he doesn't need to make anyone proud

i will only say two things.

one: i'm glad taylor won. it may seem unlikely for katharine to win, but taylor is the underdog here. he obviously does not have the "idol" image, but in fact, i wanted someone without that image to win the actual contest. hans, berna, everyone, please bear the fact that taylor won. after all, it's just a competition, and there's really absolutely nothing wrong with being second best. or third best, in elliott's case.

two: "american idol" is just a title. anyone in the competition is considered to be an american idol in at least one person's eyes. you can be the champion, but that doesn't necessarily make you the best.

bow.

playing chicken with the train

most of you don't know it, but the philippines does have a hip-hop scene. thankfully, the local music channels focus more on the rock side of things. while i am an avid listener of (more likely than not) mainstream rap music and tend to keep an open mind to things, i believe that what pinoy rappers need to gain credibility is a change of clothes.

"pretty shallow reason," you may be thinking.

okay, so tagalog in rhyme doesn't necessarily sound good (because of the typical kanto-boy accent which you sophisticated upper-class people don't usually like) and it does have a tendency to sound better in the hands of, say, jose rizal or kiko balagtas. but if you're in the business, you're more than likely forced to rap a song or two in tagalog (krook and jolo, fil-am rappers, do have an all-tagalog track. hi sis :P) in order not to be branded as a sellout (trust me, that's a bad thing).

back to clothes. seriously, heavy use of the do-rag, saggy pants and the typical oversized football/hockey/basketball jersey isn't meant for filipinos. it wouldn't kill anyone to actually think and innovate a new style to associate pinoy rap with. now, i'm not saying they should all be rapping while dressed as farmers and fishermen, but rather the usual hip-hop gear is so stale and redundant that it only looks safe and good on the african-american rappers themselves. having said this, i applaud john cena for dressing down and sticking with a jersey or a chaingang t-shirt, cap, and the unique denim shorts. (i do miss the steel chain, though.) same goes for the black eyed peas for emphasizing style with their outfits; you see will.i.am wearing rodney jackets over lakers jerseys. and in the words of my man carly colon, "that's cool."

the point is, think of something new to wear. it wouldn't hurt pinoys to rap in nothing but shirts and jeans that actually fit and the occasional bling. think of something that redefines your identity aside from your tagalog vocals. it may be answered with immediate criticism, but it's gonna be, in the words of paula abdul, "a breath of fresh air" and it's going to eliminate stereotypes in the long run.

and for those who want to experience a breath of fresh air right now, you should listen to cowboy troy and his hick-hop. for starters, download "rollin (the ballad of big and rich)" by, obviously, big and rich featuring cowboy troy.

cheers.

diamonds are forever

i just realized that rude people (henceforth known as "assholes") still live and exist in this world. don't blame me; i live around love, peace, and kindness.

case in point: i was having a game of dota and i had the rudest teammate ever. before the game even started, i knew he was going to be an asshole once i lagged (it's sporadical, but i knew it was going to happen.) and true enough, he did. i won't go too much into detail, for the convenience of those who don't play the game, but all you need to know is that this guy is a complete and total asshole. instead of being supportive like a good teammate, he put his teammates down. i'm blocking him the next time i get on gg-client.

what's more, this guy doesn't come from anywhere else but my very beloved philippines. knowing the people back at home, i wasn't too surprised. if you sport a screen name directly from, or if not, influenced by anime, and you are a complete bastard/bitch to those around you, you're more than likely to be the poster child for kajologan.

and we all know the sad truth: maraming jologs sa pilipinas.

maybe it's because they come from a gritty lifestyle. i don't know. but in all my limited wisdom, i know that being nice, maybe at least in the outside, goes a long way.

here in the U.S., it's such a big difference. everyone is actually nice; it's rare to find someone rude and mean. i should know, i haven't encountered one yet. every store clerk and salesperson is going to greet you, ask you how you're doing, ask how the family's doing, etc. it's like what the geico gecko said: "we make them feel important." the greetings you get when you enter a fastfood here is completely different from the greetings you get when you enter a fastfood back at home; at home, it seems like something out of routine, while here, it feels like actual interaction. now, that's being nice.

if someone would like to beg to differ with that, i'd like you to know that i don't go out much, so please go and beg to differ. :)

sadly, i can't change the fact that rude assholes exist in this world, so i thank the Lord for creating whoever invented the "ignore" feature.

regarding the code

the film adaptation of dan brown's wonderful creation, the Da Vinci Code, is facing criticism and potential boycotting from various religious forces around the world. the usual claims to the book were given to the movie: too blasphemous, too erratic, too wrong. in fact, one anti-porn group in the philippines claims it to be the "most pornographic and blasphemous film in history". come on, as if they're really going to show two old people doing it in the middle of a huddled circle - that's going to see people walking out of theaters faster than another shaq movie. (okay, i might be wrong.)

what these people don't realize is that dan brown did not write the book to forever change the world's outlook on Christian and Catholic beliefs. rather, mr. brown wrote the book for the same purpose as any other bestselling author would have written theirs: to entertain people and to provoke their thoughts. the book is art, not doctrine, and there is a distinction. there may be a fine line between the two that brown has probably crossed (what with the "fact" sections of the book), but he crossed that line in the name of artistic license.

i mean, come on. people love it when a literary curveball is thrown at them; it's what sells books in the first place. but when a book is clearly labeled as fiction, the smart are separated from the gullible - those who are smart enough to know that the book is just a story, from those who are gullible enough to forget that they are actually reading fiction.

so cut tom hanks, sony, dan brown, and everyone who worked on the project some slack. movies and literature are forms of art. brown just used the legend of the holy grail to make a good story, and make a good story he did - he wasn't banking on altering your perspective on Christianity and the Gospel because he knows you're smarter than that.

remember, it's art, not doctrine.