MUSIC HAS always helped in blocking out work distractions. Working from home has one big perk: playing music the way you want it, without having to worry about distracting your officemates. Spotify is my music service preference: Pandora isn't available in India, and YouTube Music's dashboard is too clumsy to use on my gadgets. Back in the office days, I listened to Spotify through earphones. Now, at home, I have Spotify filling the room with its gloriousness through my sound system.
I GREW up in the Philippines saying "Hey Joe" to any American I'd see, and lived in India saying "Hi Kamala" to acquaintances. So it's such a welcome and hopeful treat to now say "Hello Joe and Kamala, it's so nice to have you both where you belong"!
DO YOU remember when you joined Twitter? I do—it's been 13 years, since 6 August 2007. I signed up after hearing an American speaker at a conference gush over this newly-launched app. She proclaimed its ability to keep you instantly updated on news due to its real-time messaging technology.
2020 marks 60 years since Barbra Streisand sang live for the first time. Since then, her stage performances in clubs, concerts, television shows, and fund-raisers have become unparalleled channels for showcasing her bounty of grace and warmth, her dedication to excellence, her passion for truth, and her gift of song.
NINE OF my siblings and I gathered together tonight on Zoom. This is the first time we have all come together and reached out collectively to each other during the pandemic. It was initially challenging to decide on a time that would work for everyone with five different time zones. Breakast on Saturday in Toronto and Virginia was dinner in New Delhi and late night in Manila. But it eventually worked out.
I TURNED 55 today, a milestone of sorts as I've just entered the middle of the quinquagenarian decade. But like anything else happening this year, this birthday has come and gone with bigger priorities in mind. There was no singing of birthday wishes, only receiving greetings with replies of "Are you safe?" or "Hope you're doing safely". There was no birthday cake, only the quickly-prepared lunch before the 1PM office meeting on Zoom.
WITH ROADS and workplaces practically deserted, COVID-19 may have brought in a positive consequence: lower pollution levels and wildlife taking over human space. Smog has lifted in places like Los Angeles and New Delhi. The canals of Venice are sparkling, and swans are swimming. Around the world, animals are venturing out in places previously held by people.
IT WAS another midsummer morning in Delhi, with temperature hovering at 38 degrees Celsius. I was expecting the heat to top yesterday's temperature, which touched the highest mark this season at 40.9 degrees Celsius. Suddenly, the skies turned dark, dusty winds howled, and rain threw its pellets. Then, just as suddenly, it all stopped. A massive dust storm just hit the city, and it left behind an eerie stillness.
FOLLOWING UP on my earlier post about Jim Chappell's Acadia, I must share another piece that has always stayed with me. Mr. Chappell's Spotify playlist is on permanent playback during the lockdown, and topping it is the magnificent "Field Day" from 1990's Saturday's Rhapsody. No other song on Mr. Chappell's 1990s catalog exemplifies the breezy Chappell melodiousness better than this track.
THE AMERICAN composer and pianist Jim Chappell is quite famous in the Philippines, where several of his albums received heavy airplay on smooth jazz radio stations in the late eighties and nineties. The poignant song "Gone", from his sophomore album Dusk, became a huge hit in Manila in the aftermath of Mount Pinatubo's cataclysmic eruption in 1991. Afterwards, the Chappell sensibility never left the country. He held a series of sold-out concerts in Manila in the summer of 1993, and released a contemporary jazz album with the quartet HearSay titled Manila Nights in 1994.
THERE ISN'T much movement to do these days, so I stepped out of my office . . . into my living room. Watch for those three furry officemates.
AT A corner of my study room—now my work-from-home office—is a second-hand console table holding a Keurig coffee machine given by my sister Kathleen three years ago. To replicate the pantry in our Lenskart office, I've include a bone-china tea jug that I once found in the cellar of my brother's apartment building in Toronto. Aluminum containers carry assorted tea sachets, while the table's drawers contain coffee packs and my daily medicines.
THE KITCHEN has been my sanctuary of calm since the lockdown began. This is the place where I can take the focus away from the all-consuming anxieties of the pandemic. I prepare and have my meals at 11:30AM to 1:00PM (lunch) and 7:30PM to 9:00PM (dinner), a routine that has kept me grounded.
WEARING A mask, I stepped out of the house in Garden Estate to pick up grocery delivered at the main gate. This was the first time I ventured out during the lockdown, and the experience was astonishing. I saw the bluest sky I've ever seen in Delhi, and heard choruses of birds seeming to outdo each other's chirps. Spring flowers were in a blaze of morning glory. The sun, normally hot this time of the year, was unusually warm—the wind was in fact rather breezy.
WHEN I lived in Israel nearly 20 years ago, the health services center always advised me to drink water as a preventive measure against general sickness. It did make sense, considering how Israel's dry weather could speed up the risk of dehydration. The Associated Press has reported that drinking water won't prevent contracting COVID-19. But there are ways that water can help in these perilous times. The body needs water to function, as it optimizes body processes and fortifies the immune system. Drinking water can also improve cognitive functions, allowing better judgement and wiser decision-making.
WITH RESTAURANTS closed and kitchen helpers banned from entering our housing society, dining at home during the lockdown means self-reliance. This became a challenge to a man like me who's living alone and strenuously balancing work and domestic chores. As it turned out, reawakening my culinary skills has become rather uplifting and unwinding. It's a task I now look forward to twice a day (lunch and dinner).
It's also gratifying when you concoct a meal from whatever ingredients are available in the fridge and pantry. Plus, all those cravings are now literally in the palm of your hand, ready to carve the dish in the exact way that you want it. My favorite home dish has always been spaghetti, since it's easy to prepare and creates a welcome break from the heavier Filipino dishes eaten with rice. I'm now exploring so many possibilities with pasta—impossible to do before the lockdown as I was mostly in the office.
