Tonette Martel’s ‘Between East and West’ : Traveling with mind and body
March 11, 2007 | 12:00am
Between East and West may sound at first like a geo-political treatise on East-West relations, or a novel about a Fil-Am child struggling underneath the burden of his cross-cultural heritage. But in Tonette Martel’s hands, Between East and West takes flight as a very unique travel book/collection of thought-provoking essays, and proves that, here in the Philippines, publishers (in this case, Anvil Publishing) are still ready to print books that are a challenge to peruse and absorb. Tonette is not out to give us a quick travel fix, or merely entertain. Her purpose is loftier than that; she is out to enrich and refine our concept of travel, and endeavors to give us "sumptuous food for thought." This she achieves in spades, and disregarding your common garden-variety accessibility, it’s a book that may be a challenge to read, but is definitely a rewarding experience.
In essence, the book is a collection of essays on the places, themes and ideas that have helped shape today’s Zeitgeist, and Tonette’s personal take on globalization. Through the arts and cultural richness of those countries she has visited, Tonette riffs on the melding of East and West, and how certain basic human needs and wants transcend cultural divides and differences. The intimate relationship between art and life is another persistent theme of the book, how the arts embody the voice of a people at a particular juncture of time and place, and can continue to help us better understand what remains unique and different in this age of globalization and the shrinking of the world via Information Technology.
Two years in the making, and considered by her a "labor of love," the essays in Between East and West were written over the last 10 years and were scrutinized and rewritten with two major vantage points in mind. As Tonette explains, "It is the merging of cultures of contemporary life, as well as the universal themes that still define everyday life." Travels to Bali, to Cambodia, to St. Paul de Vence, off the Cote d’Azur in France, to Mexico, to India and Thailand  they all become jumping-off points for Tonette to explore influences between cultures, assimilation and coincidences, and how traditions in art between two seemingly divergent cultures can be both unique and yet unify the two.
Popular travel writers nowadays, like Bill Bryson and Pico Iyer, put themselves very much into the narrative flow of their travel pieces. Anecdotal, using first-person narrative, and mixing self-deprecating humor with the insights and observations, these writers’ styles make their work compelling and immensely popular. Tonette is cut from a different kind of fabric. More like a throwback to the explorers and scholars who made traveling their obsession and life pursuit during the 18th and 19th centuries, I wouldn’t be surprised if Tonette were eligible to enjoy special membership privileges in the Royal Society of Explorers. This is not travel by whimsy or spontaneity; rather, it is purposeful travel that is well-researched even before boarding the plane or ship. It is travel with great forethought in mind, while staying open to the unexpected and unplanned. It is travel within a framework that allows one to maximize the time available, with specific goals and targets in mind. There is deliberate, educated purpose in visiting each specific country  with an itinerary that supports this decision.
And of course, afterward, there is the reflection on those travels that makes Tonette’s essays memorable.
Queried as to why it seems there’s so much more interest in observing and studying the rich cultural heritages of our neighboring countries than our own, Tonette had this to say: "I guess there’s still that vestige of our colonial hangover, and we take things for granted when it refers to our own cultural heritage. To be perfectly frank, our culture is also relatively ‘young.’ It doesn’t possess the roots of, say, Thailand, Bali or Cambodia. Whether we do it consciously or not, we still have that ‘dayuhan sa sariling bayan’ mentality. I talk about that in the book. There’s a chapter about the migratory nature of Ilocanos, of how rewarding a tour of the monuments in the Ilocos region can be when you’re guided by the likes of F. Sionil Jose who has really done the research!"
Terms like "Global Village" and "One World" are bandied about a lot, but it’s through well-researched and intelligent books such as Tonette’s that one discovers just how true these terms are. There is cultural uniqueness and multiplicity, but underpinning these is the common thread that makes borders and the sense of closed communities a thing of the past. As Tonette likes to remind us, we can talk about the dichotomy between the Christian and Muslim worlds, but an educated Muslim woman anywhere in the world will have needs, wants and concerns very similar to those of her Christian counterpart. Freedom of expression, quality of life as a woman, respect in the workplace and having time for her family are concerns that transcend religion or cultural divides. It is this connectivity that Tonette’s book explores and reveals with wisdom and depth  how we can be so different and still be so the same.
In essence, the book is a collection of essays on the places, themes and ideas that have helped shape today’s Zeitgeist, and Tonette’s personal take on globalization. Through the arts and cultural richness of those countries she has visited, Tonette riffs on the melding of East and West, and how certain basic human needs and wants transcend cultural divides and differences. The intimate relationship between art and life is another persistent theme of the book, how the arts embody the voice of a people at a particular juncture of time and place, and can continue to help us better understand what remains unique and different in this age of globalization and the shrinking of the world via Information Technology.
Two years in the making, and considered by her a "labor of love," the essays in Between East and West were written over the last 10 years and were scrutinized and rewritten with two major vantage points in mind. As Tonette explains, "It is the merging of cultures of contemporary life, as well as the universal themes that still define everyday life." Travels to Bali, to Cambodia, to St. Paul de Vence, off the Cote d’Azur in France, to Mexico, to India and Thailand  they all become jumping-off points for Tonette to explore influences between cultures, assimilation and coincidences, and how traditions in art between two seemingly divergent cultures can be both unique and yet unify the two.
Popular travel writers nowadays, like Bill Bryson and Pico Iyer, put themselves very much into the narrative flow of their travel pieces. Anecdotal, using first-person narrative, and mixing self-deprecating humor with the insights and observations, these writers’ styles make their work compelling and immensely popular. Tonette is cut from a different kind of fabric. More like a throwback to the explorers and scholars who made traveling their obsession and life pursuit during the 18th and 19th centuries, I wouldn’t be surprised if Tonette were eligible to enjoy special membership privileges in the Royal Society of Explorers. This is not travel by whimsy or spontaneity; rather, it is purposeful travel that is well-researched even before boarding the plane or ship. It is travel with great forethought in mind, while staying open to the unexpected and unplanned. It is travel within a framework that allows one to maximize the time available, with specific goals and targets in mind. There is deliberate, educated purpose in visiting each specific country  with an itinerary that supports this decision.
And of course, afterward, there is the reflection on those travels that makes Tonette’s essays memorable.
Queried as to why it seems there’s so much more interest in observing and studying the rich cultural heritages of our neighboring countries than our own, Tonette had this to say: "I guess there’s still that vestige of our colonial hangover, and we take things for granted when it refers to our own cultural heritage. To be perfectly frank, our culture is also relatively ‘young.’ It doesn’t possess the roots of, say, Thailand, Bali or Cambodia. Whether we do it consciously or not, we still have that ‘dayuhan sa sariling bayan’ mentality. I talk about that in the book. There’s a chapter about the migratory nature of Ilocanos, of how rewarding a tour of the monuments in the Ilocos region can be when you’re guided by the likes of F. Sionil Jose who has really done the research!"
Terms like "Global Village" and "One World" are bandied about a lot, but it’s through well-researched and intelligent books such as Tonette’s that one discovers just how true these terms are. There is cultural uniqueness and multiplicity, but underpinning these is the common thread that makes borders and the sense of closed communities a thing of the past. As Tonette likes to remind us, we can talk about the dichotomy between the Christian and Muslim worlds, but an educated Muslim woman anywhere in the world will have needs, wants and concerns very similar to those of her Christian counterpart. Freedom of expression, quality of life as a woman, respect in the workplace and having time for her family are concerns that transcend religion or cultural divides. It is this connectivity that Tonette’s book explores and reveals with wisdom and depth  how we can be so different and still be so the same.
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