The Memoriter Blogs

A couple of governesses I have met in literature live an emotionally sadistic childhood, a boring adolescent period, and a moderately interesting lovelife. Still, they remain fascinating in their own utterly drab way (to me, at least). They are fascinating in the sense that they are neither servant nor a part of the family and yet they hold the important key to ensure their charges are equipped with far more superior knowledge than those learning under a structured school system.

Despite their way of life, governesses are, in essence, teachers. And that makes them doubly fascinating to me, especially since I hold the teaching profession in great respect. Now that I am teaching professionally at least one semester in a year, my admiration for governesses---and my old teachers and friends-who-are-now-teachers---tripled. Governesses in the old times are lucky to be tutoring one to five brat-like charges. How about my friend, Candice, handling 50 talkative high school students in Talisay City or my friend, Montane, teaching 60 hyperactive kids in a mountain barangay in Toledo City five days a week? The largest---and latest---that I have managed is a college class of 30 young ladies for three times a week for six weeks, and I was already having back pains.

In the Philippines, we respect our teachers---at least, that’s the feedback I got from two full-time college teachers. We get easily scandalized when we hear news reports of teachers physically, emotionally, and/or sexually abusing their students, simply because we understand the nobility of the profession through which more or less 15 years of formal learning and development of our children are depending on. This perhaps explain how we expect so much from our teachers, as stated in the “Code of Ethics for Professional Teachers” that covers all teachers in public, private, and vocational schools, whether on full-time or part-time basis:

Teachers are duly licensed professionals who possesses dignity and reputation with high moral values as well as technical and professional competence in the practice of their noble profession, and they strictly adhere to, observe, and practice this set of ethical and moral principles, standards, and values.

And this set went on to cover obligations to the state, community, profession, learners, parents, business, and as a person.

In my case, being a new teacher, while I paddled my way through ethics and social responsibility, I stressed my mind out more worrying on whether or not I was doing the right thing and whether or not my students actually learned something from me. Teaching was synonymous to worrying edging towards mental craziness. And as Maryrose Wood said in her book, The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place #1: The Mysterious Howling: “Clearly, being anxious is a full-time and rather exhausting occupation.”

The cast of Paglaum

The production crew of Paglaum

The cast and crew and their teacher

This summer, despite my high level of anxiety, I managed to learn and relearn a few things in my Developmental Theater class when it comes to college teaching:

1. Set the rules during the very first meeting. Check attendance promptly and regularly to show that your students’ attendance matters to you, apart from it being a rule in the schoolbook.

2. Let the students own their work. And this means letting them understand that it is okay to commit mistakes if it means doing better the next time.

3. Seek help. In my case, I do not claim to be an expert of a subject, especially stage performance, which is why I invite friends with theater experience more extensive than mine to speak before my class.

4. As much as possible, keep the students off their seats, which means facilitating several relevant physical activities while being consciously aware of the time. And, in the process, get to know your students. Believe me, contrary to my traditional beliefs, it's okay to know your students.

5. Do not be afraid to speak in Cebuano (or in your comfortable language understood by all) to get the message of your lesson out clearly.

6. There are always students who won’t approve of your teaching methods, unconventional or otherwise, but that does not mean you should treat them less. They are your students, and the golden principle always applies: You cannot please everyone, so don’t die trying.

7. Motivate them.Based on my summer experience, my students are at a certain young age where they want to do something so unforgettable in their lives--so unforgettable they were willing (unwittingly at that) to put the school and my job at risk, so I have to advise them to be "reasonably" creative. Fortunately, they did.

8. Don’t be afraid of poor evaluation from your students but remain humble when they bask you with positive feedback in exchange of the knowledge and skills training you’ve offered to them.

9. Most of the time, trust and follow your instinct. You’ll be amazed where it will take you.

The play's theater program (page 1)

The play's theater program (page 2)...The Directors' Note is very touching.

In his book, The Skillful Teacher, Stephen Brookfield likened teaching to a white-water rafting because of how it takes one to high levels of exhilaration and excitement and to low levels of boredom and reflection. “As we successfully negotiate rapids fraught with danger, we feel a sense of self-confident exhilaration. As we start downstream after capsizing, our self-confidence is shaken and we are awash in self-doubt. All teachers sooner or later capsize, and all teachers worth their salt regularly ask themselves whether or not they are doing the right thing,” Brookfieldwrote.

Although I haven’t tried white-water rafting in Cagayan de Oro, I sympathize with the ups and downs of the teaching experience. The closest I can probably compare it to is that of a Ferris wheel ride I had in a carnival, one of the highlights of our barangay fiesta several years ago. So I agree again with Brookfield when he said, “For the truth is that teaching is frequently a gloriously messy pursuit in which surprise, shock, and risk are endemic.”

I was surprised at discovering how talented my students are but they themselves did not know it; I was shocked to learn that many of them doubted their capabilities; and it took a lot of risk on my part and their part to mount a play that explores teen issues, including premarital sex, and stage it on an auditorium in a private college owned by very conservative nuns. It took a lot of restraint, creative, cooperation, and understanding. Together, they successfully did their play; not bad for an amateur group with only barely three weeks of regular practice. The class aptly called their play, “Paglaum”, which means hope in Cebuano. Here is an excerpt of my opening remarks during the play production:

“As a teacher, it is an honor to meet courageous and diligent young ladies who braved an exploration of teen related issues that call for acknowledgement and resolution. This play is a creative and collective result of their individual perspectives. The keyword here is collective. The class has worked as a team since day one from conceptualization to script-writing to publicity and promotions to rehearsals. I would like to believe that somehow through this class, these 29 ladies learned the true essence of working together, learning together, and having fun together to achieve their goal of educating and entertaining the public. I call on you to listen and learn and, with the issues that will be presented through the play, have hope.”

My summer this year may not spell much of beaches and sun tan but I have had a great time with these young ladies. The class in itself was a huge emotional investment, but the emotional compensation was incredible and far outweighs the investment. Mind you, my experience was not all fun; there were moments of boredom and fatigue, but they pale in comparison to the time when the class cheered after I praised them for a big improvement after only a week of rehearsals, to the time when my heart swelled with pride when I learned that the production crew, on their own, took a stand and amicably settled an agreement with the nuns over the use of the auditorium, and to the time when they hugged me backstage right after their final play production, practically crying with joy over their success yet fully aware that some good things just have to end and that we have to move on.

A bouquet of lovely flowers from my students

Let me end this post with the wise words of Paulo Coelho who wrote in his book, The Witch of Portobello, “What is a teacher? I’ll tell you: it isn’t someone who teaches something, but someone who inspires the student to give of her best in order to discover what she already knows.”

Enjoy the rest of the summer, my dear readers.

- Nancy

As early as seven in the morning, during an ordinary workday, the speed of trucks that sends the streets to convulsion and the drowsy pace of pedestrians ambling in their search for good breakfast would not prevent one or two individuals to grab the microphone from the nearest videoke and belt out songs by Parokya ni Edgar. They could effectively send many wincing with aural pain, but they are better (in an amusing way, that is) than a rooster’s call that is practically useless under the metal-bonging cacophony of the leisurely moving garbage truck.

Filipinos love to sing. Singing is not reserved to videokes or to concerts. We sing wherever, whenever we want—inside stuffy jeepneys, at work, over the phone, at any special occasion, even during heartaches, over baptisms and burials, reunions, and under the shower (or on the toilet, distasteful as that thought may incur). In fact, we have been long been singing, way before Portugese explorer Ferdinand Magellan and his mob came to the Philippines, as historical records show. This guy named Antonio Pigafetta, a scholar, mentioned about hearing a gong-drum ensemble in Cebu. And when this foreign troupe did land and made themselves comfortable, Filipinos—dangerously pliant as we are—rapidly assimilated to Spanish practices with the upper Filipino class belting out Andalucian songs, strumming the harp, and gyrating to Spanish music.

Over the years, despite the arrival of two more foreign mobs crusting our pliant personalities, we managed to produce some good songs played in phonographs and aired over the radio. Up to now, every Sundays, we hear wistful songs like Ben Zubiri’s “Matud Nila” (1941), Minggoy Lopez’s “Rosas Pandan” (1938), and Manuel Velez’s “Sa Kabukiran” (1941). This, while during the rest of the days, we hear Western songs with a “dance-able” beat but…what is that song all about? We also hear songs many people could barely understand, save for an English line during chorus repeatedly (sometimes angrily) piped with, uh, um, distinct sense of, er, difficulty (please, Lord, let not my dear younger sister read this blog post!). And still, we keep hearing almost the same set of old Cebuano songs every Sundays over the radio. While we exalt them in the kingdom of glory, where are the new good Cebuano songs that our own kids will be able to glorify, too, when we reach Pilita Corales’ current age?

