Silenced Majority Portal

Philippine Inmates Dance to Queen

Mahusay Sila! Pero mas maganda ang tribute nila sa MJ noon.  

Australian Comic Nailed to a Cross in Philippines

John Safran, a comic from Australia, joined three Filipino men and a woman who were each nailed to crosses as part of the Easter celebration.  The Australian reportedly did it for "forensic" insight into religion.  The ceremony, which took place just outside Manila, is an annual event.  

From The Age: 

An AFP report from Manila said the Australian, who was half-naked and wearing a long-haired wig with an improvised crown of thorns, joined Filipinos in a procession carrying a huge wooden cross to a crucifixion site.

He could be heard moaning loudly as the nails were driven into his palms and as his cross was hoisted up, allowing him to hang for about five minutes.

When he was taken down, he was rushed by men dressed as centurions to a medical tent for treatment.

Another story about these rituals, including the tale of Ruben Enaje who endured his 23rd crucifixion.  Enaje, a carpenter, vowed to undergo the ritual after he escaped unscathed when falling from a three-storey building. Accompanying the Kristos are hundreds of “flaggelants”, or “penitentes” – hooded men who whip their own bloody backs with whips of bamboo and rope, as penance for sins.

Cadillac One: Can Take a Hit from an Asteroid

That's what the Christian Science Monitor is reporting.  Filipinos have a joke about Cadillacs. For many Filipinos, owning a car is out of reach much less a luxury car, such as a Cadillac.  They tell visitors they have a Cadi-lakad.  (lakad is the verb  to walk).  

Shrimp Head Soup for Christmas Dinner?

Two million Filipinos (OFWs or Overseas Foreign Workers) are employed in Qatar as migrant workers, but that number is decreasing slightly as a result of the world financial crisis.  Recently laid off workers don't have the money to return home, and as a result they are begging in the streets of Qatar for food.  Some industrious Filipinos walk to the fish market where they collect shrimp heads that were discarded in the trash by shrimp venders.  They boil these to make soup and hope that they can find some rice to eat with this makeshift meal.  

The video below is in Tagalog, but you can see the Filipinos collecting the shrimp heads at the market. Is this part of the flat world that Thomas Friedman writes about in his award winning book? 

Jesus Paint By Numbers: More Thrift Store Goodies

I stopped by the thrift store near my house and found some noteworthy religious items for sale.  The Jesus Paint By Numbers caught my eye immediately, and it was paired with Moses holding the ten commandments for the photo.  I placed the items on a futon sofa which made a nice, uncluttered backdrop.

I also saw a folk-art piece that was framed that contained a poem:

Jesus is nice - reindeer, too but the best of Christmas is the Lord's gift to you.  I paired that with a manger scene for the photo. The figures in the manger scene look more like Dutch than persons from the Middle East.  I should have noted if they were wearing wooden shoes.  

The last items are porcelain Jesus Bells depicting Helping the Fisherman (and later walking on water), Feeding the Poor, and The Last Supper.  We bought the bells as a gift for my brother-in-law for his new home. He told us a movie star, Alicia Alonzo, used to live in it.  Alonzo was the star in Mad Doctor of Blood Island.  

A news story appeared tonight that's relevant to bell depicting Jesus feeding the poor.  Nations' representatives voted on a United Nations resolution declaring "hunger an outrage and a violation of human dignity, requiring the adoption of urgent measures at the national, regional and international level, for its elimination."  

180 nations voted in favor of the resolution; one, the US, voted against it.  This is the only separation of church and state that the Republicans believe in.  They are waiting apparently for Jesus to return to earth to feed the poor with a loaf of bread and a fish.  

Re: EXIT POLL Ohio Voters ONLY

Exit Polls have proven over time to be one of the most accurate predictors of elections.

With that in mind, we're starting a new feature on Barack Like Me dedicated to Exit Polls, starting with the Great State of Ohio, but we want to expand to all States in the coming weeks,

A similar poll has been set up at The Daily Kos at the below link:

http://digital-components.dailykos.com/

As of this writing McCain is standing at 71% on Barack Like Me and Obama is at 80% on Kos, and with that in mind we'd like to broaden the range out to get a clearer picture of where things might lie, so please pass this along to any and all Good Americans that you may know now to see where their sentiments are.

Thanks!

~Nyc

The Band Journey's Filipino Youtube Discovery

The band Journey played a gig in Seattle a few days ago, and their concert was filled with nostalgic songs from their prime in the 1980s. The fans reportedly loved the concert even though the band's original lead singer wasn't with them. Their former lead singer Steve Perry left the band in 1996, and the band has been floundering since that time. But Journey is back with a lead singer from the Philippines that the band found while watching covers of their music on Youtube.

