Pasok Po...

A couple of entries ago, I posted a few photos of my soon to be obliterated view from my bedroom. This time around, I'm bringing the camera inside my room to record the knick knacks I surround my self with.

As mentioned before, I've been living inside this tiny bedroom for nearly three years now.This Friday marks my third year in Thailand, so this is a post to celebrate what is yet another year in the Land of Smiles, if you may. (Gosh, it has been that long?)

Like most bedrooms, mine has evolved over the years: from the spartan, characterless space that it was into something I consider as a treasure chest of my travels, well sort of. What I like about the latest incarnation of my bedroom is how its ornaments remind me of my little trips here and there as well as memories of home and the people close to my heart.

While I don't have a theme for my bedroom (puhlease, I don't want to live in a film set), my only rule is I have to use organic materials as much as possible, so there's a lot of wood and grass in my bedroom instead of some metal or glass (which I could not afford anyway).

Anyway, let's begin snooping around, shall we?

Let's start with the accessories I hang on my little shelf. The photo below shows some necklaces Fuchsiaboy gave me, such as this rather controversial cork necklace, right Donita? Also, I have a necklace a teacher in South Cotabato gave me when I went there for a field visit three years ago. You can also see in the photo the little origami cranes Liwayway brought me from Japan.

More accessories, please. Here's a stack of bracelets I hardly wear these days. And of course the humongous safety pin that Fuchsiaboy introduced me to. I used to have about four of them but I gave the rest to my sister. The copper holder is another present from La Donita from a Khmer artist. (Don, ang laki ng presence mo sa room koh!!!)

Here you can see my little hand-made terracotta cows and oil burner from Koh Kret. The tea set is from Bubbles, which he brought me from South Korea. The little Japanese fan is another present from Liwayway.

Below is my pen holder, which is actually a sticky rice container. The round basket behind it is another accessory holder (some pins, brooches, bracelets, etc.). The bigger basket serves as a receptacle for my wallet, cellphone, and watch - I hate these items being just thrown around the place. The little BluGre mug is a gift from Thea when I visited Davao last year. It now contains loose change.

Now let's talk about my baskets. I have about ten all over my bedroom. I prefer to keep my bags, CDs, books, and some clothes in them rather than getting a proper cupboard. I find closets rather ghastly, and please let's not talk about plastic containers. I love the texture of woven grass, hence the profusion of baskets. I get most of them from Chatuchak.

I got the pretty quilt in the first photo below from my first trip to Jakarta last year.

Recently I decided to post some photos of my friends and family on my wall. I should've done it a long time ago because it's really nice to be reminded everyday of the people who matter most to you. These photos always make me smile.

Hanging above my bed is this thingie (I honestly don't know how to call it) from Penang when I visited the former Czarina of Penang a couple of years ago. In the background is Lara Stone... that's how I call the big painting that towers beside my bed.

My bedside table has some books and a reading lamp. If you look close enough at the black book you can read the title of the book I'm currently reading.

Below is a photo of the grass mat I bought from a man selling them on the street. It was dirt cheap so I decided to get one. I love how it adds texture to the floor. The mangosteens are my dinner tonight.

Also you can see a part of my bed, which I bought early this year. My old bed was sagging and we all know every gay man needs a strong bed, chai mai?

This is my fern Daria Werbowy. I have taken care of plants before but somehow they don't thrive that well under my care. So I've since sworn not to welcome any living thing in my room until one day my BF forced me into getting one. I grudgingly dragged home the fern last May and it has somehow survived all these months. It has grown on me, to be honest because it does bring a lot of life into the room. Please God don't let it die.

Let's move on to my window chuchuvelles where a few creatures reside. The top ledge has a collection of elephants I got from Surin and this Ganesh statue a guy gave me. I don't know how to call that woman with a soft wrist (it was also given to me along with Ganesh), but it is prominent in Thai spirit houses.

The next ledge has this pendant/toy I got from a trip to Amphawa and then the male puppet is from Hanoi. The Rama puppet is from my latest trip to Indonesia and the bulol rice god is from the Philippines (I found them in Kultura).

