Down the Rabbit Hole

I heard the radio ad for Firebird and Other Ballets  one day and thought that this may be the chance I get to watch Ballet Philippines again. It's one of the hobbies I picked up as a child: watching theatre acts and musical performances as part of my cultural education , shall I say.  And as usual, I had absolutely no idea what I was about to watch. But in this case, ignorance makes the visuals a pleasant surprise because the costumes were not the typical tutus that ballerinas wear in classical performances; rather, they were wearing masterpieces by Mark Lewis Higgins. I got a seat on the first row; hence, I got a really good view of the costumes. They are amazing! The princess' costume reminded me of the Paunjalay  because of the vivid blues and the bells. On the other hand, the ensemble dancers reminded me of flower vases... this is so Beauty and the Beast  (the vases where actually people who had been enchanted to be flower vases, like Lumiere, ...

Indeed, the Silangan Chamber Guitar Ensemble showed what guitar performances are like beyond six strings. It was an evening of classical music in Church Among the Palm's new chapel; despite issues with the acoustics (the echoes were quite bad), the guitarists' renditions of the classics made me wonder how could they play such complicated pieces seemingly without difficulty? I have to be honest; I am not such a big fan of classical music. I know Mozart's Requiem quite well and I listen to it when I feel stressed out. Beethoven, sure, with Symphony No. 9's Ode to Joy. Other than these pieces, I am not familiar with classical music... much less with those arranged particularly to be played by guitar ensembles. And so tonight, I listened in to appreciate the classics. And the guitarists helped... a lot. The audience was taken on a musical journey that enthralled and educated. We listened to pieces composed by people I have never heard of (except for Antonio Vivald...

I must admit, I had a semester's worth of Jesuit exposure while at the Ateneo de Manila University but I didn't use that opportunity to explore who St Ignatius of Loyola was... Except to know that the campus was named after him. So when I saw Tony's shared post about a movie on the saint's life, to be shown at the  Ateneo High School, I wished that the movie have a wider release... Because I couldn't watch on the school's film showing schedule. Wish granted... I heard that the film was to be shown in selected cinemas this week. Naturally, I took the first opportunity I got. (I went to the cinema right after I dropped by the French school). I don't think that what follows are spoilers because the story is widely published. So here we go: The movie was about the life of Iñigo before he established the Jesuit order. Like many of the other saints, he wasn't such a straight-laced guy at the beginning... In fact, he was a soldier who hungered for death...

Here's a life lesson: happiness is a choice. A few people have said that I am similar to Joy in Inside Out . I try, I really do. There are days that are good and easy but there are days when I fake it until I make it (through the day). When the going is rough, all I can do is look at life through  rose-coloured glasses . Unfortunately, some of those off-days came as June closed and July began.  The days leading up to my birthday weren't so good so I didn't feel like celebrating my birthday this year. But I did learn something on those days: steer clear from people who feel that they are in the centre of other people's universes. It is not often that I am made to feel that I am not supposed to be where I am or that I am smaller than I am because these people feel that they're VIPs; less so so close to my birthday.  While the start of the month wasn't so good, the rest of my birthday week was okay. I still bought my chocolate mousse cake and ate it. I wal...

I honestly thought that a looking glass would play a major role in this film; instead, clocks. The looking glass was just Alice's way to travel between her world and Underland. And for me, the looking-glass successfully blurred the lines of red and white. Characters are all carrying a tinge of pink. Time. I had thought that its embodiment was the enemy. Particularly because it demands patience. Apparently, Alice was the antagonist after all. She went to the past to save the Mad Hatter's family but she ended up destroying the fabric of life in Underland. Time warned her of this, by the way, and tried to stop her. But hard-headed Alice just had to do her own thing without thinking of the consequences. ... And consequences she did realise. With the clock ticking, she learned that her meddling wouldn't have much of an impact because of the invisible but omnipresent character, Fate. She had hoped to stop an accident, which she did; and then a second accident happened. Hello, Pr...

"Heto ako, basang-basa sa ulan, walang masisilungan, walang malalapitan. Sana'y may luha pa akong mailuluha at nang mabawasan ang aking kalungkutan." (Aegis, 1998) I am not familiar with Aegis (the Filipino rock band) though I've heard their songs frequently being sung at videoke bars by friends. The band is known for power ballads with raw vocal belting by the singer/s. And their songs are highly relatable to Filipinos. A stroke of genius, it truly was, when someone thought of putting the band's song into a musical. The final product is the Philippine Educational and Theatre Association's (PETA) "Rak of Aegis". I trooped to PETA's Phinma Theatre in Quezon City with Krishna, Man, Ate Bing, Ate Mary, and Pogs on a Friday afternoon. We braved the EDSA traffic and the small side roads leading to the theatre (thank you, Waze!). It took us a bit more than three hours to get there, as expected, but we came just in time to find parking and have...

I was drawn to watch this film because Tom Hanks is one of the stars. He played the role of the father of a child living with Asperger syndrome, a mental disability, marked by diminished social capability in the child. Oskar, the child, was only able to communicate well with his father and eventually with his grandfather. He did not have a good relationship with his mother, who was often relegated to the background. The close relationship between father and son was marked by their preoccupation with scavenger hunts. These games put Oskar in a position to communicate with other people. The fun and games abruptly ended on that fateful morning of September 11th, 2001 . Oskar's father was in one of the two World Trade Centre towers and he died when the building collapsed. It was a pretty traumatic experience for Oskar but somehow, through his father's effects, he was able to conjure a last scavenger hunt. One of the most difficult for him to do because his father wasn't b...