A Silent Scream of Humble Dreams

"Though no one else will see/Nothing left for sympathy/A million flights to crash/Like a silent screams of humble dreams to me"
---from "I Stand With You" by the Dawn

A whole lot has happened since I got to see Tulad ng Dati and wrote what sort-of passed up as a review. The movie went on to win as Cinemalaya's Best Picture and had a couple of screenings at UP Diliman. Talk of hitting the mainstream was high at that time but "Donsol", a movie about whale sharks starring Angel Aquino (not as a fish, silly! and oh, she actually won Best Actress for this) beat them to the punch.

The band played three songs for Rockestra 2, sharing the stage with the Manila Philharmonic Orchestra. I saw it with Goo, one balmy Friday night at the FAT. I still think they should've played either Dreams or Love (will set us free) since these are the best pieces that would benefit most from the rarefied ambient punch only a 50-piece orchestra could provide.

The band also re-released an 18-track re-working of their staples ("Tulad ng Dati"), the merits of which will be discussed in another entry.

And in between all of that, they joined some young bands for the Apo Tribute (giving a spacey jive to "Bawat Bata") and twanged off some classic chords for the, ahem, Alaxan jingle (3...2....1...flash photo of Manny Pacquiao, shadowboxing...)

Sandejas' rock biopic is far from perfect. I still find the Mr. Holland's Opus sequence with Jett and his daughter too melodramatic. Predictably enough, when that segment played, as if on cue, it got the whole theater gushing and teary-eyed. Pucha, panlasang pinoy nga naman.

The Ratbu feat Karl Roy vs. The Dawn finale was hilarious, sure but it was somewhat lame and "pilit" as a finishing kick to the movie. It's tough to not use the words, "the Dawn" and "institution" in the same sentence because after 20 years and countless hits, that's just what the band is to Pinoy Rock: their presence (persistence?) in the industry matched only by their love for music and dedication to their craft.

So really, the face-off with Ratbu wasn't warranted at all.

I could go on and on about why they're good for the industry and why I'd kill, cheat and steal to get copies of their older works but I'd much rather leave you be, hit the play button, turn up the volume, make you listen to "I Stand With You" and wink as you join me in air-guitaring Teddy's signature solo...

Painting Skies With Flames and Flies

I arrived at the CCP a good 2 hours ahead of screening time.

The buzz surrounding the movie was at an all-time high: a couple of days ago, one college kid had gone out of her way to heap praise upon the movie in the e-group, I surmise, the only way giggly college girls know how (?!!?!?).

Anyhow, my attitude shifted from sociopathic, demented Martian tourist to starry-eyed, gushing teenager/society page writer (HAHA! NOT!).

I mean, hey, this was premiere night and the band was there. So was actress MD who looked awfully buffed (thick?) in person. Even Lemon was there. (Dang, goo, you should've come nalang and traded your review books for some R N' R...)

'Tulad ng Dati' by Mike Sandejas is a fictional/semi-bio pic about the pioneering Pinoy Rock Band, The Dawn. It is one of eight entries in the 2nd Cinemalaya Philippine Independent Film Festival.

I wanted to see all the movies (if only to convince myself that there's still hope for Philippine cinema) but my schedule just wouldn't allow it.

I really wanted to see 'Mudraks' which was co-directed by Arah Jell Badayos (QueSci `96--->now ain't that something? :P) but I guess I'll just have to keep my fingers x-ed and hope it hits video soon enough.

*-*-*

TND kicks off with the band playing the hit song of the same name (from `05's "Harapin").

It is 2006, and while the Dawn rock on, the band has fallen on hard times.

Jett is a bored suburban dad, the type who drives his teenage daughter to school and hangs around the house in between gigs. He is not happy with where the band is nor is he sure where it is going.

He has the rueful look of a man who has seen everything but has yet to find that one thing which he lost along the way.

One random night, he gets mugged and sustains a blow to the head. He wakes up with selective memory loss, remembering only everyhing in his life that happened up until 1988, in the band's heyday.

