features
by Sherwin Dane Haro San Jose, Antique, Philippines January 16, 2021 As far as character arcs go, “varsity chess player” to “mixed martial artist” to “seminarian” to “pastor” to “HAPI Executive Director” might be as wild as it gets, and yet that’s exactly the route that the man on today’s Spotlight, Alvin John “AJ” Ballares, […]
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Sherwin Dane Haro Nov. 3, 2020 San Jose, Antique, Philippines Audio narration by Shane Haro All too often, we hear stories about people who experience a painful childhood and come out the other side too broken to ever enact positive change in the world. Mutya Valenzuela, HAPI Board of Trustees member and one of the […]
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Shane Haro June 2020 Antique When it comes to HAPI affairs, you’ll find that Chief Financial Officer and Branding Head Edwin “Dweng” Bulaclac, Jr. is strictly no-nonsense. It says a lot that community quarantine has only sharpened his focus rather than dull it, with HAPI’s recent PPE Mobilization Drive to Benefit Frontliners and Farmers’ Relief […]
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In a culture dominated by religiosity, overt superstition, and fake news, it takes a truly ballsy person to fight against the noise. While pushing for secularism is by no means a competition, Marissa Torres Langseth, HAPI Founder and Chairperson Emeritus, was the first to openly advocate for a more secular Philippines in the public stage. […]
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Let us hear from a millennial from NYC, USA and also my neighbor for over 18 years in Fresh Meadows, Queens, USA about love and courage. Aman was raised in the Sikh faith, in a multiethnic family, with ancestral roots in Sikhism, Islam and Catholicism. At a tender age of 18, Aman has traveled far […]
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Photo: George Calvelo/ABS-CBN News In light of the divided consensus over the Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity and Expression (SOGIE) Equality Bill in the Senate and the recent brouhahas surrounding transgender woman Gretchen Diez, it’s occurred to me that there is now a greater pushback towards the LGBTQ+ community in the Philippines than ever before. […]
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Typhoon Ruby is headed our way and already I see dozens of Facebook posts urging people to pray that it will be deflected, for God to spare the country, and so on. If the effectivity of prayers that came before past super typhoons are any indication, I doubt if the results would be any different this time around. Not that […]