im tired. emotionally, spiritually, physically, creatively. and social media is white noise, loud and empty. yesterday, i deactivated my facebook account. in times when im in this conflicted restless anxious state, i get off facebook and keep only twitter and my blog for sending out smoke signals when i need to. i tried to deactivate my instagram but there was only a delete option. without batting an eyelash, i went for the delete. no more instagram. my avoidance of the greater watering hole of online society tends to go for only a few days. i do hope i get revived faster than usual. i make no promises. what do they say about wizards again?
totally unrelated photo of ET being “bathed” by steven spielberg. cheers and have a happy, fruitful life. go read a book or something.
i booked plane tickets for my art department staff around august last year so they could join me in my mindanao birthday celebration this year. i planned out a week’s itinerary for them, most of whom never stepped on cagayan de oro before. this list of activities included white water rafting and ziplining. unfortunately, about a week before we were to fly out from manila, we received news of a tragic accident resulting to the death of a bohol tourist while rafting in cdo. i tried to tame down fear by explaining this is an isolated case–only 3rd death in 17 years since the rafting industry came about; happened also on friday the 13th (june 13 2014). yes, superstition but whatever. eventually i got the group to agree on no rafting and instead do a tour of camiguin.
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ive been to camiguin in the 80s and then around the year 2000. this would only be my third time there. the place almost hasnt changed and that’s a good thing. what’s also great about the place is it doesn’t cost much to go there. here’s my attempt to persuade others to visit camiguin by listing what we spent for this year (june 2014).
to get to camiguin from manila, you can take the plane to cagayan de oro. promo fares on cebu pacific normally are issued out 6-8 months before the travel period. after taxes and surcharges, one would be paying PHP1500++ promo fare round trip manila-cagayan de oro (no check-in baggage). normal plane rates run around PHP6,000 round trip if purchased maybe a week before a flight, cebupac or pal (pal is normally more expensive by p200 haha). upon arrival at the airport, take a shuttle (ranges PHP 150 to 200 per head) to bring you to the city 30 minutes away (normal drop offs are at centrio mall or at limketkai mall).
from wherever you are in CDO, take a cab or jeep to agora market. ask to be dropped off at the bus terminal or where the vans going to balingoan pier are located. cab may be around p100. jeep is 7.50 per head.
there were 11 of us in the group to camiguin. the barkers struck up a deal with the driver (normally, you wouldnt be able to talk to driver until later not unless you have contacts) and explained to us the van had a 14-person capacity and they were charging us 1,650 package rate for all 11. we agreed, got on, and van immediately left for balingoan pier.
we wanted to leave CDO early and hoped to arrive at balingoan pier around 10AM (cdo to balingoan will take about 1.5 to 2 hours) but we got out of the house late. it’s always a challenge herding a large group especially on vacation where schedules are mere suggestions. the driver did assure us we’d catch the 11.30AM boat in balingoan pier. and we did.
upon arrival at balingoan pier, we headed straight to the ticketing office. ferry tickets to camiguin (benoni port) cost around P150 per head. plus P2 environmental fee. plus p2 terminal fee.
we arrived at camiguin’s benoni pier around lunchtime. a driver with a multicab was supposed to meet us there (i made reservations prior). right when the boat approached the pier, porters started coming up the boat including a guy who came up waving a sign with my name on it. “that’s us.” we followed the guy who led us to a purple multicab and endorsed us to the driver from the resort we were staying at.
the day before leaving for camiguin, my brother-in-law and i were already in contact with the owners of paguia resort (contact number 0917-310-7085, look for ruel) and we booked for a big room/house that would fit our group of 11 for only P2000 a night, including an extra bed. the same resort also sent out
the film we worked on for about a year of our small, insignificant lives (compared to fallen heroes who fought for our liberation) just released a teaser trailer! sharing with you a glimpse of the biggest movie we’ve all worked on, so far! i give you jerrold tarog’s HENERAL LUNA!
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directed by JERROLD TAROG cinematography PONG IGNACIO production design BENJAMIN PADERO & CARLO B. TABIJE music JERROLD TAROG editor JERROLD TAROG catering JERROLD TAROG free coffee JERROLD TAROG sunscreen JERROLD TAROG (kadaghan bas imo ngalan diri JERROLD TAROG) screenplay JERROLD TAROG ED ROCHA HENRY FRANCIA producer ED ROCHA executive producer FERNANDO ORTIGAS
heard a lot about this place from my sisters. it’s a cozy watering hole in an area surrounded by bridal shops. i do remember in the 80s the building burrow is located now used to house our favorite video store (honi music center or something like that) where we’d bribe our grandfather to take us during weekends so we can pick out and rent animated films on betamax.
