September 16, 2007

CONTENTS

Features

• Arya! The Art of Alan Gomez
  

Columns

• Stings from the Wild
• Island Blend

Arya!

The Art of Alan Gomez

His model ships have sailed off faraway places, bringing with them treasures that smell of rice fields and banana plantations. His framed mixed media artworks depicting Bohol’s best proudly gaze at you in restaurants and resorts around town. His charming original creations appear in most every trade show that the province partakes in.

His art has become a celebrity of sorts but he whose hands and genius shaped these obra’s, has remained elusive. Until now.

Alanieto ‘Alan’ Gomez is not a people person. He leaves that to his father, Nito Gomez, who has been marketing and promoting his son’s artistic creations from the beginning of this artist’s career.

It was in 1988 when Alan Gomez sold his first galleon. It started as a hobby, a fascination of model vessels meticulously 3d-rendered in indigenous materials, chiefly unas (dried banana leaves). Proud of his first creation, it sat prominently in their sala. It didn’t take long for it to be noticed by a guest. It was purchased almost instantly.

Many galleons and schooners later, Alan and his art has since evolved into framed mixed media artworks (the art includes the frame) and other model vehicles like vintage planes, jeepneys and bicycles. But he remained loyal to his media of choice, easy to come by, native materials such as unas, coco products, twigs, bamboo.

Though he spent some good years in an architectural school, Alan is self-made and takes inspiration from everything and anything that takes his fancy. In the faux-window-frame art that he made for Atty. Jun Amora’s new office, he applied the technique he saw in Disney’s Art Attack in creating the texture for the frame.

Though some may dismiss his creations as craftwork, not artwork, Alan stands by his conceptions as works of art. He says his art cannot be duplicated, replicated and mass-produced, as with the craftworks’ case. His artwork is pedantic, and could only be sculpted, modeled, painted with his own hands.

But he need not defend his art. Not in the case of Alan Gomez’ art.

His art has transcended craft and scale, Loayanon’s want a real-size galleon rise in their sandugo site, and guess who they approached?

The sails of a real galleon will be seen flapping over the Loay sandugo site years from now, it will be an Alan Gomez.

Bush Around the Beat

Bush, Inc. as a political parlance refers to the family of the US 41^st president and the current 43^rd president. The father of 41^st was a senator and a brother of 43^rd is the governor of a state. It’s a record outmatched by some political families in our country as we have outmatched the US record of entertainers throwing their hats into the political ring.

As the world knows, both Bushes made war with Saddam Hussein, and in a weirdly funny sense, those wars were between the “Butcher of Baghdad” and the “Butchers of Syntax.”

Bush the father and the son are both known for verbal miscues. Those who kept track of their mangled English have enough entries to produce books not unlike our own “Eraptions.” Our Erap can be forgiven though, perhaps not for his plunder case but certainly for his mangled English, he being a non-native English speaker.

Bushism was actually born of Bush the father and now ably continued by Bush the son. It is in keeping with Yogiism, Goldwynism, and even Yodaism, all describing ways of stringing English words a cut above, or below, the usual English syntax.

The father-and-son verbal mangling hadn’t spared their wives. Take this from Bush senior: ‘It has been said by some cynic, maybe it was a former president, “If you want a friend in Washington, get a dog.” Well, we took them literally― that advice― as you know. But I didn’t need that because I have Barbara Bush.’ Dubya the son followed by declaring sometime later: ‘The most important job is not to be governor, or first lady in my case.’

The latest from Dubya was at the APEC summit in Australia. He thanked Australian Prime Minister John Howard for the OPEC summit and declared that Howard had visited Iraq to see the Austrian troops there. The gaffe prompted this editorial in a leading Mideast broadsheet thus ‘…the son, elected to the White House, not once but twice. Americans must be gluttons for punishment.’

In terms of language, both Bushes are guilty of malapropism, neologism, spoonerism, and portmanteau. This also shows that English as a language makes it easy for language murderers to acquit themselves, what with these uncommon words to describe their crime and a French word thrown in for good measure.

Confuse two similar-sounding words, and there’s malapropism. Bush’s OPEC for APEC and Austrian for Australian belong here. ‘A tax cut is really one of the anecdotes to coming out of an economic illness,’ Dubya said in 2000. One can take heart that anecdotes instead of antidotes isn’t a Freudian slip.

Coining new words or extending word meanings is a neologism. ‘It’s no exaggeration to say the undecideds could go one way or another,’ the father said in 1988.

Spoonerism is when words or letters are exchanged, as the title of this piece shows. ‘If the terriers and bariffs are torn down, the economy will grow,’ the 43^rd famously said in 2000. So much for barriers and tariffs. They could be going to the dogs.

