UNIVERSITAS September 2010 by University of Asia and the Pacific

An official publication of the University of Asia and the Pacific

Renaissance

September 2010

ENGINEERS SCIENTISTS

Editorial

At the start of a new future

chool year 2010-2011 marks the birth of a new course—Bachelor of Science in Applied Mathematics—under the new School of Sciences and Engineering. It is also the starting point of the University’s new eight-year plan. We have been provided—through the University’s vision for 2018— with a roadmap for our journey in the next eight years. It not only gives us a sense of purpose and direction but also fires our enthusiasm in carrying out our duties. We are greatly motivated by the knowledge that our day-to-day tasks contribute to the progress of the University’s quest to be a prestigious research and teaching institution in the Asia-Pacific region. Our work, be it big or small, gives life to this vision. Undoubtedly, we all have our personal goals and professional ambitions. We work hard at what we do in order to help our family, to gain experience, or to master skills. But beyond all that, what we do bears profound meaning in terms of our work’s role in contributing toward a higher purpose. What’s more, the University’s vision allows an increased sense of teamwork because every member of the community needs to work together to implement the strategies we have mapped toward achieving our institution’s goals. Yes, the targets have been moved. The bar has been raised. It’s time to roll up our sleeves and do our part— teaching, managing, carrying out technical and non-technical duties, etc.—in realizing UA&P 2018.

An official publication of the University of Asia and the Pacific ✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽

Editor: Ms. Boots Ruelos Managing Editor: Mr. Daryl Zamora Associate Editor: Mr. Carlo Cabrera Contributing Writers: Mr. Daryl Zamora John Vincent Pimentel Ramon Cabrera Gab Asuncion Francis Bautista Ms. Anna Alejo Dr. Jose Maria Mariano Ms. Beth de Castro Kinna Kwan Ms. Camille Diola Dr. Jaime Laya Jonathan Ray Alforte Jas Magsino Viory Janeo Krista Kyla Seachon Manpreet Grewal Dei Boado Kinah Solomon Dr. Leodivico Lacsamana Alexander John Dy Dave Villaroman Erin Locsin Angel Yulo Isha de Vera Ms. Laya Boquiren Mr. Tyrone Limon Mr. Luis Arcangel Mr. Carlo Cabrera Mr. Michael Paje Contributing Photographers: Mr. Carlo Cabrera Justin Akia ITEC Ayala Foundation Inc. Haiping Lu Abigail Adel Aris Acoba Dino Placino EM Ladies 2012 and 2013 Kim Bennet Manalo Mr. Jopet Puno Contributing Staff: Ms. Beth de Castro Graphic Design: Jerry Manalili/Chili Dogs Printing: Apple Printers, Inc. ✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽✽ You may contact us at: Corporate Communications Office University of Asia and the Pacific Pearl Drive, Ortigas Center, Pasig City Telephone No.: 637 0912 local 301/342 Fax No.: 637 0912 local 342 E-mail: universitas@uap.asia www.uap.edu.ph Schools/Institutes: College of Arts and Sciences (CAS) School of Economics (SEC) School of Education and Human Development (SED) School of Management (SMN) School of Communication (SCM) School of Sciences and Engineering (SSE) Institute of Political Economy (IPE)

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

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TIP #3

Don’t be afraid to be alone

Center for Social Responsibility officer reelected to int’l council on sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . CircuIT: Who said IT is all about boring numbers and codes? . . Filipino dept chair wins in national poetry contest . . . . . . . . . . . . Veteran broadcaster Ms. Chi-Chi Robles heads CCO . . . . . . . . . . Ms. Asie Ocampo is new Admissions Director . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . School of Management students on top 5 in HSBC competition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Campaign for Change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Four new lawyers from UA&P . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Life and UA&P according to Lance Capulong . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . New associate professors: Dr. Veronica Ramirez and Dr. Jerry Kliatchko . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A love affair with poetry . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Love Life, Live Love . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Prof. Kim Djun Kil: Pioneering Korean Studies at UA&P . . . . . . Prof. Joem Antonio: Beyond the Palancas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . School of Sciences and Engineering: Educating Leonardos . . . . . Dean Amado Saquido: Finding a founding dean . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A vision for the University 2018 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Graduation 2010 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Commencement Address: Make a Difference . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Valedictory Address: Bridging the Gap . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . XCU:SEB [The CAS Student Executive Board on Extreme Close-up] . . . . . Empowering the Youth at the Democracy Camp . . . . . . . . . . . . . . AYLC and the whys of leadership . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Institute of Political Economy students, faculty attend PPSA confab . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Student councils hold congress at UA&P . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . How to become a master student . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . UNIV 2010: Inspiring a global culture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . R&J: Behind the Mask . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . R&J: Behind the Curtain . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Why So Serious? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ER+GO Photography competition winners . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . EM Creative Series 2010 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Musings on the EM Creative Series 2010 Edition . . . . . . . . . . . . . Pintado . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . BIGGKAS 2010 Summer Sports Clinic: Soccer fans and summer fun . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Prescup Season 10: Changing of the Guard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The Bataan Death March 102Km Ultramarathon . . . . . . . . . . . .

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UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Center for Social Responsibility officer reelected to int’l council on sustainability

P H OTO C O U R T E SY O F M R . C O L I N H U B O

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Center for Social Responsibility Operations Committee ViceChair Colin Hubo was recently reelected to the Stakeholder Council of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI). He is the Philippines’ lone representative to the Amsterdam-based group that produces the world’s most widely used standard for corporate social responsibility and sustainability reporting. According to a communiqué from GRI Governance Coordinator Elina Sviklina, Mr. Hubo’s “pre-existing work on sustainability issues and professional background were the basis of [his election].” He was selected from about 40 candidates representing business, civil society, and mediating institutions. Thirteen of the nominees were chosen to be

among the Council’s Asian members, including Mr. Hubo. As part of the 60-member Stakeholder Council, Mr. Hubo attends the group’s annual conference in Amsterdam, where they deliberate key strategic issues regarding corporate social responsibility and sustainability reporting. Mr. Hubo will serve the Council until the end of 2012. Today more than 1,000 organizations in 60 countries use the GRI guidelines publicly to report on their environmental, economic, and social performance. The GRI also collaborates with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the United Nations Global Compact. Mr. Daryl Zamora  Corporate Communications Office

CircuIT

News

Who said IT is all about boring numbers and codes? Recently the IT Executive Council came up with more than the usual bits and bytes in an event exclusively IT: CircuIT. The week-long affair gave students the chance to appreciate a colorful exhibit, have skills development talks, and unwind in the so-called Funfest. CircuIT began Day One with a thanksgiving Mass at the Stella Orientis Chapel. Then students proceeded to a circus-themed exhibit at Study Hall B, featuring the artistry of IT students expressed in photos and videos. What was interesting was that the venue was a great art project itself. The exhibit team did a great job creating a festive atmosphere that really fit the theme. A booth with gaming and music consoles were also put up, drawing crowds by the dozens. After the visual treat came the IT Development Talks. There were two sessions: a discussion on games development (courtesy of Microsoft) and on software piracy (given by IMC students). Afterwards, IT students vied in a competition using a software made by their fellow students; a trivia contest won by sophomore Christian Tenchavez also added to the showcase of brainpower. The CircuIT festivities ended with Funfest. Modified parlor games allowed the students, faculty, and staff of the then Institute of Information Science and Technology Studies (now Department of Information Technology under the new School of Sciences and Engineering) to have fun and cultivate camaraderie among themselves. To those involved, it was a fitting end to the memorable week. Indeed CircuIT showed people how techie students are not actually married to their laptops, and how two seemingly unrelated worlds (“circus” and “IT”) can unite to create an extraordinary experience. CircuIT’s success only highlighted the whole-person formation imparted to UA&P students. Gab Asuncion  College of Arts and Sciences 2nd Year

Filipino dept chair wins in national poetry contest

Department of Filipino Chair Leodivico C. Lacsamana placed 3rd in this year’s Talaang Ginto sa Tula for his poem “PINTADO: Inuukit sa Kulay ang Hibla ng Hininga” (see page 50 for the full text). The Talaan is an annual national poetry contest organized by the Komisyon sa Wikang Filipino. The award is given in celebration of the “Araw ni Balagtas” (April 2), commemorating the life and literary legacy of Francisco Balagtas, author of the classic Filipino epic Florante at Laura. “I want to inspire the young generation to put country above self,” says Dr. Lacsamana, referring to the poem. “If they will inscribe the history of their country (through deeds and action), they should color it with hope, unity, and peace. Hence, the title ‘PINTADO’ (The Painted Ones).” Currently teaching Filipino Language and Literature, as well as Literary Theory and Criticism, Dr. Lacsamana holds a doctorate in Philippine Studies from the University of the Philippines. He received the 1989 Metrobank Outstanding Teacher (Secondary Level) award when he was still teaching at La Salle Greenhills. He is presently writing a Filipino translation of Dante’s Inferno. Mr. Daryl Zamora  Corporate Communications Office M R . C A R LO C A B R E R A

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Veteran broadcaster Ms. Chi-Chi Robles heads CCO

F Ms. Chi-Chi Robles (3rd from right) is now at the helm of UA&P’s corporate communications team M R . C A R LO C A B R E R A

Ms. Asie Ocampo is new Admissions Director Seated on her office chair, Ms. Astrea Ocampo glides away from the computer to engage herself in an interview. The grace with which she talks and conducts herself must have served her well before she became UA&P’s new Admissions Director. Armed with an undergraduate degree in medical technology and a master’s degree from the Asian Institute of Management, Ms. Ocampo has worked for the sales and marketing departments of multinational companies since 1975. That work history is marked with outstanding achievements, including her ascent to her company’s regional office, the acceptance and implementation of marketing strategies she had formulated for her company’s Southeast Asian market, and the redemption of a company that was incurring losses. Ms. Ocampo left for UA&P when she was senior vice president and general manager of Perfumeria Española Inc., a maker of the world-famous Heno de Pravia personal care products.

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

or the Corporate Communications Office (CCO), the operative word being “communications,” the time has come to turn up the volume with the appointment of an experienced new CCO Director from, fittingly enough, the broadcast world. You may have heard (of) her. Broadcast veteran of 20 years Ms. Maria Mercedes Fajardo-Robles now reports to UA&P at the top of CCO, a vital cog in the University machine. With a vast and varied career in her field, Ms. “ChiChi” is well-known for her newscasting in several television networks in the country as well as hosting of many presidential TV programs and news coverage produced by Radio-Television Malacañang under former Presidents Corazon Aquino, Fidel Ramos, Joseph Estrada, and Gloria MacapagalArroyo. She has also done work behind the camera as a TV news producer and writer. A proud product of the public education system, she finished with a BA in Broadcast Communication at the

Principle

While it does seem like there has been a huge shift in her career—transiting from the corporate world to academe—Ms. Ocampo disagrees that it’s so. “There’s not much difference... in the sense that it’s still about running a company.” Now that assertion is stuffed with meaning. With her 30 years’ experience in general management, Ms. Ocampo takes managing teams and companies to a higher level. “People should be able to learn,” she says. “People need to continue to grow, with each of them having a career objective as well.” For Ms. Ocampo, success is not about getting the applause for oneself, but about helping others improve. That has been her guiding principle. “I will be happy if the fruits of my work will benefit many people.” That is why everything about the Admissions Office excites her. It means dealing with high school students and parents of all sorts, with the aim of attracting topnotch students to the University and making their application experience more rewarding. She relishes the thought that deserving students are admitted to the University; more so, that promising ones from poor families are given scholarships and other benefits.

M R . C A R LO C A B R E R A

“I will be happy if the fruits of my work will benefit many people.” /////////////////

News University of the Philippines (UP) and took up graduate studies at Southern Illinois University under the prestigious Fulbright Program. Sharing her field expertise in the realm of education, Ms. Robles was formerly the Chair of the Department of Communication of the Far Eastern University and of the Department of Mass Communication of St. Scholastica’s College. She was also a senior lecturer at UP, the Ateneo de Manila University, and the Asian Institute of Journalism and Communication. Despite the demands of the industries in which she operates, Ms. Robles has found time to fulfill obligations in several related organizations such as being the immediate past president of the Philippine Association of Communication Educators, a board member of the Philippine Fulbright Scholars Association of the Philippines, and a founding board member of the Creative Media Professionals Guild of Asia and the Pacific. She served the Commission on Higher Education as a technical consultant on Broadcasting Curriculum for ten years and is currently a member of the newly formed Technical Panel on Communication, Journalism and Broadcasting. Outside the country, she is a member of the executive board of the Asian Media Information and Communication Centre, a Singapore-based NGO. Just this June, she was elected by the AMIC Board as its Deputy Chair. On top of all that, however, she talks about being a wife and mother of three to be her greatest vocation and joy. Truth in broadcasting. Mr. Carlo Cabrera Corporate Communications Office

The plans

Talking about the Admissions’ plans, Ms. Ocampo confided that they will stick to the University’s general strategic plan. She says that Admissions has five areas to cover: “These include enrolment, UA&P image and prestige, local and international recruitment, full computerization of Admissions’ systems, and staff training and development.” Indeed the mandate she received as admissions director poses a challenge for Ms. Ocampo. She remains undaunted, though, and optimistic. “I hope my 30-year experience as part of top management in multinational companies will contribute to achieving the University’s vision and goals,” she says. Now that she is already getting used to her new workplace, virtually introducing ‘fresh blood’ into the UA&P community, one thing particularly strikes Ms. Ocampo as amusing: mingling with students is making her “feel younger.” Then she beams, amused she actually said it.

Mr. Daryl Zamora  Corporate Communications Office

School of Management students on top 5 in HSBC competition First launched in the Philippines in 2003, the HSBC Young Entrepreneur Awards (YEA) is a six-month business plan writing competition that provides opportunities for Filipino university students to demonstrate their creativity and acquire practical business knowledge. Aiming to cultivate young people’s interest in entrepreneurship, this competition also inspires students to discover viable communitybased solutions that will positively impact the future. HSBC toured various universities throughout the country to promote the competition and invite potential participants, eventually shortlisting some 150 teams. Scheduled from October 2009 to March 2010, the competition was divided into four rounds, supported by a series of seminars and workshops conducted by the country’s most esteemed professors and businessmen. Each round of elimination further closed in on the teams to compete in the finals. During the competition, participants had the chance to gain basic knowledge in running a successful company, write a business plan, and sharpen their presentation skills. Deliverables for each round were critiqued by a panel of judges as they graded a business proposal, a business plan, a 3-minute spiel, and the final presentation. After the last round, only five teams remained to present their business plans during the Philippine Grand Finals. We were among them. ‘D-Day’ The 16th of March fell on a Tuesday. What would have been a normal school day for any university student turned out to be—for five teams, 14

students—a day to showcase their knowledge and newly acquired skills in a business presentation. Anxiously waiting at the Pasay Room of Shangri-La Makati at 9:00 am, each team stood ready for its own personal D-Day, which would start at 1:00 pm. Even if the school affiliation of the teams remained anonymous from the start, there was something obvious: four teams represented the Ateneo de Manila University, while one stood for UA&P. Fifteen minutes seems like a lot of time. But for this competition, every second was of the essence for presenting. As the five teams entered the room, they were welcomed by a crowd mostly composed of familiar faces, but eclipsed by the presence of five august judges: Mr. Ramon del Rosario (President and CEO of PHINMA), Mr. James Go (Chairman and CEO of JG Summit Holdings), Ms. Josephine Yap (President and COO of Filinvest Development Corporation), Mr. Fernando Zobel de Ayala (President and COO of Ayala Corporation), and Mr. Mark Watkinson (President and CEO of HSBC Philippines) as the chairman of the board of judges. The presentation By the time our team (which included Rachel Espejo) was called to present, we approached the stage excited about what we were about to do. Guided by Mr. Luis Arcangel of the School of Communication, we pulled off a unique presentation on Pestbuster, an organic and odorless pesticide (in white powder form) that eradicates cockroaches, termites, ants, and other insect pests. Rendered Zen-style, the presentation engaged the audience

despite what could have been a dreary topic. Confidence was solid throughout the 15-minute presentation, further spurred by the loud applause from the audience, our competitors, and the judges themselves. Before the event ended, Mr. Zobel gave an inspiring speech encouraging Filipinos to be entrepreneurs. As the judging criteria were flashed on the screen for the first time, after the judges deliberated, it seemed that more weight had been given to

innovative community projects that were not necessarily feasible than to those that were realistically viable. The Ateneo’s top three teams got the bronze, silver, and gold. Although we didn’t secure any award, we are thankful to God to have reached the finals and are grateful to those who supported us. We know that there will always be more opportunities for us students to express our knowledge. Serving as a stepping-stone for students, activities like the HSBC YEA allow for an application of on-campus learning to further discover the endless stream of knowledge flowing from the outside world.

