Looking Back at the 4th BTS Global Interdisciplinary Conference in KL, Malaysia

 

Reading for Care: The Plant on the Window Speaks

Inspired by the Memoir Writing Workshop by Women Writing last Saturday, February 7, we begin Reading for Care: How Literature Holds Us, a new blog series that centers on attention and awareness to the beauty of words and how it holds space for readers like us. All you need is a pen and a paper (or a notebook) and 10-20 minutes time allotment for journaling.

The instructions are simple: Read the poem for the week. Sit with it. Write responses in your journal.

Note:
This is a reading and journaling space, not therapy. Please feel free to pause or step away whenever you need to.

Here we go!

Arrival: Notice this photo and stay in the moment of noticing. Breathe. Inhale. Exhale. Do this 3-5 times.

Encounter the poem, The Little Plant in the Window Speaks by Annette Wynne.

The Little Plant on the Window Speaks

by Annette Wynne

If you had let me stay all winter long outside,
Long, long ago, I should have died.
And so I'll live for you and keep
A little summer while the others sleep—
A little summer on your window-sill—
I'll be your growing garden spot until
The rough winds go away,
And great big gardens call you out to play.

When Literature Holds: Journal prompts 

1. What did you notice, visually, in sound, or in feeling, as you read? 

2. Which line felt steady or comforting? Write it in your journal. 

3. What image from the poem stayed with you? Did it bring a memory, 

a place, or a person to mind?

Extending the experience (only if you wish or if the spirit is nudging 

towards generosity), you can:

1. Share a similar photo on your socmed account.

2. Do something artistic or creative.

3. Read more poetry: The Human Touch, Weighing the World

Thank you for dropping by. May you find shelter in what you notice.

Recommended Reads: Continuing the Healing Work of Reading

I'm sharing the texts I used in the workshop on the Memoir with and by Women Writing.

Reading to Settle and Stay with Fragility

• Berry, Wendell. The Peace of Wild Things. Poem. From Collected Poems of Wendell Berry. Counterpoint, 2012.

• Kalanithi, Paul. When Breath Becomes Air. Memoir. Random House, 2016.

• Didion, Joan. The Year of Magical Thinking. Memoir. Alfred A. Knopf, 2005.

Reading for Recognition (Mirrors)

• Howe, Marie. What the Living Do. Poem. From What the Living Do. W.W. Norton, 1998.

• Baticulon, Ronnie. Some Days You Can’t Save Them All. Memoir. Anvil Publishing, 2018.

• Smith, Maggie. Good Bones. Poem. First published 2016.

 

Reading for Perspective (Windows)

• Hopkins, Gerard Manley. Pied Beauty. Poem. First published 1918.

• Alejo, Bert. Tagpi-tagping Kariktan. Filipino translation of Pied Beauty.

• Evasco, Marjorie (ed.). Viral Signs. Poetry anthology. University of the Philippines Press, 2017.

 

Reading that Opens Possibility (Doors)

• Adams, Sarah. Be Cool to the Pizza Dude. Essay. From Letters from a Father.

• Gay, Ross. The Book of Delights. Essay collection. Algonquin Books, 2019.

• Didion, Joan. Keeping a Notebook. Essay. First published 1968.

Bangtan Hermana Notes: The Kinship in BTS’s Narrative of Return

When news of BTS walking the King’s Path broke across social media, many of us instinctively affixed “of the King” to the word return. As an author of folklore retellings and someone who has studied folk art, I think this calls for unpacking. BTS’s album title is Arirang, positioned as a folk song, a song of the people. An intangible art.

Folk songs are art whose material is people. They are intangible not because they are unreal, but because they live only through being carried across seasons, borders, and generations.

I am not rejecting honor, especially when ARMYs before me have invested deep fan labor. I am staying true to the form of Arirang as an art in itself, which BTS has chosen to name their comeback album. Seen this way, BTS engaging Arirang is not merely converting cultural heritage into pop.

It is them stepping into a role that is older than pop: the carrier. The bearer of culture.

