Tuesday, December 8, 2009

EYE SEE ES TWENTY FOUR

Kevin Nguyen
ICS 24
Marilyn
12/8/09

EYE SEE ES TWENTY FOUR

The quarter is at it's end. As I look back on the class, I realized that this was one big community with art, intelligence, support, and best of all, life. The goal of the LinC class was a success. This course along it's classmates really felt like another group of family and friends as it was intended to be. Whoever made it, was a genius. I see that I have changed after experiencing the course material and seeing my colleagues' art, compassion, and existence.

Marshall gave us many assignments in which we have to present ourselves and our art, and take notes of each others works. This was how I got to know a lot of the people in class (besides mingling with them). For example, Fatima made a demon story which told her experience going to the Philippines and how miserable and wet it was. I never knew that about her and now I do. Or when Xang started ranting out lyrics and voicing his dissenting opinion against Marshall's beliefs. That was eccentric since he was the few that openly disagreed, and even more so, that his style of rant was of anguish and EMINEM rap. But then again, there are some things that I found out that I, or anyone else, shouldnt have known at all such as Marshall himself.

This course was a freaking family. Compassion was everywhere needed. As each of us told our stories of past experiences, legacies, and problems, the class was always there, listening and taking it in as each information was presented and revealed. My story, Karissa's American Dream story, Yong's language story, Marshall's dick problems, Marilyn's hippy stories--hell, I realised most of our stories were international experiences or past problems, maybe even prejudices. But the main point is how we can relate to one another and how carefully we have listened and respected each other's views. I became more comfortable with talking out my view points in front of everyone and not pussy foot things like how I once did before in highschool.

But above all, just knowing my colleagues and how they even existed in this world has changed my attitude about it. There is soo much culture, ethics, love, respect, and experiences that none of us knew we had or received. I am more optimistic about America now than I ever was. I finally understood what it meant to be in a community of love, friends, and diversity. The existence of of these communities are what makes America, America. It is a melting pot of everyone and their stories. I am glad to have taken this class with Marshall, Jim, and especially Marilyn. I am more aware of my being and of other aspects and people of the world. I will be missing ICS 24.

