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Showing posts from June, 2025

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Rizal and Me: Commemorating Rizal's 164th Birth Anniversary

Posted by Margaux Camaya, The Visual Traveler June 19, 2025

History Philippine History Rizal travel

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18 'Beki' Words to Add to Your Vocabulary

The Philippines is truly a diverse country. Aside from having thousands of islands, fifty different ways to cook adobo, we also have hundreds of languages and dialects. Filipinos are also innovative. One of the popular lingo or slang that came about during the 20th Century is known as Swardspeak or Beki.

The Visual Noli Me Tangere: 28 Paintings at the National Museum of Fine Arts

It was a Saturday morning when I went to the National Museum of Fine Arts. And if it weren't for a group of young people who were taking a selfie, I wouldn't have known that there is a special exhibit of twenty-eight Noli Me Tangere Paintings by Leonardo Tayao Cruz . This is the largest collection of paintings inspired by Jose Rizal 's novel. When one of the security guards approached the group to ask them to refrain from making a lot of noise, I got to talk to her afterward about the Museum. She advised me of the Noli Me Tangere exhibit which is located on the Judiciary Floor (Sandiganbayan Reception Hall and Gallery) . Right after my conversation with the guard, I went directly to the ground floor to see the paintings. The oil paintings were completed between 2002 and 2006. They were previously displayed at the Rizal Shrine in Fort Santiago in 2008. The paintings were done in the classical-impressionist style which the artist is known for. ...

El Filibusterismo: The Death of Maria Clara De Los Santos

A drawing of Maria Clara by Vicente Manansala. National Museum of Fine Arts. As a Jose Rizal fan, it might sound blasphemous but I don't enjoy reading El Filibusterismo as compared to Noli Me Tangere . I find Rizal's writing a little hurried and the narrative complex in this book. As a sequel to Noli Me Tangere , it does tie up the loose ends that were left unanswered at the end of the book. I always get emotional whenever I read El Fili. Maybe it was all because of the "revolutionary" talk that happens throughout the story. The scenes in El Fili are graver and forthright. There seems to be a sense of darkness that surrounds every page. The Deal There is this particular chapter in El Fili where Simoun , the intrigue-laden protagonist, visits the infirmed Capitan Tiago . The old man is being taken care of by Basilio, the young orphan sacristan in Noli Me Tangere who is now a medical student. Captain Santiago de los Santos is the father of Maria Clara, the...

Boxer Codex: This Is What 16th Century Filipinos Looked Like

"The Bisayans are accustomed to paint their bodies with some very elegant tattoos. They do this with iron or brass rods, the points of which are heated on fire. These are done in the manner illuminations, paintings all parts of the body, such as the chest, the stomach, legs, arms, shoulders, hands, and muscles, and among some, the posteriors." What seems to be the connection between a British Peer, World War II, a historian, and the Philippines? A 307-page manuscript that is full of colored drawings, superstitions, norms, and descriptions of flora and fauna that is known today as the Boxer Codex. The twenty-month British occupation of Manila and Cavite from 1762-1764 saw a massive sacking of academic and historical materials that were brought back to the United Kingdom by the forces of Brigadier General William Draper. A huge percentage of that plunder came from the Augustinian library . In the next century or so, the colored illustrated manuscript would end up...

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A week before the declaration of the Enhanced Community Quarantine in Cebu City last March, I visited a local bookstore and came across Neni Sta. Romana-Cruz's Philippine Proverbs book published by Tahanan Books. It's a compilation of 105 sayings gathered from the different languages and dialects that we have in the Philippines. I've been a fan of Ms. Sta. Romana-Cruz since I bought her books, You Know You're Filipino If...A Pinoy Primer and Don't Take a Bath on a Friday: Philippine Superstitions and Folk Beliefs in the early 2000s. I so love these books that I've even given copies of them as gifts to my cousins who grew up in the United States of America and even to my international acquaintances. I also have a copy of her take on how we Filipinos love wordplay, especially on store signs and business names. The title of this book is, Ngalang Pinoy: A Primer on Filipino Wordplay . Looking at the cover illustration of her books, one would think that they are de...

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