Last month we facilitated a leadership workshop for a group of public high school students. We have been doing these kinds of workshops for several years now for financially-challenged students so the job was not very difficult. The more challenging part came when the facilitators were given an extra task: to help the students reflect on the coming Christmas season.
This extra task should have been easy except that most of the students came from poor families who have just recently suffered the wrath of typhoon Ondoy. Most of them have had their houses and property flooded and destroyed, the few material things they own, including their school books, notebooks and bags, inevitably lost. How many of them have had to go through the horrendous experience of seeing the waters rushing in, quickly swallowing their houses as they move up to their roof, cold, wet and very afraid, for themselves and their loved ones.
Most of them had not fully recovered from the typhoon and the flooding, the horror-filled experience still fresh in their minds and hearts. Who was I then to talk about the joys of Christmas, one who has been fortunate enough to not go through the same trials as them?
So nervously I asked the students what they were hopeful and grateful for with the coming of Christmas. Most of them said they were grateful that although they’ve lost so much, they still had their families and friends. Some said they were grateful for the people who’ve helped them in their time of great need. Their resilience, the ability to be grateful and find grace amidst their loss, is truly amazing.
But what’s even more amazing is what many of them said they hoped for. You’d think that for people who have lost so much, they’d hope for gifts, for new school supplies, for food on the table, for new appliances, for a roof on their heads. I myself might have asked for a new laptop, shallow as I am. But this wasn’t what had happened. Most of the students said, some with heads bowed and voices low, had hoped to be able to help their families by studying hard and finishing their education. Most of them hoped to be able to serve one day, to give back to those who have been there for them in difficult times.
We ended the session realizing a couple of things. One, that this Christmas we should be grateful for every little act of kindness, small gestures that are expressions of a great love. After all Christ gave us the greatest act of kindness and love by coming to live with us and die for us.
Yet we must not end here. We must also realize that in as much as we have been recipients of kindness, we also have a great capacity to give kindness, no matter what or how much we have lost. We are never too poor or down trodden to give and love.
It has certainly been a very tiring 2009 with a rush of one tragedy after another – typhoon Ondoy and Peping, earthquakes, the Mayon volcano eruption, the Maguindanao massacre, the death of Cory Aquino, and the countless acts of impunity against the people by certain leaders. Add to this our own personal disasters and the Star of Bethlehem doesn’t seem to shine as brightly as it did 2,000 years ago.
But if we look carefully into the folds and shadows of 2009, we are sure to find small yet bright acts of kindness that can overcome any tragedy, that can move the spirit to believe in hope, that make us feel grateful despite everything that’s happened to us. And if we look even more closely we might see that many times these acts of kindness come from those who have suffered more than us, those who seem weaker and lonelier than we could ever be. In their able and generous hands, hope shines the brightest.
And if this is so, then we will know that one of the greatest gifts of Christmas, of Christ’s solidarity with our world, is ultimately our immense and infinite capacity for love and service, the capacity to be the star that brings hope and comfort to the tired and hopeless hearts of men.
In the past year I have been very blest to have come across so many peoplewho have given me the strength to hope once more through their small and great acts of kindness. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
I wish I could thank all of you personally; but I can only be so blest. But know that I am incessantly praying for you to find joy, to find love and to find Him in everything and everyone, in all things good and bad, in everything dark and light.
Monday, January 4, 2010
Sunday, January 3, 2010
The Best and Worst Movies of the Year - Agree or Disagree?
So here are the best and worst movies of 2009 according to Mr. Tom Charity of www.cnn.com. I do agree with some of his choices while some I have yet tosee. When are they going to show Coraline here? Hurt Locker?
So do you agree or disagree with Mr. Charity?The best and worst films of 2009
By Tom Charity, Special to CNN(CNN) -- Over the past week, "Avatar" and "Sherlock Holmes" sealed another record-breaking box-office year for Hollywood, with a little help from a trio of singing chipmunks.
The economy may not be back on its feet yet, but at least the movie business is recession-proof, right?
Not so fast. Blockbusters are attracting huge audiences, but size doesn't come cheap, and this year -- like last year -- the studios continued to cut back on the middle ground: the low- to mid-budget films that are rarely enormously profitable but that have nevertheless formed the bedrock of America's love affair with movies for the best part of the last century.
