bedtime reading queue.  i’ll be lucky to get through a third of it by March :P  have any other reading suggestions?

A few weeks ago I ordered The Ballad of Paper Ships, a collection of gorgeous moody folk songs by Odessa Chen, a super-talented Bay Area singer-songwriter.  She even took the time to write a note!

yay free shipping!
Doesn’t that just make you feel all warm and fuzzy?  You can’t replicate this sort of experience on iTunes or Spotify.
Odessa’s album is supposed to come out sometime before the year ends.  Keep your ears peeled :)  In the meantime, enjoy this performance of “Made Up My Mind,” my favorite tune from her album:

Till next time,

Andrew

(me :P )

A few months ago I entered a performing songwriter competition held by the organizers of the Texas Independent Music Expo (TIME) in Dallas, Texas.   Ultimately, I wasn’t chosen as one of the ten finalists (but I got honorable menton woot!) but I thought it would be fun to attend the actual expo.

My dad and I headed out early morning Saturday to start our 3 hour trek to Dallas.  Along the way, we picked up my little brother from his college in Tyler since he wanted to come along as well.  We arrived at Sons of Hermann Hall, the venue of the Expo, around 1 PM; unfortunately, this meant we missed out on the vocal warm-up workshop.  We did, however, arrive just in time for performances from the finalists in the performing songwriter competition.  It was a pretty eclectic bunch of performers, from Taylor Swift-esque troubadours to country singers to dudes that echoed Josh Ritter, Jason Mraz and even delta blues!  My favorite was a guy named Ramoth-Gilead, who absolutely slayed the crowd with his deeply soulful vocals and his potent blending of R&B, gospel and hip-hop.  

one of the Performing Songwriter Contest Performances

After the performances, the rest of the afternoon alternated between music industry workshops and other performances from various singer-songwriters.  The workshops were pretty helpful, ranging from copyright law, getting song placements on film and TV, and song analysis.  

I had also signed up to have my song “Believe” critiqued by a panel of judges.  My major goal for the next 12 months is to become a better songwriter, so I thought it would be a good idea to get song feedback from more seasoned folk.  My panel consisted of the president of the Dallas Songwriters Association (DSA) and a local music attorney; needless to say, I was a bit intimidated.  My anxiety went through the roof when the CD I brought wasn’t able to play on either a boombox or a laptop; with no way to play the CD, I ended up having to sing “Believe” acapella.  What a super-weird experience — it felt like I was auditioning for American Idol or X Factor.  To my surprise, the first thing the panelists said when I finished was that I had a great voice; guess all those vocal warm ups are paying off.  Then they started into the criticism; they thought the song was a great start, but it needed more focus in the lyrics and song structure.  The super-stubborn part of me was yelling:  ”I like the song as it is!”  But who knows…if I try and tweak the song according to their suggestions, I might like it even more.  Never hurts to try :)  So I’ll be revisiting “Believe” in the coming weeks and months to see if I can tighten it up.  Overall, my song critique experience was a very valuable experience and taught me a lot about my inner songwriter.

After my song critique I grabbed some free pizza courtesy of the Expo and sat through a few more workshops and performances.  Then it was time for the first open mic event of the night!  It had been almost two months since I last performed, so I was both excited and scared to get back on stage, especially in the presence of so many talented performing songwriters.  

James Michael Taylor

David Stewart

I was the last performer scheduled; when my time came, I strapped on my dad’s old classical guitar and walked over to the stage. I sang two of my originals,”16” and “Last of the Cowboys” (you can watch below):

The performance felt really good, and it seemed like I was able to connect with people, which is the most amazing feeling.  It was incredibly validating when people came up to me afterwards to complement my performance.  I even made friends with a fellow songwriter (David Stewart, in one of the pics above) and exchanged business cards.

I’m glad I went to the Expo.  I could have just stayed in my comfort zone, tinkering with songs at home, but I took a chance and ended up learning a lot, things I wouldn’t have learned as quickly on my own.  Being around such talented and kind songwriters really inspired me to step up my craft.  

Time to start working on those songs…

-Andrew

P.S. If you’re in the Dallas area, definitely hit up Alligator Cafe.  Great cajun food and some rockin’ bread puddin’ (makes me weak in the knees, sooooo goood!).  

P.P.S.:  Bread Pudding Lovers Association = best association ever.  Ima start the Halo-Halo Lovers Association (HHLA).  holla! 

