The Cabinet of Pinoy Curiosities

Alyssa Alano would have remained a minor curiosity in the dustbin of Pinoy cultural excreta, otherwise known as Kuya Germs's The Master Showman -- had it not been for YouTube and email.

Times like these, I wish I could follow Jim Paredes's example and move to Australia.


On the news today: Manila's City Council has formed a resolution to ban The Da Vince Code movie. Interviewed on ANC was Congressman Abante, whose character unfortunately is the reverse of his name.

His arguments:

• The Philippines is the only Catholic country in Asia.
• A portion of the Catholics in our nation -- and he quoted 26% -- are "weak" Catholics because they don't even bother to hear mass.
• In light of these statistics, we shouldn't show The Da Vinci Code -- we might further weaken our Catholic country.
• Moreover, Abante stated, Dan Brown's book weaves fiction and fact together. Doing this might mislead the ignorant Filipinos to question their faith (and thus weaken the foundations of this country).
• He also stated that there is a clause in the Revised Penal Code that makes it a criminal offense to show movies that offend religion, and Da Vinci Code falls under this.
• What I picked up from the debate (other anti-Da Vinci Code advocates were interviewed) is that Filipinos should not be left to decide for themselves.
• Also if I remember my Constitution correctly, freedom of speech is a basic right, and where a law conflicts with this (as the clause from the Revised Penal Code does), then the Constitution prevails, since it is the fundamental law, after all.
• Get this: they want the movie -- and eventually the book -- banned all over the Philippines.

Typhoon Yoyong was supposed to thrash our country bearing winds of up to 185 kph. Although we see the usual lot of bad things coming out of such disasters (landslides and floods due to overlogged forests, relief goods disappearing before reaching the intended beneficiaries), I discovered one good thing about Yoyong. Manila was rid of billboards, if only for a day.

MMDA asked billboard owners to remove their tarpaulin signs until the storm passed. This was to provide potential damage from billboards crashing. After all, the taut tarpaulin signs are like windsails. Try to imagine how these signs would stand against winds that threatened to reach 185 kph.

[Or, a simple view of what's wrong with our country]

Last night, a woman was held up by two men in a taxi she was riding in Makati. The first goon was the cab driver. His assistant hid in the trunk and came out when the driver stopped the cab to announce the stickup. They drove the victim around Makati for some time before finally letting the poor woman out.

I was hearing the news fresh through my car radio. It disturbed me to realize that events of these types have become normal for us.

It is a generally accepted fact that fireworks were invented in China. From there, it made its way to Europe, America and to my next-door neighbor, who obviously imports it in large quantities through his military connections. Every New Year, he lays down a monster called sawa which is the length of a small airport landing strip.

We writers enjoy doing a lot of pointless stuff, like belabor what is already obvious. Take that previous sentence, for example, or my next statement, which is this: Filipinos love to eat.