WHY SINIGANG?

BY: DOREEN G. FERNANDEZ

Rather than the overworked adobo ( so identified as the Philippine stew in foreign cookbooks), sinigang seems to me the dish most representative of Filipino taste. We like the lightly boiled, the slightly soured, the dish that includes fish (or shrimp or meat) vegetables and broth. It is adaptable to all tastes ( if you don‘t like shrimp, then bangus, or pork), to all classes and budgets, (even ayungin, in humble little piles, find their way into the pot), and to seasons and availability (walang talong, mahal ang gabi, kangkong na lang).

But why? Why does sinigang find its way to bare dulang, to formica-topped restaurant booth, to gleaming ilustrado table? Why does one like anything at all? How is a people‘s taste shaped?

But still, why soured? Aside from the fact that sour broths are cooling in hot weather, could it be perhaps because the dish is meant to be eaten against the mild background of rice? Easy to plant and harvest, and allowing more than one crop a year, rice is ubiquitous on the landscape.

One can picture our ancestors settling down beside their rivers and finally tuning to the cultivation of fields, with rice as one of the first steady crops.

RICE Rice to us is more than basic cereal, for as

constant background, steady accompaniment; it is also the shaper of other foods, and of tastes. We not only sour, but also salt (daing, tuyo, bagoong) because the blandness of rice suggests the desirability of sharp contrast.

Rice can be ground into flour and thus the proliferation of puto; the mildly sweet Putong Polo, the banana leaf-encased Manapla variety; puto filled with meat or flavored with ube; puto in cakes or wedges, white or brown eaten with dinuguan or salabat.

THE GREENERY The landscape also offers the vines, shrubs,

fields, forests and trees from which comes the galaxy of gulay with which we are blest all year round. ―Back home, an American friend commented.

All we use from day to day are peas, carrots, potatoes, cabbage, and very few others.

The dietarily uninhibited Filipino, on the other hand, recognizes the succulence of roots (gabi, ube, kamote); the delicacy and flavor of leaves (pechay, dahong bawang, kintsay, pako, malunggay) and tendrils (talbos ng ampalaya, kalabasa, sayote); the bounty of fruits (not only upo ad kalabasa, talong and ampalaya, but also desserts like langka and banana, which double as vegetables. ; and the excitement of flowers like katuray and kalabasa.

Guide Questions:1. How can you describe the Philippine

traditions you read in the essay? 2. Why is it important to know our own

traditions and values as Filipinos to further establish our identity as Asians?

3. Are traditions common among Asian and African countries? Explain briefly.

AN INFORMATIVE ARTICLE An informative article gives the reader

unbiased facts about a topic. An informative article provides the readers with details on a given topic. The informative article is not an argumentative article that tries to persuade the reader to one side or the other. It covers all the pertinent details: who, what, when, where and why. Newspaper reporting uses informative articles; how-to articles represent another category

Tips for Writing an Informative Article by Lakshmi Menon

How to write an informative article? Writing an article is not that difficult as you think. The following tips can help you in writing an informative article:

1. Write about what you really know. Before writing, do a search and find out some more details to polish your knowledge on the selected topic. You can find details about anything on the internet, using a search engine.

2. Please remember the vital point that many of your readers may already know more details than you about the topic you are writing. Therefore, write about the topic you have sufficient knowledge about.

3. People will be more interested to know how you sorted out a particular problem when you had faced one. A well written article about solving your own problem will be more useful to the readers. Many of them would have faced a similar problem and your information will be of immense help to them.

4. Remember to leave enough white space in between your paragraphs. You may wonder why it should be. Reading the matter on the monitor is different from reading on the printed page. It causes eye strain and for some people neck pain also. The other main reason is that many of our readers will be senior citizens, who will be looking for various information. Hence, it is better to see that your article is senior citizen-friendly, which means easy for them to read.

5. Try to write small paragraphs, which is easy to read. Most of the people will be just scanning the matter within a short time. Therefore, the smaller the paragraph the easier to read. Just place yourself in that position. How many times have you read long articles on the net? I do agree that we take time to read long articles when they are highly important to our need. Otherwise, on a routine basis, more people read only smaller articles.

6. After writing your article, read it at least 3-5 times, and if necessary read once aloud. It helps you to find the mistakes in your articles. Then you can revise your article appropriately.

Complete the Generalization Chart you answered at the beginning.

My initial thoughts

My findings and corrections

Supporting evidence

Qualifying conditions

My generalizations.

AssignmentYour municipality/city is hosting the 1st Asia-Africa

Cultural Summit. As the head of the promotional activities for the event, the City Tourism Council intends to put up an exhibit dubbed as ―Taste Asia, Taste Africa‖ as a welcome treat to the summit delegates. As a member of the well acclaimed group of event organizers, you are being tasked to prepare an exhibit of informative write-ups with multimedia support showcasing the different traditions and values of selected Afro-Asian countries. Your output will be evaluated on the quality of information presented, creativity, relevance to the theme and visual impact