Privileged Views

If I were to list the five people I've felt so privileged to meet in my lifetime, N.V.M. Gonzalez would be one of them. The Philippine National Artist for Literature in 1997 was an exemplary man both as writer and raconteur -- witty, interesting, amusing, imaginative, with a mind that stayed young even as his body aged. To celebrate his birthday (September 8) a year prior to his centennial, we are posting an article by James McEnteer, "You Can't Go Home Again If You Never Left," originally published in Filipinas magazine, that we think captures the spirit of the late N.V.M. We are also posting one of his short stories, "The Tomato Game" from his book, The Bread of Salt and Other Stories.

Living in a country as dramatically different from the Philippines as Japan can be both enlarging and traumatic. The trick is not to take the strangeness too seriously as our regular contributor, Marites Danguilan Vitug, writes in "Surviving Japan Without Nihongo," an instructive piece on enjoying a place even without learning the language. 

Meanwhile, another regular, Myles A. Garcia, enthralls us with a nostalgic trip down cinema lane with "My Manila Movie Memories." Among readers of a certain age, who hasn't played hooky from school to catch the movies in downtown Manila, he asks. Who indeed hadn't made a special memory or two in those darkened movie theaters of our Hollywood daydreams?

Here's hoping the trip back brings a lingering feeling that will brighten your days ahead.

America, Mon Amour

America (or more specifically the United States) has been the “dream” land of generations of Filipinos, the pie-in-the-sky that hundreds of thousands aspire to reach. Yet America remains both hospitable and inhospitable to those who reach its shores. On one hand it embraces those who successfully navigate the often treacherous paths to assimilation, on the other, it puts every new immigrant through a wringer, squeezing out every drop of skill, talent and determination for the greater glory of this land of milk, honey and mountains of debt.

In this issue, we feature some of the stories of Filipino immigration to the US -- the brides of Filipino servicemen who fought for freedom and democracy in WWII only to find that in the real world of the US in the late '40s, freedom and democracy were two-edged swords; a Filipino doctor who came in the mid-'60s and who, until now, can't forget the culture shock of his first day; Filipino graphic artists trusted with defining the looks of some of the superheroes in comic books; mail-order brides confronted with the ugly side of some Americans; and a Filipino hairdresser in New York whose innovative approach to giving back puts bigots to shame.

The late great Filipino American writer, Carlos Bulosan said it best: "If you want to know what we are, look at the men reading books, searching in the dark pages of history for the lost word, the key to the mystery of the living peace. We are factory hands, field hands, mill hands, searching, building and molding structures. We are doctors, scientists, chemists discovering and eliminating disease, hunger and antagonism. We are soldiers, Navy men, citizens, guarding the imperishable dreams of our fathers to live in freedom. We are the living dream of dead men. We are the living spirit of free men.”

Ghosts, Priests, Publicity

While August 21, 1983 will be forever remembered as the day Ninoy Aquino was assassinated, there was another August 21 tragedy 12 years prior that should also be enshrined in our homeland's collective memory: the bombing of Plaza Miranda in 1971. The heinous crime almost wiped out the entire opposition (the Liberal Party) to Ferdinand Marcos who promptly responded by suspending the writ of habeas corpus and subsequently, declaring martial law.

To jog our memories, we are reprinting "The Ghosts of Plaza Miranda," an excerpt from investigative journalist/historian Gregg Jones' book, Red Revolution: Inside the Philippine Guerrilla Movement. Likewise, author and former revolutionary Mila D. Aguilar gives us a personal account of where she was on that fateful day.

Filipino priests are now making their mark in the US as about 800 of them are ministering to the spiritual health of Catholics in various states. Harvey I. Barkin in "OFWs of the Cloth" relates the journeys and the challenges that Pinoy priests have faced as they try to organize themselves into the National Assembly of Filipino Priests (NAFP), under the encouragement of LA Auxiliary Bishop (and the highest ranking Filipino in the US Catholic Church hierarchy) Oscar Solis.

Regular contributor Anthony Maddela scores another major story in "Go-Getter," about Sony Pictures' Senior Vice President of Worldwide Publicity Fritz Friedman. Friedman, who immigrated to the US from Manila when he was a young boy, has chalked up impressive accomplishments in the movie and video industry as a publicist par excellence, and his name is worth dropping if you're in that industry. He retires this month after 34 years with Sony Pictures.

Everyone's talking about the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, so we're riding the wave and giving you links to the Filipino celebrities who have gotten wet, all in the spirit of fun and charity.

We are also posting a video interview of Michelle Pozon, a Filipina entrepreneur in Paris, who has joined the thousands of people all over the world helping out the victims of Typhoon Haiyan/Yolanda.