Their new lead singer is Arnel Pineda. Pineda's mother died when he was a child (13) and for a while he was homeless. Before being recruited by Journey, he was a member of a band in the Philippines that sometimes did stints in places like Hong Kong. The CBS news featured Pineda and his story on their Sunday morning news show (video below). An article in this week's Rolling Stone claims that Pineda is homesick and misses his girlfriend and son. He sometimes cries and says he is doing this for his family. He complains that he only sees the inside of buses and stages and never gets to walk around. Welcome to America!

I was never a big Journey fan and I didn't attend the concert, but this story is incredible. It surprises me that there haven't been more stories like this. Every time I travel to the Philippines I hear bands that rival the most talented ones in the US. During my last trip, I heard a country western band in Baguio that sounded better than ones I heard in Nashville. The lead singer's dream is to sing in Nashville. The next time I go there I will make a Youtube video of him and just maybe....

My Congressman Endorsed Obama Today (Slugbug)

Rep. Jim McDermott became the fourth U.S. House member from Washington to endorse Barack Obama for president. He said, "I am confident as president he will end the war in Iraq and bring our sons and daughters home." McDermott said he has been greatly impressed by Obama's appeal to young people.

McDermott joins at least five other Washington "superdelegates" who have endorsed Obama in the race for the Democratic nomination: Gov. Chris Gregoire; Reps. Rick Larsen, Adam Smith and Brian Baird; and Pat Notter, a member of the Democratic National Committee. Sen. Hillary Clinton has the support of five of the state's superdelegates, including Sens. Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell, Reps. Norm Dicks and Jay Inslee, and King County Executive Ron Sims. Obama won Washington's caucuses earlier this year.

Ex-President Bill Clinton staged a fundraiser in Seattle in the fall of 2006 to help McDermott pay legal bills from his battle with GOP House Minority Leader John Boehner. McDermott said Thursday he had repeatedly tried to reach Hillary Clinton to tell her he was endorsing Obama. McDermott said he's still fearful that the Bush Administration will manufacture a crisis with Iran as a way of reigniting voter fears of the Democrats' ability to handle security issues.

Filipinos Can Dance: Year of the Rat (almost)

Most of us don’t think of rats in a positive light, but the Chinese when they developed their zodiac calendar with a 12 year cycle, selected the rat to begin the sequence. The year of the rat doesn’t officially begin until Feb 7, but many nations, including the Philippines, kick off the celebration on January 1st (there will be another celebration on Feb 7th).

Persons born during the year of the rat are believed to possess certain characteristics (from the Wikipedia).

... rats are leaders, pioneers and conquerors. They are charming, passionate, charismatic, practical and hardworking. Rat people are endowed with great leadership skills and are perhaps the most organized and systematic of the twelve signs. Intelligent and cunning at the same time, rats are highly ambitious and strong-willed people who are keen and unapologetic promoters of their own agendas, which often include money and power. They are energetic and versatile and can usually find their way around obstacles, and adapt to various environments easily. A rat's natural charm and sharp demeanor make it an appealing friend for almost anyone, but rats are usually highly exclusive and selective when choosing friends and so often have only a few very close friends whom they trust.

ebay has a variety of rat-related items for sale to mark the new year. There are expensive crystal rats as well as gold-plated ones. If you want something simpler, you can settle for a t-shirt.

I was watching Philippine TV this morning, and as part of the celebration marking the year of the rat, a zoo keeper was interviewed and he showed examples of several species of Philippine rats that are endangered. Among them is the cloud rat, the largest in the world. The zoo’s spokesperson encouraged persons to visit the zoo to see for themselves examples of these endangered species.

The television personality that interviewed the zoo keeper mentioned that residents of Manila can see rats in their sewers or even in their houses.

The show finished with the Unang Hirit dancers performing a “rat dance.” A short clip of it is below. The caged rats, brought by the zookeeper, can be seen in the lower left side of the screen when the whole dance floor is shown. The rat cage has a green top.

It’s examples like this that endear me to the Philippines; there are no pretentious airs, none whatsoever. The goodnatured people of the Philippines have had two major revolutions in which they toppled their government by having citizens mass in the streets. The army sides with the citizens and there were very few deaths. Cheers for people power revolutions

Persons in other nations could learn from their peaceful, unpretentious no-nonsense example.

Kapayapaan

Candy Cane Lane's conscientious objector

I read in the newspaper about a 65-year-old woman named Ester who resolutely refuses to decorate her house there, despite 48 years tradition. She hates that it lasts three weeks and fills the neighborhood with slow-moving vehicles with exhaust fumes. She belongs to the Scandinavian Cultural Group of UW, which hosts professors and families from Norway, Denmark, Sweden and Holland. Her husband is a retired astronomy professor with Parkinson's disease. Her house is like an elegant black dress at a party with sequined ballgowns with tiaras.

This year this neighborhood's houses had signs with "Peace" in different languages. I saw her house tonight. Someone had put a sign in front of it which said "Fred." That means "Peace" in Norwegian.

(Photos: D Grieser)