Getting an education at CCP

In the short time that I have been chairman of the Cultural Center of the Philippines, I have learned about many things that I would otherwise not have done on another job.

If I were to be asked what would be the core policy under my chairmanship my answer would immediately be: regionalism. And by regionalism I do not mean just inviting people from the provinces to events in the center. I realize it would be more a change of attitude than a policy not to think of Manila as the center where all important things happen. I think so much is lost if we do not cultivate centers of culture in our provinces.

The new trustees in the boards are accomplished artists in their own fields although they cannot be said to be socially prominent in Manila circles. 

Take Gardi Labad. Until I met him I did not know that he was behind the Loboc Children’s Choir which I had heard people rave about. Yesterday they performed to open the 2010 Philippine Heritage Festival and sung the newly resurrected 19th century Misa Baclayana at a mass in the Manila Cathedral Hospital. Labad is dedicated to searching for cultural talent and history anywhere in the Philippines where it can be found.

Recently, he met with my late husband’s family to see how the ancestral house could be used as a center of art and communications for that part of the Visayas. “The Pedrosa house in Palo is often referred to an icon among regional culture aficionados,” says Labad. They plan to put a marker that would narrate its history. That is a start. Once upon a time, it was even used as headquarters during the Philippine Revolution.

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While in San Francisco I visited The Tenderloin, a god-forsaken area sandwiched among the expensive and posh areas of the city. Mayor Gavin Newsom has started a new project called “Reality Tourism.” The way I understand it, its very shabbiness can be resurrected into something for tourists to see.

Thor Swift for The New York Times writes that “civic boosters are hoping to turn the grit of the Uptown Tenderloin district into an attraction, pointing out its ties to music (the Grateful Dead recorded there) and its “rich vice history” even if the gambling dens and speakeasies are gone. There will be tours of its many residential hotels, where my friend, Jim Jensen, a resident of San Francisco says once housed Filipinos desperate for living quarters. Why limit your visit to San Francisco gawking at the Golden Gate Bridge or its museums when there is real life in Upper Tenderloin?

To San Francisco’s civic minded innovators they want “Upper Tenderloin” to be a stop for tourists so they can confront “its ragged, druggy and determinedly dingy domain of the city’s most down and out.”

With a listing on the National Register of Historic Places, community and city leaders are preparing to transform the Tenderloin for reality tourism. They will also build a new museum, an arts district and walking tours of “the world’s largest collection of historic single-room occupancy hotels.”  

I think Filipinos should take an interest in this project because of its association with the early manongs who migrated to the US. Some of them lived and died in these single room decrepit hotels. When they say that they will bring people and show them where people live in single room occupancy buildings, it will be a completely different experience from gawking at the huge houses in Menlo Park or Hillsborough.

It is hoped by the promoters of reality tourism that it will generate “a positive identity for the Tenderloin” and draw tourists in the area by posting hundreds of plaques on buildings throughout the neighborhood. ”We will create great visual interest for those walking down the community’s streets,” says Randy Shaw who is the moving spirit behind converting Upper Tenderloin as reality tourism.

I bet you rich Filipinos just quickly drive by on their way to Union Square completely unmindful that its history is rich with Filipino connections. I am told that it tells of stories and stories of early Filipino migrants who could not return home when their dreams of prosperity in America were dashed.

“I think a lot of San Franciscans appreciate the Tenderloin,” said Don S. Falk, one of the developers They have renovated 15 residential hotels in the Tenderloin. He says it is part of the identity of San Franciscans.

 Its equivalent in Manila is if we were to develop Tondo into reality tourism. I am sure researchers will find many historical associations with Tondo even if it has become more decrepit. I think it would be a great place to translate into reality tourism. We would have to revive its historical associations as part of Secretary Atienza’s campaign slogan of “Buhayin ang Maynila” when he becomes mayor of the city again.

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From dingy and desperate Upper Tenderloin I went to The Cartier in America Exhibit at the California Palace of the Legion of Honor. It was a totally different world and the contrast was so stark.

I was curious why a museum should be called after a French award. Well, the staff said it was a mini version of grand museums in Europe that is why they called it the Legion of Honor Museum. It had a grand entrance, marble facade, reflecting pond and statues just like museums in Europe. There is even a Rodin Statue at the center as well as a Louvre-inspired pyramid.

Some of the pieces of jewelry may not be seen again as a collection so it was worthwhile visiting it at San Francisco. The pieces were works of art by Cartier. He made them for America’s heiresses during the early 1900s to wear for grand occasions. Cartier came to American and opened his New York Store in 1909. At the time, the US had 300 millionaires, representing a large market. The exhibit is about the jewelry Cartier made at the time that made him “King of Jewelers” during the Belle Époque. What a contrast it was to Upper Tenderloin.