In a society proud to place a high value on independence, movie culture seems increasingly stratified and programmatic. Moviegoing is no longer habitual for most adults; the gamers who flock to "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen" -- the biggest grosser of the year in more ways than one -- are impatient with character and nuance, and are simply looking for maximum bang.
So long as Hollywood keeps upping the ante, audiences will repay the compliment. But sooner or later, something's got to give. If film production costs keep escalating, it will be the audience who pays, not only in higher ticket prices, but in reduced choice.
"Avatar" deserves to be a hit, but I have a strong suspicion that in setting out to save cinema, James Cameron has only made things worse. If the housing market bubble can burst, so can the blockbuster business.
"Avatar" didn't make my top 10, though I liked it well enough and much better than most in what was, by and large, a dismal year for Hollywood movies.
There were a few bright spots: J.J. Abrams reinvigorated the "Star Trek" franchise ... Pixar ("Up") and Disney ("The Princess and the Frog") contributed to a banner year for animated films ... there were adventurous commercial films from Steven Soderbergh ("The Informant!"), Spike Jonze ("Where the Wild Things Are") and Michael Mann ("Public Enemies") ... and Francis Coppola returned with his unapologetically esoteric and personal "Tetro."
The year will also be remembered as a watershed year for female filmmakers: Kathryn Bigelow, Jane Campion, Nora Ephron, Nancy Meyers, Rebecca Miller, Christine Jeffs, Anne Fletcher, Mira Nair, Karyn Kusama, Lone Scherfig, Lynn Shelton and Drew Barrymore, for starters. (And that's ignoring the French: Agnes Varda, Claire Denis and Anne Fontaine all had films on the arthouse circuit in recent months.) Of course, not all these films were hits, but the success of female-driven movies such as "The Twilight Saga: New Moon," "Julie & Julia" and anything at all to do with Sandra Bullock should put an end to that old Hollywood canard that those movies don't open.
And now, the top 10:
1. "A Serious Man"
It's bizarre that the Coens' best movie in a decade isn't getting the respect (or the audiences) it deserves. On the surface, "A Serious Man" seems to be a modest venture -- it doesn't feature any stars, and it appears to be a relatively banal story about a physics professor, Larry (Michael Stuhlbarg), barely coping with the news that his wife is leaving him just as a work promotion hangs in the balance. Yet from these domestic tribulations, the Coens have fashioned a movie that is, on the one hand, a probing examination of mortality, faith and guilt; and on the other, a bitingly acidic black comedy about middle-American Jewish mores in the late 1960s.
2. "Ponyo"
There may never have been a better vintage for animated feature films. Three made my top 10, and two more came close. The best came from Japan: Hayao Miyazaki ("Spirited Away") has long been held in high esteem in America, though he's never had a box office hit here. "Ponyo" is a strange and beguiling fantasy film about a sea spirit. It's an odd eco-fable, but illustrated with such beauty and imagination, it transports entirely into another world.
3. "Inglourious Basterds"
Quentin Tarantino's outrageous and brilliant war movie is the ultimate in revisionism. For 2½ hours in the dark, the cinema is everywhere and everything.
4. "Two Lovers"
Eclipsed in the zeitgeist by lead actor Joaquin Phoenix's mysterious behavior on Letterman, this is probably the most underrated movie of the year, not least for the actor's consummate portrait of a man desperately in love with the wrong girl (Gwyneth Paltrow).
5. "Coraline"
This was supposed to be the year of 3D, and with the arrival of "Avatar," I suppose it was. But nobody used the third dimension more creatively than Henry Selick in this dark and disturbing animated feature about a young girl momentarily tempted by a glimpse of an idyllic other life.
6. "The Headless Woman"
Lucrecia Martel's Argentine enigma spoke volumes while spelling out nothing. Martel demands attention; she may be the finest filmmaker on the continent.
7. "The Hurt Locker"
The best-reviewed American movie of the year is an intense, unflinching suspense film about a bomb disposal expert in Iraq (a career-making performance from Jeremy Renner). Why did it bottom out at $13 million at the box office? The distressing scene in which Renner cut into the corpse of a booby-trapped dead child may have had something to do with it. That kind of courage is rare in movies, but there's a smaller market for honesty.
