Hmm, I was hoping that I would get some interesting comments from the Flips list with respect to my blog entry about the national artist Virgilio Almario. Unfortunately, I have seen diddly squat from the members of the Flips list. I suppose that they have more experience about national artists coming up short during a lecture. I wondered how many of those on the flips list actually knew Almario. Heck, how many of them took classes with him?

Instead, my entry has been discussed in this October 28 blog entry and another blog. The question in my mind is "Did they read the karinderia blog? Do they know sarcasm? Are these two colonized like Rio Alma and me? Are these two pulling my leg? Or, are they actually serious?"

They have problems because

"1.) sa tingin niya circus monkey si Rio. 2.) sa tingin niya 2 years ang kailangan para matutong mag-Tagalog." (1. In his view, Rio is a circus monkey. 2. In his view, it takes two years to learn Tagalog.)

Rio's refusal to read a passage of balagtasan in a LECTURE does not make sense because he is lecturing on BALAGTASAN. How can you discuss something and not give an example? How can you discuss rhyme and meter and then not give an actual analysis of the rhyme scheme or the meter or refuse to read an example of the balagtasan? Was reading a passage of balagtasan a requisite on a lecture on balagtasan? YES!!! YES!!! YES!!! I don't expect Filipinos to perform in lectures like circus monkeys. I do expect them to lecture well and to represent Filipinos. You should have seen the confused faces of the students when Rio did not read an example of balagtasan. It was EMBARASSING. Just because someone is a national artist does not excuse one from lecturing in a haphazard way.

As for learning Tagalog, I was making a sarcastic comment. However, I have known people who learned Tagalog in one year while they were in the Philippines doing research.

What really bothers me is that I stated that Almario was colonized and the angas blog did not have a problem with that. Either Filipinos are very smart or they don't know what colonized means.