November 2008 Archives

By Ruel S. De Vera, Associate Editor Sunday Inquirer Magazine IT'S an expression that I could never really identify with. "It's like riding a bike." Apparently, it means that once you've learned how to do a certain thing, you never forget. But what if you never learned to do it in the first place? As a bookish, skinny kid, I never learned to ride a bicycle. I remember sharing a tricycle with my siblings, but never going too fast because it made me dizzy. I actually remember riding an actual bike -- but with training wheels -- years later -- in a spectacularly unsuccessful fashion. For some reason, I really could not keep the bike upright and in motion, this, even with the training wheels. I kept crashing into the subdivision's foliage and getting scratches and bumps. I pretty much gave up trying to learn—and never did. There are many things to take away from that little tidbit. For one thing, balance has never been my strong suit. Despite my best efforts, multi-tasking is not one of my strengths. I'm more like that memorable member of DC's Legion of Super-Heroes, Jo Nah, better known as Ultra Boy (the Keith Giffen version). Ultra Boy, after all, had all of Superboy's powers, but could only use them one at a time. Thus, I can really only do one activity at any given moment, as that one activity requires all my attention. So, I never learned how to drive. When I had to steer, I kept forgetting how to shift gears. When I had to shift to second, I couldn't figure out how to brake. The weird thing is that I love cars and can appreciate a muscular motorcycle. Even stranger, I love watching the Tour de France. I consider Lance Armstrong to be a true role model, am glad that his manager Johan Bruyneel is a true organization genius. Every year, I enjoy watching the peloton and its battle up and down the peaks. It will be a pleasure to watch Armstrong ride the Tour for Bruyneel at Team Astana no matter what the results. And all this, for someone who can't keep a bicycle upright. It's a lesson I guess that just because we can't do something, doesn't mean we can't appreciate it. In fact, we might actually be able to appreciate, even love it more precisely because we can't. That is something we never forget -- how it is, not to ride a bike. Read about bicycles and other traffic ideas in the November 30 issue of the Sunday Inquirer Magazine.

By Ruel S. De Vera, Associate Editor Sunday Inquirer Magazine LIKE a twist in one of his books, news of Michael Crichton’s demise arrived as a shock. No one knew the author was even sick, so finding out Crichton was really dead at 66 after a battle with cancer was truly startling. What it also does is remove one of the few authors who really had a following after all these decades. Crichton was never the easiest author to read. His prose tended to be heavy with dense paragraphs of explanations, often moving at the speed of crawling magma. The movies adapted from his books essentially pared down his narrative to just action. He always considered explaining how these things happened as important as why. What he never lacked was the big idea. This was partly because of his truly unique background. He moved from studying English at Harvard to studying medicine at Harvard, writing in his spare time before finally quitting med school. Most readers know Crichton hit the big time when his dinosaur-redux novel “Jurassic Park” gobbled up the competition on the shelves in 1990 and then the box office in 1993. That movie changed our idea of modern day monsters forever, launching a merchandising empire and making dinos cool again. The real defining moment of Crichton’s writing, in my mind, came much earlier, in 1969, when he wrote “The Andromeda Strain.” That novel, plus the 1971 Robert Wise movie, came to define our idea of pandemic panic. Its claustrophobic setting became the definitive environment for any unseen bug that runs wild in a lab. That very same paranoia informs every single sickness movie today, from “Outbreak” to “28 Days Later.” Plus the stark, minimalist 1971 film is superior in every way to the slick but stunted, nearly unintelligible 2008 TV remake. He made us fear the biohazard symbol. It was then that Crichton hatched his idea that science can indeed be scary. After an early stint writing books under the pseudonym John Lange, he has since explored that theme, from time travel (“Timeline”) to aircraft safety (“Airframe”), from robotics (“Westworld”) to nanotechnology (“Prey”), from aliens (“Sphere”) to mutant apes (“Congo”), even delving into social issues (“Disclosure”) and courting controversy by railing against the very concept of global warming (“State of Fear”). That Hollywood often failed to capture the essence of his books did not stop the movies from being successful for the most part. “Congo” and “Sphere,” in particular, were turkeys. Ironically, “Jurassic Park” was, among his more recent work, the movie that hewed closest of his book, it was the sequel “The Lost World,” that really ran off the tracks. The movie hardly even resembled the book in any way. The third and planned fourth film were not adapted from novels. He did many other things, of course, directing films (“Coma”), writing films (“Twister”) and creating TV series (“E.R.”). It should not be surprising then that his best books also resulted in the best movies, though decades apart. “The Andromeda Strain” and “Jurassic Park” don’t even seem to have anything in common save for their author, yet both stand as remarkable explorations of science and the zeitgeist at the time. Even as he terrified us with the prospect of science unleashed, he told us why and how it should be. He gave mad science a face, whether it was the invisible organism, Yul Bryner’s cybernetic cowboy, or the T-Rex chomping down on a lawyer. He made science a star, and that we will miss the most.

