hello, this is a test, im kinda scared if this gets broken or sumn. it's been working so far and I would really love to keep it that way.

In the English language, we say the word “love,” while most of the time being unconscious of the many meanings this may elicit in various individuals—one person’s definition of love will never be the same as the other. There may be about a million ways to define this phenomenon, but the word “love” acts as a multipurpose word that is meant to act in place of every variance of meaning one could possibly create. However, in the Arabic language there are multiple ways to express the word love. These alternative forms of the word “love” emerged from the plethora of romantic Arabic poetry over time. While many of these are used exclusively in poetic form, it’s still interesting to take a close look at these variations in order to understand just how vast the interpretations of love in the Arabic language is, especially in celebration of World Arabic Language Day.

Do you know your rights as a human being? Have you ever felt that these rights were violated? These are the first questions that come to mind when human rights are mentioned. I wonder if everyone is aware of their rights and what they do when these rights are violated. Human Rights Day is observed every 10th of December to raise awareness about the importance of human rights and the ongoing struggle for their protection. It commemorates the United Nations’ 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), a milestone document in the history of human rights affirming the inalienable rights of all individuals regardless of their ethnicity, nationality, or religion. As the world marks this day, it is essential to reflect on the state of human rights in several countries such as the Philippines where challenges in realizing these rights persist.

The play wasn’t anything grand, with what a small school and an even smaller amount of students studying in said school, but it was something that my mother and I thoroughly prepared for. I remember it clearly like it just happened; we didn’t have any of the garb the popular Western depictions of Mary had, so with cloth scraps my mother collected—or found lying around in our house, I’m not too sure on that detail anymore—she had a seamstress make the clothes for me. All for a one-day play that we’ve practiced for less than a month that ended in all of us dancing to Gangnam Style. It was wacky, maybe even something you could label as campy, but nonetheless, it was an experience that’s forever etched in my memory.

In "Why Fell the Supremo?", a part of his collection of essays titled "A Question of Heroes," National Artist for Literature Nick Joaquin calls Andres Bonifacio an "uncomfortable hero." This may be a jarring title to give, especially for the majority of Filipinos who view Bonifacio as the pioneer of revolution—the very essence of what it means to resist oppression. Yet, why did one of our National Artists dubb one of our heroes with such a shameful title?

The 29th of November marks the 47th year anniversary of the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People. That very same day back in 1947, the General Assembly established the Partition Resolution. The resolution called for the creation of a "Jewish State" and an "Arab State" in Palestine, with Jerusalem designated as a corpus separatum - (a separated body)- under a unique international governance. However, to date, only one of these states has been established, which is Israel.

Human | sa únos Ang kalinaw | mobanós; Tápos | sa bagyo Ang huyóhoy | mobaylo Ingon karon | nga búlan: Nga batobaláni | sa katalagman, Pag-alisdan | ra usab Sa taknang | kasadyáan Daw ako | sakayánon Naglayág | sa kagabhion Hiatlan ngadto | sa láwod Sa hánging | naghagurós

My grandmother watches a game show intently. Wide eyes tucked behind loose skin. Skin much tighter in 1966; Ringo’s suit matched the screen.

Each year, World Children’s Day is celebrated on November 20. It was first established in 1954 to promote awareness of children and their welfare. This date holds great significance as it marks the adoption of the Declaration of the Rights of the Child by the UN General Assembly in 1959, as well as the adoption of the Convention on the Rights of the Child In 1989. Thus, November 20 has been commemorated as the anniversary of these milestones.

It's easy to say that there is nothing romantic about toilets. Being the main catalyst in disposing of human waste, it's only rational to find them filthy; the butt of low-effort jokes. What is romantic about pungent smells stirring in humid still air? However, toilets being treated as such leads to a further lack of care in comfort rooms. Only then is there really nothing romantic about toilets.

Gat Jose Rizal once said, “Ang hindi marunong lumingon sa pinanggalingan ay hindi makakarating sa paroroonan.” He who does not look back from where he came will never reach his destination. He who does not know his own history can never move forward to a greater future. As a result, schools do their best to impart history—to commemorate and to memorialize our ancestors and everything that has led up to now. In spite of this, we still fail to include the peoples who have been there since the beginning: our indigenous peoples.

Fantastical tales used to end with “And they lived happily ever after”. But on the internet, they end with “And everyone clapped”.

Contrary to what motivational quotes and posts say, you exist in this universe not for a grand reason. It doesn’t matter if the biggest thing you did today was to wake up or to brush your teeth, or if the most worthwhile thing that you’ve ever done in your life already happened four years ago. You exist because you matter—you exist because the people you love also love you.

