The New Shade of Pink

Book: Brusko Pink: King Kong Barbies

Author: Louie Cano

Review by: Raydon L. Reyes

Brusko and Pink are terms most people will consider paradoxical. Pink is often associated with all things soft, cuddly, and in sexist terms, "girly". Brusko brings to mind that muscle-bound, tank top wearing, macho man one usually spots in any nearby gym in the city. Brusko Pink: King Kong Barbies overthrows these stereotypical associations as it aims to prove how terms, just like men, have done away with their rigidity in this post modern world.

The author Louie Cano, being gay himself, exposes the new generation of the pink community that has long since transcended the crossdressing parlorista through his collection of essays. Although it doesn't claim that the skirt-wearing effeminates that still traverse the worn-out streets of Manila have gone instinct, it focuses on this "new breed" of homosexuals. It is a breed that has discovered the wonders of donning a rough, all-male exterior, enhanced and innovated by the vanity that gays have mastered over the years of their pink existence.

The importance of good appearance and the pain that comes before it is tackled first and foremost by the title article. The gym is the new cool hang-out and torture-house for those who want to achieve the perfect body and to attract the perfect mate, possibly inside the gym as well. But the gym is more than just a place to indulge one's narcissistic (or voyeuristic) urges. It is literally a place of pain as you try to break your own limit by lifting big chunks of metal and sweating like a pig, if a pig had a defined and toned body, for the heck of it. And according to Cano, the pain, which in itself is the measure of your strength, makes it all worth it.

The book sheds light on the hook-up culture that is prevalent in the gay community. Public transportation becomes the new place to break sensual boundaries as the author narrates his experience inside a bus with grinding that usually only occurs at the middle of the dancefloors of Malate. Random walls that serve as toilets for the common pedestrian become the place to exchange numbers and bodily fluids, other than urine and sweat. Even pastries aren't spared as a male prostitute that Cano interviews compares himself to a doughnut: "empty, shallow, and barren".

As ambitious as the book is as it tackles both social and personal issues that the Filipino gay or bisexual deals with in his everyday life, Brusko Pink is far from being overly serious. Cano gives the reader something to think about as he speculates on what the world would be like if food was dirty and that other "F" word was clean.

"Suck cheese, you Popsicle Slurper!"

A mini-dictionary of gay lingo is provided for the non-gay, and the aspiring ones, to finally understand what they are talking about as they exclaim terms such as aketch, bobaysung, eclavoo, and vadutch.

Cano even provides a mini-manual for people hoping to attract the right man in his essay entitled, "How to Bag a Man": an article that makes so much sense that even non-gays can make good use of it.

Brusko Pink: King Kong Barbies is just the right combination of wit, humor, emotion, sensuality, and substance that one is looking for and can expect from a guy who makes a big deal of spelling "fuchsia", and that is meant in a good way. The author gives us a taste of what his life is like through the usage of language and imagery, based on his own experience, that he uses: smooth, free-flowing, tangy, and occasionally spicy. It leaves the reader looking for more from this former writer of Batibot. It is recommended to those willing to nullify yet another stereotype from their minds and see the evolved world of this paradoxically old but new shade of red that is painted over the walls of our urban streets.

+purple_lantern+

(image of book from www.bed.com.ph)