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Update from CARA (Compassion and Responsibility for Animals), which looks after the stray cats of BGC.

So the Serendra Board blows off an invitation from City Hall. That can’t be good.
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Photos from Cats of BGC

By now you must be aware that Serendra in BGC (Remember that place where they had a gas explosion some years ago and all the tenants had to be evacuated? No not Glorietta 2, the one in BGC) prohibits residents and tenants from feeding the stray cats in the area. This is a place that styles itself as “pet-friendly”, so the hypocrisy would be laughable if it weren’t infuriating.

“As much as we value animals and promote their welfare”??? Clearly they think they are dealing with gullible idiots. A contradiction is still a contradiction even if you dress it in this season’s designer knockoffs.
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Photo by Allan Carreon

Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a warm, drizzly September in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos* get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street and yelling at random passersby—then, I account it high time to go to Quiapo as soon as I can.

Thanks, Herman Melville.

* a morbid state of mind, depression, low spirits

Everything is available in Quiapo, and at wholesale rates that make me feel like a flaming idiot for buying anything in shopping malls. Malls are for watching movies, soaking up airconditioning, and general preening. The streets and alleys of Quiapo are for shopping.

Note this combination of items approved of by the Church, and items disapproved of by the Church. I also stocked up on anting-anting.

After our consultations with our suking manghuhula, Allan my social media manager (I have two, haha, the other being Bubbles) and I had an excellent and very reasonably-priced lunch at a Chinese restaurant. (Which of us is the Fruit Salad?)

We went to Excelente for Chinese ham and queso de bola. Ham scraps, which are great on pan de sal, now cost Php1060 a kilo (!!!!!)

It was heartening to see that although Quiapo’s streets are filthy, crowded, hot and chaotic, and its regulars may not occupy overpriced condominiums or wear expensive clothes, homeless cats and dogs are given food and shelter. People are allowed to be human, unlike in Ayala Land’s Serendra condominium and dining complex, where people who dare to feed stray cats are charged huge fines. I guess claiming to support animal welfare while punishing people for actually caring for animals is their lifestyle. Of course we know what happens when there are no cats. Rats.

Cat haters, this one’s for you.

I’m very late to the party, but I finally saw Respeto and it’s awesome.

Hendrix (Abra) is a young man who lives in the slums of Pandacan, Manila. He has no prospects, except to get killed in the ongoing war against drugs. His world is a toilet: when police arrive to demolish their shanties, the residents fight back with shit and piss.

Hendrix whiles away his days with his friends Betchai (Chai Fonacier) and Payaso (Yves Bagadiong), and dreams of becoming a rapper. He joins rap battles where only the most savage FlipTop rhymers survive, and on his first attempt his misogynist verses are shredded by a woman. Ha! Then he crosses paths with Doc (Dido de la Paz), a broken-down old poet who runs a second-hand bookstore.

You think you’ve seen this movie, but you haven’t.

Tough, smart, honest, Alberto Monteras’s Respeto is what we need from the cinema in these dark times. It reminds us of the cycles of violence we are trapped in, and how every act of violence no matter how seemingly justified mires us deeper in this cycle. Certain aspects of the plot may be a stretch, but the magic of cinema is that we overlook these flaws because we are caught up in the moment.

Respeto is set in a vicious struggle for survival, but it rejects the miserablism of poverty porn to hold out a glimmer of hope. Art will not make you rich and famous. Art will not bring you love. Art will not even save you, but it will make you worth saving.

I’ve been wanting to write about this case of bullying for months, but my friend stopped me. She wanted to give the school officials the chance to do the right thing. Months passed and they did nothing despite several meetings with my friend and her son, in the presence of psychologists and lawyers. They said they were concerned with “fairness”, which is this case means inaction. In the end my friend decided to just take her son out of that school, away from the bully who had tormented him for years, and the school administration that enables and protects this bully.

My friend’s son has Asperger’s syndrome (an autism spectrum disorder). When he is anxious, he fidgets and mumbles to himself. Otherwise he is your typical 20-year-old college student. He can look after himself and takes public transportation to school. He gets good grades. My friend enrolled him in that college because it claims to be sensitive to the needs of students with developmental disorders.

Two years ago, one of his older classmates began bullying him. This older classmate would draw penises on his schoolwork, make loud sexual remarks and act out masturbating in order to embarrass him in public. This happened often and regularly. My friend’s son was traumatized by this bullying.

My friend documented all the instances she was aware of. On three occasions she reported the bullying to the school administration. They made vague promises, but did nothing. Finally she demanded a meeting with the school officials, the bully and his parents. The bully and his parents did not appear, and the school officials did not censure them. The school officials even made excuses for their absence.

My friend asked for yet another meeting, and to underscore the seriousness of the matter she brought her son’s psychologist and her family lawyer. I attended the meeting to lend her moral support. The school officials were pleasant and reassuring. They said they would get back to her in seven days’ time.

Three weeks passed.

After 22 days, the school administration handed down a memo. My friend’s son and the bully were asked to sign an agreement that they would “refrain from acting aggressively toward each other”. The memo recommended that my friend’s son, the student who was being bullied, “control his behavior” and that he be “accompanied by a companion or a shadow” inside the school.

Not only did the school administration refuse to enact any disciplinary measures on the bully, but their memo made it sound as if my friend’s son, the boy with Asperger’s, had brought this ill treatment on himself.

After several more attempts to contact the school officials, my friend decided that she had had it. She was tired of being given the runaround by the very people who were supposed to have her son’s welfare in mind. It was clear that the school had no intention of censuring the classmate who was bullying her son. And she could not bear the thought that her son would continue to go to that college and endure emotional torment. She transferred him to another school.

My friend’s son is doing very well at his new school. My friend has decided to let the matter go, but her stomach still turns when she thinks of what her son had to go through.

I take a personal interest in cases of bullying. I was bullied in high school and I am still furious about it. While it was going on, no one stuck up for me for fear of being bullied themselves. Adults actually hinted that it was somehow my fault. I do not think it was funny. I do not attribute it to youthful shenanigans, nor am I amused at the effort of otherwise intelligent people to describe it as “a character-building experience.”

I am writing this because I want my friend’s son to know that he is not alone.