Lost in the haze of more recent events that he cannot comprehend much less recall, he pushes to change things to 'tulad ng dati', with mixed results. A couple of shouting matches and bruised egos later, he quits the band. Desperate, he takes a risk and joins in with the country's number 1 band, the crass and annoying, Ratbunitata.

Stop...Is this a shot at all the ugly-ass untalented hacks on the scene right now? Just asking :P

After his first and last gig with Ratbu, Jett has a moment of clarity (drug-induced) where he gets advice from his friend, the Dawn's legendary axeman, the late Teddy Diaz.

This goth dreamscape, replete with airy piano and eerie chimes in the background is the highlight of the movie.

Ping Medina's resemblance to Teddy Diaz is haunting. He takes on his older bro role pretty well, being alternately doting and firm and even kupal---which was just how Teddy was according to those who knew him.

The two talk of life and death, memory and loss, meaning and purpose.

A botched suicide attempt later, Jett is back with a vengeance, a man who found exactly what he was looking for---himself.

Midnight eyes/Chasing shadows throught the night/Dismal cries/Painting skies with flames and flies ---from "I Stand With You" by the Dawn

To be continued...

Fat Guy, Can Cook Part 2!

This fish recipe just happened. I was thinking of replicating the typical Chinese resto's Garlic Steamed Fish (around 220 at Hap Chang, last time I checked). I went online looking for the perfect mix (sound of gong banging) but instead found several different ways to flavor the fish.

In the end, I settled with the ingredients I had on hand and that was that.

Easy Steamed Fish
Ingredients
4-5 fish fillets (mahi-mahi, lapu-lapu or whatever have you)
ginger, chopped
leeks, chopped
1/2 cup rice wine
1/4 cup soy sauce
salt and pepper

Put the rice wine, soy sauce, ginger and leeks in your 'steamer'. If you don't have time to marinade the fish, just season it well with salt and pepper and plop it right in. Add half an onion and some lemon wedges next to your fillets. Try not to disturb the fish too much and keep that cover down to save all the flavor.
'Steam' the fish in your 'steamer' for 20 minutes, you know it's done when it flakes off easily. Let the "steamer" cool down on its own for the next 20 minutes, so that all that flavor gets trapped and your fish ends up tasty. Top it off with a dash oyster sauce and fried bawang and voila, it's a masterpiece!

Serves 3 to 5.

+++

My good friend Barry ("Pabby") is not a bad cook himself. Well ok, he's the Jedi Master, especially since he does get to cook regularly so his knack for improv is just something else. This is a recipe he shared with me which I tried to follow to the letter.

Barry's Roast Pork Shoulder

Pork Shoulder, preferably with bone in
Rosemary
Laurel leaves
Thyme
10-12 cloves of garlic, whole
Black pepper, whole
Rock Salt

Think of that one person you hate most and imagine that you got his shoulder pinned down on your chopping board. With a large knife, stab the pork shoulder ten times. Then say, "Take that, you two-bit oaf! You ugly-ass, overcompetitive blobhead! You obnoxious little sewer rat!"

Oh, where was I?

The point here is to come up with nifty little pockets. Fill each pocket with a clove of garlic, bits of laurel leaf, black pepper and rosemary. Rub the skin with rock salt. Set aside and let the flavor seep through the meat at least overnight.

If you feel like it or you got it in stock, pouring a bottle of beer isn't such a bad idea either.

Sit the shoulder in your turbo-broiler or convection oven. Cooking time would depend from oven to oven but 30 to 45 minutes would be reasonable.

Serves 4 to 6.

Fat Guy, Can Cook!

Cooking is one of the things I'd love to get better at. Next to medicine, writing, singing and fantasy gaming, of course.
In a fast food world where putting something in your mouth every few hours or so tends to pass as eating, a good meal, possibly home-cooked, preferably tasty in hefty servings and uncompromisingly nutritious is just heaven.

That said, this little blog of mine will take an odd turn and become...a cooking blog! And you just gotta trust me on this---fat guy knows best.

