SENIOR HIGH SCHOOL WORKTEXT IN CREATIVE NONFICTION

QUARTER 4

Name: ____________________________________ Grade: ____________

Topic or Title/s: Forms and Types of Creative Nonfiction

Learning Competency: Present a commentary/critique on a chosen

creative nonfictional text representing a particular type or form
(Biography/Autobiography, Literary Journalism/Reportage, Personal
Narratives, Travelogue, Reflection Essay, True Narratives, Blogs,
Testimonies, Other Forms)

I. Introduction
Literature is no longer literature in the romantic or modernist sense of the
word with its stress on individual genius. The term has become more complex with
the rise of emergent genres coupled with popularity of alternative modes through
which they can be shared. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and other social networking
sites have considerably changed the ways through which knowledge is articulated or
spread. The question, What is literature? Is no longer to be answered with single
definition. With technology and with greater tolerance for diversity and differences,
literature, like many other things, has lost its absolute essence and is now seen
through different lenses. Add to this is the ever-present need to share stories and to
express emotions.
Discussed in this lesson are some of the emergent forms under creative
nonfiction that also seem to challenge our very idea of the literary. What is
interesting is the relative difficulty with which creative nonfiction may be classified or
divided. In many instances, one may be hard to make distinctions and set the
boundaries between some of the subgenres, say between the personal narrative and
the travelogue, or between the testimonio and the reflection essay. It seems that
there more similarities than there are
differences as far as the types of creative nonfiction are concerned. Thus, the
description of each type was carefully, if painstakingly, couched to show nuances.
In this lesson, you are expected to present a commentary/critique on a chosen
creative nonfictional text representing a particular type of for
Biography/Autobiography, Literary Journalism/Reportage, Personal Narratives,
Travelogue and other forms.

II. Development
A. Biography / Autobiography
By now, you have already the word biography. A biography is a kind of
narrative that deals with the life of a person. Classical biographies are about the
lives of popular figures, say national heroes or celebrities.
An autobiography is a kind of biography that centers on the life of the narrator
himself/herself. The term autobiography is said to have been derived from the Greek
words autos (which means “self”), bios (which means “life”), and graphein (which
means
“to write”). Literally, an autobiography is a form of writing that is about one’s – that
is, the narrator’s own life. An autobiography, however, does not simply list down or
relate events chronologically. It borrows some of the literary strategies and devices
of fiction, such as characterization and plot, in order to make one’s life story
interesting. When writing an autobiography, one should also exercise discernment in
choosing the details that a writer wishes to include, particularly the details that are
not only memorable but are also worth sharing with the readers.
The autobiography shares certain characteristics with other types of creative
nonfiction, primarily its being the first person. But unlike the personal narrative,
which usually focuses on a single event or episode, the autobiography deals with a
certain event or episode, the autobiography deals with a chain of events and covers
a long period of time. Indicating information such as dates and places is essential.

The selection that follows centers on the many struggles that the narrator
experienced while growing up and attending school. Find out what some of these
struggles were and how, in the end, he was able to pull through.

Still Worth Living: How I Survived Life’s Uncertainties

Atilla Roma

Because I came from working –class background, I was haunted by the spectre of
financial insecurity while growing up. The modest means of livelihood that my parents had
was a small store that sold fish and vegetables, but we had days when the sales were not
good. They were able to continue the business for a few years, which supported the
schooling of the children and satisfied most of our basic needs.
My siblings and I attended the same public grade school which was about one and one
and a half 10avourite10 away. From 1984 to 1990, I went to Bayanan Elementary School.
Fortunately, through those years, I did not find it hard to socialize with classmates with
whom I shared the same working- class background. It was, therefore, quite painful to part
ways with them when I graduated from elementary.