Several months ago I bought a wooden bench from Chatuchak. I actually needed it for my work-out but it has served mostly as a table for my books, candles, and flower vase. The terracotta container is from Koh Kret and I picked that little box from a second-hand stall at the Philippine Embassy in last month's celebration of Independence Day.

And of course the flowers, which I try to change every three days. I love them flowers to death! It's amazing how it lifts my mood every time I see them first thing in the morning.

Lastly, here's my new plant that I bought just this evening. I'm naming her Alek Wek. After the success of Daria Werbowy, I feel more confident in taking care of another supermodel plant, hence, Alek. She's also my gift to myself for my third year in BangCock.

The wooden chair is a recent acquisition. It's really one of those cheap things you buy in the mall, but I needed a fold-able chair to sit on while I read the papers in the morning while having coffee. To make it more elegant, I covered it with a fabric I got from Si Pan Don in Laos last year (hola, Bitch of Bangkok!).

So that's pretty much my little crib, dear readers. Now close the door on your way out, ok mai?

Botox Princess

Guess who was just recently in town? It's no other than the Queen of Botox... CHARICE! Yes, Charice Pempengco ITSELF, the new poster child of Botulinum toxin. Sad, but true.

So fresh from Belo's clinic, Charice did not hesitate to show off her new face to her fans in Bangkok last Friday. Of course go ang bakla from Surigao, di ba?

I expected to see only at most 200 people to watch Charice in Siam Discovery. Afterall, who would want to watch Charice in BKK except Pinoys, di ba? So I thought it was going to be one intimate concert.

When I arrived there one hour before her performance, I was dumbfounded to see a crowd filling the ground floor of the small-ish mall. And then there were also quite a good number of people on the upper floors looking over the atrium.

Soon enough, a bigger crowd formed. I'm not exactly good at estimate crowds but the audience could easily reach about a thousand, but that's a wild guess. Of course there lots of Filipinos but the Thais definitely outnumber the Pinoys. There was a good number of Thai school girls and baklitas holding signs to welcome Charice to Bangkok. Many of them were even singing to her songs, which was played while we waited for the Botox Princess.

It was a long wait indeed because the starting time was moved to half an hour later. Goodness, my Louboutins were already killing my feet. Anyway, suffer for botox... ay, Charice.

With the time extension, more people came in and I could hardly move as the people pushed towards the stage. I was soooo not ready to die in a stampede for Charice, please lang. Mystica pa siguro, keri lang. Charing! Ay, Charice!

Anyway, there was a front act... some winner of Academy Fantasia (Thailand's American Idol). I love her, she's so skinny and tall!!!

When Charice was called on stage for the pre-peformance interview the crowd erupted in screams and cameras started flashing all over the place. First thing I had to check was her jaw muscles, if indeed they're smaller, or at least frozen. Hmmm... not really.

But I was more concerned she would have a locked jaw in the middle of the interview. I prayed to the Virgin, and somehow it worked coz Charice charmed the crowed, even saying a few Thai lines.

Also, Charice's English has improved quite a lot since I first saw her on Ellen and Oprah. Recall: "I can't bilibit!". There's a new sense of confidence from the girl this time. She seemed relaxed, although not exactly spontaneous either. There's definitely a big room for improvement on her language skills especially now that she's appearing on Glee. 

And so Charice sang about five songs. It was quite mind-blowing how such a small girl could pack a huge voice inside her. Well, that's a given of course; that's what got her on Oprah to begin with.

More than the voice, I guess she really has a strong appeal coz she could charm the crowd. She knows how to engage them, working them before she belts out an out of this world note. I could tell she enjoys performing when the crowd is responsive and so she stimulates them even more.

And no, thank the Virgin, no locked jaws during her performance.

A Room Without a View

I've been living in a tiny guestroom in my office building for three years now (an anniversary post is on its way). Being on the top floor, I call it the "attic". Romantic, no? The space is rather cramped but I like it that way.