Alexander John Dy and Dave Villaroman  School of Management 4th year

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

News

o stir UA&P students into engaging more in sociocivic pursuits, the College of Arts and Sciences Student Executive Board (CAS-SEB), in cooperation with Anima and Politeia, two of the official student political parties of the University, conducted on March 16 a voter’s education program entitled “Campaign for Change.” According to SEB External Vice President Nicole Briones, the event aimed to enlighten UA&P students on the effects of corruption on society, lay down the qualities that leaders of the country must possess, present avenues for participation in the elections, and encourage students to take part in civic affairs. The event’s speakers were Ms. Puri Gonzalez of the Business for Integrity and Stability of Our Nation 2020 (BISYON 2020) and Mr. Melanio Santella Jr. of the National Youth Commission (NYC). Ms. Gonzalez said that corruption can take the form of bribery, extortion, cronyism, nepotism, patronage, graft, and embezzlement. She challenged the students to be involved in civic affairs to bring about meaningful change in government and in society. In the second session, Mr. Santella introduced the National Youth Commission, which is under the Office of the President. He mentioned the important qualities of government leaders: integrity, leadership by example, good track record, clear conviction, moral character, concern for the people, and that of being a visionary. Furthermore, he presented the rights and duties of a citizen in relation to voting and guidelines for voting. He challenged the youth to take on their crucial role in moving civil society forward. Although the event was brief, the organizers Mr. Francis Bautista  thought that it was a good start for better youth participation in UA&P. School of Management ‘10

Four new lawyers from UA&P

Gutierrez

Sinson

Pasco

Ner

n ig pa am C r fo

Three political economy alumnae and an industrial economics alumnus passed last year’s bar examination: Melina Rose Gutierrez, Katherine Sinson, Maria Rosario Pasco, and Alexander Ner. Melina Rose Gutierrez obtained her Bachelor of Arts degree, Major in Humanities with Professional Certificate in Political Economy in 2005. She took up Law at the Ateneo de Manila University and was in the Dean’s List for Second Honors from 2007 to 2009. Meg is now the Chief of Staff of the Government Service Insurance System (GSIS) Board of Trustees. She plans to take the New York Bar and take up Master of Laws within the next two years. Katherine Sinson is a 2004 graduate with a Bachelor of Arts degree, Major in Humanities with Professional Certificate in Political Economy. She attended the MBA and Juris Doctor program of the De La Salle University-Far Eastern University, and was also accepted in a scholarship program at the University of San Diego in 2007. She is now with the Foreign Trade Service Corps of the Department of Trade and Industry. Maria Rosario Pasco is a 2004 graduate of UA&P with a Bachelor of Arts degree, Major in Humanities with Professional Certificate in Political Economy. Alexander Ner [Industrial Economics Program ‘04] graduated from the Ateneo de Manila Law School with a Juris Doctor degree last year. He was in the Dean’s List for Second Honors in 2008. He is currently a tax consultant at a local firm affiliated with KPMG International. He intends to move to a law firm after a couple of years and eventually take up Master of Laws specializing on tax or finance. Ms. Beth de Castro  Corporate Communications Office

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Alumni Life and UA&P according to Lance Capulong

P H OTO C O U R T E SY O F L A N C E C A P U LO N G

His first foray into the world of business was in a small meat shop he called Let’s Meat Up. The name didn’t last. The business was growing fast and had to be given a more “professional”-sounding name. Today Lance Capulong (Entrepreneurial Management ‘07) is the sole proprietor of the same shop now known as Homewell Foods Co. He also works for his family’s burgeoning real estate firm. And he’s only 24. Capulong’s rapid rise in business can be traced back to his early years in UA&P. Unlike his years in high school, where only the top few had the chance to handle teams, UA&P’s relatively small population worked to Capulong’s advantage. “Everybody was given the opportunity to lead,” he says. “It honed my leadership [skills] a lot.” He cites how he and his classmates used to organize big events by themselves successfully. Now taking his MBA at the Ateneo de Manila University, Capulong looks back at the EM program admiringly. “The training is very scientific, at the same time practical. Whatever I hear in the classroom, I could immediately apply and test upon going to the meat shop. That’s very important.” Capulong is referring to the EM program’s new business venture component that requires students

“What really helped me a lot is the emphasis on ethics and morals. The emphasis on the people—the stakeholders—really gave me a wider perspective of business and work.” ///////////////// to put up a profitable business even as they worry about Shakespeare and Dante with the rest of the UA&P liberal arts students. Let’s Meat Up proved to be an effective experiment for Capulong. “But the techniques are just the surface benefits,” he quips. “Apart from that, what really helped me a lot is the emphasis on ethics and morals. The emphasis on the people—the stakeholders—really gave me a wider perspective of business and work.” He confides how going to spiritual direction with Fr. Edgar Soria helped him cope with the ups and downs and zigzags of university life. Now he is encouraging students to have a spiritual director and to get serious about improving their spiritual life. “I think that’s what’s most important. As my spiritual director would tell me, it’s the

foundation of everything. If my interior life is not okay, a lot of things get affected. If you put that in the center, you will be able to do a lot of great things.” And great things are precisely what Capulong is busy with nowadays. He is splitting his time among various businesses and his studies. He strives, however, to strike a good balance among all these things and his family life: on weekends he usually spends time playing tennis or basketball with his siblings; at other times it’s about hitting the couch to watch movies with his parents, whom he considers his inspiration. “My father started as a jeepney driver when he was 13, and then he worked his way through,” Capulong says. “And my mother was a daughter of a farmer.” Having seen his parents’ hard work to

establish what became a big garment factory employing 700 people, the Outstanding EM Student Award recipient is awed at how his parents constructed success from scratch. But Capulong also looks up to his former bosses, particularly the Gokongweis, one of whom shares his first name. “I would see their dedication to work,” he remarks. “Even if they are executives, you would see their cars running to reach the 7:30 mark in the morning. No matter how rich you are, you still have to be dedicated to work.” With his healthy outlook on work and life, what can prevent Lance Capulong from conquering the skies? Mr. Daryl Zamora  Corporate Communications Office

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Campus Life

New associate professors Dr. Veronica Ramirez Being an Associate Professor in a school like UA&P is no easy task. Expectations take an exponential turn for the greater and duties compound already daunting piles of regular teaching tasks. But, for someone like Dr. Veronica Ramirez who constantly pushes herself beyond limits for herself and for others, all that and more constitute nothing less than what she readily demands of herself, day in and day out. “If I start one thing, I have to see it through,” she says. “If I don’t feel like I love something, I don’t do it,” a statement that would resonate even more profoundly if one were aware of the sheer body of work she’s accomplished—most of it, all at the same time. Split down the middle between being an artist and an educator, the consummate overachiever’s accumulated knowledge and skills in either field would be staggering enough for most individuals. Dr. Ramirez, however, excels in both, in and out of the University, while finding time to share those expertise with everyone around her, as well as her daughter and three boys (“Four if you count my husband,” she jests) who have taken well with the arts. The Fine Arts graduate from the College of the Holy Spirit (CHS) first combined her two passions when she started teaching at her old high school in Castillejos, Zambales and, eventually, CHS. After one year, she came back to Manila to pursue MA in Language and Literature. Her pursuits as an educator soon took on a deeper dimension of self-sacrifice as she spent three years in the mountains of Morong working for the International Catholic Migration Commission, teaching English as a Second Language at the Philippine Refugee Processing Center. To this day, Dr. Ramirez continues to reach out in different roles, whether it’s in her consultancy work, her efforts to improve the state of public school teachers, or in art. Being an ardent educator and a nurturing parent are hardly mutually exclusive qualities,

but they are especially intertwined in her case: while taking up her PhD in Educational Administration at the University of the Philippines (UP), Dr. Ramirez underwent two pregnancies while juggling two jobs at the same time. She was nonetheless undeterred by the experience. Three years after completing her PhD, she went back to studying to earn an MA in Art History. In the years between, a good deal of her formative experiences also took place abroad, such as meeting with Filipino-American artists in California and several others for her thesis research work and presenting papers on Philippine art and education. The most notable of these experiences would undoubtedly be the three years spent in Ukraine to learn sculpture, which, given Dr. Ramirez’s proclivity to exert herself to the fullest, was time well-spent. While there, she took time out of her studies in sculpture to learn the language as well as to become adept at guitar, violin, and piano. She also had the opportunity to attend the Summer Institute on Character Education in New York, where she met Professor Tom Lickona who continues to guide her in her work on values education today. At this point, there’s no wonder why her habit of multiple hat-wearing carried over along with her arrival at UA&P. At the University, she was the chair of the Arts department concurrently with being the Director of the School of Education. While she had a measure of success in these administrative capacities for nine years (including a hand in jumpstarting the Master of Arts in Child Development and Education program), she has decided to go back to being a full-time teacher for the Arts Department of the College of Arts and Sciences. This isn’t to say that she’s finally settling down to a more manageable workload; she simply wanted to do more writing and research, and be involved in more work of a different kind, the kind that you’d remember was there since the beginning, if you could keep up with all that flurry. Dr. Veronica Ramirez constantly pushes herself beyond limits for herself and for others, and there’s plenty of work to be done on the latter.

“If I start one thing, I have to see it through. If I don’t feel like I love something, I don’t do it.” /////////////////

M R . C A R LO C A B R E R A

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Dr. Jerry Kliatchko

M R . C A R LO C A B R E R A

A commonly spoken aphorism in the field of marketing communications, an industry to which Dr. Jerry Kliatchko is certainly no stranger, is that, if you spend enough effort developing the quality of your product, you wouldn’t need to spend anything on marketing it: the product would simply sell itself by virtue of its benefits. Dr. Kliatchko would likely scoff at such a notion, not just because it’s overly simplistic or that it’s naively idealistic, but because he believes surrendering to it means you’d be missing out on an opportunity. Around here, the more oft-used aphorism goes “The value of a campaign is in its values.” That has been the mantra of the Tambuli Awards, a brainchild of Dr. Kliatchko that recognizes marketing campaigns that promote societal values hand-in-hand with marketing profitability. It goes by the idea that you can make the world a better place simply by taking advantage of an effective and readily available (not to mention lucrative) avenue for communication. The success of the Tambuli Awards since it was launched in 2005 has helped establish the School of Communication (SCM) as “the leader in IMC education in Asia.” It has since become an annual affair, coinciding with Dr. Kliatchko’s new role as Dean of SCM, which means that things aren’t going to slow down for him any time soon. That’s the downside to innovation: you always have to keep up. Luckily, he is more than capable of accepting that challenge.

News P H OTO S B Y A B I G A I L A D E L

“Jerry Kliatchko represents the group of men and women who are the most innovative forces for the developing academic and professional field of integrated marketing communications in Asia and in the world,” says close colleague Dr. Clarke Caywood, a professor at the Department of Integrated Marketing Communications of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. Dr. Kliatchko earned his doctorate in Public Communication at the University of Navarra in Spain. Prior to that, he was a graduate of the University of the Philippines with a BA in Mass Communication Major in Broadcast Communication and an MA in Speech Com-

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munication. Since moving to UA&P, he has steadily risen up the ranks while giving significant contributions to the field of marketing communications through, among others, the book Understanding Integrated Marketing Communications and several articles published in highly rated international journals. Dr. Kliatchko is also a member of several international organizations dedicated to marketing communications, such as the American Academy of Advertising, the International Association for Mass Communication Research, and the Asian Media Information and Communication Centre, the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication. Mr. Carlo Cabrera Corporate Communications Office

ERRATA (MARCH 2010 ISSUE) The article on Dr. Rolando Dy’s book Food for Thought was written by Mr. Leandro V. Coronel, not Ms. Ditas Macabasco. Benjamin de Leon (p. 5) should have been described as a 4th year School of Communication student. Mr. Carlo Cabrera wrote the articles on pp. 8-9. Victor Cruz, then a 5th year School of Communication student, wrote “FulbrightSyCip lecturer on Asia’s role in 21st century globalization” (p. 11). Martin Verdejo (p. 33) should have been described as a freshman of the Institute of Information Technology Studies (now under the School of Sciences and Engineering as the Department of Information Science and Technology). Jade Sison (p. 48) and Angel Yulo (p. 52) should have been described as sophomores of the College of Arts and Sciences.

Dr. Ophelia Alcantara Dimalanta (4th from left) and members of the Creative Writers’ Guild

A love affair with poetry The morning of February 26 waxed poetic as Dr. Ophelia Alcantara Dimalanta recounted the moment she wrote her classic “A Kind of Burning.” The awed audience, composed mostly of Creative Writers’ Guild (CWG) members, held their breath. Spearheaded by the CWG, “A Love Affair with Poetry” with Dr. Dimalanta was the first of a proposed series of forums with Philippine literary legends. Once described by Palanca Award Hall-of-Fame honoree Cirilio Bautista as “not only our foremost woman poet but also one of the best poets writing now regardless of gender,” Dr. Dimalanta has won numerous local and international awards in poetry. She is also a professor and writer-in-residence of the University of Santo Tomas. Now she also regularly judges at the Palanca Awards. During the event, CWG moderator Mr. Emmanuel Rentoy read aloud some of Dr. Dimalanta’s most famous works such as “Montage,” “A Kind of Burning,” and “Love in a Contemporary Key.” Discussing the last poem, Dr. Dimalanta said that most university students could relate to it because it is primarily about teenage love. She also pointed out that she still learns a lot of things from her students, even though she had already many years of experience. “Write not for an audience, but to please your own standards,” Dr. Dimalanta said in response to the question of whether she caters to a certain audience for each of her works. She also asserted that she is her biggest critic. To her, “grammar is one of the most important things to consider in poetry writing.” The forum ended with all the participants satisfied and inspired. Indeed, while listening to Dr. Dimalanta, one could feel an aura of expertise exuding from her. She made everyone feel at ease, but she also treated the audience as if they were her own students—tactfully, sagaciously. Krista Kyla Seachon  College of Arts and Sciences 2nd Year

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

News

Love Life, Live Love

February is when people usually devote special time for someone they love. Here in UA&P, it’s also a time when a group of committed students devote time for a cause they truly love: the sanctity of life.

ast February 8-12, the College of Arts and Sciences-Student Executive Board (SEB) celebrated Pro-Life Week 2010 with the theme “Love Life, Live Love.” Held in partnership with Polis, Haranya, and the Creative Writers’ Guild, the Pro-Life Week emphasized the sanctity of life and the real meaning of love. The week kicked off with a pro-life rally where the SEB officers led in unveiling the Statement of Support of Human Life. Signatories composed of SEB officers and presidents of various student organizations declared the need to “uphold the dignity and quality of human life from natural conception/fertilization to natural death; respect and protect the natural institutions of Marriage and the Family; work through our own individual means, for the improvement of the quality of life of each human being.” The first day also witnessed the opening of the “Love Life, Live Love” photography exhibit at the Li Seng Giap Auditorium lobby. The event also featured activities tackling issues on real love. “Love Talks,” hosted by Mr. Dom Galeon, was a light talk show tackling issues on love, courtship, infatuation, and the like. The talk show featured industrial economics senior Steph Sol, communication junior Jonas Gonzales (SCM 3rd year), and freshman Mari Baretto (CAS 1st year) who shared their two cents’ worth on these things as well as their experiences. The main event of the Pro-Life Week was the 1st Student Conference on Life and Love, attended by student leaders from Pasig Catholic College, Far Eastern University, University of Santo Tomas, and Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila. The Conference kicked off with the talk of Senator Aquilino Pimentel Jr. on the legal issues of the Reproductive Health (RH) Bill. The senator asserted that the bill would undermine the inviolability of marriage and the institution

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

C H A N N E L . N AT I O N A LG E O G R A P H I C .C O M / E P I S O D E / I N -T H E - W O M B

of the family as recognized by our Constitution. Mr. George Winternitz then focused on the adverse effects of population control on the economy, particularly demographics. Mr. Winternitz cited the experiences of developed countries, whose population policy caused a large drop in the birth rate. This policy caused imbalance in their demographics, given that they now have a large population of old people, with very few young people to support them. The third speaker was Ms. Lora Tan Garcia who discussed the RH Bill in the eyes of a mother. Through her heartwarming and sincere speech, Ms. Garcia discussed how the bill would undermine her right as a parent to educate her children on Sexuality. The week ended with a forum featuring pro-life senatorial candidates, including Atty. Jo Imbong (Ang Kapatiran), Ms. Susan “Toots” Ople (Nacionalista Party), Rep. Apolinario Lozada (Pwersa ng Masa), and Mr. Joey De Venecia (Pwersa ng Masa). Each candidate presented his or her stand regarding the controversial RH Bill and his or her platform on the improvement of the

“Uphold the dignity and quality of human life from natural conception/ fertilization to natural death; respect and protect the natural institutions of Marriage and the Family; work through our own individual means, for the improvement of the quality of life of each human being.”

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quality of life in the country. A panel composed of students from the School of Economics, School of Education and Human Development, and the Institute of Political Economy also posed questions to the candidates pertaining to their stand on issues such as healthcare, job security, and urban planning. This year’s Pro-Life Week, as other ProLife Weeks, had been a truly special time for us, knowing that we were able to work for a cause we believe in and love. Ramon N. Cabrera  Institute of Political Economy 4th Year

(Clockwise, from top left) Sen. Aquilino Pimentel Jr.; participants of the Pro-Life Week seminar; Mr. George Winternitz; a student inscribes his signature on the Statement of Support of Human Life

Pro-Life Photo Exhibit

“Sorbetes” by Ms. Paz Santos

“Dreaming” by Nichole Arellano

“Binyag” by Ms. Paz Santos

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

PROF. KIM DJUN KIL

Pioneering Korean Studies at UA&P The Department of Pacific Rim Studies (PRS) prides itself on the convergence of interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary perspectives inherent in its programs. This convergence is facilitated by the faculty membership supporting the institution. For SY 2009-2010, the PRS was privileged to have on-board a visiting faculty in Korean Studies. Under the auspices of the Korea Foundation, Mr. Kim Djun Kil made his second visit to UA&P to teach Korean History and Contemporary South Korea. He shares his insights on his current stint, giving us a glimpse of Korea’s history and culture. What’s it like the second time around? What courses do you handle? It’s great to be back indeed! I teach two courses—“Korea: A Comprehensive History” and “Hallyu: South Korean Pop Culture.” Anything special or unique about these courses? These courses carry Korea in a macroglobal perspective. I want to show how Korea fits in the East Asian World. You see, Korea was ignored in East Asian history. Western scholars like Fairbanks used historiographies

that shaded Korea. Korea was known as a hermit nation because of its geographical location. This labeling arose because classical western historiography in East Asia used second-hand sources, mostly coming from the Chinese. I want to rectify this incorrect understanding of Korea. I want to show how Korea has enriched East Asian history. This is a new approach in Korean studies. I wish to re-introduce Korea, China, and Japan by shifting from the classical way of understanding East Asian history. Korea serves as a bridge between China and Japan in premodern civilization. In modern times, South Korea, being a democratic state, acts as a bridge between the USA and China. As a specialist in Korean Studies, what is the state of Korean Studies in and outside Korea? Any thoughts on Korean Studies in the Philippines? Korean studies in South Korea can be characterized as nationalistic in the sense that most historians there focus on creating awareness of Korea’s history, often reacting and rectifying some false discourses about Japan’s colonization of Korea during the Second World War. This kind of historiography

creates myths and legends instead of factual narration. It is unfortunate that the Philippines doesn’t have much on Korean Studies. But this is precisely why I’m here now. I want to promote Korean Studies to Filipino scholars. UA&P is the proper venue to lodge Korean Studies because of its Pacific Rim Studies center, which fosters an interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary scholarship. It’s an excellent venue because the PRS accommodates various and varied perspectives. I hope to train Filipino scholars to create a critical mass on Korean Studies in the Philippines. The Philippines and South Korea share a common thread. Both countries are democratic states.

UA&P is the proper venue to lodge Korean Studies because of its Pacific Rim Studies Center, which fosters an interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary scholarship.