The best example of portmanteau, a word that combines the sound and meaning of two words, is smog for smoke and fog. Used first by Lewis Carrol in Alice in Wonderland, smog is now an accepted word. Who knows what fate awaits misunderestimated, Dubya’s own portmanteau of misunderstood and underestimated?

A president’s job must be very stressful; it also confuses Bush the son about geography. Consider where he is in the scheme of humanity in these lines, delivered on different occasions: ‘Africa is a nation that suffers incredible disease.’ ‘We’ve got to work with Nigeria. That’s an important continent.’ ‘That there be a stable Iran. Iran that is capable of rejecting Iranian influence… I mean Iraq.’ Wherefore he speaks, I believe this tops them all: ‘I think war is a dangerous place.’

Such mangled English, harmless as long as it doesn’t launch a thousand nuclear missiles, is there to be enjoyed. It even encourages wit, like the news reporter’s who dubbed Bush the 41^st as The English Patient.

‘He can’t help it. He was born with a silver foot in his mouth,’ quipped a former Texas lady governor about Bush the father. So is it with the son. He would have been less pleasantly folksy if he were born as the man with the golden tongue.

Island Blend

Tourism. It’s not just about a trip to a place. Beyond a destination, there are always new cultures to observe, ways of life to learn about and from. The key to attracting tourists and winning their hearts lies not just in the natural beauty of a place but also in her gentle, welcoming people. In very similar words, Cebu Gov. Gwen Garcia welcomed delegates and guests to the first ever Philippine International Tourism Fair (PITF) held in Mandaue City over a week ago, underscoring the key role the local population plays in creating a top tourism destination.

Bohol, the current white-hot buzz word in the travel trade both here and abroad, made very good use of the headways in recent years in the local tourism sector by fielding a strong delegation to the international event. The Boholano contingent—led and assembled by the Bohol Provincial Government through its Tourism Office (under the helm of the dynamic Baby Balio)—included reps from the island’s busiest resorts, restaurants, travel agencies and other tourist-based establishments.

Spotted at the busy Bohol cluster of booths were: the gracious Vicky Wallace of Bohol Bee Farm assisted by marketing agent Resti Tejido and interior design genius Brang Alvarez; Amarela Beach Resort’s owner Atty. Doy Nunag and his booth’s designer, pretty daughter Bianca, with their front office staff; Eskaya Beach Resort and Spa’s lady boss Phoebe Baquial-Lim and sales exec Rene Divino; Amorita Resort’s chirpy owner Marivic Hernandez with fun and articulate GM Rocky Jorolan; mega successful entrepreneur Paz Trotin of Bohol Diver’s Resort; and Kag. Tonypet Ouano of Pandanon Island Resort in Getafe.

One level below, the Philippine Travel Exchange was also being staged. Here we saw Bohol Beach Club’s Fe Ginete, Angel’s Wing’s Sarah Jao-Dejaresco, Lourdes Sultan of The Travel Village and Ron Garrido of 4Bs Travel busy selling Bohol resorts, services and packages to over a hundred big-time travel buyers from around the world.

Bohol Association of Hotels, Resorts and Restaurants (BAHRR) personalities Jun Caturza of JJ’s Seafood Village and Merva Budlong of Water Paradise Resort were also around to lend their support. Ditto for Peter Dejaresco, head of the Bohol Tourism Council, diver-contractor Holger Horn, travel agent Nonette Bolo, smart and no-nonsense Jo Remolador-Cabarrus along with the other pretty muses from the tourism office Orie Navarro, Gina Kapirig, their handsome gent Chito Vano, and Vida May Tirol who emceed the program during the fab well-attended ‘Blazing Bohol’ cocktails (in contrast to the lackluster Boracay presentation of the previous day). Food and drinks during the Bohol presentation was provided by Port of Waterfront Hotel.

The booth commissioned by the Province of Bohol was one of the most photographed. Ms. Balio and Boy Dumadag conceptualized a living, life-size diorama, giving exhibition viewers an interactive sensory Bol-anon experience. Ramp model and HNU tourism stude Michael Sepe and photographic model Grace Celedes rode a bamboo raft on a silken olive green river dramatically flanked by graceful nipa fronds, reeds and tropical flowers. The sound of frogs, birds and running water continuously played in the background as the glorious scent of flowers from an essence-burning pot wafted through the air. The scene could have been any of the thousands of secluded coves dotting the many tributaries snaking through our island. People got drawn. They sniffed, ogled, listened, touched the flowers and leaves, picked brochures, inquired and took pictures, most of the time with themselves front and center.

It won’t be long before we’ll see them again, this time as they enjoy the real deal—up close and personal—through a unique experience that can only be Bohol.