Dangwa Flower Depot

BUSINESS&ECONOMY 9
Dangwa
Flower Depot
Dangwa is a popular fresh flower market in Metro Manila.
It is composed of more than 50 stalls set-up along Dos Castillas and other parallel streets in Dimasalang, Sampaloc,
Manila. Prices of flowers in the area are both negotiable
and affordable. On a regular day, roses can be bargained
for as low as P50 a dozen. During special occasions like
Valentine’s Day and All Souls’ Day, prices of key products
have been known to soar by as much as six times their
usual standard. The term Dangwa is believed to have been
taken from the name of a nearby bus station, the Dangwa
Transport Terminal.
Products Offered
Considered a center of flower retail in the Metro, Dangwa
showcases the richness of floral products in Luzon. A wide
range of blooms are offered day in and day out, from
roses, zinnias, marigolds, and chrysanthemums, to anthuriums, gerberas, daisies, and tulips. Rare flowers can also
be bought at some select stores but have to be ordered
at least a week before needed. While most of the stalls
cater to individual customers, there are also wholesale
flower retailers in the area that answer to large orders.
Ornamental petals and leaves, floral supplies and decors,
and accessories like laces and ribbons are also available in
Dangwa.
Sampagitang
Walang Bango
by Inigo Ed. Regalado
1918
A society in turmoil with its traditional
values being eroded by western mores
and lifestyles in this period of deepening
American colonization is depicted in
Sampagitang Walang Bango, Regalado’s
masterful study of adultery in Manila’s
high society. The novel is a graphic
revelation of the ugliness and hypocirisy
that pervade the lives of the rich. Bandino is a successful businessman who has
perfected the art of seduction by offering
blandishments that women cannot
refuse. His beautiful and love-starved
wife, Nenita, feels increasingly alienated
from her husband. The sparks of rebellion finally flare up and she starts an
affair with Pakito, a lawyer engaged to
the modest and demure Liling. The lovers are found out by the husband who, in
a fit of rage and humiliation at being a
cuckold, tries to shoot himself. Only the
timely arrival of their daughter brings
him back to his senses. Forlorn and
dejected, Bandino goes abroad together
with their only child. Nenita, abandoned
by both her lover and her husband, is
overwhelmed with grief and loneliness.
Other Services
While a great number of people flock the flower depot
to buy flowers, there are also some who visit to get their
flowers arranged. Stores in Dangwa take arrangement
orders for special affairs like weddings, debuts, wakes, fiestas, and other church celebrations. Flower arrangement,
like other services in the area, is also very inexpensive.
Best Time
The flower market is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.
It is generally believed that the best time to go to there is
between 1 and 3 o’clock in the morning when fresh stocks
of flowers have just arrived...
(Pangasinense)
For the complete article, visit http://en.wikipilipinas.org/index.php?title=Dangwa
10 GOVERNMENT&POLITICS
Hiwaga ng Puso
by Carlos Ronquillo
(1913)
This is a story told from the point of
view of a woman, Concepcion Reyes,
born poor, orphaned at an early age,
and adopted by a kind teacher. She goes
to Manila and there falls in love with
Pedring. But they part ways eventually
because of some misunderstanding. It
is as a colegiala at the convent school,
La Concordia, that she learns that the
unrest in the community is being perpetrated not by outlaws but by the enemies
of Spain and the Church. This is what
her confessor, Padre Blas, has informed
her. Sion eventually discovers that
her confessor has evil designs on her.
Through Sion and her adoptive mother,
the reader is made privy to a number of
important episodes in the Revolution.
Thus in the novel’s final chapters, the
narrow dimension of personal love is
widened to encompass the nations’ lifestory. The novel ends with Pedring and
Sion finally being reconciled.
Crimes of
Passion
Filipinos by tradition are passionate in love. They are romantic and have many customs about courtship and weddings, such as the harana, pamamanhikan, and paninilbihan. But these are just the sweet side of love. What
happens when love is not requited, or worse, betrayed?
Many people will try to get over the pain. But a few will
view the rejection as a humiliation and exact equally passionate revenge...
Datu Sumakwel and Kapinangan
According to the Maragtas legend, Datu Sumakwel took
over as leader of Panay when Datu Puti left. Sumakwel, after learning that his wife Kapinangan was having an affair
with his vassal Guronggurong, pretended to go on a long
trip. Hidden in the ceiling, the Panay Datu caught the lovers “in the act” and speared Guronggurong, who was killed
instantly. This would have been a simple crime of passion,
except that Kapinangan, unaware that the killer was her
husband, cut up the body of her lover to quickly dispose of
it, hoping Sumakwel would never find out.
