Sawikaan 2010: Word of the Year

Sawikaan 2010: Word of the Year Conference in UP Diliman in July



The Filipinas Institute of Translation (FIT), Inc. in cooperation with the Blas Ople Foundation, Anvil Publishing, DepEd, CHED, U.P. Sentro ng Wikang Filipino, and the U.P. College of Arts and Letters will hold Sawikaan 2010: Pambansang Kumperensiya sa Salita ng Taon on July 29-30, 8:00am-5:00pm at the Pulungang Claro M. Recto, Bulwagang Rizal, Diliman, Quezon City.

In 2007, “miskol” was declared word of the year because it perfectly captured the Filipino style of appropriating a foreign communication practice to suit the local mores.

The conference was not held in 2008 and 2009, as the organizers believe no words came out at that period worthy of the title. It follows then that there is now enough word contenders for the event’s revival.

Old or new words will be considered by the judges as possible word of the year as long as these impacted on the sociocultural, political, social, economic, and other aspects of Filipino life in the last two years. These could be borrowed from a foreign or a local language, or an old one that has acquired a new meaning. The word of the year is a significant addition to Filipino vocabulary and a welcome dictionary entry.

As in the previous years, Sawikaan has invited language experts to talk about how to further develop the Filipino national language. Speakers for the July 29 sessions include Dr. Mario I. Miclat, the dean of the U.P. Asian Center; Dr. Zeus Salazar, the respected historian; Dr. Jaime Caro, computer scientist; and Dr. Jesus Federico Hernandez, the Chair of the U.P. Department of Linguistics. Topics to be tackled are neologism, lexicon from non-English languages, computer technology and language, and contribution from the gay subculture.

The revised edition of the UP Diksiyonaryong Filipino (Anvil Publishing) will be launched after the fora. National Artist for Literature Virgilio S. Almario is the editor of the dictionary.

On July 30, ten to twelve proponents will present their papers. Entries in the running include “jejemon, “unli,” “load,” “tarpo,” “spam,” “solb,” “emo,” “namumutbol,” “Ondoy,” and “Ampatuan.” Presentations will be judged according to the paper’s outstanding research, power of evidence and argumentation, and quality of writing. The Blas Ople Foundation will give cash prize to the first, second, and third best papers. The Sawikaan papers will be published as a book.

For inquiries, write to Ms. Eilene Narvaez at filipinas.translati on@gmail. com. Or visit the official website sawikaan.net.

Helicopter ni Gov. Nantes

Narito po ang larawan ng nag-crash na helicopter (tugma ang registry number ng larawan at ang binabanggit ng pahayagang Philippine Star). Kuha ko ito sa campus ng SLSU-Lucban noong Marso. Ang totoo, unang pagkakita ko pa lang, may kakaibang kaba na ako sa hitsura ng helicopter, pero siyempre hanggang kaba lang ako. Nabanggit ko yata ang kabang ito sa isang kasama at ilang mga mag-aaral habang pinipitikan ko ng larawan ang helicopter.





a
Nakikiramay po ako sa pamilya ng aming gobernador at kaniyang mga kasama at nadamay sa malagim na pangyayari. At siyempre, sa isang magandang lalawigang naulila.

MELANCHOLY MEMORIES OF OBANDO

*JOSELITO DELOS REYES is an award-winning poet in Filipino, and a member of the Linangan sa Imahen, Retorika, at Anyo (LIRA). A teacher by profession, he is currently taking a master’s degree in Philippine Studies at the De La Salle University-Manila. Raised in Obando, he now lives in Lucban, Quezon.

Not that I don’t have a hometown, but I used to long for what my college buddies and colleagues have—a hometown brimming with pastoral air, a two-month preparation for a journey during extended holidays, the challenge of landing a discounted airfare ticket, and bringing in goodies after vacation. Not with Obando, my minimum-fare hometown because of her proximity to the bustling metro. Jeepney-fare as of this writing: P 15 from Monumento, the heart of Caloocan City.

From where I used to stay in Valenzuela City, Obando—measuring the shortest distance between two points—is just a two-kilometer horizon among parcels of bangus, sugpo, and tilapia ponds. Even on a hazy day, the San Pascual Baylon bell tower and American-era tangke de agua can be seen from our backyard. Kwitis display can be watched and heard during fiestas signaling the start of the morning fertility rites procession, and my family’s fifteen-minute tricycle return to the hometown.