BTS is moving from palace threshold to civic space to open square. From history into the present. From one voice to many.

Kinship, in this reading, is not symbolic. It is structural. Folk songs are never held by the singer alone; they survive because they are sustained by a chorus. This is where ARMY enters not just as audience, not merely as consumers, but as co-carriers.

Millions of us will never meet, yet we recognize ourselves in the same song, at the same time, across distance and difference. That shared act of listening, repeating, and remembering is what turns sound into belonging. When BTS sings Arirang, they are not simply addressing a market; they are calling a kin group into being again. A people imagined into relation through voice, timing, and care. This is not fandom as hierarchy nor a parasocial relationship. It is community as chorus.

This is also why, for me, the shorthand “kings of K-pop” fails to hold. Kingship relies on vertical power, singular ascent, and fixed centers. What BTS has built over a decade and more, does not move that way, despite ARMY’s valiant campaigns across charts and voting seasons. BTS’s work spreads laterally through themes that recur rather than resolve (the Möbius strip at Sowoozoo), through members who diverge and return without severing the root (solo mixtapes, songs, and projects during the enlistment era), through listeners who form countless nodes of meaning across cultures and generations (ARMY as a diverse fandom). In this structure, nothing depends on a throne. Nothing requires a crown. The song moves because people move with it. If this return matters, it is not because rulers are being restored, but because a shared imagination is being renewed, one that resists enclosure, survives translation, and remains alive precisely because it does not belong to anyone alone.

A folk song’s light flickers. It endures not because it is fixed, but because it is vulnerable enough to be carried. Its life depends on repetition, memory, and people choosing to keep singing even when conditions are uncertain or difficult. Spectacle can amplify it, but it can also thin it out. Smoothing the roughness, closing the gaps where ordinary people once stepped in. Kinship is what protects the song here. When meaning is shared rather than owned, when the chorus matters as much as the voice at the center, the song stays alive. What is at risk in moments like this is not relevance, but intimacy.

So I stay with the tension. I let the scale be what it is, and I keep my attention on the smaller movements: how the song is framed, how restraint is practiced, how space is left open for listeners to enter. Folk traditions survive not by being resolved into monuments, but by remaining passable: hand to hand, voice to voice, generation to generation. If Arirang continues to flicker through this return, it will be because kinship, not kingship, is doing the carrying.

#BTSComeback2026 #BTS_ARIRANG

Three Times the Charm in Bohol

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The Healing Work of Reading: How Literature Holds Us Before We Write

The Healing Work of Reading: How Literature Holds Us Before We Write 

This workshop honors writing as a practice of care. Participants are not asked to heal on demand, but to engage honestly, gently, and at their own pace. Writing is treated as a companion, not a cure. 

Reading gives us language for what we feel. Writing gives us permission to speak it. 

• Reading as orientation, not escape

In bibliotherapy, reading is how participants realize: I am not alone in this experience. Stories give language to unnamed feelings, offer mirrors and windows, and create emotional safety. 

• Writing as integration and repair Writing is where experience is metabolized. It is sense-making: placing pain, memory, joy, or confusion into narrative form so it can be held, shaped, and eventually released. 

This is classic bibliotherapy logic: • Read → recognize • Write → integrate • Share (optional) → witness and be witnessed 

Key idea: Healing is not erasure of pain, but a relationship with it. We read to understand the world that shaped us. We write to understand what it did to us and what we will carry forward. 

Reading for Healing: When Literature Holds Us 

Silent reading of chosen text: poetry, short essay, flash fiction, song lyrics 

Prompts: 

• What line stayed with you? 

• What feeling did the text name or stir? 

• What did the text allow you to feel safely? 

Key idea: Reading gives us words before we have the courage to use our own. 

Writing as Listening: An Open Door to Understand the Self Write without explaining. 

Write without correcting. Write to hear yourself. 

Guided writing prompts: 

• What part of yourself felt seen by what you read?

• What are you carrying that has been waiting for language? 

Key idea: We write here not to make meaning yet, but to hear what meaning is forming. 

