And the winners are…Award!
If you are serious about the whole writing (and by default literary) business, one of the viruses that you will eventually catch is the award-bug. You will think that you need to win an award:
2) for all your work to be validated and
3) say “Yeah, I’m really a writer now. Yahoo!”
Every August, I witness an insidious anxiety and frenzy among writers, “Is the Palanca out? Who won?”
Most reactions upon leakages would be:
2) yeah, that figures (because the writer’s texts are really blah)
3) yeah, that figures (because the writer’s texts have been figured out to belong to the liked or disliked writer).
Of course if you (or your friend) won, you would react with “Yehey! Hay, salamat! Party! Woohoo! Ang galing!”
Of course if you (or your friend) lost, you would react with “Shet! Ok lang yan. Magaling ka, don’t you worry. Maybe next year, pare.” OR “Huh, alam mo naman, chuchubel yan eh. Mga tae naman.”
I:
love it when I see a winning name and majority do not know who that person is i.e. the name is not a bleep in the writing/literary radar. I say, “Yeah! Someone new has come out to play!”
wince when I see winning names and everybody knows that they’re all part of the same fellowships and circles or trapezoids because this is what gives the majority-of-those-who-care the idea that it’s a network of conspiracy.
submit an entry (almost) every year because it is one virus from the U.P. Creative Writing Program that is implanted into your Neuro-Linguistic Programming: you have to win. In addition, the Palanca was the tenth on my ten-reasons-to-live-for-list way back when I was a suicidal freak. I placed it there because it was preposterous, definitely not a reason to live for therefore rendering the list as a testament to why I should off myself. [Suicide is the ultimate fuck-you-to-the-universe: may be stupid, but not for sissies. Caveat to those who say “I’ll never”. In studies, this is those who usually get a very bad case of it.]
hope that someday these awards will actually have a “Loyalty Award”.
And when Joey asked, “What if you win one of these years? What are you going to do?”
I laughed, “Then I just might likely get less personal or whatever attacks for saying or writing my criticism.”
Recently, a young female who writes poetry (I’m betting will win a Palanca in five years if she just acquires discipline) said to me, “I’m sorry that I didn’t support you before…I’ve been thinking about it…Mas okay nga na someone’s telling you that your poem’s not good…Kesa sabihin lagi na okay kasi friends kayo eh di naman okay…I admire your honesty and courage…”
Award!
*Thank you.*
It’s a given, by the way, that when I do finally win a Palanca (maybe someday when the crow goes blond), my whole barangay will throw a booze-sex-drugs-violence-rock-and-roll-love orgy.
Yeah, I will probably laugh my ass off.
How do I fuck thee?
In the first week of the Silliman National Writers Workshop 2007, there was a short story up for slaughter. It was something about “Cloud Carvers” written by RJ Malayang. Majority of the panelists said, “What is this? Carving clouds? This is not a story.”
Premise: Most of these panelists have very dated exposure and preferences when it comes to content.
I said to the workshop, “We actually have this. There’s been an anthology with these kinds of stories for the past two years being edited by Dean Alfar. There’s also a digest being run by Ken Yu. Some stories like this have also been published in the Philippine Free Press since 2006 and a story like this won during the awarding this year.”
Premise: Cloud Carvers’ execution still needed a lot of work but the content was under Speculative Fiction.
In critical discourse, this is called locating text in (Philippine) Literary History.
I use this to spot what’s new and not.
Just like I spotted Sasha Martinez’s “beautiful language” short fiction about sex and said to the panelists (and Sir Jimmy who loved the sound of perky rack), “Sir, do you read Mills& Boon? Romance novels? If you do, then you’ll know stories like this are common and nothing new.”
Just like I spotted “Penitensya” written by Khaye Alpay and said, “There’s already a story like this written by Marivi Soliven Blanco published in the 1997 Likhaan Book of Poetry and Fiction. It’s entitled ‘Penitence’.” Then smilingly to Sir Jimmy, “Which I believe you edited, Sir.” (Since he was one of the editors.)
Here’s an excerpt from Blanco’s “Penitence” (because I found it one of the best stories from that year):
“When will you have seen enough of this…this nonsense?” Magda stood up.