Many of my elementary classmates and friends went to a public high school just a
jeepney ride away from home. I had also thought that I would attend the same school, so
my parents’ decisions to send me in a private high school, just a stone’s throw our house,
came to me as a big surprise. In high school, the experience of being in a bigger institution
and in the company of new classmates, many of whom had relatively comfortable lives,
made me feel uneasy, and 10 insecure, and alienated. My lower class upbringing easily
came into conflict with middle- class culture of my high school classmates. Not wanting to
feel out of place, I painstakingly tried familiarize myself with the movies, music, reading
materials (mostly foreign and comic books), and fashion that my high school
classmates knew. The feelings of insecurity became more intense whenever I went to my
classmates’ well carpeted and well- furnished houses.

Money was also constant concern, I was given a partial scholarship at the beginning
after my father had personally requested the school administration. But I was not able to
keep my grades high and eventually lost the scholarship. From then on, my schooling
became an uphill battle. What made matters worse was learning that my mother had a
 serious lung ailment which drained our financial resources further. Before long, our small
store went bankrupt and closed down. I feared that, considering my mother’s condition and
the state our finances, I would not be able continue my schooling.

Fortunately, I was able to earn my high school diploma in 1994 despite having so many
absences. Our financial concerns continued, however, and I felt the need to find immediate
employment rather than attend college. But my parents discouraged me from quitting
school, and instead encouraged me to look for a public university where the fees were
relatively low. Although I enrolled in a university, I still continued to struggle with financial
limitations, writing promissory letters in many instances to take major exams and claim my
grades on time. I also asked college teachers to allow me to photocopy books a few pages at
a time instead of buying them. That I had to take two jeepney rides to reach school made
my situation more complicated. Inevitably, I sometimes, rode the jeep or the bus without
paying the fare. At times, I would take a two – kilometre route on foot. I also engaged in odd
jobs to help support my schooling and that of my younger siblings (although they
themselves were working students). For a fee, I would do the school projects of children in
our neighbourhood or type the papers of college classmates.

When I graduated from college in 1999, I was determined to find a job right away in
order to address my family’s financial concerns. Because I never really wanted to teach,
contented that I had survived four years of college, I applied in at least four government
offices as an ordinary clerk. But when all four applicants got rejected, despite the relatively
good score in the civil service examination I had taken a few months before, I was left with
no other choice but to try my luck in teaching.

Since then, the career I have chosen – far from being my first love – has not only been
rewarding financially. It has also restored my sense of self- worth.

B. Literary Journalism
Literary journalism is a type of creative nonfiction that is closely related to
magazine and newspaper writing. Some references call it narrative journalism or
immersion journalism for it requires a close connection to the subject of the piece. It
can largely be in the form of an essay in which case it is called the literary
journalistic essay. It shares some of the elements of traditional fiction such as
dialogue, setting, characterization, and plot structure to make the narration vivid.
Unlike the autobiography, the personal narrative or the testimonio, literary
journalism deals with another personality (i.e., t is not the author), because of which
it may require some research on the character and the events in the narrative. In the
Philippines, one of the most popular practitioners of the genre is the late Nick
Joaquin, also known as Quijano de Manila, whose reportage pieces clearly deviate
from straight journalism with its employment of literary devices and elements of
fiction such as those cited earlier. When he won the Ramon Magsaysay Awards,
Joaquin said that the old distinction between literature and journalism no longer
holds true, as the elements of the two genres can actually be fused in order to
produce something more creative and interesting.
 The following creative nonfiction piece is about the author's about the author's
foray into Carcar City in the southern part of the island province. It was not a simple
vacation, however, for the experience provided him with informative insights on the
cultural wealth of Carcar, including the city's rich, albeit largely unexplored, literary
tradition. Read the selection and take note of how the traditional boundaries between
journalism and literature are seemingly blurred.

