Dare to Care: Four Step Skin Care RegiMEN
Among other things, skin is yet another differentiator between men and women. For starters, men are genetically thick-faced. Their skin is 20% thicker than women’s skin. Men also have larger pores, and more facial and body hair. Also, men do not glow as women do, they s-w-e-a-t.
Article by By Ana Santos
All these are reasons why men need to take special care of their skin and use products that are specifically formulated for a man.
If you’re a regular Joe whose skin care regimen is good old soap and water—or worse, you just use the soap your girlfriend or wife uses—it’s time to declare a “men’s section” in your bathroom for your own version of the deeply respected mantra: Cleanse, Tone, Moisturize.
More after the jump.
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Behind the Scenes: Going Back to the 70s with Kamikazee!
A behind the scenes look of the video shoot of Kamikazee’s latest single, ‘Hanggang Tingin’.
Words and photos by Denise J. Mallabo
When I arrived in a studio somewhere in Cubao around 11am, the video shoot for Kamikazee’s latest single ‘Hanggang Tingin’ was already in full swing. As far as experience goes, this was an early call time for musicians since gigs would always finish in the wee hours of the morning. Never the less the production and the band wasted no time. Production designers Wiji Lacsamana and Hannah Liongoren did an awesome job turning maybe two pieces of plywood into a whole house! Complete with Led Zeppelin, Jimmy Hendrix posters and other nostalgic fixtures. The music video’s director Denise Castillo said it was based on the hit sitcom That 70’s Show, which made Ashton Kutcher and Topher Grace popular. “Kumuha kami ng scenes from the show na favorite nung boys tapos gumawa kami ng sarili naming version,” said Denise. (In fact the production team behind the shoot had to borrow a red Mustang instead a Vista Cruiser which was not available.) “May parts din na may disco scene. For the performance mala KISS naman yung dating pero medyo uuhhmmm jologs ha ha!”
Every Kamikazee video that’s been released, there’s always something peculiar to look forward to—be it the boisterous dance sequences or the unexpected drama but personally. Personally, I’d go for the cameos. In the past, they’ve had stars like Rica Peralejo, Kaye Abad, Ping Medina and band friends like Parokya ni Edgar and Concrete Sam. This time they went all out. For this one, there’s comedian Nova Villa doing a pseudo make-out scene with drummer and UNO illustrator Allan Burdeos. Folk singer Freddie Aguilar took time off to do a quick scene with the boys who were star struck upon seeing him enter the room. UNO girl and Turbo Goth front woman Sarah Gaugler appeared as the “Jackie” from That 70s Show. There are still more familiar faces but I’ll let you find the rest (Clue: there’s a contributing photographer and a Managing Editor of a certain magazine who dressed in authentic jeproks outfits, dancing there…somewhere) .
The song ‘Hanggang Tingin’ can be found in Kamikazee’s latest album Long Time Noisy under Universal Records. It’s out now in your favorite record bars; do grab a copy of the original album, the entire packaging is definitely worth it.
An Excerpt from Waking the Dead
Waking the Dead, Yvette Tan’s first collection of short ficton will be launched on August 15, 2009, 4pm at Powerbooks Megamall. The collection contains published short fiction, some of them award-winning. The book was illustrated by the great, the wonderful, the talented Andrew Drilon.
The Bridge
“It’s magnificent here.”
I could hear the Madame’s voice as I approached the balcony.
“You simply must come over,” she was saying. “I could throw a party and have the crème de la crème of society flown over. It will be magnificent.”
I could see her on the balcony, sitting prettily on one of the garden chairs, talking on a little white telephone with a red hand piece and a clown’s face in the middle where the numbers should be. There was no cord to be seen. It wasn’t connected to anything. My first thought was, has the Madame gone mad?
“I’ve brought him with me,” the Madame continued. “He’s such a dear to be around, though the locals are wary of him.” She paused, then continued, laughing, “But oh the money I save on phone bills!”
I laid out her food, my eyes on her hands, which cradled the phone as if it was a baby. If I could wish for anything in the world, it would be to have hands like hers, skin like hers. I found myself wondering what she would look like without her bouffant and her butterfly-sleeved dresses, without her armor. Would she be like Aling Gloria, at ease in whatever was handed to her, not letting anything, even good fortune, change her ways? Would she be like Nanay, a frail survivor who would do anything for the sake of her family? Or would she be like Ate, who wanted the world to love her, who believed that the key to a good life lay in the beauty she was blessed with, and unconsciously lorded it over everyone else?
