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answers to queries

sorry for the late response to all your queries. first, it was the case of jan jan of cebu. then cardinal rosales said nobody could swish in the santacruzan. so i had my hands full talking to media, from 6 am to 8 pm, on radio, on tv, in print.

now i have four sets of student papers to check.

and questions from you to answer.

1. yes, the color of the dome in the manila cathedral is not gray, but blue-green. but what i wrote is fiction, and i chose gray to forebode the ashen sense of things found in the neighboring building, the old, decrepit comelec.

2. ninotchka rosca wrote a good novel in state of war, and i think we should be thankful she did. noting how hard it is to be a filipino writer, with little money and lots of flak all around, it is a wonder good novels still get to be written by the pinoy wordsmith.

3. yes, i was supposed to start a column in a tabloid, but i could hardly find the time to write.

4. the radio station is still looking for more advertisers for my radio show.

5. i did not watch the 24 oras report on the young turks, but the voice over was done by a reporter who doesn't know me, or is homophobic. i have reported this oversight to gma 7 news management.

6. i am committed to the issue of environment. i am a signatory to the ecowaste coaliation in the last elections, and have given information to the coalition for its publicity campaigns. the kyoto protocol agreement should push through, and soon, it's been ten years it was signed. and we should look for cheaper, cleaner alternatives to oil, ie, wind power, electric car, hydro electic power, biogas/ methane use, etc.

7. i am teaching books of the century this summer. we have finished james joyce, virginia woolf. franz kafka, albert camus and t.s. eliot. all in four weeks! this week, we will wrestle with the poems of rainer maria rilke and the great, big tome of gabriel garcia marquez, cien anos de soledad. may heaven help us.

8. did you read mr gatmaitan's prognosis for 2010? i agree with my friend manolo quezon that he seems to be dismissive, though, of blogs, social networking sites, etc. eh si manoy sonny trillanes made a splash first because of his friendster account, ano?

afraid and mga old sa internet. i wonder y.

you keep dry in the rain.

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