///////////////// It appears that Korea is active in the international scene lately. Would you comment on this sudden upsurge of Korean culture worldwide? It is interesting to observe the sudden prominence of Korean culture worldwide. I discuss this in “Hallyu: the Korean way,” another course that I teach here. This global diffusion of “Korean culture” is mainly coming from South Korea. It is not native Korean culture, which is becoming popular, but something that is strongly influenced by American culture. You can see a hybrid, that’s why it’s highly successful. I would say that these things that we encounter now—Korean pop music, pop acts, and telenovelas—can be traced to South Korea’s experience with globalization. What’s cooking in the Pacific Rim Studies Department on Korean Studies this school year? We will be offering Korean language soon as part of a new course—Korean Language and Culture. The Korean International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) will be sending Korean language teachers in the next few months. I am also excited about the possibility of cross-cultural studies on the Philippines and South Korea regarding the two countries’ experience with democratic institutions such as election administration. My stay in UA&P is indeed well-timed the second time around as I get to observe, too, the experience of the Philippines in its first automated elections. Interview by Mr. Philip Michael I. Paje  Department of Pacific Rim Studies Faculty Before joining academe, Mr. Kim Djun Kil assumed a wide array of duties in the fields of media and cultural affairs as well as international public diplomacy. He was Minister for Public Affairs at the Embassy of the Republic of Korea, Washington, D.C., Director-General of the Government Publications Office, and a Consul at Korea’s New York Consulate and Director of Korean Cultural Service in New York. He also served in several key positions at the Korean Ministry of Culture and Information.

M R . C A R LO C A B R E R A

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Academics

MR. JOEM ANTONIO

Beyond the Palancas

ith an unhurried pace he enters the Corporate Communications Office. I stand up and offer him the seat across mine. He mentions that he came unprepared. “You don’t need to prepare to be yourself, sir.” I say. He chuckles. “Oh, okay. No problem then,” Mr. Joachim Antonio replies as he settles comfortably on the office chair. No flashy lights. No arrogant air. It isn’t obvious that Sir Joem, as his students like to call him, has three Palanca Awards to his name. You could even mistake him for a student of the University as he walks around the campus. It isn’t surprising to me because he’s a UA&P alumnus of MA Humanities from batch 2005. He now teaches Philippine History and Rizal for the College of Arts and Sciences in a place so familiar to him that it could be called home. Besides teaching, Sir Joem is into writing (with three Palancas, the passion is apparent). One Filipino short story, “Ang Ampalaya sa Pinggan ni Pippo,” and two one-act plays, “Newspaper Dance” and “Gabriel,” have garnered the awards so far. Right now, he’s waiting for the organization’s announcements whether any of the five works he entered for this year are going to share the fortune of his previous pieces. We will all find out in September. One of his recent works, however, has already received recognition, short-listed to be exact, by the recent SAGIP awards. “Narding Carpio and the Waves” brings the Filipino legend Bernardo Caprio into a modern barangay setting inspired by the recent Ondoy tragedy. This coming school year, Sir Joem is going to put the pen down for a bit and help others win Palancas. He says: “I know some brilliant writers. All they need is a little push. I’m going to be like a coach to them.” Another way Sir Joem is sharing his talent is through Bodega. Basically, Bodega is a group of friends who have a passion for the arts. Originally, it began as an endeavour with one of his friends, Mr. Jonathan Guilliermo, and their desire to teach scriptwriting in order to develop new writers. As the group grew, they realized that the people in

P H OTO C O U R T E SY O F M R . J O E M A N TO N I O

the group were interested in other mediums besides writing—directing, acting, music, and photography. The reason behind the group’s name lies in their common principle as artists, which is to work within their means. He adds: “If you don’t have it, don’t put it in your script. It’s all about knowing yourself, your audience, and your medium.” If you visit Fully Booked, you will notice that there are writing workshops called Inkblot taught by no other than Sir Joem. I asked him how he came up with the workshop. “Well, Inkblot is an off-shoot of Bodega,” he says. “A friend and I decided that if we wanted to majorly influence [Philippine] culture, we had to bring the teaching outside the school. We were lucky to get a deal with the bookstore.” Since I am of the same major which he finished, I asked Sir Joem for some advice. “Not just for Humanities students, but for all students in general: you depend on your own studies,” he says. “Easy doesn’t necessarily mean effortless, and tedious doesn’t exactly mean difficult.” For a guy in his twenties and with this much heart and talent, so much is still to be accomplished. And Philippine Culture better watch out for future upgrades: Sir Joem’s immediate plans include finishing his PhD in Creative Writing and writing a novel. Yes, the book is sure to become a hit and earn some nods.

“Not just for Humanities students, but for all students in general: you depend on your own studies. Easy doesn’t necessarily mean effortless, and tedious doesn’t exactly mean difficult.”

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Angel Yulo  College of Arts and Sciences 3rd Year

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

P H O T O BY M R . J O P E T P U N O

Renaissance

ENGINEERS SCIENTISTS

A prolific painter, sculptor, botanist, anatomist, geologist, musician, mathematician, architect, inventor, engineer, cartographer, writer, and philosopher (whew!), Leonardo da Vinci does seem to be the quintessential “Renaissance man.” The Florentine genius could have easily swept the jackpot prizes of Who Wants to be Millionaire?, Jeopardy, and Game Ka Na Ba?. Instantly he could have dethroned Steve Jobs in combining form and function, aesthetics and ergonomics... But how about faith and reason? No one is sure. What is sure is that UA&P strives to give students a wholeperson education that would empower them to harmonize reason and faith. And this begins with moulding students into individuals who are not only adept in the sciences, but exceptional in the humanities as well—like the famed Italian marvel. And with the recent establishment of the School of Sciences and Engineering (SSE), the idea that the University is nurturing Renaissance men and women now achieves greater clarity. Quoting the school’s charter, SSE Dean Amado Saquido says the new school aims to form its students into “Renaissance scientists and engineers with a unique portfolio of knowledge, abilities, skills, and habits.” UA&P’s long-standing tradition in the liberal arts will ensure that, he says.

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

The new school aims to form its students into “Renaissance scientists and engineers with a unique portfolio of knowledge, abilities, skills, and habits.” ////////////////////////////

ENGINEERING A NEW SCHOOL. (From left) Vice Dean for Academic and Faculty Affairs Florencio Gaa, Vice Dean for Development Enrique Ligot, Dean Amado Saquido, and School Secretary Rey Vincenzo Cruz constitute the officers of the new School of Sciences and Engineering.

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

MR . CARLO CABRER A

Cover Story According to Dr. Saquido, programs offered at SSE “build on the liberal arts program of the University.” Indeed the development of science-and-technologybased programs at SSE is not a rogue move from UA&P’s liberal arts tradition, but a completion of it. Dr. Saquido, an electrical engineer with a doctorate in Finance from the University of the Philippines, adds that while other universities merely concentrate on the technical aspects of science and engineering, UA&P’s SSE will, on the other hand, also look deeply into the theoretical and human aspects of scientific and engineering issues. It’s about having a broader and clearer perspective, he explains.

New programs

On April 15 this year, the Institute of Information Technology Studies (IIT) was converted into the School of Sciences and Engineering. The Department of Information Science and Technology, Department of Engineering, Department of Mathematics, and Department of Natural Science now comprise the new school. Two have also joined the new school’s faculty: Mr. Enrique Ligot, a mechanical engineer with a master’s degree in Finance from the University of the Philippines; and Dr. Florencio Gaa, who holds a doctorate in Mechanical Engineering from the University of New South Wales in Sydney. Currently, SSE has seven freshmen in the new Applied Mathematics Program (AMP). According to Department of Mathematics Chair Dr. Eva Rodriguez, the AMP “[prepares] highly competent and liberally educated mathematicians. [These individuals] can construct mathematical models of real-world situations to aid in decision-making and effectively communicate the results of their research.” Among the professional fields in which AMP graduates may enter are risk management, finance engineering, quality control management, securities trading, computer programming, mathematical biology, mathematical economics, and academe. Another SSE degree program is the Bachelor of Science in Industrial Engineering (IE), which is now waiting for the final nod of the Commission on Higher Education (CHED). The program spans five years. With a curriculum that draws from Stanford University’s Management Science and Engineering program, the UA&P IE program envisions itself producing engineers who can design and implement ethical, socially relevant, and environmentally sound solutions to complex economic, management, and industrial problems.

A bit of history

SSE is not exactly a recently conceived idea among the University’s leaders, but a plan dating back to the 1990s. UA&P’s pioneers saw the need to humanize the sciences and engineering, both of which experienced rapid technological growth at the turn of the century. The sense of the transcendent—of the ‘beyond what is apparent’—was lost on the way and such loss led to greater materialism. Dr. Saquido cited the recent global economic crisis as an example of the challenges facing the sciences nowadays. “Today the human factor [in business] is neglected,” he says. Today’s engineers and scientists may have effective models in order to earn profits or invent things, but all at the cost of ethical conduct. SSE aims to address that, armed with UA&P’s grounding in the humanities.

Tomorrow, tomorrow

Young as it is, SSE has set its eyes on big, big things. Dr. Saquido says SSE will establish a research consulting group, which will “manage” SSE’s projects according to a research vision. This will be part of the school’s efforts in establishing partnerships with firms, schools, and think tanks in the Asia-Pacific region. The school also aims to

open more degree programs, including BS Environmental Science or Human Biology, and MS Applied Mathematics and to relaunch the MS Information Technology. Indeed, there’s much to expect and hope for in SSE. It’s opening a new way of looking at (and doing) the hard sciences. Er, let me correct that. In a sense, it’s re-opening an old way of engineering and scientific scholarship. It’s making a renaissance—a rebirth—of humanism in things technological and scientific. But with a twist: at UA&P, faith and reason are the sweetest couple; the “two wings,” as Pope John Paul the Great would say, “on which the human spirit rises to the contemplation of truth.” How Leonardo would love showing his new invention (an iPhone app) at Study Hall A.

SSE Dean Amado Saquido From his CV’s disarming simplicity to his office’s austere elegance, everything about him is of an unassuming demeanor, a nononsense verve, and silent optimism. UA&P has indeed found the best founding dean for its School of Sciences and Engineering in Dr. Amado Saquido. The valedictorian of his elementary school class in Albay, as well as of his Philippine Science High School batch, Dr. Saquido excelled throughout his academic life. He graduated cum laude from UP-Diliman with a bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering. In 1995, he earned his master’s degree in Information Management and received a Medal of Honor from the Ateneo de Manila University. Then he attained his PhD in Finance from UP’s College of Business Administration in 2007. But Dr. Saquido’s fit as SSE’s first dean is not attributable only to his scholastic honors. He has been with UA&P all these years— perhaps in a hidden way—as part of the Office of the Vice Grand Chancellor (OVGC), which advises U&AP on doctrinal and spiritual formation imparted at the University, and as consultant to the organizations that brought about the University itself. Dr. Saquido has seen UA&P grow. He worked as consultant to the Southeast Asian Science Foundation, Inc. (SEASFI), whose main project was the Center for Research and Communication (CRC). He saw CRC expand to the College of Arts and Sciences and,

eventually, to UA&P in 1995. Dr. Saquido also occupied various positions in the Philippine Foundation for Cultural and Educational Development, Inc. (PFCED). In it he undertook expansion projects in Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, and Macau, setting up cultural and educational institutions until 1996. After SEASFI was renamed UA&P Foundation in 1995, Dr. Saquido taught briefly at UA&P’s IT department. Then he became part of the OVGC until his installation as SSE dean. Now Dr. Saquido continues with his mission of “contributing to the betterment of society through personal and professional development of individuals,” particularly through involvement in non-profit educational organizations. At SSE, Dr. Saquido has a grand opportunity to do just that. As founding dean, he has much groundwork to do, which will definitely benefit future generations of SSE students. Asked for his comment regarding UA&P’s rapid rise to the country’s top 10 universities, he says it is “because of what all the others have worked for in the past 15 years” (since UA&P’s inception). Well, at the rate that SSE is progressing and is projecting itself to advance in the next eight years, people 15 years from now may have to thank and admire Dr. Saquido and his team as well.

Mr. Daryl Zamora Corporate Communications Office 

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Strategic Plan

The General Assembly Address of UA&P President Jose Maria Mariano, PhD  16 June 2010

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

The task that the University Board of Trustees and the University Management Committee have set

for me to accomplish is to outline for you, in broad strokes, our vision of the University of Asia and the Pacific for the year 2018. >>

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Strategic Plan

We wish to remain faithful to the mission that the founders of the University of Asia and the Pacific committed to in 1994-1995. At the same time, among the many principles articulated by the founders of the University, and as a way to focus our efforts during the period 2010-2018, we wish to highlight our commitment to contribute as a university to the integral human development of the peoples of the Asia-Pacific region.

solutions to the problems besetting contemporary society, which promote the dignity of the human person in all circumstances. Without claiming to exhaust the wealth contained in the phrase “integral human development”, we single out three features that hold a special significance for our institution—unity of knowledge, unity of life, and the rediscovery of the meaning of ordinary work. We believe that by imprinting these features on all our instruction and research, we can create a new and immensely effective curiosity about the faith and the light it sheds on all social realities, and thereby attract many partners in the private and public sector who can collaborate with us in achieving our purpose. We propose for ourselves this goal: by 2018, each academic unit of the University shall have at least one local and one international educational partnership program that is aligned to, and will support, its research, extension and development agenda. And by “Asia-Pacific”, we refer to the region that is named in our seal—Asia and the Pacific—towards which we direct our universal outlook and our desire to be recognized as a key player among its institutions of learning. Our goal in this regard is simple. By 2018, we shall be ranked among the top 100 Asian universities in the QS international ranking scheme, where four leading Philippine universities recently placed 58th, 78th, 101st, and 106th.

Vision

Strategy

Firmly grounded on this mission, we envision ourselves as a university that, by 2018, will have achieved recognition in the Asia-Pacific region as a prestigious research and teaching institution that attracts top faculty, staff, and students, and actively engages in partnerships with the public and private sectors. We are, in other words, proposing for ourselves a vision with three strategic themes. First, we re-affirm the specific strategy adopted by the founders of our University of identifying and developing

To achieve these goals, we shall adopt the following seven strategies. 1. We shall maintain our firm grounding in the tradition and arts of learning in liberal education and the humanities. Our College of Arts and Sciences shall continue to be the intellectual gateway to the professional schools, and our graduates shall be known, not only for being well-rounded professionals with broad humanistic learning, but also for being individuals who

e now face, at the start of this academic year 2010-2011, a new eight-year period in our history. Our efforts throughout the year just over— many thanks to the active collaboration of key persons in the University to refine and to mold and hammer in place the many inputs to our 2010-2018 strategic plan—all these efforts have given us a blueprint of UA&P for 2018 that I shall now proceed to describe.

Mission

As we move forward to achieve our vision, we must be convinced that the most important product that will come out of the institution will be the institution itself. /////////////////////

areas of learning and education not already served extensively and excellently by others. We shall attract top faculty, staff, and students who are ready and willing to contribute to this effort. By 2018, we shall be seeing an annual intake of 600 freshmen with high school averages of at least 85%, the best professors eager to teach them, and a highly trained and motivated staff to run the University. We will have achieved the following ratios: Masters to Phd at 50:50, student to teacher at 11:1, and faculty to staff at 2:1. Second, our deeply Christian and at the same time firmly secular approach urges us always to look for

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

have acquired what the liberal arts alone can give—they would have learned how to learn. But to give our liberal education the edge it should have, we need to achieve a truly seamless articulation between our core curriculum and the professional specializations, in both the five-year MA curriculum and in the four-year bachelor’s degree programs we have just put in place. To this end too we shall ensure that all our faculty members will continue to have access to the broader horizons of the liberal arts and the humanities, in addition to higher-order training in their respective fields.

2. We want our program offerings to continue to signify real contributions to the professions. Our institution has from the start enjoyed a modest reputation for being innovative—witness our programs in business economics, information technology, entrepreneurial management, political economy, integrated marketing communications, even, in the field of practical pedagogy, our straight five-year program. These are programs that have blazed trails, not for the sheer sake of novelty, but because we have always tried to identify and develop areas of learning and education not already served extensively and excellently by others. We commit to a continual updating of our current program offerings and content according to the needs of the communities we serve. We shall identify fields in our course offerings where professorial appointments and chairs are crucial to our mission. In addition to the new program we began this school year in applied mathematics, and the courses in management science and engineering and human capital development we shall begin to receive students in during the next admissions season, we are at work on developing within the next eight years, as degree program offerings, trail-blazers in areas such as media and entertainment, human biology, business intelligence, advanced executive education, including doctoral programs in business economics and in educational philosophy and leadership. And though we do not envision higher degree program offerings in psychology and sociology in the next eight years, we shall aim to develop research expertise in these and related areas that will allow us to inject into them the Christian dimension they sorely lack. 3. Diversifying our program offerings should make UA&P a more attractive option to many more bright students. Certainly the numbers this year seem to show that more bright students are at least curious about our University—more students passed our entrance exams than in previous years despite a higher cut-off mark. But to be a university of choice for the top students in as near a future as possible, we shall continue to commit

students—that is, intelligent, highly motivated, and from a wide spectrum of socio-economic classes—and excellent academic content and methodology, that can only draw more bright students and drive our standards upwards. 4. To handle more bright students, we shall need more bright faculty and staff members. We shall establish personnel development programs that will attract and retain our best faculty and staff. We are aware that the most ambitious compensation scheme that the University can muster will never be able to compete with what industry offers. So we shall simply cease to compete with industry. Instead, we shall partner with industry by encouraging, developing, strengthening, and then deploying the consultancy capabilities of our faculty and staff members. Not only would this answer, at least in part, the financial needs of our faculty and staff, it will also benefit UA&P’s brand as a hub of experts who are driven, not only by the desire to ease the burdens weighing down the communities in which we work, but also by the University’s mission to humanize society. But beyond productivity results and project surplus is the simple realization that our institution, given what it professes in its Credo, should not only demand results but, more importantly, consciously and proactively develop talent. Aside from making accessible the usual array of conferences and study fellowships, we shall do this by encouraging the development of personal and professional competencies through one-on-one mentoring. We have just completed an experimental edition of a Guide for Mentors that establishes student mentoring on firmer pedagogical principles. We have agreed to use an approach we have learned from the research and advocacy of Dr Pablo Cardona of IESE, who was here briefly last January. We are set to work on putting in place a similar scheme for the mentoring of the faculty and staff. We are confident it will achieve three things: (a) develop the talent and career of our people that will make them more “employable”, independently of any consideration for retaining them in the institution, (b) help our people discover a deep and genuine commitment to our institutional mission, enough

resources so that 20 percent of our student population will enjoy study grants—that is, about 500 of our future 2500 undergraduate population—will eventually be grantees with way above 85% calibrated high school average. About 250 of these 500 grantees will be merit scholars with higher than 90% calibrated high school average. At least a third of these, conservatively—about 80—should eventually graduate with honors, and another 25%—about 5 honor scholars every year—can be attracted to stay to teach in our undergraduate programs. It is not the numbers that are important, but the resulting brand image of excellent

to build ties that go beyond any consideration of extrinsic returns, and (c) create a common vocabulary for mentoring that will reflect an institutional commitment to a culture of mentoring as an integral element of the UA&P identity. 5. Our vision for UA&P is of a university that is inseparably part of mainstream society, that wrestles with the concrete questions that everyone asks, that works hand-in-hand with others who also want to see things go better—with the alumni, with local high schools and universities, with industry, local government units, non-profit organizations, with embassies and international