While I only briefly studied in Obando, I am still proud of being one of the voracious talaba munchers of my hometown, a habitué of a local greasy burger joint called “McDomeng”, a hole in the wall somewhere in Barangay Catanghalan. The owner was named—you guessed it right—Mang Domeng, who, aside from being the owner of the former burger monopoly in Obando, had a minor role as the character “Domeng” in Iskul Bukol, the sitcom of the new wave and Betamax generation. (Last I heard from an Obando e-group on Facebook, the burger joint is still lording over the town’s burger industry, but now on a classier establishment.)

At the onset of the Spandau Ballet and Bagets epoch, Sundays were Obando days. After attending mass, my family would visit aunts, uncles and cousins. We share the same fried tilapia, paksiw na ayungin, a shrimp variety called “hipong puti” in sampaloc broth and—far from the aphrodisiac notion of my elementary and still tender mind—talaba swimming in garlic-vinegar. During these short but frequent visits, I became the local text (not the SMS but the popular betting game using an inch by two-inch cards, one side printed with drawings of stills from local action movies of Dante Varona and Anthony Alonzo) and rubber band mogul cum plunderer of my playmates.

I have so many hometown memories. It was there where I first puffed a Marlboro, gulped my first bitter brown bottle on a family reunion, and first blurred my vision courtesy of the pricey thirty-peso long-necks and cheaper bilogs and lapads in between tabo-servings of tahong and silvery fish creatively called buwan-buwan and bidbid fresh from Barangay Binuangan, a motorized bangka-ride away from the bayan. It was in Obando where I first experienced the primal palpitation from a first year high school crush named Cherry San Diego of Barangay Lawa (Where is she now? I don’t know, some foreign lakes maybe. Facebook has its limits). It was also on my minimum-fare hometown that I learned the mystic rhythm and chant of Pasyon, voice amplified by gargantuan servings of biko, kutsinta, palitaw, and scalding cupfuls of chicken sopas, sweetened mongo and salabat. It was on Rebecca, the lone bedbug-infested movie house in town now turned into a Christian fellowship quarters, I marvelled the first three big screen movies of my life, all re-runs I believe: the first “Superman” starring Christopher Reeve, Dino de Laurentiis’ “Kingkong”, and “The Untouchable Family” starring Chichay and Redford White, a parody of Brian De Palma’s 1987 hit “The Untouchable”.

Before I read Doña Pia’s ordeal under Padre Damaso in Rizal’s Noli Me Tangere (in-passing during high school and college, and in full when I became a college instructor), I have always known that Obando is famous for her fertility rite processions. My cousins and I would always slither our way in the crowd to catch glimpse of pairs wanting to have a baby amidst the symphony of the blaring Musikong Bumbong and Magsikap Band. Always, a middle-aged and sun-baked couple gracefully led the dancing procession. I was told by my nanay, though I never had the chance to confirm, that the said former childless couple came from Cebu, and had become a permanent devotee of the procession performing their panata, even after the three patron saints—Sta. Clara, San Pascual Baylon, and Nuestra Señora de Salambao—granted them three kids. I was told, though again unconfirmed, that they named their children Clara, Pascual, and Virginia.

Once there was neighborhood news that Vilma Santos, who was then still childless with second husband Ralph Recto, would finally grace the dance floor that is Obando to have a child. Faster than shouting “Darna!” or “Ding, ang bato!”, news spread to town. It seemed that all fair-minded people who owned TV sets in Obando trooped the church grounds to see Vilma and Ralph in the flesh to dance the “Santa Clara pinong-pino...”. I have never seen the Darna of my youth in person. The following morning, the third and last day of fiesta, another wildfire of a gossip emerged; allegedly because of a looming crowd management crisis of the hermano mayor and the local police, Vilma and Ralph would just attend the morning pre-procession mass and would no longer swing on the parade. They were no-shows. That also happened to Sharon and Kiko years after. I no longer fell for the news.

Fiesta processions traversing the major artery (J.P. Rizal Street) and minor streets of Obando (Claridades and Plaridel) usually lasted three hours, in time for sumptuous lunch of seafood at the local market called punduhan. Food is good here with atsarang dampalit, a variety of grass growing on the river and fishpond banks of Obando. Fiesta afternoons were spent haggling with calamay, sinigwelas, and kasuy street vendors, if not looking for bargain goodies at the church patio turned pre-Made-in-China tianggehan. A nightly perya awaits the locals. Because of countless Ferris wheel rides, I learned to muster the courage to ride mammoth roller coasters and erased acrophobia on my vocabulary. I have seen the carnival’s Amazona who gorged on live chickens (not real, though she can kill the hapless white leghorns with a dinosaur-strength bite on the neck) and Babaeng Oktopus (again, not real; the girl has upper and lower limb deformities). It was in the same peryahan where I temporarily got hooked to beto-beto, a dice game on saucers tapped on ply boards.