Please pray for my dog Bobby.  She went missing a day ago and I’ve been driving all over the neighborhood looking for her.  Love you Bobby, hope you’re safe and sound, wherever you are <3

Wooo!  A music post!  Yes, I still play music, and lovin’ it! :)  

Last Tuesday, I played at the monthly FOLK U! showcase, subtitled “Backless to School” and held at Route 196.  FOLK U! is an amazing haven for singer-songwriters who desire a safe space and attentive listeners to share their original music with.  It’s definitely one of the things that I will miss when I leave Manila in 5 weeks time (!!!)  

Setlist:

16

Trojan Horse

Last of the Cowboys 

Unfortunately I didn’t get video but there were cameras all over the place — I’ll update the post if anything pops up.  But the set is the same as my Red Couch concert back at Stanford if you haven’t seen the vid yet; I’m really proud of it :)  Watch here!

Pics of my performance, taken by Piya Constantino:

P.S. the writing on my guitar is from Freddie Aguilar.  He wrote it in Filipino - “Mabuhay ang musica” - but it roughly translates to “long live music.”

Highlights:

-Watching Fando and Liz perform.  They have such cinematic songs.  And Ledh, the singer, also is the one who puts on FOLK U!  Thanks Ledh for inviting me time and time again :)

-The Pittsburgh med students coming in for the last song of my set.  They were a fun bunch to hang out with!  

-The singer-songwriter Kate Torralba, who had some really great songs with a Regina Spector vibe.  Her song “Video” has this rad piano-electric bass interplay with JM Quiblat that makes me want to boooooooogie in an angsty way.

-Another singer-songwriter, Miro Nicolai Capistrano Valera, who totally had this 90s-alt-rock-ballad-Creed thing going on, but had a killer voice and catchy melodies.

-The host, Kristine, who was hilarious and energetic, even though I couldn’t catch half of her Tagalog (ok, more like 80% of it).  She remembered me from the last FOLK U! and mocked my deep voice hehe, all in good fun :)

Till next time…

Man, I write my posts like I’m the screenplay writer for Memento.  So this actually happened the day before I left for Palawan; Friday, June 17th was the scheduled day for the last of the on-site trainings and orientations for the worms project I’m assisting with at the NIH, taking place in Cavite.

Cavite is a province two hours southwest of Manila, just past Tagaytay (a popular tourist destination in Luzon).  Everything is much more spread out in Cavite, though there are still pockets of commercial clusters — just look for the SMs or Robinson’s, or visit Dasmariñas City.  The main road that passes through Cavite is very narrow, which blows traffic to epic proportions come rush hour.

The morning of the orientation, I piled into a big ol’ 12 passenger van along with the other RAs and the Pittsburgh med students.  The med students were tagging along to observe and to make contact with Cavite health staff, since part of their research takes in Cavite.  After picking up a mountain of Chow King food for lunch, we made it to the Korean hospital where the orientation was to take place.  

Setting up was made a lot easier with the med students, who helped put up tables and arranged chairs.  Otherwise, the orientation went pretty similarly to the other orientations (see here for the typical flow of events), so I won’t bore you with that.  But here are some pics:

me doin’ my MC thang.

speaking: the provincial epidemiologist of Cavite.

the attendees:  a mix of Department of Health officials, local government health workers from the health centers, and DepEd staff.

a lecture on parasitology with the medical technologists, who will be examining study participants’ stools for worms.

The other RA and I explain how to obtain consent from potential study participants.

Medical technologists practice identifying worms under the microscope.

The other RA and I demonstrate how to take height measurements using the “height measuring apparatus” we designed for the study.

What I didn’t expect was the culture shock I experienced with the medical students.  Don’t get me wrong, I love ‘em, they’re really nice and passionate peeps.  And the shock wasn’t positive or negative, just surprising; I was getting a huge dose of America interacting with them, and it served to highlight for me all the little things that the Philippines had changed in me.  Haha, it’s difficult to word this delicately…being in the Philippines has taught me the benefits of speaking subtly, of patience.  For me this has manifested itself into a sort of soft-spoken introverted-ness (and it doesn’t help that I get super shy about speaking in Tagalog).  But interacting with Americans, it’s like a different self was emerging, maybe my old self — cracking American jokes, talking in strong American cadences about American things (San Francisco!  American med schools!  American fast food!).  So it was interesting, to be made aware of that dichotomy in myself.  But I guess that comes with the territory — as a Filipino-American, I am not quite Filipino and not quite American.  And I’m figuring out what balance of the two I want for myself.  

