Carmen Guerrero Nakpil’s new book

Years ago, when a book of mine (Bamboo and the Greenwood Tree) was published, an official of the British Embassy wrote to me, "Your book must be good because even Carmen Guerrero Nakpil has praised it." I mention that incident as an indication of how Mrs. Nakpil has been looked upon by many, namely, with respect and with fear. For she looks at things with a critical eye, and expresses her opinion clearly, fearlessly, and often brilliantly.

Her new book is no exception: entitled Whatever and published by the Ateneo de Manila University Press.

She writes often of trivial things, but what she says of them is never trivial. For example, what could be more trivial than a beauty salon for men – which she sometimes patronizes, claiming that she is one of the few women allowed in because "as an older woman my presence is no longer considered predatory or threatening. I also have what they consider masculine habits." One of those habits is that she reads not women’s magazines but those that men prefer, like the Wall Street Journal. One such magazine, Foreign Post, carries an article about the menace that Filipina women are to tourists: a Filipina and her "cousin" the taxi driver and her "uncle" the security guard divest tourists of thousands of dollars and feed him "ethnic food."

Mrs. Nakpil’s comment: "I am usually reduced to helpless laughter by the accounts of these misadventures. All this poor chaps moving in the wrong circles! After all, bar girls, guest relations officers, and taxi drivers’ cousins anywhere in the world are not known for their delicacy of feelings. What did they expect?"

She advices the tourists. "Put yourselves out of harm’s way. Leave your wallet at home, because there are a lot of nice, glossy places with superlative music, food and drink in Malate, where instead of paying you will get paid. And handsomely too, and with much better grace."

Mrs. Nakpil has a piece on President Clinton at the international meeting in Seattle. She describes him "for his Pinay fans": "He’s every inch as cute as he looks on TV." She maneuvers to be in the same room with him and prepares to "ambush" him with a question, when the aides shouted "No questions!"

The questions she had intended to ask was, "What do you think the Philippine role should be under our charged circumstances?" Not being able to ask Clinton, she answers the question herself.

"Our role should be providing what everyone else on the Pacific Rim lacks (not counting the Latinos like Chile who are still not there): a sense of fun. The Pinoy’s highest, national product is hedonism, or deriving pleasure from whatever they’re doing whether it is picking themselves up from the latest volcanic eruption or a coup d’etat. Charm, music, play-acting, excess of every kind are the Pinoy forte. We are characters in a play, at our best with a world audience. These are the services we can provide."

It’s one way of looking at things, and not entire a bad way. But it takes Carmen Guerrero Nakpil to say it.

But not everything in this book is about trivia. There are matters of greater moments discussed, especially in the last two sections. The War and the Fall of Bataan; the terrible and mindless outrage of turning the Botanical Gardens into a building lot; journalism right after the War; and other concerns. Mrs. Nakpil has some very important (and wise) things to say. Her essays in this book are very much worth reading.