‘Umbrella Revolution’ shows Hong Kong’s beautiful fight for democracy
MANILA, Philippines - Between the two branding tags used to identify the protests in Hong Kong – “The Occupy Central Movement” and “The Umbrella Revolution” – I prefer the latter. Apart from being original, it sounds more mundane, romantic, working-class. People do not occupy – that’s what governments do. But people do carry umbrellas and use them in the rain or under the oppressive heat of the sun. They are helpless against a barrage of tear gas, like Hong Kong may inevitably be helpless against the strong-arm machinations of mainland China. But there they were, raised high, for days, in vain, in a surge of righteous indignation, in all their beautiful, breathtaking defiance.
We wish we had a tita like @TitasOfManila
Between @TitasofManila, @MomsofManila, @DadsofManila, and @KuyasofManila, Pinoy Twitter has quickly turned into a bedtime snicker-fest for bourgeois kids. Somewhere along the way, perhaps when @YayasofManila was created, “of Manila” started to sound like a glaring misnomer. @TitasofManila, in particular, tweets things that roughly 80 percent of the metropolis will never relate to: “*shops at Anne Klein*,” “Can you put Don Moen songs in my iPad?”, or the golden “Sige na. Sing for Tita. I’ll give you 500.” I wish I had a Tita like that. The whole nation wishes it had a Tita like that. We’d happily sing Don Moen’s greatest hits for 500 pesos a pop and promise to never make fun of her on Twitter.
Liam Neeson carries on killing everyone
The Internet went nuts this week upon the release of the trailer for Tak3n – the 3rd installment of the popular Taken movie franchise. The reactions were split between “Are you kidding me?” and “This is awesome!” Obviously, the correct reaction is a mixture of both – a 3rd Taken movie is indeed simultaneously ridiculous and a gift from the heavens. We’re willing to ride with the premise that a former soldier who happens to be an excellent sniper, an explosives expert, and a hand-to-hand combat god has to fend off threats against his family for all his life as long as we get to watch him kill people by the dozens. May the Liam Neeson Kills Everyone genre live on forever.
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