And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom. 30 January 2008
Posted by bornonacusp in Domesticity, Image Gallery, Poetry.add a comment
We woke up this morning to the sight of our orange dahlia’s first flower blooming.
French fictionist Anais Nin’s ode to the blossoming of a flower comes to mind.
(Photograph by bornonacusp)
Ian McEwan comes to India 28 January 2008
Posted by bornonacusp in Readings.add a comment
Ian McEwan, shortlisted for 2007’s Man Booker Prize for Fiction and author of Atonement, is in India for the Jaipur Literature Festival.
In an interview with Hindustan Times, he speaks of his first visit to India (“I’ve never been with so many people at once, and yet I felt relaxed and ignored”), his view of fiction writing (“All fiction is localised. You write about things around you”), and why he thinks he should not be given congratulatory remarks for the Best Picture win of Atonement at the Golden Globes (“People have come up to me to congratulate about the Golden Globe, which is nonsense. Now what if the film was very bad? Would I have got the brickbats? No, and rightfully not. So why should I get the bouquets if the film is great”).
Read the HT interview here.
(McEwan’s photograph from BBC News.)
Even pigeons go to heaven 26 January 2008
Posted by bornonacusp in For Film Buffs.add a comment
One of the nominees in this year’s Oscars for Animated shorts, Meme Les Pigeons Vont Au Paradis (Even Pigeons Go To Heaven).
Joie de vivre 25 January 2008
Posted by bornonacusp in Dateline: Delhi.add a comment
Is she coming with him to India? But where will she sit when they do their audience with the Prime Minister? How will she be addressed; surely she can’t be called First Lady, so, ‘girlfriend’? Will she join him on his weekend trip to the Taj Mahal?
Honestly. I do not understand the big fuss in the Indian media about the possible implications Carla Bruni’s accompanying French President Nicolas Sarkozy may have on so-called protocol. But here they go, day in and day out for the last few weeks, discussing the ‘appropriateness’ of a visiting head of state being escorted by a woman not his legal wife.
The supermodel-singer jumped the gun on these curious ones, anyway, and told French media a couple of days ago that she won’t be coming to India with Sarkozy.
I bet she wanted to. But with all the apparent noise she has provoked here, she probably thought it would be better to just pass on this one.
I find this truly puzzling. What has ‘protocol’ got to do with any of it? Shouldn’t this protocol matter be read more sensibly? So the woman does not have a stamped piece of paper to show her Indian hosts that she is this man’s partner. But is that what love/desire has come to be all about? And on a more practical level, shouldn’t she simply be made to sit wherever companions of visiting dignitaries are seated?
Better for these news writers and commentators to talk about how he is as a president. How he will set about to fulfill his promises to the common French people, including securing their purchasing power.
As to other things, loosen up. Bask in the joy of living.
I am still in mourning 25 January 2008
Posted by bornonacusp in Elsewhere in the world, For Film Buffs.add a comment
I’ve always been a fan of Heath Ledger. And that’s why I don’t understand how, after his sudden death two days ago, most news writers seem to be remembering him only for his gay-cowboy role in 2005’s Brokeback Mountain. When, clearly, he’s been around for much longer than two years, and has shown enough talent to warrant notice both in his home country Australia and in Hollywood. Whether he was playing a heartbreaker-just-waiting-for-the-right-girl in 1999’s 10 Things I Hate About You, or a son of a dysfunctional family in Monster’s Ball, or as Mel Gibson’s son in the Revolutionary War epic The Patriot, Heath Ledger was an actor whose mettle deserved to be recognised even without having to have a sexual romp with another man.
Kwentong Peyups 10 January 2008
Posted by bornonacusp in Uncategorized.2 comments
Got this note announcing the solicitation of stories from alumni of the University of the Philippines, which marks its Centennial this year.
