Notes of An Interview with Juan S.P. Hidalgo 1

Last week, I had an opportunity to interview Juan S.P. Hidalgo - considered a mentor to many writers for his 30 plus year tenure as editor of Bannawag and as founder of GUMIL. I feel like anything I write will not do him justice so I would just like to take this opportunity to jot down some preliminary notes about the interview.

I arrived a little early for the 2:00 interview at his home in UP and was trying to look inconspicious as I walked up and down his street carrying a big red box of Red Ribbon ensaymadas. A few minutes before 2, as I was walking past his gate for the third time, a man in a sando and khaki shorts watering his plants called my attention with a simple raise of his eyebrows.

"I'm looking for Mr. Hidalgo," I called out, whereupon he smiled, pointed his thumbs at himself and waved me over to the gate. I was then led by Linda to the backyard where I sat, taking notes of the writer's home. There were about ten plastic chairs arranged in a circle, with a round table at the far end. On the table was an ashtray, a pack of Marlboro reds, Guitar matches and scattered papers with handwritten notes.

Mr. Hidalgo followed after a few minutes and we shook hands. He asked if I spoke the language of the Maharlikas and I stuttered, unsure if he meant Tagalog or Ilokano. He invited me to read a screenplay that he was editing (a translation of one of his works into Tagalog) while he took a shower. I scanned the neatly typed pages, specifically looking for his handwritten notes but only found a few corrections including one that crossed out the typewritten word "dinengdeng" and replaced it with "pinakbet" in a printed blue scrawl.

I spoke for a few minutes with his daughter Marie Sol and her husband Dexter, a film director before Mr. Hidalgo returned wearing a brown plaid polo, black plants and sandals.

Our interview was scheduled for three hours but stretched to seven such that we continued our conversation (or more aptly monologue) by candlelight. I still have three 90 minute tapes to transcribe.

Ode to Sisig

Here's a poem I wrote in a TESOL class a couple of years ago:

For lunch I always eat sisig.
It's yummy and comes from a pig.
At lunch I always go to 7-11.
But their sisig is made out of chicken.

Yeah, I know, it needs a little work before I submit it to the Palancas...

On Visiting the National Library for the First Time

I went to the National Library a couple of days ago for the first time. Which might actually be a shameful confession since I am a Literature graduate and all. I took the LRT to Carriedo and then took a jeep to Kalaw but got off too early so ended up having to walk even farther than if I had just gotten down at UN avenue.

I admit I was a little excited, giddy at the thought of finally visiting the library and exploring its books but after a long walk and then being turned away to get a 1x1 pic for the library card, I was a little put off. After all the requirements had been completed, I finally got to go upstairs and lose myself in its annals... meh. Not very inspiring.

You're only allowed to look for two books at a time and have to pass some sort of hierarchy of grumpy librarians who will check your call numbers before they let you near the shelves. I'd normally root for librarians but there's nothing like being treated like a high schooler to dampen any scholastic zeal, I think.

But then again, maybe I'm not giving it a chance, maybe my expectations were too high. We'll see how next time goes.

Oh by the way, happy singles awareness day.

Taxi Drivers I Have Met 1

Certain taxi drivers really get my goat. Some are interesting and friendly while I just want to smash others in the face. I hate it when they're selective and ask you where you're going before they let you in. I get back at them by leaving the taxi door wide open and walking away when they reject me. I heard one guy cursing loudly once when I did that as he leaned over to try and close the door. Suck it.

I also hate it when they start making comments like "Naku, traffic. Mauubos gas ko dito." Or "Naku, ang layo. Walang pasahero pagbalik." A few nights ago, I was in a really bad mood and just told the driver to let me out if it was such a hassle for him. "Ay, malapit na tayo eh." Frack.

Just venting but there are cool taxi drivers like Johntrey who I've actually ridden with twice. The first time, we had a good conversation as he told me that he was trying to fix his his papers to go to Canada. A couple of days later I was flagging down a taxi when another driver sped up in front, veered in front of him and waved at me. And there was Johntrey smiling and telling me to get in. Cool guy.

Favourite Passage 1

"For the sake of a single verse, one must see many cities, men and things, one must know the animals, one must feel how the birds fly and know the gesture with which the little flowers open in the morning. One must be able to think back to roads in unknown regions, to unexpected meetings and to partings one had long seen coming; to days of childhood that are still unexplained, to parents whom one had to hurt when they brought one some joy and one did not grasp it (it was a joy for someone else); to childhood illnesses that so strangely begin with such a number of profound and grave transformations, to days in rooms withdrawn and quiet and to mornings by the sea, to the sea itself, to seas, to nights of travel that rushed along on high and flew with all the stars-and it is not yet enough if one may think of all this. One must have memories of many nights of love, none of which was like the others, of the screams of women in labor, and of light, white, sleeping women in childbed, closing again. But one must also have been beside the dying, must have sat beside the dead in the room with the open window and the fitful noises. And still it is not yet enough to have memories. One must be able to forget them when they are many and one must have the great patience to wait until they come again. For it is not yet the memories themselves. Not till they have turned to blood within us, to glance and gesture, nameless and no longer to be distinguished from ourselves-not till then can it happen that in a most rare hour the first word of a verse arises in their midst and goes forth from them."