Sunday, December 6, 2009

Last Essay

Kevin Nguyen
ICS 24
Marilyn
12/3/09
The History Dream
Churchill once said. “History is written by the victors.” This holds true since the conqueror can gloat and glorify all he wants and show the world in his image. The concept of history in Dream Jungle is an interesting one, in which reality and fiction have been merged together in a way that its almost indistinguishable. Jessica Hagedorn merges the Philippine’s dramatic history and the filming of “Apocalypse Now” with her very own fiction and message. She uses scapegoats, and foils for each character and historical contexts to make specific references to each event as it has happened, could have happened, and never happened because history is bound to repeat itself.
The first of a few references Hagedorn makes is the idea or history of “discovery and conquest” in the Philippines. In fact, it is what the first part of her novel is called. The Philippines have been conquered and occupied by foreign invaders many times before. The Filipino people and their resources have been raped, used, and wasted time over time again and again. A good example would be the Spaniards, who have sailed by and conquered the people under their rule in the process centuries ago. Hagedorn included several excerpts from “Primo Viaggio Intorno Al Mundo” by Antonio Pigagetta, who was the travel log recorder of Captain Magellan’s expedition around the world, and she included her own fictional character, a rich Spaniard aptly named Zamora de Legazpi. Zomora de Legazpi represents a parallel foil to the wealthy Spaniards, specifically Captain Magellan and many other conquistadores, who “discovered” a group of natives, “taught” them a lesson, “took” their woman and goods, and thus “conquering” the indigenous people. There have been many references to this from the excerpt of Antonio Pigagetta when he was observing the natives such as “…and those boats resemble the dolphins which leap in the water from wave to wave. Those Ladroni (i.e., robbers) thought, according to the signs which they made, that there were no other people in the world but themselves.”(4) Or when they were in shock and awe, experiencing defeat at the lost of their beloved Captain:
One of them wounded him on the left leg with a large cutlass, which resembles a scimitar, only being larger. That caused the captain to fall face downward, when immediately they rushed upon him with iron and bamboo spears and with their cutlasses until they killed our mirror, our life, our comfort, and our true guide. (106)
Ironic isn’t it? How they referred to their captain as if something great and holy, but he, the captain, along with everyone else, just wanted gold and conquest in the name of God.
Zamora, however, is pretty much the same especially when he bosses around his servants and taking advantage with the young girls like when he was naked and lecturing in front of Rizalina. “Enough about dreams. You’d better go, little girl. Or else your mother will think poorly of me…I’ve lived up to my promise, haven’t I?...You can stop trembling now. The lesson is over.”(49) Or when Zamora is flirty, eager to have sex with many mistresses outside of his marriage such as Celia, his baby caretaker, who just had an abortion because of him. Poor little girls, you can imagine how scared they were and how much of their innocence was lost. And then there is Bodabil, a small Taobo boy Zamora found deep within the uninhabited Philippine mountain regions. This is a reference to the Talibo scam back in the day with the President and false relief fund “PIMPF” in order to gain easy money. But the point is that Zamora claimed that he discovered these indigenous people and that he will save these people from their Stone Age ways for “ who knows what’s sake”. It ended in a terrible way more or less like Captain Magellan and his men, he was soon questioned with the validity of his relief effort, losing his family, losing Rizalina, and slowly dying away, losing his significance.
Zomora’s thirst for lust and dominance is like that of the foreign conquistadores centuries ago whose justification for conquering may be nothing short of “colonialism”, a term mentioned by Ann-Lesley. Legazipi also has an interesting foil of himself, the sadistic Mayor Fritz Magbantay. Hagedorn has created the sadistic Mayor Fritz to show how devious man can be as he lectures in front of his innocent victims (just like how the invaders and Zamora did) right before he does something shameful to them. Nap, Fritz’s driver, thought of this as he witnessed Fritz lecturing to Lina inside the car later on in part two of the book: “What’s the deal with her anyway? She was just a teenage girl, slightly prettier than most, but so what?” (257)
Another reference to history would be the filming of “Napalm Sunset”—the second part of the book—which is actually the filming of “Apocalypse Now” by Francis Coppola. Hagedorn replaces Coppola with Tony Pierce, and Cowboy with Vincent Moody, and many others while keeping authenticity of the hot difficult situation of foreign Americans filming and interacting with the natives in the Philippines. History, again, repeats itself here even though it features different actors and a new scenario. Pierce, Moody, and Fritz are shown how they naturally interact with and exploit the natives. Moody acts like a father to Lina and gets with her after meeting her at a strip club. Pierce hires cheap labor for his production, bossing around everyone alike and disrespectfully considers the surrounding land to be “a venture far too deep into the heart, where savages rule and civilization does not exist” or what ever Marshall was telling us how the director perceived the Philippine land to be—possibly a meaningless toy by the end of the movie. And then you have Fritz, who just wants to sell out his land’s resources to the American actors, and many other dirty businesses. His lusting efforts with Lina mentioned earlier were stopped because of Aling Belen, the protective old lady that watches over the foreigners with condemning eyes. From the book, how she acts is like an ancient spirit and pride of the Philippine homeland, watching over the land, agonized at the sight of the looting and raping of its people and earth.
Now, here comes the validity of history of Dream Jungle. It is true that Janet Pierce did a documentary of the movie and that the actors were partying and screwing around. The Spaniards did have done a lot of things towards the people and so have many other foreigners that come and go. Its also true that there was corruption (even today) with the high ranking officials selling out their people with the Talibo scam, prostitution, outsiders, and many more.
So what is false? The only false things here—but not limited to-- are the story of Zamora and his so called tribes, the diaries, documents and testimonies, the reporter Paz, and especially the old lady Alen Beling. But even if it is false, Jessica Hagedorn creates such fictional characters that to even dismiss it as false, would be dismissing the possibility of ever having such a type of person, attitude, and existence in real life. Lets take, for example, old lady Alen Beling, who represents the ancient spirit of her people’s homeland, and compare her with many of the old Filipino people who have seen the troubles that most young people at first don’t see. How can anyone like her NOT exist? These old people should already know how shameful it is to see their country wasting away by the unguided youth and ill intentioned foreigners. Or another example would be the recorded audio tape from Paz’s mother. What ever the mother was talking about could have happened, happened, or never have happened in this world at all like when she describes how she met Paz’s father. “Purely by accident.” She says (283) How many real life people in the Philippines could say that they did this? So in essence, the way history is in Dream Jungle is cultural, personal, and ethnical subjectivism.
Jessica Hagedorn fully integrates actual history with her fiction and story telling in such a way that it’s a blend of truth, untruth, and the unknown. The possibility that even such a person, place, or thing that existed can go along so well when it is indeed fiction alongside history, is the concept of her novel, Dream Jungle. One can only dream and fantasize with the idea that such and such exists and it may not even be possible, yet it could have happened. Think of it as an equation, where the history is the formula and the variables are humans, young and old. If you replace the setting or its pieces, the history will still be the same on the account that you don’t know IF it would ever not happen. The author does just that and presents to us a story heavily based on recorded evidence and the idea of indistinguishable real life drama scenarios.