Now, let’s open the curtain for Vispop, the Visayan Pop Songwriting Campaign that challenges Cebuano songwriters to produce songs that can “break into current radio airplay…that have both a hook and a heart…that are radio-friendly, and yet are also substantial in their theme and approach”. As a campaign, it aims to alleviate the current state of Cebuano music (or perhaps the lack thereof?) on the radio by infusing into our airwave system a “more professional and competitive playlist of new Cebuano songs”. Vispop is organized by Artist Ko or Artists & Musicians Marketing Cooperative led by its core team Ian Zafra (songwriter/music producer from the band Sheila & The Insects), Cattski Espina (singer/songwriter/music producer), Jude Gitamondoc (composer/music producer) and Lorenzo “Insoy” Niñal (songwriter/music producer and frontman of the band Missing Filemon [and my former teacher and editor whose witty columns I admire so much]) in cooperation with the Filipino Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers.

So after rounding up groups and schools and getting 80 entries, Vispop selected six finalists who battled each other’s vocal cords out last May 18 at the Benedicto College Artists Hall. They were Marianne Dungog (a former student of mine in St. Theresa’s College) and Kyle Wong with “Balay Ni Mayang”, Paterno Niñal with “Hinaut”, Alphecca Perpetua with “Historias”, Marie Maureen Salvaleon with “Pa-Pictura Ko Nimo, Gwapo”, Lourdes Maglinte with “Laylay” and Jewel (another former student of mine) and Joe Villaflores with “Duyog.” Jewel and Joe won first place; Lourdes at the second; and Marian and Kyle made it to the third spot. Congratulations!

Big thanks to Vispop and the team behind it, we are getting the new local sound we can be proud of, something that is certainly not baratand bakya. It’s true that Filipinos, or in this case the Cebuanos, love to sing. It’s just a matter of having more new really good Cebuano material we can belt out.

- Nancy–

For someone who spends most of her time with books as a school librarian, Ms. Lorna Eguia was still in awe at the sight of books that lined up the cozy shelves of La Belle Aurore Bookshop along Junquera Street, CebuCity.

“I work in a library, and here I am, staring at books as if I have never seen them before,” Lorna chuckled, pointing out that it was her first time to enter the quaint little bookshop, a second branch, owned by Joseff Lee.

She is a full-time librarian at the University of San Carlos (USC) American Corner and the School of Business and Economics.

Even during her spare time, this 40-year-old slender lady who always sports a friendly smile spends it with books—by telling them to kids—with the firm belief that storytelling is just a “starter” to get children to be inquisitive of the things around them and to teach them to communicate properly with others.

“Have you noticed that the ways of communicating now is different from our younger days? It’s one way. More and more children are addicted to video games and the Internet that we could hardly talk to them. So I think storytelling is an antidote to this addiction,” Lorna, a native from Dalaguete, Cebu, said.

Apart from being an antidote, storytelling, she added, is also a way to improve a child’s memory and strengthen family bonding.

But storytelling is not as easy as saying A-B-C or counting 1-2-3. It requires enunciation skills, organization, creativity in delivery, mastery of the story, and the ability to tell it with confidence. For Lorna, there is even a technique for every story, and a storyteller knows how to identify that technique early on while considering the story’s lines and the audience it will be presented to. In fact, she studied some of these techniques for her master’s thesis, “Storytelling Techniques in Selected Grade School Libraries in CebuCity: A Storytelling Sampler”, which presented eight different storytelling techniques—read-aloud, draw and tell, flannel or felt board, puppetry, storytelling apron, story sack or bag, storigami, and creative dramatics.

Her favorite is the read-aloud, a common storytelling technique even among parents, and the story bag, which she finds excitingly challenging.

Backed up with these techniques, and acquiring confidence from the support of her husband, Joey, a teacher-librarian, and taking inspiration from the talent of Kamini Ramachandran, a professional storyteller based in Singapore, Lorna goes around cities and mountain barangays to plant and nurture the love for storytelling. Her most recent gig was the second run of Storytelling 101 organized by the Basadours, a non-profit organization in Cebu composed of passionate storytellers from all ages and walks of life dedicated to literacy development, at the Cebu City Public Library last June 8.

Before that, she conducted storytelling seminar-workshops with the members of the Cebu Librarian’s Association, with teacher-librarians under the Department of Education Cebu City Division, barangay reading center personnel, and public librarians from different areas in CebuProvince.

“When I started training the teacher-librarians, they were reluctant to accept the responsibility of taking care of their school libraries because—let’s face it—they are additional load for them. So when I came in, I showed them the importance of loving their work before I taught them any storytelling techniques,” Lorna recalled.

She feels her hard work paid off after seeing many children coming to the public school libraries to read without having the teachers stretching their vocal veins and requiring them to do so.

The emotional fulfilment was overpowering for Lorna, especially since she started storytelling as a professional requirement that she learned to eventually love and do as a volunteer work.

“There is a big potential for storytelling. It is not only limited to kids. It can also be used in meetings, for there is such a thing called corporate storytelling, and I would like to learn how to do that,” she said.

For now, in each of her gig, she promotes inspirational children’s stories, Bible stories, and fables while maintaining her distance from horror and gothic stories that are in stark contrast to the positive vibes she wants to present. One of her favorites is Akong Bugsay (My Bugsay), a bilingual children’s book written by Amaya Aboitiz of the Ramon Aboitiz Foundation Inc.

Akong Bugsay follows the story of a small boy named Andoy who went on his first fishing trip with his father. Along the way, they both experience natural and emotional challenges. But Andoy plans and works for his goal: to catch fish for his family. And with courage and determination, he achieves it.

“Since I got a copy of this book, I never missed bringing this in the seminar-workshops and training with volunteers, student leaders, orphans, and children. I even brought it to the mountain barangays where I would get reactions like, ‘Ms. Lorna, we could not relate with Andoy because we are into farming, not fishing,’ but I would find a way to creatively deliver Andoy’s message,” Lorna said.

She shared how her daughter, Raine, 9, has successfully followed the lessons of Akong Bugsay—decide on a goal, make a plan, carry out your plan, use your paddle to move towards your goal, believe in yourself and stay positive, ask for help if you need it, keep going until you succeed, rest, give thanks, and set a new goal.

“Right after I told her of the story last March 19, she responded by drawing her goal for summer, which is to win in the swimming competition. And following Andoy’s lessons, she did,” Lorna beamed.

Here is the world of Lorna who finds joy in the support of her husband, Joey; in the successes of her children, Grant, 14, Shine, 11, and Raine; in the hordes of children who flock public and public school libraries; in the smiles of teacher-librarians who love their work; in the spirit of volunteerism of various groups like Basadours (which she thinks is Cebu’s successful version of Alitaptap Storytellers); and in the innocent wonder of the children who would sit raptly listening as her telling of an inspirational story unfolds.

- Nancy-

Nadia has always been a silent child, but not necessarily lonely. She almost always went anywhere alone. In high school, the company she kept were polite classmates who happened to be her neighbors who have no choice but to ride the tricycle with her because their parents asked them to. The bigger the crowd, the safer, their mothers would point out. For Nadia, she did not mind; she was used to being alone. She only talked to them when spoken to and she only smiled when she felt pleased, not to please her company.

On her second year in high school, Nadia met Rosie, a bubbly girl with a square face. At least, that was Nadia’s first impression of her. She was minding her own business—reading a book in one corner of the classroom during recess—when Rosie went up to her and asked her how she was and what she was reading. Suspicious, Nadia politely said she was feeling okay and she was reading a Nancy Drew case. What followed was a lengthy conversation Nadia no longer remembered and they have been seeing a lot of each other ever since. They were partners in a couple of school projects and Rosie joined Nadia’s entourage on the way home as her house was just along the tricycle’s route. Compared to her other classmates, Rosie’s liveliness and zest for life seem sincere, and Nadia found herself enjoying her company more and more.

Nadia felt she was closer to Rosie who graduated at a public school before transferring to SantaCeciliaSchool for Girls than any of her classmates with whom she grew up with at the same school since Grade 1. When Rosie did not report to class for a week due to dengue, Nadia visited her at the hospital almost everyday, giving her her recess snacks of peanut butter sandwich and orange juice. When Rosie celebrated her birthday, Nadia gave her a colorful friendship bracelet that was selling like hotcakes at the department store. Nadia was pleased when Rosie was pleased, and, for her, that was enough. So since Rosie loved to talk, Nadia let her talk, let her voice be a soothing balm, and she would remain silent almost every time. When Rosie asked her to share stories, Nadia would turn speechless, trying to figure out what details in her simple life with her simple family would she share that are at par with Rosie’s dramatic tales of family travels and her neighbors’ scandals, then Rosie would pick up where she left off and carry on with the conversation as if nothing happened.

