At the gallery, each step from one painting or multimedia piece to another invited me into these artists’ elucidations while reminding me of short stories my immigrant family members told. I grew up Filipina through my family’s connections to the motherland, the Philippines. My parents’ stories, my grandmother’s cooking, my ability to fluently understand my mother’s native tongue, Ilokano, and my cousins’ ghost stories heavily shaped the way I learned about my Filipina American (Pinay) culture and identity.

A mix of these ingredients - symbolizing land, language, food and folklore - all culminated during a family dinner. My older cousin, Nolo, cordially visited my family whenever he could. He joined us for this one particular evening that I can never forget (as in, I’ve tried, but the memories won’t escape me). What was a joyous meal full of laughter and playing catch-up simply remained a night of storytelling. But with scary stories. One by one, my elder extended family members left the dinner table for bedtime while my cousin Nolo talked all about his then-recent trip to the Philippines. He described his firsthand encounters with, what I thought and soon after unlearned, were mythical characters native to Filipino folklore.

The family table quickly became compelling. My brother William, cousin Richard and I uneasily listened to Nolo speak directly to my mother’s childhood musings and memories. My mother was the only adult figure left at the table with us cousins. Being the youngest there, they all chatted about things I knew little of - international airports, rural countrysides and rice fields. While overhearing a boisterous conversation about how Nolo witnessed a Filipino pastime (but an illegal activity in the U.S.) known as cockfighting, the lights went out!

“Brownout!” my mother shouted before she lit a candle and brought it back to the dinner table. Similar to an electrical depletion known as a “Blackout,” this is what many Filipinos might say when the electricity goes out, as it usually does in the Philippines where erratic weather changes occur due to its tropical climate and susceptibility to heavy rains, typhoons and monsoons. “Bari-bari apo,” I remember my mom softly say to herself. What did that mean? I understood most sayings, but I’d never heard this one.

All of the cousins sat around a large white candle. I was too afraid to leave the table and the light source. Because brownouts rarely take place in the States (as my family calls it), this flame was a novelty to me. As we peered into the light, we relished at the dripping candle wax and its root at the burning wick. I noticed that Nolo’s fascination soon turned into swift concentration.

“Wanna see some magic?” he asked.

“Yeah!” my cousins and I replied with our excited little voices.

Nolo lifted his pointer finger towards the light and deftly ran it in back-and-forth fashion through the flame.

An explosive chorus of “Whoa!” and “How do you do that?!” followed by “Can you do it to me, too?” affirmed Nolo’s feat. One by one, Nolo took William’s and Richard’s pointer fingers and guided them through the flame.  I refused. I was too afraid. Instead, I inquired about how Nolo learned to do this.

“I learned it in the Philippines. My cousins showed me. I was bored,” Nolo answered as he eyed my mother, who just walked into the room.

“Hey Auntie, have you ever seen a duwende?” Nolo wondered out loud.

“No, why! Did you see one in the Philippines?” my mother asked with wide eyes.

“No, but my sister did,” he explained. Nolo’s younger sister, my cousin May, apparently saw a dwarf spirit called duwende and fell ill with a fever the very next day. In Filipino folklore, duwende is a type of dwarf or elf spirit that can be very helpful or even hurtful if they are offended. They reside in trees, little houses, or mounds in the ground near peoples’ actual houses. They can be good or mischievous depending on how they are treated. My mother talked about how she was afraid to walk around at night in fear that she would step on one. “Yeah, you’re right,” Nolo confirmed. “I think she might have bothered or stepped on one when we walked outside in the dark.”

“That’s why you say Bari bari.” It’s a saying that someone would use in an attempt to pardon or excuse themselves from bothering any lingering spirits. For example, if you needed to relieve yourself in a forest or if you had to throw something out in the dirt, then you would say it. “Or, in Tagalog it’s Tabi-Tabi Po. But in Ilokano, you say Bari-Bari.” Okay, got it. Finally! I figured it out after all these years.

Initially, I thought of these creatures called duwende, aswang, manananggal, tikbalang and kapre in cartoon format. There are unique renderings of these kinds of spirits in the “Tabi-Tabi Po” exhibition. I imagined in cartoon because 1) I was young, 2) it was easier for me soften out potentially negative images that scared me and 3) each creature I learned about at that time had a Westernized look-alike. I guess I learned to relate this way. I merely equated duwendes to the dwarves in Snow White. As I got older, I learned the Western characters and imagined an aswang to be like a vampire, pictured a manananggal like a ghost and a witch put together, can easily see a tikbalang as a centaur and a kapre as a Filipino version of America’s infamous Bigfoot.

