01.31.08 kulturnatib

For good?

Are you staying there for good? Or, are you leaving for good? These, and their variations, were some of the most common questions asked of me when my departure was certain and, then, imminent.

Despite their proximity in that previous sentence, there was, it turned out, a lot of time between certainty and imminence. Enough, certainly, for these questions to percolate, then steam off.

To help things along, in the interregnum, there were the despedida parties, official and unofficial. And for those who were not in those parties, or who would have heard about them yet were unable to show up, or simply would have heard about my certain then imminent departure, the questions, when I bumped into them, would be blurted out, preceded by; Oh, you're still here?

Yes, was naturally the answer. And, yes, also to the succeeding questions.

I am staying, leaving, or, otherwise, as I write; I am now here for good.

Then, as my departure documents were wending their way -- every so slowly, it seemed -- to my apartment door, this answer was more than less tongue in cheek. But then, also with some truth.

I was leaving for good. I was going to stay for good. I am now here for good. There are actually, as always, many goods.

First of all, it is good that I be with my wife and, soon to be, family. It is, or should be, good for the practice and production of the kind of art that I have, in recent months, been practicing and producing. It is good for the cross-cultural facility, a foundation perhaps, that we are envisioning to help Filipino artists and Filipino art education institutions. It is good for our involvement with development issues and practice among Filipinos here and in the Philippines as well as other immigrant communities here.

About these I think of, as I survey the rack of Filipino publications, one of which banners a story about a Filipino-Canadian community coming together to try to save a Philippine government office from certain closure; as I wonder if it is just this particular office that has an obviously retouched photo of GMA or if this photo is now the standard issue to Philippine missions abroad and, even; as I feel, as soon I stepped in, that, if not for the subzero cold outside, this could be just any government office in the Philippines.

Actually, by international law, this is more than just a government office. This is sovereign Philippine territory. For all practical purposes, this is the Philippines. In Canada. This is the Philippine Embassy in Ottawa.

There is no mistaking that this is a Philippine office. No wonder; it is cramped, office tables are bunched up together, there is a radio playing rather loudly, office people are chatting even louder, the forms to fill up look like they're mimeographed – could those dinosaurs still be alive? -- and you are advised on filling up the form that clearly is not what the form is asking for but can be made to still be acceptable somehow.

I am renewing my passport. Doing this, I think, answers or tries to answer that other dimension of those questions about leaving, staying for good. This dimension really asks the question about identity. Are you leaving behind your being Filipino? Are you staying in that other-hood identity of being also-Filipino or not-any-much-more-of-a-Filipino? And, these, for good?

A passport, of course, is not everything about identity. Yet, it can also be a lot of things that in many ways can simply spell the difference between getting around different countries – except and especially the U.S. -- easier or more difficult depending on the passport on hand.

For those with simple utilitarian attachments to their passports, dual-citizenship is an acceptable, even preferable contingency. And this embassy offers information about that for the asking.

Kudos to this embassy, they were rather fast. In less than an hour I had my new passport. Handwritten and all, but still new and official and good for another five more years. A year less, I found out later to some dismay, when I realized that I really didn't need a renewal until next year.

Still, enough time to sort out some more this question; for good?

01.17.08 kulturnatib

Debutants

This, by most standards, is a small class. There are between 11 to 13 students in this class. The fact that this is not a definite number, or at least a singular one, makes this class different. Yet, in all other respects this is a regular class.

It is so regular that my recollection of what regular is does not go back to the last time I was in school a little over twenty years ago. It goes back farther; all the way to my elementary school days when I had to wake up very early, prepare my school bag -- especially the most important content in that bag, the lunch and/or the baon, though it wasn't me doing that, unlike now -- then heft it.

I know; heft at that time was like lifting a puny thing with one finger compared to the 40 tonner kids nowadays have to contend with. But, that is another matter.

Along with the food goes the notebook, the workbooks, textbooks, the pencils, erasers, assorted ball pens and a few now newer, though still regular stuff; notably the highlighters.

Still, those elementary school days are not worth the recollection for those alone.

This class is in many ways an elementary class, though its cognate in English refers to an age way beyond those primary years, closer to secondary, even college.