Shortly after, Serena, another classmate who was just as bubbly, became close to Rosie. They have secrets Nadia did not know, but she did not mind. She understood that they were closer than she and Rosie were, because they are second-degree cousins and neighbors. Still, Nadia, in her aloof manner, made herself readily available whenever she thought Rosie needed her, even after the three of them went on to separate colleges after finishing high school. When Rosie’s house in the middle of a slum area got burned down along with her neighbors’ houses, Nadia went through her closet and picked out clothes to give Rosie. After Rosie’s family rebuilt their house, Nadia would visit a couple of times in a year and bring food. On some occasions, Rosie was not around due to school activities or she went on a date with her first boyfriend.

By her third year in college, Nadia’s visits to Rosie became less frequent as she got caught up in her responsibilities as a student leader and her thesis required more of her time. She rarely heard from Rosie as well. But Nadia didn’t mind; she understood how Rosie would be just as busy as her. They exchanged how-are-you text messages every now and then. One summer day before she started fourth year, Nadia visited Rosie’s house only to be met by her friend’s gregarious but kind mother who filled her in on some shocking updates—how Rosie had long broken up with her first boyfriend and recently met, through a relative, a good man from another province; how Serena has stopped her college studies to give birth to a baby; how Serena’s irresponsible boyfriend, a former seminarian, was not standing up to his responsibilities as a father; how Serena came to Rosie to borrow money and never returned it; how Serena ran away from home to stay at Rosie’s house for three days after a fight with her mother over her unwanted pregnancy; and how Rosie was so busy with so many school projects that demand market research.

Nadia went home, feeling betrayed and guilty. Since she could not figure out the reasons for her emotions, she set them aside and went on with her life—she graduated top of her class, met a good man from a non-profit group who became her first boyfriend, renovated her parents’ home, landed on a decent job in a big corporation, got promoted twice, pursued postgraduate studies, and worked as a part-time college instructor. This happened in the span of seven years. Within this time, Nadia visited Rosie every birthday and Rosie did the same until Nadia stopped visiting her the past two birthdays. Sometime during this period, Nadia’s boyfriend met an accident and had to stay in the hospital for three weeks. Rosie visited once and gave cash assistance, which Nadia was grateful of.

Then the big announcement came. Rosie was getting married to her second boyfriend. She invited Nadia to be part of the offertory. Although hurt that she was not included as among the bride’s maids, Nadia kept silent and agreed. Rosie and her husband, now a corporate bigwig with a job that requires him to travel to different parts of the country, built their home in the southern part of the province. Nadia visited her twice with her boyfriend. Each time, Rosie was always talkative, detailing how happy and lucky she was. Nadia, in turn, was happy to know that Rosie was content with her picture-perfect situation—she has work to occupy her time, a rich husband, a beautiful house, a lovely car, two house maids, and a refrigerator brimming with food—which, from what she gathered from Rosie, was quite different from the situation of Serena who was a single mother living in her parents’ house and struggling from one job to the other.

Six months later, Rosie made another big announcement. She was pregnant. She informed Nadia through a text message. Nadia expressed her happiness, acutely reminded of how everything was falling almost into place, according to Rosie’s plan hatched in high school. “When I grow up, I want a beautiful house with a garden, a husband with work and can provide for me and my children, and a car. I want to get married at 26 and have two babies—a boy first then girl—before I reach 30…” Rosie had shared. It turned out that Rosie’s first baby was indeed a boy. The announcement came from Rosie’s husband through a private message over Facebook a week after Rosie’s birth. Nadia sighed. Somehow, she half expected such case to happen. Still, she felt somehow hurt, betrayed, and guilty, and she could not understand why.

Three weeks later, while giving out lessons to college students, Nadia received a text message from her mother informing her that Rosie and her husband had dropped by their home after visiting a nearby caterer for their son’s baptism. They invited Nadia to be a godmother. Two nights followed before Rosie sent Nadia a text message echoing the invitation. With painful emotions she could not explain, she replied, “I will think about it.” And think she did, from the first time they met to the recent text message. They have been meeting on and off over the past 15 years. During this time, Nadia had learned to open up bits and pieces of her life, sharing her ideas on the city’s public safety measures and her thoughts on love relationships, with which Rosie has an elegant way of switching the conversation to other topics that would eventually discuss about her familial happiness. Each time, Nadia hadn’t minded; in fact, she even smiled and accepted the turn of the discourse. Rosie was Rosie, she had thought with natural acceptance. Now, looking back, it suddenly struck her that the past decade or so has always been about Rosie. And she wondered, was Rosie really as happy as she claimed to be? Does she really know Rosie after all these years? Does Rosie know her? Were they merely friends by obligation to memory and family? What has changed?

It took a week before Nadia finally made a decision. Before she started her Saturday afternoon class, she opened her phone and sent a text message, “I’m sorry, Rosie, I could not make it to the baptism next month.” She sighed. Then she put the ringer off and went to face her students with a smile that reflected the lightness of her heart to start the three-hour lesson.

The End

One does not need to do a lot of analysis to figure out that many poor parents in Cebu are too hard up to put food on the table and send their children to school. But there are others who are propelled by the belief that a good education for their children can end the vicious cycle of their hardship, and so they send their eldest of five or so kids to (almost free) public schools, while they trade anything from pirated DVDs to homemade fishballs on the streets and in the markets, and hope for the best.

Fortunately, we hear of some feel-good stories of eldest children, most likely forced to grow up quite fast with a certain expectation packed up in his school bag for every day he goes to school, who made a success out of his or her studies and compete for every college scholarship he or she would learn of. Others are not so lucky, and parents are quick to lay the blame on the teachers, which could be (partly) true.

There is a slight discomfort in this seemingly trite equation, though. Many of these families rely on other people for their children’s education. I think paying someone else to teach one’s children does not give that one the right to complain if his children are not performing well. Education is a tricky thing; for all we know, his children are naturally brilliant but their learning has been challenged with rough obstacles, such as poor nutrition, lack of resources, and lack of parental guidance.

This lead to one point: education is family business. For this matter, there is a need for more sustainable family literacy projects, especially for the poor, which, I think, are above and beyond the rigorous storytelling sessions we have for poor children every weekend.

Family literacy

It is with excitement that I present to you Alimbukad: Basa Pamilya (A Family Literacy Project, Educational Excellence through Parental Engagement), a joint project of Zonta Club of Cebu II and the Cebu City Public Library (CCPL). The two partners will launch this project on July 16, which is timely as it is National Children’s Book Day.

The project’s goal is to improve the literacy of underprivileged parents and children and break the cycle of educational difficulties by empowering parents to take leadership role in their children’s education.

Basically, the set up goes like this. Twenty parents and their preschool children, aged four to five years old, who are enrolled in the three day care centers of Barangay Capitol, Cebu City—the pilot site where CCPL is located—will have 12 two-hour weekly sessions every Friday following the launch. Wi Suan Ti, a teacher for nearly four decades and a member of the Zonta Club of Cebu II, will facilitate these sessions at CCPL.

While parents undergo free intensive training in literacy and oral language development (reading aloud, book talk, phonetic learning activities, and print awareness), the children will be in a separate room doing literacy activities with adult volunteers. Then parents and children will get together for a Parent and Child Together Time (PACT), which is designed by the parents and the mentors to encourage a sense of discovery and play and improve parent-child communication.

“Parents are a child’s first and important teacher. They must be equipped on how and what to teach. It is not enough that they enrol their children in school; they have to be part of their children’s learning development if they want their children to become successful in the future,” said CCPL Librarian Rosario Ruth Chua when I visited her two weeks ago.

Alimbukad: Basa Pamilya is funded by the Zonta Club of Cebu II, but the organizers will continue to seek assistance, be it financial or book donations, from individuals and companies. Funds will be used to purchase teaching and reading materials, book bags, snacks, transportation subsidy, and school supplies. Mentors and auxiliary staff are all volunteers.

If you wish to help through financial or books donations, please call up (6332) 412-4460 or (6332) 253-1526 and look for Mrs. Chua.

Integration, Sustainability

Believing that integration of literacy activities is a vital part of the program, the organizers will provide each family with a book bag that contains books to read aloud and talk about during the week.

There will also be a checklist of other activities to do at home, including nursery rhymes, singing, identifying letters and sounds, and making entries in ABC book, among others.

Parents are required to do at least 20 minutes of family literacy activities with their children at home everyday, and hopefully, even after the program, the family will continue with them as a regular productive habit. Parents who will be performing well will be granted with incentives, such as sacks of rice.

Mrs. Chua indulged me by posing inside CCPL's Children's Reading Center.

A checklist to record their child’s weekly progress and a Home Reading Response Book will serve as the parents’ monitoring tools. For the children, they will undergo an exit assessment to evaluate his or her preschool readiness. Their day care teachers will also be interviewed and onsite observation will be conducted to gather additional data. Monthly follow-up activities hope to ensure sustainability of the program’s objectives.