CARCAR CITY: A LITERARY TOUR

John Iremil E. Teodoro

The sea between Cebu and Bohol was so calm that morning. The summer season was
coming to an end but it was so humid and the sun was extra generous with its rays,
rendering the seascape and the surrounding landscape golden. We were on the rough
roadside of Tuyom, overlooking a white-sand beach where families were having picnics that
enchanting Sunday morning.
Tuyom is a seaside barangay of Carcar City, Cebu, and we were there on a "literary tour
on June 21. It is where canonical Cebuano writer Marcel Navarra wrote and set many of his
stories. Navarra is acknowledged as the
"Father of the Modern Cebuano Short Story" His best-known story "Ug Gianod Ako" (And I
Was Swept) is included in
Philippine literature textbooks. He is only one among 16 writers hailing from Carcar, thus
making the city a literary tourist destination.
Carcar City, located 40 kilometers south of Cebu City, is considered the cradle of Cebu's
colonial heritage where until today century-old landmarks, ancestral houses and public
buildings can be found. An hour bus ride from the Queen City of the South, it is very
accessible through public transport, and the trip will always be worth it.
There were two coasters of us in that tour, mostly writers and literature students of
Cebu. The panelists and fellows in the recently concluded Subay Baktas: Literary History
Writing Traning Workshop 2015 of the Cebuano Studies Center at the University of San
Carlos also joined. There were also a group of writers from lloilo City. Iligan City-based
writer Christine Godinez Ortega, the chair of the National Committee on Literary Arts of the
National Commission for Culture and the Arts, was there.
“Tuyom” is a Cebuano Word for a particular kind of sea urchin, which assumed was or
still is, abundant in the area. So, I was a little bit worried about the kids frolicking on the
white-sand beach. But it seemed they were enjoying the sea that morning which made me
envious. I Was it he was watching. would be very happy. envious. It was tempted to abandon
the tour and stay on the beach and enjoy the sea. l'm sure Navarra, if he was watching, would
be very happy.
Also, in tuyom is the crumbling Moro watchtower called Bantayan sa Hari. When we
wondered about its name, thinking that a king would never do such a lowly job of watching
out for the coming Moro pirates, poet Merlie Alunan regally replied, "Well, during the
Spanish colonial era, everything belonged to the king.” This watch over is one the locations of
Renato Madrid’s novel, Mass for the Death of the Enemy. Madrid is the penname of a priest
who was once a parish priest of the nearby Valladolid Church.
On our way to the city proper, we passed by to pray at the shrine of Bish0pTeofilo
Camomot at the Daughters of Saint Teresa convent in the barangay of Valladolid. Bishop
Camomot's selfless service to God is legendary. It is even believed that he can appear in two
places at the time to minister to the faithful. His shrine is a place of miracles. His beatification
is now being processed at the Vatican.
Before we went to the Carcar City Museum at the City Hall grounds to meet the mayor,
we visited Mercado Mansion, an old Spanish bahay na bato painted Mediterranean blue by
the main highway. Mercado is an old political family in Carcar. We had a great time taking
group pictures and selfies in that house.
Then we went to the museum where Mayor Nicepuro Apura was so happy to meet us.