“I have to go now,” the Madame was saying. “Talk to you soon.” She turned to me. “Ija,” she said. “Do you know what this is?”
“It’s a telephone, Madame,” I said.
“It’s a toy telephone,” the Madame said. “But I can use it as if it were a real one. It’s one of Ronnie’s powers.” She put the phone on the table and took my hand. I shivered as her hands closed over my own, reveling as their smoothness closed over my small rough one. “I can tell you’re like him. What can you do?”
I looked at her. She was staring intently at me, her lovely dark eyes trying to see what was behind mine. Even though all the adults treated me as if I was an older child, the Madame was the first one to talk to me as if I was an adult.
“Sometimes,” I said, “I see and hear things others don’t. I dream things, know things that I shouldn’t know. Sometimes, I know things even before they happen.” This wasn’t a boast. To boast would be to add that sometimes, Mang Ambo, the local albulario, came to me when he had a patient whose sickness was too stubborn to cure, or when he couldn’t reason with the entities that were causing trouble to some of the folks that sought his help. I never liked it when Mang Ambo asked me to talk to them; they were always asking me to go off with them, to travel to a place with no worries, no cares. A place not even the Madame has dreamed of. But even that would not be boasting, because it was all true.
“How do you know these things?” she asked.
I shrugged. “Sometimes, they tell me. Sometimes, I just know.”
“They?”
“Ate Tina and Kuya Chris,” I said. “They were supposed to be my brother and sister, except Ate Tina decided to leave early, and when Kuya Chris came along, he decided to join her. They asked me to come along but I said no, because I knew that Nanay would be sad.”
“I see,” she said absently, as if she already knew the answers but wanted to hear them from me. I remembered snatches of a conversation my parents had, something about the Madame and her husband knowing everything about everyone in the country. “So now you can read minds, predict the future.”
I looked down at my feet, dark from being under the sun and dirty from being in the dust all day. I’m dirtying the Madame’s floor, I thought.
The Madame squeezed my hand. I looked up at her again. She was smiling. “What am I thinking of right now?” she asked.
“The bridge,” I answered.
I felt a jolt, a current that ran through her, up her arms, to her hands and into mine, all crackly blue and green. And then it hit me. What the boy was saying, what he had been trying to tell me.
I pulled my hand away from hers and ran back down to the kitchen, forgetting to take the tray with me.
ACER Timeline Size Comparison
ACER sent us their latest line of notebooks, the Timeline. The design philosophy for this new line inculcates a discless portable computer in an era where USB flash drives are more commonly used than CD’s or DVD’s.
We have a little size comparison vs. the current line of MacBooks (the one I own) and as you can see, in terms of size, the Timeline and unibody MacBook are almost the same in terms of dimensions, except that ACER wedged the end of their unit by just a wee bit to make it easier to type. In terms of weight, the Timeline is significantly lighter as well. Of course, you have to take into account that the MacBook was able to cram a DVD writer inside its beautiful aluminum body.
We have a pretty comprehensive review of the ACER Timeline up against the MSI X-Slim and the “industry standard” MacBook Air inside the pages of our July issue. Do grab a copy of our July 2009 issue when it hits the stands. If you’re planning on getting a next generation discless laptop, you may want to check the full review out.
Team Manila’s “Sisa” Shirt takes Yahoo! Messenger approach
There’s a rather cool partnership between Yahoo! Philippines and Team Manila. The city-wide Project Purple Hunt that spawns forth kick ass prizes such as mobile phones, purple Krispy Kreme Donuts, and a graffiti-ed Honda Jazz now introduces their latest PR move — fashion.
These are limited edition shirts in two designs, both have cuts for men and women. Shirts sell for P550.00 and are available starting today.
If you’ve been a good grade school student, you probably tackled that required reading from school — your Noli and Fili. Sisa is the mother of Crispin and Basilio who goes bonkers after knowledge of their slaughter, convent walls bloodstained with their blood.
A little dark humor there for Team Manila and Yahoo! Philippines.
Ice Cream Bar: Out in the Cold
A cool, but non-pretentious place to bring a first time date who you want to get to know better. At the ice cream bar, you can sit back, relax and enjoy each other’s company over your favorite ice cream flavors. If they say that alcohol loosens the tongue, ice cream indulgence has a somewhat similar drop down your defenses effect, without the dreaded morning after hang over.