“We do not intend to make this program a passing program. We definitely want to see results among our parents and children. And when we do, we will replicate this program to the other barangays in CebuCity,” said Mrs. Chua.

Looking at the big picture, I think the program, if carried out well, will be able to address several issues simultaneously, including bonding between parents and children through reading, increased positive school performance, stronger love for reading, and increased library attendance, among others.

Then perhaps, in the near future, one need not do a lot of analysis to figure out why many poor parents in Cebupersonally teach and learn with their children and still send them to school, no matter how hard up they are to put food on the table.

Well, for now, I have hope (and support) to match the program's purpose.

- Nancy-

"Children are made readers on the laps of their parents" -Emilie Buchwald

For a change, I attempted something I have never done before in this blog: read aloud a couple of verses written by Cornelio Festin Faigao, record my utterly nasal and dry voice on my phone, and uploaded them on Soundcloud. Ta-da.

Perhaps my next statement will sound off-putting to you, but I think that one cannot be in Cebu, Philippinesfor long and not know who Faigao was (and is, in the minds and hearts of young journalists, literary writers, and educators today). He was a poet, fiction writer, essayist, journalist, scholar, teacher, and lawyer, apart from being a husband and a father. He was born in Romblon, studied in Manilaand Cebu, and worked in Cebu.

Until I attended the launching of two Faigao books last June, I only know Faigao as the revered man honored through one of the most coveted annual writer’s fellowship in the country—the Cornelio F. Faigao Memorial Annual Writers Workshop—that is running 28 years now

The University of San Carlos (USC) Press in cooperation with The Freeman Lifestyle launched two Faigao books last June 8 at the Waterfront Cebu City Hotel and Casino. These two books are Canto Voice by Cornelio F. Faigao and The Female Heart and Other Plays by his daughter, pioneering Filipino-American playwright Linda Faigao-Hall. (On the side, I attempted something different during the launching, too; it must be the Faigao spirit. You see, I donned leotards and bright green and orange loose pants and tied my short hair in a ponytail—all these things I haven’t done in a long time.)

Canto Voice, which is edited by Hope Sabanpan-Yu, director of USC’s Cebuano Studies Center, is a collection of Faigao’s satirical but thought-provoking interpretation of the socio-political landscape of his times. While these verses were published in the Pioneer Press in the 1950s, many of these are still relevant to what is going on today.

In her introduction, Yu said: “Faigao’s poetry shapes the reader into an active thinker, requiring the interpretive function in a specifically aggressive manner, as it continually asks the reader to isolate a phrase or person from the original contest and put this into a new framework in which it has been presented in the poems.”

I chose this part of her introduction because it resonated to me. I mean, it happened with me, when I read verse after verse of Faigao’s collection that I bought during the launching, another unusual move inspired by the series of readings by Eileen Mangubat, publisher of Cebu Daily News; Mila Espina, columnist of Sun.Star Cebu; and Joeberth Ocao, editor of The Freeman.

Here are two of my many favorite verse columns by Faigao, The Youth (page 24) and Roads (page 17) taken from Canto Voice. Enjoy!

- Nancy-

Many fairytales in the West present stepmothers as evil. They are tall, with arched eyebrows and tightly clipped hairstyles; and they are, if I may say so, exceptionally fashionable. At least, that is how I picture them in my mind, a personal view reinforced by children’s picture books and animated movies. As obvious examples, there is the intriguing stepmother of Snow White, the predictable stepmother of Cinderella, and the crazy stepmother of Rapunzel.

It is easy to believe stepmothers as evil because they are not related to the protagonist by blood. Suffice it to say, if the protagonist is good then his or her parents must also be good. Apparently, I assume that goodness must run strongly in the blood of the family that the vileness must be embodied in a complete stranger outside the family in order to create absolute ideals that are necessary ingredients in a fairy tale.

So, when I read Tingting a Bolawan and Her Wicked Aunts, my eyebrows arched in incredulity at how two aunts could “kidnap” their poor sister’s sons and daughter (named Tingting a Bolawan), put the infants in a water vessel, and throw it to the river, and how they would go through such desperate measures to ensure the children who survive to become beautiful and courageous and kind men and woman would die. There is no mention of a motivation, apart from their natural ability to be really good at being evil. Add to that is the father’s temperament that drives him to order his wife bath in hot water daily. From today’s point of view, Tingting a Bolawan’s family relations appear like a bunch of crazies and this is no fairy tale fit for a kid.

But by the by, this is a story worth treasuring since it is a folktale passed on for many generations and properly recorded in the first non-periodical series of “Mindanao Art and Culture” produced by the University Research Center of the Mindanao State University in the Islamic City of Marawi in 1979. The first of the series collected the Agamaniyog Folktales. Agamaniyog is the setting of many popular Maranao folktales and fables. It means “land of coconuts” (agama is a Sanskrit word for “religion” but the Maranaos extended the meaning to include a town, while niyogmeans “coconut”) but in folklore, it is a land of splendour and glory, a fairyland.

According to Mamitua Saber, one of the editors of Mindanao Art and Culture in this first collection, the Maranaos, which means “people of the lake” who settled around the edge of Lake Lanao that is surrounded with myths and legends, often use this setting in their stories peppered with color and moral values, much like those from the Arabian tales, reflecting an Arabian influence in folklore.

Tinikling dance of the Maranaos (source: www.maranao.com)

I chanced upon this non-periodical series at the library of St. Theresa’s College (STC) where I am teaching one subject this semester. STC is also where I finished by college studies. I remember that STC has a museum that proudly shows a glimpse of Maranao culture. But I recently just got back and the area that used to house the museum while I was studying is now a media center. I am now making a mental note to ask where the museum was relocated.

For now, why not read here the story of Tingting a Bolawan and Her Wicked Aunts, my dear readers. Enjoy!

Tingting a Bolawan and Her Wicked Aunts (A Mindanao Folktale) from Nancy Cudis

- Nancy -

Let me tell you a story, a heart-warming one about how stories can be good company to a lonely child, the magic of friendship, and how a friend’s energetic retelling of memories as fairy tales can inexplicably restore a sick child to good health.

In her short story, Pure Magic, Lakambini Sitoy, an award-winning Filipino writer, illustrates the therapeutic power of stories. It tells the adventures of Ellen who looks forward to summer playing with Mirava, a neighbor and close friend. When they meet, both would make up tall tales about strange looking things in Ellen’s grandmother’s house. These tales create deep-seated mental pictures that could pass as strong motifs for the story, such as the scrap of paper under the grandmother’s bed, which transformed itself, with the children’s powerful imagination, into a love letter from a long-lost fiancé.

Then Mirava gets so sick that her elders think she is going to die. But Ellen is brimming with optimism that her friend will recover and with restlessness over what she can do for her.

Without Mirava none of the secrets of the big old house and the garden were real. I need some magic, she thought. Some magic to bring them back. But she knew she couldn’t do it all on her own. All by herself she wasn’t that powerful. She needed Mirava. And Mirava was ill. But that was it, she thought. Mirava she couldbring back. And she knew just how to do it.

While the story ended with a warm sense of poignancy and hope, it gives the readers something to remember and think about: give children the opportunity to play, build friendships, make stories, create memories, and be optimistic. And to the adults, let’s learn from our children.

I placed here a Slideshare copy of the story, Pure Magic, for you to read and enjoy. I discovered Pure Magic in The Golden Loom (1997), a collection of Carlos Palanca MemorialAwards for Literature (short story for children category) compiled by Tahanan Books for Young Readers. I bought this collection from MuseoPambata where I had an awesome time rediscovering just how colorful and vibrant and alive children and their imaginations are.

Pure Magic by Lakambini Sitoy from Nancy Cudis

Big thanks to Lakambini Sitoy for the great read. She has published three books of fiction (Filles de Sweethaven, Jungle Planet, and Mens Rea). She has received numerous prizes in the

Philippines

, including first prize in the 1996 Don Carlos Palanca Memorial Awards for Literature for her story, Pure Magic. I just found out she has a blog called Letters from the Outlands.

One of the favorite playthings of children visitors at Museo Pambata (Photo by Nancy Cudis)

Ellen’s story acutely reminded me of a poem by Robert Louis Stevenson in his collection, A Child’s Garden of Verses. It’s called “Foreign Lands”. Here is the complete text:

Foreign Lands

By Robert Louis Stevenson

Up into the cherry tree

Who should climb but little me?

I held the trunk with both my hands

And looked abroad on foreign lands.

I saw the next door garden lie,

Adorned with flowers before my eye,

And many pleasant places more

That I had never seen before.

I saw the dimpling river pass

And be the sky’s blue looking-glass;

The dusty roads go up and down

With people tramping in to town.

If I could find a higher tree,

Farther and father I should see,

To where the grown-up river slips

Into the sea among the ships.

