More articles about: notes and essays

Me at 12, frozen in the afternoon light in our small living room extension, looking out at a backyard of tall and unkept grass. The phone is ringing. A record is playing. This might have been the summer when girls happened to ...

Dear Paolo, In our family, there is one day in our lives that will forever live in infamy.  May 23, 2009.  We lost a major part of our small family on that day. Lola Daisy, your cousin Anton and his Yaya Tess, and your only ...

My son of a bitch father used to boast that we had a security guard to guard our farmhouse.We didn't have a security guard. We had an idiot named Patricio who refused to wear underpants, or any sort of pants for that ...

The Battle of Marawi ended in October last year, yet we in Mindanao are still under martial law. For Moros, it is something that brings back the horrors of the imposition of Martial Law in 1972, when widespread violations of Moros’ human rights ...

I always wanted to be a dad. Even as a teenager, I dreamt about being married to the most beautiful woman in the world, and then having the most adorable, loving, caring, talented children. I would even write down my future children's ...

It doesn’t really matter who started it. What matters is that our men allowed an official, world-stage basketball game to escalate into a vicious street-corner brawl. What matters is that our national sportsmen were so shamefully unsportsmanlike to their opponents, visitors to ...

From when I was about four years old all the way up to my late teens, my dad would take me to work—whatever his work happened to be at that moment in his life.When he was in banking he took me to ...

At Dulo MNL, where the music takes lead, it’s hard to tell who’s who. Sometimes that’s the point. On good nights, the space is so packed that you can’t tell who you’re dancing next to. Probably someone you’ve met before. Like a ...

AS a boxer who was without equal, Manny Pacquiao united Filipinos from all over the world with the power of his punches and the overflowing national pride stirred by his victories. As a politician, he tears us apart by the carelessness of ...

There is no head at our dining table. We have a rectangular table made of wood, with white steel legs, surrounded by cheap plastic chairs of various colours. There are no assigned positions, only preferred chair colours that must be respected lest a certain ...

Just as we are inexplicably drawn to certain people, whom we end up loving forever, I have been inexplicably drawn to Islam, a way of life to which I’ve surrendered now and will embrace forever. There’s so much about this lifeway that moves ...

National Artist for Literature Cirilo F. Bautista passed away early yesterday, May 6, at the age of 76. He is fondly remembered as one of this generation's literary greats, whose works were expressive of the Filipino experience. Esquire was lucky to have ...

Remember when video killed the radio star? We doubt it. We doubt you even remember MTV, that channel where the music video "Video Killed the Radio Star” by a band called The Buggles aired at first broadcast. The Buggles were a one-hit ...

We live in a world smart to advertising. We don't have examples, we have “pegs”; bloggers have become “influencers”; almost everything taking place on the Internet is part of some grand “marketing strategy.” The idea of a “professional contest joiner” has even ...

The resurgence of wrestling in the Philippines began as an underground movement—staged in a boxing arena (instead of a real wrestling ring…because that would be too expensive); men hurling their bodies at each other, most likely mimicking videos they would watch off ...

During enrollment season, the corridors would be stuffed with bodies; some standing and texting their friends that they were about to lose hope, some sitting on the floor, buried in a book or blankly listening to music, some nodding off to sleep, ...

.Arman,We met two years ago when I was a reporter doing stories on economics. It was 10 p.m. on a Tuesday. Through the side mirror I watched your shadow emerge from the street leading into a labyrinth of shanties. You worked 13 ...

So I'm going to stick my head out because I feel there is a lot of confusion going around on the dengue vaccine again. This is my interpretation of the Sanofi release. For the record, I am an infectious diseases physician who ...

When fat, grasping, Harvey Weinstein was unmasked for the sexual predator that he was, it was a watershed moment for women, and everyone cheered as the allegations, each bolstered and emboldened by the previous, came thick and fast. The next big name ...

The Kramers are a bit of a cultural phenomenon here in Manila. Doug and his wife Chesca, along with their three gorgeous children, have announced themselves as a sort of Endorsement Dream Team over the years, picking up impressive accounts with KFC, Nesfruta, Hapee ...