He underscored Carcar City being a heritage city and told us, "1 am positive that you will be
amazed with Carcar's abundant literary heritage and cultural riches, not to mention its
diverse culinary delights!" He thanked us for visiting their city.
The Carcar City Museum is a small two-storey building with a beautiful American
colonial architecture. It was built to be Carcar's elite club house but was transformed into a
mini-hospital during the cholera outbreak at the turn of the 20th century. The marble tiles
on the floor have black stars, which are jarring to the eyes but beautiful in the historical
sense.
From there, we proceeded to the neighboring grounds of St. Catherine's College for the
linambay lecture by Cebu historian Trizer Dale Mansueto. Linambay is Cebu's version of
moro-moro or komedya, and Carcar has a great tradition of this in the past. According to
Mansueto, the rich families in Carcar would produce and act in these productions that were
shown for free in the public plaza. Sister Maria Fe Lobetos, O.P., directress of St. Catherine's
College, welcomed us with rice cakes, coconut candies and cold water. She was thankful to
the Cebuano Studies Center for Center for involving them in this activity and said, "We
support the CSC's drive in educating the young Catherinians especially on the efforts to
include these writers and their works in our classes to manifest ownership of our very own
gifted people.” She was referring, of course, to Carcar's magnificent writers.
The lunch at the terrace overlooking the old municipals swimming pool (waterless and
not being used to conserve water, we were told) was a blast. I had to stop myself from
getting a third helping of the divine humba-humba spread over a plate of heaven white rice.
Humba-humba is a tradition Cebuano pork dish akin to adobo. It was so saboroso in a
deadly way, the tasty pork lovingly melted in your tongue.
We were welcomed by a a rondalla of little girls in that beautiful venue at the back of
the museum. They were playing Cebuano folk songs while nforosa we were looking at the
exhibit on the writers: Juanito Florido Alcordo, Sinforosa Oliveros Alcordo, Vicente
Barcenillo Alcoseba, Vicente Alcudia Mariano Alcover Diosdado Garces Alesna, Epifanio
Alfafara, Leoncio del Mar Florido, Mariano del Mar Florido, Vicente del Mar Florido (Yes,
they are brothers!), Jose Dayagro Galicano, Maria Alcordo Kabigon, Galileo Varga, and of
course,Navarra. The rondalla was playving while we were enjoying our lunch.
After lunch, some of us hiked to the public market nearby to buy pork chicharon (Mat-
Mat was the best brand, we were told), ampao (Sweetened rice puffs), and banana chips.
These are the traditional Filipino delicacies, which Carcar is known for in Cebu.
in Cebu. On our way back to Cebu City, we passed by Carcar Shoe Expo, where
Christine Godinez Ortega frantically shopped for shoes and sandals. I bought a brown
leather belt for only PhP280. And it was of good quality, maybe worth more than a
thousand pesos in malls in Metro Manila. Outside of one of the stalls, I saw Merlie Alunan
eating lomboy from a plastic bag she bought from a vendor. Of course, I helped myself with
 that fruit with the sweetness that brought me back to my childhood in not-so-far-away
Antique.
The Carcar Litera Tour was organized by the Cebuano Studies Center of the University
of San Carlos under the directorship of the indefatigable Hope Sabanpan-Yu, a writer, critic
and literary mover.