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Strategic Plan agencies. We shall continue to build on our many existing agreements with universities in Spain, Mexico, Argentina, and Chile, and a few others in the Asia-Pacific region such as Indonesia, Korea, and Vietnam. But among the many possibilities for partnership we encounter, we shall eventually select those that have clear strategic value. This means applying essentially three criteria: First, we shall be on the lookout for more vital linkages by leveraging our trail-blazing expertise through consultancy research, by pursuing joint undertakings in corporate social responsibility, by soliciting industry participation in curriculum development, by systematizing reflection on and sharing our experience in mentoring, as well as by asking for corporate sponsorships to support our scholarships and professorial chairs. We have already talked of strengthening and deploying the consultancy capabilities of our faculty, which at the same time strengthens our brand of research—rigorous, scientific, relevant and down to earth, at the same time multidisciplinary, and open to philosophical, even theological, reflection. An example that comes readily to mind is the conference on Caritas in Veritate that, after two months of pre-conference conferences, will culminate in a day-long forum on the 29 June, with the participation of our own faculty members with years of experience of consultancy research, as well as local and international experts from various disciplines. Second, we shall be especially interested to get the alumni to participate in building up their alma mater, by assisting graduate placement and promoting continuing education, by marketing our programs and our brand of whole-person and individualized education, by facilitating business-academe partnerships. An indicator of alumni satisfaction shall be the generosity of alumni donations. And, third, our partnerships shall never be a relationship where we in the academic community offer industry our erudition in solving issues and needs, while they in turn reciprocate by investing first in our research, then in our other material requirements. Our partnerships will never be transactional ventures but mission-based relationships. We partner with people and institutions with a genuine desire to learn from them, and no less genuine desire to win them over to our cause. We bring them to UA&P because we want to give them the opportunity to experience, assimilate, identify with, and then spread the positive and universal spirit of the University. Thus too we shall contribute to the integral human development of the peoples in the region. 6. Our university centers shall play a leading role in forging partnerships with the public and private sector. At the same time, through them, we shall reinforce the imprint of the UA&P hallmarks on all our academic and formative activities. The Center for Students and Alumni will make UA&P a center for cultural, civic, and sports development activities, not only for UA&P students, but also for the community in which the University operates. Through its diverse activities, most of which are student-run, CSA will showcase the UA&P hallmark of values education. The Center for Social Responsibility will promote the UA&P hallmark of people development. It will be known in the Asia-Pacific region as a leading force in corporate social responsibility research and education. It will be the nerve center of all social responsibility efforts of the University, while serving as a strategic partner of other organizations, public and private, in their pursuit of the common good.

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Our partnerships will never be transactional ventures but missionbased relationships. We partner with people and institutions with a genuine desire to learn from them, and no less genuine desire to win them over to our cause.

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Following agreements recently forged by the governing bodies of the Center for Research and Communication and our University, we can now jointly pursue our university research and communications agenda, and, by CRC’s vigorous collaboration with research institutes that pursue a parallel research agenda, it shall be known as the Asian counterpart of similar endeavors in the Americas and in Europe. The CRC shall represent a focus for the UA&P hallmark of research and communication, and ensure that the edge their forty-three year experience can give our research—data-gathering and incisive analysis of concrete professional issues and current social needs—will remain strong. At the same time, we shall expand the scope that the CRC has hitherto been known for and shall pursue team effort and a multidisciplinary approach, so that, while deploying the most technical expertise in solving a problem, the results never fail to cast light on the human condition. 7. We shall measure ourselves against world-class standards in teaching, research, and institutional administration, and obtain autonomy status from the Philippine Commission on Higher Education by 2016 or earlier. Such a status will give us the flexibility to respond more adequately to fast-paced change in the region. It will enable us to steer our program offerings towards the needs and expectations of the regional job market, and ultimately multiply our effectiveness in carrying out our mission throughout the region. We understand, however, that internationalization, or at least “Asia-Pacific regionalization”, is not simply a matter of attaining world-class standards. We shall also strive to diversify the composition of our faculty through international faculty fellowships and to lay the foundations of a culturaleducational exchange program for international students, particularly those from countries in the Asia-Pacific region. All this will redound to a more diverse international community in our campus, and enrich the learning experience of our students. In this connection, an English Center shall be taken into consideration, as the Philippines remains among the few English-speaking Asian countries that can attract those looking for less expensive alternatives to hone their English than Europe or the United States. Our experience in organizing the Tambuli Awards is particularly instructive for our internationalization project. Following a decision to hold the Awards annually, it has now expanded not only in the number of entries (50% more than in the previous year) but also in scope, by counting among its judges communications and advertising executives from the Southeast Asian region. We are confident that well within the next eight years, the Tambuli Awards will no longer be a local affair but a truly Asia-Pacific phenomenon. This underscores the fact that above all internationalization means dealing with international content, with subject matter that reflects the concerns of the international community. In terms of our principal concern, internationalization means preparing our students for international citizenship and for competition in an international job market. To equip ourselves with the relevant capabilities, we shall send faculty members to postdoctoral study fellowships in prestigious institutions in the region. In June last year we sent several faculty members to IESE’s International Faculty Program in Barcelona. This very day another group is there, attending this year’s program. We shall be on the lookout for similar programs closer to home, and perhaps more in direct touch with the burning questions of the Asia-Pacific region. By 2018, more sectors in UA&P will have gained enough ex-

MISSION To contribute to the integral human development of the peoples of the Asia-Pacific region VISION By 2018, UA&P will have achieved recognition in the Asia-Pacific region as a prestigious research and teaching institution that attracts top faculty, staff, and students, and actively engages in partnerships with the public and private sectors posure to lead the way to internationalize our teaching and research, taking care nevertheless to keep ourselves rooted in the traditions of our country and our attention focused on the concrete concerns of the community in which we operate, beginning with those in most need.

Strategic Enablers To support these seven strategies, five enablers have been identified. First enabler: schools development. We have just set up a new school—our School of Sciences and Engineering. In the pipeline are a School of Law and Governance and a Business School, distinct from the School of Management, which shall offer an MBA and various Senior Executive Education Programs. For schools both new and old, we shall need to systematize program planning, review and development, manpower planning and development, and resource planning and development. In this internal capacity building effort, the administrative units will be playing a major role. The Registrar’s Office has been asked to oversee a demanding schedule of program accreditation. Our Human Resource Management Office will be much occupied looking for the best qualified young professionals who can be relied on for the University’s future. The HRM Office will also work closely with the Operations Committees to get more of the faculty to complete their higher studies at the soonest time possible and for more to be granted university tenure. In the past school year, five of our faculty members earned their PhDs and two were conferred the rank of Associate Professor. We shall see how the momentum can increase. Second enabler: marketing communications. Through the Corporate Communications Office, we shall implement no less than an integrated marketing communications plan that will allow us to attract the top students, the top faculty and staff, and to win over to our mission a host of collaborators, both here and across the entire Asia-Pacific region. Third: information technology systems. We shall implement an intensive and university-wide information technology systems plan that includes education support systems, executive support systems, and operations support systems. More importantly, in collaboration with the University Library, our Information Technology Office shall push for education informatics resources that are firmly anchored on sound learning strategies. All faculty members shall collaborate on a web-based Academic Information Resource that will complement the push for interdisciplinary collaboration in content production. Beginning with

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Strategic Plan their course syllabi, it shall represent the intellectual capital of the UA&P faculty. Fourth: we need a more responsive business model. Our student population will always remain relatively small, by choice, relative especially to the enormous amount of research, extension, and developmental activities that our 2018 vision entails. It would be foolhardy to expect tuition revenue to cover all these activities, as we have been doing for the past five years or so. Our Development Office shall therefore coordinate universitywide efforts that will enable us to use, throughout the period 2010-2018, an alternative business model—one that relies on diversifying our fund sources through partnerships that contribute to our mission. And the fifth enabler: multi-campus expansion. We are now completing the master plan for the current campus—the Ortigas campus—that shall be the basis for an extensive campus development plan and the blueprint for the scheduling of all capital expenditure projects of the University. By 2018 we shall be ready to expand to a two-campus university, with the main campus just outside Manila, where the central administration, the College of Arts and Sciences, and most Graduate Schools are located; and the Ortigas Campus, where we shall locate the future Business School, possibly the Law School, and branch offices of the business-oriented graduate programs.

Institution Building This, ladies and gentlemen, is our vision for UA&P eight years down the road. We may imagine, perhaps, stretching ahead of us, an intense period of productive activity, of offering more and more innovative goods and products and services to society—from forms as tangible as papers corrected on time, bibliographies assessed on time, publications—even relief goods, when the occasion calls for it, as it did the middle of last school year—to things that can only be contemplated—abstract knowledge, the appreciation of values, wisdom. That is true, but only partly so. As we move forward to achieve our vision, we must be convinced that the most important product that will come out of the institution will be the institution itself. And it is this that I would like us now to consider. Given the considerable amount of internal capacity building that our 2018 strategic vision requires, we see the need, beginning now, to strengthen in all sectors of UA&P a work culture and environment that highlights the following features: 1. Accountability 2. Synergy 3. Communication Accountability. Through the business planning cycle that is about to commence, we shall work hard at translating these broad strokes into the specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound goals that each individual in each of our academic and administrative units can own as the concrete expression of his commitment to our institutional mission. Above all, we shall work at harnessing the free spirit of initiative that is one of the features of our corporate culture each one of us commit to when we sign on to UA&P. We all understand that the totality of that commitment includes fiduciary responsibility for the resources made available for the institutional mission. Since

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If we invest effort in this manner, beginning today, the first day of the academic year, in building the institution by strengthening accountability, synergy, and mission-driven communication, we shall secure our capacity to grow towards our 2018 vision.

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these resources are not unlimited, we will have to select, to emphasize or de-emphasize, to prioritize and even de-list causes worthy in themselves but must for now go backstage or be altogether dropped. We will have to aim for the most comprehensive impact of the activities we do decide to undertake, as free as possible from conflicting interests and distractions, and with a view to sustaining the effort by ensuring an adequate flow of resources. And we shall strengthen the confidence we all invest in the collegial process for deciding how best to exercise fiduciary responsibility at any given moment of the institution’s history. Synergy. We shall strengthen a positive bias for interdisciplinary dialogue and team research, and for vigorous inter-unit cooperation in all the important activities we undertake. Alongside the commitment to advance one’s profession and to advance in one’s profession, we shall count on each one’s commitment to the organization beyond the bounds of his assigned functions. We shall count on his practical grasp of how its various units interrelate. And we shall count on his advancing inter-functional collaboration everywhere in the organization. Such a commitment is all the more urgent since our strategic vision urges us to look out of the University, and we would not be able to do that profitably if we cannot confidently attract to the University, if we cannot confidently point to UA&P as an embodiment of the ideals of unity and cooperation we are proposing. Finally: the communication of our institutional mission—and our Christian identity—in all details of university life. The institutional environment we desire, one that transmits values in all areas and in all situations, is essentially a human environment, consisting of our daily engagement with the interests and concerns of our colleagues, where we foster a work ethic marked by intellectual seriousness, attention and respect, agility in service, teamwork, diligence and punctuality, good grooming and refinement in speech, care for the facilities, and so on. To win over collaborators to a common mission, this university environment itself—the work culture physically evident, breathable, in the campus—should be the primary attraction and our most effective instructor. If we invest effort in this manner, beginning today, the first day of the academic year, in building the institution by strengthening accountability, synergy, and missiondriven communication, we shall secure our capacity to grow towards our 2018 vision. Succession planning will be less a matter of accretion from the outside and more an internal development that can be relied on. We can then diversify leadership, expand our potential for a second campus—even a third, if we like—and have enough to field in cooperative engagements all over the region. I trust that eight years from now, all I’ve said won’t just be words but a reality—the very institution we love so much, our University of Asia and the Pacific. Thank you and welcome to the new school year.

Feature

Graduation 2010

The 2010 graduates from a variety of disciplines marched to accept their yearned-for diplomas before a beaming crowd of professors, parents, and friends at the Philippine International Convention Center last June 5. Karen Kathleen Alday opened the ceremonies with a moving salutation that recounts the Universityâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s unique academic and co-curricular traditions and the people who make them possible. Wearing color-coded togas and beccas that mark diverse degree programs, the 341 new alumni eagerly listened to the practical advice of statesman and banker Jaime Laya who urged them to lead a balanced life and to try to stand out in their respective disciplines. Jonathan Ray Alforte, who delivered the valedictory address, also challenged his fellow graduates to extend the Universityâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s culture outside its halls and to their workplaces. The rites, led by University President Jose Maria Mariano, capped in a solemn celebration the studentsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; four to five years of liberal education and specialized studies in UA&P. >>

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

COMMENCEMENT ADDRESS

Make a Difference Jaime C. Laya, PhD  Chairman, Philtrust Bank

Dr. Placido Mapa, Jr. and the trustees of the University of Asia and the Pacific; Dr. Jose Maria G. Mariano, university president; deans and members of the faculty, members of the graduating class, their parents, siblings and significant others; distinguished guests; ladies and gentlemen: I am greatly honored that you have invited me to this important milestone in the lives of so many young people and of the school that has guided them. I therefore wish to congratulate the graduates for successfully completing their respective courses; to share in the joy of their parents and families; and to salute the University and its people on its good work. I am aware that profundity and brevity are expected of me. In pursuit of the former, I tried to recall the wisdom directed my way at my own graduations—I’ve had five—but failed. I may therefore not succeed in profundity, but as no one remembers graduation speeches, the likelihood is that I can do no lasting harm. Three of my children attended the same high school and I was invited to speak in all three graduations. I was so busy then that I gave the identical talk at all and no one noticed, not even my wife. This is just between us, however. A grandchild—the only one likely to grow up here—is expected soon and I may need the speech again. A lifetime ago, I was like you, at my own college commencement exercises. Also like you, I must have been happy, worried, and hopeful. Indeed, many challenges came my way in the decades since. I won some, lost in others. There were many opportunities, I recognized a few, missed many more. You would not recognize the Manila of that time. Cell phones, computers, or Internet, had not yet been invented. Television and air conditioning were for the super rich. Much of Pasig, Quezon City, and Makati was grassland and rice fields. Where we now are was sea. I would like to share just a few thoughts that might be of help in coping with the future’s new world. Nothing earth shaking, nothing of wow quality, just plain common sense. The first is from my mother, the second from someone’s talk, the third from a college professor, and the fourth from an ex-boxer.

Thought One: Rise Above the Crowd

My mother was a schoolteacher and she taught by example. We didn’t have too many man-to-man talks (my father passed away early), but at one of those, all she said was, “Do not wait for anyone to tell you what to do. Know what is needed and just do it.” You will live and work among other young people like you. They also know reading, writing, arithmetic. They are also well educated, good looking, be-degreed, and pedigreed. They will all be expert at Word, Excel, Powerpoint, the Internet. They will do assigned work as well, maybe better, than you. How do you get noticed? By finding something you can do better than others—working harder, expressing yourself better, doing neater work, finishing earlier, being more thorough, thinking ahead of the boss, going one step further. Homer said the same thing in Iliad: “Always to be best, and to be distinguished above the rest.” Taking the initiative, being creative, going the extra mile, is the way “to be distinguished above the rest.”

Second Thought: Be Nice

I’ve forgotten who gave it—it could have been the late Don Filemón Rodriguez, a pillar of post-war Philippine business—but

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one of the most practical bits of graduation advice I’ve heard is, “If you can say something in several ways, say it the nicest way.” Words said and things done without thought or in anger, are soon regretted. More broadly, one has to maintain good relations with everyone. In word and deed, treat everyone with loyalty and respect, whether superior, colleague, or subordinate. If you can’t stand someone, avoid him if you can. If you P H OTO C O U R T E SY O F D R . J A I M E L AYA can’t, go elsewhere, but Try to discern what while you’re with him, don’t God wishes you to do, obstruct, don’t badmouth. Try to keep old and follow God’s will, friends. As you rise in an not for personal wealth organization, become more or glory, but for country successful—whatever the and fellowmen. measure you use—people will flatter you, tell you what you want to hear. You will find new friends interested only in what is at your command. As the American dramatist Wilson Mizner said, “Be nice to people on your way up because you’ll meet ‘em on your way down.” One of the things everyone needs to learn is how to say no nicely. No to temptation, certainly; often, no to barkada and friends; and as parent, no to children. And definitely, no to so many suggestions, requests, or demands when one becomes manager of any organization. I congratulated myself when a new acquaintance said his late father once came to ask me for something. The father had forgotten if I had said yes or no, but remembered only how nice I was. Actually, I had said no.

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Third Thought: Move On

Former Prime Minister Cesar Virata was my teacher in B.A. 101, Introduction to Management. He initiated us into the case method, where one is given the facts and figures, and is then expected to identify the problem and to decide what to do. He taught me two lessons: (a) learn from experience and (b) ask always, “Okay, what do I do now?” One learns from success as from failure. Could I have done that better? Could I have said it better? What did I do right, where did I go wrong? One also learns from others’ successes and failures, if one ask the same questions. Only then can one do better the next time. The higher you rise in an organization, the higher your company’s earnings are, the more you believe that you’re infallible. You begin to think that everything you do is right, your judgment perfect. You become careless, you ignore others’ wisdom and end up committing big mistakes. Life is not always easy and rosy and one has to force oneself to rise from disappointment and defeat. There is no point

Feature in brooding over what cannot be undone. Cut the tears, pull yourself together and ask, “Okay. Now, what do I do next?”

Fourth: Focus on the Important

The ex-boxer is Fr. Hector Raynal, my occasional spiritual adviser—my fault, not his. Days spent at the Work’s study centers are refreshing for soul and mind—for the body too, with more sleep and less food. Fr. Raynal was several times my retreat master and apart from the need for frequent confession and other things I won’t confess here, the message that got through and surely the same message given to everyone here, is that one must lead a balanced life—faith first, then family, work, and oneself. In the end, and I mean the end, the significance of one’s life is summed up very briefly. St. Luke did so of Joseph of Arimathea, saying, “He was a good and a just man.” He was rich enough to have a tomb made and to buy fine linen. There surely were other wealthy men in Jerusalem, but only Joseph is remembered two thousand years later—for his character, not his money.