'Evil' Spaghetti

Ingredients
Sauce
1 kilo ground beef
2 large onions, chopped
4-6 cloves garlic (sliced finely, ala Godfather II)
1 whole bar of butter (yes, you will be needing all of this)
1 large can of tomato sauce

Noodles
1 kilo Spaghetti Noodles
Oil, salt, boiling water

Optional
1/2 pack or 4 pcs Tender Juicy Hotdog Jumbo, sliced (for kiddie parties)
1 small can of button mushrooms
1 can of sun-dried tomatoes

Directions
The sauce is easy enough to cook. Start by putting some butter into a large frying pan and browning the garlic. Add the onions and do some scat-singing for the meantime...bee-dee-dop-beep-bop-dubida.
Ok, now add the beef, making sure you spread it around so that you get to fry it nicely.
This would be the perfect time to add more butter, so just drop it all in. Scared? Ok, maybe half a bar would do, for now.
Although, seriously, you need to keep adding more butter to keep the whole thing cooking.
Mix it up well and make sure each square inch of beef gets to kiss butter. Ain't it funny how these two things meet again in the frying pan, of all places? Toss in some salt, sugar, ground pepper and oregano. And no, you don't need to add vetsin.
Just keep frying that beef over medium fire and tossing it around every few minutes. You don't want it overcooked like a Taco Bell nightmare so watch over it! In around 45 minutes, you will have beef that is brown, partly gritty and most importantly, cooked.
Transfer the meat into a saucepan and add the tomato sauce. Throw in some optional ingredients like hotdogs, sausages, hot links or little lost schoolchildren's fingers. Just kidding!
The sauce works pretty well on its own and if you've got nothing more to add save for those `shrooms, cover that pot and let it simmer for another 10-15 minutes, enough to buy you time to cook the noodles.

Serves 5-6.

Subpar Proxies: Ultraelectromagneticjam (3/5)

Ely Buendia thinks that the effort is premature as 3/4 of the Heads (God knows where Marcus is) are still making music.

My girlfriend, a long-time friend and fan of the band thinks it's hilarious particularly when we got to listen to Sponge Bob Cola's Pare Ko.

I think it's a bit more complicated given the two things all tribute albums should achieve, namely, to honor the band/artist and their body of work and to make good music.

Like most tribute albums, Ultraelectromagneticjam's bound to get mixed reviews. As a rule, the artists/groups that found a nifty middleground where they could infuse their own style without making the song sound too different and/or unremarkable, succeeded.

Interestingly enough, since the Eheads were, after all, a pop band, the alternative acts made the most out of their studio time.

6CycleMind's Alapaap was dreamy but grounded just the same. Imago's Spoliarium was simply sublime. ONL's japanime take on Huwag Kang Matakot was cute.

And while Lourd De Veyra seemed like he was chasing the beat half the time in Alkohol, Eheads by Sago was something special. I wonder how'd they fare if they reworked some of Adoro's songs (South Superhighway?) but that's another story.

The tracks were profoundly unbearable came from pogi/ganda rock contingent. These guys just didn't have clue on how best to make the songs theirs without insulting a legion of Eheads fans or more appropriately, "disemboweling a classic".

Kitchie Nadal on a vocoder with Ligaya and Barbie being Barbie on Overdrive are just two of the lower points of the album.

The nadir, of course, would have to be Sponge Cola's Pare Ko which was just laughably lame. If anything, they did get to answer: "How does a jilted pogi rocker sound like?" Answer: painful, not unlike getting a long-forgotten molar extracted.

All the rest, I give the benefit of doubt or "wala lang".

An RnB cut of With a Smile and MYMP version (Why do I have this odd feeling that an MYMP version of "Dito sa Pitong Gatang" isn't far behind? ) was bound to happen anyway, I know that much was true. Cueshe doing Hard to Believe was killed in a lot of other forums but I can't entirlely blame the pogi outfit, that was a weak song to begin with.

Francis Magalona is the voice of reason in this made-for-the-money compilation, mouthing off steadfastly in Superproxy: "There's no substitute for the real."