Closing and Integration 

Choose one line from what you wrote that you want to carry forward. 

Reflection prompt: Pick a question to answer 

• What did writing reveal today? 

• What did reading help you discover? 

• What might you continue listening to after this workshop?

Reminder: 

• Healing writing is cyclical like the season. It does not travel in a straight line. 

 • We return to reading when words fail. 

• We return to writing when silence becomes heavy. 

Prepared by: Zarach C. Gagatiga, RL 

http://lovealibararian.blogspot.com 

On IG: @zarahgeeh | @the.readingarmy |@silver_linings_t.zee 

Readings: 

What the living do: https://wordsfortheyear.com/2016/05/09/what-the-living-do-by-marie-howe/?utm_source= 

Keeping a Notebook: https://cdn.thewirecutter.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Joan-Didion-On-Keeping-a-Notebook.pdf https://www.yourdailypoem.com/listpoem.jsp?poem_id=2386

Pied Beauty:  https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44399/pied-beauty

Author Visit: Kyu at the Beacon Academy

 

With the DepEd Philippines on Word Read Aloud Day 2026

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Bangtan Herman Notes: BTS Brings Arirang to the People

 

Fangirling @ 14 and 40: A Witnessing of the Lived Experience of Filipino Teenagers and Middle-Aged Women ARMY Zine Edition 2026

Three years ago, more or less, I wrote a paper that centers Filipino teenagers and middle-aged women ARMYs and examines how they navigate bias, prejudice, and joy in fandom spaces. Prompted by the clamor for acknowledgment and respect for Baby ARMYs in these age groups during BTS’s Enlistment Era, I recently revisited the paper and made revisions. 

Below is the abstract and the QR code for the full paper.

Fangirling @ 14 and 40: A Witnessing of the Lived Experience of Filipino Teenagers and Middle-Aged Women ARMY

By Zarah C. Gagatiga, RL

Read and presented at the 4th BTS Global Interdisciplinary Conference, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on August 16–18, 2023

Abstract

Teenage fangirls have long been stereotyped as shallow and irrelevant. On worse occasions, they are stigmatized as hysterical fans trapped in their own bubble of delusion. With the advent of K-pop, the screaming fangirl trope has resurfaced as well as the mature women who fangirl over K-pop idols, bands, girl groups, and boy groups alike. Teenagers or middle-aged women fangirls both experience prejudice and indifference from families, friends, and the larger society.

This academic essay explores the narratives and lived experiences of Filipino teenage girls and middle-aged women ARMY who, in one way or another, have survived and thrived in their own ways through interacting and engaging with co-ARMYs and their chosen fanbase. Using phenomenology as research design, the thematic analysis shows that Filipino teenage girls gravitate to the self-awareness and identity formation present in the art and music of BTS. On the one hand, middle-aged women are drawn to BTS’ songs and aesthetics that engage them to introspect, leading them to reclaim their lost selves and rediscover new talents and rekindle friendships with co-ARMYs in their age group. The essay highlights the unifying power of BTS in bridging age gaps and fostering camaraderie among female fans of diverse backgrounds.

Author of the Month Interview: Kenneth Yu on Stories of Reckoning

The featured author of the blog for the month of January is Mr. Kenneth Yu a.k.a Kyu He is a writer and the editor of the Philippine Genre Stories. He has two newly published books The Greatest Fight of Sunny Granada and Other Stories (Anvil) and Mouths to Speak, Voices to Sing (Penguin Random House). As guest author, Kyu answers three questions about craft and the themes that permeate the anthology.

1. In “The Story of Sunny Granada,” death becomes a point of connection rather than finality. What drew you to use a dying moment as a space for reckoning and reconnection?

In "The Greatest Fight of Sunny Granada", I used the knockout that one sees often in MMA fights as "dying" because at the point of knockout, the fighter will lose the match which is like dying to any competitive athlete. Then I used the "my life is flashing before my eyes" as a device to set up the back story of Sunny Granada so that the reader can then understand the stakes of the fight. For athletes, especially top level ones, defeat can be painful, not just mentally but physically (I've read and watched interviews of athletes after devastating losses and you can see the pain in their expressions) so I wanted to drive home how painful this loss is to the protagonist of the story. But I also used the "life flashing before my eyes" idea to set up not just the back story, but also to hold the key to how Sunny could make his comeback.