Parting Words

I wish you, the UA&P Class of 2010, well on your chosen paths and on your life ahead. You are privileged. You have received a better education than most; did not have to study by the light of a street electric post (as did a valedictorian of Arellano High School in Manila, my own high school); or to dig

through garbage heaps and sleep on a sidewalk by night. None of you have experienced a hungry day or felt how it is to be absent for want of jeepney fare. You are graduating from one of the Philippines’ best universities. You think, reason, and communicate well. You know what is right and wrong. You possess the skills needed to earn a living, possess the nimbleness of mind to recognize change and quickly devise a response, to initiate change. All that your school, your parents, your country expect of you is not to let these advantages go to naught, to try to discern what God wishes you to do, and follow God’s will, not for personal wealth or glory, but for country and fellowmen. You have our forefathers as models. Jose Rizal was 26 when he wrote Noli Me Tangere. Juan Luna was 26 when he bested Spain‘s best with his painting Spoliarium. Gregorio del Pilar was a General and at 24 defended Tirad Pass with his life. Andres Bonifacio was 29 when he formed the Katipunan, as was Emilio Aguinaldo when he declared Philippine Independence and founded the Malolos Republic. Antonio Luna at 32 was Army Chief and Apolinario Mabini at 35 was Prime Minister. They were then not much older than you are. Let them be your inspiration. Make a difference in your own way. Be different from those who steal and do their country harm. Be Kahlil Gibran’s “… devoted patriot, who whispers in the ear of his inner self: ‘I love to serve my country as a faithful servant.’” Godspeed.

VALEDICTORY ADDRESS

Bridging the Gap Mr. Jonathan Ray Alforte  School of Economics ‘10

Dr. Jaime Laya, our guest speaker; Former President Fidel V. Ramos; Dr. Placido Mapa, Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the UA&P Foundation Incorporated; Dr. Jose Maria Mariano, UA&P President; the UA&P administration, faculty, and staff; respected guests, beloved parents, fellow graduates, Jejemons and Jejebusters, NBA enthusiasts and Lakers haters, ladies and gentlemen: good afternoon! Ika-dalawampu’t siyam ng Mayo ng taong dalawang libo’t lima nang pinagpasyahan kong tanggapin ang iskolarsyip na ipinagkaloob ng pamantasang ito. Matagal naming pinag-isipan ng aking pamilya ang mga bagay-bagay, marami kasi ang kailangang isaalang-alang. Pero sino ba naman ang makakatanggi sa “You have been granted 100% Merit Scholarship with board and lodging, book allowance, and monthly stipend”, ani sa sulat na aking natanggap ilang linggo bago ang araw na iyun. Dala-dala ang aking maleta, sumakay ako ng bus, kasama ang aking ama, na puno ng pag-asa at pag-aalinlangan. Pansamantala kong nilisan ang aking pamilya at ang lugar na aking kinalakihan, na tanging lakas ng loob at kagustuhang magtagumpay ang dalang puhunan. Hindi ako makatulog sa bus nang gabing yun. Ang dami kasing tanong na naglalaro sa aking isipan, “Paano kung lumampas kami ng istasyon?”, “Ano kaya ang hitsura ng Maynila?” “Makikita ko kaya si Angel Locsin? O si Jolina Magdangal kaya?”. Hindi rin maipinta ang aking mukha sa halo-halong emosyon. Sabik na masaya na natatakot na hindi mo maintindihan.

Ngunit aaminin ko, sobra-sobra ang kaba ko no’n, kahalintulad ng kaba ko ngayon sa entabladong ito, habang nagsasalita sa inyong harapan. Ang tanging nakapag-panatag lang sa akin para ituloy ang biyaheng iyon ay ang pagnanasang matulungan ko ang aking mga magulang, maging magandang halimbawa sa aking mga pinsan at kabarangay, at, kung papalarin, ay makatulong din sa aking mga kapwa Bikolano. Batid ko rin na ang mga pangarap na iyon ang simula ng maraming pagbabago. True enough, a lot has indeed changed. From a small boy with big dreams…to a boy who is still small (sorry, I only grew a few inches, but gained a lot of weight, obviously), whose dreams are little by little becoming a reality. For sure, you still remember the first time you set foot in our school. It was that very same day when I realized it’s a different world out here. I immediately noticed the big difference between the Ortigas life and the life I had lived back in Bicol. I noticed the big gap between the less privileged and the privileged ones. That gap, I felt, was rooted on the choices and opportunities available for the fortunate people—choices and opportunities which the less privileged are deprived of. News tells us that there is a growing gap between the rich and the poor: the rich becoming richer, and the poor becoming poorer. In the little world of economics, we have what we call the Gini Coefficient, which measures the income inequality of a country. A value of 0 indicates perfect equality, which means that all wealth is divided equally among everyone. On the other hand, a value of 1 indicates that only one person has all the

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

K I M B E N N E T M A N A LO

And I challenge you now, my dear batchmates, to embody that same attitude outside our school, that is, in our workplace, to be instruments of opening up opportunities and chances to others.

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wealth and everyone else has nothing. The lower the value of it, the better. According to the United Nations data, the Gini Coefficient of our country in 2009 was 0.44. This is already high compared to the Gini coefficient of our neighboring countries: Cambodia: 0.407, Malaysia: 0.378, Indonesia: 0.394, and Vietnam: 0.378. For example, education is not a birthright. The less fortunate are deprived of going to a good school because they cannot afford it, while the privileged are enjoying their stay in prestigious universities and colleges. I’m not from a very well-off family. And if things had gone differently, I would not even have dreamt of the chance to study in a high-profile university here in Manila. But UA&P gave me that

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

chance. That chance to improve my language proficiency and my love for the arts. That chance to learn the most basic, yet the most important lesson one should learn: the essence of man, his being, his right to live a dignified life, and his capability to give himself to others. These are the lessons that we have learned during our stay in the University. As graduates of the University, we are now equipped with the necessary skills and knowledge to help give that same chance to other people. Now more than ever, we are in the position to offer more help, our talents and skills, to uplift the lives of others. In UA&P, we already did that when we braved the rainy nights of Ondoy and gave that chance for others to survive. We already did that when we joined the BIGGKAS outreach program and provided to the San Joaquin Elementary School students that chance to learn math, science, religion, and sports. We already did that when we followed the simple rule in the cafeteria, when we wore our I.D. and followed the dress code, which paved the way for more opportunities to further cultivate the corporate culture of the University. And I challenge you now, my dear batchmates, to embody that same attitude outside our school, that is, in our workplace, to be instruments of opening up opportunities and chances to others. Sure you can organize an outreach program, donate a million pesos in cash, be a politician, or even visit the depths of South Africa to show that you are contributing to the provision of chances and opportunities, of closing the gap….But you don’t necessarily have to go to that extent. It can be as simple as doing your work well in the office. By doing this, you are giving justice to those individuals who are deprived of the chance to study and earn a well-paying job. That is the least that we can do for them. As Ivy Baker Priest puts it, “Great opportunities to help others seldom come, but small ones come daily.” Let us grab those small opportunities everyday to help others, which will eventually bridge the gap between the less privileged and the privileged. As we march later to get our diplomas, remember all the challenges that we have traversed just to earn that piece of document. Remember the sleepless nights that we have spent just to finish our APS or PRS papers. Remember the group study sessions that we have conducted just to review for our Math exams. Remember the tons and tons of reading materials that we have photocopied; the numerous highlighters that we have consumed; the number of coffee or Extra Joss that we drunk just to stay awake; and the endless trials of OLS models we have tested. But most important, remember those people behind all of these because they are the ones who provided us with the opportunities to improve ourselves, to be better individuals, and the chance to be men for others….And may we do for others as well, just as they did for us, starting from enhancing the lives of those people around us (your seatmates, for example), one person at a time…one community at a time. To the UA&P community, Amber Study Center, Tambuli Residence Hall, School of Economics, IEP friends, and dormers, thank you for giving me a shot at pursuing my dreams. To my family, thank you for giving me the opportunity to love and be loved. And to our Lord Almighty, thank you for giving me the chance to begin and begin again everytime I fall. Marhay na aldaw po asin Dios mabalos saindo gabos!

Student Life

XCU: SEB

[The CAS Student Executive Board on Extreme Close-up] page 32

page

How to become a

master student

[

)

“To get what you want, it helps to know what you want,” Dave Ellis says in his book. This means you must know yourselves. This is not easy. It takes bravery, for instance, to admit that we’re afraid of Calculus or that we never complete term papers on time. Or that we have a poor self-image and have the bad habit of ignoring views that oppose ours. It’s not easy to tell the truth about ourselves, but the moment we get to know and accept ourselves, we start making progress.

AYLC and the whys of leadership page 38

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B E S : U C X ard o B e v i ut c e x E t uden t S S A [The C

p] u e s o l eC m e r t x on E

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Student Life

e 12 at th h c r a M ool ast the sch orn in l f w o s t y s s a e actuall EB) w r the r S o ( m f e s d h t r t n a f e Bo eo tud un ecutive only on ellow s x f t E a r i t h ls and f e t i n h a e s t t i d e e u w d v t r o S e S kn or o se s are m new CA e didn’t selves t e e g w h m a t t e s stuff. p a , h u y h t g o n i n d i r W o e e . t w s m y t o i e e on foll ple cer s comm and som e cerem In the , h . s t s l e e e y r v , In a sim n. The officer o s o f t n fac g be rde graphic s. Fun hat lon o r t t e n c i w fi e s f i CAS Ga n o ll k one EB ut we a od and t your S o u f o e b t i a r year. B ow avo e as a f idn’t kn c d i r y l s b t s a i l rob t you p a h t s t c fa g Lu  Haipin y b s Photo

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Josemari Lorenzo Valdez CAS SEB President School of Communication 3rd Year Affiliations Student Council Alliance of the Philippines National Treasurer Men’s Basketball Varsity Catalyst - co-founder HPAIR - member ViARE - member Dulaang ROC - member Isko - member BIGGKAS - volunteer UA&P Adventure Club Political party - Anima Fun Facts Favorite Movies: The Notebook, Pursuit of Happyness, Coach Carter, La Amistad Favorite Food: rice, beef steak, flaming wings, Mama’s paella Favorite Song: “Slow Dancing in a Burning Room” by John Mayer, “Undiscovered” by James Morrison

Jolo is the type of person who would really go out of his way just to make sure that his friends are okay. Although he may seem mabarkada, he is genuinely focused on his academics and priorities. He has been very active in the different organizations, and is one of the key players of the Men’s basketball team. You will most probably see him walking back and forth all over school. Thanks to everyone who voted! As I said in my campaign, this year’s SEB will leave a legacy of its own. We will continue to support the different orgs and varsities in school; we will be transparent and approachable. We will not be just a “couple of event organizers” in school, but rather we will lead, serve, and provide the students with projects that will promote student dynamism both inside and outside the school. Together, let us exceed all expectations!

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Lean Alfred Santos CAS SEB Internal Vice President Institute of Political Economy 3rd Year Affiliations ER+GO - Founding Secretary HPAIR - member Creative Writer’s Guild member Dulaang ROC - member Political party - Politea Sangguniang Kabataan Councilor - Barangay Krus na Ligas Quezon City Fun Facts Favorite color: blue Favorite food: adobo Favorite book: Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Sallinger Favorite movie: I am Sam, A Beautiful Mind You would most probably see Lean hanging out with his friends at the

ledge or studying in the library. He enjoys reading books, surfing the Internet, writing, and drawing. Lean also has a passion for music; he can play the drums. Lean also participates in the various student organizations. He is a founding member of ER+GO, and he has starred in the Dulaang ROC Playfest. We are all leaders. What may stand in the way is we don’t know our capabilities. Service is a selfless act and I believe that “we can’t give what we do not have”; we have to start with ourselves to be something greater. Leadership is not the work of one man alone, but an effort of the whole community toward one vision. Let’s get fired up and blaze a trail! Let’s make this school year meaningful and productive! UNITAS!

Student Life

Nicole Shane Briones CAS SEB External Vice President School of Communication 3rd Year Affiliations Junior Marketing Communications (JMC) - member Catalyst - member ER+GO - member BIGGKAS - volunteer ViARE - member Dulaang ROC - member I am S.T.R.O.N.G. member Agricultural Alliance of the Philippines (AGAP) - Party List Political party - Anima Fun Facts Favorite color: red and blue Favorite food: Sushi! Favorite book: How to Walk in High Heels by Camilla Morton

Nicole is described by her friends as a strong willed and independent woman. On her free time she enjoys watching movies and TV shows. She also enjoys acting and singing, and her heart is passionate about socio-civic activities. Nicole is also very hardworking and determined. She adheres to the saying that “Nothing worthwhile comes easy.” This school year is going to be different. The reason is that we have many original and well-planned projects in store for the UA&P community. In my term as EVP, I aspire to promote student involvement and activism on social issues outside our University. I envision UA&P students who are united and prominent in helping build society.

Joannes Paulus Mari Reyes CAS SEB- SECO School of Communication 3rd Year Affiliations Futsal Varsity Philippine Team for Futsal Catalyst - Co-Founder UA&P Adventure Club member BIGGKAS - volunteer Political party - Anima (He wants to join ROC) Fun Facts Favorite color: blue Favorite food: royal Caribbean Jamaican patties Favorite Book: The Giving Tree

Paulus is extremely outgoing and funloving! He calls himself a YES man! He is always up for anything fun and new. You would usually see him in Study Hall A with his friends. Paulus keeps a very active lifestyle. He plays frisbee, futsal, and sometimes goes mountain climbing. He wants to be your friend. S.U.S.I! School Unity and Student Involvement is the key to School Spirit! Let us all be active! I hope that this year, even just once, more than half the population will watch a varsity game.

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Michael Leonardo Lee CAS SEB Finance Officer School of Management 3rd Year Affiliations ER+GO - Founding member BIGGKAS - volunteer Political party - Anima Fun Facts Favorite Movies: Iron Man I and II, Pursuit of Happyness, Transformers Favorite Food: lengua and salmon sashimi Favorite Books: graphic novels (Superman, Batman, Xmen) Leo was named after two ninja turtles “Michaelangelo” and

“Leonardo.” He usually hangs out in Study Hall A with his large group of friends. Leo thought it would be quite difficult to adjust to the University at first, since he was the only one from his high school batch to enrol in UA&P. However, he says the people made it easy for him. In his free time, Leo enjoys watching movies and playing sports like basketball. I want to take this opportunity to thank everyone who supported and participated in the SEB elections. We will keep our word and do our best to get the job done. We encourage you to take part in the various projects of SEB to be able to make this year even more fruitful and meaningful.

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Mara Alessandra Tuason CAS SEB Secretary School of Management 3rd Year Affiliations UA&P Chorale - Assistant Section Leader BIGGKAS - volunteer ER+GO - member Political party - Politea Fun Facts Favorite movie: Up, How to Train a Dragon Favorite color: blue Favorite food: pizza, pasta, anything but vegetables!

Mara is one of the two re-elected officers in this year’s SEB batch. She may seem quiet at first, but Mara is actually a really approachable person. You would most probably see her doing paper work and documentation in the Office of Student Affairs, if not jamming and singing with her chorale friends in the CAS garden. Hey guys! Let’s make our stay in UA&P worthwhile! We will give you many opportunities to participate in our fun activities; all we ask is that you be active and involved. Let us all blaze a trail! Hope to work with you guys soon!

Student Life

ACY DEMOCR

VOTE

Empowering the Youth at the

Democracy Camp

aking off from last year’s success, this year’s Democracy Camp held last April 5-8 at Las Brisas Resort, Antipolo City was a singular experience not only for the student campers but for the organizers as well. Spearheaded by the Institute of Political Economy (IPE) and the Philippine Center for Civic Education and Democracy (PCCED), the event was handled by Polis, the organization of political economy students. The campers were outstanding student leaders from different high schools in Metro Manila. Democracy Camp 2010 was a good balance of talks, forums, games, and experiences all meant to instill in the campers a deep appreciation of democratic values. The first thing in the camp agenda was a talk by IPE’s Dr. Lloyd Bautista. A specialist in governance, he defined in simple terms the often ambiguous concept of democracy. The participants then evaluated democratic values prevalent in Philippine society with Ms. Vida Gruet, also an IPE faculty member. Equipped with the foundations of democracy, the students started the second day with a jamming session with Mr. Alvin Campomanes, a UA&P History teacher, talking about the late Francis Magalona’s repertoire of nationalistic songs. The studentcampers then moved on to the more serious task of deconstructing Philippine democratic institutions, which are plagued with inefficiencies, unpredictability, and corruption; Dr. Cleo Calimbahin of IPE handled this session. After their break, the students resumed to acquire new insights on the historical development of Philippine politics from Mr. Reynald Trillana,

program director of the Philippine Council for Islam and Democracy. Breaking this slew of lectures was a solidarity session on “Common Good,” which required the campers to hunt for hidden “democratic treasures” and match the imbedded images to the corresponding democratic institutions and principles. This hunt symbolized the pursuit of common good, which theoretically and practically is elusive in contemporary democratic societies. To top the day off, IPE’s Ms. Monica Ang gave a talk and a workshop on public policy; with this, the students exercised the skills they learned by participating in the pioneering democracy education-oriented program “Project Citizen.” Another challenging session during the third day required the campers to think with an economic mindset, as they vied for power while simulating the process and contingencies of trading in a democratic capitalist state. This workshop on political participation paved the way to the focal point of the camp—the role of citizens in a democracy. Then SEB Internal Vice President Mon Cabrera and this writer gave a workshop and a lecture on how active citizenship enables democracy to function. Former SEB Finance Officer Justin Akia then spoke about project management and implementation. In this activity, the campers consolidated all the skills and lessons they acquired in previous sessions to come up with project plans for dictated situations. This consolidation culminated in the workshop conducted by History Department Chair Sophia Marco. In all of these, the facilitators played the pivotal role of guiding the campers in their reflections by holding brainstorming sessions

JUSTIN AKIA

As the days progressed, one can notice the transformation of the campers in their characters and noteworthy contribution to the discussions.