This is the Débutant class. Sorry, but in this class we are not taught social graces, how to dance the Grand Cotillion Dance, how to pick the 'roses' and the 'candles,' and all the other silly details of this throw back to pseudo-Spanish elitism that seems to survive only in the Philippines at a time when by age 12 Filipina girls are getting more adept at managing their Friendster, Multiply or even Facebook accounts than, perhaps, minding their social manners.

And then, none in this class, save for one, is really any close to being in the age to be 'given away.' It is even the case that it is the children of those in this class who are approaching this age, if not past it for some.

So, debutants we might be but we are no spring chickens. It is for this and other reasons that this school where this class is organized under is called Centre Nouvel-Horizon : Centre d'education des adultes.

The other reasons come with the first part of the name. Nouvel-Horizon or new horizon.

For the majority of those in this school, their new horizon is acquiring a new skill, a certification or further technical education that can either get them into a life-long career or into even further study in the university.

For us, our new horizon is learning a new language. We are taking part in a process much encouraged by the Quebec provincial government that in many cases involve free tuition with some allowance. This process helps facilitate integration and is called francisation.

As expected, we come from all over where French is not our mother tongue; from Colombia, Ghana, Rwanda, El Salvador, Uzbekistan, Serbia, Nepal, Canada and the Philippines. That, of course, is in no particular order.

In another French class, in this same school, there are more from other countries not represented in our class. But, our country is represented very ably by a Filipina, originally from Davao, who on our second encounter at the cafeteria already offered to bring dangguit, cow's heart and innards, cooked, as usual, to maximize cholesterol impact.

So, together we struggle with a language that, with most of us, sound familiar enough since Spanish and English together with French and Italian are the Romance Languages commonly rooted in Latin. Thus, when in a particularly difficult bind, we resort back to either English or Spanish, at which points, I regret not taking my college Spanish more seriously.

For all this, the class is quite fun. Yes, we stumble with our French with much sign-language as a crutch, but we soar with stories of home, family and even tragedy in the most universal of sign languages – our smiles and laughter.

01.10.08 kulturnatib

Winterlude

Last week I wrote about snow and how in some places, notably in Dubai, winter is no longer a prerequisite for having some or a lot of that cold, white, fluffy stuff that actually stays that way or freezes that way only in the imagination.

Actually, snow melts and in the course of melting it becomes slush, muddy and really yucky stuff. This, of course, does not figure in the imagination, especially for those whom a White Christmas is more dreamed about than the Silent Night is celebrated.

Here there is definitely a winter -- fiercer than in many places -- and there is snow and, as my luck would have it, probably more since I arrived if temperature and snow have any correspondence. The newspapers have already announced this to be the coldest in the last fifteen years days into the official start of winter.

But, to my surprise, while crossing on foot along Pont Alexandra or Alexandra Bridge that spans the Ottawa River and connecting the provinces of Ontario and Quebec, I was greeted by the sight that, when I asked what it was, made me realize that sometimes even winter alone is not enough.

Amids the expanse of white snow that have been dumped by two snow storms and a few more regular snow falls, including a part of the Ottawa River which, at that point, is almost entirely iced over, were fountains of white powder arching high and onto a growing mound of more powder.

I had never seen those before, but, even while I asked, I guessed that they were snow making machines.

Although less fascinating for the comparison, I imagine snow making machines to be somewhat like those machines, of which there is less and less you see in the city, around elementary schools, that spew out colored webs of sugar into a circular metal drum that is then collected with a bamboo stick into a sticky bouquet of pure childhood delight.

With snow making machines, however, there is only whiteness from the barrel of a more prosaic piece electrical equipment that bears a resemblance to an extremely fat but short cannon.

Little did I know that these machines were the advance cavalry in what is billed as North America's greatest winter celebration; Winterlude or Bal de Neige.

Every February since 1979 the National Capital Commission of Canada hosts this festival that features the culture and activities of snow and ice in spectacular proportions that brings in visitors from all over that in 2005 was estimated to be two hundred thousand shy of a million.

At the Jacques Cartier Park where the snow making machines were will be the largest snow playground in the continent, where kids can romp and slide on more than 30 giant snow slides. Along with these will be a variety shows, performances and a whole slew of games.