Right on, bro. Right on.

p.s.
My greatest fear? That one day, 10, 15 years into the future, one of my kids comes across this album and concludes that the Eheads suck ass.

And then I'd have to ground him/her for a week and put him/her on a steady diet of Cutterpillow, Ultra and Circus, just so he/she learns firsthand that they don't

Editoryal

(Ang maikling editoryal na ito ay isinumite ko nung lumahok ako sa isang editorial exam. Tungkol ito sa planong pagtaas ng aming matrikula sa darating na taon. Sa contest naman, hindi ako nanalo. Nagprotesta ako pero syempre butata. Nakakaburat man, wala na akong pakialam o pakiramdam. Kawalan nila yun, hindi sa akin, mga tinamaan ng *&$%&##!@#@% sila. Hmm, siguro hindi lang din nila trip ang Radioactive Sago.)

Start Digging

"Tubig sa water pipe/Burak sa kape/Gamot sa ubo/sa utak ng gago" - From "Masarap" by the Radioactive Sago Project

The sago quote says it all, pure and simple, like a random donut mistakenly left unglazed. And while it has absolutely nothing to do with the college administration's proposal to raise tuition fees in the near future, it practically spells out what we think about the whole deal.

The Task Force on Tuition Fee Increase was formed to deliberate on the matter and come up with their recommendations. Reading the minutes of the past few meetings was akin to hearing a rogue band of mice plotting to snag the Big Cheese.

If bleak was a color, it would be the perfect shade to paint the college's future with, overblown centennial festivities aside. Government subsidies have been steadily declining. Donors are allegedly suffering from "donor's fatigue" and have refused to help our plight. We have fallen on hard times and barring any windfall, the administration has seen that a tuition fee hike---is the most---and at times, it seems---only viable solution.

While such a move is something most of the Starbucks-swilling creatures this campus can afford, not everyone can pay for a tall latte four times a week, much less have enough money left over to provide for their medical education. The task force only hinted---and rather vaguely, at that---about "strengthening the scholarship program" to address the needs of this subset of the Dean's "cherished students".

We can only commend the Task Force's and this administration's actions for boldly addressing the issue of finances. Apparently, it takes more than just hot air and trademark peyups yabang to keep the country's premier medical school afloat.

Still, the lack of effort to find other means of funding is unsettling. Problem solving is a creative process. If creativity came in soda cans, we would be more than willing to help out by pelting the office with three cases worth each day just so the task force can get a clue.

Lastly, we are sorry to rain on the parade but the centennial buzz is the last straw and leaves a particularly butt-ugly notion as to how this administration sets its priorities.

A lot of money has been poured into the preparations and activities, more than enough money perhaps to support five students in need of aid for at least one school year. We find it extremely befuddling as to how the administration can ask us all to live large and loud when it should really be squeezing every peso that comes its way.

Which begs several questions: Is a tuition fee increase unavoidable? Does the college really not have enough money to stay out of the red? Are there still other means by which these problems can be addressed?

And most importantly: are the centennial celebrations our own lame remix of The Matrix's overlong party scenes where the whole point of frenzied decadence is to forget that tomorrow, our world will be smacked to bits?

With scenes like these, we believe that the best course of action involves procuring an absurd number of shovels and having students work four-hour shifts, digging all over campus.

Who knows what we'll find down there?

Marcos gold? Oil? A long-sleeping dragon to help us lobby for funding?

And if we still don't get anything after sorting and sifting through the dirt, we could all just throw ourselves in because, truth be told, that's where this whole deal is going to take us anyway.

#

Hoops and Hopes

(Note: still more recycled stuff)

As I was saying, I didn't have much of a drill playing ball at high noon.

Then again, if my uncle was still around that time, things might have been much different.

Got an uncle. Real Pinoy playground legend. Stood a shade under six feet, maybe smaller. Could dunk. One mad game on the side. Probably got no jumper, no matter. Real strong. Worked with weights to up his leap.

