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Korean cat in Seoul cafe, June 2011. Photo by JZ.

We were in a taxi when the driver pointed to some Koreans coming out of a restaurant. “Mga Koreyano,” he growled. “Magugulang ang mga yan.” (Koreans are deceitful.)

“Bakit naman ho?” (Why do you say that?) we asked.

“Gusto akong dayain,” he replied. “Ihatid ko daw siya sa Laguna, tapos ime-metro? Hindi puede yon.” (One tried to cheat me. He said, Take me to Laguna but turn on the meter. That’s not right.)

We don’t know how taxis charge to drive passengers outside Metro Manila, so we assumed the kontrata system was in effect (They agree on a rate at the start of the trip).

“Magulang ang mga yan,” he repeated.

“Baka ho nagkataon lang,” we said. “Yung mga Koreyano ho sa Seoul mabait naman.” (Maybe it was just that guy. The Koreans we met in Seoul were quite nice.) The first time we tried to use the ticket machine at a Korean train station we must’ve looked so bewildered that someone came over to offer help. As he spoke no English we conversed in signs.)

“Hindi, madaya sila,” the cabbie insisted.

When we got to our destination the meter read 68 pesos. We didn’t have the exact change so we handed over 100 pesos.

“Wala akong barya,” he said peremptorily, showing a roll of P100 bills.

“Meron ho kayong P50?” We had a P20 peso bill.

“Wala, wala talaga.” What he meant was that we should give him the P100 and consider the change his tip.

We weren’t about to give this unpleasant man a P32 tip. A 47 percent gratuity, are we insane?

Fortunately we had a lot of loose change. We gave him the P20 bill and exactly P48 in 5 and 1-peso coins.

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Thank you for the advice. Unlike you forward-thinking types we do not carry P68 in 25-centavo coins at all times, as they would tend to jangle.

However, in the dark days of martial law, some lawyers would pay their activist-clients’ bail in 25-centavo coins in order to tick off the authorities.

Yes we have two contests running at the same time but it’s a long weekend and people need something to do.

Fan fiction, once regarded as the province of freaks and obsessives, has been getting more respect. After all if you know a character very well—and many fans believe they know their favorite characters better than their own authors do—and you envision them in a situation that hasn’t occurred to their original author, why shouldn’t you write your own story? Well, lawsuits for one, but that’s if you intend to publish without permission.

Here for instance is an archive of non-canonical Buffy stories written by fans of BtVS.

In this week’s LitWit Challenge we invite you to pluck any character (or as many characters as you like) out of a beloved book and put them in a story of your own imagining. Yes you can tear off Joffrey Baratheon’s head or let Pip dump Estella. We’re lifting the word count rule so you can let your fantasies run loose. The deadline is Tuesday, 10 April 2012 at noon, and the prize is this charming book about books.

We’re waiting.

The Weekly LitWit Challenge is brought to you by our friends at National Bookstore.

Mitsou is a book about a cat, by the painter Balthus.

Now read Meow, a short story by Felix J. Palma, in the Sex issue of Words Without Borders.

We’re going to the preview of James Cameron’s Titanic in 3D tonight. To refresh our memory we dug up our original review of Titanic (compiled in Twisted 4: The Twisted Menace). Ooh mocking and disdainful. Will we change our mind?

We have no memory of DiCaprio announcing he was bisexual; it may have been a rumor that was going around at the time.

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We’re giving away this piece of Titanic movie memorabilia: a travel bag with the title on it. (Medyo nakakatakot lang gamitin kung sasakay ka ng barko, pero ikaw lang ang may ganito.)

For a chance to win this bag, watch Titanic in 3D, opening in theatres on Saturday, 7 April 2012, then send us your love letter to Jack (Leonardo DiCaprio) or Rose (Kate Winslet) or Billy Zane’s eyebrows in 500 words or less. Best love letter wins!

Post your love letters in Comments. We’ll accept entries till 16 April 2012.

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Aargh remember those radio remixes of the love song from Titanic? Bad enough that Celine Dion was shredding our eardrums but DJs tossed in bits of movie dialogue:

“Jack!”
“Rose!”
“Jack!”
“Rose!”
“Jack!”
“Glug glug glug glug…” Okay we imagined this last line but it might’ve improved the mix.

Matt Zoller Seitz in Vulture.

Game of Thrones is doing for sword-and-sorcery what the remake of Battlestar Galactica did for science-fiction on TV, and what the Godfather series did for the gangster story: foregrounding its mythic power, and showing that the genre can be brazenly serious, even ostentatiously artful, and unquestionably adult, without killing its simple pleasures. In one of the new episodes, Tyrion tells an enemy whom he’s exiling, “I hope you enjoy the walk. I found it surprisingly beautiful, in a brutal, horribly uncomfortable sort of way.” He could be talking about the show.

Before Nora Aunor, all the big stars of the Filipino screen were mestizo. Photo from alphamusic.ph.

At the Hong Kong Sevens rugby tournament the other week the Fiji Rugby Union made this observation on their official Twitter account.

“The only thing Philippines about the Philippine team playing in the Hong Kong 7s is the name of the team.”

This remark is interesting in light of the flap over Arnold Clavio’s “hindi kayumanggi” statement about the Philippine national football team. We don’t think the Philippine Rugby Union should make like the Azkals management and write a strongly-worded letter denouncing this “racist” statement.

In the first place it will seem like a sore loser move because Fiji won the HK7s, thrashing the world’s rugby powers before beating the mighty New Zealand in the final. (The Philippines, making its first-ever appearance in the tournament, was like the plucky indie movie at the Oscars who’s just happy to be nominated.)

Read our column at InterAksyon.com.