“Look at this,” she jerked her head toward the half-full church. “This is what Holy Week is about. People boring themselves silly with novenas, sitting at home with the TV unplugged, thinking about a dead God, for heaven’s sake! Isn’t that penance enough? What is the point of those men killing themselves out there, when you know, they know, that they’ll be back next year, and the year after, bleeding on the same road, for the same stupid sins? It’s an exercise in futility. You encourage it by watching.”
“But you agreed to come. You knew how important it was for me to see the biggest event in this town.”
“Go on. Use that hokey, nostalgic nativism on me again, the way you always do. But you don’t really want to find the mythical Filipino-ness of your forefathers, do you? All you really want is a bunch of slides in lurid color to show the folks back home: here is my mother country. Look how primitive, how barbaric they are. Look how far I’ve come! Well, I won’t stand for it anymore!”
“Why are you acting like such a bitch all of a sudden?”
Some people praying beneath the “Agony in the Garden” station turned and looked at them curiously. She glared back at them.
“That’s just great. Now you’ve done it!”
“Done what?”
“Cussed me. In a church. On a Good fucking Friday. Look, you really want to be a part of this farce? Why don’t you just go out there and strip, so I can beat the heck out of you?”
Magda pulled out her sunglasses and slapped them on. “Let’s go. At least now we actually have something to do penance for.”
And when I went gaga over Kris Dalao’s “The Space Allotted for Birds” poem, my loved Sir Ernie Yee said, aghast and laughing, “Really?! You like that poem?! Why?!”
Last time I laughed about things like “criticism”, it was with Martin Villanueva on a recent Saturday. I said to him, “Hayop yun workshop oh! Di nagproduce ng writer kundi critic!”
I’m impertinent, some say.
Right.
Stand(ards)!
The prototype: …When the Commonwealth Literary Contest of 1940 was announced, for example, one of its aims was “to encourage creative works that record or interpret the contemporary scene, or that deal with the social and economic problems of the individual and of society over and above those that are merely concerned with fantasy or mysticism or vain speculation.” [The Filipino Short Story in English: An Update for the ‘90s]
And Butch Dalisay said “Critical preferences, of course, may and do change over time, and thankfully so.”
The Year is 2008.
Well?
Male Writer + Female Writer = Sex
The writing/literary business is one of the most malicious scenes I’ve ever encountered. Just because:
1) female hangs out with male ergo they’re having sex
2) female does writing projects with male ergo they’re having sex
Gossipmongers have a spreading-gossip-fest (and of course they’re not honest about that).
You can do what I do: when I hear something, I ask the person-who-is-fodder-for-gossip (if I actually care for you much more have time). And really, you just don’t lie to people like me.
Most of the time, I laugh my ass off at gossipmongers.
That’s way better for the latter because otherwise I would say something like:
“GET A LIFE LOSER!” or
“WHY ARE YOU GRIPING? BECAUSE S/HE WON’T FUCK YOU?” or
“IS THIS BECAUSE S/HE IS BETTER IN WRITING THAN YOU?” Or maybe ask for vinegar from the server and spike your drink with it.
Or drag you to the nearest commode and wash your mouth with soap.
Or I can simply slap you.
Content = Writer
There’s this word called “persona” that allows someone to explore characters and possibilities different from your personal reality through writing or texts.
I write so many texts about killing several people because the world will be a better place without them.
I also write so many texts about fucking several people because I find these people fuckably hot.
Does that mean I’m a homicidal nymphomaniac?
If I write about drugs does that mean I’m an addict?
Wow, if that’s the case… I wrote as Ladyboy…I must be a bakla with a penis. Or may be as Joachim put it: a transcendental non-operative transsexual.
Ashu, read on Psychoanalytic Theory in Literary Theory and Criticism, why don’t you. And while you’re at it, widen your perception on the whole idea of “Perception”, too.
Process vs. Product
A lot of so-called-writers get so enamored with the “writing life” and stuck in the “writing process”: the whole booze-sex-drug-love-rock-and-roll-angst-freedom et cetera BULLSHIT.
It’s all part of the process, they say.
Aber, where’s your poem/story/essay/chuva that’s supposed to be a product of this process?
Unless you’re doing what I’m doing which is what I quaintly call “meta-writing” wherein the process is the product because you’re living and writing it all out in poetry/short fiction/essay/CNF/crap.
Kiss-Kiss & Bang-Bang
I’m snooty.
