Anne Curtis likes books and Twitter, supports RH Bill, criticizes Cybercrime Law

A woman’s guess is much more accurate than a man’s certainty.— Rudyard Kipling

During a recent visit to Dr. Steve Mark Gan’s GAOC dental clinic in Makati City, I chanced upon the 27-year-old actress, singer, celebrity endorser and TV host Anne Curtis who later tweeted she needed to have her wisdom teeth taken out. Anne is the undisputed “Queen of Twitter,” with 3,722,657 followers, the highest for any person in the Philippines.

I told the actress that during a recent dinner hosted by businessman John Kaw in Greenhills, San Juan City, I suggested to National Book Development Board (NBDB) chairman Neni Sta. Romana-Cruz that they invite Anne Curtis, Sharon Cuneta-Pangilinan, Kris Aquino and other famous people to promote reading books nationwide. Anne had told me before that she’s “a bookworm.”

Gutsy support for family planning & freedom of expression

Aside from her beauty and brains, I also admire Anne Curtis for using her influential Twitter account to publicly express her strong, gutsy and progressive ideas.

On the pro-life, pro-women and pro-poor Reproductive Health (RH) bill championed by Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago, Senator Pia Cayetano, former Congresswoman Risa Hontiveros-Baraquel and Rep. Kimi Cojuangco, Anne tweeted on Nov. 23: “I don’t understand why the RH bill hasn’t been passed yet. Every woman and family has the right to be educated about proper family planning.

On the controversial and hugely unpopular Cybercrime Law, Anne tweeted: “Being someone that’s active in the social media world I couldn’t help but feel sad and scared while reading the Cybercrime Act.”

She tweeted: “Whatever happened to freedom of speech? Having an opinion? Expressing oneself? These are our own accounts. Our property. Our lives.” At the end of another tweet, she said: “I hope they consider REVISING the Cybercrime Act.”

Anne Curtis likes inspirational and romance-themed novels

When I asked what her latest top 10 favorite books are (book lovers sometimes update favorite books by including new wonderful titles read), Anne replied:

1. The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera. This 1984 existential Czech novel by Milan Kundera is about the lives of two men, two women and a dog during the short-lived reformist “Prague Spring” period of Czechoslovak history in 1968. The 1988 American-made movie adaptation of this novel starring Daniel Day-Lewis, Lena Olin and Juliette Binoche had so disappointed the multi-awarded Kundera. The novelist is a perennial contender for the Nobel Prize.

2. Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. This 1985 novel by Colombia’s great Nobel Prize for Literature winner is a love triangle, the tale of a man’s enduring grand love for a woman despite her marrying another guy. Time rated the 2007 film adaptation by English director Mike Newell as “a serious contender (for) the worst movie ever made from a great novel ... Skip the film; reread the book.”

Swatch ambassador Anne Curtis: “Whatever happened to freedom of speech? Having an opinion? Expressing oneself? These are our own accounts.

3. Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel. This 1989 Mexican novel is about a young girl in love with a guy whom she couldn’t marry, because her mother upholds a family tradition that the youngest daughter cannot marry but should care for the mom until her death. The girl, Tita,  could only express her love through her cooking, in a unique magic realism way. The novel was adapted into film in 1992 by Mexican director Alfonso Arau; it was a box office success and won many Mexican awards.

4. Eleven Minutes by Paulo Coelho. This 2003 Brazilian novel tells the story of a Brazilian prostitute named Maria and her quest for love, which she thinks she has finally found in a handsome young painter named Ralf in Geneva. 

5. Fifty Shades of Grey by E. L. James. This 2011 bestseller is described as an erotic novel, a British work about the relationship between college graduate Anastasia Steele and young business tycoon Christian Grey. It is the first book of a trilogy, which has become the fastest-selling paperback novel in history, surpassing even the record of J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter novelS. Hollywood will soon be filming its movie adaptation, with rumors saying that superstar actress Angelina Jolie wants to be its director and another report claiming that Canadian actor/singer Ryan Gosling will play the role of Christian Grey.

6. The Man Who Ate the 747 by Ben Sherwood. The author is now president of America’s ABC News, but in 2000 when he was then working for NBC Nightly News, he wrote the tragicomic bestseller about J.J. Smith, the investigator of a fictional version of the Guinness Book of World Records. This guy goes to the rural town of Superior, Nebraska to verify a record-breaking effort of a man eating a Boeing 747 jet by grinding parts into gritty dust. By this act of eating a whole plane, the farmer hopes to prove his incomparable love for a woman.

7. Veronika Decides to Die by Paulo Coelho. This thought-provoking and uplifting 1998 Brazilian novel tells the story of a beautiful 24-year-old woman named Veronika from the Eastern European country of Slovenia. Veronika is suicidal and is later forcibly committed into a mental institution, where she struggles for liberation and meaning. This novel has been adapted into a 2009 film by English director Emily Young, starring Sarah Michelle Gellar and was set in New York City instead of the book’s original Slovenia milieu.

8. The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom. This 2003 bestselling inspirational novel by the American author of Tuesdays With Morrie tells the saga of an 83-year-old maintenance man named Eddie who dies in a heroic attempt to save a little girl falling from an amusement park ride. It tells Eddie’s life story, his going to heaven, and his meeting five persons who had influenced his life the most before. The novel has been adapted into a film for TV in 2004 starring John Voight.

9. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov. The famous Russian author wrote this controversial yet critically-acclaimed literary classic in English and published it in 1955 in Paris and 1958 in New York. It was only later translated into Russian language by Nabokov. It tells the controversial tale of a middle-aged literature professor named Humbert Humbert who fells in love and gets involved with a young girl named Dolores Haze, whom he calls by the nickname Lolita. The novel was adapted to film by the late American director Stanley Kubrick in 1962, and again in 1997 by English filmmaker Adrian Lyne. Lolita has also been adapted for stage, operas, ballets and even into a Broadway musical.

10. The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy. This 1997 novel and winner in the same year of Britain’s prestigious Booker Prize is an English-language work by the Indian author. It’s the tale of a fraternal twins’ experiences as kids whose lives are destroyed by the “Love Laws,” which mandate “who should be loved, and how. And how much.” The novel tells of how life’s small things influence people and lives; it is partly family fable, forbidden love story and political drama.

Let us all read books like the rare beauty and brains Anne Curtis!

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