Since they open till late at night on Fridays and Saturdays, the Ice Cream Bar is quick getaway for a midnight snack for a sugar rush to satisfy a nocturnal craving for ice cream.
The Ice Cream Bar
Joya at Rockwell, South Tower
Joya Drive (between Plaza Drive and Estrella Street)
Tel: +632 403-0891
Words by Ana Santos
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RevYOU: Sony Ericsson W760i Walkman Phone
Made available in the latter part of 2009’s first quarter, the Sony Ericsson W760i Walkman stands by the elegance and functionality that we expected from the Japanese. Compared to other spec-heavy phones out there with maxed out cameras and touch screens, the W760i brings together the good old fashioned features that work, while subtly adding a bit of new technology without screaming too loud at about P16,000.00.
I’ve had this phone for roughly a month and a half, a little bit before it came out to the retail spaces. Here are my thoughts
What’s to like:
Camera: This isn’t a megapixel war. It’s a war on clear photos, and the humble 3.2MP camera beats most of the higher end competition. Remember, a good camera phone
Tracker: In the Philippines, I never really found a good use for a GPS tracking device for navigating the streets of Makati. The W760i comes with built in GPS and A-GPS (assisted GPS) which is put to practical use by a built in application called Tracker. If you’re the type who uses a Nike+ to run
Sound: It’s a Walkman isn’t it? The W760i comes with two booming stereo speakers that are very visible on the front face of the phone.
Track ID: This is a new feature available in most music phones. It goes by different names but it does one very interesting thing — your phone becomes a mini Gracenote DB. When a song is playing on the radio, you can turn on Track ID to let your phone listen to the track sample. It then connects to the Internet and matches the song with the artist name and song title.
What needed improvement:
Earphones set up: I always found it frustrating that whenever Sony Ericsson advertised a phone under the “Walkman” brand it would mean that the unit should come with a 3.5mm jack. This is a half truth — most entry to mid range SE Walkman phones do come with good 3.5mm earphones but the jack doesn’t plug straight into the phone. Rather, the headphones have to go through an adapter (the same slot for the charger) and not directly to the unit. If you lose the adapter, you’re screwed.
For the price you pay, you get a very good music phone that’s built to last. Perhaps my only gripe is the exclusion of WiFi, but that obviously wasn’t the target of Sony Ericsson. But you know what, I can go rambling on all day about this phone — I want to hear what you think, and get your name and review published on the tech section of the magazine!
If you own a Sony Ericsson W760i, this page is for you.
We’re building a new section in UNO and it’s kicking off with tech. Going online presents new possibilities in marrying the joys of sexy, printed paper with the here-and-now of the Internet. We call this section RevYOU and it builds heavily on the wisdom of many people who own a particular piece of technology — yet oftentimes don’t agree with the one guy who wrote the gadget review on the glossy. So yeah, as both UNO’s tech editor and online editor I thought of bringing the community of readers together to review a particular product and come June ‘09, I’m going to compile and publish this inside the magazine — with your name beside the one liners of user experience you have with the Sony Ericsson W760i. Tell us what you like about it. Tell us what you don’t like about it — you can use the comments section at the bottom of this page.
And please, put your real name, a valid email address and if you have one, a blog — because we’re going to raffle off something as well before we go to print 
If you want to leave more than one comment, then go ahead — but remember, each answer must be unique!
Rocky Balboa: Yes We Can!
A Tribute to a Great American Hero
Ushered in by Obama becoming the U.S.A.’s 44th President, the present era has been touted as one for heroes. To be specific, American ones. But before anything else, we look back and pay tribute to one of their greatest champions, whose body of work has brought us all together to celebrate one man beating the shit out of another. Not to mention very short shorts for heterosexual men.
Best Inspirational Speech:
Rocky Balboa. Funnily enough my favorite inspirational speech comes from a character that was in all the movies yet hardly plays a significant role—it’s Duke, Apollo Creed’s former manager, played by Tony Burton. By this time Rocky is once again the underdog, a total has-been who is almost a joke to his fans and the generation of boxers he inspired. He is facing his mortality, his old age, and his uselessness. He decides to go against current heavyweight champ Mason Dixon, and everyone expects him to go down early in the fight. Before he begins training, Duke tells him how it’s gonna be done —
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Sexy is the City: All New 2009 Honda City
Honda has been quite busy for the past few years. They ran their Formula 1 team until the end of the 2008 season, built a humanoid named Asimo, and even launched the HondaJet aircraft. Closer to home, they’ve been putting together the pieces of the 2009 Honda City.