Bernardo “Narding” Anzures and Lilian Velez
Narding Anzures, a former child actor, was the leading
man of Lilian Velez in several films. Anzures found out that
Lilian was going to have another leading man, Jaime de la
Rosa. On the night of June 26, 1948, he broke into Velez’s
house and stabbed her and her housemaid to death. The
only surviving witness was Velez’s four-year-old daughter.
Anzures was tried and convicted of
murder, and later died in prison
of tuberculosis.
Stephen Mark Whisenhunt
and Elsa Santos Castillo
The most well-known “crime
of passion” in the Philippines could very well be the
murder of Elsa Santos Castillo by lover Stephen Mark
Whisenhunt. On September
24, 1993, Whisenhunt stabbed
and killed Castillo in his condo
in Greenhills, San Juan, Metro
Manila, then dismembered her
body and threw away the different body parts along the
road to Bagac, Bataan ...
(Kapampangan)
For the complete article, visit
http://en.wikipilipinas.org/index.php?title=Crimes_of_Passion_-_Eight_True_Tales_of_the_Dark_Side_of_Love
PHILIPPINECOMMUNITIES 11
Chinese
New Year
Chinese New Year (also called Spring Festival) is the first
day of the Chinese calendar (lunar year). It is the major
festivity of the Philippine Chinese Community (informally
called Tsinoys) which could fall on any day from January 21
and February 21 depending on when the first new moon of
the Lunar Year rises. Each year is named after one of the
twelve animals in Chinese astrology: Rat, Ox, Tiger, Rabbit, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Sheep, Monkey, Rooster, Dog, or
Pig. Traditionally, festivities for the New Year commenced
as early as the 23rd day of the 12th moon of the lunar
calendar, and ended with the Lantern Festival on the 15th
day of the New Year. It is not an official Philippine holiday,
so students in Chinese schools usually only get an afternoon off. But while Tsinoys have to work or go to school
during Chinese New Year, they still celebrate it with style.
History
The festival falls before China’s planting season, when the
ground is still frozen. Since farmers have to wait for the
soil to thaw, they spend the time waiting making offerings
of gratitude to the gods.
Orang!
by Jose Diaz Ampil
(1910)
This is a text where the principal story
appears to be an exemplum, or an illustration of the work’s major thesis. The
story begins as two men discuss the burdens the population has to carry−the
onerous taxes, the consequences of the
Payne Bill−and the failure of Filipino
government officials to do anything to
ease the suffering especially of the poor.
Then the narrative focuses its attention
on a pair of lovers−Emong and Orang.
They would like to get married but
Emong feels that he would not want
Orang to live the miserable life he is
leading. Driven by desperation and
frustration, Emong takes his own life.
Orang, bereft of any reason to cling to
life, loses her will to live and dies as the
novel ends.
Traditions
Families especially pray to the Kitchen God, who is responsible for reporting everything that transpires throughout the year to the Emperor of all Gods. They offer the
Kitchen God sweet foods so he will report sweet things.
Tikoy, a sticky pudding, is not only a favorite treat on this
occasion, it is a favorite offering to the Kitchen Gods
since it is said to be
capable of keeping the
God’s jaw glued shut,
to prevent him from
making an unfavorable report. After the
food offerings are all
made, an image of the
Kitchen God is put on
a paper chair and set
on fire so he can
“ride the flames”
to heaven. He
returns at the
height of the
New Year’s Eve
celebrations ...
(Bicolano)
For the complete article, visit http://en.wikipilipinas.org/index.php?title=Chinese_New_Year
12 CULTURE&ARTS
A
midst the public spaces of the metropolis, where enormous billboards, towering
buildings, and busy streets dominate, lives some of the most astonishing masterpieces of famed Filipino visual artists. These excellent
works of art serve not only as aesthetics but also as timeless
cultural and historical landmarks of the Philippines.
EDSA People Power Monument
The EDSA monument was designed by sculptor Eduardo
Castrillo in 1993. The structure was cast to serve as a memorial tribute to the brave Filipinos who marched in the
historic avenue of EDSA during the 1986 People Power Revolution to overthrow former president Ferdinand Marcos.
