Monthly Archives: November 2008

Fist in the Air in the Land of Hypocrisy*

Posted on by Marocharim
20

* – from “Wake Up” by Rage Against the Machine

I was walking around Ortigas Center awhile ago after putting in another day at work when I felt a stabbing pain in my wrists and fingers.  I don’t know if it’s carpal tunnel syndrome, repetitive stress injury, bone spurs, or the remnants of neuralgia from years past.  Unless I’m typing, the most comfortable position for my hands right now would be to clench them.  I know that if I buckled and cried from the pain, not a soul in any given building in Ortigas Center or the Republic of the Philippines will give a damn.  So I guess that for the lack of money to pay a chiropractor, I might as well clench my hands.

Clenched fists mean a lot of things, not the least of which is fighting.  The clenched fist is a symbol of resistance.  To clench your fist means to stand up for what’s right because you believe in it, not because you feel like it.

One thing that has not been hurting, though: my conscience.  You can beat up my hands, but you cannot beat up my conscience.

I think that when you blog about political issues and social issues, you cannot treat citizenship, political participation, and social obligation from your blogging.  When we say something or write about something, we should be able to act on it when the situation calls for it.  Our words shouldn’t be empty; we should be able to stand by our principles.  It’s not a matter of winning or losing, revolution or insurrection, cost or benefit.

Fairness, justice, and freedom are more than just words; they are perspectives.

- V, V for Vendetta

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Reflections on Four Years of The Marocharim Experiment

Posted on by Marocharim
4

I know that blog anniversaries are a dime-a-dozen, and that maybe talking about your blog’s anniversary tends to be on the blowhard side of the equation.  Yes, for all intents and purposes, no one cares if you’re celebrating (or “celebrating”) your blog’s anniversary.

But if you’ve been around for four years or so, you’ll probably either indulge in self-promotion, or indulge in self-reflection.

November 9, 2008… it’s been four years, isn’t it?

I was with a group of Plurkers the other night at Eastwood enjoying some ice cream and fruit-flavored… “Julius,” when a girl in the group (I think her name’s Tiffany… I’m not good with names, bleh) asked me what I blog about.  If you’re a regular reader, you’ll understand that it’s kind of hard to explain, but after a long litany of stuff, I ended up saying “Hey, I also translate Backstreet Boys into Filipino.”

Tiffany gave me a look of disbelief and asked, “Why?”

What an excellent question!

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Standing Room Only

Posted on by Marocharim
1

Principles and advocacies are like train rides on crowded coaches.

Some opt not to ride the crowded train at all because it’s not comfortable, so they wait for the next train.  Some opt to pack themselves inside the train and wedge themselves into the train, just so that they can sit down and be comfortable with the ride, hovering like vultures to see if someone will give up a seat.

Then there are people who realize that there’s nothing to do but to stand inside that train.

There’s nothing to do but to stand inside that train no matter how much it moves, no matter how many people sit down, no matter where you’re going, or no matter how much money there is in your pocket.  For you to get somewhere, you have to stand for it.  No matter what, principles and advocacies are standing room only.

I reiterate: principles and advocacies are standing room only.

Bomba La Isadora: Translating "Iisa Pa Lamang" Quotes

Posted on by Marocharim
3

You kind of figure that four years of The Marocharim Experiment (yes, TMX was first written November 9, 2004) should be celebrated in the grand manner: like some thoughtful, inspirational post.

Like talking about responsibility, how much times have changed, like how important it is for us to stand up for what we believe in no matter what the cost, no matter what that is.  That we should stand up for what’s right because we write about it.  That we’re more important than what we know and what we believe, but we should keep our feet planted firmly on the ground, knowing that all of this is temporary.

There endeth your one-paragraph summary of what blogging means to me.  Anyway…

One of my favorite moments in “Iisa Pa Lamang” (shit, I’ll actually write about this) was when Isadora caught – yes, caught – the grenade aimed at Sophia by Marco the Psycho.  Like a lot of people, the reason why I so heart IPL are one-liners; where else would you have dialogue like that?