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at the end of the day, and on the next day by reviewing essential concepts and principles. As the days progressed, one can notice the transformation of the campers in their characters and noteworthy contribution to the discussions. We, the Democracy Camp organizers, are proud to say that we have transformed the lives of 46 young individuals who may become our future leaders. John Vincent Pimentel  Institute of Political Economy 4th Year

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Student Life our vision and to have passion and values to act on this vision, because without action, a vision becomes a dream. They reminded us, in Gang Badoy’s words, that “laziness, fear, and the lack of resources should never be reasons for not doing anything or for simply dreaming” and in Efren Penaflorida’s words, that “no one is too weak, strong, poor, rich, old, or young to make a change.” Their passion and commitment were so contagious. We all left the Congress irretrievably different. Unlike other leadership seminars I’ve attended, the AYLC was extraordinarily challenging. It did not enumerate the hows of becoming an effective leader— how to manage time, how to manage people, how to make good decisions, how to make an action plan, and other technical how-tos. It made us see why we need to be good leaders, what we were personally fighting for as leaders, what the essence of servant leadership is, and why we can be better servant-leaders for the country. As for myself, I left the Congress knowing that I, as does everyone, have the responsibility and capability to effect change. And, more important, I returned

AYLC

and the whys of leadership P H OTO C O U R T E SY O F AYA L A F O U N DAT I O N I N C.

I thought it was just another leadership seminar that will bore us with lectures about the “Ten Ways to Become an Effective Leader,” or agitate us with a presentation of an action plan. But when I spoke to friends who had been delegates to the same conference (Sir X Vallez, Sir Roni Balbieran, and Ms. Marie Puyat), I learned that it was a lot different and way cooler. And so, I applied and luckily got in. The next thing I knew, I was sitting on a bus to Alfonso, Cavite with 80 hopeful young leaders across the nation for the 12th National Ayala Young Leaders Congress (AYLC). The Congress basically included sets of panel discussions, lectures, outdoor activities, dialogues, and group

sharing. But most of the time we were listening to remarkable Filipino leaders—persons such ss CNN Hero of the Year Efren Peñaflorida, Gov. Daisy AvanceFuentes of South Cotabato, Manila Water Co. President Rene Almendras, YouthVotePhilippines convenor Jaime Garchitorena, RockEd Philippines founder Gang Badoy, National Artist Ben Hur Villanueva, Probe Productions President CheChe Lazaro, AYLC alumni Edward Nino Puyod of Philippine Greenfarm Development Corp., Coun. Concon Hernandez of Lipa City, Lesley Cordero of the USAID Energy and Clean Air Project, Ayala Corp. Chairman Emeritus Jaime Zobel de Ayala, and Chairman and CEO Jaime

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Augusto Zobel de Ayala. These men and women shared with us their leadership stories, the changes they have made, their principles, their advocacies, and their commitment to positive change and service. As this year’s theme was “AKO: Pagbabago!” they challenged us to create change by becoming better servantleaders equipped with a powerful vision and the will to action. Change, according to one of the speakers, is the movement from one state to a better state. And for a leader to effect change, he has to have a vision—a clear and vivid picture of the positive state he wants the community or organization to achieve. The speakers encouraged us to see

“It made us see why we need to be good leaders, what we were personally fighting for as leaders, what the essence of servant leadership is, and why we can be better servantleaders for the country.”

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to my normal life knowing what I want and can do to serve my community. AYLC may not have informed me about the Ten Ways on How to Be a Great Leader or the 12 Leadership Skills, but it made me realize my personal vision. It gave me an important burden: to act. The Congress also allowed me to create friendships with amazing people who are leaders in their own communities and organizations. I believe these friendships are built to last. The Congress left permanent marks in my soul, like a deep wound on the skin, resistant to any metaphysical anti-scar cream in the world. Kinna Kwan  College of Arts and Sciences 4th Year

Institute of Political Economy students, faculty attend PPSA confab Away from the hustle and bustle of Manila, the Philippine Political Science Association (PPSA), including political science experts Joel Rocamora and Teresa Tadem (who for many PolEco students have become “celebrities” for their contribution to course readings) held a three-day conference last April 8-10 at the University of the Philippines–Baguio. They—together with students like us—were there to discuss and share knowledge from research work that reflected the conference’s central theme: “Transitions.” Presented were papers on an array of topics that highlighted change—from issues with the 2010 automated elections, the changes in Philippine local industries due to globalization, the plight of migrant workers, theories on political change, and other topics concerning economic development, cultural change, and political transformations. Aside from learning about the research that other scholars have conducted, we also contributed to the research network by sharing our own works: the first is a thesis on the voting behavior of the youth in Jakarta, Indonesia [by Diana Boado]. The second is a research on political consumerism in the Philippines [by Kinah Solomon]. Our most distinctive memory of the PPSA event was the surreal experience of being in front of one’s peers, relating to them almost two years’ worth of our hard-won research. All the facets of the trip led to this moment when we stood in a room full of academics and began to share the results of our own research. Defending our research in front of a number of older, and from the looks of it, wiser and more experienced persons, brings to light a highly important realization: for this particular circumstance and for the most part of our career path, we have and will have much to learn and much to improve. Nonetheless, our work would not have been as compelling if it were not for the constructive criticism and insights of our peers.

Within the two-day conference, we were also fortunate to be able to attend the presentations of both local and foreign researchers, professors, and other students. We also attended lectures on proportional representation with regard to the party-list systems as well as studies on the urban poor, which gave us an understanding of the different facets of the Philippine political landscape. Aside from that, we also attended the launching of The Politics of Change in the Philippines, one of whose authors is Dr. Cleo Calimbahin, a member of the Institute of Political Economy (IPE) faculty. A quick scan of the conference program would give any newcomer the impression that everything would be formal and serious. We found out instead that the conference atmosphere was friendly and inviting. After attending the conference, we know now how it feels to be a colleague of a political science expert who is at least five to ten years older than ourselves and who could well be a UA&P professor. We also realize that the training that we PolEco students receive from the IPE faculty equip us to keep up with theory-laden discussions and have a sense of ownership of the research work that we do. The experience further confirmed that coming from a small university and a unique course is not a disadvantage but a source of confidence— what matters is how you present yourself to others, as well as how you make use of the knowledge you have acquired. Diana Boado and Kinah Solomon  Institute of Political Economy alumnae ‘10

(From left) Kinah Solomon, Diana Boado, Dr. Cleo Calimbahin, and Ms. Monica Ang during lighter moments at the PPSA conference

Student councils hold congress at UA&P The Student Council Alliance of the Philippines (SCAP) recently held its 7th National Congress at UA&P with the theme “Achieving Transformative Politics through Accountable Leadership.” Eighty delegates from around the country came to participate and discuss the 2010 Peace Agenda in warlord-dominated areas, the Sangguniang Kabataan reform, and the proposed Magna Carta for Students. SCAP is a group of student councils from 120 member universities nationwide. It seeks to advance the welfare and rights of Filipino students and recognizes the need for a global outlook on the issues befalling Philippine society and the world. Student Executive Board (SEB) officers Jolo Valdez (President), Lean Santos (Internal VP), and Nicole Briones (External VP) represented UA&P in the three-day meet. Reflecting on the discussions during the confer-

This is the first time in SCAP’s 14-year history that UA&P will be holding a position in the SCAP National Executive Board. It would be the perfect opportunity for our University’s beliefs and outlook on certain issues to be heard by other universities in the country.

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ence, Valdez said, “It is true that there is still much to be done by the government officials. But at the same time, each student can do a lot to help [solve] the different crises that our country has been going through.” After a series of discussions on Philippine social issues, the Congress ended with a citizen journalism workshop given by the Probe Team. SCAP Congress capped the event with the election of a new set of officers. Valdez was elected as National Treasurer. “I consider it an honor to be chosen and a responsibility to serve [in this position],” he said. “This is the first time in SCAP’s 14-year history that UA&P will be holding a position in the SCAP National Executive Board. It would be the perfect opportunity for our University’s beliefs and outlook on certain issues to be heard by other universities in the country.” In his election, Valdez saw the chance to share with others what is taught in UA&P’s liberal education and values education. “It is a good venue for us to voice out the University’s stand on the issue of the primacy of life, which appears to be a stand of only a minority in the alliance,” he said. Gab Asuncion  College of Arts and Sciences 2nd Year

P H OTO C O U R T E SY O F M S . M O N I C A A N G

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

How to become a master student TIP #1

Get a full stomach

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Student Life Taking a full breakfast, finding time to exercise, making a daily schedule, reserving some quiet time, and not being afraid to be alone are important first steps to becoming a master student in college. When I was asked this very tough question during an interview, I froze. I must admit I’m not quite sure how to approach it. My first instinct is to go back to the book Becoming a Master Student by Dave Ellis. But that would be cheating. An interview is done mainly to solicit a personal response to a set of questions. So, I came up with my own advice. At least, these are the ones that I think any college freshman should be able to muster before they tackle the difficult stages of college life.

TIP #2

t first, the expression “When the body is healthy, the soul dances” may sound almost pagan or too hedonistic. But if you look deeper, you would realize how much wisdom there is in this saying. Learning is a high-energy process involving experimentation, discovery, relationship building, a huge amount of concentration, and optimism. If a child or a teenager fails to nourish herself properly, does not get sufficient sleep, and fails to exercise given the heavy academic workload, that student may be a candidate for the asylum more than for the Dean’s List. For learning to take place, the essential physical needs of the body have to be in place or be met regularly. I am not even saying that one join an organization that has extensive hours of physical activity such as Squadra or the Varsity. What is required, at the minimum, is a full stomach in the morning to take care of the day’s woes. The physical exercise releases chemicals that keep one’s disposition up and cheerful. The daily schedule assures the master student that there is a time for everything. The itinerary, which should have been prepared the previous night, enables her to align her priorities and tackle them with a firm resolve at the start of the day. The few minutes you spend organizing your daily hours gives peace and assurance that your life has direction and that you are not leaving your precious day to chance. Hence, with the schedule fixed according to priorities: academics, socials, etc., one can find quiet time to spend in prayer. Communing with God is the most intelligent activity that a master student must never neglect. People TIP #3 say a person’s culture is enriched by the kind of company one associates with. In this case, there’s no better conversation partner than the Divine Maker. He can be most engaging if only we allow ourselves to be

Of course, this stand could be part of the principle that I live by—“not being afraid to be alone,” at least on occasion. College life could be solitary in one sense: deciding the class schedule at the period of enlistment, choosing the major to take, going to the library to do research, writing the term paper that’s due in a week when everyone else likes to party or go to the mall, or going to Confession or spiritual direction, which is also a solitary event, that is, one makes a beeline to the chapel alone. In all these activities, a common thread runs through: courage, which has its root in self-knowledge. “To get what you want, it helps to know what you want,” Dave Ellis says in his book. This means you must know yourselves. This is not easy. It takes bravery, for instance, to admit that we’re afraid of Calculus or that we never complete term papers on time. Or that we have a poor selfimage and have the bad habit of ignoring views that oppose ours. It’s not easy to tell the truth about ourselves, but the moment we get to know and accept ourselves, we start making progress. Students must know that their biggest enemy in college is their poor attitude to a number of things. It is often how we view the subject that determines our participation in class and how much learning can take place. “There is no boring teacher, only bored students,” Dr. Mary Ann Cenzon of the Philosophy Department once quipped. If we have a good grasp of our strong and weak points, then we can make short-term and long-term goals. Part of self-knowledge is coming to terms with your learning style. If you study better with visual aids, then by all means make good notes and use mnemonic device. College students must make their subject syllabus their close friend. It is as essential as a dictionary. That is their reference to accomplishing the course requirements and planning strategies attuned to the professor’s. Finally, consulting the teachers every now and then certainly would help. Finding time to tutor classmates is actually a help for the tutor more than for the person taught. For teaching is a good measure of how much a student has understood the subject; that is, if she is understood by her peers as well. Giving tutorials has also its merits, apart from enhancing one’s social skills. These tutorials applied to children or the underprivileged provide a balance. A college student does not learn in a vacuum. Neither should she limit herself to the university campus. There’s more to life than the small area of Ortigas. Sharing time and talent and growing in patience are important requirements to forming executives of big corporations. This lifelong training begins in college.

Keep a daily planner

entertained by Him. Thus, this prayer time should happen daily. Just as you breathe robustly with the right amount of food, sleep, and exercise, so does the soul’s condition thrive with the daily dose of prayer. Learning how to keep quiet for 30 minutes expands a person’s capacity to absorb things. One is able to think and listen to oneself think. I’m afraid this is one folly of this generation: they surround themselves with so much noise, distractions, and gadgets, and thus become slaves to music,

Learning is a high-energy process involving experimentation, discovery, relationship building, a huge amount of concentration, and optimism.

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technology, and rabid consumerism. Facebook, for example, should have no room in a student’s life during weekdays. One should be brave enough to face up to the facts: the vicious pull of the social network sites is a trap and any serious student must be smart enough not to fall into the powerful force of its attraction. I consciously did not want to open a Facebook account, simply because I don’t have time to start and manage the account. And now that I am not part of the Facebook world, I don’t think I am missing so much.

Don’t be afraid to be alone

Ms. Anna Alejo  College of Arts and Sciences Faculty

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Student Life P H OTO C O U R T E SY O F U N I V F O R U M

Inspiring a global culture

UNIV 2010 “When in Rome, do as the Romans do.” But what exactly do Romans—particularly students like us—do? Do they take part in international congresses about culture and faith? Perhaps they do; but even if they don’t, we hied to Rome to learn about how our faith can change the world. We were in Rome from March 28 to April 3 as pilgrims with a mission: to represent the country in the UNIV International Congress. Launched in 1968 by the Instituto per la Cooperazione Universitaria (ICU), an Italian nongovernment organization, UNIV is an annual gathering of students from around the globe to discuss issues relevant to the university, emphasizing the spirit of service and unity of life that everyone must live. Each year, university students from all over the world take part in the project by doing research on a chosen theme in light of their respective disciplines and cultural backgrounds. This year’s theme was “Can Christianity inspire a global culture?” Paper presentations on the theme were held at the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross, with presenters from such countries as the United States, Canada, Trinidad and Tobago, Venezuela, Spain, Italy, Kenya, France, and the Philippines. This year, two papers from the Philippines were presented

during the Congress. One is entitled “Christian Ideals as Exemplified in Women’s Blogs.” The paper, written by De La Salle University (DLSU) student Carell G. Ocampo, shows that women’s blogs, no matter what the bloggers’ culture or religion is, touch upon Christian ideals, such as love of God and love of fellowmen. In short, one need not be Christian or Catholic to believe and uphold Christian ideals. The researcher picked five women bloggers from the list of top-ranked blogs per country and analyzed the contents of their blogs. These women bloggers varied not only in culture and religion but also in age and occupation. Some are housewives/mothers; one was an Asian career woman; others are into journalism and literature. Clearly, women everywhere and in all walks of life can play an important role as God’s agents of goodness, especially within the family, where the cradle of personhood is developed. In a way, a woman’s “distinct way of being—her generosity, love for detail, quick mindedness, and intuition”—makes society more humane, and with this comes the civilizing of the family, and thus all men. The other paper dwells on authentic human development and poverty alleviation through

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

social entrepreneurship. Written by Carmina Angelica C. Valeroso from DLSU, the paper presented several examples of enterprises (such as Hapinoy & Rags2Riches) that are about looking not only after profit but also after the welfare of their beneficiaries. Hapinoy & Rags2Riches helped women, through training, get financing for their small businesses and gain the most from their investment. The women involved in the ventures claimed that their income increased, and with the financial security, they have acquired a “sense of agency to change themselves.” This material growth gave them fulfilment and inspired them to give back to others in need. Because of all the help they have been given, their faith has been strengthened. The Congress left us an ironic realization that we may be the same and yet we are not the same anymore. For is it possible to encounter beauty and remain unchanged? The beauty of the learning experience we had while in Rome lies in the fact that the cultural exchange that took place

became an avenue for us to perceive matters of our Christian faith in a new light. The reason is that, somehow, the ideals that serve as the pillars of our faith go beyond what is abstract into what is tangible upon seeing that these ideals are applicable into a wide range of topics that cut across national borders and cultural peculiarities. Diversity no longer separates, but binds, because behind this diversity there lies something universal. And while there is a common ground, each one lives these ideals according to a blueprint that is unique and personal. Rome is at the heart of the Christian faith, and while it is true that the grandeur and the magnificence of St. Peter’s Basilica makes faith seem tangible, the encounter with people from around the globe who strive to apply these ideals in their own minute lives makes this tangibility more real and actual. This experience left us thinking about how we can measure up to the challenge of putting the faith into practice in our own specific contexts, in our own circumstances, in our own lives day by day. The Congress left us a wonderful experience— that of being given the chance to share our views with other youths from all over the world and, in the process, being able to gain a better understanding of others and of our selves. At the end of the Congress, the challenge of UNIV lives on with UNIV 2011’s theme: “Living Freedom Decisively.” Jas Magsino  Institute of Political Economy 5th year Viory Janeo  School of Economics 5th year

Jas Magsino (3rd from left) and Viory Janeo (5th) with other Philippine delegates to the UNIV Congress

Arts

page

Behind the Mask page 44

Behind the Curtain page 45

EM Creative Series 2010 Mounting an art event is a rite of passage that every EM freshman has to go through with much enthusiasmâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;or dread. During my first two years of handling the course, my students in Visual Arts typically produced art exhibits, and the students in Performing Arts typically produced plays. I still cringe, at times with a tinge of endearment, when I recall my first batch of studentsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; childlike attempt at painting fruits, flowers, sunsets, and coconut trees... Musings on the EM Creative Series 2010 Edition, page 47

Why So Serious? page 48

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Arts

Behind the Curtain

Behind the Mask

From the late weeks of November 2009, the cast and crew had spent their after-school hours memorizing lines, designing props and sets, and putting everything together to punctuate the semester with a great performance. Finally, after three months, the doors of Telengtan Hall opened to a world filled with swordfights and witty remarks, explosive natures and fiery passions. Directed by Office of Student Affairs Kultura-Desk Head, Joel Parcon, and choreographed by UA&P alumna, Foz Castro, the play Romeo and Juliet was staged, highlighting the comedy, drama, and tragedy of this short love affair. Romeo and Juliet is not just about forbidden love but also about the wild unchecked feelings that greatly influence the actions of man whether they awaken the best feelings or set off the worst heartbreaks. The star-crossed lovers— played by Louie de Leon, Jake Morales, Erin Locsin, and Angel Yulo—and the other actors brought out the explosively contrasting emotions of the characters. These are what the ordinary observer sees when watching plays—the story and the characters that bring it to life—but few actually appreciate what goes on behind the actors’ performances. It is not only the cast that excite the attention of the audience but the whole production team, especially the crew, as well. Yes, the audience could view the dance, the feud, the witty exchanges, and the kisses but all these could not have impacted them so much without the technical details behind the scenes. The idea for the design of each lighting and costume, prop, and set was to play up the emotions of the characters and the danger when left unchecked. Mr. Parcon wanted to bring out the different emotions with the use of colors, and where else to find his inspiration but the emotional spectrum of DC Comics—yes, comic books! The seven colors of the rainbow depicted the various emotions. By the play of lights, the different moods of each scene were enhanced. Whether it is the passionate and raging red as Romeo cried out for the death of Mercutio, or the affectionate and overwhelming purple as the two titled characters shared their time together on stage. The costumes also followed this concept, having one family wearing their hearts on their sleeves while the other as the more emotional and reactive family. As for the costumes, the modern-day clothes in place of the formal renaissance outfits brought in the familiar and casual feel. Hasn’t anyone noticed that each cast member had his or her own style of mask at the start of the play? These masks represented the different personalities of the characters being played—from Tybalt’s exquisite designs to Juliet’s virginal white color. There were also other new twists aside from the modern-day clothes—the unexpected blood spatter throughout the play and the interpretive dance at the beginning. That short dance portrayed the roller coaster journey of the lovers, from their first meeting to their dreadful death. All these novel ideas would not have panned out without the use of the intimate theater setting. Mr. Parcon said that, at first, it wasn’t given any thought. He visualized the play, and the Telengtan Hall came to mind. He then realized that an intimate theater would show the rawness of emotions and compel the audience to ride with the experiences of the play because of their close proximity to the actors from those short dreamy moments to the tragic conclusion. It brought a certain sense of empathy as the actors interacted with the audience. These could not have been done in the proscenium setting (theater stage), where the audience watch the performance as if peering into an aquarium. The interaction would have been limited, and the experience not so intimate. In a play, everything matters. Everyone plays a part. From the main actors that take up the stage to the smallest details in props, clothes and make-up. In appreciating theater, we appreciate everything in it.