U.P. Oblation
The University of the Philippines’ renowned landmark, the
Oblation, is a masterpiece of National Artist Guillermo Tolentino. In 1935, Guillermo was commissioned by Rafael
Palma (then University President) to craft a monument that
translates in visual form the second stanza of Jose Rizal’s
“Last Farewell”. The concrete statue painted in bronze
stands 3.5 meter high (representing the 350 years of Spanish colonization of the Philippines) on a pile of rocks symbolizing the islands of the Philippines. Funding for the statue
was raised through a two-month fund campaign that garnered P2,000. The model of the statue was widely rumored
to be Fernando Poe, Sr. though there are sources that claim
that the real model was Guillermo’s student apprentice
Anastacio Caedo.
Manila Metropolitan Theater
The Manila Metropolitan Theater—located
in Padre Burgos Street—is formerly Manila’s
premier venue for theatrical performances.
Built in 1935, this art deco structure was designed by the distinguished Filipino architect
Juan M. de Guzman Arellano. The bronze
sculptures of female figures on the facade of
the theater are works by the Italian sculptor
Francesco Riccardo Monti. Inside, the relief carving of Philippine plants that adorns
the lobby walls and interior surfaces of the
building is designed by the artist Isabelo
Tampingco. It was reconstructed after the
US liberation of Manila in 1945, fell into
disuse in the 1960s, restored in the following decade, and fell again into disrepair. It
is currently undergoing renovation through
Manila City government’s project to restore
its historical buildings
...
For the complete article, visit http://en.wikipilipinas.org/index.
php?title=10_Famous_Arts_in_Public_Spaces
ilipiniana.net is embarking on yet another ambitious project: the online publication of Sangdaang (100) Nobelang Tagalog. The objective is to preserve and
promote this literary art form, which began in the early 1900s and lasted until the
1990s, when reader interest waned in the genre and was pre-empted by the advent
of text messaging, Internet, video games, manga and anime komiks, and romance
novels.
This project offers to the public rare and out-of-print Tagalog novels that deserve
to be read and appreciated by new generations of Filipino readers. These novels
have been acquired by Filipiniana.net and are currently being processed for online
publication. Each novel comes in a full-text version accompanied with an executive
summary and annotations by award-winning essayist and literary critic Soledad S.
Reyes and its translation by Roberto T. Añonuevo, brilliant poet and author of awardwinning anthologies. It also features other Filipiniana.net editorial interventions,
including keywords, subject headings and clarificatory hyperlinks.
The 100 Nobelang Tagalog concentrates its attention on the rise of the Tagalog novel, from its origins in the first decade of the 20th century to 1920s, leading to the what critic Iñigo Ed. Regalado considered as its golden years. Although
the revolutionary movement was extinguished by 1902, the nationalist sentiment
continued to find expression in the free press, since the American colonizers could
not understand the language of the colonized. Furthermore, according to the collection editor Soledad Reyes, the disappearance of the Spanish-era Comisión Permanente de Censura and the breakup of Spanish friar control over the press led
to the establishment of a new group of familial publishing companies owned by
the Martinez, Santos, Bernal and Fajardo families, and a sharp rise in the publication of Tagalog, regional and Spanish newspapers, magazines, and books.
The first proto-novels in Tagalog, as defined by scholar Resil Mojares, were Modesto
de Castro’s Urbana at Felisa (1864) featuring the correspondences of two sisters,
one in Manila and the other in Bulacan, and Miguel de Bustamante’s Si Tandang Bacio
Macunat (1885), which was a polemical tract written by a friar bent of proving the
undoing of natives through education.
Some of the earliest novels in the Filipiniana.net collection are works that depicted
in a negative light the Americanization of the first decade of the 20th century. Some
of these titles were Nena at Neneng (1905), considered the first Tagalog novel and
the masterpiece of Valeriano Hernandez Peña, better known as the “Father of the
Tagalog Novel”; and Pinaglahuan (1907), Faustino S. Aguilar’s classic novel on the
American occupation and its attendant exploitative materialism and capitalism that
was rampant during the period.
100 Nobelang Tagalog can be accessed for free by simply logging on to www.filipiniana.net.
For the complete rationale, visit http://filipiniana.net/tagalognovel.jsp
T h e P h i l i pp i ne
D ig ital Librar y
F u l l te x t a n d s e a r c h a b l e d i g i t a l l i b r a r y of P h i l i pp i n e
boo k s , d o c u m e n t s , a n d i m a g e s .
A knowledge-sharing inititative of