You stand up and the room spins—you’re conscious enough to know why. You somehow make your way to the kitchen in the darkest corner of your apartment. You open the cupboards and you are greeted by your stash of instant noodles (you also notice that it’s depleting in number). You grab the spicy flavor because it keeps you full for a longer time compared to the regular one. You open the lid a bit. Reaching over for the thermos, you pour hot water in the cup. You ignore the bolded warning on the packaging that reads “EAT IN MODERATION.” Three minutes pass by. Dinner is served. How does that one taste compared to last night? And the night before that?

My mother peels an orange for my father I never understood why my father loved oranges Father, are your hands so important that you couldn’t lift them? Daughters are never as tolerable But I thought about peeling an orange once And the bitterness of an orange was all I knew Oh Father, where did you go? Mother, should we grow apples in our backyard? Mother, you don’t have to peel oranges anymore

American novelist R.F. Kuang presented a thought in her novel Babel that has remained in my mind ever since the night that I first read it: “Translation means doing violence upon the original, it means warping and distorting it for foreign, unintended eyes. So, where does that leave us? How can we conclude except by acknowledging that an act of translation is always an act of betrayal?” If what Kuang suggested is true and that the act of translation is truly an act of betrayal, then what does that make us—ignorant overconsumers of translation? With how accustomed our current generation is to the effects of globalization, it may be easy to overlook how often we encounter translated content in our daily lives.

“To those accustomed to privilege, equality can feel like oppression.”

The school year is over. It was my first time traveling alone with 2GO Travel, and the first time experiencing a seven-hour delay before arriving at my destination. The vessel had some “technical issues,” so the supposedly night trip went to a day trip instead. I was rereading Jose Rizal’s El Filibusterismo during the waiting hours—just to kill the time—and I was between Chapters 1 to 2 which talks about the bapor tabo. In my experience aboard the Masagana, I noticed an invisible division between passengers inside the hotel-like interior of the vessel and those outside on the upper deck. The delay had caused this division, with passengers inside enjoying amenities while those outside were uncovered to the scorching heat of the sun, the banging sound of machines, and black smoke from the funnel.

In the Philippines, you can be part of the LGBTQ community and be a devoted Catholic but never a chance to experience same-sex marriage or just even a civil union. You can express your gender by wearing what you are comfortable with but people won’t acknowledge your gender identity. You can be gay, lesbian, or any other gender in schools, but you have to conform to what the school thinks is right regarding hair grooming and proper school uniform. You can be gay, but you cannot enjoy and freely make the streets your runway of rainbows. This is the reality that gay people experience in the Philippines: homosexuality is tolerated more than accepted.

University of San Carlos’s BA Literary and Cultural Studies with Creative Writing (BA LCS) was invited to Komunidad Inked Scripts 2024, an event organized by Ayala Malls in Ayala Central Bloc last Saturday, May 25, 2024. An hour was designated to hold a segment for the art of spoken word from 5PM to 6PM, featuring seasoned professionals, poets, students majoring in LCS, and a HUMSS Student from Hulma, the Literature club of USC South Campus on the stage of the Activity Center.

I went to Sto. Niño Mactan Montessori School on May 28 with little idea what this play was about. I was only told moments after the curtains had risen and everything went dark: first, that this was set in 1940’s Bataan, during the Japanese Occupation, and second, that it was a musical. Both were enough to keep me in my seat already.

I enjoy science-fiction, specifically those of the optimistic kind. As an idealist myself, I am deeply interested in a future wherein humanity thrives and technological utopia. Such stories depict a world wherein robots perform all the menial tasks that normally would eat a sizable chunk out of a person’s time and energy, and humanity is then left with whatever artistic passions and scientific developments are gained with such newfound time and energy. How depressing it is then that in reality the robots are making poetry while human people are clocking in at the factory lines.

“All tortoises are in fact turtles—that is, they belong to the order Testudines or Chelonia, reptiles having bodies encased in a bony shell—but not all turtles are tortoises.” —Kathleen Kuiper (from Britannica)

The plan was simple. Visit every single one of the 22 museums participating in this year’s Gabii sa Kabilin, an annual one-night event where museums all across Metro Cebu have their doors open until midnight for people to stop by. In my USC branded tote bag were a plastic water bottle, a Tupperware of Chips Ahoy cookies, a pair of brown khaki shorts, a blue journal riddled with stickers, two black ballpens, my P300 GSK 2024 premium ticket, and an accompanying fold-out brochure. The ticket, which was worth two days of my allotted daily food budget, was required for a class and entailed discounts on food and merch, a one-time tartanilla ride, and free bus rides going to every museum that spanned past Cebu City and into Mandaue, Talisay, and Lapu-Lapu.