WHITE : actual text TEAL : what Jake (Romeo) is thinking GOLD : what Angel (Juliet) is thinking [Romeo, Benvolio, and Mercutio enter the banquet hall wearing masks.] Someone is pointing at me. Whoops, don’t look directly at the audience! CAPULET: Welcome, gentlemen! …I have seen the day That I have worn a visor and could tell A whispering tale in a fair lady’s ear, Such as would please: ‘tis gone, ‘tis gone, ‘tis gone: You are welcome, gentlemen! come, musicians, play. Alright just pretend that I don’t know Juliet is coming in. [Humming.] Now I have to act like I don’t care about the party. Just think of an awkward high school party. [Music plays, and they dance] Wow, this dance is pretty good, the dancers really have been rehearsing well. Figures: this is probably the hundredth time they’ve done this. Okay, it’s about to end, Angel’s about to come in. [Juliet enters with Paris.] These heels are killing me. Plus, this is a really long gown. I could do better with a pair of rubber shoes and running shorts. It’s a good thing Miguel’s right beside me to catch my fall in case I trip. One step at a time, Angel. ROMEO [To a SERVANT] What lady is that, which doth enrich the hand of yonder knight? SERVANT I know not, sir.

Erin Locsin  College of Arts and Sciences 2nd Year

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

ROMEO O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!… Did my heart love till now? forswear it, sight! For I ne’er saw true beauty till this night. Whoa! The lights are changing colors. Awesome! The tech people have impeccable timing. Good job! Alright! Not bad. I think the audience over there in the end of the room heard me. And the audience likes the free food. TYBALT This, by his voice, should be a Montague. … To strike him dead, I hold it not a sin... CAPULET Content thee, gentle coz, let him alone; … Therefore be patient, take no note of him: It is my will, the which if thou respect… Wow, RJ’s voice is really clear and loud! He is one scary Daddy Capulet! I can’t wait till he gets really mad; it’s like Telengtan will shake. TYBALT It fits, when such a villain is a guest: I’ll not endure him. CAPULET He shall be endured: What, goodman boy! I say, he shall: go to; Am I the master here, or you? go to… I can hardly hear from outside Telengtan. I’ll have to listen with my ear against the door. TYBALT Why, uncle, ‘tis a shame. CAPULET Go to, go to; You are a saucy boy: is’t so, indeed? … You are a princox; go: Be quiet, or —More light, more light! For shame! I’ll make you quiet… Okay, now I have to wait outside Telengtan until

Dae comes storming out. Dae likes changing his voice when he acts mad. TYBALT …I will withdraw: but this intrusion shall Now seeming sweet convert to bitter gall. Boy, my heart is pounding. I’m about to come in and take Juliet. [Romeo takes Juliet’s hand. They run backstage to move to the upper area of the stage.] Here we go again. Run like a refined young woman. Honestly, I could really do better without the heels. Enough excuses, Angel. Just go. Forget what you’re told to do in PE and training. No strong push-off. No full arm swing. Light on your feet. Think butterfly. Flutter when you run. Okay, this is the tricky part; I have to make sure I don’t look like a stiff. Remember what RJ Torres told me: “Mr. Suave, it’s time to do that Manly Run. I hope Angel doesn’t slip while we run. Those heels look deadly! ROMEO If I profane with my unworthiest hand This holy shrine, the gentle fine is this: My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss. Okay, here goes, gentle now, take hold of her hands… Remember Jake, project and don’t stop looking at her. You’re supposed to be in love. JULIET Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much, Which mannerly devotion shows in this; For saints have hands that pilgrims’ hands do touch, And palm to palm is holy palmers’ kiss. This is it. What we practiced for so long is finally being played out in front of an audience. The Telengtan Hall seems like a different place with so many people inside or maybe it’s just the nerves. Shake it off. Shake it off. Whew. ROMEO Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too? JULIET Ay, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer. ROMEO O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do; They pray, grant thou, lest faith turn to despair. Okay be gentle this whole sequence should be flawless. I’ve practiced this like a thousand times. JULIET Saints do not move, though grant for prayers’ sake. ROMEO Then move not, while my prayer’s effect I take. Okay, here it is, the moment of truth—the kiss! We have to position our angle right. One, two, three! ROMEO Thus from my lips, by yours, my sin is purged. I remember they made some change in the blocking here. Ah yes. Turn around. Face the audience with your hands clasped together. What else? Oh. Sir Joel said that I should project

my voice more. Louder. Louder. Don’t strain your throat. Use your diaphragm. Here we go. JULIET Then have my lips the sin that they have took. ROMEO Sin from thy lips? O trespass sweetly urged! Give me my sin again. I’m so glad Erin and Louie gave us last minute tips on how to make this moment look like we are more in love. The other Romeo and Juliet do a pretty good job in these particular scenes. Second moment of truth! Here we go...Whew, got through it, at least the hard part is done (hahaha). Nurse Kit, come and break us apart (haha). JULIET You kiss by the book. NURSE Madam, your mother craves a word with you. [Nurse takes Juliet away to stage right.] ROMEO [To NURSE] What is her mother? NURSE Marry, bachelor, Her mother is the lady of the house. ROMEO Is she a Capulet? O dear account! my life is my foe’s debt. BENVOLIO [to Romeo] Away, begone; the sport is at the best. [Exeunt all but JULIET and NURSE] JULIET Come hither, nurse. What is yond gentleman? NURSE I know not. JULIET Go ask his name. The act is almost over. Yey! Let’s finish this. NURSE His name is Romeo, and a Montague; The only son of your great enemy. JULIET My only love sprung from my only hate! Too early seen unknown, and known too late! Prodigious birth of love it is to me, That I must love a loathed enemy. Aww. I really adore my Nurse. Kit is such a seasoned actress. She can really keep that accent constant all throughout. I hope to take on challenging roles too someday when I have done more plays. Wow, the Nurses (Kit and Jam) really project well. It’s probably all that training they got from Sir Joel. [One calls within ‘Juliet.’] NURSE Anon, anon! Come, let’s away; the strangers all are gone. Loath-ed—Correct Old English pronunciation. Shakespeare extended the words to get his number of syllables per line all the same. There’s my cue. Time to zoom backstage for a costume change. That was a great scene, everything went great! Nice Job dancers, waiters, Nurse! Bravo Angel, I think Romeo would have really been charmed. I’ll see ya’ in the next scene.

Jake Morales  School of Communication 3rd Year Angel Yulo  College of Arts and Sciences 3rd Year

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Arts

P H OTO S B Y D I N O P L AC I N O

Why So

Serious?

Here’s UA&P in a whirlwind of images. The beginning of 2010: Students bustling through the corridors with their minds fixed on “getting school over with.” Teachers frantically going through their schedule to check if they were heading to the right classrooms. Conferences and examinations in various venues around campus. Academe mania. A curious head emerged from the cloud of people and directed a fair question to all: “Why so serious?” A group of voices in unison asked the same question once more, in the hope of breaking the “academe mania,” which undoubtedly set off a tremor of stress and aimless pouts across the faces of the students. But no one except for a group of dedicated individuals entertained this question. Last February and March, they answered it through ViARE’s staging of a production consisting of four one-act plays all under the genre of the “Theater of the Absurd.” This genre first came up in the mid-1900’s with its reference to the absurdity of characters’ reactions to equally unusual events. These plays weren’t meant to be logical or rational because the characters were lost and floating in a baffling world. ViARE chose this genre for the year-end production to strike an upbeat tempo for the otherwise harassed university student without losing the more cerebral sub-context of each play. As flocks of audience members entered the PLDT Hall, they were unaware of the kind of universe they were about to be immersed in. “The Best Daddy” played by Joachim Antonio screeched a loud “Open your eyes...RIGHT...NOW!” A play written by Shel Silverstein and directed by JJ Rimando, “The Best Daddy” presents a seemingly twisted-minded father who keeps his daughter Lisa guessing about her birthday gift hidden under a blanket. A pony...a dead pony? Her sister? A deceased sister? Lisa believes it at first, until her father exclaims that he was just playing a practical joke. “The Still Alarm,” written by George S. Kauffman and directed by Cesca Tan and Gopal Advani, relays a day in the life of two dignified Englishmen who remain calm despite the clearly alarming fire intensifying in their hotel room. Despite the sweat beading down their foreheads, they speak with the bellboy and two firemen as if they were at a party. In this satirical play, they all become fast friends and remain nonchalant throughout that life-threatening situation. “Arabian Nights,” written by David Ives and directed by Bok Gil, is a short piece about Norman, a foreign tourist, buying a souvenir from Flora, a shopkeeper, through an interpreter. Norman and Flora engage in an exchange of simple words that are made meaningful by the expressive interpretations of an interpreter. Note: they all speak the

Kara del Rosario and Paolo Panganiban in “The Leader”

Kelly Lati in “The Best Daddy”

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Lee de Torres (left) and Ikey Canoy in “Arabian Nights”

same language. But for Norman and Flora, language wasn’t enough to communicate what they really wanted to say to each other. “The Leader” by Eugene Ionesco and directed by Joao Atienza and Ag de Mesa closed the show with the array of characters ranging from avid admirers to animated announcers down to a gothic girl. These characters followed by a peculiar couple, all revere and follow what actually is a headless leader. After all the downright weird situations and characters encountered in that hour, everything just seemed pointless and senseless. Nothing was ever so serious after all, it was simply...absurd. Absurd is that which is devoid of purpose....Cut off from his religious, metaphysical, and transcendental roots, man is lost; all his actions become senseless, absurd, useless”. After all, according to Elisa Chamorro, the Theatre of the Absurd seems to have been “a reaction to the disappearance of the religious dimension” from life in that era. “The Best Daddy” starred Kelly Lati and Joachim Antonio. “The Still Alarm” starred Angelo Racelis, Abner Bayangan, Gian Kalaw, Jaime Zavala and Jenny Valladores. “Arabian Nights” starred Ikey Canoy, Lee de Torres, and Isha de Vera. “The Leader” starred Mike Kurfurst, Paolo Panganiban, Glo Anne Guevarra, Kara del Rosario, Vicky Haynes, Miko Arambulo, Ghea Callado, Charles Villacorta, and Martin Vicencio.

After all the downright weird situations and characters encountered in that hour, everything just seemed pointless and senseless. Nothing was ever so serious after all, it was simply...absurd.

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Isha de Vera  College of Arts and Sciences 3rd Year

1st place “Hatchlings” by Paz Santos

In an effort to help the youth become aware of the environment’s current situation, student organization ER+GO held a photography contest last February. Here are the winning entries.

2nd place “Untitled” by Aaron Articulo

3rd place “No Color” by Joseph Duke Real

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Arts

EM Creative Series 2010

he second semester culminated in not one but five events under the EM arts classes, all of which were held last March 5 to March 14, with several all-female groups being trained to mount art events efficiently and with content that contribute to cultural enrichment. The EM Creative Series 2010 Edition was launched with “Fogueira,” a sophomore ladies production that featured Capoeira (a Brazilian martial dance) vis-a-vis the Batucada. The audience was delighted with the energy of martial movements of the Escola Brasileira Capoeira integrated with the rhythms of Brigada, the Philippines’ authentic Brazilian drumline led by Inky de Dios. The next day, the first group of freshmen ladies braved physical and mental challenges as they mounted “DIGG: an Exhibition of Multi-media Performances and New Media Installations.” Endorsed by the National Commission on Culture and the Arts, this event was graced by National Artist

P H OTO S C O U R T E SY O F E M L A D I E S B ATC H E S 2 012 A N D 2 013

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

for Literature Dr. Bienvenido Lumbera who read a piece called “Invitation to Another World.” DIGG was the locus of collaborations between design practitioners from the University of Santo Tomas, the De La Salle School of Design and Arts, and UP Diliman Art Studies Department. Also featured was Mind Tap Studios, along with some web design and motion graphics art collectives. The highlight of DIGG was the multi-media collaboration of media artist Tad Ermitaño (Philippine representative to the Ogaki Biennale in Japan and the ISEA festival in Singapore) and movement artists from Myra Beltran’s Itim Asu production. This was only the second time that Ermitaño’s brainchild was shown to the

Arts

Musings on the EM Creative Series 2010 Edition

public; hence the concept and execution of the work being experimental, it was risky, yet rewarding. DIGG was well attended by artists and representatives from the media sector who eagerly anticipated how gestures can be digitally captured, mirrored, altered, multiplied, and manipulated in real time. The third of the series of five events was a family-oriented event called “Patintero,” which was held at the Dizon Auditorium with excerpts of Mga Kuwento Ni Lola Basyang by the Philippine Educational Theater Association (PETA). Produced by another group of female sophomore students, it was an afternoon of interactive theater as families and friends of the UA&P community flocked to the UA&P campus on a Sunday afternoon to witness Lola Basyang telling stories of “Ang Prinsipeng Mahaba ang Ilong” and “Ang Babaeng Tumalo sa Hari.” The show was for the benefit of underprivileged children from the Oranbo Elementary School and students of Catechism classes organized by the Balanghai CATS Outreach. The fourth day featured performance poetry by Kooky Tuason, Maegan Aguilar, Raul Roco Jr., Charms Tuazon, and the Ateneo Heights in an event called “Manifesto,” organized by the third group of sophomore ladies. Last but not the least, the second group of freshmen ladies mounted “Emblaze,” an “art fair” featuring creative products such as sculptures by Moralde Arrogante and other creative practitioners.

Mounting an art event is a rite of passage that every EM freshman has to go through with much enthusiasm—or dread. During my first two years of handling the course, my students in Visual Arts typically produced art exhibits, and the students in Performing Arts typically produced plays. I still cringe, at times with a tinge of endearment, when I recall my first batch of students’ childlike attempt at painting fruits, flowers, sunsets, and coconut trees. The production team dressed Telengtan Hall and, as part of the production design for a well-known Filipino classic, transformed it into a junkyard, complete with tattered newspapers, strewn bottles, and steel water drums, as the audience sat beside actors, on steel kegs and beverage cases—an attempt to demystify the proscenium theater, and deconstruct the performer-spectator barrier, and to appropriate the aesthetics of poverty. Those days had a different spirit. There has been a radical paradigm shift since 2008. For one thing, the art events are now held outside the UA&P campus to make it more accessible to the general public and to allow my EM students to expand their market. Moreover, there is increasing collaboration with the private sector, local and national government, civil society organizations, and international agencies. Freshmen would boldly seek and win the support of institutions, including the Department of Environment and Natural Resources, the National Commission for Culture and the Arts, and several academic institutions. Students implement projects not purely for profits but for advocacy as well. Incidentally, an international organization called Conservation International endorses a project of an EM Arts class whose students have become involved in advocacies related to climate change awareness, establishing community livelihood programs for the indigenous peoples of Mount Mantalingahan in Palawan. Students are also inspired to promote individuThe best part is when als and small-and-medium enterprises in the creative students become confident industries. Artistic creation has shifted from the emin facing any challenge from phasis on the ouvre to the interstices between work as then on, whether they have creation and work as creative product as we include grown to hate me or love me interior design implements, office implements, fashafter all the pressure. ionable apparel, and accessories made of custommade handcrafted indigenous traditions, recycled eco-friendly materials, and uniquely designed objects. The students are inspired by contemporary artistic praxes that influence the kind of creative practices they feature in their events, as they are exposed to documented and actual multimedia materials inside and outside the classroom. For Visual Arts classes, there has been increased preference for visual design as applied in utilitarian objects, new/digital media, and the performance art beyond painting. As students study form and content, they become more aware of process and mode of production and of the potential of creative products and practices in contributing to a creative economy. They have become more aware of how art contributes to commerce and vice versa. Consequently, as students define their role in society, they see the shift from being creators-workers to producers-managers. It has always been a stressful semester as I work late nights pushing students to improve and practice professionalism, managing crisis scenarios, controlling risks and damages, and at times simply affirming an expectant young heart for a job well done. It has always been my second nature (as a shameless workaholic) to be available to students who have quite erratic schedules. They would sometimes send files in real time through my yahoo messenger, depending on my no-nonsense comments and instant feedback. A “day off” is illusory as my mobile phone beeps at all hours, as students forward their concerns and consult on crucial decisions. This goes on for at least three months, as my phone bill shoots up and the art events scale up in magnitude. Nevertheless, it is greatly satisfying to be there for my students as they make their baby steps. It is highly fulfilling to see them implement plans like professionals who grew up fast. There’s no better stress reliever than to see them tired but satisfied with themselves at the end of the “hell-week.” One of the greatest rewards is when after the postmortem evaluation, they happily share the profits among themselves. After the students manage and handle their financial resources (teacher not included, for obvious ethical reasons), I see posts on Facebook on how they spent the fruits of their labor—wisely, I hope. The best part is when students become confident in facing any challenge from then on, whether they have grown to hate me or love me after all the pressure. It is 2010, and the students no longer paint sunsets and coconut trees. Students barely 17 years old now scout for artists (upon my recommendation and subject to my scrutiny) from across various media and disciplines. Kids fresh from high school now manage artists in the events we mount, learn how to prepare contracts with suppliers, implement full-blown campaigns, go through the logistical challenges of mounting a seamless show, and at times are on their toes in case problems arise. I see more and more students being thrust (at times with much hesitation) into the real market environment. I could say that these are the best years of my life.