To where the roads on either hand

Lead onward into fairy land,

Where all the children dine at five,

And all the playthings come alive.

Stories, such as those that Ellen share with Mirava, are said to speak a child’s language because, with color and images, they provide situations children can relate with, which direct to issues on anger, bullying, loss, and abuse, among others.

Storytelling is a good step to introducing children to the printed word, to literature. This leads me to remind us that one of the important roles that adults hold when it comes to children and books: make sure children and books come together often and ensure that their reading or story experience is happy, stimulating, and memorable.

So, bottomline is, fill your child's world with good stories!

Source: Literature for Children: A Short Introduction by David L. Russell

- Nancy-

A public seminar about libraries and book reviewing in Cebuis a rare gem, something I don’t get to hear often. So when Tarie Sabido of Asia in the Heart, World on the Mind, one of my favorite bloggers, announced on her blog that she and Zarah Gagatiga of School Librarian in Action, another favorite blogger, were coming to Cebu on July 20, for a public tête-à-tête with librarians, I signed up immediately, even when I had my librarianship in my past life and I’m currently stuck with being a friend of the library.

A fan girl among great people. (L-R: Tari, me, Zarah, and Ms. Ani Almario of Adarna House)

“Basa, mga Kapatid! A Free Seminar on Library Activities and Book Reviewing” was organized by the Philippine Board on Books for Young People (PBBY) in partnership with Adarna House and University of San Jose-Recoletos (where I'm completing my post-graduate studies).

Here are some significant details: The PBBY is a private, non-stock, non-profit organization dedicated to the development of children’s literature in the Philippines. It takes the lead in celebrating the National Children’s Book Day (NCBD) that is celebrated every third week of July to commemorate the anniversary of the publication of the Philippines’ national hero Jose Rizal’s “The Monkey and the Turtle” in London. This year, “Basa, mga Kapatid!” is the theme of NCBD.

Zarah, a librarian, is the past chair of the organization. Now, it’s Tarie, a teacher and a book reviewer, who is taking the helm. As a regular reader of their blogs, I think they are both fantastic persons.

During the seminar, I arrived in time to catch Zarah discussing the concepts of a library and the implications of the K-12 program on libraries and libraries. She provided a multi-dimensional value to the library, which I appreciated very much. She posed the simple question, “What is a library?”

She went on to explain four concepts that should characterize a library:

systems, wherein the library should be a source of all information that is significant to the public, including government forms (it was a light bulb moment when I heard this);
structures that covers physical, virtual, and intellectual, such that libraries are still considered essential in researches and in being avenues for relationship building, between readers, between teachers and librarians, and most importantly, between readers and librarians;
culture, wherein libraries develops reading culture, book awareness, and lifelong learning among readers, teaching children early on the basic principles of intellectual rights, among others; and
community, with Zarah emphasizing that “it takes a community to nurture a library” (especially a public one, since its scope and reach is much bigger than that of a school library)

With the recent implementation of the K-12 program in the Philippines, Zarah said that the implication of this development on libraries and librarians include:

engagement in continuous and meaningful professional development activities
establishment of local, regional, national, and global links and networks through information communication technologies
challenge for libraries to be K-12 librarians and lifelong learners (which will open librarians to more opportunities to reach out to the young, especially by collaborating with teachers)

Zarah recommended several teacher-librarian collaboration activities:

involve teaching in the selection and evaluation of learning resources and media (library open house or media shop)
provide hands-on training and library user education to teachers (IT Camp, information literacy forums, or workshops and seminars)
sit down and talk about the curriculum, unit plans, lessons to cover and resources to use (Kapihan sa Aklatan or Teacher’s Library Day)
compile a reading list that addresses a reading purpose (Reader’s Choice Awards or Top Ten Books or Apps of the Month)

The way Zarah said them, they all sounded so ideal yet practical, so I hoped the librarians, teachers, and students present will consider them in their future plans.

In the afternoon, Tarie shared tips on book reviewing, especially children's books, but that would be another blog post.

I also met new friends, Sister Donna and Clifford, whom I am communicating with now via Instagram.

On the side, what's a book event without books? So I bought three lovely Adarna House books--Diwayen, Noong Bago Dumating ang mga Espanyol by Augie Rivera; Si Ambongan by Lamberto E. Antonio; and Bru-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha...Bru-hi-hi-hi-hi-hiby Ma. Corazon Remigio. I will attempt to provide a book review (something I haven't done for a long time) on Remigio's work because it's my favorite of the three. It reminded me closely of my own grandmother (and besides, the kid looked a lot like me when I was her age).

The main character in the book and myself

Now, for the good news, I have a book giveaway for my readers and followers in Cebu! Yay! It will have to be in Cebufor now; I will throw an international giveaway another time. Or international and Filipino readers (outside Cebu) can still join but the books won will be donated to the book drive initiated by these groups in Cebu. Come on, guys, this is your chance to help out, too!

The instructions are simple. Just share (in detail, if possible) your memorable library experience in the comment section. I will pick two winners. Each winner will get to choose three of the six books from my personal collection. I will announce the winners on August 24. That’s it! So keep those lovely stories coming! In exchange, here are the books:

Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
Bleeding Kansas by Sara Paretsky
Selected Poems of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Iguana Dreams edited by Oscar Hijuelos
On Being Told That Her Second Husband has Taken His First Lover and Other Stories by Tess Slesinger
75 Readings: An Anthology edited by Santi Busceni and Charlotte Smith

- Nancy -

This is my first time to join #BookBeginnings hosted by Gillion of Rose City Reader and my renewed attempt to join a meme. When I started reading The Flight of Gemma Hardy by Margot Livesey and began following Gillion’s blog at the same time, I was tempted to join in. That was a long time ago. For some reason, I never managed to punch the keys and submit my post.

Now, I’m beginning to read another book that many publishers, or readers for that matter, would easily classify as middle-grade, given the colorful cover design, the age of the main characters, and the mystery-driven storyline. The story tells of two friends’ search for their missing friend and a missing valuable sculpture. On a personal note, Blue Balliett’s The Calder Game transcends beyond just another middle-grade mystery by how the author wrote it.

Some time ago, I read Blue Balliett’s The Wright 3 and I was pleasantly surprised by how the book turns out to be some sort of a subtle self-exploration guide for the young. Admirably, Balliett effectively used something that other authors would readily use as a tool for fights and revenge without fully helping readers understand and appreciate it: art. While I am trying to read as many books as I can in my lifetime, I haven’t came across a book yet similar to Balliett’s refreshing and poetic attempt at making sense of one’s young self through art and at the same time pushing readers, young and adult alike, to think harder as they wade through a quite challenging set of clues.

Now, reading the first page of The Calder Game. I realized I just have to share this suspended interest opening with you, even when I am not sure if this kind of book is acceptable in the meme, since I’ve observed several posts on literary and women’s fiction submitted for this I-look-forward-to weekly event.

The setting is a very old town in England. It is dawn, a pale October dawn that pours through the streets like cream, erasing line and dissolving shadow. Red ivy stir against damp stone; the houses are stone, the walls are stone, the street is stone. A lace curtain has escaped through an open window and waves unseen in the early light. Now a black cat blinks, stretches, and slowly crosses the empty square, stepping carefully around a raise sign that reads, Minotaur, Alexander Calder, 1959.

My fascination for mysteries from almost all reading levels has been constantly reinforced by the likes of Sarah Paretsky and Dorothy L. Sayers. My next read would most likely be a Dorothy L. Sayers book. I miss her witty writing. By then, that would be another #BookBeginnings post.

- Nancy-

Oh, the old valuable books our libraries publicly make available but hardly borrowed! This was my first thought when I came across—and borrowed—The Aswang Syncrasy in Philippine Folklore, a 1971 paper-published-into-a-book by Maximo D. Ramos, considered the “Dean of Philippine Lower Mythology” from the library of St. Theresa’s College (STC).

The smell of book is nauseating, proof that it has not been opened in many years. The pages have yellowed over the years, with many of them maddeningly stained and dog-eared by a few of its previous borrowers. Still, I carried on and let so many familiar words, descriptions of landscapes, and familiar stories from childhood leap out to me from the pages.

