“Surely not hymns praising nations that treat the Philippines as either a military outpost, geopolitical chessboard, or obedient pawn.” Do read this lovely essay by Wilson Flores.

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We mourn with the writing community the passing of Amadis Guerrero, who chronicled the travails and joys of this strange nation, such as this account we share on the sorrows and laughter of the Left, EDSA, and what the future – then – held for people active in the struggle for change. Thank you, Amadis, for your abiding curiosity, your faith in our people, your humor, your insights, the lightness of your touch.

We celebrate the 25th year of the #IYAS National Writers Workshop, which is now well underway. The silver anniversary homecoming is just days away! This year’s selected writers are once more having a grand time, because in #IYAS, they are challenged and encouraged, and their voices get even more lift using wings they were born with. Through the tireless work [READ]

This event is tomorrow, a provocation we hope that is fit for the 25th year of such a generous, loving, fierce, and cerebral national writers workshop, one that covers writing in several languages, in poetry, essay, short story, and so on and on and on, organized by the University of St. La Salle (USLS) in partnership with the DLSU Bienvenido N. Santos Creative Writing Center (BNSCWC). Mabuhay #IYAS!

Friends across oceans? Yes! What a lovely time spent with Lito and AA Valerio, and their inquisitive son, Teo. They dropped by the Constantino Foundation compound in late April. They were spending a few weeks in the Philippines on holiday, much of it spent visiting family in Davao. But they were also looking for a copy of the newly released 50th anniversary edition of The Philippines: A Past Revisited (APR). We both laughed at the effort by a few sellers to pass off ridiculously priced versions – used frayed copies of APR selling at P1,500-1,800, which people were actually buying, when they could have purchased the latest new hardbound edition at P699, and the newly released softbound version, the 24th printing with a new introduction, at P599.

We exchanged a lot of stories. Romance, university days, friendships, social struggles and political debacles. It was a [READ]