Believe it or not, for Easter, I have been reading the gospel of John. Only chapters 11and 12 on the family of Lazarus, Martha and Mary whom Jesus loved and the strange anointment of Jesus. Did you know that Mary used spikenard, a very rare and expensive oil to wash (perhaps massage) the feet of Jesus?
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Hiyas na Tanglaw award
SIFU RENE NAVARRO
In deep recognition of his contributions to the capacity development of the staff and students of INAM Philippines on classical Chinese medicine and traditional Chinese medicine, thus enhancing the quality of healthcare to the Filipino people served by INAM;
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Diary 3/2/25: Dragon Tiger Video Ching See San
When I began studying Shaolin Kungfu with Johnny F. Chiuten, I was told by him that the style was Hung Ga or Angka or Hong Cha, depending on the dialect. This was in the mid-1960s when we did not have the internet and there was really a paucity of information about martial arts. Then when I settled in the US I learned in the 1970s that there were several styles of Hung Gar, each claiming authenticity and bragging rights, with different forms and techniques that “evolved” from the original ancestor in the Southern Shaolin in Fujian back during the Qing Dynasty.
Continue reading “Diary 3/2/25: Dragon Tiger Video Ching See San”Diary 1/18/25: Daoism Study
Diary 1/18/25: Daoism Study
I often receive questions from students. A student told me that, in response to my advice, she is taking lessons in Daoism with scholar Livia Kohn twice a month. I gave a few suggestions for her and those who are interested in studying Daoism. Studying Daoism is a long, difficult and possibly costly education.
Continue reading “Diary 1/18/25: Daoism Study”Diary update 11/29/24
We just got back from a Thanksgiving Party at the Billingham’s (Joe and Claire) in the woods in Erwinna, Bucks County, PA. Just relatives: Al, Laura, Laura’s parents, Isabel and her husband Jay and Ava, Lolit and me. It was such a pleasure just being with family, chatting updates, what everybody was doing. Ava, now 23, is employed in New York City. Isabel, now 25, is doing her doctorate in bio-engineering at Penn. Even the time spent stooped over the jigsaw puzzle of Gustav Klimt’s The Woman in Gold was a pleasure.
Continue reading “Diary update 11/29/24”Paris: Through the Years
There was the music, of course, by Debussy and Berlioz and the art of Monet snd Picasso. But in college it was Albert Camus who incarnated Paris. Not Jean Paul Sartre, although I read his work on existentialism. Not Simone de Beauvoir either. It was Camus and his novels – The Stranger, the Plague – and his essays The Rebel and Art, Sedition and Death. I read about those intellectuals on the Left Bank. I went for the more accessible writings – Francoise Sagan and Antoine de St-Exupery and later on Roland Barthes. Michel Foucault and Jacques Derrida were too high above my comprehension. I had a copy of Sartre’s Being and Nothingness but I never went beyond the first chapter. The Little Prince is still my favorite book. I gave my rare copy of Peter Ustinov’s rendition on vinyl to my granddaughter Isabel on her wedding.
Continue reading “Paris: Through the Years”A(nother) Death in the Family
Just received the news that another friend from college has passed away. Ed Labitag was my classmate and fraternity brother. The list is getting longer. Jut a few months ago, it was Salvador “Buddy” Carlota, former dean of the college of law in the University of the Philippines and authority on administrative law. He was also a talented musician who played the piano and the guitar. Almost immediately afterwards, it was Josue “Sonny” Villa, the Philippine ambassador to China. Earlier another ambassador to China Jose Santiago “Chito” Sta Romana passed in Hainan Island: he was taken by Covid. Years back Frankie Llaguno, writer and colleague in the Banana Club like Buddy, died from a chronic disease.
Continue reading “A(nother) Death in the Family”Shamans, Babaylans and Kuranderas
The different healing modalities – meditation, qigong, nutrition/dietetics, massage, martial arts, feng-shui, astrology, sexology, acupuncture, herbalism, essential oils, alchemy – have their origins in shamanism.
Continue reading “Shamans, Babaylans and Kuranderas”Hiroshima
I am going to attend the commemoration of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki at the Todabayashi Serenity Garden tonight at 6:30. It starts at the LEPOCO office at 53 E. Lehigh Street for the program and readings and then there’s a walk to the Garden.
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I would like to share the live presentation I did last year on June 18 at the Marble Summer Arts Festival in NYC. I called it Babaylan Prayer in honor of the shamans and healers who, even today, in different forms, carry on the rituals and traditions of ancient Philippines. I choreographed this short program as a “wordless worship”. It is part of a longer work that I’ve taught in seminars. The background music is from the CD Shakuhachi The Japanese Flute by Kohachiro Miyata. The video was filmed by Carlos Esguerra and edited by Manny Maramara.
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