The best part of the room is not inside anyway, rather it's the beautiful view outside. Our building is not surrounded by really tall buildings, so I have a nice view of the neighborhood.

On my first day here, I was immediately struck by the temple roofs not far from my building, which I can see from my bathroom window. I can also see the Rama IX bridge from the wide windows running on the entire length of the bedroom. Even if I'm on my bed I can see the spire of the bridge and it's pretty much the first thing I see when I wake up.

For years now I've been enjoying my view. I especially love the sunsets. I have gazillions of photos of the sunset from my bedroom. Many times I'd sit on the rooftop and just watch the sunset, or relish the view of the bridge and temple roofs lighted up in nighttime. I have in fact spent many evenings on the rooftop with friends drinking some beer, smoking, or just enjoying the breeze... and of course the view.

Starting last year, things around the neighborhood started to change. The construction of a new building right on the temple grounds was started. Slowly, columns of steel bars crept higher and higher. Concrete soon followed. Cranes were erected and the buzz of a typical building construction can be heard late into the night.

At the government office just beside my building, they also demolished a row of small structures, leaving behind a dusty surface. Soon enough, the surface was flattened, deep holes were dug, and gigantic cranes sprouted overnight. The construction was started about a year ago, almost at the same time as the school building, and in both sites construction workers have been deep into their work since then.

Aside from the noise, which luckily I don't hear much of when I'm inside my bedroom, I'm truly, truly mourning the loss of the view that I used to enjoy. Currently, the school building construction has effectively obstructed the temple roofs and a large part of the bridge has been replaced by this ugly green tarp that covers the side of the construction site.

From the side of the government building, I'm also losing the view of the Pratunam area, which I used to see on clear days. Replacing it is a phalanx of despicable columns that continue to rise and rise as each day passes.

Currently, the construction is ongoing and I imagine it to last a few more months. Until then, I'm very sad to lose the view from my room inch by inch.

Shelf Life: Ilustrado

When my sister visited me a couple of months ago, she gave me Ilustrado as a birthday gift. I actually requested it from her after hearing quite a bit about the novel since it won the Man Asian Literary Prize in 2008 for what was then an unpublished work.

Ilustrado finally came out this year. I have the Philippine print, but I've also seen the international edition in Kinokuniya in Bangkok.

I swear it's very rare to see Filipino books in Thailand. One time I saw a used copy of Jose Rizal's Noli Me Tangere at the Sanam Luang night market... translated to Thai no less! That was one quite proud moment for me but other than that Filipino books are hard to come by here. Well, I saw Jessica Hagedorn's Dream Jungle at B2S a little over a year ago, but that's it.

Now back to Ilustrado. The attention Miguel Syjuco's novel has brought to Philippine literature comes in no better time. I could not remember any recent Filipino book that garnered this much international attention. It has received good reviews from the New York Times, The New Yorker, and The Guardian.

But most importantly, it has piqued Filipinos' curiosity and has encouraged us to  grab a copy rather than the latest Dan Brown or Paolo Coelho (parang awa, pwede?).

This is no doubt a novel worth reading, especially for Filipinos, because it highlights the corruption of our culture by no one but ourselves. Syjuco zooms in on the alta sociedad, the upper crust of the society, their frivolities and insensitivity to the glaring poverty of the majority.

He also plays on the joke that is Philippine politics wherein a leader of a religious cult, a separatist senator, a security guard, the country's president, and a starlet collide... entertaining (perhaps distracting?) the masses to no end.

While the schizophrenia of the Filipino culture and history serves as a backdrop to this novel, the plot revolves around the main character's, also named Miguel Syjuco, search for the lost manuscript of his mentor, Crispin Salvador, who is one day found floating in the Hudson River.

Miguel flies to Manila in search for the manuscript. While he unearths the many facets of the life of Crispin, he is also pushed into confronting his past as a prodigal grandson and his halcyon days as a member of Manila's nihilistic set.

