Old news reconstructs the past
El Renacimiento (Rebirth or Renaissance) was a newspaper I learned about in college, after reading a translation of Fidel Reyes’ “Aves de Rapiña” (Birds of Prey). While I had come across stray copies during my research, I never gave it a second look after noting that...
To do or not to do
One way to get Filipinos to do something is to tell them not to do it. We build overpasses for pedestrians who don’t use them. We draw yellow lines on our streets (what the English call “Zebra crossings”) only to be ignored by both motorists and pedestrians. The...
Newspapers digital and physical
As an Inquirer columnist, I was given complimentary access to InqPlus, so I need not source a physical copy of the Inquirer anymore. Inquirer content is accessible to me 24/7 anywhere with a stable internet connection. I can access the Inquirer at the University of...
School suicides
Some 404 basic education students, according to Department of Education (DepEd) figures, committed suicide in academic year 2021-2022. That figure is not small, considering that 2,147 students in the same period did not succeed in doing so. For DepEd, these are mere...
Traces of Philippine history abroad
After two years of pandemic lockdown, many people I know have gone abroad on “revenge travel.” Many of them, discovering or revisiting nearby Japan and Korea, ask me where to eat in Tokyo or Kyoto that I know quite well from numerous trips from 2002 to 2020, when I...
COVID in future history
The 32nd-anniversary edition of my book “Rizal without the Overcoat” has two covers: both in striking red, identical except for the first run that has Rizal wearing a face mask, succeeding editions have him without a mask. More than creating a collector’s item, I...
Santo Niño de Tacloban
That the Philippines has the longest Christmas season in the world may explain why the most popular celebrations on the first month of the year happen to be for the Nazareno de Quiapo (Jan. 9) and the Santo Niño de Cebu with its Sinulog festival on the third Sunday of...
The Marcos medals, questionable in 1966
Two decades before Alfred McCoy’s 1986 exposé on Ferdinand Marcos Sr.’s war medals and war record, the US state department and Army already knew two medals were questionable. These come to light from declassified US documents that I was reading in relation to the...
Windows to the past
Wanted dead or alive” posters I have only seen in cowboy films and cartoons. While I have read and heard about “shoot to kill” orders for high-profile or dangerous criminals, I have never come across a physical wanted poster till this week. In a small exhibit of...
Filipiniana in Michigan
Ann Arbor is said to be one of the best places to live in the US, except during the winter. Friends say I was foolish to accept the invitation as visiting professor at the University of Michigan (U-M), but then I looked beyond the subzero temperatures to the challenge...