As part of UP’s 100th year celebration, we are putting together 100 Kwentong Peyups, a series of columns which will appear in the Philippine Daily Inquirer and Philippine Star throughout the year. We invite all past students of any of the University of the Philippines’ units to submit their stories. Submissions should:
1. Be a maximum of 1,000 words.
2. Be a personal experience and written in the first-person.
3. Be emotionally engaging — funny, sad, scary, etc.
4. Make the connection between the story and a life lesson that serves you well today .
If possible, please include an old photo/scanned memento.
Include your name, College or Unit and Course, and year you entered UP as well as your email address. If you remember your Student Number, even better.
Send your submissions to 100kwentongpeyups@campaignsandgrey.net.
You will be notified via email if your story has been selected for publication or for use in other Centennial celebrations.
Happy 100th year, UP! 9 January 2008
Posted by bornonacusp in Uncategorized.1 comment so far
Really looks and sounds like it was such fun, the kick-off for the centennial celebrations of the University of the Philippines, my dear alma mater for whom my heart will always hold the fondest memories. (Before leaving for Delhi, every occasion that my feet would lead me to my old campus, never failed to move me over and over; just the sight of the acacia-tree-lined avenues, the smell of the air.)
Wish was there yesterday to watch the fireworks show, listen to wondrous singing by the world-renowned UP Madrigal Singers, and just be with fellow isko’s and iska’s.
Staged snaps 7 January 2008
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The photograph on top — Alfred Eisenstaedt’s 1945 shot of a sailor and a nurse in a kiss celebrating V-J Day — is a classic. It is so compelling, that after it was published in LIFE, a lot of sailors and nurses claimed it was theirs. And the shot was spontaneous, real.
But the one below it — Robert Doisneau’s photograph of a couple kissing by the Hotel de Ville in Paris in 1950 — was not. The man and woman were indeed a couple, but they were professional models who were merely asked by Doisneau to pose for him for the shot.
With available software today, it has become easy to manipulate images and pass them off as anything we wish them to be. But ’staging’ snapshots has been the stuff of old.
Which of other classic photographs are staged? From fairies to undersea monsters and war images. Read here.
Divorce in the time of SMS 4 January 2008
Posted by bornonacusp in Elsewhere in the world.add a comment
In the Philippines where I was born and raised, the Internet and mobile-telecommunications technologies have helped spur an uprising against a President.
In many other places across the globe, SMS, web sites, web logs, and networking sites are making sure nobody gets away with anything — from the most mundane celebrity goof-ups to the terribly insane decisions state leaders are making, you will surely get a heads up on every thing. (We are not talking here, of course, of the millions and millions who do not have access to these technologies — much less have food to eat — and thus fall through the cracks of the ‘communication revolution’.)
No doubt, these so-called ‘new technologies’ are creating such an impact in people’s lives that there is a huge swath of today’s population that will not even be able to imagine life before their dawning.
Three things I read today from the wires, which again show you just what it is people can do with all of these tools in their hands.
1. Two profiles very recently appeared on networking site, Facebook, claiming to be those of Bilawal Bhutto, son of slain Pakistan politician Benazir. Facebook has quickly taken down the pages after Bhutto’s Pakistan People’s Party, which the 19-year-old Bilawal took over after his mother’s assassination, said the profiles were a hoax and Facebook itself determined that they were, indeed.
2. An Egyptian woman missed a call from her husband on her mobile phone. Shortly after, she received a text message from him saying, “I divorce you because you didn’t answer your husband.” A unilateral declaration of divorce by a man seals the deed, according to Islamic law. But the woman is now seeking the court’s opinion on whether her husband’s declaration of divorce by text message is legally valid.
3. A Saudi blogger was arrested reportedly after writing against religious extremism and demanding political reforms in the kingdom. The man’s family still do not know where he is being held and what he is being charged with, almost a month since he was taken. His fellow bloggers are now campaigning for his release through their own sites.
‘Every child that is born brings with it the hope that God has not yet despaired of mankind.’ 2 January 2008
Posted by bornonacusp in Muni-Muni.add a comment
- Rabindranath Tagore, Indian literary icon.
For J & S. Whose lovely daughter, A, was born to J before 2007’s end.