After the orientation, we headed back.  Traffic at the end of a Friday = krrrrrraaazy!  But we eventually got to Manila around 6 PM, where I jetted pretty quick since I had to prepare for a show later on that night at Conspiracy Garden Cafe (more on that another time)…

Next up on the blog queue:  FOLK U!  (i’m talking about a concert, promise ;P)

A couple of weekends ago I went to Palawan, which is a group of gorgeous islands southwest of Luzon.  It was a spur of the moment sort of thing; a group of med students from Pittsburgh doing research with the NIH (where I work) invited me to come along, and it sounded like fun :)  I met the med students at the Puerto Princesa airport; once we were all there I used my Tagalog to help haggle down the price of a van + driver that we could use for the weekend.  In general the trip was really good for my tagalog speaking/comprehension — maybe I should be traveling more in general. 

Once we got a van and driver, we crowded in for the 2 hour drive to Sabang, which is home to an underground river!  There were a whole lotta people so we hwad to wait a while.  In the meantime we took goofy photos, which i don’t have a copy of at the moment.  The river itself was super cool and amusing — the guide pointed out rock formations that looked like Jesus, a mushroom, corn, an Easter candle, poop…obviously the guides have pretty good imaginations :P

After floating through the cave we stayed the night at Port Barton, a small town of 4000 that only has electricity from 6 PM to 11 PM every day.  When we drove in, you could see families chillin’ on their front porch, some of them in near-darkness.  Though it was already pretty late, some of us went to satiate the traveling muchies with a late dinner, where i hawd some yummy calamari.

In da morning we ate again (yay!) at a resort called Greenview, which had scrumptious corned beef (quickly becoming my new fav Filipino breakfast).  Then we hopped on a boat to do some island hopping!!  We went to two islands: ‘Exotic’ and ‘German’ island.  Since it’s off-season for tourists, there were very few people; it felt like we had rented out the islands for ourselves!  sooooo coool.  And apparently German Island is owned by a congressman in Palawan, but lets people visit the island?  Random.

After island hopping, we rode back to Puerto Princesa and got back early evening.  We found a place to stay for the night (one way to haggle:  have four people talking to the hotel owner simultaneously.  Thankfully he was very gracious about it), then roamed the streets for food, settling for an epic bar/grill type place that had really good sweet and sour lapu-lapu.  

But the night was not without incident:  While walking on a sidewalk that wasn’t well lit, I didn’t see a sewer hole, and my left leg fell in!  Thank goodness it was a really shallow one, but my knee got scraped up a bit.  One of the med students behind me underestimated what I meant by “hole” and basically fell in — she had to go back immediately to wash the poop off :(  The rest of up carried on, ‘cause there was a festival nearby!

At the festival, in true Pinoy fashion, there was a stage for dancing and singing, so we watched the local performers.  Afterwards we wandered around the shops and stumbled upon an even bigger stage with breakdancers.  But by that time it was getting late and people were pretty tired so we headed back.  

The next morning was my flight back to Manila (sadness!)  All in all, it was a really fun but brief vacation; hopefully I’ll be able to go back to Palawan with my family one of these days.

Next up:  Cavite!

Second on the flashback list is my end-of-March trip to Baguio, an idyllic mountain city 6 hours north of Manila.  What sort of business brings me there, you ask?  Well, Baguio is one of the six research sites targeted by the study I’m attached to on worm infections in adolescent females (see my previous post on the trainings in Tacloban and Cebu).  

Preparing each site for the demands of the study requires a lot of legwork and several meetings to coordinate how research will be conducted on the ground.  There are two meetings for each site; the first meeting is the ‘groundwork’ meeting, when all of the stakeholders get to meet one another and learn about the project, while the second meeting is the training/orientation of local health workers.  This meeting at Baguio was the initial groundwork meeting.  It was my first time to join a groundwork meeting, so I was plenty excited.

