Gemma Cruz Araneta | LANDSCAPE

In a delicately tremulous  voice, with barely a trace of a Chinese accent, she cooed  “free world” and   “totalitarian” many  times during her interview with Mr. Steven Bannon, a national security adviser of President D. Trump. She is  Simone Gao of “Zooming In.” I am sure  most of you have seen her shows on YouTube. … Read more

How clever, how subtly Machiavellian — “Wow China, Amazing China.” Erstwhile Secretary of Tourism  (now Senator) Richard Gordon should protest that  his marketing pitch –“Wow Philippines” — has been plagiarized. Thailand might also not be happy that her  immensely successful “Amazing Thailand”  has  been taken in vain. I wonder if there will also be a … Read more

This  “enhanced community quarantine” is a palimpsest of the  successive lockdowns I have had to live through in  a now distant past.  There were no plagues or  pandemics that threatened community or  country; it was only I who was  sick and had to be isolated from everyone else. Stoically, I  survived those three periods of … Read more

Dr. Pio Valenzuela went to Dapitan in June, 1896, accompanied by two men pretending to be patients, to tell Jose Rizal about the Katipunan and convince him to join the anti-colonial revolution against Spain. When asked if they already had enough arms, Valenzuela answered in the negative, but declared that they were willing to start … Read more

On  5 October 1682,  the Archbishop of Manila, Fray Phelippe Fernandez de  Pardourgently convened for a meeting the religious superiors of all the orders in the colony, but for  some strange reason, he expressly ignored the Cathedral Chapter, the  college of clerics who were his advisers. At issue was a royal decree dated 1677, wherein … Read more

On 8 November 1519, Hernan Cortez, the intrepid Spanish conquistador, met the legendary Moctezuma II face to face. That first-ever encounter was not only visual, it necessarily included one other faculty intrinsic to human beings, the olfactory one, the sense of smell. As soon as Moctezuma heard that the Spaniards were marching to Tenochtitlan (now … Read more

While dusting bookshelves, I came upon a paper by Prof. Francis A. Gealogo titled “The Philippines in the World of the Influenza Pandemic of 1918-1919” (Philippine Studies, Vol. 57,No. 2, June 2009). It is a must read in the time of COVID-19. The professor said there is a dearth of serious in-depth studies of how … Read more

When  Miguel Lopez de Legazpi, ex-mayor of Mexico, cast anchor and began to  subjugate Cebu in 1565,  the food supply of the conquerors became  precarious very soon. The inhabitants of Sugbu (Cebu), Pintados the Spaniards called them,  seemed incapable of providing  for boatloads of Europeans who came with  Cross and Sword; They were not interested … Read more

A hundred and fifty-two years after Magellan arrived, during the Season of Repentance (Cuaresma or Lent), the Sword and Cross were still battling for hegemony, before the eyes of bewildered natives.   A protagonist of the drama was Don Geronimo de Herrera, chief chaplain of the Capilla de la Encarnacion, the parish of the Infantry in … Read more

At this writing Cuba, our historical half-sister, has not reported a single case of Covid-19 virus. Those who loathe  the regime in that island republic will surely say that there is no freedom of information there so negative news is stifled and only good news, if there is any such thing, escapes government censorship. I … Read more