Cancer is a peculiar thing, your body is a petri dish for testing different medical treatments and all you have to do is win the battle. I always wondered, after watching and reading a lot about cancer patients, what gave them so much strength to find love amidst the pain and challenges that they undergo everyday. Love can be unconditional and our own way of viewing it can carry a different meaning for many people. When I remember the stories of the people who fought cancer, “A Fault In Our Stars” by John Green comes to mind, a book published in 2012 and the movie was released in 2014 starring Shallene Woodley and Ansel Elgort. A tear-jerking story about two deep-thinking teens with cancer and it is one of the beloved young adult stories in recent history.

Make sure to ready buckets of krill, fish, and squid because we are celebrating World Penguin’s Day!

As the official paper of DCLL of the University of San Carlos, HALANGDON reflects what the word “art” means in all of its programs as the department has plenty of artists in many creative expressions. Communications, Linguistics, Literature—DCLL offers programs for betterment of self-expression. True to our motto, we chose our programs in how we wished for our voices to be heard, and to most of us, art is an outlet to further express our thoughts, no matter how inane, or insane it may be.

SOLARES held its first art festival titled ‘Sulyap sa Sining’ at the Ayala Central Bloc Activity Center, featuring DCLL student writers, painters, filmmakers, and photographers alongside other Cebuano artists in a celebration of artistic expression. The event began its first day on Thursday, April 18, 2024 and is set to conclude today Saturday, April 20. The festival featured a colorful variety of booths selling stickers, pins, art prints, paintings, photographs, books, and other creations by artists found all throughout Cebu.

'Chorizo de Cebu’is a sausage from the Queen City of the South as part of its Spanish Heritage. This famous Philippine delicacy originating from Cebu is a red flavorful bomb made from ground pork fat and pork lean, salt, sugar, black pepper, and chilis, among other ingredients. I could go into great detail of its rich history, but I do not want to turn this article into another Wikipedia entry. I am here for something different, and that is to share my personal experience about these delicious balls of flavor.

Theater has been around for thousands of years and its life-changing power has moved and held humans for that long. It’s a special kind of storytelling because it’s never gonna be the same thing twice and it’s inherently communal – the way things are meant to be in this world. Andrew Russell, the Producing Artistic Director of the Tony Award-winning Intiman Theatre, says that as we experience “wrongness” in real-time, we begin our healing at the same time that it begins for the characters onstage. He calls this a “public moment–” when you are being pulled into the same moment as many others and experiencing it together.

Whether it was through his outspoken commentary on Cebuano Life in DYSS Super Radyo, his witty and fearless writing style in Sunstar Cebu, or his unwavering charisma on top of a voice that commanded respect at the GMA-7 Broadcast, Bobby Nalzaro was an icon that forever stands as an inspiration to all Cebuano journalists.

“She is just a woman.” Not every milestone in history is remembered, as countless stories have faded into obscurity, so too the pain and triumph that defines the life a person has lived. In the case of women, for all their struggles, their pain and hard work, the burden of their own gender often drags them down from the spotlight. Let us go back through history and open the heart-warming chapters of these women’s lives as we celebrate the very International Women’s Month with all the appreciation, gratitude and respect all the women in the world deserves.

“I told you so” are four words that flutter so easily out of my mouth and anyone who knows me even a little is fully aware that I will take any opportunity to vocalize how I was in fact right.

The School of Arts and Science Council conducted a Film Showing event held at the PE Viewing room last February 13, 2024 Tuesday. It is the second in a set of LoveFest events held in anticipation of Valentine’s Day for our hopeless romantic Carolinians.

In honor of Valentine's week, the SAS Council held the Lovefest Seminar on Wednesday, February 12, 2024, at 1:30–4:30 p.m. at the PE viewing room, themed as “Love to the Point of Creation,” it was inspired by the creation of rubber gloves.

100 years ago today, the tenth anniversary of the start of WW1 was four months away. The Philippines, in the middle of its first and second republic was under American rule in the roaring 20s, the Korean Peninsula had been under Japanese rule for over a decade, and Germany's Weimar Republic will arrest Adolf Hitler in the coming month only to release him by December. In three months J.Edgar Hoover will be appointed head of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and a month prior Vladimir Lenin died. The Summer Olympics will be held in Paris and the Chinese Zodiac was the year of the Rat. It was Valentine's Day and Juan Ponce Enrile was born.