There were speculations that Honda would take a daring step, possibly an imaginative concept car? When spy images of the new City leaked out in late 2008, it was clear Honda did indeed take that leap of faith. And it paid off—the 2009 Honda City is oozing with so much sex appeal that it somehow makes up for the previous generation City’s somewhat goofy styling.
The new City’s front facia looks as if it was inspired from one of the characters of Star Wars or Transformers although the car’s project leader said it was actually inspired by the arrows used by Greek archers. The car’s streamlined grille and angular headlight lenses gives this subcompact designed for the Asian market an illusion of size. This sleek look extends over the rising roofline and past the stubby rear end, giving it a more masculine stance. Even with a shorter trunk, the new City is over a thumbnail longer than its previous generation and boasts of a 506-liter trunk capacity. The new City now bares similar lines to its bigger brothers, the Civic and the Accord.
Not only does the new City look big on the outside, it also feels roomy inside. By extending the wheelbase, designers managed to extend the rear legroom by a remarkable 25 millimeters. That might not sound like much but it could mean the difference between a comfortable ride and a regrettable one for someone vertically gifted.
Weapon of Choice
The City’s 1.3-liter and 1.5-liter i-VTEC engines produce a whopping 100 PS and 120 PS respectively—astonishing figures from relatively small displacements. Remember the Honda Civic ESi from the early ‘90s? It needed 1.6 liters to produce the same output as the City’s 1.5-liter powerplant.
Drivers of the City are assured of loads of fun especially with the 1.5-liter engine, which transmits power to the wheels through a 5-speed automatic transmission with F1-inspired paddle shifters. Despite the high output, both City engines are fuel-efficient and pass Euro 4 standards for emissions.
All City variants come with Anti-lock Brake System (ABS), EBD (Electronic Brake Distribution), and Brake Assist (BA). In addition, 1.3 S and the 1.5 E models are equipped with an iPod-ready sound system and dual SRS airbags. Only the 1.5 E gets fog lamps, side mirror turn lamps, 4-wheel disk brakes, plus the exclusive “Polished Metal” color (as shown in the showroom pictures).
A few years ago, people bought the City simply because they couldn’t afford a Civic. But the third generation City has now made a mark for itself and is no longer a mere second option. The new City is breaking barriers with its impressive standard equipment and striking looks—just what it needs to go up against the big boys.
Prices start at P 676,000 for the 1.3-liter model and P 806,000 for the 1.5-liter model.
Story and photos by Christopher T. Kho, originally appearing in UNO’s March 2009 issue. Showroom photos were taken at Honda Cars Shaw.
Sounds of 1989: The Dawn, Tears for Fears, XTC
Luis wrote this piece back in January ‘09 for our music issue. “The Sounds of 1989″ talks about a rock critic’s personal look back at the music of the tail end of the 80’s.
1989 was a ridiculously good year for music — this was the year of the Pixies’ Doolittle, New Order’s Technique, The Cure’s Disintegration, Elvis Costello’s Spike, the Cowboy Junkies’ Trinity Sessions, and releases by the Beastie Boys, De La Soul, The Wedding Present, even Madonna and Lisa Stansfield and that Batman soundtrack by Prince, and oh let’s not forget Nirvana’s Bleach.
My musical tastes were still forming — it was not too long before 1989 that my choice of listening fare was limited to a Justice League story cassette and Snoopy turn-the-page-while-you-listen audio books — but this was a landmark year for me in terms of finding music I would love ’til this day. Here’s a personal list of my choices for the best albums from 1989:
XTC - ORANGES AND LEMONS
It was “The Mayor of Simpleton” that started it all for me — and by “it all” I mean my long-term, ongoing love affair with the band XTC, an affair marked by giddy heights, occasional disappointments, incomprehension or outright disapproval from some and kindred understanding in others, and lots of waiting in between releases. “The Mayor of Simpleton” was the perfect gateway drug, so to speak, to XTC: insanely catchy and sonically rich, with clever-funny lyrics, and yet a sincere sentimental heart underneath. (I have since read that it’s not really one of the band’s favorites, but oh well. They were really useless at choosing their own singles.) Most of the rest of the album is no less impressive: perfect pop like “The Loving” and “King for a Day” and, oh my God, “Chalkhills and Children,” which still has the power to float me off into a wondrous womblike dreamland. I lent this to a girl in high school who loved the stranger, less poppy stuff on it (”Poor Skeleton Steps Out,” for example, and “President Kill”), which caused me to fall for her a little bit. Despite the fact that it inspired a band name that still makes me wince, this album is still one of my favorites.