These characters in these stories were never a matter of fiction for me. Growing up Filipina American has, in a way, conditioned me to be afraid these apparitions. In a country and culture where our interactions with anything of the ghostly kind is relegated to annual party celebrations like Halloween, television series of unsolved crime mysteries and the occasional Hollywood blockbuster film like “Paranormal Activity,” it is no wonder why many people decide the fictitious to be wrong or unreal. I am working on unlearning my habit to worry hard. We are given many reasons and instances in which the mythical are cruel or demonic. Many people fear the unknown and the unseen alike because of the chance that other things exist beyond us. We fear ghosts because they might haunt us or the spaces we occupy. We fear not knowing because we might be left unprepared or unable to react quickly enough. We fear. We seldom ask to co-exist.

Seeing “Tabi-Tabi Po” allowed me to make further connections and sense about how necessary it is to be in tune with my environment - whether or not I know what’s around. Featured artist Bru said, “You have to be in touch with spirits. You have to care about your environment. And when you lose touch, when you live in the city for so long, it’s just all cement. And lights. You lose part of yourself.”

—

Tabi-Tabi Po was featured in San Francisco’s 1:AM Gallery from November 13th, 2009 to December 12th, 2009. Supplementary information about the exhibit and the hosting space can be found on their websites, featured at the beginning of this blog entry. The above photos were taken from 1:AM SF’s Flickr account. In order of appearance, the photos selected for this blog are:

“A Giant in the Mental” by Christopher De Leon
“Malakat Waves” by Angry Woebots
“Nuno Sa Punso” by Dianne Que

–

Janice Lobo Sapigao is a new intern with New Village Press in Oakland, CA. She is a blogger, writer, poet, playwright and all-around arts enthusiast. She recently graduated from the University of California, San Diego with a B.A. in Ethnic Studies and a minor in Urban Studies & Planning.

During her time in Southern California, she fell into many activist circles where she was able to join Kamalayan Kollective, a  political, people-centered, feminist organization that seeks to raise critical consciousness about issues that affect the Pinay/Pinoy, Pilipina/o, Pilipina/o American communities and other marginalized and underserved communities. She has worked with organizations such as UCSD Kaibigang Pilipino as a scriptwriter, GABRIELA Network as an actress in the play “Export Quality,” and the UCSD Campus Community Centers as a former CUDLI intern and a Joy De La Cruz Art & Activism Intern. Her writing has led her to feature in and work with UC Berkeley’s Maganda Magazine, with Los Angeles-based BakitWhy.com and with the UCSD Comprehensive Research Center in Health Disparities.

Aside from interning with New Village Press, Janice is currently living in San Jose, CA after academically interning with Book-in-a-Day in Washington, D.C and studying abroad in Buenos Aires, Argentina. She is also working on a manuscript for her first book of poetry, short stories and writings. She is looking forward to a lively career in community building through literary arts, no matter what, by any means necessary.

Tuesday morning. My corner. The mural of the weekend has become performance art. A lesson, like Tibetan sand paintings, in the truth of life — change. And also like the ephemeral art of Tibetan llamas, we can remember it was primarily done to heal and bless the environment and all living beings. The young person I buy coffee from next door sympathizes and guesses that the owner of the building had it painted out. “Maybe it was too Oakland for them,” he offers.

I am sad to lose the artwork of Saturday, yet immensely grateful to those who have been nurturing a healthy and life-affirming street-art culture. A recent festival with a competition for these artists was held at Defremery Park in Oakland.  It was the 3rd Annual Estria Invitational Graffiti Battle at “Life Is Living,” curated by Marc Bamuthi Joseph. The theme for the competing artists, who came from far and wide, including Honolulu, Harlem and Chicago, was GROW.

(more…)

Corner of 42nd Street and Telegraph. Here’s the completed mural in the morning light.
Protect Our Kidz – Stop the Arms Trade is the Culture Warriors’ message.