Yeah, because I refuse to be plastic in all these shindigs and say hi and hello and chika and kiss ass with people whom I don’t even know and may or may not be stabbing me in the back.
Once I giggled to Ms. Delgado, “Ma’am, date tayo minsan! Usap tayo!”
She laughed, “Oo nga eh. Pag andito ka kasi, dami eh! You’re so popular!”
I laughed, “Ma’am, not popular, notorious!”
And if I do talk to you and spend time with you, that means that’s a genuine interest.
I care because you’re special: I’m the Alien Care Bear For The Gifted.
Short Fiction vs. Creative Nonfiction
Joey was recently talking to me about CNF in relation to my claim that all texts are CNF.
I told him, “May pinaghuhugutan kasi yan from the personal or nonfiction and it needs to be told and cannot be told under nonfiction. Either di pa kaya or inhibited by the constraints of what they say CNF is. It just so happens that nonfiction can be transformed by your imagination. Puede lumabas in the form of a short story, poem, one-act-play, etc. Does that make that any less true? No. Kaya nga the task is to make the truth believable.”
Joey asked me about how I could differentiate my Short Fiction from my Creative Nonfiction.
I said, “The facts in the text. I don’t fuck around with the facts in my CNF because it renders the nonfiction factor false. But then facts are personal truths. Kasi puedeng iba naman yun naaalala nila o kaya di na nila naaalala. Dinedeny pa minsan. Paninindigan ko yun naalala ko. Kaya nga vigilant sa remembering and verifying memories.”
And some writers who hide their nonfiction in short fiction have a tendency to change facts for the sake of pulling off the story so that it becomes believable. The problem is that most of these writers forget the truth and believe their own fiction.
Joey posed a challenge:
I just finished writing a short story called “Spelling Normal”. The material for that is nonfiction. I know it’s short fiction because some facts were changed. Joey challenged me to write it as Creative Nonfiction.
I asked, “You want it with the same treatment? Or I can write it in whatever way?”
Joey said, “Up to you.”
“Sige, when I’m done I’ll post it one of these days.”
That’s also a technique in critical discourse: Comparative Analysis.
Teachers vs. Students
(Classroom)
Me: You didn’t read the assigned reading? Why?
Student: Because I’m expecting that you’ll explain it.
Me: Really? Ang kapal ng mukha mo.
(Outside the classroom)
So there I was talking to two who were brokenhearted-lost-end-of-the-world-hu-hu-heh. One was saying “Who is this Kahlil Gibran?” and the other was saying “Who is this Pablo Neruda?”
On our way to clarity, we saw one boy run to the CR to hide and another one running after the boy, pulling out a blade. We watched the slapstick-action-drama unfold. The usual rule is: DON’T INTERFERE. HAYAAN MONG MAGPATAYAN AT MAGMUKHANG MGA TANGA.
But see, they were really just disturbing all the people who came there to do their business. As old-farts-consumers, Joey and I said, “Huy! Tama na yan! Take it outside!”
There was the response, “Sorry, sorry, sige.”
Then violent-college-testosterone-with-booze-cock-fight flared up again in a matter of minutes, this time with a thrown bottle that made people go “Aaaaayyyyyy!”
Joey said, “Ano ba!”
The response was a pointed finger (of the boy with the knife) at Joey, “Bakit?! Pulis ka ba?! Ha?! Gusto mo rin?!”
Joey stood up, “ANO?! SIGE! ANO GUSTO NIYO?!”
I got scared because Joey was about to lose his cool.
But nobody messes with my cat while I’m breathing. I stood up and shouted, “ANO BA! TIGILAN NIYO NGA YAN! SINASAWAY NA KAYO AH! MGA NAKAKAHIYA KAYO! NAKA-UNIFORM PA KAYO! FACULTY AKO!”
They left (to continue it outside) and some said, “Miss, sorry, sorry.”
One other boy had the audacity to get in my face with that finger-duro, “Look, back off…” and placed his arms before me, touching me.
I said, “No, you back off,” raising my arms in a defensive position (while Joey was pulling me away).
The boy said, “Don’t touch me. Don’t touch me,” while pushing me with his raised arms.
Joey said (while I was pulling him back), “Don’t… touch… her… like …that.”
The boy said (with arms and hands raised, mocking), “I’m not touching her…I’m not touching her…”
Some were saying while cutting it all out, “Miss, sorry, sorry…Pare, tama na…” And the boy left.