the concept of this bar is pretty simple and straightforward. this supplements the bartending program of a vocational school located beside it. the interior is sparsely decorated but tastefully done and the bar features a wide selection of hard liquor and commercial beers. the beers are priced a bit higher than most establishments in the area (p50) and they dont offer it in buckets. it kinda works to keep the bar’s clientele within a certain age group or social class perhaps (it’s cheap but not that cheap haha).
came by tonight with my sister, cousin, and my mother. i wanted to see this place as i was intrigued by the concept. the acoustics could have been better but the lighting worked for me and i always love anything with dark grey walls (right wall of bar). the food is decent (i got to try their cheezy meaty fries; they were out of calamares) and they serve their beers in frozen mugs. the biggest come-on is that the place is indeed cozy (and clean!). carlo and i currently still maintain our dream bar to only serve coffee and beer and seeing this makes our dream feasible.
the burrow is located on capistrano street, in front of thai me up. the 1st image is borrowed from the bar’s facebook page. you can look up its location via foursquare here.
i saw the trailer a few weeks back and i was excited for this. i totally forgot this was by luc besson when i went to watch LUCY this afternoon with my mother. i was a major fan of the professional and the rather quirky fifth element with corbin dallas multi-pass. the concept of maximizing human potential was interesting but i felt its writing in LUCY could have been more thorough and more fleshed out. the visuals were interesting enough but kubrick did a much more spectaular job in 2001: a space odyssey. having said that, scarlett was perfect for the role, with her raspy alto voice, and morgan freeman, for always being there when you need him. as i said, i forgot luc besson directed this film and while watching the movie, i kept saying, this feels like something luc besson would do. the pace, the damsel in distress, the empowered female, the basic feel of the movie, the french police and the car chase through paris, the musical score (by longtime collaborator eric serra), even a korean version of gary oldman. btw, included in a montage is a snipet from the philippines of our cebu prisoners dancing. and maybe another scene that involved delivering a baby (could also be any southeast asian country though). 3.5/5
a lot of people on facebook (at least in my facebook news feed) have developed an annoying habit of sharing stuff from annoying websites like viral nova and sfglobe feature videos and articles with slogans that annoyingly challenge your curiosity to click on and see if it really will “blow your mind away, literally!” the content may be cute or interesting but what gets my goat is really the way they present stories that if you do not click on, you’re gonna lose half of your life. come on!
screencap of san francisco globe
i have to screen stuff all the time and well, today i found myself reading up on food waste in europe and how supermarkets can help out. the Philippines do have food waste but since we’re a much smaller country, i feel our food waste is still manageable and our daily produce somehow do end up somewhere where people still eat them. but still, a larger percentage of the food that have wilted or turned brown while in supermarkets and palengkes stay there until they are really bad and will have to be disposed. i heard that in SM supermarkets, a supplier has to keep his shelf fully stocked all the time. i wonder where the stocks that have wilted a bit would have gone. in palengkes, we do see that vegetables that dont get sold eventually just turn bad and then gets dumped. now i hear the philippine market is opened for imported produce from the states.
is this really a good idea? we’re already dealing with so much surplus (not everything gets purchased and consumed) amidst poverty and hunger plus our farmers are already struggling to grow perfect vegetables that will fit the supermarket standard (good enough for a photo-shoot). it’s bad enough we are importing rice from vietnam instead of investing on our rice farmers. i think we cant really afford to have competition from importers. and we havent even discussed GMOs here.
so today i was also reading up on this supermarket’s goal on selling the not-so pretty vegetables and educate the public that these are totally the same as their pretty counterparts. they are just as nutritious and ok for consumption. and selling them at a cheaper price is a great marketing strategy to lessen europe’s food waste.
this other website talks about the first german grocery that attempts to lessen packaging by selling wholesale items into tingi-tingi, the same idea as our sari-sari store, except the store is prettier and they cut out excessive packaging. click on the photo for the link.
how are you as a consumer? do you have a healthy balance of purchasing from supermarkets and palengkes? here in katipunan, we have 3 choices of supermarkets: Rustan’s Fresh, SM Save More, and Shoppersville. of the three, rustan’s is obviously more expensive. their vegetables are pretty but that’s the premium of a high-end supermarket and obviously they are more expensive. SM Save More is cheaper and some packed vegetables are less in quantity so you get it “cheaper.” i like that shoppersville is not a chain supermarket and has been in katipunan for a really long time! their stocks are great and i really havent done a comparison but i think their vegetables are priced cheaper than SM Save More’s. if you really wanna go cheap, take a cab to marikina market and even if you compute transportation fare, it still comes out cheaper than having shopped at rustans, i kid you not. we once spent P1000 ($23) on vegetables and a few crabs, fish, and chicken (including cab fare). had we gone to rustans, it would have set us off at around P2300+ ($53). how smart a consumer are you?