Sure enough, people have conflicting feelings towards celebrating on the 14th of February. Regardless if Valentine’s day lifts your spirits high up in the love-filled air or drags you mercilessly down a chilling pithole, a good romance book will never fail you. RomComs, romantic dramas, tragic romances — you name it! So long as one or more of the fictional characters are the epitome of the pure and unconditional love you desire for yourself, then you’re scheduled for the best book date this Valentine’s.

105 DCLL students eagerly welcomed the activity-packed Second Semester following the first General Assembly titled ‘MAGSTORYA TA, KA-SOLARES!: a discourse unfiltered’ of the second half of A.Y. 2023-2024 by the Societas Lingua Artes (SOLARES) held at the SAS Viewing Room at the Philip Van Engelen Building last Saturday, February 3, 2024.

There is a murder — everyone is a suspect. Do you have a good alibi? The clues. The red herrings. The witnesses. The detective. Who’s up for murder mysteries and detective stories that’ll keep you guessing?

A beloved tradition of Catholic Filipinos during the holidays, Misa de Gallo is a nine-day novena mass held at the crack of dawn from December 16 until the eve of Christmas. However, there is another set of masses held by some churches, called Simbang Gabi, which spans from the 16th to the 23rd of December. The two traditions are often confused with each other, but their differences are best understood through their history.

Last Thursday December 7, 2023, the first-year students of the Literary and Cultural Studies with Creative Writing (LCS) held a literary festival on PE13C, alongside a continuation of PALABRA’s Pages and Threads Book Sale in the basement halls of the PE building.

Societatis Lingua Artes (SOLARES), an official co-curricular organization of the Department of Communications, Linguistics, and Literature (DCLL), conducted its second general assembly to discuss their accomplishments for the first semester of A.Y. 2023-2024 at the Rigney Hall in USC Talamban Campus last Saturday, December 2, 2023.

Of no doubt, we strive and seek quality, fairness, and order. The quality and the luxury of receiving such materials that do not only aid us in survival but also allow us to experience the finesse of what we desire to have being treated with fairness and genuine treatment to every person we know and to get to know yet with our uniqueness and very self. The order and union with every person we are with through every journey and situation However, not all have experienced these kinds of treatments. Not all experience equality, justice, and peace. And most of them, sadly, are women.

Dearly beloved we are all gathered here today to mourn for a dear companion. A sorrowful demise but to those that knew the departed well, not an unexpected one. Join me as I detail my personal experience witnessing the final days of a friend. This is a eulogy to Litfest.

Sponsored by the National Commission for Culture and the Arts (NCCA) and in cooperation with the Department of Communications, Linguistics and Literature (DCLL) as well as various other academic organizations, the conference was held with the intention of educating Carolinians on how local food and cuisine influences Visayan Societies.

Picture this, I sit on a crowded 13C jeepney on the way to Colon and I use "sit" very generously because three quarters of my rear end are sat upon nothing but air molecules. The anachronistic hands of my tablet's clock app read 2:00PM, the horizon remained to be tinted blue with orange bronze hues a few hours from engulfing the sky. The museum closes at 4:30PM, forty minutes had passed and the jeep had only just now passed Country Mall, this is bad.

Sa atubangan sa USC, atong makita ang Ferlic Tan's Crispy Chicken, usa ka pungko-pungko nga namaligya ug mga piniritong pagkaon sama sa manok. Naa sad silay baligya piniritong hotdog, ngohiong, ug lumpiya. Lami ug makabusog ang ilang mga paninda, sama kalami pud ang iyang presyo nga barato para sa tanan. Apan gawas nga kini lugar nga sentro sa pagkaon, usa usab kini ka lugar diin ang usa ka istorya nagsugod nga gitipigan.

The Department of Anthropology, Sociology, and History (DASH) hosted a film viewing event as part of the Rudolf Rahmann Lecture Series, titled "Short Films and Its Relevance to Cebuano Culture and Society Featuring Huwebes Huwebes and Sibuyas ni Perfecto." Along with the faculty and students of the DASH, film media students from Cebu Normal University, specifically from the school organization CiNe-U, as well as several students from other departments of the School of Arts and Sciences were also present.

We all have that one place we come back to for studying and for fun, whether it be with friends our ourselves. Just in time for Midterms week, Here are the best near TC has to offer, arranged by yours truly: Halangdon!