The perks of being an instructor even for just one subject at STC where I also graduated is I can return the book at anytime within the five-month semester. So yes, the book is still with me and has been for the last four weeks. It’s my first non-fiction book I completed reading in two years. And quickly at that, since it holds a topic fascinating to me ever since I read The Mythology Class by Arnold Arre: aswangs, a Filipino term (dominantly used among the Tagalogs, Bicolanos, and Visayas in the

Philippines

) that refers to a lot of mythical beings of the European tradition, including:

the blood-sucking vampire, disguised as a beautiful woman who “uses the tip of its tongue, pointed like the proboscis of a mosquito, to pierce the jugular vein”;

the self-segmenting viscera sucker, which disguises itself as an attractive woman (why does it have to be a woman again?) by day and discards its lower body from the waist down to fly or float and to suck out the internal organs or to feed on the voided phlegm of the sick with its tongue that is “extended, narrow, and tubular like a drinking straw…and it is capable of being distended to a great length”;

the man-eating weredog, which could be a man or woman (but more of the man this time) that turns into a ferocious dog (since wolves are not endemic to the Philippines) at night, attacks villagers, and prey on kids who cry too much;

the vindictive or evil-eye witch, could be a man or woman, but oftentimes the latter, who is extremely vindictive (never underestimate the stubbornness of an angry woman!) or causes sickness without meaning to do so by “magically intruding various objects through the victim’s bodily orifices or by herself entering the victim’s body…”; and

the carrion-eating ghoul, that steal human corpses and devour them with “its nails (that) are horny, curved, and sharp and its teeth pointed”.

In his paper, Ramos is quick to point out to the readers that these creature of lower mythology do not exactly fit into the traditional European categories, given the distance and cultural variables. Creatures of lower mythology, according to Wayland D. Hand of the University of Californiain a 1963 lecture, are “fabular beings below the rank of ghosts, ancestral spirits, saints, angels, and beneficent deities”.

The beauty—or the grossness (however you take it)—of Ramos’ paper is he differentiated the characteristics of the five aspects of the aswang mentioned above in admirably great detail, believing that a responsible student of mythology should make the distinction first to help future students do further research on the subject.

It seems that Ramos took on that responsibility quite well. More than that, he collected stories from students of Philippine and European mythology at the University of the East and included some of them in his paper, supporting his descriptions of the five aspects that encompass the Philippine aswang.

“A fresh insight into Philippine society can thus be gained from a knowledge of the folk belief concerning the aswang creatures,” Ramos concluded at the end of his paper before he shared the stories about the said monsters from the different islands in the Philippines.

Here are some of my insights about certain Filipino beliefs gained from his paper, some of them may still be prevalent, especially in the rural areas:

Parents prefer to marry off their children into families they know rather well for fear that a handsome stranger might be a vampire. According to Ramos, “this fear, added to the desire of mestizos to marry among themselves for reasons of race and from a wish to keep the family poperty intact, has blocked the enculturation of Filipinos of white extraction in the provincial towns”.

Beliefs about the viscera sucker may have encourage the prone sleeping position to protect or hide the sleeper’s bodily orifices.

While many writers have attributed the steep pitch of the old-type Philippine thatched roof to the heavy tropical rainfall, Ramos suggests that steep roofs with its crossed bamboo staves sharpened at the ends (considered an effective tool against the said monsters) was created to provide the aswang with less chance of balancing themselves on such a roof and preying on its victims.

Belief in vampires and viscera suckers can help explain why Filipinos in the rural areas “hang at the eaves of their homes the carapaces of marine crabs, lobsters, prawns, and stuffed sea fish” because these would remind the aswang of their salt-water habitat (salt being something the aswangs fear). This could explain Filipino’s partiality over salt, sour, and spicy foods, which are considered as repellents against the aswang.

In the past, cascading long hair is the ideal for the Filipino women, especially those pregnant, to protect themselves from weredogs.

When you visit rural homes, you might still find a sting ray’s tail that is readily used by parents to discipline their wayward child to exorcise any witch that might have entered the child’s body.

The belief in witches has helped created an extremely polite people such that Filipinos develop an evasive glance, not looking one another straight in the eye, and being courteous for fear that being cross with another person who could be a witch will be quickly taken ill.

While other cultures are generally solemn and reserved at mortuary vigils, Filipinos are quite noisy, being on guard (with games and food) against ghouls that might steal the dead.

According to Ramos, the Filipino’s habit of “promiscuously spitting in public places may have derived from his ancestors’ custom of chewing aromatic betel, the juice of which was believed effective in scaring off the aswang creatures as one went about his daily chores or walked in the wood”.

I think this one is the most interesting: Ramos went on to surmise that the Filipino’s habit of urinating in parks or at the roadsides (I’m looking at you, boys), especially where there are no comfort rooms, was born of his belief that salt, such as that in urine, could drive the aswang away.

Oh, there are so much more insights into rural Philippine society you could gather out of this paper, which is about 100 pages. You can download it for a certain fee at JSTOR: The Aswang Syncrasy in Philippine Folklore.

Ramos is also the author of Boyhood in Moonsoon Country, another book I borrowed from STC. I was captivated by the stories of nostalgia the book contained. It took me many hours after I borrowed the book to realize that its author and the writer of The Aswang Syncrasy is one and the same.

I will share selected interesting stories from Ramos’ paper and from the second book I borrowed—that is, in another post. This post is long enough as it is, though I hope you learned something.

Share with me your concepts and the stories you have heard about the Philippine aswang.

- Nancy-

Joining in the annual reading challenge, Readers Imbibing Peril (RIP), is a decision made naturally (perhaps inevitably) after a couple of blog posts that tackle peril, without me consciously aware of it. These include “Crazy wicked aunts in a Maranao folktale” and “The Aswang Phenomenon”.

Readers Imbibing Peril is hosted by Carl Anderson of Stainless Steel Droppings. I have to thank Nina of Multo (Ghost) and Jay of Bilbliophilopolisfor reminding me through their blogs about this event that hundreds of booklovers join in every year. I have learned about RIP last year but missed my chance of joining it since I learned about it quite belatedly.

Not surprisingly, I will be joining the Peril of the Short Story. I hope to read and post about some odd stories by Filipino writers. By odd, I hope to wallow in the realm of mystery, suspense, thriller, dark fantasy, gothic, horror, supernatural, or, as Carl nicely puts it, “anything sufficiently moody that shares a kinship with the above”.

If nothing crazy is going to happen to me at work, at school, or at my civic groups, I hope to share with you these stories in the coming days:

Reportage on Lovers: A Medley of Factual Romances, Happy or Tragical, Most of Which Made News by Quijano de Manila. The author is the other name that National Artist for Literature Nick Joaquin made famous during his journalism career. And this work is an anthology of (tragic) fiction inspired from the news.

Johny Tiñoso and the Proud Beauty by Nick Joaquin. This is a Philippine contemporary version of one of my favorite fairytales, Beauty and the Beast.

How Love Came to Juan Tamad by Nick Joaquin. Every Filipino knows Juan Tamad. The nice thing about this is that there are Filipino gods engaging with him—Maria Makiling and Monte Banahaw. And it’s an interesting engagement!

Mariang Isda, Peregrina, and Abadeha. These are three different stories—folktales, for that matter—on the Filipino Cinderella.

A Bottle of Storm Clouds by Eliza Victoria. I hope to finish the second half of this speculative fiction anthology. The first half I have talked about here.

If I can finish it in time, I might also be able to share about Book, Line, and Sinker: A Library Lover’s Mystery, a cozy mystery by Jenn McKinlay.

Join me in this event and be awed by the wealth of stories that imbibe readers in peril. But well, we enjoy them thoroughly, right?

- Nancy-

Images taken from Readers Imbibing Peril

Cinderella is not really a personal favorite fairytale, what with Cinderella being physically and emotionally persecuted, bad sisters basking in the joy of making other people miserable, and the prince, er, not exactly an admirable character. I understand they are part of the fairytale formula, but that does not mean I have to like it. Still, the way her story has survived and adapted in different media is proof of how memorable Cinderella truly is.

Cinderella is a folktale that shows triumph of good over evil. It tells the story of a woman who was forced into unfortunate circumstances but nature cooperates with her wishes for a better life. There are so many variants of the story, such that even the Philippines is included in the Wikipedialist and Aarne-Thompson-Uther Folktale Type 510A and Related Stories of Persecuted Heroines list of these variants. Regardless how many variants there are, the name Cinderella has become the archetypal name.

Her story is said to have been published first by Charles Perraultin Histoires ou contest du temps passé(1697), and later by Brothers Grimm in Grimms’ Fairy Tales.

Perrault’s story is what is commonly adapted. From my point of view, it is more likeable and less realistic. All the affable elements we want our young children to know are present, including a charming Cinderella, treated as a servant; a pair of not-so-evil-after-all sisters; the fascinating ball gowns; rodents-turned-servants; the fairy godmother; some cozy magic with a curfew; a rich prince who gets so (stupidly) tongue-tied at the sight of Cinderella’s beauty that he forgets to ask for her name; and the thrilling slipper test.

However, have you read Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm’s version of Cinderella? It has more blood in it than the dainty animated version by Walt Disney, such that the sisters are abnormally cruel even to themselves to the extent that they are eager to cut of their toes and their heels in order to fit in the shoe that is made of gold, not glass. Even the birds, supposedly gentle, are like vultures in the old text, pecking out the eyes of the wicked sisters, rendering them blind for the rest of their lives. In my mind, it was like watching an account of the Game of Thrones series, downplayed but nevertheless gory.

