Manila Then and Now

MANILA TRANSITIO 1945

March 7, 2009

In February of 1945, history tells us that the City of Manila was completely destroyed in a battle between the United States Armed Forces and the Japanese Imperial Army. An estimated 120,000 people were lost and our beloved City of Manila was never the same again.

Manila Transitio is a multi-media event organized by the Intramuros Administration with Carlos Celdran and multi media artists Tad Ermitano, Donna Miranda, Mabi David, Kawayan de Guia, Malek Lopez, Caliph8, Ringo Bunoan, and several other artists that will celebrate Manila – the city that was and the Manila that will be.

An evening of performances, music, vintage photographs and films, video art, installations, open mic, food, drink, poetry and dance within different sections of The Fort Santiago, this will be a lovely alternative to spend your night.  Guest readings will be performed by Shamaine Buencamino, Roslyn Perez, Peter Serrano, Jake Macapagal, Jamie Wilson, and Aida Santos while  flamenco music wille be provided by Yerbaguena.

The symbolic release of 120 illuminated spirit lanterns into the night sky by the gates of Fort Santiago will cap the evening.

And the best part is, this multi-media event is FREE!

*Reasonably priced buffet and beer will be sold in Fort Santiago before the event. Or you can bring your own bottle of wine/picnic.

Manila NOW 2009

 

 

Just a month and a few days and it will be the Philippine International Furniture Show again. We can’t wait to be there.

Our Cross to Bear

Navigating through the streets of Manila always brings a mixed sense of wonderment and dread. An accidental drive through Sta. Cruz and Binondo area reintroduced me to this historic area. But for all of its rich historical and cultural past, it couldn’t be saved and what remains is a grimy ghost of its past glory, hardly recognizable. It is now a labyrinthine world of small shops, hawkers, narrow streets, and a multitude of people, electric cables draping and crisscrossing through the plaza.

It makes one wonder whether the people milling about its streets, going through their business ever stopped to appreciate the beauty what they actually have. Are places and time like horses that lose their meaning once they’ve ran a good run? Or is it the fact that I am an outsider looking in that makes it easier to see what others have been sorely taking for granted?

It seems that as a people we are constantly waging a war with our past, and the means to win it is to obliterate traces of our history and reduce what’s left to something that amounts to as little as possible. And it begs the question when we could finally be at peace and reclaim our heritage and our past.

We found photos of the old Sta.Cruz District and some recent photos of the area. See for yourself what we’ve made out of this treasure, then what can we do to save it. – TM

old sta.cruz church postcard (photo courtesy of manilahub)

sta.cruz church now (photo from manilahub)

plaza goiti then (photo from manila nostalgia)

sta cruz plaza now (photo from nostalgia manila)

Forgotten Heritage: A look at Quiapo and its architecture, part 1

It is an unavoidable circumstance to overlook and take for granted what is right before you, and everyone is mighty guilty of this on a daily basis. After all, objectivity is hard to maintain once you find yourself embroiled in anything at all. It takes someone from the outside to actually point out what you’ve failed to realize all this time.
This goes for architecture as well. As soon as a building or structure loses its novelty then it becomes almost impossible for people to look at it in a new light. Most often, they are reduced to being dated and irrelevant, and like an old movie star, they lose their shine just waiting to be upstaged by the next young thing.
Such is the fate of most of the buildings found in downtown Manila, and particularly that of Quiapo. Once a relatively wealthy business district, Quiapo has now fallen to such neglect and disrepair and has devolved into the seedy part of Manila—dilapidated apartment blocks, adult movie theaters—and people these days rarely try to look beyond the grit and grime. It would be a lie to say that I’ve always seen Quiapo for both its historical and architectural value, and if it weren’t for a nasty traffic jam by the Quiapo bridge, I wouldn’t have had a new-found appreciation for the area.
A cursory look at the buildings reveal those built during the burgeoning stages of modernism here in the Philippines. Though not exactly skyscrapers, these buildings aren’t exactly lacking in interest either.
No taller than five stories, buildings were designed to have a very distinct humanized scale. Brise soleil or sunshades were commonly used to control admittance of light and heat, and façade embellishments may have been minimal but tasteful. And who knows, maybe during their heydays, these buildings may have held people’s admiration as it did mine now.
There was even a building with a distinctly Art Deco flavor, and it’s funny how people with a supposed interest in architecture can only think of the Metropolitan Theater as the only extant example of Art Deco architecture. Another building even bore on its façade a bas-relief, a detail that is now lost in an age where glass and steel had become commonplace, and is obviously overshadowed by a more famous bas-relief by National Artist Napoleon Abueva on the façade of the Insular Life in Makati.
They were all there—artifacts from a bygone era designed by unsung and nameless architect—but forgotten. People have been so busy attending to more practical matters that we have lost sense of history. We, with our short memories have tried to replace these tangible memories from our past with buildings void of soul, all in the name of progress. – TM