C. Personal Narrative

A personal narrative shares some aspects of the traditional structure of fiction

such as characters and setting. Like the other types of creative nonfiction; however,
the details of such a narrative should not just revolve around the events; they should
also incorporate the narrator’s personal thoughts and feelings. One should also
employ literary devices used in traditional fiction such as figurative language, for
example in describing a place or a character in the story.
While a personal narrative should be about a real event, for example, a
narrator may find it useful to use a figurative language. Such additions are aimed at
making the narration more colorful, vivid, and therefore, more effective.
The personal narrative, of course, is told from the first-person point of view.
But unlike the autobiography which deals with a chain of events, the personal
narrative often concerns a particularly happy, sad, humorous, or outrageous episode
in one’s life.

The following personal narrative is about its Filipino author’s brief stay in a
remote village in France. The title itself suggests the author’s attitude toward the
place.

My French Village
Criselda Yabes

Les Ardennes is hidden in the northeast region of France. The French don’t give it much
of a thought, unlike the Riviera in the south, the countryside of Normandy in the north, or the
waves of the Atlantic against Brittany. If by any chance they’ve come across it, they’d say it’s
at the end of the world, or describe it as “the finger stuck in the ass” of Belgium with which it
shares the frontier.
For three consecutive summers, I stayed in a small village referred to as part of the
region’s la valleé. Even that has an ominous ring to it; that being in a valley depicts the
imagined claustrophobia of a people, its small-mindedness, its fear of strangers; and that I,
being an Asian, from a country many had probably never heard of, was an oddity.
My village, Haybes, faces a wall of a thick green forest that people find oppressive, as if
it keeps them imprisoned. I should have been surprised but wasn’t when I discovered that a
Filipina has been living here among 2,000 souls, married to a retired French man and making
herself as inconspicuous as possible.
Anna Liza rang me up one day when she’d heard of me while at an errand at the
pharmacy situated by the river and across the steel bridge as one enters the village. That was
normal: the pharmacist is my ex-husband who had had the urge to return to his place of
childhood, this damn valley as he would sometimes say out of frustration.
There’s not much to be done in Haybes; it doesn’t even have a decent café. The
restaurants would be far from seeing their names in the Michelin guide. The pizzeria run by

an Italian is ranked lower than its counterparts in the next town about ten kilometers away.
The bakery has had its ups and down with the clientele that finds the baguette a tad below its
taste.
What this village has--the entire valley for that matter--is the one thing I could not
escape from: nature. And so I invited Anna Liza, my fellow Pinay, for a stroll in the woods just
behind my house. It was where I’d go for walks in the late afternoons and it became like a
park for me, choosing any of the trails that wove through other villages, a silent meander
among pines and oaks and other trees not seen in my own country.
Having been here more than 20 years, raising a daughter, tending to a household in what
resembled a subdivision, the forest was a strange apparition for Anna Liza. She was afraid of
snakes. She feared getting raped (although there had been no such incidents in our part of the
woods). I showed her there was nothing dark to it, making her listen to the soothing run of
the stream, pointing out to her the infrequent marks of caves from which stone slates known
as the ardoise were gathered in the old days.
The ardoise had been the valley’s industry, along with other massive manufacturing
and metallurgical factories that had made this region wealthy, enticing migrants from Italy
and Spain through the first half of the 20th century. But it had been more of a relic, until the
village historian made a rather impressive movie about what took place in Haybes during the
First World War.
That was one of the rare occasions when residents came out of their dwellings for a
public gathering. At the very least they were proud of what the community had done one
hundred years ago, trying to defend the village from the German soldiers. There had been a
massacre. The church survived razing by the enemy, the only structure in which Anna Liza
was hoping to find solace as she would have done back home; but it has been locked to keep
away vandals and is opened only for weddings and baptisms.
She arrived in Haybes in the early 1990s when prosperity was already waning, the
rich protecting themselves in their enclave while the growing unemployed, the immigrants,
the poor Arabs put up in social housing were pushed to the backside of the village. Anna Liza
seized me in a panic when we ran into Muslim teenagers playing by the creek.
In my house made of the ardoise, thin purple slates fitted to the walls, I would wait for
the sun to shine. The valley’s worst reputation is for its rain, consistently wetting the forest
and filling up the river. The mist covers the village like a phantom that comes to visit from
time to time. At the slight hint of the bright rays, I’d be off on my bicycle, trundling down the
hill until I reached the level ground of the track along the River Meuse.
That was where I chanced upon Anna Liza a few days after our forest hike. She was
walking to the pharmacy to buy some creams on a doctor’s prescription. Her legs had swollen
from a rash after we’d sat on a bench in the arboretum. I felt guilty and made up for it by
inviting her for a bike ride along the Meuse as autumn was fast approaching. She came for the
sake of exercise when the weather called for it.
But the river for her was useless, “Walang silbi,” she said, because the sight of the
water made her pine for the seas back home thousands of miles away. I came to Les Ardennes
for this river looping around villages, sending out the ducks, geese, swans to the banks,
displaying the hues of the verdant greens. I love this river. It made me daydream, it made me
go forward, and it gave me a certain amount of strength.
The biking track from one end to another stretches to about 90 kilometers, starting
 from the city of Charleville-Mezieres--home of the rebel poet Arthur Rimbaud of the late