Soon enough, readers would find a story within a story within a story in a novel that is filled with overlapping narrators and point of views. Syjuco refers to newspaper articles, excerpts from a biography, blog posts replete with comments, popular jokes, and magazine interviews.

As a caveat (and possible spoiler), there's really no reason to try to string all the story lines together. The novel is made up of at once entertaining and at the same time profound parts that might not be worth summing up. The parts are better than the whole in this book's case.

For Filipino readers, many of the criticisms Syjuco fires against Filipino culture is somewhat familiar because many of the characters and events are parodies of actual people and situations. At times his observations come from an outsider's perspective, owing perhaps to the fact that Syjuco has been living away from the Philippines for years now.

If there's anything negative I can say about Ilustrado, there are many lines in the novel that I feel were just overwrought, bordering on the pretentious. I guess the writer is just overeager to show his skills, but that's my assumption.

Otherwise, the novel is an enjoyable read and, while not the best Filipino novel yet, is definitely a good addition to Philippine literature.

Back from Depok

I was away last week to attend a meeting in Indonesia. It was my second trip to Java and this time around we stayed in Depok, a town two hours away from Jakarta. I had no prior idea on what Depok is all about, except that the University of Indonesia is found there. I soon found out that it's rather nondescript; the dusty streets are clogged with traffic.

We got to see some malls, but that's the last thing we wanted to visit... if only Depok has other attractions. One note about the malls, people are allowed to smoke inside. I don't know if it's allowed all over Indonesia because that's what I saw as well when I visited Bogor last year.

Anyway, back to Depok... on our last day there we were brought to a massive mosque with a golden dome. I was quite struck by the sheer size of the building. I haven't been to a mosque before. Too bad we could not go inside.

It was early evening when we went there. Hordes of people were spilling out of buses, perhaps to say their evening prayers. There's something frenzied about the place as people dashed from every direction. We opted to stay outside the mosque because there were people praying inside.

When I'm in Indonesia I always feel like I'm home. Basta, there's something about Indonesians that remind me of Pinoys.

How to be an Angel

I visited a few galleries last Saturday with Miss Bubbles, so here I am sharing some photos (no, I'm not yet a photo blog... puhlease).

Our first stop is Kathmandu Photo Gallery, a few steps from where Bubbles lives. Kathmandu is a charming shop-house that had been converted into a gallery, and is close to the Hindu temple in Silom.

Luke Cassidy-Dorion is currently showing his photographs of Ramkhamhaeng University in an exhibit called Ram.

A few blocks away from Kathmandu is Silom Galleria, perhaps one of Bangkok's premiere locations of art galleries. (But what do I know, I haven't exactly explored the other galleries in the other parts of town.)

What I like about Silom Galleria is you can see a good number of galleries in one stop because it has about a dozen contemporary art galleries interspersed with jewelry stores.  I haven't visited the place in ages though so I thought it's time I drop by it again.

On our visit last Saturday, however, I noticed that some galleries have shut their operations while others are simply closed temporarily.

Among the open galleries, I was very struck by the exhibit at Artery. There was a sprawling painting that was somewhat a parody of The Last Supper as well as some other works that seem to play with classic masterpieces such as the Mona Lisa. Unfortunately, I didn't have the chance to ID the artist as the exhibit has yet to open (in about two weeks' time, I guess).

I was very impressed as well with these black and white oil paintings from another artist.

We then moved to another gallery. I forgot its name though but they had good collection of eclectic pieces.

As always, one of the highlights of any trip to Silom Galleria is a stop at the Thavibu Gallery, which specializes in contemporary art from Thailand, Vietnam, and Burma. There's a nice lady there who's always cheerfully giving some background information about their exhibits even if it's quite obvious that I could never afford any of those pieces that run up to half a million baht.

The current exhibit called How to be an Angel is by Vietnamese artist Truong Tan. Using the traditional Vietnamese lacquer painting, which I heard is a painstaking and time-consuming process (but the output is always divine!), most of his pieces, I noticed, are homo-erotic.