That was in the early, early 80s. 1983, I think. Pylometric training, pylometric even, well, wasn't even a word yet. Spud Webb's jumpsoles hardly had a beta version back then.

Uncle got no pencil though as he dropped out of school, ran away, drifted. Then he was just, gone. Bless his soul. One day I woke up to find my grandmother sobbing with a telegram in her hands.

As the rest of the household started getting up, a certain gloom, like a dust cloud, loomed over it. Each aunt was crying and my uncles were quiet.

Uncle, the baller was dead.

I couldn't cry. I didn't know the man well enough. We weren't too tight, at least not that I can remember. Although now I recall being told that one time we were out of town on some picnic and we had to cross a hanging bridge replete with squeaking rails andhe bore me over his shoulders.

Uncle, the baller was dead.

He had been buried in some cemetery down in Negros, killed for trying to stop two drunks from fighting. He was hacked with a bolo the type they use around the farm for breaking open coconuts and splitting bamboo stakes.

Tsk, tsk. I still remember the pictures, of his body being unearthed and the unnamed stench melding with the anguish stretched across an aunt's face.

Then again, if uncle was around, maybe not. We weren't tight. He hated my Mom for chastising him and his misdemeanors. Mom particularly hated his dropping out of school and floating around.

Still, I'm tempted to think, what if he were just around a bit longer to get into organized ball?

A sportswriter once did a sort of study slash history slash documentary on the New York blacktop playgrounds and its legends.

The curse of every playground legend is this: they won't do as well in organized ball as they do on the streets, Coney Hawkins being exhibit A. Sure he became an all star. A few times over. But the stuff of lore brought out of the NYC borough stayed there.

The product failed to fully live up to the hype.

To paraphrase the same sportswriter the lore that made the legend, was for most part, a blanket the community wrapped their blacktop warriors in, a blanket that was more like an extension of the individual members' of the community's humanity.

The heroes and legends of the playground were supposed to achieve the dreams the 'hood could not even take a blind shot at.

And as that old ax went, "You miss 100 percent of the shots you don’t take."

bling, bling: a ball junkie be tickin'

(Note: more recycled stuff)

I took to basketball seriously enough at around age 8. that's when I started heading to the playground right after school, clumsily dribbling an orange ball and shooting the lights out of the angry midday sun. I was of course, the only kid out.

Probably, I was the only person out shooting hoops during that time of day. Man, was it hot out there. The noon could be pretty nasty. The courts back then didn't have a roof covering the upside with some "well-meaning" politician advertising it as his effort to stop drugs and prostitution and gambling and other social ills and vices one can enumerate.

I didn't have any drill of any sort, at least not that I can remember. I just played my guts out. I just took shots from each square inch I could square off for a jumper. Heh. Still got that soft touch and range. And oh yeah, the pulse. Can hit the mid and long-range jumper and set shot with a lot less effort than most guys.

Still recall the time, one shootaround, I sank one of every two shots I took from beyond the arc. That was at least 8 shots or so before it tapered off. Fifty-percent.

Or that other time that could perhaps be best game I played ever. Just another informal scrimmage, really. Went 4 of 4 from all over the court, grabbed 8 rebounds and dished 3 good ones in 15 minutes. Not to mention decent D. Two of those 4 shots were off the backboard, Duncanesque jumpers at 15 and 17...the two other were breakaway lay-ins.

One of them was one shot I find hard to forget. I heard once that in your basketball life, you could only make your highest jump only once. One time and that's it. MJ, Dr. J, VC and all those mutants and jumpsoles freaks aside, you can only jump your highest at a single time, in a single play.

I also heard that it seemed to just be another jump. Then you start to notice...you just keep on soaring and seem to be walking on air. Unreal.

Let me tell you this. I got no jump. Perhaps because I was built more along the lines of the Karl Malone-Brian Grant body type, low center of gravity, big frame, big bones, and flabby, flat feet that's why.

