A friend once told me that in governance, the last name’s the charm. It is a well known trend that has not lost its luster throughout Philippine history. A less popular idea, however, is that this family affair does not necessarily equal pursuits of tyranny. It is assumed by common folk that this trend is…
Tag: Opinion
The dress code matters
I’m the type of person who has random things on my head. I usually have what we Filipinos would call “trips” or rather crazy ideas. One of my “trips” is the dress code. It has been tried, tested and revised for a couple of terms already and this is an issue we can all relate…
Dear future,
It was like receiving a letter from the past. Weirdly enough, it came in the form of an email. Some few weeks ago, I had a brief correspondence with our first editor in chief (EIC) Polo Pantaleon. I asked him to write a special column for this month’s equally special anniversary issue. Too bad he…
The house that Smit built
Well it’s not even a house to begin with. It certainly doesn’t have a roof, which is why patches of grass have been indifferently washed away by time like an old man’s receding hairline. It most certainly doesn’t have a name. It’s simply called “the football field.” No walls either; only a several-meters high fence,…
I have been green-minded for half my life. I was in the same institution for 17 years of my life because, much like my family’s receding hairlines, studying in La Salle was a family legacy. Green had been hard-wired into my DNA. I am a Lasallian three generations deep and damn proud of it. My…
Light bulb!
This verbally manifested thought bubble from Despicable Me’s villainous main character, Gru, whenever he had a revelation – or at least whenever he thought he had a great idea – accurately described many moments in my life at The LaSallian. Some schemes turned out to be great; some, epic fail; and some, weirdly enough, both.…
This past year, I became particularly conscious of my age. I never really gave it much thought before (then again, I was younger), but when you realize you are the dinosaur at The LaSallian’s acquaintance party, you are bound to give your age some attention. The LaSallian, in all its glorious 50 years, has seen…
From one era to another
Our batch of staff and editors at The LaSallian belonged to an era that we may now describe as an infant in technology. As a staffer of the Menagerie section for two years, I submitted my articles in print-out and diskette. In 1998, when I became University editor, I carried more diskettes from my reporters.…
Cut and dried
Recently I was accused of being a liberal, to which I replied I didn’t consider it a slur. In the last century, women were given the vote and African-Americans were granted equal rights in the US, a large part of which was due to progressive grassroots movements. Great strides were made because stubborn men and…
Memories of flower people and student power