Interestingly, Cinderella’s story is so popular that even Filipinos have their own versions. They manifest how creative the Filipino imagination is and reflect our collective attempt at self-expression. I found four Filipino Cinderellas—two in an old book and two online:

Maria and the Golden Slipper. This is found in Dean S. Fansler’s Filipino Popular Tales. His source is Dolores Zafra, a Tagalog from Pagsanjan, Laguna, who learned about the story as a little girl. It contains the usual facets of Perrault’s version, with Maria as Cinderella, except for the presence of the fairy godmother. In this story, the spirit of Maria’s mother is reincarnated in the body of crab that is cooked, eaten, and shell planted to grow into a gift-giving talking tree.

When night came, Rosa and Damiana went to the ball, and Juana retired for the night as soon as her daughters were gone. When Maria saw that her aunt was sleeping, she went into the garden and asked the tree for what she wanted. The tree changed her clothes into very beautiful ones, and furnished her with a fine coach drawn by four fine horses, and a pair of golden slippers.

Abadeha, the Philippine Cinderella. This is adapted by Myrna J. de la Paz. While it contains the Cinderella formula, the landscape upon where the personalities move about is so characteristic of the Philippines. There is the river by which a lot of women’s tasks are done (washing, fetching water, and the like); there is the mention of a stingray to be used as a punishment whip; there are spirits roaming around and ancestors to be prayed to; there is respect for animals, including chickens, and trees; and there’s a chieftain who orders his son to use the drum to announce something.

And Abadeha ran out to her coop where she found the dead chicken’s feet. Clutching them, she ran to the river, and again, the spirit appeared. She told her to plant the feet on her mother’s grave and pray to her ancestors, and the girl did just so. The rainy season came and went, and the girl went back to check the grave site. What a surprise she had! The chicken feet that she had planted had grown into an enchanted tree flowering with all sorts of treasures, such as rings, bracelets, necklaces, earrings, pearls, diamonds, and golden dresses.

Mariang Isda. This is a Visayan story I found in Stories and Legends from Filipino Folklore by Sister Maria Delia Coronel, ICM. Her source is Lita Troyal from Matalom, Leyte, as narrated by Ardelia Calderon. Unlike the first two versions, this one tells of how sad Maria is at home in the company of her father and stepmother. Living along the coast, she saved and befriended a talking fish. The folks think her mad. This is how she got the nickname, Mariang Isda (isda is Tagalog for fish).

One bright morning, the barrio people were astonished to find Maria gone. His father and stepmother inquired from all the people vainly for Maria was not around. People say the sea god had transformed her into a mermaid. Others believed the mysterious fish had taken Maria with her, never to come back to her cruel world. Until now, where Mariang Isda is, nobody knows.

Perigrina. This is another Visayan story in the same book by Sister Coronel. Her source is Ernestina Dalugdog from Calape, Mantataog, Bohol, as narrated by Tonette Solatan. It has a unique combination of all the three tales above as well as the elements of Perrault’s version. It tells of Perigrina’s stress in the company of an evil stepmother and two stepsisters. Periang (her nickname) befriends a fish who sacrifices itself as food for her stepfamily in order to help Perigrina. The fish bones are planted and grow into an enchanted tree that blossoms gems and lovely gowns.

Anzat her stepmother found out and grabbed the fruits Periang had gathered but she was instantly turned into a stone statue. Upon seeing this, Pukay and Kikay were alarmed and they lay flat on the ground and kissed the hem of Perigrina’s skirt, promising her that they would never be jealous and unkind to her again. Perigrina forgave them. Anzat regained her old self but they all learned a lesson to be kind and good always.

What other old variants of Cinderella have you read or heard? Share with me and I would be glad to read them.

- Nancy-

This is a blog entry for the R.eaders I.mbibing P.eril (RIP) hosted by Stainless Steel Droppings.

This post is a sequel to the entry I made on an old paper byMaximo D. Ramos. Did I mention how his paper published into a book by the Philippine Folklore Society in 1971 became my first non-fiction book in two years? It is divided into two parts—the first part explains the behavior of the aswang in five different aspects while the second part shares stories contributed by students in Philippine and European mythology at the University of the East. These stories have been handed down from various sources; others were written from memory based on how family members, relatives, friends, and neighbors narrated them.

This is my first time to come across these stories, but a lot of elements are present in the stories I personally heard from my grandparents, such as the tiktiksounds outside the roof when a family member is pregnant, strange car accidents on a narrow road deemed to be haunted or passed by enchanted creatures on their way to their tree-homes, and a cursed family living right beside a haunted balete tree. A central figure in these stories is the faith healer. If I could find a reliable source about faith healers, I might make a separate blog post about him or her.

Anyway, for this post, I’m going to share with you four very short stories out of the 87 stories, selected with personal bias but primarily based on the element of surprise it evoked within me when I read them (or the way my left eyebrow raised involuntarily a notch higher when I pored over these brief stories).

Feast in a cemetery (contributed by Wigberto N. Corpuz, 19, from Agno, Pangasinan, who had it from Eleanor Narvaiz Corpuz, 24, an elementary school teacher from Tidog, Agno who in turn had it from Josefa Nitafan Corpuz, 60, of the same community)

My grandfather said that one day at sunset while he was going home to our barrio, he passed through the cemetery. Halfway through, he saw four individuals quarrelling at their meal. A head was on the tomb but he did not give it any significance. They invited him to join them but he ran away. When he got home his face was very pale because he remembered that his cousin had been buried recently. (Translated from Iloko text)

A house full of vampires (contributed by Immaculada B. Blancaflor, 32, from Santa, Ilocos Sur, who collected it from Teofista Bumagat, 19, a housemaid from Dueñas, Iloilo)

There was a soldier who got lost in Dueñas, a barrio in Iloilo. Because he knew someone there named Sario, he decided to go to Sario’s house. “Sario, Sario, this is your soldier friend Ruben. May I sleep here for the night?” He was let in and led into the only room in Sario’s house. He noticed that there were many people in the house. “I did not know you had many visitors, it is very embarrassing,” said the soldier. “They are friends of my mother, and by and by they will leave,” answered Sario. When Ruben was asleep, he was suddenly awakened by a peculiar smell. He heard movements in the room and then he felt something touching him. He saw that it was a big bat. He pulled out his bolo and shouted, “You devil, I will kill you.” Then he called Sario. When Sario came into the room, the bat and the smell disappeared. Sario left the room. After a while, Ruben again felt something touching his body. It felt like the tip of sharp needle. He shouted and brought out his bolo. Sario came to the room again and said, “Mother, don’t fool around here.” Ruben got scared and decided to leave the house. The moon was full and bright as he came out of his room. Bu its light he saw bodies in the sala, cut through the waist with no heads. He hurriedly took salt and sprinkled it on the cut bodies. Then Ruben left the house. He decided to spend the rest of the night in another house and there he learned that the mother of Sario was the head of the aswang in Barrio Dueñas, and it was in Sario’s house that the aswang periodically met. (Translated from Tagalog text)

A viscera sucking mother-in-law (contributed by Corazon Manuel, 30, from Bangued, Abra, who collected it from Francisco Alforque, 60, a farmer from Naga, Cebu City)

From my grandparents I have hear many stories about aswang. Among many, I heard this story: There was a family in a small village known as having all the blood of aswang. There was a beautiful lady in this family and many wanted to court her. There was a man from another village who had seen the lady and wanted to marry her. But many people advised him not to marry her. After their marriage, the young couple lived with the family of the girl. Not long after their marriage, the man noticed something. At first the man did not pay attention to this. But there was a time when he saw his mother-in-law bowing down through the floor, and at midnight the mother-in-law flew. The mother-in-law was already so old that her life was very much conditioned between life and death. If her package of being an aswang could not be given to somebody, the dying mother would suffer much. So the wife of the man received the package, and the husband also noted the same event had happened to his wife. At midnight she was always out looking for her victim. And in the following morning, the whole town were puzzled over what had been the cause of the people’s death. (Translated from Cebu-Visayan text)

Rejected suitor hires Igorot manggagamod (Contributed by Norma V. Esposo, 21, from Canarvacanan, Binalonan, Pangasinan, who had it from Estrella Cabay, 25, from the same town, who in turn heard it from her sister Maria)

In 1960 Manag Mer had two suitors—Vicente, a Chinese, and Prangan, a Filipino from Pozorrubio, Pangasinan. These two courted her a long time but it was Vicente who was answered (accepted) by her. Prangan was angry so he went to Baguioand asked the help of his friend, an Igorot. He had Manang Mer gamod (bewitched) by his friend, so Manag Mer was sick for a long time. There were times when she had a very high fever and times when she felt very cold. We took her to many doctors but she was not cured. So my mother called Tata Andring, an herb healer. Tata Andring placed a stone in her hand, and suddenly the sick woman shouted and her eyes grew bright. She was whipped or chastised by Tata Andring until she talked and said, “I am Prangan, do not chastise me any more because it is painful. I am going to cure Mer.” Manang took saliva from her mouth and placed it on her stomach. Suddenly Manang stood and said, “Why, what happened to me?” From then on she didn’t get sick any more. Tata Andring said that Prangan had taken her footprint, placed it in a bottle, and kept it under a stove. (Translated from Iloko text)

So, what do you think of these stories? What related stories have you heard?