The other research assistant and I met at the Victory Liner bus station at 6 AM for the epic 6 hour bus ride.  I definitely recommend Victory if you’re doing any sort of bus travel; it’s very comfy especially for the price.  The ride itself was super pleasant; for the hours I managed to stay awake, the windows filled with sweeping mountain landscapes and colorful shops scattered on the sides of the road.  The open, sprawling landscape was a welcome sight for Manila eyes.  

Upon arriving at Baguio, we immediately hopped in a taxi in search of the Baguio City Health Department (CHD), where the meeting was supposed to take place.  We eventually made it to the CHD in time to catch my advisor, who had already arrived and was talking to the staff there.  The other research assistant and I set up shop in the meeting room, getting the projector and snacks ready.  

Once everyone settled in the meeting room, my advisor kicked off his presentation, easing the meeting participants (a mix of DOH, local government unit and health center staff) into the particulars and the needs of the research study.  The Department of Health (DOH) National STH Coordinator was also able to join us, helping to convey that the DOH was fully supportive of our study.  The other research assistant and I were in charge of making sure that everything else ran smoothly, and brought up project-related issues to Dr. Belizario to make sure he didn’t miss anything during the presentation.  All in all, the meeting went over very well with the participants; all seemed pretty enthused to help with the project, which is always a good sign.    

After the groundwork meeting, my advisor, the other research assistant and I went over to the Good Shepard food store, which is famous in the Philippines for its variety of tasty goodies.

Once we stocked up on goodies to take home to our families (pasalubong, baby!), we went out for dinner and had a few beers back at the hotel, where my advisor told me and the other research assistant story after entertaining story.  Unfortunately, I can’t recall the stories at the moment, so you’ll just have to take my word for it :)

The next day, my advisor gave me and the other research assistant free reign to explore Baguio for the day; he was going to go back, as he had an engagement in Manila.  The other research assistant had been to Baguio before, so he was nice enough to take me on a nice improvised tour of the city.  Though he hadn’t been back since high school, he sure did remember a lot!  

The first stop was Mines View Park, which has a GORGEOUS view of Baguio and the surrounding mountain towns.  I could’ve stayed there all day, it was so pretty and peaceful.  Alas, time waits for no one, so on to the next stop…

Bulalo!  ok, that’s not a place, but it’s one of my fav Filipino dishes.  Imagine a big fat pork leg, boiled and cooked in savory broth mixed in with veggies and potatoes, and you have bulalo!  The bone marrow is also quite tasty hehe.  

After our bulalo lunch, we went to Burnham Park, the oldest park in Baguio, and took a nice stroll.

Our final stop was Lourdes Grotto, housing the image of the Lady of Lourdes.  Getting there takes a bit of effort, as there is a sizeable staircase (my old enemy…stairs!) but it’s worth the climb.

And that was that; the other research assistant and I boarded the next Victory Liner bus back to Manila and waved farewell to Baguio.  I hope I’ll get another chance to visit sometime soon; I can tell that Baguio is a nice place for “getting away from it all.”  

Stay tuned for more Fulbright flashbacks!

Hello, and welcome to Fulbright Flashbacks!  As I approach these last (eight) weeks of my Fulbright grant, I’ve decided to take the time to backblog a few cool things that I’ve experienced these past few months in the Philippines.  

First up on the list is the conquering of Mt. Apo back in mid-March.  The tallest mountain in the Philippines, standing at 9,692 feet, Mt. Apo is no walk in the park.  Not that I expected it to be.  But to give you an idea of where my mind was at, here is a sample conversation of between me and my Davao friend, who was spearheading the trip:

me:  so how fit do I have to be to climb Apo?

friend:  you walk to work right?

me:  yeah, like a 5-7 minute walk…

friend:  great, you’ll be fine!  don’t worry.

Little did I know…

So anyhoo, a couple of friends and I booked our tickets to Davao at the very last minute and caught an evening flight.  We met up with our Davao friend as well as several other Fulbrighters at the charming Viajeros Inn before calling it a night.

The next day, we had to make our way to base camp, which entailed a trike (tricycle) ride + walk over to the bus station, for a two hour bus ride, where we went to the Mt. Apo tourism office, which oriented us on the rules and safety regulations we should follow while climbing the mountain.  We also met our guide for the climb at the office.  After the orientation, we grabbed dinner at a BBQ side stand and transferred to a van for another 2-hour ride to base camp.  We got to the base around late evening, grabbing some snacks before calling it a night.  