8. "Bright Star"
Another box office under-achiever, Jane Campion's most assured film in a long time deserves to find a wider audience on DVD. The story of John Keats and love of his life Fanny Brawne, this is a sensual, immersive, deeply passionate movie.
9. "Fantastic Mr. Fox"
I enjoyed "Up in the Air," too, but if I had to pick one George Clooney movie this year, it would have to be this. Taking Roald Dahl's story as a starting point, Wes Anderson reconceived the reckless red fox as another of his irresistible, incorrigible and tragically immature alpha males. Mr. Fox's bravado has potentially terrible ramifications for his family and friends, as he ruefully comes to admit, yet this is his nature, and he cannot be otherwise. The same is true of Anderson, yet the switch to stop-motion has inspired his most visually lovely film and freed up his comic imagination.
10. "La Danse: The Paris Opera Ballet"
Veteran documentarian Fred Wiseman trains his camera on the rehearsals and inner workings of the venerable Parisian ballet company for 2½ hours -- roughly the time it took for Michael Bay to destroy one of the seven wonders of the world. Movie audiences thrill to destruction, but the art of creation can also be enthralling.
And the worst films of the year, with No. 1 taking the dishonor as worst film of 2009:
10. "Year One"
9. "X-Men Origins: Wolverine"
8. "The Ugly Truth"
7. "Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen"
6. "The Time Traveler's Wife"
5. "Ghosts of Girlfriends Past"
4. "Couples Retreat"
3. "New in Town"
2. "Nine"
1. "Miss March"
Friday, January 1, 2010
photo of the day 5: tall trees
Taken in Camp John Hay in Baguio. More about that trip in the coming entries.
Movie Review: Baby Mama
Thanks to HBO, I've been able to watch flicks I've missed in the past couple of years due to work, social life or simple indifference. The other night I got to watch Baby Mama, starring Amy Pohler and Tina Fey. 
I like Tina Fey and Amy Pohler. I enjoy watching them on SNL when they were still cast members. I perticularly like Ms. Fey, she's obviously very smart. She's the first female head writer for SNL, she writes and stars in the critically acclaimed 30 Rock alongside Alec Baldwin. She's can be a poster girl for the feminist movement. She's strong, beautiful and sexy.
If that's the case, her roles on screen might be a commentary on how society views strong women. In 30 Rock, she's made fun of by her coworkers,she's made to look sad and ridiculous. In Baby Mama, her character Angie, is at the top of her game: she's vice-president, she lives in an expensive apartment and, gasp!, she wants to have a baby on her own, without a husband. And here, once more, she's made to look lonely until she finds a man. But that's another discussion meant for another blog entry.
In Baby Mama, Tina Fey is her old awkwardly funny, witty self. And when paired up with Pohler, comedy ensues. However, like your typical SNL sketch some scenes fall flat and feel forced while others are comedy gem like that sequence where Pohler is getting fertilized.
What's refreshing about this flick is that it's a comedy targeted at women that's not a romantic comedy. It's not very often that that happens.
Baby Mama has its moments, but it's not enough, not even with Fey in it, to drive me to watch it again.
I give this movie a C+
From the Bookshelf: Amsterdam
To start off the new year, I'm going to put a new section on this blog: From The Bookshelf. This is where I recommend books I've recently read. Although I must remind you that I won't be doing any book reviews since I don't feel confident enough to do one. Maybe someday. But for now, I'm just telling you , these are the books I've read and go read them if you can take my word for it. Okay?
I know, I know, I'm no Oprah and the books I recommend won't suddenly become instant bestsellers, but what the hey. Just sharing okay?
One of the best books I've read in 2009 is Amsterdam by Ian Mc Ewan. It's quite short, but McEwan brings so much life to his character, to their passions, to their desires, to their will that it feels so epic. 
Amsterdam is about the rise and fall of two men, bestfriends who make a pact that will lead to both their inevitable doom. In the hands of an amateur the story could have ended up preachy, especially with its ending. But in the deft hands of Mc Ewan, Amsterdam is becomes an irony filled satire that is both funny and sad. Although one would sometimes get a sense that McEwan has thought more about the story than its characters as in his other book, Atonement.
It also seems that McEwan often has troubles with his endings. His stories and characters become so big, that it is hard to find a satisfying ending. In Amsterdam some might find the ending ridculous. But given the tone of the narrative which borders on fable, I'd say that the funny, justice-filled ending is well-justified.
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