This central character appears to be the hero. A hiphop artist weilding a spray can in one hand and swinging a microphone on a cord in the other. These are his weapons of mass expression! (more…)

Sidewalk scene in front of Pizzaiolo Restaurant, Oakland, California, September 18, 2009 around 7:15 pm.

Imagine my surprise Friday evening to emerge from a favorite dinner spot and discover a party on the sidewalk. But wait, there was something different about the street — beyond the sidewalk artist, busy with his pink chalk and boombox syncopation there was a full-blown game of Scrabble taking place on a real grass lawn, with lawn chairs and umbrella right where there used to be a parking spot on busy Telegraph Avenue! (more…)

This weekend I got dirty at 3rd i’s Green Eye event by visiting a couple urban veggie gardens on a tour with MyFarm, and watching a film about that stuff that makes them grow – Dirt! – all hosted by Artists Television Access in San Francisco.

A documentary on the living, breathing skin that coats our planet, Dirt! the Movie promotes the value of that stuff beneath our feet.  Dirt sustains us, feeds us and shelters us, yet we undervalue and mistreat it.  Directors Bill Benenson and Gene Rosow remind us that the mistreatment of dirt is the root of all our problems – from deforestation and conflicts over fertile land, to sterile fields and shrinking fish populations – and that the nourishment of dirt is a huge part of the solution.

New Village author James Jiler is featured in the film for doing just that!  His horticultural training program for prisoners on Rikers Island connects inmates with nature, and plants the seeds needed to restore cultural value of this essential resource for life. Read about this successful in-prison Greenhouse and post-release GreenTeam program in the book Doing Time in the Garden.

For a clip of the film, and information on how you can get involved, visit DirtTheMovie.org

photo credit:  http://www.shelbycountyswcd.org/

— Amanda Bensel

Through my work at New Village Press, I’ve discovered an organization that does just that. The Press is currently partnering with The Center for the Living City (CLC) - a New York City-based, educational non-profit – on a collection of original essays re-envisioning the work of activist and self-taught urbanist Jane Jacobs for the present day. This book, What We See, is the sister project to the CLC’s ongoing, international series of neighborhood tours - Jane’s Walk. (more…)

Anusha Venkataraman has written a thoughtful and enlightening review of Beverly Naidus’s new book Arts for Change. From the apt overview—

“Part memoir, part historical narrative, part resource guide, Naidus’ book summons in an accessible and easy-to-read format her experiences, challenges and advice from years of working in the field.”

to insight about how 20th century social movements influenced teaching—

“. . . the social movements of the 1960s and 70s brought forward the re-emergence of the artist as social agent. It was during this time that Naidus shaped her creative practice in relation to feminism, the antiwar movement, environmentalism and, eventually, progressive education theories. What all of these movements — and Naidus’ involvement in them — have in common is that they advocate, implicitly or explicitly, a politics of pedagogy that fundamentally shifts the power dynamics between student and teacher, haves and have-nots, oppressor and oppressed.”

it’s the kind of meaty, reflective review that sets one to wondering years later if we have, in fact, read the book or just a great write-up of it. To increase the effect, CAN also offers a tasty pdf excerpt of Chapter 4, “Facilitating an Interdisciplinary Arts Curriculum.”  Nonetheless, dear friends, please note that however useful Venkataraman’s commentary in CAN’s Reading Room, I am not suggesting you skip a full and rewarding reading of Arts for Change!

The hands-on program walks prisoners through every stage of maintaining their 1,200 square-foot organic flower garden, teaching them how to plan, budget, irrigate, and work with the soil, as well as identify and propagate the plants they wish to grow. In doing so, IGP is helping prepare inmates for meaningful jobs in landscaping and agriculture upon their release. Proponents of the program believe that this will help reduce the number of people caught in the cycle of incarceration, which sees over 70% of inmates back behind bars within three years of their release. (more…)

Dear Friends of New Village Press,

What a dramatic new year this is, as we turn the great wheels of Change with a capital C!

In keeping with our country’s spirit, New Village is happy to release our eleventh original title—Arts for Change: Teaching Outside the Frame by Beverly Naidus.

Artist, writer, university educator, Beverly Naidus takes a fearless look at the evolution of socially-engaged arts taught in various educational settings. We learn the ins and outs of her own feisty career, ways she engages her students with their conscience, and the courageous paths of more than thirty teaching-artist colleagues she interviews. (more…)