TEARS FOR FEARS - THE SEEDS OF LOVE
Having grown up in the 80s, I was, of course, a Tears for Fears fan already by the time this came out. I heard the “Sowing the Seeds of Love” single first, and found it a great slice of Beatlesque pop (nice video, too). But I was not quite prepared for how much I ended up liking the entire album, from the affecting, anti-patriarchal, Oleta Adams-enhanced “Woman in Chains” to the heart-stopping, romantic apocalyptic “Famous Last Words,” with stops at the charming and wistful “Advice for the Young at Heart” and the arena-rocking “Year of the Knife” along the way. Their first two albums were excellent, but I have to admit, this is probably my favorite. I remember thinking then — “How are they ever going to top this?” So of course they broke up. (They’re back together doing tours now though, a fact which some enterprising local concert promoter should exploit.) Is it too embarrassing to admit that I used to play this in my bedroom with the lights off, singing along to “Famous Last Words” while wallowing in teenage angst? It is? Okay, I won’t then.
THE DAWN - BEYOND THE BEND / LIVE
The Dawn’s Beyond the Bend was the first album I ever reviewed in my life, and my first experience with getting my writing misinterpreted as well — funny how those two go together. I liked the album quite a lot, but I also pointed out that a couple of the songs fell flat for me (I was never a big fan of “R.T.Y.D. (Rock Till You Drop),” for example). Also, I may have opined that the last album was better — as, you know, effing critics are wont to do. So after the review came out in the school paper, one of my high school classmates got pissed off at me for dissing The Dawn. Which was not my point really. Anyway, perhaps even more significant to me was The Dawn’s Live album, largely because I was in the audience when the thing was recorded, in the cheap seats with four friends (one of whom is dead now, but not because of that concert), trying not to get hit as fights kept breaking out between the drug addicts in our section. The live recording of “Little Paradise” — or rather, my memory of the live recording of “Little Paradise,” since my Live cassette is long gone — still chokes me up a little bit. Finally, it was thanks to The Dawn’s influence that my friends and I donned straw hats and tsinelas and performed “Magtanim Ay ‘Di Biro” for a Filipino class presentation. Thanks, The Dawn!
THE STONE ROSES - THE STONE ROSES
In a way, I owe my musical education (such as it is) to the British Council — the old British Council in New Manila, specifically Mang Fred with his stack of under-the-counter issues of Melody Maker. (This is why I was nose-deep in Britpop when most of my friends were whipping their heads back and forth to grunge.) I still miss the Maker, with its wonderfully hyperbolic album reviews. It was thanks to a review of The Stone Roses’ debut that I sought this cassette out — I believe the adjective “Godlike” had been used, as well as the exhortation to quit one’s job and spend a week just listening to the damn thing over and over. I didn’t have a job to quit, but I must have cut a few classes while giving my full attention to this guitartastic, rhythmlicious, neo-psychefunky classic. (Yes, it’s so good I have to invent words to describe it.) Considering the seemingly effortless way they just whipped out this masterpiece, it’s kind of amazing — amazing in a bad way, that is — that it took them five years to follow it up, with a real stinker of a sophomore slump called Second Coming. Can’t deny the awesomeness of their debut though.
THE BLUE NILE - HATS
I came across The Blue Nile some time after 1989, which explains why I got it on CD instead of cassette. (Younger readers may wonder about the differences between these musical formats I speak of — never mind, not important now.) It was, again, thanks to a review that I picked this up — this time, a review in Rolling Stone, a review that did not bestow five or even four stars out of five on it, but did have this evocative line: “The band uses instruments masterfully to convey feelings: Synthesizers breathe warmth, a wan trumpet paints late-night downtown scenes, understated percussion registers like the beat of a heart.” Lovely. It sounded like something I would appreciate, and so the next time I confronted the unfriendly salespeople of the now-gone CD Warehouse, I asked for this. I’m glad I did. Years later, and it still serves as a perfect soundtrack for moonlit urban longing, for a certain sort of sweet desolation. Whenever I meet somebody and learn that they love this album too, I’m almost always sure that I’ve found a new friend.
// Luis Katigbak
