TELLTALE SIGNS

by Rodel Rodis
February 14, 2011
The Philippine Supreme Court exhibited chicanery in its February 8, 2011 decision denying “with finality” the appeal of the five men known as the “Abadilla 5” who were convicted of the ambush killing of Col. Rolando Abadilla on June 13, 1996. Continue reading →

by Rodel Rodis
January 31, 2011
The Filipino Channel’s Balitang America recently featured Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother Chinay author Amy Chua in a news segment that included street interviews of Filipinos who were asked their reaction to Chua’s parental directive that her two daughters not watch TV or play video games during school days and that they spend at least 4 hours a day studying their books and practicing their piano and violin. And that they never get less than an A for any of their subjects. Continue reading →

by Rodel Rodis
January 21, 2011
The most hated author in America today is not Sarah Palin but Amy Chua, a Filipino-Chinese American whose controversial best-selling book “Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother” has ignited a firestorm of controversy about how she raised her kids.  Continue reading →

by Rodel Rodis
January 7, 2011
Men with receding hairlines may take comfort in the modern proverb “the more you lose hair, the more you gain face.” I do not know if Pres. Noynoy Aquino is losing more hair but I do fear he is losing more face as a result of his decision to boycott the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony honoring Liu Xiaobo. Continue reading →

by Rodel Rodis
January 1, 2011
What do the Star Wars trilogy, the Star Trek movies, Raiders of the Lost Ark, Johnny Mnemonic, Virtuosity, and other sci-fi classics have in common? Continue reading →

by Rodel Rodis
December 25, 2010
If Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo (GMA) had been the president who bowed to Chinese pressure and boycotted the Nobel Peace Prize event in Oslo on December 10 to save the lives of 5 Filipinos in China’s death row, few eyelashes would have batted. Continue reading →

by Rodel Rodis
December 3, 2010
Philippine Tourism Secre tary Alberto Lim dodged the bullet last week when his undersecretary, Vicente Romano, gallantly accepted full responsibility for the “Pilipinas Kay Ganda” fiasco and resigned, absolving his boss of any blame. Continue reading →

by Rodel Rodis
November 21, 2010

In the June 3, 2008 California primary elections, West Sacramento Mayor Christopher Cabaldon was heavily favored to win the Democratic nomination in the predominantly Democratic 8th Assembly District and to go on to be the first Filipino elected to the California legislature since the first Filipinos landed in Morro Bay, California on October 18, 1587. It would be historic. Continue reading →

by Rodel Rodis
November 13, 2010
I wanted to write about something else entirely this week but this issue just doesn’t quit. When I wrote “The Silence of the Eagles” on Tuesday, November 2, the “Memo to the Loyola Schools Community” had not yet appeared in the Internet so I was not able to read it and refer to it in my piece.
Continue reading →

by Rodel Rodis
September 3, 2010

A Filipina friend from Israel emailed me that when she was in Hongkong a few years ago, she visited a non-Filipino colleague at his condo unit. As she was leaving, he warned her that she might get challenged for using the elevator because Filipino domestic employees, he said, are restricted to the stairs. “It was a very high-rise building!” my friend related in shock. In the new award-winning Ted Unarce documentary, Modern Day Slaves, a Filipina domestic employee in Hongkong (one of four OFW subjects of the film) narrates how she was punished for prematurely cooking rice before her employer had ordered her to do so. Continue reading →