Rafe Bartholomew (right) with Jude Turcuato (Photo by Bhenj Agustin)
This should be on Tripadvisor or Lonely Planet if it isn’t already: You know you’re in the Philippines when you see a basketball court in every barangay.
Indeed, Filipinos are so smitten by the sport – just ask Rafe Bartholomew, author of the best-selling book-turned-movie “Pacific Rim” and the three part docu-diary “Pinoy Hoops” on National Geographic Channel.
“In the Philippines, (the image of) basketball stars are plastered on (public) jeeps. Some have all basketball, some just the NBA logo, some put Lebron James… some of the courts we’ve visited, the people we’ve spoke to, really made me see more sides to what basketball means in the country,” he said in an interview.
“Oh, yes, and even some of the saints are dressed in jersey.”
Filmed in two years, the docu-diary will ultimately talk about the indefatigable Filipino spirit. Bartholomew particularly noted how kids would “bang a hole in the ground” just to put a ring up.
“This desire to play and serve your goal… to brave your goals in life… it’s just ingenuity – that ability to innovate and come up with solutions where you don’t have a lot to work with – that’s very nice to see and definitely represented through basketball,” Bartholomew said.
He added that as far as this project goes, the ever-hospitable Filipinos made him “look good,” made the job easy for him. Bartholomew was so at home in the country that he was confident enough to take public commute and even go to places “where a lot of people told me not to go” in order to present an outsider’s point of view of the people’s obsession for hoops.
“It’s a rough environment (sometimes) but that doesn’t mean people will get you. I was safe in this country and you know, no matter where we went, we just found really positive people and bonded with them.”
According to a release, some of the places that Bartholomew visited were Caloocan City where a basketball court was erected atop an old burned abandoned building; Paete in Laguna province where, rumor has it, that in the past, NPA and military used to play basketball together; and Payatas where locals play the ball despite the unpleasant circumstance.
“Pinoy Hoop’s” first installment will air on Oct. 21 at 9 p.m.
Hoops, there it is!
Source: Mb.com.ph (October 14, 2013 at 12:56PM)
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