The recent hostage-taking crisis in the country really shocked me. Why 11 hours? Why the silliness and seemingly comical techniques of the police? Why the rope to force open the door? Why the little car, not a truck to force open the door? Why did the police arrest the hostage taker’s brother? Why? Why? Why?
But the biggest question on my mind is why did the president do nothing during the crisis?
I am not for the movement that he resigns. I do understand why the Chinese reacted the way they did. They called for resignation because that is an integral part of their culture. I have lived with the Chinese for about two years in their native land and have learned their ways and their language. What happened to the president or what he did is, in Mandarin, very “diu lian.” He lost his face. His face fell. He threw his face.
And you step back when that happens. Or in ancient Chinese culture, you kill yourself. It is similar to the samurai or Kamikaze culture of the Japanese.
The concept of face is very strongly rooted in the Chinese culture. They would rather die than lose face. I understand why they reacted that way especially when there was no strong apology from the president expressing sincere grief. He was caught smiling in some photos.
In a Chinese perspective, the president is “makapal ang mukha.”
But I would rather have a president that other nation’s think to be “makapal ang mukha,” than to have no president at all.
I believe in the careful handling of the issue through proper investigation and prompt action. Prompt action could have saved P-Noy’s face. But the damage has been done. And in Chinese culture, the way you regain face is by submission, down-to-earth humility and a billion apologies.
Or you lose your face forever. Yes, by suicide.
Friday, August 27, 2010
Friday, August 6, 2010
Hoopster Ain’t Smart: Think Again
Ok. Ready… now pass the ball. To 13. Make a low pose and form the tree. Fast now! The head! The head! Tighter grip. Go for the three D!
Couldn’t understand? Me either.
Imagine being in the heat of a basketball game, sweating and exhausted, the whole crowd booing against you, the 10 second shot clock pressure, the shame of losing the ball on the last few seconds of the game, the possibility of being blamed and shamed if the ball doesn’t go in.
Imagine being there and battling out all the noise, the boos and the yells from the crowd, the sweat and the exhaustion, the stretched muscle, trying to hear the coach’s commands and finding a way to execute them perfectly as ordered.
Playing basketball is not as easy as you think it is. It’s pretty intense stuff.
Imagine all this pressure from the hard court and you still have to think of the homework due midnight after the game at Araneta, the research paper due first thing in the morning, the midterm exam tomorrow afternoon. Welcome to a collegiate baller’s life.
University of the Philippines’ Carlo Gomez admits it’s hard to be a student athlete, especially in a university that lives for the zenith of academic excellence and where sports is considered second class.
But desire kept him going and got him to where he is now, playing in the most prestigious collegiate athletic basketball tournament in the country, the University Athletic Association of the Philippines.
Since he was a kid, Gomez already had a passion for the game. It has always been with him growing up.
When asked about the physical, mental and emotional rigors of collegiate basketball coupled with academic pressure and challenges, he shrugs off his shoulders and says he loves basketball. What else can he do, but play? It’s that simple.
Desire keeps him going.
He loves the game.
He lives for the game.
But his grades must be maintained, lest he becomes ineligible to play. So with a tired and exhausted body, he goes home to burn the midnight oil studying for exams and working on university papers. On the court he burns his rubber soles; on his study table he burns the midnight oil.
That takes a lot of spirit, stamina and courage to handle such stress and pressure. And it does take more than average intellect to handle such challenges and come off victor, winning a game and scoring good grades.
So after every rigorous practice or an exhausting match, he picks up his bag, changes to a clean shirt and goes home ready for another game on the hard court of his study table and books, scoring exams and dunking papers.
Couldn’t understand? Me either.
Imagine being in the heat of a basketball game, sweating and exhausted, the whole crowd booing against you, the 10 second shot clock pressure, the shame of losing the ball on the last few seconds of the game, the possibility of being blamed and shamed if the ball doesn’t go in.
Imagine being there and battling out all the noise, the boos and the yells from the crowd, the sweat and the exhaustion, the stretched muscle, trying to hear the coach’s commands and finding a way to execute them perfectly as ordered.
Playing basketball is not as easy as you think it is. It’s pretty intense stuff.
Imagine all this pressure from the hard court and you still have to think of the homework due midnight after the game at Araneta, the research paper due first thing in the morning, the midterm exam tomorrow afternoon. Welcome to a collegiate baller’s life.
University of the Philippines’ Carlo Gomez admits it’s hard to be a student athlete, especially in a university that lives for the zenith of academic excellence and where sports is considered second class.
But desire kept him going and got him to where he is now, playing in the most prestigious collegiate athletic basketball tournament in the country, the University Athletic Association of the Philippines.
Since he was a kid, Gomez already had a passion for the game. It has always been with him growing up.
When asked about the physical, mental and emotional rigors of collegiate basketball coupled with academic pressure and challenges, he shrugs off his shoulders and says he loves basketball. What else can he do, but play? It’s that simple.