Then the fun begins.  I can’t remember if we got up at 4 or 5 AM.  Needless to say, it was early!  Our guide’s family prepared for the group a nice nourishing breakfast before we headed out.  

What followed next was some of the toughest physical activity of my life, bar none.  I was in no way or shape prepared for the climb, which was literally a climb — no rails here folks, just uphill after uphill.  It was exhilarating and exhausting all at once.  The first few hours saw my best friend slip on a ledge and hurt her knee (thankfully she was okay for the rest of the climb), and another friend bailing out of the climb after his asthma started acting up.  From then on it was hours of crossing rivers, tomato-and-cheese sandwiches, and ridiculous ledges.  At one point, there was a dirt ledge, with nothing stable to hold on except for a log.  Let me tell you, I clung to that log for dear life!  It was one of those moment where you’re too scared to be embarrassed about the situation, which was a grown dude suspended in midair, bear-hugging a log like his mommy.  Ah, life :)

Oh, and did I say there were no rails?  There is one rail…at the 90 degree section of Mt. Apo.  It’s a good 100-foot vertical climb, and in some parts there is nothing to hold on to but a wooden rail that extends down the majority of the 90 degree section.  Scary as heck!  But also super cool.

Did I mention how cool it was?  It’s definitely cool.

After 11 hours of climbing, we make it to the lake, which is about 5 hours from the summit.  We set up camp by the lake, which is probably the most pristine lake I’ve ever seen, and rest up.  We had some pretty tasty pesto/white sauce pasty for dinner.  Our hunger made it taste even better ;)

I don’t think I was able to sleep more than two hours that night.  I had no sleeping bag and only a set of thin blankets to keep warm — that, along with the rock hard floor made for a very cold and trying night.  Alas, we had to get up at 4 AM for the final stretch.  

That final stretch was ridiculously trying.  I don’t think I would have made it without the relentless support of my best friend, and vice versa.  Part of the difficulty was psychological.  The guide said it would only be 3 hours to the top, but our group overall moved at a slower pace, so it actually took 5-6 hours.  At the time, we had no idea when we were gonna get there, and morale was definitely waning among the group.

But in the end…perseverance!!!  The sweet, sweet taste of summit air.  The view was totally breathtaking, though at least half of us were content to collapse and nap.  

I forgot to mention that I brought a cheapo guitar with me, all the way to the top, just so we could all have a sing-along at the end.  Here’s a video of me covering “Hallelujah” at the Apo summit:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23Kh2ul_KaM

Unfortunately, there was no helipad, as I had secretly wished for while climbing to the top; the truth was, we would have to…

wait for it…

climb back down.

AHHHHHH!

After packing our things and heading out, the climb back down seemed straightforward enough.  But as time went on, it was clear that we weren’t advancing quickly enough, and night fell just before we were halfway through the climb.  Now that was some SCARY stuff — when you’re manuvering on a slippery ledge, with a cranky river 50 feet below you, the blood pressure tends to rise :P.  Furthermore, I had to share a flashlight, since there wasn’t enough to go around, which led to an amusing mini-game.  My friend with the light would walk about 20 feet ahead of me, lighting the path.  I would then wait for him to turn around and light my path, which gave me a few seconds to traverse before he turned around and walked some more.  Rinse, lather and repeat!  I felt like a little kid, in a good way :)

Also, I didn’t bother with any pretense of climbing — my legs were gone, so I basically slid down the majority of Mt. Apo on my butt.  Woohoo!

But yeah…it also started sprinkling, which upped the ante since our guide said that the rivers would flood if it started to all-out rain.  In other words, we had to high-tail it down that mountain.  Although there was a bit of hyperbole involved, I can’t remember the last time I’ve felt so in danger for such an extended period of time.  All of us in the group really had to work together in order to make the successful climb down.  

After at least another 10 hours crossing 5 rivers, butt-sliding, drinking iodine treated water, and a grueling final uphill, we at last made it back to the main road!  Phew.  epic, epic, epic.  I don’t think I’ll ever climb Mt. Apo again, but I am really grateful for the experience!  It truly extended my physical and psychological limits and brought me closer to my friends.  I heartily recommend Apo — just remember to pack a sleeping bag with the tent :)

Next up:  Baguio!

I <3 Bon Iver.  Like, man crush on Justin Vernon-level of <3.  And this performance of “Skinny Love” makes me smile like no other :)