To commemorate this year's World Mental Health Day, let us journey inside the mind labyrinth of Disney-Pixar's most cerebral film, Inside Out. In the year 2015, Inside Out was best known for its creative setting of little voices inside our heads, representing our emotions; joy, sadness, anger, disgust, and fear.

USC-TC—School of Arts and Sciences (SAS) Council conducted its traditional Pep Rally 2023 to send off SAS Majesties athletes for the USC Days 2023 at the Philip Van Engelen Building – Open Theatre in Talamban Campus around 4-6 p.m., Friday, October 6.

Pulong sa mga Alagad sa Obra (PALABRA) finally held an intimate and cozy assembly for the academic year 2023-2024 on September 30, 2023. Led by Jason Yntig, the PALABRA president, and the event’s host, Joshua Carillo, the treasurer for PALABRA and 2nd year representative. Yntig officially began the program by giving his sincerest warm welcome to all Lit majors present, which was then followed by the introduction of this academic year’s PALABRA officers.

Big Bad Wolf (BBW) howled early access last September 14, 2023, Thursday, at Lower Ground Level, Cube Wing, Seaside SM City Cebu. Pulong sa mga Alagad sa Obra (PALABRA) of Bachelors of Arts in Literary and Cultural Students with Creative Writing from University of San Carlos hunted the wolf at his very own lair! Awo~ 

On September 23, the Department of Communications, Linguistics and Literature (DCLL) hosted an online Press Freedom Week Talk in commemoration of Cebu’s 31st Press Freedom Week, with the title, “Through the Watchdog’s Eyes: Involvement and Challenges.”

Matalinghaga ang mga Pilipino, mahilig sila sa mga mabulaklak na pananalita, sila'y isang mala-tula na tao. Kahit ano man ang pinag uusapan, sa mga karaniwang bagay-bagay hanggang sa mga pinaka matindi't mabigat na usapan, lumalabas talaga ang espiritu ni Balagtas. At ano pa bang makaraniwan ngunit mabigat ang mas nakaka higit pa sa kamatayan.

Last September 1 and 2, in partnership with the Unified Artists of Cebu under the guidance of the National Commission for Culture and the Arts, the Cebuano Studies Center held its Zoom conference to give a platform to various Visayan various theater and dramatic arts groups.

Did you know that blueberries grow naturally in the Philippines too? A new species was even discovered here in Cebu back in 2018 by Sir Val Salares under the University of San Carlos’ Department of Biology, alongside his team of researchers from other universities.

On September 1, Societatis Lingua Artes (SOLARES) President Remoto teased future activities and events for the first semester of the academic year to the Department of Communication Linguistics and Literature (DCLL) student body at this year’s General Assembly.

The movie Oppenheimer, which first aired in Philippine Cinemas on July 19, 2023, depicts the journey that J. Robert Oppenheimer took to design the first ever nuclear bomb. The physicist’s legacy with nuclear fission is a scientific milestone of destructive potential, something the world understood well when the first atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima and ended World War 2.

This National Heroes Day, Halangdon would like to spotlight some of the Filipino women throughout history and the different forms of heroism they have shown throughout their lives.

On August 21, 1983, thousands flocked to the Manila International Airport, all wearing yellow clothes and tying yellow ribbons to the surrounding trees following the song “Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Old Oak Tree.” It was all to welcome an exile who to them was the strongest resistor to an unjust regime that ruled the country for many years. Who, despite the warnings of family and friends, returned to his homeland knowing the dangers that await him. As he stood before the oppressions of the Martial Law Regine before, he would rather die on his feet with honor than live on bended knees in shame.

As the earth rumbles our buildings and homes could only sway in its mercy. They are caused by extensive cracks along the Earth's surface called "faults" or "fault lines", displaced by the constantly moving hot layer underneath called the "Mantle". The result is a massive movement or upheaval of the Earth's surface and unprecedented human casualties. These are earthquakes, and they happen all around the world, in some places more so than the others. The Philippines is one of such places.

To start the new academic year, the Societatis Lingua Artes (SOLARES) held their first-ever Academic Orientation last August 15, 2023, at the School of Arts and Sciences Open Theater. The orientation was attended by the students of the Department of Communication Linguistics and Literature (DCLL) from the freshmen to the seniors, together with the DCLL faculty members.

Woven intricately into Visayan culture—tagay has become a cherished social and recreational activity of the Visayan (Cebuano) people where friends and family come together to enjoy alcoholic beverages at clubs and karaoke sessions. While it did not exist in the same manner in the past, the culture of drinking can be traced back to pre-colonial times, taking on different forms and cultural significance throughout history.