Not far will be the showcase of ice and snow sculptures of which many will be the works of international ice and snow carvers pitting their skills against each other and a material that, more than any other, embodies the science and the mystery of the transformations of energy and matter.

For the sporty, there is the longest natural ice skating rink in the world. Every winter and especially with the Winterlude, the Rideau Canal becomes the Rideau Canal Skateway. A 7 kilometer, 4-car lane wide iced track.

This is the site of the Winterlude Triathlon, the Bedzzz Annual Bed Race – a fund raiser involving pushing hospital beds across the ice -- skating demonstrations and other ice-skating activities. This year, too, it will be the site of the festival opening kick-off night that pays tribute to the 400th birthday of Quebec City, the oldest European settlement in North America.

I have always been told that landing here in winter is no red carpet event. It could be worse and more, I was warned.

Now, learning about this festival has made me think twice. They could be right, as snow and very cold do go hand in hand. But, they can also be wrong as, then, it could, actually, be quite nice.

01.03.08 kulturnatib

The outdoors, where it's at

My brother recently wrote: “We do not envy you cross-country skiing . . . .” As they should not, I thought, when I read this.

He was replying to a recently sent email letter from me with an attached picture and a caption that said, simply, cross-country skiing though it would have been more accurately captioned; cross-country skiing, at rest.

Envy is bad enough when its object or subject is within reach. It is criminal or, even worse, immoral when it is not. Such is its malevolence, actual and potential, that it is honored with a mention in the topmost of all top ten list of all times: The ten commandments.

Though shalt not covet, the stone tablet thunders. Covet, envy, same difference.

But, my brother would not envy this. Not mainly because he is a man of the cloth -- actually a pastor, he is not Roman Catholic -- but simply because, unlike me, he is not the sporty type.

About the only sport he engages in is Starbucks outlet hunting. He has a whole cabinet full of trophies he has won or, bought actually: Starbucks mugs from all over.

I, too, rarely envy though I am the sporty type, especially when it is of a sport engaged in mostly or most enjoyably outdoors.

Here, far north of the equator and at this time of the year, the outdoors is mostly swathed in what most of us Pinoys still dream of for Christmas: snow and its close relative, ice.

Winter sports then are activities, competitive, very seriously so, or recreational that can only be done with either snow or ice or both.

Since I am here and for some time to come, I have decided that I will learn and enjoy, strictly on a recreational level, a winter sport. At this point, cross-country skiing is the most accessible and easily learned. Thus the picture to my brother.

I am aware that we have evolved to such a level where winter sports doesn't really need winter. One used to be able to ice skate in the middle of a Philippine summer at some mall in both Manila and Cebu. There were even some locals who, practicing on these ice rinks, competed internationally to some acclaim.

Then, who could not help but be inspired by the Jamaican bobsled team in the 25th Winter Olympics in 1988 in Calgary, Canada, immortalized in no less than a Disney movie?

Still what takes the cake in this department, where billions have been and are being invested in the hopes that it can be eaten, too, is the Dubai Sunny Mountain Ski Dome project in a desert corner of Dubai that is scheduled to be completed by the end of this year.

It is a an audacious project, not only for the engineering challenges that it presents, but mostly for the fervent belief approaching a religious faith, which, in recent years, Dubai has become its most ardent champion; that there is no problem, even a created, artificial one that is not solved by throwing tons of money at.

I am very deeply skeptical of these solutions. They always come at a bargain with even more, even bigger and infinitely more intractable problems.

As excited as I am to embrace this new sport, I have misgivings for not learning an old one.

While I was learning to walk, Cebu had began to earn a name for herself as a scuba diving haven. Even as the diving spots have now moved elsewhere, they are still close enough for Cebu to be a favored jump off point to these spots.

And these spots, are truly amazing. Overall, the Philippines, despite the wanton destruction, continues to be among the best dive destinations in the world.

Not to take advantage of this 'competitive advantage' at quite reasonably affordable prices is a very serious handicap for an outdoors Filipino, or outdoors person in the Philippines.

I am now among those who see this outdoor, underwater opportunity from afar.

Unlike them, however, I can never be that far. The sea will always be with me, even as I enjoy the new outdoors in what is now home.