters.

Southeast Asia on a Shoestring is a valuable guidebook that, additionally, lists important everyday phrases in the nine main languages spoken in the region. Still, best not to rely too much on every fact that is presented, as some details are likely to be outdated from the time of writing. But all in all, this is a well-structured and condensed manual with easy to follow and convenient information. This storehouse of a book is surely for keeps.

Written by: Payal Patel, June 17th 2008