By Ruel S. De Vera, Associate Editor Sunday Inquirer Magazine OF all the relationships that end, it's the ones we have with food which seem hardest to forget completely. Maybe it's because food activates a sensory aspect, one that is more visceral and thus more difficult to simply erase. A sniff of a similar aroma will suddenly flood the senses with nostalgia. The most poignant thing to lose is the favorite restaurant. It's particularly difficult when the waiters know you, and even know what you without asking. "The usual." Places move, chefs transfer, and customers will just have to accept the fact that their favorite haunt is gone. I have dealt with this particular situation twice. My first favorite restaurant was Café Intermezzo in Greenbelt. I would be there every Wednesday, and inevitably I would meet friends there because they knew I'd be there at that day every week. Their lamb chops were my regular meal and once Intermezzo left, replaced by a Burger King, I never found another place quite like it. The second place I really liked going to was a friend's joint. Clinton Palanca is both a wicked fictionist and an impressive chef. Prospero's was his place, and I loved both its incarnations, in Katipunan and Greenbelt. The tenderloin was amazing and the iced tea remains the best anywhere. Clinton eventually decided to move on, Prospero's gone with the tide, but its memories remain. And though I never ate there often enough, Full House on Katipunan Avenue was always a great place for merienda. The spaghetti was tasty, but the chicken crepe was sublime. Full House was only one of the many places along Katipunan that, due to the ebb and flow of students in schools fronting it, came and went. We remember fondly Puzzle Point and Anne's, but are joyful that Café Sweet Inspirations endures with the best Mongolian Barbecue setup in Quezon City. Of all the institutions close to Ateneo's campus itself, it is the eatery inside Ateneo that impresses with its longevity. Last semester, the Comm Dept. moved to the mainland, but Manang's remains where it has always been, dispensing inihaw na liempo to a crowd of students and an ever-increasing stream of alumni. Inevitably, favorite products vanish as well, driven to extinction. I know many friends who remember Choco Vim fondly. I know I am not alone when I speak of missing the original Magnolia Chocolait in those awesome glass bottles. The small ones were really cute and the big ones inhabited fridges for years as water bottles. I miss the original Jack N Jill Munchies (the cheese ones!) as well as Carol-Ann's Potato Sticks. Nothing has the same spicy crunch as Granny Goose Hot Stix. Despite was seemed to be a complete disappearing act, Serg's Chocolate is reported to be back. If true, that is great news. In fact, I am happy to note that not all our favorite snacks have been exterminated. Some thrive in their natural settings: the school canteen and in student's pockets. Haw Flakes were perfect for pretend communion, while the amazing Clover Bits were perfect for eating undetected in the classroom. They're not easy to find, but they are still very much around. Long live Haw Flakes and Clover Bits! Read about other winning tastes in the November 9, 2008 issue of the Sunday Inquirer Magazine.