Hagedorn, Jessica. Dream Jungle. New York: Penguin. 2003

The History Dream D1

Kevin Nguyen
ICS 24
Marilyn
12/3/09
The History Dream
Churchill once said. “History is written by the victors.” This holds true since the conqueror can gloat and glorify all he wants and show the world in his image. The concept of history in Dream Jungle is an interesting one, in which reality and fiction have been merged together in a way that its almost indistinguishable. Jessica Hagedorn merges the Philippine’s dramatic history and the filming of “Apocalypse Now” with her very own fiction and message. She uses scapegoats, and foils for each character and event involved and make specific references to each event as it has happened, could have happened, and never happened.
The first of a few references Hagedorn makes is the idea of “discovery and conquest”. In fact, it is what the first part of her novel is called. There seems to be some notion that goes unnoticed until its too late, the idea that the Filipino people and their resources have been raped, used, and wasted time over time again and again. A good example would be the Spaniards, who have sailed by and conquered the people under their rule in the process centuries ago. Hagedorn included several excerpts from “Primo Viaggio Intorno Al Mundo” by Antonio Pigagetta, who was the travel log recorder of Captain Magellan’s expedition around the world, and she included a rich Spaniard aptly named Zamora de Legazpi. Zomora de Legazpi represents a parallel foil to the wealthy Spaniards, specifically Captain Magellan and many other conquistadores, who “discovered” a group of natives, “taught” them a lesson, “took” their woman and goods, and thus “conquering” the

Sunday, November 22, 2009

blah

frankly i prefer if marilyn showed Apocalypse now and then that Documentary so ppl can get it since the book based itself off of those two movies

