This is the blog of Ian Rosales Casocot. Filipino writer. Sometime academic. Former backpacker. Twink bait. Hamster lover.
The Boy The Girl
The Rat The Rabbit
and the Last Magic Days
Chapbook, 2018
Republic of Carnage:
Three Horror Stories
For the Way We Live Now
Chapbook, 2018
Bamboo Girls:
Stories and Poems
From a Forgotten Life
Ateneo de Naga University Press, 2018
Don't Tell Anyone:
Literary Smut
With Shakira Andrea Sison
Pride Press / Anvil Publishing, 2017
Cupful of Anger,
Bottle Full of Smoke:
The Stories of
Jose V. Montebon Jr.
Silliman Writers Series, 2017
First Sight of Snow
and Other Stories
Encounters Chapbook Series
Et Al Books, 2014
Celebration: An Anthology to Commemorate the 50th Anniversary of the Silliman University National Writers Workshop
Sands and Coral, 2011-2013
Silliman University, 2013
Handulantaw: Celebrating 50 Years of Culture and the Arts in Silliman
Tao Foundation and Silliman University Cultural Affairs Committee, 2013
Inday Goes About Her Day
Locsin Books, 2012
Beautiful Accidents: Stories
University of the Philippines Press, 2011
Heartbreak & Magic: Stories of Fantasy and Horror
Anvil, 2011
Old Movies and Other Stories
National Commission for Culture
and the Arts, 2006
FutureShock Prose: An Anthology of Young Writers and New Literatures
Sands and Coral, 2003
Nominated for Best Anthology
2004 National Book Awards
I will be the first one to tell you that I am no saint. And neither are my friends. We have our faults — we are far from perfect. But, who is? I urge people who read and continually indulge in this form of guilty pleasure to keep an open mind. It is the easiest thing to jump on the bandwagon and point fingers and judge others but as a Biblical verse says, “Judge not, lest you too be judged.” Or something to that effect. Even Someone Up There in all His infinite wisdom said, “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.”
I choose to throw bread at those who throw stones at my friends. I cannot stop people from judging and misjudging. If there’s one thing I’ve learned from being in this industry — it is about not being judgmental. I am the last to resort to name-calling because I myself have been called so many names — I actually find it funny, thank God. Being in this “light” makes us easy targets for prejudiced stereotypical mudslinging — but hey, even if you are an accountant or a librarian or a janitor or a blogger — there’s no escaping that. It is just part and parcel of human living. So instead of fighting it, let us learn to embrace life, with all its surprising twists and turns. In the end, the truth shall surface, and people will get what they deserve. The best revenge is success.
Labels: blogging, issues, journalism