Manila Vanilla

What it's like to be a U.S. Fulbright scholar, basketball player, journalist, and the whitest man in Metro Manila.

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Location: Quezon City, Metro Manila, Philippines

New Yorker by birth, shipped across the globe to the world of malls, shanty-towns, patronage, corruption, basketball and a curious burnt-toast smell that wafts around at dusk

Tuesday, December 26, 2006

Kelly Williams in the Detroit Free Press


My story on Santa Lucia Realty's rookie phenom Kelly Williams in the Detroit Free Press. Photo by Erin Lorenzana/Lyn Rillon. Read it here.

Thursday, December 21, 2006

Video: Shook Ones, Part III


I ain't a crook, son. But let's see you try to jump off a slippery-ass rock a few hours into the way northern part of the Cordillera mountains without a little pussyfooting. This had to be one of the most stunning spots I've ever visited, and it was definitely worth nearly breaking my hip and a false hookworm alert to get there. In Adams, Ilocos Norte.

Bagay kay Patrick ang chain mail!


Ok, so freedom fighter Patrick Agin has pretty much nothing to do with the Philippines. But his struggle for self-expression resonates the world over. Read his story before Times Select makes you pay for it.

Wednesday, December 06, 2006

One reason to love Philippine politics


"I'm not angry, Mr. President, I am not angry. I am irate. I am foaming at the mouth. I'm homicidal. I'm suicidal. I'm humiliated, debased, degraded. And not only that, I feel like throwing up to be living my middle years in a country of this nature. I am nauseated. I spit in the face of Chief Justice Artemio Panganiban and his cohorts in the Supreme Court."

Sunday, December 03, 2006

Tiger Style!


Big Rafeboogs ain't nothin' to fuck with!