2. Many stories in the collection feel like acts of coming to terms rather than resolution. How do you think about closure in fiction, especially when longing, regret, or pain stretches across time or generations?

Whenever I think of or see people having to deal with situations (large or small) that upset the previous order of their lives that they were satisfied with, I often see them trying to restore that old order, with no changes. It's a longing for "We've always been this way, done things this way, we can't let it go." In my current frame of mind, I think change is constant, be it from evolving points of view, technology, growth, maturity, personal revelations, and each of these contribute to change big or small. Therefore, restoring the old order, as it was experienced before, is impossible, and when that stubbornness to stay the same clashes with the inevitability of change, we get that conflict. To use your words, coming to terms with and accepting the fact that the old ways will always give way to new ones is healthier and better for one's own peace. It's a matter of adapting to change rather than resisting it at the cost of so much energy and pain.

Again, this can be both internal and external, affecting individuals as well as societies. The fascination with nostalgia and "the good old days" is particularly at odds with this need to adapt, because nostalgia, with its message of "these were better times", a message that can entrap us, makes one forget that time and the world is moving on and we should go along with it. Eventually, the new ways will become old, too. It may be healthier if the old learns to adapt to and with the new, together, and where applicable, give way to the new with humility and dignity.

A healthier outlook would be to remember the past, learn from it, consider its positives as well as be realistic of its negatives, and treat the uncertainty of change that the future holds as something to learn from and adapt to. This attitude keeps us from stagnation. There really is no going back, and to quote that old proverb, "You can't go home again." I am aware that change can be for the better or worse, but that is a reflection more of the external, of things beyond our control. The moral framework around which adaptation revolves should be concerned with the decisions we make over things within our control, one that is hopefully for the better and guided by respect and consideration for others and ourselves. Well, at least, that's my current frame of mind, which, of course, is always subject to change itself, haha.

3. Stories like “Spider Hunt” and “Blending In” offer hope that arrives only after discomfort has been fully felt. What kind of hope were you interested in writing toward and what does grace mean to you in the context of these stories?

It had been pointed out to me by a reader that I infuse my stories with hope, which I humbly admit, took me by surprise. I was not consciously aware of that. I actually thought I wrote from an experience of, as you say, discomfort, the negative, and I fully explore that as well as I can in my fiction. But perhaps the hope is subconscious, now that you and that other reader had mentioned it, and because I am still able to refuse to give in to the seeming reality that discomfort and despair is the general way of things.

You mentioned "Spider Hunt" and "Blending In" as hopeful only after discomfort has been fully felt, and that is intended. I think that it is in these stories that I explore the possibilities of how bad negative situations can be. But as I wrote them, yes, I did indeed turn the situations around, making readers (and myself) see that yes, there is a way to recovery. "Beats", too, taken as it is, seems hopeful and like a paean to the beauty of the marine world. It is that, true, and was inspired by my daughter's excitement at her first dive into the sea. But it was written with the sad knowledge that we are losing much of our oceans to pollution, which right now feels irreversible (but again, I refuse to believe so, maybe [in a] delusional [way]). But the hope is by reading "Beats" one can appreciate and help care for our seas. Perhaps the grace comes from the acceptance of discomfort, the realization and self awareness of our own shortcomings and dissonance, the remorse and regret (yes, regret!) for our mistakes, and the humility to work at rectification. A tall order for people, especially proud people not used to facing their mistakes, but hopefully, not impossible.

Kenneth Yu is on social media as Kenneth G Yu on Facebook and @kenneth_yu86 on IG. You can get a copy of Kyu's books by following these links:

The Greatest Fight of Sunny Granada and Other Stories

Mouths to Speak, Voices to Sing

Featured Author of the Month: Kenneth Yu

 

Brown Yellow Magazine Cover Design Minimal Style for Cooking Food Chef Author by ZarahG

Bangtan Hermana Notes: BTS is Seven. 7 is 1. 1 is 7.

