We sat down to a longish interview with Ian at Singapore’s posh 52nd floor China Club, and I’ll be reporting on that encounter in another piece for The STAR’s travel section very soon. All I can say for now is that sitting at the same table with Ian Wright is like trying to sleep in a rollercoaster – the man’s energy is incredible and infectious, and he can warm up a crowd in 10 seconds flat, even with just a grin and a grimace. Of course he’s had at least 12 years’ experience dealing with the most difficult audiences in the world – club-swishing bandits and chattering monkeys among them – so the boyish charm is as good a survival tool as any other.
The Wright interview took place against the backdrop of the World Gourmet Summit – a gastronomic extravaganza that Singapore has been hosting for about a decade now to claim its spot in the global food and arts map – and it was with much trepidation that I flew to Singapore, since you all know what a culinary philistine I am, preferring Ma Mon Luk mami to all other treats on the tabletop. (Many years ago, in blithe ignorance of this fact, a well-connected friend secured me an invitation to a very exclusive dinner to be prepared by Manila’s top 20 chefs; I declined as politely as I could, short of kicking and screaming.) It was a relief to be reassured that we were there for Mr. Wright and not the chocolate-glazed artichokes or whatever passes for haute cuisine these days.
Still, the man and the menu met at dinner, one specially crafted by Ian for about 300 guests at the Hyatt around the theme of "The Food I Like." Now, I know you’re thinking sheep eyeballs and rotten shark meat and that kind of extreme cuisine, but there was (thankfully) nothing of the sort on the menu, which turned out to be eclectically delicious, even for a regular meat-lovin’ bloke like me. If you are what you eat, then this is what Ian Wright is.
We started out with what I’ll call "drinks" (duh): Montesia Brut NV, S. Pellegrino sparkling mineral water, Acqua Panna still water, and RIPE Juices. Of course I doubled up on the champagne, which tasted, uhm, sweet-sour. I passed on the sparkling water – I’ve always felt funny drinking bubbly and slightly salty water, like ingesting a mouthful of ocean. The menu proper opened with potato and green pea patis (probably not the patis we know; this was something solid; but then again I can’t find another online definition for patis); tomato, onion, and Chinese parsley salad, with yogurt and mint dressing. I must’ve liked this because I don’t remember pushing any leftovers to a corner of my plate.
This was followed by a glass of 2005 Oyster Bay, Sauvignon Blanc (hmm, more sweet-sour), and then by the first dish that caught my eye: Thai noodle soup with minced chicken and coriander, served in an open buko (the thick meat of which we Pinoys, of course, shoveled into). The 2004 Wolf Blass, Red Label Semillon Blanc served as a prelude to fish ‘n chips – the first dish I could actually identify with, if not plain identify – appropriately served in a folded newspaper especially printed for the purpose.
A 2003 Castello della Sala, Chardonnay introduced the main course: roasted sirloin of beef and Yorkshire pudding, with braised carrots and red wine sauce. The roast beef affirmed my prehistoric kinship with Ian – and, finally, some red! – 2004 Oyster Bay, Pinot Noir. Dessert consisted of a selection of Los Postres del America del Sur (Desserts from South America), which turned out to be lots of bite-sized chocolates, and the biggest strawberries I’ve ever seen in my life, the size of our itlog na maalat. I could hardly pronounce what we downed all that sweet stuff with, which was 2003 Wolf Blass, Gold Label Brotrytis Gewurtzraminer. As if my bladder wasn’t bursting yet, we had freshly brewed coffee and a selection of fine teas, and my pal Krip will forgive me (probably not) if I passed on the nightcap, a Macallan sherry oak 12 years old single malt to go with the cacao Barry Pralines.
When you think of all the questionable comestibles Ian had to endure in his jaunts around the world, this decidedly more upscale yet still jologs-friendly menu was a perfect compromise between street food and the kind of dinner you drop a year’s pay for but can’t even pronounce (or maybe even eat).
Good chow. The only thing missing was rice.
I chanced upon this announcement of the Bridport Prize in the website of the British Council Philippines (www.britishcouncil.org/) giving notice of one of the richest writing prizes in the world for a single story or poem. Folks, forget the Palancas (no, I don’t mean that; but you had only until yesterday to join it, so that’s moot now). Take a look at the terms below and hie over to the BC link above to download the entry form.
The Bridport Arts Centre in Dorset has issued a call for entries to the richest open writing competition in the English language.
Up for grabs are GBP5,000 for a short story (up to 5,000 words) or a poem (42 lines). Second prizes are GBP1,000 each, and third prize for each category is GBP500. (FYI, one British pound is about P100, so you do the math.)
Anyone can enter, so long as the work is unpublished. Entries must be in English, typewritten, single-sided, with pages numbered and securely fastened. Stories should be double-spaced. Entries must not show any name, address, nor identifying marks other than the title. All details should be on the entry form.
Submit your entries to the British Council office, 10th floor Taipan Place, Emerald Avenue, Ortigas Center, Pasig on or before May 15. Entries will not be returned, and no corrections may be made after the receipt. Entry fees for qualifying works from the Philippines will be covered by the British Council.
Grand prizewinners in the worldwide competition will be notified in writing by the beginning of October. Prizes will be awarded on Nov. 18 during the Bridport Literary Festival.
The winning stories and those shortlisted will be read by leading London literary agents with a view to representing writers. The top 26 stories and poems will be published in the 2006 Bridport Anthology. The top 13 stories will be submitted further to the National Short Story Prize, worth GBP 15,000, and the top four poems to the Forward Prize.
The Bridport Prize has been the first step in the careers of established poets and novelists such as Kate Atkinson, Tobias Hill, Helen Dunmore, and Carol Ann Duffy. It has been a yearly opportunity for writers since 1973.
For details, call 914-1011 to 14.
The story I best like to tell people about banking on one’s talent has to do with Gina Apostol (author of the novel Bibliolepsy), who, as an undergraduate, typed exquisite little pieces of prose about earthquakes in Mexico, the weather in Leyte, and such apparitions. She mailed them (in envelopes; this was in the mid-1980s, well before e-mail) to John Barth, a writer she admired who was teaching in Johns Hopkins in Baltimore. He wrote her back, saying how much he admired her work, and offered her a graduate assistantship in the writing program of Johns Hopkins, which she took and completed.
Another story has to do with the Stegner Fellowship at Stanford – one of America’s most sought-after – which a bunch of writer-friends and I heard about from the late Cochise Bernabe over beer after the launch of my very first book in December 1984. Cochise had just visited the US and had picked up some Stegner forms, which none of us seemed to notice that evening. The next day four of us, presumably stone sober, applied for the Stegner. We heard no more about it until one bright April day when the call came for one of us – the most junior, as it turned out, the brilliant Fidelito Cortes, who went on to study under Denise Levertov, among others.
Sometimes great things happen to good guys. Believe it.