outside rustan’s in katipunan, there’s a fruit and vegetable stand where i sometimes buy my bananas after having shopped at rustan’s. lemons in rustans are p20 (46cents) a piece while the guy outside rustan’s sells his lemons for half the price. and they’re practically the same kind of lemon. which would be a smarter choice, eh?
we havent even talked about purchasing local and cutting down on carbon footprint. i once tried purchasing local products instead of my usual brands and i did find very minimal differences, or none at all. instead of colgate for toothpaste, i picked happy (produced by ACS, a filipino company). instead of head and shoulders, i tried human nature (pretty awesome local brand selling all-natural, organic products but slightly expensive). our products are as good as their imported counterparts. we’re just programmed to think imported is always better, unfortunately.
ive ranted enough. my blog is really going nowhere. one minute i talk about movies or set design then i talk about something like this. i should get back to regular programming.
it’s been weeks since ive shot anything. HENERAL LUNA wrapped up mid june and ive been in and out of bed in katipunan and in mindanao since. my 2-week birthday break was awesome but ive been restless since i got back here in manila. there are so many things i would like to do and pursue except that i dont have the energy and the funds for it. i need to be aggressive with my life decisions. i hope i dont fall into the trap of the usual and remain in my lazy, comfort zone. if there should be anything to come out of this, i know my future will be secure. and i will sit on my rattan rocking chair in a house i designed and built with a magnificent view. art is life. and my life is my expression. july 15.2014. 17.56hrs. cheers!
put myself in a rather tight spot as ive declared staying away from social networks until i get to watch the episode 9 of game of thrones lest somebody spoils it for me. with nothing else to do, i write this short blog and give you this video of one of the best vocalists ever, karen carpenter, in a stripped down version of For All We Know. manila just cooled down after a brief shower and the afternoon’s perfect with karen’s alto brooding over the speakers.
we spent about 2 weeks in capas, tarlac to shoot the battle scenes of HENERAL LUNA in may. why oh why did we only find this cafe last week? found on the ground floor of mr blue inn (macarthur highway, capas tarlac), where monica and the pm team were billeted while doing preps for our train station shoot, id see monica’s posts of her breakfast on instragram but it wasnt until i got here that i was charmed by the place.
LES CAPEHAN DE TARLAC is currently on a soft opening status, serving only breakfast but will cook lunch and dinner meals if you book ahead and discuss with the cook on what you want to eat. we asked for pakbet and galunggong for lunch and ginataang kalabasa and fish fillet for dinner, of which some ingredients were harvested from their garden at the back. the coffee they serve is from baguio, freshly brewed with panutcha sweetener and you pay per head (unli coffee? yes). it’s almost the cafe carlo and i wanted to resurrect blumentritt into where id only serve coffee and beer. whatever is available in the ref would be offered for the day.
im also of course a sucker for nice cement finishes and the semi-industrial minimalist nature of the interiors. it felt like the dining room tambayan of a buddy, intimate and totally friendly. i hope this cafe will be a hit with locals and tourists.
les capehan de tarlac is found on the ground floor of the DEB building along the macarthur highway in capas tarlac. look for the signage of mr blue inn.
after a grueling race against time, the art department managed to finish enough of our train and station set for HENERAL LUNA to be able to shoot on time as scheduled last week. perhaps given another day of construction on location, sets such as this would have a bit more detail and more texture. as they say, works of art are always works in progress. that didnt stop us from celebrating when the day’s shoot packed up of course. and with pictures taken by our DOP, pong ignacio. (sorry, no photos of the set at this time)
bottom row: jetro, mike-abueg, sammy, iyah, arman, myself, carlo, kitch. next row: melven, docdoc, pollyboy1, chet, kuya jaime in white, vlad in the cap, kuya polly, mikee and monica right behind me, ciara, rhon. backrow: bong in red, rydel, pollyboys (sorry, i dont remember all of their names, will research), norman in blue, richard, mike with the buri hat. not in photo were ate lhen, lolafer, dianne, nikki (who decided to get a glass of water at this time and couldnt be found, hence she missed this).
and so we dance
i am a designer but i am nothing without a team that backs me up for everything that needs to be built and purchased and setup and stowed away after a shoot. i always believe that with the combination of talent, skill, time, and work put in by this people, we’d have a great movie. however, it also wouldn’t be worth doing if everybody was so cranky and serious. that is why i always pick easy-to-deal-with people and i like to keep my crew happy and not ngaragged as much as possible (new word, put it in webster. means, harassed and stressed out to the nth level). and of course, as they say, the more the manyer. thank you guys.you’re all awesome!
benjamin padero 