I told the boy’s companions, “Please tell your friend not to act like that. What if he encounters people who don’t really care and will just kill him? Diyos kong mga bata ‘to oh.”
The boy’s companions said, “Yes, Miss. We know and understand, Miss. Sorry, Miss.”
After a couple of minutes, the finger-duro-to-my-face-boy came back and said, “Miss, I’m sorry. I didn’t know that you were a teacher. I just don’t like being touched… But I really don’t care who you are.”
This is especially the part wherein any teacher would want to say
(AKO RIN, I DON’T LIKE BEING TOUCHED AND DON’T CARE WHO YOU ARE)
(UUPAKAN KITA)
(YUN ASTA MO UGALI NG MGA MAYAYABANG NA MAY PERA)
(BASTOS KA PA SA MAS MATANDA AT BABAE)
(AY, WAG NA.)
(I CARE KASI ABOUT MY PERSONS)
(WHO WILL NOT STOP LOOKING FOR YOU)
(AND WILL FIND YOU AND KILL YOU)
(MAS WALA SILA CARE)
(HAY, ANG LABO MO KIDDO.)
I shook my head.
And Joey said a couple of minutes later as he shook his head and laughed, “Thank God none of the boys are with us… Putang ina! Buti na lang wala si Oso!”
I cringed and thought, Buti na lang talaga. Di ko alam kung paano ka yun marerendahan sa laki nun.
I laughed, imagining if Katitang or Ayn or Elena or Eve or (jesus christ) Steph were with us. [Last time Steph flared up, it took Oso, his best friend and me to stop her. She’s about five feet, by the way.]
And Oso said when he found out minutes later, “Putang inang mga bobo yan oh! Akala nila makukuha nila angas and respeto dahil sa nang-aaway sila?!”
And I felt so proud of him.
Before I left minuets later, I asked the manager, “Does this usually happen here?”
The manager said, “Ma’am, ‘di po. Mga regulars ho ‘yun. Ewan ko nga kung anong nangyari. Bigla na lang raw tinawag yun may kutsilyo kasi kakausapin. Tapos sinapak siya. Kaya ayun.”
I shook my head, “
The watch-your-car-boy said to us, “Ma’am, pinagtripan nga yun isa sa mga kotseng binabantayan namin kasi sinasaway namin sila.”
And this is why there’s a certain rule that says BARS ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE ANYWHERE NEAR A SCHOOL.
I told my students on the last day of lecture, “Do you want to be thought of as like that?”
They said, disgusted, “No, Miss.”
I said, “Well, unfortunately you’re being represented by students like that.”
And most students say to me while shaking their heads, “Miss/Ma’am, di ka talaga kasi mukhang teacher eh. You look too young.”
I laugh every time, “Shall I look frumpy then just so I really look like your idea of a teacher, hmmm?”
I vs. Stereotype
You pull it out, make sure you draw blood with it.
(If you’re too much of a stupid fucking sissy to do it.)
If not your opponent’s (because you changed your mind or you’re just too much of a stupid fucking sissy to actually stab someone) then cut yourself and draw blood.
The Blade is appeased.
You pull it out, make sure you fire it.
(If you’re too much of a stupid fucking sissy to do it.)
If not at your opponent (because you changed your mind or you’re just too much of a stupid fucking sissy to actually shoot someone), one shot to the heavens or the ground would do.
The Gun is appeased.
That is how Warriors do it.
The least I make sure of is to draw blood if I take out my blade or gun.
(And I have an arsenal and the rule in my world is Don’t Hurt: Kill.)
But I have mothers who are my censors who say:
“Put it in words, anak, put it in words….”
Grrrrrrrrrrrrr…
And my mothers are appeased.
Exciting.
I hope you enjoyed this ride.
Thank you for reading this.
1 comment:
"I laughed, imagining if Katitang or Ayn or Elena or Eve or (jesus christ) Steph were with us. [Last time Steph flared up, it took Oso, his best friend and me to stop her. She’s about five feet, by the way.]"
Hay, sinabi mo. Eto na nga't nagbabaog-baogan, baka lalo pang malaglag matres ko.
By the way, I'm five flat, so Estepani would be a little under it. Heehee. And yes, we're totally (over)compensating. :-)
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