Fashion Failure
My dad’s elder sister, the one who raised me in my pre-puberty years, is a bona fide fashion plate. In her GSIS days (between the late 60’s to the early 80’s) she had a new dress for every party, and most of the time I had a miniature version of what she had. She was always aware of the latest women’s fashion trends.
I remember every other weekend my aunt would weave through the maze of Zurbaran with me in tow, shopping for the latest in fabrics. We would then take our booty to her mother’s dress shop at the corner of Taft Avenue and Nakpil, where my grandmother would conjure a design with a pencil on a corner of her pattern paper, and by next weekend would bring out the finished product with a flourish. My grandmother, well-known among students (and their mothers) who went to the Philippine Women’s University across the street from her shop was considered to be one of the established women’s clothing designers in her time.
I’m rather disappointed that I never got to spend my teen-age years with them. If I had I wouldn’t be the fashion wreck that I am today. Back then neither my aunt nor my grandmother would allow me to attend a wedding in my denims, much less go to the office in them. The office always meant formal clothing, sensible skirts or slacks and Dansko shoes. And makeup. I am helpless in all of that, preferring to wear the office uniform (dark blue polo shirt with the company logo on the sleeve) and either loose slacks or denims and my trusty pair of Converse moccasins. If they were here with me now I’d bet they’d be dropping magazines that offered style resources for women and tut-tutting at me for the way I dress.
If you are 39 years old and above…
If you happen to :
- be at least 39 years old at the time you are reading this
- have gone to school in the Philippines, whether in public or private school
- have worn white Spartan canvass rubber shoes when you were a kid
I would like you to play the video and then close your eyes. You don’t need to watch guitar icon Chet Atkins play the guitar as cleanly as only a virtuoso can. But I want you to close your eyes and try to remember when you heard this song for the first time.
That’s it … just close your eyes and think back. You remember now? Good.
I would like you to write what you remember as a comment to this post. Tell me everything you remember.
You’d be helping an old woman get through the first years of old age. There may be some entrecard credits for you too, if you’re an entrecarder.
Sowing the seeds
Back when I was in grade school there was a program that the government launched called the Green Revolution. Simply put, the Green Revolution encouraged everyone—whether they were city dwellers or those who lived in the suburbs and provinces—who had a plot of land to plant vegetables. Schools were especially enjoined to do so, as they were the most likely to have Garden Planters available to cultivate. This was a two-pronged effort to augment the family or school’s table with produce grown with the residents and students own hands.
The movement progressed to such lengths that even areas bordering drainage canals were cultivated, with or without the use of a garden planter. City residents made use of such limited space that even their Window Box Planters sprouted tomatoes and spring onions. City and provincial schools had as many two by six plots planted to pechay and ampalaya (bitter melon) as they did decorative shrubs in Indoor Planters. Households in the provinces where there was more land available to till yielded homegrown crops that allowed them to save on the food budget.
I regret that such a planters movement has become almost impossible to implement in today’s setting. Urban space that used to be available for planting is now more often used to build makeshift houses for people who have come to the city to try their luck. People everywhere seem more prone to pouring cement on a piece of land instead of pouring fertilizer for crops. And all of a sudden I am reminded that there is no more fertilizer and because of that there are no crops.
Not anymore.
Nabosesan by Bienvenido Lumbera
I first met Professor Bienvenido Lumbera in 1985, when I attended the UP Writers Workshop in the summer of that year. That was 23 years ago. As with most well-loved teachers, Prof. Lumbera possesses the rare gift of wearing the years well. He looks exactly the same in this video as I remember him then.
This video was taken during a Lecture on Poetry and Politics that he gave on the 17th of May 2008 at the Ateneo de Davao University.
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