Monday, November 16, 2009

Peer Analysis Final

Kevin Nguyen
Marshall/Marilyn
ICS 24
11.11.09
Analysis of Joe-Vincent
Joe-Vincent Estioko made two very fine spoken word pieces: “Sleep to Dream” and Thank You Mom and Dad”. But he chose “Sleep to Dream” as the main one to present with. It is about his feelings and thoughts of Heaven, like how it is to him: “a world of peace” or “where you don’t have to worry about being brutally attacked.” He tried to have emotion and vehemence in his work just as much as Alvin Lau did with his “Asian-American, Where Have You Gone?” In fact, it was this artist that motivated Joe to start his own spoken word in the first place.
The project for him wasn’t too difficult, if not, a discovery. The only problem was figuring out what to write about and memorizing it. Then, the creative piece came to him in an unusual way, “I had no idea what my topic was going to be but one night before I fell asleep, different thoughts were rushing in and out of my brain. Then it hit me; why not talk about a dream.”—and so he did. He basically got it all down within one day; his rhymes, his rhythm, his imagery, his tempo, and his tone were all in the spoken word. An example of his rhyme and rhythm tempo would be when (in his work) he said, “… if your friends have your back, you don’t have to worry about being brutally attacked…” and “…where theres no reason to hurt and no feeling of pain, where friendships are forever and love eternally remains…” Amazing flow isn’t there? But when I asked him what did he wanted to improve on if he had the time, he replied “I wanted to include some alliterations.” and also to “practice more on the movements on the lines.”
His project was pretty good when he first presented it to me and the whole class. His tone was soft, low, and calm—possibly due to his shyness—enough for all of us to hear. Indeed, the beat, rhyme, imagery, tempo, and tone were there, but there was something else, something inside his soul, within the calm tone, there was heart—his heart. Actually, everyone who made a spoken word piece (or any creative project for that matter) included their heart into it, trying to tell us something about something. For instance, Marshall’s spoken word piece about the Asian penis and how everyone kept shunning it away, even from pornography, and treating it differently, was basically a rant-- a rant from deep within Marshall’s soul and belief towards the white world.
I’ve learned quite a lot about social and personal experiences from doing my project and analyzing Joe’s creative project such as how people are not much different from you and that they struggle in the same way as you do. Others’ opinions may be relative for they are another view at the subjective matter at hand. Given the same task, usually there is something that is held in common when many are heading to obtain it. Although he did superb, I believe that Joe-Vincent Estioko’s project was very well made despite some minor mistakes or so he claims. Everyone’s experience may be different but in the end, we all went through something right?

8====D~

Okay, What the Fuh...

Im gettin tired of this.....emasculinity and penis talkin..cause..I know that whoever tames the penis..tames the beast..and vice versa.

Today, I just realize Marshall is a complete perv'...I mean..yes, hes Japanese..but really..he seems to derive some sort of excitement and pleasure out of this. Perhaps it has something predominately to do with the lesson and also his biased belief/rant towards the white world. There seems to be a behind the scenes kind of thing about penis's, insecurity, jealousy, and superior dominance going on and Marshall is still fighting all that nonsense-- for one, I am an Existentialist-Realist so you can say it doesnt really matter to me-- just like them old people back then joking and waving around thier dicks and clits.

Clits you say? Well some women have bigger clits than others and does that make them any less hornier? (thats a different topic, I think) But the point here is..the dragon ladys, the female police enforcers and drill sargeants and dominatrixes...what makes them..soo..full of..balls...of steel? No, OVARIES of steel.

Again, all it takes is some female--err feminine i should say--seduction and a way to pleasure the penis and you got yourself some hay rolling and dominance..feh..

A 3rd Opinion...Marshall has some issues alright...i mean he did also a rant spoken word about his penis and his belief and yeah.

And also..today..there was fan service... Patrick and Shane's intimate act and showing how to pick each other up for sex and what not. I dont like this....not cool you know? Mic was smart..showed the ring..but some guys are just..stubborn...and also poor julie...tryin to pick up justin... but either way...there was this..fan service or some kind of stimulant/horniness/excitedness coming from teh girls as I observe them watching..especially Uyen--she was smiling and all excited and Julie..she was just shy but underneath it all..yeah...in fact...all of us...underneath it all...what is there but uncivilized manners? Theres just..something wrong with teh class lately...

Saturday, November 14, 2009

The American Dream..(Asian Style)

Who says Asians cant be downright gangster in search of thier own "The American Dream"?

(It's a Pun--a joke-- btw)

But also this Anime is awesome cause it features a main character who is a Chinese student/contractor in his twenties and how he handles his current and past problems. Darker Than Black is one of my favorite animes because of its plot line, action, animation, humor, and past-time music.