Back to the shot. Breakaway after a steal. I was running straight on the right side of the court. Defense had only one man down the hole. For some odd reason, my good buddy Carl (a third string point guard in high school, haha ...got game really, needs a jumper though).. whips up an awry pass (yeah, and a bit more crisp on those passes too wouldn't hurt...kidding) in my direction...I pick up my dribble and start going full throttle...10, 8, 6, feet from the hoop, I cradle the ball, hold it tight with both hands and go up...the one guy, a rather athletic though flabby forward lunged at me...Aerial ballet, a dogfight, mano a mano...now hold it, freeze frame...my man starts going down...

I remember swinging the ball instinctively to the right, swerving it away from him…I paused for what seemed like the duration of a couple of heartbeats…then I said..."hoyyy"and flicked the ball in after that.

When I looked back, everyone on the floor was staring at what I just pulled off.

"Bumitin sa ere." "Hangtime move"

And then we went back playing.

Gawd, I thought: “Did I just do that?”

Segue: an introduction going someplace, at least...

(Note: For the original piece, it's still on www.geocities.com/burninjae along with the gloomy-ass background. I'm way too lazy to post anything new so I might as well recycle.)

one day when I go start writing my memoirs, i can look back at the last months of my teenhood spent in front of a computer, snatching desperately at ideas and trying to make them come out as nifty, witty prose that I'd hope would head somewhere.

at 19: when my life, which always ran on fast forward (at times, aimlessly), was yanked off the reel and set aside for the meantime. i can put no amount of misery upon my predicament. after all, it was my own, free choice, to be put in what i may call a self-imposed sabbatical.

a few months back, i was a first year medical student, just another med student leeching off my folks' dough. now, well, i am a bum of sorts, still leeching off my folks' dough. what can I say? plus ca change, plus la meme chose. the more things change, the more they stay the same. those frenchmen couldn't sound much haughtier.

if all seems dark and gloomy on this page, i guess it's not without reason. after i moved to the US not too far back, i told myself that yeah, i had lost the angst-not all of it but much of it dropped off by the wayside. but like lost baggage, somehow, it found its way back to its owner.

i don't want to sound like a fallen rock icon or a stoned, starving artist tripping on the current drug of choice. and so instead, in stereotypical gen-X tone, i have to say that my pain is mine and mine alone.

so quit pestering me that it isn’t that bad because you're seeing it from your frameset, your scheme of things. ok, maybe it really ain't but right now, i'm trying not to think of it. out of sight, out of mind. i'd prefer not to see what isn't quite there. a problem doesn’t really exist until you identify it as a problem. hey look, i'm still here. plodding punch drunk and weak-kneed thru the rounds. i’d prefer to laugh it off.

self-immolation won’t get you anywhere. of course if i were female, i could sign up for a hateful bitch album ala alanis morrissette and i'd probably rake in millions…kidding. nah, not a mean soul myself: actually, to my friends (and they are a select few) I am, (acccckkkkk), one of the sweetest persons they know.

now regarding the gloomy (and at times, boring) art, the whole concept was this: to use black, white and gray in portraying a somewhat jaded view of the pop world. life in mono, as it were. and yeah, film noirish to a certain extent ('the dark side of human nature') though it lacks the violence and needs a few more shady characters. that was pretty much the aim but technicalities got in the way.

i consider it a real challenge because i'm not working with color. sigh. you can always pick out a color chart and find that this kind of green goes well with a tinge of this yellow. in using the life in mono theme---i have to create and re-create images one way or the other so as to highlight themes in a certain, meaningful way. sometimes it works out so well, I doubt I even did the image. other times, it doesn't sink so fine so I don't feel like owning up to it either.

on the other hand, not using color also simplifies things. you are after all, merely working with pencils and shading: black, white and gray. however, please do not get the idea that i'm a high-sounding vanguard of modern art: the last neat piece i ever did was "vernon's chicken" (mosaic) which used rice grains and chinese watercolor.

i was in fifth grade then. real nice. ahhh, those were the days. that aside, black and white, gives a rather classic feel. right?

it's hauntingly warm in an inanimate sort of way, like photos of someone's long dead relatives.