Jessica Zafra's Blog, page 74

Let’s Buy Spain update: Filipino brand Emperador buys Spain’s Fundador

Bodegas Fundador Listed liquor company Emperador Inc. owned by tycoon Andrew L. Tan has acquired Fundador Pedro Domecq, Spain’s largest and oldest brandy, in an “all-cash” deal worth 275 million euros, or P13.8 billion, the Inquirer learned Monday. The purchase solidifies Emperador’s position as the world’s largest brandy company and makes the Tan-led firm one […]

One More One More Chance

This is how out of touch we are with pop culture: We saw that A Second Chance had opened in theatres, cried, “Nikolaj Coster-Waldau!” and made plans to see it. When we got to the cinema we guessed by the long queues and excited viewers that it was not the Danish cop drama directed by […]

How taste works

A flavor experience may begin with a past meal: The memory (1) activates dopamine reward centers, leading us to crave the flavors to come. We salivate. A brain primed for pleasure begins to receive sensory impulses from the food as we move it (2) to our mouth, see its colors and shapes (3) and inhale […]

Loving Doorstops (or, Reading Long Books in the age of instant media)

Literature is incompatible with the information age. The digital world demands speed, accessibility, connectivity, user-friendliness, interactivity. Reading requires slowness. It asks you to disengage from “the real world”, to shut out other people and listen to the writer’s voice inside your head. Even before people started Instagramming their food the way we said grace before […]

These are not Photoshopped, these are actual carpets and we want them.

At first glance, Faig Ahmed’s carpets look like digital photos that didn’t load right the first time you clicked on them. Intricate patterns morph into messes of pixelation; blocks of color slide off like someone scrolled past them too fast; and some of the 2D mats look like they are bulging off a screen. But […]

The unsettling glamour of Clarice Lispector, our sanity insurance policy.

Ran into our Jedi Master yesterday, and after he recounted the most recent threats and insults he had issued to his 300,000 Twitter followers, he gave us the book he was carrying. The Complete Stories of Clarice Lispector contains 86 of her short stories, translated from the Portuguese by Katrina Dodson. This is our first […]

Belgians respond to terror raids with cats

When, on Sunday evening, Belgian police asked citizens not to tweet about the armed operations that were being carried out around the country, anyone could have been excused for reacting with fear. Belgian forces – searching for suspects in the aftermath of the Paris attacks – told citizens to stay indoors and not go near […]

Conan in Armenia: At the market

Art auctions are a spectator sport

Kiss of Judas by Napoleon Abueva, starting bid Php400,000 Nuestra Señora de la Soledad de Porta Vaga, starting bid Php700,000 Talking Birds by H.R. Ocampo, starting at Php1.8M If you want to convert your cash into a piece of Philippine art history, there’s Vicente Manansala’s “Mother and Child” from 1971, opening bid Php2M; a landscape […]

It’s the End of The Word As We Know It

Read it in words.