I've started planning meals for each day of the week. The lockdown is truly making me take charge of myself. That's a good thing.
A HOT mug of Philippine cacao drink is a piece of bliss in times of uncertainty. To prepare:
- Boil one cup of milk.
- Add 2-3 cacao pellets. I use SaBroso, a pure cacao brand brought by my friend Conchita Velez during her India visit last February. Otherwise, use a one-inch block of dark baking chocolate.
- Whisk in the cacao or chocolate pellets until they liquefy into the milk.
- Turn the heat off as soon as the milk starts to rise.
- Add sugar, if you wish. (I don't.)
- Serve and indulge immediately.
AS WE enter the fourth week of COVID-19's spread in India, Lenskart has taken the decisive call to support the larger cause of fighting the virus and to secure the well-being of its employees, partners, and customers. All our offices across India are now shut down. We are working from home to ensure that no operations are negatively impacted and the optical requirements of our customers are continously serviced.
The idea of working from home sounds delightful until you actually start working from home. I've quickly learned that it calls for solid self-discipline and full self-accountability. The familiarity of living rooms and bedrooms can tempt, and the hustle and bustle of domestic chores can distract. It's important to create a boundary between the space to work and the space to unwind.
The photo on the left is my makeshift but comfortable workstation. The glass coffee table in my library is now my desk. I never managed to bring home office stationery when we started the remote work arrangement, but I've kept what is needed to always keep the motivation running: a pot of air-purifying sansevieria, a water jug, a tea mug, and Barbra Streisand.
My heart goes out to everyone affected by COVID-19. Please stay safe.
THE GOVERNMENT of India ordered a nationwide lockdown today. For the next 21 days, all social movements outside homes are banned across this subcontinent of 1.3 billion people. No one is allowed to step out of their homes. Travel and transport on land and air are frozen. There are already ten reported fatalities in India, with rates of infection expected to leap in the coming weeks. The fight against COVID-19 has now entered a severe, historic stage.
THE GOVERNMENT of India declared a 14-hour "Janata Curfew" (people's curfew) today as it began to step up its fight against COVID-19. The number of infections in the country has now reached 500, and several offices have started requiring their staff to work from home. Today's curfew meant that nobody is allowed to leave home from 7AM to 9PM.
ONE OF the joys of video-on-demand services is the immediate access to must-see movies that flew under the radar. Kingsman: The Secret Service has been on my shortlist since its release in 2015, but I never managed to view it. Netflix finally gave me that opportunity this weekend.
WE FIRST met in October 1984 as interior design students at the University of the Philippines. Through the next three years, we assisted each other with our class assignments, projects, and semestral theses. After college, we had each other's back through the struggles and triumphs of building careers and families. Last weekend, we were old friends getting together again, reminiscing on those many years of friendship.
FORTY YEARS ago today, I fell in love with Barbra Streisand. I was watching the live telecast of the 1980 Grammy Awards, and suddenly I beheld an unannounced performance of "You Don't Bring Me Flowers" by Neil Diamond and her. It was the most romantic pairing of voices I had ever heard. It was pure. It was electric.
I MISSED watching Mission to Mars during its theatrical run in 2000. After finally seeing it on Netflix tonight, I was disappointed. Nothing is remarkable except for the fact that Brian De Palma allowed himself to aggrandize a very lame plot. It gets worse with an imperiously dated and soggy soundtrack and a predictable and soggy ending.
I should have kept missing it.
THE 2010s were an incredible decade for technology. As we welcome the 2020s, we look forward to how technology will continue to impact our communities and industries in positive ways. Speaking of technology, I can't believe it's been 20 years since the Y2K bug!
This year also marks the 60th year of Barbra Streisand in the entertainment industry. The passing decade was an era of Ms. Streisand giving back—to her fans and to the benificiaries of her many philantrophic contributions and advocacies. Here's a video of the decade's highlights.
Happy new year and new decade, everyone!
THE GRANDEST of Indian festivals is upon us. For those who celebrate it worldwide, Diwali means time for families to come together with gifts, light, and laughter. Today, and in the days around it, there is such positive energy brought about by fellowship filled with love.
ON 22 JUNE 1969, Judy Garland passed away, ending a lifetime of personal struggles and career crises. She has been called one of the greatest entertainers of all time, with a legacy influencing the artistry of several generations of performers. In remembrance of the 50th anniversary of Ms. Garland's passing, here is Barbra Streisand performing "Over the Rainbow".
INDIA'S FASTEST-GROWING eyewear brand has just opened its 500th store, which, at 5,000 square feet, also becomes the country's largest eyewear store. Lenskart.com's new concept store in Electronic City, Bengaluru, encourages shoppers to reach out and touch, try, learn, and feel good about the latest eyewear fashion and technology.
I FELL in love with Anne Rice's gothic fiction after seeing the film adaptation of her first novel, Interview With A Vampire, in 1994. Her writing was both sensuous and sensational, endowing her undead characters with nobility and munificence while plunging them into the insalubrious depths of horrifying and eventually tragic existence. I collected the first six volumes of The Vampire Chronicles, and stopped after moving to Israel in 2000. Physical bookstores eventually disappeared, making it tough to find the new volumes unless I went online. I never had the chance to go back to Ms. Rice.
THIS IS Michel Legrand at his purest cinematic self, back in the sixties when film music was in its most uninhibited. His youthful exuberance on the conductor's dais is matched with his vibrant training in jazz and film scores, with strings reaching up to gloriously stratospheric levels to deliver that signature Legrand sound.