Ms. Laya Boquiren  Entrepreneurial Management Program Faculty

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UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Arts III. Kasaysayan: Kung Kukulayan ang Bayan May sariling kamandag ang malulumot na naratibo ng ating pagkalahi. Nag-uudyok sa alaala na iguhit muli nakabalabal na aglahi, tulad ng pagkabayubay ng Manunubos sa krus, iniisa-isa ang litanya ng mga silahis at guhit, sa ugoy ng hinagpis at kinipkip na anyaya. Maabo ang paligid, nakapulapol ang burak sa barko ng mga berdugo, hawak ang sandata, baril na makinis at espadang makintab na tila pilak. Saanman idako ng nakasaksing katutubo yaring matang dilat at gulat, mestiso ang lumukob sa tahimik na baybaying nagpupuyos, nangingilabot.

Pintado:

Inuukit sa Kulay ang Hibla ng Hininga Leodivico C. Lacsamana, PhD  Chair, Department of Filipino I. Pasakalye: Dalumat at Gahum ng Kulay Ang pagbibinyag sa bisa ng kulay ay tahas na pag-ukit ng mga salaysay; isang pag-aantada sa ngalan ng haraya na di maiiwasang isaysay. Tinatatakan ng ibayong kakintalan ang pinagkaingatang kairalan, bilangguang ginto na nangunguyapit sa di matigatig na katotohanan. Ayon sa alamat ng sandaigdigan, lumuwal ang kulay sa pisngi ng langit; mapupusyaw na liwanag na biglang kumislap sa sulok at sa rurok ng isip. Kamay ng Lumikha’y nagpaubayang abutin, kaloob na biyayang inangkin; ang karaniwang tao, kahit na hungkag, tumanggap mandin ng sagradong bituin. Sipatin ang daigdig at pagkasuriin ang kinagisnang misteryo ng kulay. Gumigiyagis ang hiwaga sa sapin-sapin na sinag ng isang pagbubunyag. Bawat bagay, bawat diwa, bawat likha ay nangangalisag sa taglay na liyab ng nag-uumapaw na kulay at sanga-sangang dahas ng pagpapakahulugan. Sa kulay, kung gayon, hinuhugot ang tuwirang pagtuklas sa disenyo ng buhay; ganap na kawil ng isip sa diwa, ng diwa sa titik, ng salita sa likha. Ang dambuhalang telon ng tabularasa, umuukit ng isang tapestriya, Nagdingas na dalumat ng sansinukubang nahubog, nabuhay karaka-raka. II. Katutubong Panahon: Matimyas ang Kulay ng Pagsasarili Lupang kayumanggi. Kayumangging lupa, kulay ng gunita, kupas na simula ; Kulay ng kahapon at lantay na rangya, kasaganahang payak bagamat sadya. Wala na ang lumipas, mabilis itong sumagitsit sa hangi’t himpapawirin; dumikit sa ulan, sinalo ng buwan, agad na sumanib sa mga bituin. May iniwang pilat ang silip ng nagdaan na malalim ang tahip kaysa dibdib. Ipinaaalala ang kakahuyang hitik sa kuliglig at mayuming awit; bulawang alaala ng malinaw na batis, burok na langit, dilaw na pipit, daigdig na sinauna na hitik sa asul na dagat at kahel na tag-init. Bagamat higit diyan, may iginigiit na bugtong ang mainit na hininga ng basal na tagistis ng hamog sa sariwang dalisdis at masamyong talampas; bulong na dumadaloy sa kalawakan ng luntiang parang, na tulad sa ilaw, agad tumagos sa kasuluk-sulukan ng isip at lirip, ng ibig at nais Bahaghari ang pamayanan, iba’t iba ang kulay at anyo ng kasarinlan. Pira-pirasong telang tinahi ng talinghaga, ng sistema at kabuhayang ang taglay na sinag ay puti’t busilak, maiigting na metapora ng isang ugnayang mabunyi at magalang, binubusog sa awit ng kaluwalhatian. Dilaw at puti, lunti at bughaw, mapusyaw na byoleta at banayad na pula, matingkad na kahel at abuhing sisidlan na lantay na ginto, pilak at tanso. Anuman ang kulay, anuman ang anyo, mababanaag ang matwid at totoo. Noong unang panahon, inukit ang kulay sa mata at dugo ng katutubo.

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Lagablab naman ang sa Rizal at Bonifacio, apoy na gumuhit sa dibuho ng pagtutol, sa pananalanta ng mga mananakop at mga huwad na d’yos. Lalaging may sunog sa buong kapuluan, parating liliyab ang bawat bayan; walang-katapusang pamumula ng sagupaan ng salita at agam-agam. Makapal na usok at malalangis na kamao, magkasunod na pananakop ng madilaw na Hapones at maputing Amerikano na agad nagpalalo: maigting na panunupil, mabangis na pagtrato, madilubyong pananagano. Sa pagsasalikop ng impyerno’t imperyalismo, nagiging lila ang estado Yumanig ang apoy sa Plaza Miranda, gumuhit ang talim ng Batas Militar. Nangitim ang bayan, nagmistulang pulbura ang sulok at gilid ng bawat lugar. Pinaslang si Ninoy, nag-snap eleksyon, nagluksa ang bayan, isang kadiliman ang kumubabaw sa mapait na tanaw at balintataw ng bawat mamamayan. Parada ng kulay at ligwak ng ingay ang umilanlang sa EDSA uno at dos. Umulan ng dilaw, namulaklak ng pula, nakisingit ang asul, naglitawan pauli-ulit na pagtanghal sa reta-retasong kulay ng pagkakakilanlan; ritwal na minamaniobra ng iba’t ibang mithiin sa iisang tanghalan. Kung may kulay ang dahas, di na ito pula, at lalong hindi rin itim ni dilim. Hunyango na ang panahon, doble-kara ang sistema, naghuhudas ang alipin. Sa ganitong pagtuturing, ang adviento ay kwaresma, ang kwaresma ay adviento, walang tiyak na kulay sa isang layon, kung asan ang kislap, andoon ang ayon. IV. Paglulunoy: Eskarlata ang Ngayon, Pusali ang Panahon May bangis na patuloy na gumagala sa panahong itong iba na ang digma. Deliryong ayaw paawat, sungayang d’yablo na laging balisa at naninila. Nangangamoy ang masangsang na pandaraya sa kanayunan at sa buong bansa. Dapat bang pagtakhan kung bakit may tigmak ng pangingilala ang iyong kasama? May mga sandaling namimilit ibalik ang dating gunita at paniwala; batas na inukit sa hibla ng hininga, talim ng dalumat na humihiwa. Ginigipit ang diwa na siliping muli ang kinagisnang kulay sa paligid kahit pa wasak at lubusang nagiba ang pagkatahi ng titik sa sinulid. Ay! ayoko mang isiping tiwali ang lahat sa panahong ito ng marangyang pagbabago, ng balighong landasin, ng kutad na bayang marurupok ang suhay, natanto ko rin ang gumapang na lisya sa kaloob-loban ng kabuhayang tadtad ng sugat, tadtad ng pangamba, pati na pangarap nagmistulang mabuway. Ay! hindi ko man titigan ang kulay ng basura sa mga estero, bangketa’t pusalian, lirip ko rin, itim na nasa na dumarapurak sa bawat isa. May lasong sumusulak sa pupas na pangako ng mga palalong palamara, punebreng lumulunod sa umuusling silahis ng umuusbong na umaga. Pintado ang bayan ko, pintado ang kapwa ko, pintado ang bawat Pilipino. Bukas kaya, anong kulay ba ang iyong ipipinta sa tela ng kasaysayan?

This poem won 3rd place in the national Talaang Ginto sa Tula organized by the Komisyon sa Wikang Filipino.

Sports PRESCUP SEASON 10

BIGGKAS 2010 Summer Sports Clinic

Changing of the Guard

Soccer fans and summer fun

page 54

page

The Bataan Death March

102 Km Ultramarathon

“After 42.195 kilometers, everyone turns into furry animals with funny names”— Anonymous page 55 A R I S AC O B A

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

BIGGKAS 2010 Summer Sports Clinic

Photos by Aris Acoba 

Soccer fans and summer

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Sports

fun

occer is often called the “world sport” and it has definitely proven itself worthy of that label as it is the most widely played sport on the planet. Through the numerous global tournaments, of which the most famous is the World Cup, people have witnessed the sport’s ability to bring the world together, bridging gaps and unfamiliarity between players and fans coming from the different parts of the world. Some even say that you can set a soccer ball down on any corner in the world and find yourself surrounded with friends in an instant; it can certainly be your easy ticket to friendship. By joining the BIGGKAS 2010 Summer Sports Clinic, however, I discovered that there is definitely more to this sport than just gaining friendships. The sports clinic was spearheaded by BIGGKAS, a socio-civic university-wide project started by the Civics Desk of the Office of the Students Affairs. BIGGKAS is an acronym that stands for Basa, Isip, Gawa, Galing, Katekismo, Arte, at Sport. These serve as the six main components of the project that the volunteers teach to the students of San Joaquin Elementary school, whose students primarily come from underprivileged areas. Being involved with BIGGKAS works in favor of us, volunteers, and the kids. By joining this program, we were able to develop a stronger sense of charity, philanthropy, and citizenship through the tutorial classes and workshops facilitated by BIGGKAS. As for the pupils of San Joaquin Elementary School, they got to hone their knowledge, attitude, and skills related to the main components of BIGGKAS, eventually gearing them to tackle social problems affecting their daily lives. Last summer, BIGGKAS got the kids physical and active through the Summer Sports Clinic (part of the Sport and Galing components of BIGGKAS), under the supervision of Ms. Anna Alejo. The sessions were held thrice a week at the Rizal High School stadium, which could accommodate soccer, basketball, and volleyball trainings. The track field was also definitely a plus for the kids who, being kids, were happy just running around in laps. Of course, the volunteers were there to teach more than just running and the skills for the sports; we were also there to impart to the kids the values they can get from playing sports. Mounting the sports clinic was in itself a challenge. It involved recruiting volunteer coaches and corporate sponsors such as Piknik, Unilever, and Magnolia (which gave out loads of ice cream in one of the sessions). The Physical Education department also lent a hand by taking part in the training sessions and donating their sporting equipment. I am very fortunate for being involved with the sports clinic because, aside from bonding with my co-volunteers and the kids, I was able to reignite and shore up the love I had for soccer as I saw firsthand its positive effects on the kids. As the soccer training sessions went by, the kids became better and better at being alert and disciplined, something I did not expect the first time I met them. It was also very fulfilling to see the kids at actual games applying the skills we taught them. I smile as I recall the priceless look on my fellow coaches’ faces whenever a trainee would accurately pass the ball to his teammate who goes on to make a goal. What’s even more priceless is when the kids would look up to me and ask, “Kuya, okay ba yung ginawa ko?” And in that moment, I can’t help but be proud of them and all of the volunteers for inspiring these kids to do better. Besides allowing me to teach the kids my favorite sport, the sports clinic gave me the joy of seeing them being kids: simply having fun and forgetting the problems they probably deal with everyday.

What’s even more priceless is when the kids would look up to me and ask, “Kuya, okay ba yung ginawa ko?” ///////////////

Mr. Manpreet Grewal  School of Communication ‘10

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Sports

midst all the hype, excitement, and tension, which are typically present in a championship game, this Division 1 classic definitely lived up to its lofty billing: Rookie team STC dethroned two-time defending champion Hardy Boys in a nailbiting 97-93 overtime win and ruled the 2010 President’s Cup last March 27 at the UA&P Multi-Purpose Court. The game went down in Prescup history as one of the most closely fought encounters. Both teams had their own sets of rallies. There were plenty of deadlocks and leadchanges, like a virtual tennis match. After 20 minutes of pulsating action, the score at half time was 45-43, with STC on top. The Hardy Boys team captain Dabs Castillo picked up three quick fouls (one coming from a technical). Nonetheless, this situation did not prevent him from playing his heart out. The triumvirate of Castillo, mythical member Martin Cuna, and big man Waffy Fabie started to assert its edge on both ends of the court. Cuna contributed 22 markers and Fabie a game-high 25. This enabled

Hardy to build an eight-point cushion, 70-62, midway through the final quarter. However, just when it seemed like Hardy was going to cruise to its third straight crown, STC showed rare poise and dropped its own 13-2 bomb, to regain the lead, 75-72. Finals MVP Migs Vazquez scattered 21 points and fellow mythical awardee Mike Pamintuan added 22. The frontline duo sparked the STC offensive in the latter stages. With 1:32 left in the fourth period, STC guard Matty Naguiat drew a charge from

While winning a third consecutive championship escaped the Hardy Boys, it can still pursue other feats in the league. Winning another one will separate it from other past champions as the winningest team in Prescup’s young history...On the other hand, STC now has a great opportunity to start its own era.

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PRESCUP SEASON 10

Changing of the Guard

P H OTO S B Y M R . T Y R O N E E M M A N U E L I . L I M O N

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

Dabs Castillo. More than forcing the turnover, Castillo picked up his fifth and final foul, disqualifying him from the rest of the game. He was playing the entire contest until this development. The former 3-time MVP finished with 24 markers, but his absence was severely felt in crunch time, as the 2008-2009 champions looked lost without him. The Hardy Boys were still leading at this point, but they were unable to close out the game. In the waning seconds Waffy Fabie and Gian Odejar missed three of their four free throws. Hitting just one more free throw would have iced the game—and the triple championship fairytale—for the Hardy Boys. But STC had another ending in mind. With five seconds left in regulation and STC down by three, Matty Naguiat buried a clutch trifecta from the right corner, from a drive and kick out designed play, as the crowd went berserk, sending the game into overtime. The unassuming Naguiat finished with 20 points, including four back-breaking triples. In the extra chapter, STC further dominated play enroute to the 2010 crown. Martin Cuna tried to carry the offensive and playmaking load, but they were simply outplayed down the stretch. The Hardy Boys were gracious in defeat. The Prescup community expects them to be back next year. It is hoped that this new and exciting rivalry born this Season 10 will be sustained in the coming years. While winning a third consecutive championship escaped the Hardy Boys, it can still pursue other feats in the league. Winning another one will separate it from other past champions as the winningest team in Prescup’s young history. Its players are still in their peak and the recent defeat does not in anyway diminish its ability to win again. On the other hand, STC now has a great opportunity to start its own era, having the rare combination of youth and experience. With the latest outcome of events, the race for Prescup dominance has just become wider. Tyrone Emmanuel I. Limon  College of Arts and Sciences alumnus ‘98

The Bataan Death March

102 Km Ultramarathon Mr. Luis Arcangel  School of Communication Faculty

I must have told myself I’ll never do this again atleast 20 times during the race. Funny thing is, I signed up for the 2011 edition right after, this time for 151 kilometers with the route stretching to Capas, Tarlac.. Can’t wait to share with you the stories that would come out of that experience. ‘Till next year! K102, San Fernando, Pampanga 4:50 pm. 36 straight hours of lucidness. 17 hours of running. 82nd place of 142. 43 didn’t make it to the finish line. At that precise moment in time, nothing seemed to matter anymore. The high is like nothing you could ever experience. BDM is a beast. It strips you down and swallows you whole. It changes you.

Minalin

Lubao

K80 Guagua

PA M PA N G A

K72 to 80 This was probably the roughest stretch of the entire race for me. The pain on my knee was immense.. Everything seemed to grind to a standstill, inch by painstaking inch seemingly rendered in stop-motion animation. I’m fading, fading badly. I must have fallen asleep while running, as I was jarred back to consciousness by the afterburn of a bus that was about 2 feet away from me. It felt like climbing a summit-less Everest. Why was I doing this again?

K67 Dinalupihan

BATA A N Orani

“After 42.195 kilometers, everyone turns into furry animals with funny names”—Anonymous The Bataan Death March 102k Ultramarathon (BDM) is currently the longest individual road race in the country, an annual event held to commemorate the infamous Bataan Death March during World War II. The route spans 102 kilometers from Mariveles, Bataan to San Fernando, Pampanga. It is organized by Jovie Narcise, a retired general known in running circles as the “Bald Runner” and who has been the leader in promulgating the sport in the country.

Abucay

K72, I don’t know where I am. It’s time...to quit? No. NO. NO!!!! Just as I was settling into some semblance of a comfortable second wind along with a good rhythm with the crew, I felt a familiar pain on the outer edge of my left knee. I was panicking inside. I have 3/4 of a marathon to go, I can’t put weight on my knee anymore. A combination of frustration, panic, exhaustion and sleep-deprivation suddenly all kicked in, and before I knew it the tears were welling. I refuse to quit. If you had told me to roll to the finish line, I would have. Ice. Massage. Tourniquet. Prayers. And the madness continues. K70, somewhere very, very hot in Bataan. I couldn’t care less what time it is. It’s hot. Really hot. Scrambled-eggson-the-pavement hot. Only later on were we informed that the heat actually hit 41 degrees on the thermostat. The only way I was able to survive was by being soaked in ice-cold towels and being hosed down head to foot every 10 minutes. Everything was starting to look like a mirage. Ugh.

Orion

The Support Crew After some last minute vacillating and a lot of hemming and hawing over supplies, I, together with my support crew, finally left Manila. You are required to have your own crew, no way could you complete such a Herculean task on your own. My ragtag team was led by best buddy AJ, my uncle Tito Caloy, and AJ’s friend RV. A stranger helping you out on a life experience? I’ll take on any help I can get.

K102

San Fernando

K80, I saw the Lito Lapid Sign So This Must Be Pampanga.

K21, Somewhere in Bataan. 2:13 am. Okay. Still a bit surreal. After talking about this race everyday for several months now, I still couldn’t believe that I was actually doing this. Was running under the pretext of making good time while under the cover of night. First steps in an epic journey.

FINISH

K32 Limay

K50, still somewhere in Bataan, 6:45 am After more than 7 hours of running, I finally reached the first and only pitstop. BR had prepared some goodies for the runners. It was a fun scene actually, because it resembled more of a camp. Some people were even taking showers! Unbelievable. I changed into a fresh pair of clothes and promptly sped off.

K00, Mariveles, Bataan. 10 pm. We arrive at ground zero without much aplomb. Souvenir photos at the line and with the Bald Runner (or BR as we fondly call him) were being snapped incessantly as one could sense a palpable feeling of nervous anticipation in the air. Just a couple of hours more! 11:30 pm. And we’re off! Gulp. 142 brave souls. I wonder what would happen to us? Cabcaben

START K00

Mariveles

UNIVERSITAS September 2010

CONGRATULATIONS

to the Tambuli Awards 2010 Winners! Carmencita Esteban Platinum Award

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