“On the question of pedophilia, The White Book was unequivocal: it formally advised against Thailand, which no longer had anything to recommend it, if indeed it ever had. It was much better to go to the Philippines or, better still, to Cambodia—the journey might be dangerous, but it was worth the effort.” - from Platform by Michel Houellebecq.
The movie 8mm refers to the Philippines as a source of snuff movies.
Patis dissed: “The nuoc mam from Phu Quoc Island was the best of all, clear and with an astonishingly subtle taste. . .But the sauce in this restaurant is from the Philippines, very bad, not from Thailand, which at least is a pale second-best.” - from the story Love by Robert Olen Butler.
In the movie Constantine, the possessed girl hisses at Keanu Reeves: “PapaTAYin natin siya!” So Hollywood has established that Tagalog is the language spoken in hell.
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J.Z., "Catalouging"I remember being a grade schooler and rummaging through my mom's stack of old MOD (was it Women's Today?) magazines in search of her articles. Her column was entitled En Nui, something like that. The most memorable line? "'[Quote],' she said through a mouthful of dead chicken." I dunno, that line
killed me. Anyway late last year I found her blog, and now I'm catching up on the stuff I've missed since I was hit by the KMBT bug (no pun intended.)
So yes, I've been reading Jessica Zafra material before she became
the Jessica Zafra of the Manananggal stories, the Twisted columns, the talk shows, and most especially the totally drool-worthy association with Ely Buendia, my first serious OPM rock star crush.
In freshman year college, our Introduction to Poetry class had a project that involved creating a journal and writing about "something poetic" at least three times a week. I didn't always write about poetic stuff, just whatever I felt like writing. I
looved writing in that journal. I think that project evolved into this blog, maybe. (On a totally off-tangent topic dammit my sentences are completely getting screwed over by 24/7 exposure to Nihongo. My brain is forcing Japanese grammar onto my sentence structures, seriously. If you know what I'm talking about HOW THE HELL DO YOU MANAGE?)
Anyway. Back to Jessica Zafra. Angelique Roux, my third year high school English class teacher, once told me that she doesn't like Jessica Zafra's writing. "Anybody can write like her. All she does is complain." Meanwhile, Paula Cirera, long-time secret crush of one of my "close" friends and one of those who read my original English class journal, wrote in her Friendster
testi for me that "i love jame kasi she's funny and she has this cynical, deadpan Jessica Zafra-like writing style that I've always envied."
I'm not lifting my own chair. (Dammit my English is seriously being warped by spending too much time around Jim the God of Bug Fixing and Misuse of the English Language.) Reading Jessica's blog tonight, I realized, Pau may be right. Not about the funny and cynical and deadpan and enviable writing style part, just the Jessica Zafra-like part. I find her stuff really funny and intellectual and God I only wish I could write - or complain, as Miss Roux would put it - half as good as she does. It sounds really weird to say this, but maybe my mom's women's magazines helped turn me into the blogger I am today.
If I'm lucky, I too will have Ely Buendia's number on my phonebook someday. ;b
Haha. Wala lang. Hindi ako makatulog sa excitement for Dec9. :D