The Lighthouse Diary Entry #82: How to Make a Research Claim

 I made this guide in line with our lesson on Research as Thinking Process. More materials to share in a few days!

How to Make a Research Claim by ZarahG

Book Review: The Greatest Fight of Sunny Granada and Other Stories by Kenneth G. Yu, Anvil 2025

The lead story of this collection begins with a dying man. On the surface, it sounds morbid, but death here is deftly used as a window to redemption. As Sunny Granada lies dying in the boxing ring, the story becomes one of connection and reconnection, of bridging the gaps in a life that is finally being reckoned with. What unfolds is unexpectedly heartwarming.

This sense of coming to terms permeates the collection. The stories are less about dramatic resolution and more about quiet reckonings. Moments when longing, regret, and unfinished business surface and are finally acknowledged.

I especially enjoyed “Spider” and “Blending In.” In these stories, there is hope, but not the easy kind. It is hope that comes after deep longing or when pain has resonated, sometimes across generations, before finding grace in the end. The grace here does not erase suffering; it arrives only after it has been fully felt.

Overall, Kenneth Yu offers stories that sit with discomfort long enough to earn their hope. These are quiet, thoughtful pieces about reckoning, connection, and the possibility of grace. A good read to calm the heart in an age of chaos and confusion. 💜

#bookreview #Bibliotherapy #readingislife

Step by Step with Teacher Zee: Epiphany

 

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The Lighthouse Diary 2025: Looking Back and Moving Forward in the IB School System

Rounding up my entries on the work I do in school. 

The Lighthouse Diary #67: Expanding Our World: Reflections on World Languages and Literature Week 2025 - During this year’s World Languages and Literature Week, we, at the BA Library had the privilege of hosting three remarkable authors namely, Joel Donato Ching Jacob, Robin Sebilono and Artie Cabezas who shared not only their books but also their writing journeys and the literary works that have shaped their thinking. Each talk, spanning 30 to 40 minutes, became more than just a discussion of craft and the writing life —it was an invitation to step beyond the familiar borders of language and thought.

 The Lighthouse Diary #68: Biñan Day and Griffin Games 2025 - The city of Biñan celebrates several significant milestones this month: its 15th Cityhood Anniversary on February 2, its 80th Liberation Day from Japanese occupation on February 3, and its 278th Foundation Day on February 4. In commemoration of these historical events, the Biñan LGU has organized various activities for the residents, and classes in schools are suspended throughout the city. Meanwhile, we are gathering at school to participate in our annual Griffin Games.

The Lighthouse Diary #69: A Model Text for the Exploratory Essay 1 of 2 – We kicked off our Extended Essay (EE) Journey last February, around the third week and we have been dwelling in topic selection; identifying sources that will inform us of breadth and depth of topics, using thinking tools such as the KWL-I Chart and Mind Maps to see connections and organize our thinking.

The Lighthouse Diary #70: A Model Text for the Exploratory Essay 2 of 2 - This is part 2 of the model text I wrote for the Exploratory Essay we require our grade 11 students to write. We have been conducting research sessions with our grade 11 students since February. They are in Phase 1 of the Research Design Cycle where selecting a topic, doing initial research and preparing an annotated bibliography are essentials. From here on, we will model the feedback mechanism that comes into play in a given exercise.

The Lighthouse Diary #71: Research Skills: Source Evaluation and OPVL 1 of 3- In November 2024, our Grade 8 students had a library and research skills session on the OPVL. The OPVL is a strategy for evaluating sources—specifically, historical sources. Nonetheless, it can also be used to analyze the validity and reliability of information and sources we encounter everyday. Focusing on Origin and Purpose, I asked my students to evaluate information from both online and print sources. I prepared a variety— books, magazines and journals, posters and calendars, labels of kits, games and the like. And of course, social media posts. Working in pairs, they were able to come up with a review of their assigned source. They took away valuable insights on the importance of source analysis, along with the skills necessary to understand historical documents, their context, and their reason for being.