There’s this hypothesis that translation is an epic fail because when you come to think of it, Filipino is more dramatic than English.  In the tradition of TMX, let’s put that hypothesis to the test.

I’ve taken the liberty of translating IPL lines not for the sake of science, but just because after four years of hypothesizing, testing, and concluding… I just want to annoy you.

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The Vote of "Non-Americans"

Posted on by Marocharim
7

Let me be (I hope) one of the first Filipino bloggers to congratulate President Barack Obama.

Awhile ago, many of us took notice – and rejoiced – when Barack Obama won the US Presidential elections to be the first African-American to lead the nation.  It was a culmination of an obsession and a fascination of that occasional season where we, non-Americans, delight and revel in an election and a right that isn’t ours.

Sen. Ed Angara, who put geopolitics into play, may have articulated the message best: Barack’s mother was from Hawaii, Sen. John McCain was detained as a prisoner of war in Vietnam, so the vote has a lot to do with Asia.

The “message to the world,” as Ding Gagelonia points out at FV – and with the same appreciation and admiration expressed by Pat Mangubat – brings out something sad… but then again, true.

I’m not anti-American, but I am a non-American.  I do not have the same Constitutional rights given to an American citizen to vote every four years for an American President.  Yet as the world rejoices over the victory of President Obama, I’m a bit more pensive.  As a non-American, what exactly do I have at stake with this milestone in American history?

Nothing.

There’s a certain fascination – sometimes even bordering on epal – on non-Americans like myself to make a big fuss about what the international community has at stake with a US Presidential election.  There have been many questions asked to both Obama and McCain over the course of the 2008 US Elections by us non-Americans: what’s their policy on outsourcing?  How will they improve foreign relations with other countries?  What’s their favorite color?  What’s their stand on reproductive health?  What will they do on their first 100 days in office?

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The Importance of Grammar in Blogging

Posted on by Marocharim
5

I agree that the Filipino blogging community should rejoice at its rapid, exponential growth.  I enjoy reading the profound thoughts and insights of many of my fellow bloggers every now and then, but I think the growth of the Filipino blogosphere is hampered by the improper use of English.

Granted that not all of us are good writers, and not all of us have a proper grasp of the rules and conventions of language, but I believe that the proper use of language is not something we should take for granted.  While I don’t get my grammar perfect all the time, I think that proper grammar is relevant in blogging.

Proper grammar is more of a “peeve” than a “non-issue.”  Yes, it’s true that we should write to express and not to impress; however, “expression” and “impression” are not mutually exclusive.  While blogging may be an informal and personal mode of communication, it is a very public exercise that comes with responsible authorship.  As bloggers, I believe that we should be expressive and impressive at the same time.

The way I see it, profound thoughts and insights do not make a blogger.  For these thoughts to be understood by readers, they must be articulated in such a way that they can be understood.  Like any exercise in writing, blogging demands the proper use of grammar and spelling.  Just because blogging is informal doesn’t mean that it should not conform to the standards of proper English.

The truth is, there is no acceptable defense for using English improperly in blogging. There are only two reasons I can think of: laziness and incompetence.  Either a blogger is too lazy to go over his or her work, or a blogger is writing in a language he or she knows very little of and couldn’t care less for.  I know it’s harsh, but it’s true.

The more we ignore – or feign ignorance about – the proper use of language, the more we contribute to the load of useless, irrelevant information that there is on the Internet.  For us to effectively communicate our thoughts and feelings, we should pay attention to grammar and spelling.  How we write – not what we write about – says a lot about who we are.

For blogging to be a credible source of information – whether it’s about ourselves or it’s about society – it must be written in a credible way.  It’s not about “aesthetics” as it is about responsibility: as writers, bloggers should conform and adhere to the rules and conventions of proper spelling and proper grammar.  Not that we should get it perfect all the time, but we should strive for excellence in writing.