Jessica Zafra's Blog, page 23

Congratulations to this year’s winners of the Palanca Awards for Literature

Winning a Palanca Award changed my life. After college I was a freelance writer contributing feature articles to magazines like Metro (where I met my lovely future editor, the late, much-missed Abe Florendo) or churning out ten versions of the same press release for PR agencies (The rent must be paid), but dreaming of writing […]

The Bibiliophibians Reading Group selection for October is Don’t Look Now by Daphne du Maurier

Last Saturday our Reading Group had its monthly meeting at Tin-Aw Art Gallery over wine and popcorn. For a host of reasons ranging from being in Shanghai to vertigo to garage sales, only six of us were able to appear for the discussion, but this gave us more time for digression, speculation, and chismis. As […]

How to save the cats from the Hellmouth (formerly known as Serendra) – Updated

Update from CARA (Compassion and Responsibility for Animals), which looks after the stray cats of BGC. So the Serendra Board blows off an invitation from City Hall. That can’t be good. * * * * * Photos from Buffy the Vampire Slayer I’ve been doing research on the problem of how to save the cats […]

How to save the cats from the Hellmouth (formerly known as Serendra)

Photos from Buffy the Vampire Slayer I’ve been doing research on the problem of how to save the cats from the Hellmouth (formerly known as Serendra), and talking to animal rights advocates. The urgent issue, in my view, is how to save the cats from starving to death now that feeding strays is banned in […]

If Serendra wants to starve the stray cats to death, then we can starve their business to death. Save the cats, then boycott Serendra.

Photos from Cats of BGC By now you must be aware that Serendra in BGC (Remember that place where they had a gas explosion some years ago and all the tenants had to be evacuated? No not Glorietta 2, the one in BGC) prohibits residents and tenants from feeding the stray cats in the area. […]

Full Moon in Quiapo

Photo by Allan Carreon Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a warm, drizzly September in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos* get such an upper hand of me, that […]

Come to our Reading Group discussion of First Love, Last Rites on Saturday, 4pm at Tin-Aw

The brutal, electrifying beauty of Respeto

I’m very late to the party, but I finally saw Respeto and it’s awesome. Hendrix (Abra) is a young man who lives in the slums of Pandacan, Manila. He has no prospects, except to get killed in the ongoing war against drugs. His world is a toilet: when police arrive to demolish their shanties, the […]

What should you do if you are bullied and your school refuses to do anything about it?

I’ve been wanting to write about this case of bullying for months, but my friend stopped me. She wanted to give the school officials the chance to do the right thing. Months passed and they did nothing despite several meetings with my friend and her son, in the presence of psychologists and lawyers. They said […]

Driver tries piteousness, lying, guilt, class struggle to make me cancel the ride. Ha!

I had a 10am meeting. Expecting the usual horrific traffic I requested a car at 9:15. To my surprise, I got a car on the first try. I went out to wait for the car and noted that traffic was abnormally light–I guess everyone was expecting the super-storm. The driver took a wrong turn, which […]