The Lighthouse Diary #72: Research Skills: Source Evaluation and OPVL 2 of 3 - This is my lesson plan for the session on Source Evaluation with our Grade 8 Students.

The Lighthouse Diary #73: Exploratory Essay: Working on Feedback & Creating a Research Pathway - This is an update on the Exploratory Essay I wrote as model text for our grade 11 students. Not only are we modeling writing as technique and strategy to teach and learn, we are also simulating the process involved in academic writing. To read Part 1 and Part 2 click the links.

Lighthouse Diary #75: Learning Through the Seasons

The closing weeks of the Academic Year is often laden with events and activities that drum up accomplishments, nostalgia, gratitude and hope. For the first time, I walked with our graduating seniors in their Batch Night bearing witness to the rituals and traditions that define us -- the senior tribute and send off. What was new this year was the recognition of staff and faculty who served in the Academy for a decade and more. This was definitely a surprise.

The Lighthouse Diary Entry #76: My Personal Code of Use on ChatGPT: Working with AI in Integrity, Creativity, and Compassion

Modeling responsible AI use is a powerful form of digital citizenship. In my context as a librarian, bibliotherapist, educator, and fan community member, it’s more than policy to practice. It is  formation.

The Lighthouse Diary Entry #77: Libraries as Partners in Becoming

Our week long library orientation closes in a few days. Facilitating the learning and acquisition of literacy skills through the library is always a big challenge. By high school, students have reached a point of view and a perception of the library as a place to soak in the aircon, which it is. And with the erratic changes in weather, this reason for going to the library can be taken advantage of. So, we persist.

The Lighthouse Diary Entry #78: Martial Law Stories PH

Taking off from Russell Molina’s talk last August 29 for Filipino Week, here is one line that refuses to leave: “Martial Law is not an event. It is an idea. Ideas can be resurrected.”

The Lighthouse Diary #79: From Curiosity to Inquiry: How the Library Can Help

I am a Louise Rosenblatt bias and a KWL junkie. It’s not surprising that I anchor my library skills and ATL sessions on Transactional Theory, Metacognitive Awareness, and Constructivist and Inquiry-Based Learning. The recent integration of the BA Library’s research services and reference program shows how theory, approach, and strategy converge. Helping students move from curiosity to inquiry, and inviting teachers to collaborate with the library in guiding authentic research.

The Lighthouse Diary #80: Inquiry and the Library

The 2nd term is the shortest of the four terms in a school year. It also has the most number of school-wide activities and holidays. With midyear exams in December, it is a packed calendar that tests everyone's mettle. We take this in stride in the Academy, but we are fully aware of the timetable and how to make the most of class days amid class suspensions. In light of the tight schedule, teachers still find time to bring their students to the library. It's been a busy term and we're not complaining!

The Lighthouse Diary #81: Books for Binan

Let's share the gift of reading!

Bangtan Herman Notes: Marketing Magic or Fandom Phenomenon? Trust BTS, ARMYRANG!

 

Book Review: Zero O’Clock by C.J. Farley

Zero O’Clock by C.J. Farley is the story of Geth, a perceptive and thoughtful teenager, living through the early months of the pandemic. It is through her point of view that I witness once more, the unfolding of a world in chaos. It is traumatic to return to 2020, but reading Zero O’Clock is, in a way, a healing experience. It feels as though Geth and I walk through the experience together. She is ARMY, besides.

So, a lot of BTS’s songs are mentioned and the group’s presence in the book is very much a part of the novel’s emotional grammar. They accompany Geth through fear, isolation, and uncertainty, offering steadiness rather than easy consolation.

Zero O’Clock is not a story about resetting. It is a narrative of courage and resilience, of moving forward while carrying loss and grief. Because, in the end, Geth runs bearing the shifts and changes of the times. And she is beautiful!

#bookreview #BTSreadinglist2026 #ARMYofBangtanBookClub #booksBeatsBTS