Desire keeps him going.
He loves the game.
He lives for the game.
But his grades must be maintained, lest he becomes ineligible to play. So with a tired and exhausted body, he goes home to burn the midnight oil studying for exams and working on university papers. On the court he burns his rubber soles; on his study table he burns the midnight oil.
That takes a lot of spirit, stamina and courage to handle such stress and pressure. And it does take more than average intellect to handle such challenges and come off victor, winning a game and scoring good grades.
So after every rigorous practice or an exhausting match, he picks up his bag, changes to a clean shirt and goes home ready for another game on the hard court of his study table and books, scoring exams and dunking papers.
The Brain of the Game: The Man Behind UP’s Fighting Maroons
“Let’s go get this done!”
Amidst squeaking sneakers and the smell of sweat from perspired and exhausted ballers, amidst the glare of the spotlight, amidst the cheers and the boos, amidst all the wreck and the havoc under the basket, amidst the missed jumpers, amidst the last second three pointer, amidst all of it, is Coach Aboy Castro’s order.
“Let’s go get this done!”
The brain of the game behind University of the Philippines Fighting Maroons, Coach Aboy Castro is as hot and energized in practice drills as in the hard court of the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) basketball tournament.
He prepares the Fighting Maroons for battles in the basketball tournament of UAAP season 73. The pressure is on his shoulders to train the Maroons, and orchestrate the moves, the play, the defense. With his hands on his waist standing as a brave commander watching over his troop of hoop warriors, he directs them to achieve the goal: stop the other team from scoring and get that ball home.
In the heat of the practice, Coach Castro remains calm and cool-headed. Saluting every obedient execution of a play by his troops, he yells “Good! Good!” When players are finally able to orchestrate the plays he draws on his white board, he claps his hands. The hoopsters, like an army, learn to move as one. One team, one move. One team, one play.
There are no individuals on the court. There is no me, only we. There is only the team. Like a troop of cavalry ready to attack and spoil enemy territory, they practice shooting and offense. Like a fleet of navy ships guarding the coast from enemy invasion, they learn defensive tactics to keep the opponent’s basket from swallowing the ball.
Others, even players, never see the game the way a coach sees it. He sees the whole dance of the game. He sees the team as one. He treats them as one: an army of orchestrated blocks, passes, shots. He knows every player’s strengths and weaknesses. He matches them and blends them together the way one blends different fruits to make four seasons shake.
In the end of a practice, he gathers his players around for last minute instructions and to utter a prayer. He picks up his bag and looks up his cellphone to read messages he missed. He leaves the arena first and stops at the crucifix, looks up at the Lord’s statue, touches his knee and makes the sign of the cross.
“(We need) better defense. 12 more games to go,” he said. The Maroons are up against University of Santo Tomas Growling Tigers tomorrow.
And with his hopes and prayers, he goes home.
Tomorrow will just be another day at the gym.
“Let’s go get this done!”
Amidst squeaking sneakers and the smell of sweat from perspired and exhausted ballers, amidst the glare of the spotlight, amidst the cheers and the boos, amidst all the wreck and the havoc under the basket, amidst the missed jumpers, amidst the last second three pointer, amidst all of it, is Coach Aboy Castro’s order.
“Let’s go get this done!”
The brain of the game behind University of the Philippines Fighting Maroons, Coach Aboy Castro is as hot and energized in practice drills as in the hard court of the University Athletic Association of the Philippines (UAAP) basketball tournament.
He prepares the Fighting Maroons for battles in the basketball tournament of UAAP season 73. The pressure is on his shoulders to train the Maroons, and orchestrate the moves, the play, the defense. With his hands on his waist standing as a brave commander watching over his troop of hoop warriors, he directs them to achieve the goal: stop the other team from scoring and get that ball home.
In the heat of the practice, Coach Castro remains calm and cool-headed. Saluting every obedient execution of a play by his troops, he yells “Good! Good!” When players are finally able to orchestrate the plays he draws on his white board, he claps his hands. The hoopsters, like an army, learn to move as one. One team, one move. One team, one play.
There are no individuals on the court. There is no me, only we. There is only the team. Like a troop of cavalry ready to attack and spoil enemy territory, they practice shooting and offense. Like a fleet of navy ships guarding the coast from enemy invasion, they learn defensive tactics to keep the opponent’s basket from swallowing the ball.
Others, even players, never see the game the way a coach sees it. He sees the whole dance of the game. He sees the team as one. He treats them as one: an army of orchestrated blocks, passes, shots. He knows every player’s strengths and weaknesses. He matches them and blends them together the way one blends different fruits to make four seasons shake.
In the end of a practice, he gathers his players around for last minute instructions and to utter a prayer. He picks up his bag and looks up his cellphone to read messages he missed. He leaves the arena first and stops at the crucifix, looks up at the Lord’s statue, touches his knee and makes the sign of the cross.