Rainer Maria Rilke, The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge

Reactions On A Talk

A few days ago, we attended a talk on the need for the vernacular to be used as the primary mode of instruction for young children. There were two things that struck me about the talk.

First was the 10 minute powerpoint invocation. Really?

Second of course was the lecture itself, but my interest is not so much in the pedagogical aspects as its postcolonial/neocolonial implications. The talk was given by a Caucasian lady who grew up in Ifugao and is versed in its traditions, culture and language. She has spent the larger part of her career as an MLE advocate in a country where the two national languages are Pilipino and English. So basically, here's a white lady (not the ghost species) addressing a Filipino audience about an educational system which insists on ramming Pilipino and English down students' throats at the expense of their own mother tounge. Is there something wrong with this picture?

In my research for our regional literature presentation, one of the main concerns is the "genocide" of regional literature and the vernacular by the "Tagalog-ization" perpetuated by Manila, or the center. The oppressed has become the oppressor. And the former oppressor now speaks for the other oppressed. Would that be right?

When I was reading Ashcroft, I realised that it was difficult to see American literature as postcolonial in response to British rule. Especially as a Filipino who knows them as a former coloniser. Perhaps it is difficult for us to see ourselves as oppressors as well. Which I think opens a lot of questions regarding that character that has been hit, and now hits elsewhere...

I still have to think about this.

The Radical Potential in Four Essays

The writing of any literature in English or the coloniser’s tongue risks perpetuating the native’s subjugation even as they attempt to assert their own identity. In their essays, four Filipino scholars investigate the ways Philippine literature can and does find its voice amid the tools of oppression, foreign and homegrown.

In their respective essays, Abad and Cruz examine how writing and reading are not only subversive acts but assertive acts as well. In his essay, A Habit of Shores, Abad suggests that the medium a poet uses is not as important as how he “reinvents the language”. Thus, the poet’s use of english should not be seen as a betrayal of the native or an acquiescence to the conqueror. Just as the colonisers scanned vistas on the horizon to claim as their own and upon which to leave their imprints, so must the poet discover and “colonise” language to his own specific ends. For Abad, language is not an embroidered costume the poet dons whether ill-fitting or not, but merely the raw material he uses to weave an original creation. By challenging the ownership of language, Abad makes english fair game for Filipino poets to speak for themselves.

While Abad focuses on the poet’s position in subverting language, Cruz hones in on the critic’s role in liberating Philippine literature from the “prison” of Western paradigms. Suggesting that Western literary theory is stunted due to its limited exposure to (and confidence in) other modes of thought and perceiving the world, Cruz laments the application of a myopic Eurocentric lens to the wild, tricky landscape of Philippine literature, especially by Filipino eyes. For a Filipino critic to see its own creations through Western eyes is not only inappropriate but indicative of a deeply penetrated subjugation which spoils and bankrupts a text. Through his lectures, Cruz warns against being wholly impressed with Western frameworks with the shocking suggestion that the native must think for themselves.

While Abad and Cruz challenge the residue of the American regime, Ramon Ileto in Pasyon and Revolution examines how a tool to encourage submission to Spanish rule instead excited the native to revolution. Informed by folk traditions and cultural values, the natives extracted their own meaning from a religious and colonial apparatus meant to instil subservience. Where the Pasyon commanded them to “sit”, the native found the call to rise and fight. Ileto’s description of the native’s exchange with the Pasyon demonstrates that in fact, although forgotten, the native can think for themselves.

Meanwhile, Legasto looks at how oppression has taken new shape in the form of State imposed notions of identity and nation from Marcos to Ramos who disseminated their own brands of Filipino-ness to bolster support for their administrations. Here, the oppressor is no easily identifiable white face but a compatriot, a native son who usurps the quest for a final defining Filipino identity for his narrow interests. For Legasto though, “there is no homogenous Filipino identity or nation. Instead, Filipino-ness might best be understood through Philippine culture and that by recognising and accepting these differences, a ‘negotiated unity’ might be brokered in the interest of creating a notion of Filipino-hood.” As these differences are articulated in the country’s culture or materials outside of the official line, literature again comes into play as a mode and vehicle of subversion and finding one’s voice. Her contention meantime of the lack of a homogenous Filipino identity or nation upsets attempts of potential tyrants to claim to speak for all Filipinos.

Through their essays, our four scholars show that the native has a mind and a voice, or rather voices, which creatively and radically subvert dominant power structures. From Spanish colonisation to the dilemma of writing in english to the new faces of a familiar oppression, those voices will be heard.