It does not out work out the way romantic movies tell us. These movies conclude on an ecstatic but idealistic assumption that love ends happily ever after. Not all are lucky in love. Not all live happily ever after. Or those happily ever afters are not the ones we consistently dreamed of as happy. There are always struggles within. Relationships still break apart. Lovers reveal themselves as all too human, prone to error, temptation, and strife. Love manifests itself not as a matter of luck but a dreadful battlefield—an exhausting war of comings and goings, of sin and forgiveness, of toil and suffering. Stripped off of its eros, magic, and fantasies, what we are left with is a fragile and futile reality of love that hurts, decays, and is finite. Love, as we imagined and desired it to be, remains (reminiscent of Descartes) an elusive dream. It is an elusive dream that torments us.
Our National DNA
These days, I ask myself questions about our political culture and our psyche as a nation. How do we think as a people? Why do we act the way we act? Why has corruption become so ingrained, so institutional it happens in all sectors of our society? We talk of corruption in government because it is the most rampant and the easiest to talk about. But it happens at all levels. We in the private sector are just as guilty as some of the ones we have voted to power.
A Mighty Good Man
These days, there are plenty of magazines and TV shows sprouting information about what a “real” man ought to be. If you look through any of these articles, you might find that today’s man is defined by the gadgets he owns, the car he drives, the money he earns and the number of girls he can seduce. The boy next door is passé. The metrosexual is in. This man exudes confidence and charm because deep down he knows that he really is all that. Sometimes, if you’re a lucky girl, he’ll let you see him under his armor and you will get a glimpse of his sensitive side.
The Game of Love
Housed in the Galleria Borghese in Rome is the life-sized marble sculpture of Apollo and Daphne made by Gian Lorenzo Bernini. Prominent during his time, Bernini is known to have possessed the unique ability to capture in marble, the essence of a narrative moment with a shocking dramatic realism. A viewer can readily perceive this gifted ability by gazing at Apollo and Daphne, one of his famous works.
10 Videos That Made The Philippines
Some years ago, I listened to a CD called, "20 Speeches That Changed A Nation". It was a list of 20 Speeches that changed, made and molded our country into what it is now. In homage to that, and borrowing from that idea, I am featuring 10 Videos that I think best represent, or show us what this country is all about. This one is by no means a definitive list. But I have tried my best to get a good sampling from all over.
Lessons Learned from the RH Bill War
The Reproductive Health Bill has divided our nation into two factions (with a third faction of those who passively--or actively--don't really care about it). This is unprecedented. In the past, the factions were drawn around political and even cultural lines. The EDSA Revolution was about anti-Marcos civilians (of which a vast majority was a Cardinal Sin-led Catholic Church) and troops against a pro-Marcos military.
Parshat Ki Tisa 5772
Water is essential to life on earth. Water covers more than 70% of the Earth’s surface and makes up 55%-78% of the human body. Without food and water, humans will last for only 3-5 days. Clean water is a basic requirement to sustain human, plant, and animal life and ensure the healthy functioning of all the world’s ecosystems.
Don’t Be Surprised!
When we get to heaven, there will be three surprises: First, we will be surprised by the people that we find there, many of whom we surely had not expected to see. The second surprise is that we will be surprised by the people who are absent--the ones we did expect to see but are not there. The third surprise, of course, will be that we are there ourselves.
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