My Siquijor adventure: getting hexed on an island paradise
In 2010, I was sent by a travel magazine to Siquijor, a small island province in the Visayas region of the Philippines. You need a ferry to get there, and I and the photographer took one from Dumaguete. The island was first called “Katagusan,” after the molave (Vitex parviflora) trees that populated it. When the Spanish […]
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The ghosts of Fort Santiago (at least some of them, anyway)
I don’t encounter the supernatural very often, nor do I wish to, but they seem to take advantage of the few times that we cross paths, packing a bunch of experiences in the span of a few days, or in this case, hours.
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Chef created mouth-watering dishes during lockdown with only a stove, an old wok, and a blunt knife
Where were you when enhanced community quarantine (ECQ) was declared? Chef Ramon Antonio was in Mactan visiting his mother. “I have been visiting my mother in Mactan every month since 2018 (always via PAL for 46 years and counting), [for] at least seven to nine days per month, since that first time she slipped. She […]
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The Lost Boys
I was a guest on a podcast recently and was asked how I got into horror film. I told the hosts that I didn’t watch horror movies until I started writing horror fiction. I realize that I was wrong. The first horror “film” I saw was Michael Jackson’s “Thriller.” MJ is problematic now, but I […]
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Mongrels by Stephen Graham Jones
This is a late post since I read this book before the pandemic. Mongrels a coming-of-age story about a boy who lives with his aunt and uncle. The three of them are wanderers: always in poverty, always on the move, the adults never seeming to hold down jobs, the kid being swept along in their […]
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Made gising-gising for the first time
Made gising-gising. This is a vegetarian version that uses patis and vegan bagoong for umami and chili chutney for heat because I had no chilis on hand. It’s… okay. It lacks the savory sweetness that pork offers as well as the bite that fresh green peppers can bring. But all in all, not bad for […]
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Ginataang ube from a friend
A friend sent me ginataang ube made with ube halaya from Baguio, black rice from Kalinga, and kamote and bananas from Tagaytay. I’d been craving ginataan for a while so this was a lovely surprise. And it was delicious! It was still warm when I got it, just freshly cooked. I’d never had ginataang ube […]
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Farmers shouldn’t be charity cases
A friend sent me a bag of produce which included these citrus fruits. I really admire their farm because, among other things, everything it grows is organic, and it really does try to give its farm employees decent wages. Agriculture and food security are big now, and a lot of people are taking advantage of […]
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Signal to Noise by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
No one in the novel is a saint or a devil, but everyone is human.
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Superman: Secret Identity by Kurt Busiek and Stuart Immonen
What happens when Clark Kent is born in a world where the Superman comic exists? Where Clark is named after the fiction superhero’s alter ego, something which hounds him all his young life but also leads him to happier times when he gets older? A friend lent me this graphic novel before quarantine happened, and […]
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