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Something about German trains

At first it is intimidating, for a foreigner who isn’t very familiar with a big city’s urban railway system. Much more if a Third World visitor takes on the complex Berlin system with its U-Bahn and S-bahn overlying the tram and bus, and the industrial-strength Deutsche Bahn comprising the much bigger train network that crisscrosses all of Germany and beyond.

But once you get hold of a map and a day-ticket, then all your fears evaporate. After some fiddling with euro coins and perhaps a quick help from someone who understands Deutsche sprache better than you, getting that ticket machine to belch out your precious day-ticket also becomes an easy piece a’cake.

 

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Massacre cooking

In 1971, as a “summer-fulltimer” activist of the Kabataang Makabayan (KM) working with MDP’s Radyo Pakikibaka, I was a regular visitor at the KM’s Boni Center along Quezon Avenue. As was the SOP in activist HQs during those times, the Boni Center prepared its daily fare of food for everyone who happened to be there at mealtimes–whether we were five or 10 or (sometimes, especially during busy protest seasons) 25 or more.

Masaker food
Massacre soup with cabbage and vermicelli

Boni Center had a finance and logistics team that, I supposed, worked with a thin and worn shoestring budget. I only assumed this, because occasionally, a team member would arrive with a big sack or two of vegetable rejects and cabbage peelings, solicited from their local public market contacts. Then we who happened to be around would help out in the kitchen, sorting out the still humanly edible pieces from those that were absolutely fit only for the pigsty cauldron. Continue reading “Massacre cooking”

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Much ado about presidential credentials

Editorial note: This piece was first published under my “Pathless Travels” column in the Nov. 30, 2003 issue of the Northern Dispatch (Nordis) Weekly. It is obviously out of date as it referred to Fernando Poe Jr.’s candidacy in the 2004 presidential elections. I’m reposting it here, with slight revisions, because I believe the main points I raised remain relevant today, as the country starts to be gripped again by election fever.

 

IN THIS WEEK’S column piece, I will make an exception to a self-imposed rule to write mainly on Northern Luzon concerns, especially “light topics” with a broad environmental, socio-cultural, or historical bent.

IRAIA thoughts
IRAIA thoughts

Today I will make a pointblank commentary on the swirling, relentless political talk that has seized the country since Gloria Macapagal Arroyo bared her plan to run for the presidency in 2004, followed by Fernando Poe Jr. formally declaring his own presidential bid a few days ago. Continue reading “Much ado about presidential credentials”