- Nancy-

This is a blog entry for the R.eaders I.mbibing P.eril (RIP) hosted by Stainless Steel Droppings.

What is the best way to celebrate books? Read them, of course. Better yet, share what you have read with others, and encourage others to read, if not with you then on their own.

These endeavors have been happening in Cebu, one event after the other such that this post has become some sort of a summary of what has happened in the past month rather than the past week. While the Sunday Post hosted by Caffeinated Book Reviewer and Showcase Sunday hosted by Books,Biscuits, and Tea request participants to share books and other bookish stuff acquired in the past week, I am going to add a bit of some things beyond the past week, which I have missed posting about for the two memes last week.

From the Library

You know, libraries will always be great resource of old books published before I was born. Old books give me glimpses of the old life, and at St. Theresa’s CollegeLibrary, I borrow seven of them:

The Aswang Syncrasy in Philippine Folklore by Maximo D. Ramos

Stories and Legends from Filipino Folklore by Maria Delia Coronel

The World is an Apple and Other Prize Plays by Alberto S. Florentino

Boyhoodin Monsoon Country by Maximo D. Ramos

The Legend ofMariang Makiling by Jose Rizal

How Love came to Juan Tamad by Nick Joaquin

Johnny Tiñoso and the Proud Beauty by Nick Joaquin

E-books

I also received an e-book copy of Agay Llanera’s Vintage Love. Through Bookrooster, I acquired a copy of Andrew Hall’s Tales of the Strange and Grim while I downloaded a free copy of Weird Tales from Northern Seas by Jonas Lauritz Idemil Lie on Amazon.

Bargain Book Hunt

A book shopper every payday, I went bargain book hunting at Booksale in SM City Cebu and La Belle Aurore Bookshop along Junquera St., CebuCitythe past two weeks, and here are the print book treasures I found:

Book, Line, and Sinker by Jenn McKinlay

The Shape of Water: The First Inspector Montalbano Mystery by Andrea Camilleri

The Curse of the Kings by Victoria Holt

The Good Husband of Zebra Drive by Alexander McCall Smith

The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery

Web logsand Libraries by Laurel A. Clyde

Stephen Fry in America

#ReadingNow

I’m currently reading the following:

Reportage on Lovers by Quijano de Manila

Archie 1000 Page Comics Digest

Book Events

I also signed up for the R.eaders I.mbibing P.eril and I’m happy to have made two posts immediately after signing up—The Filipino Cinderella and The Aswang Phenomenon: Collected Stories.

Perhaps the highlight of the weeks past is the meet-up of Cebu Book Club members in a bookish event last Aug. 30, a workday. My partners, Geezelle, Ken, and Mimi have planned for this, which was why I was a bit sad that only eight people turned up during the event. It was definitely a learning experience for us, and the lessons are well stated by Geezelle on her blog, Geemiz. I am personally thankful to our partners, Patty of onethirdpoundpattyfor doing our poster design; Cebu City Public Libraryfor the venue; La Belle Aurore Bookshop for the gift certificates for the participants; and to Geezelle for helping me shoulder the snacks.

The event title is inspired from Vicky's blog called "Books, Biscuits, and Tea"

Still, it did not discourage us from organizing a sequel to the event, which will be a face-to-face book swapping event soon, sometime in October, and this time it will be a weekend so that many will be able to participate. Looking at the bright side, the important thing is, we started the club and we will continue to roll this until we create a significant degree of presence and gathered a strong force of book lovers in Cebu.

And More Book Events!

I missed the Manila International Book Fair from Sept. 11-15 in Manila, which is an hour’s flight from Cebu. I didn’t make time and I lack the money. So I’m saving up to attend next year.

The voting period for The Filipino Readers’ Choice Awards has ended, and the list of finalists is now up and posted on its site. Judging now starts, and I’m excited to be part of the panel of judges.

Photo by Saint Theresa's College-Cebu

Congratulations to Ms. Desiree Balota and Dulce Jesus Baricuatro, PhD on the launching of their books, “Hibla ng Tubig, Habi ng Himpapawid” and “Leading with Heart and Soul”, respectively, last Sept. 7 at St. Theresa’s College.

Busy weeks I had, huh? How about you, what books have found a home in your shelves? Which ones are you reading?

- Nancy-

P.S. In another non-book related event, which I think still merits being mentioned, is that I got featured as a blogger in Ayosdito.ph, a growing online shopping site dedicated for entrepreneurs, businesses, and consumers. Check out the feature here.

The moment was tense. With heart fluttering, I crossed my legs, smiled at anybody and everybody without really seeing, as the names of the nominees of the Blogger of the Year for the Globe Cebu Media Excellence Awards2013 last Sept. 18 at Marriott Hotel Cebu were flashed onscreen and read:

Adrian Lino S. Arquiza, Eat’s My Life for “The Ten People You’ll Find in a Buffet”

Bjornson Bernales, Bjorn Cebuano Media for “7 Reasons why Cebu should be a Tech Hub”

Marlen D. Limpag, Cebu Business Guide for “School project becomes full-blown guyabano tea business”

Nancy R. Cudis, The Memoriter (formerly Simple Clockwork) for “Getting to know our National Artists for Literature”

VernonJoseph M. Go, Independent blogger for “Tree planting of People Development – Lessons Learned”

Narciso A. Tapia, Cebu Bloggers Society for “Things one should know about dengue”

“And the winner is…” said June Rabin, the event’s emcee who possesses a very admirable voice. “Nancy R. Cudis, The Memoriter for Gettingto know our National Artists for Literature!”

I blinked twice and looked at the screen to make sure it was me. As the crowd clapped, I wobbled my way between tables to the stage in my favorite three-inch wedges, favorite Aztec-inspired blouse (which I would call, on normal days, “a teacher’s safe casual pick”), and boring black pants.

(Then the tweets and Facebook statuses came...)

To which I answered, "Physical book person with an e-reader!" :)

At this time, I was grinning onstage but my mind went up to seventh heaven already, as shown in the way I received the award and stayed onstage for about five seconds without properly posing with the Globe Telecom representative. Terribly shy in front of a crowd in a public event such as this one, I was more than ready to evict myself from the stage.

But I was happy, inspired, and humbled, just the same. (Then I went home with a trophy, a cash prize, and [my self-initiated personal incentive that is a] bag of brand new books.)

On my Facebook Timeline

Thank you, GlobeTelecom, and to the awards’ panel of judges!

(Please check Sun.Star Cebu’s article for the complete list of winners, written by my good friend Bernadette Parco who I will miss very much when she embarks on a new journey next month.)

Congratulations to all the nominees and winners!

My friends, let’s blog on!

- Nancy-

My mother is a born storyteller, very verbose and quite animated. Just like her own mother, she remembers many stories from long ago, even from the time when she started first grade. Mind you, not all of these are happy bedtime stories that make you smile before you sleep. These are tragic tales of the Japanese occupation, of unrequited love, of regrets, and of what-could-have-beens

Do you remember this line: “What happened to romance? Sappy, soppy long-hand love letters...”? If you have seen the film, Beastly (2011), a nice modern-day rendition of one of my classic fairytales, Beauty and the Beast, then you have heard this line said about twice (if my poor memory serves me right). And it’s really something to think about: What happened to romance AND handwritten

I belong to a family of collectors. For the most part and for sentimental reasons, I consider myself lucky. For the rest of the part, well, I say I’m beginning to worry about the shrinking space. Nevertheless, I am grateful that my mother and her mother know how to keep things, including their crochet and embroidery projects made during their youth that have survived the weather and the pests

The crude art of teaching girls who just turned 18

New Cebuano music

The world of Lorna, a storyteller from Cebu

Best friends (an original short story by Nancy Cudis)

Reading: parental support is advised.

Two verses from “Canto Voice” by Cornelio F. Faigao

Crazy wicked aunts in a Maranao folktale

Filling a child's world with stories

The concept of a library (and a giveaway)

Book Beginnings: The Calder Game by Blue Balliett

The aswang phenomenon

Wallowing in peril

The Filipino Cinderella

The Aswang Phenomenon: Collected Stories

A celebration of books and anything bookish

Another humbling, inspiring experience

My mother and her unusual breakfast time tales

A trip down memory lane...to the post office with handwritten letters

Family heirlooms

The crude art of teaching girls who just turned 18