My studies in Manila prompted me to lessen my Obando adventures. The visits eventually became occasional and we soon found ourselves in Obando during weddings and wakes. Nanay was no longer around to let me into Obando’s briny atmosphere. It is not an irrevocable dispersal but dispersal nonetheless. I still momentarily pause to take sight of Obando in television especially during this time of mushrooming festivals. I can still remember the very meaning of a fiesta in its splendor.#


The Musikong Bumbong image (with an imprint of Image Philippines) came from the Obando, Bulacan FB account. Daghang salamat sa walang pakundangan kong paggamit sa retrato ninyo.

Ilang-ilang namin

Ginamit pa ang Diyos. Pakikinabangan daw ng Diyos ang ilang-ilang namin dahil itutuhog daw kasama ng sampaguitang hinahango nila galing Maysilo. Tapos isasabit sa mga icon o sa altar ng mga PUJ na biyaheng Monumento-Polo o Sangandaan-Polo. Matagal na daw nilang kabuhayan ang magtuhog ng sampaguita at ilang-ilang, halos dalawampung taon na. Minsan na daw nilang nadaanan ang puno ng ilang-ilang ng Kuya Boy na namumusarga sa bulaklak. Bitbit ang maliit na panungkit, bibilhin daw nila lahat ang ilang-ilang para daw mapakinabangan.



Kahit alam kong malaki ang pakinabang namin sa ilang-ilang dahil sa amoy nito sa looban namin sa Coloong, hindi ko na sinabi. Sabi ko, hindi sa akin ang puno, hintayin ang Kuya Boy na siyang nagtanim at nag-alaga para lumago ang punong naninilaw sa bulaklak. Nagpumilit ang matanda kasama ang anak daw niyang matanda na rin. Sabi ko maghintay. Nagpumilit na pumitas. Sabi ko maghintay hanggang mamyang hapon pagdating ng Kuya Boy. Magtutuhog na daw sila mamyang hapon. Sabi ko bukas ng umaga. Ayaw umalis sa gate namin. Hindi na raw nila susungkitin ang mataas, ‘yun na lang daw mababang bulaklak ang puputputin, ‘yun lang daw maabot ng matanda. Nakumbinsi ako dahil ginamit na naman ang Diyos. Bumigay ako. Bahala na, sa isip-isip ko. Kapag nadatnan ng Kuya Boy, dun na lang sila magpaliwanag. Pinutpot ang bulaklak, nakahalos kalahating fishnet. Salita nang salita tungkol sa buhay nila bilang magsasamapaguita, tungkol sa mga anak niya, na lalo daw yayabong ang puno dahil tinatalbusan ng bulaklak.


Binantayan ko habang pinupupol ang puno. Ang lintek na camera ko, nasa hiraman kaya ginamit ko ang pipitsuging lente ng cellphone. Pitik ako nang pitik. Salita naman nang salita ang matanda. Sabi ko tama na at mukhang marami nang napupol na bulaklak. Akala ko kaunti lang ang maaabot ng matanda. Hindi ko akalaing halos mapangalahati ang fishnet. Nag-abot ng apat na baryang lilimampisuhin. Matutuwa daw ang Diyos dahil mababanguhan na naman Siya. Bantulot kong tinaggap ang beinte. Iaabot ko pagdating ng Kuya Boy. Bahala na kung magalit dahil nakalbo ang ibabang bahagi ng puno.




Bago umalis ang mag-inang matanda, napansin nila ang malagong pandan malapit sa puno ng ilang-ilang. Babalikan daw nila at bibilhin. Ipampapabango sa minatamis. Hindi na ginamit ang Diyos.


Nang makaalis ang mag-ina at bago ko pa ma-upload ang mga retrato sa laptop ko, naalala ko na sinabi ng bayaw kong dating tsuper ng dyipni na ang mga sampaguita sa mga altar at rearview mirror ng PUJ na biyaheng Monumento-Polo o Sangandaan-Polo ang resibo sa pangongotong ng mga pulis at traffic-aide sa M.H. del Pilar. Tsk tsk. Ginamit pa ang Diyos.