“(We need) better defense. 12 more games to go,” he said. The Maroons are up against University of Santo Tomas Growling Tigers tomorrow.
And with his hopes and prayers, he goes home.
Tomorrow will just be another day at the gym.
“Let’s go get this done!”
TRANSLATION: Science
Science. Writing. Is. Translating.
When will everybody understand science? I imagine scientists scratching their almost bald head whenever they are fielded grade school questions from grown ups. I hope it does not frustrate scientists that most people really cannot understand or do not have a great interest towards science.
A factor of this is that scientists often cannot or do not tanslate the language of science into words laymen use and understand.
I really believe scientists must be good communicators too. Unless they can take what it is in their minds and transform it into communicable and understandable structures of words and sentences, then science really needs help. That is where science journalists come in.
Writing about science is translating. As an interpreter of the Chinese language, I see no difference between my job (my little enterprise of translation services in Chinese) and that of a writer writing about science.
As with translation, the writer needs to be familiar and understand both languages he is working on: the scientific and the mundane, the elaborate mathematical formula and the simple sentence.
Translation is very important in business, politics and almost every aspect of social life. Without translation, people will never understand each other. Without translation, globalization could not have occurred. Thus it is with the world, so it is with science.
Writing about science is worth any writer’s time and attention. It is a challenge, of course to learn a scientific subject well enough to tell it in words that laymen can and will understand. And most importantly, it is every writer’s job to make something of importance known. Science definitely is something of importance that it shapes our present society and draws the path of our future.
And making that known to everyone is something a writer’s duty inherently entails: to make know, to inform, to educate.
Science writers do that by translation.
When will everybody understand science? I imagine scientists scratching their almost bald head whenever they are fielded grade school questions from grown ups. I hope it does not frustrate scientists that most people really cannot understand or do not have a great interest towards science.
A factor of this is that scientists often cannot or do not tanslate the language of science into words laymen use and understand.
I really believe scientists must be good communicators too. Unless they can take what it is in their minds and transform it into communicable and understandable structures of words and sentences, then science really needs help. That is where science journalists come in.
Writing about science is translating. As an interpreter of the Chinese language, I see no difference between my job (my little enterprise of translation services in Chinese) and that of a writer writing about science.
As with translation, the writer needs to be familiar and understand both languages he is working on: the scientific and the mundane, the elaborate mathematical formula and the simple sentence.
Translation is very important in business, politics and almost every aspect of social life. Without translation, people will never understand each other. Without translation, globalization could not have occurred. Thus it is with the world, so it is with science.
Writing about science is worth any writer’s time and attention. It is a challenge, of course to learn a scientific subject well enough to tell it in words that laymen can and will understand. And most importantly, it is every writer’s job to make something of importance known. Science definitely is something of importance that it shapes our present society and draws the path of our future.
And making that known to everyone is something a writer’s duty inherently entails: to make know, to inform, to educate.
Science writers do that by translation.
Knowing the Structure
So I came back after five semesters. And yes my brain cells have forgotten how to smell the news.
It’s been five long semesters since I last wrote a news story. Now the chance is here.
I listened. I wrote. And viola! My first speech story for three years!
I sat there in class wondering how I did. Our professor gave back my copy. There were no marks in it. And then it struck me: I need to learn how to spot the news again.
It was a reawakening of what I had learned in the past. Spotting the news in an event is not easy task. It requires logic and reasoning. I have learned from this recent experience how to really write.
First a writer must learn the conventions of the genre he is using. And he must first learn to master those conventions or rules before he can look for exceptions and slip through the loopholes. Mastering the rule makes a writer eligible to break it. It does not mean that he breaks it for the sake of showing angst or being deviant. He breaks it to express more clearly something that writing in the rules cannot express at all.
In the end, it still goes back to the main purpose of writing: to communicate clearly. And breaking writing conventions and rules before mastering them does otherwise.
It’s been five long semesters since I last wrote a news story. Now the chance is here.
I listened. I wrote. And viola! My first speech story for three years!
I sat there in class wondering how I did. Our professor gave back my copy. There were no marks in it. And then it struck me: I need to learn how to spot the news again.
It was a reawakening of what I had learned in the past. Spotting the news in an event is not easy task. It requires logic and reasoning. I have learned from this recent experience how to really write.
First a writer must learn the conventions of the genre he is using. And he must first learn to master those conventions or rules before he can look for exceptions and slip through the loopholes. Mastering the rule makes a writer eligible to break it. It does not mean that he breaks it for the sake of showing angst or being deviant. He breaks it to express more clearly something that writing in the rules cannot express at all.
In the end, it still goes back to the main purpose of writing: to communicate clearly. And breaking writing conventions and rules before mastering them does otherwise.
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