Features

Mahmoud Khalla survived the only way his family did not. He had stepped out to find food the evening a strike brought down the five-story building where his household lived — when he came back, there was no building left to return to, only the kind of silence that doesn’t… Read more

Every October, the streets of MacArthur Highway fill with loud beats, flashing lights, steam rising from food stalls, and the clink of cold beers. Organizers, members, and volunteers rebuild stages along Balibago, hanging colorful, rectangular banners for the yearly Tigtigan Terakan Keng Dalan Festival (TTKD) from lamp posts and utility… Read more

“Shoot for the moon; even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars.” Adonis Cayanan recalled the instant when the numbers appeared on his screen: Momentary blankness. Complete numbness. Read more

Born and raised in Angeles City, Pampanga, Bombalicious Eklaver’s road to drag started the way a lot of great origin stories do — online. Her comedy videos went viral in the Philippines, and that spark was enough to turn a hobby into a calling. Read more

The screen goes dark just as someone is about to lose everything. For a few seconds, there is only the cliffhanger — a crying face, an exposed secret, an antagonist finally cornered. Then the next episode begins. It lasts less than three minutes. Read more

Angelite alumnus Yian Gabriel remembers the exact stage he stood in the first time the lights came up on him, when he was not yet a professional actor, just a student learning to feel and figure out how to remain human. In his HAU journey, Gabriel found himself stepping into… Read more

Rows of resettlement blocks and half-built roads now stand on the land where Aeta families, like Izzy Balatbat’s, once moved with the planting season, as megaprojects push tribes out of Central Luzon’s ancestral belt one relocation at a time. Read more

On a dorm room desk, there is rarely just one bill. Rent sits beside electricity, water, Wi-Fi, laundry, food, and school expenses, all competing for space in the same budget. Read more

Several hospitals refused to admit Risa — not her real name — as her family desperately searched for psychological professional care. It was only when they reached Jose B. Lingad Memorial General Hospital (JBL-MGH) in the City of San Fernando that the first-year BA Communication student was finally accepted for… Read more

She did not ask to become a measuring stick of womanhood. But that is what the internet had made her — a benchmark against which every other woman’s worth is now weighed. Read more