1800s--to the frontier town of Givet that Belgians flock to for the restaurants by the quai, the
shops and supermarkets and the odd McDonald’s by the fields. Givet is the nearest thing to
civilization from our village.
We would go there for the movies and for the patisserie that sells the Paris Brest I’d
boast to everyone as the best tasting one in the whole of France--and I am, of course,
exaggerating. Luckily for us, a new salon de thé opened close by this summer, in the town
where my ex-husband grew up, his family home already sold when his parents retired to the
Riviera. It is right across the river and I could bike to it if I wanted to.
It’s our saving grace in our corner of the valley, if you ask me. The pastries are good
enough to boost us out of our afternoon gloom. We take home baguettes for our meals for the
days ahead and the croissants saved for our Sunday breakfast treat. That’s how little it would
take to make me happy being in Les Ardennes.
According to many, happiness is on the other side of the border. The Belgians living at
the frontier know how to have fun, the opposite of the French; as if the border itself had put
up an imaginary chord dividing these two French-speaking peoples’ states of mind. It is true
that once we cross over, the air feels lighter, the sun warmer, and we envy the Belgians who
plunge into rivers in such wild spontaneity.
Without the River Meuse of my summers, Les Ardennes would have been bleaker. By
now I’d gotten the hang of biking the length of the track and I knew it by heart, capturing
many vivid pictures in my mind: the old dams of needle weir (soon to be replaced by modern
technology), the tunnel and the bends, the yachts and barges anchored by the banks, the gray
heron that hides from me.
The most difficult route goes out to a tiny and quaint village called Chooz, where the
atmosphere could be sinister, nearly 20 kilometers away from my village. The ride cuts across
the highway and into the paved plaza with a beautiful dovecote church. The houses along the
river are charming in a fairy-tale fashion, except that the greatness of its view is marred by
two nuclear power plants billowing out massive smoke; but it was thanks to the presence of
the centrale nucleaire that the villagers were lifted out of the poverty that has hit others in the
past two decades of France’s economic crisis.
I am tempted to call my village simple. My days followed the weather, mostly to be able
to schedule hanging out the laundry by the terrace of the garden, the clothesline tied to a
rowan tree that Anna Liza made me swear never to cut because she said it was lucky. When it
gets gray, other women friends come by for tea and we do an exchange of homemade fruit
jams, particularly the summer blackberries picked from the shrubs along the river.
One Sunday morning, after buying fruits and vegetables from the friendly Turk who
unloads his produce at the plaza rain or shine, I saw a striking, gray-haired woman getting off
her bike by the river. I watched her remove her socks and then her shoes. She balanced herself
on a rock by the banks, found her place to sit, and dipped her feet in the river. That was one of
the small things that made me happy about Les Ardennes, and I thought that I might do the
same if or when I return to my French village.

D. Travelogue
 A travelogue is a kind of creative nonfiction that deals with travels. A
travelogue has to be in the first person and describe the place or places where one
(that is, the narrator) has traveled.
The travelogue should not simply give descriptions, instead, it should integrate
elements of the narrative and reflective essays, among others. Literary devices such
as figurative language are also employed to make the writing more vivid.
Travelogues may be used for promoting a place, say, as a quality tourist
destination. Travelogues may also be written to call public attention to the problems
in a place (such as poverty, crime, or poor sanitation) and suggest corresponding
solutions.

The next selection is about the narrator’s first time in Baguio. While reading,
identify the details which suggests how the narrator felt while walking around the
City of Pines, first with a colleague, then on his own, and later with his family.

FOREVER “BAGUIO – ED” ON MY MIND

Bernard Liwag

I was already in my early 20s when I first saw the City of Pines. As ai could not have
afforded to travel in earlier years, I waited until I found a job and could finally afford to pay for
my own transportation fare. The opportunity came when I, together with a colleague in the
public school where I used to teach, was invited to a three – day Teachers Congress in Baguio.
My companion had been to Baguio several times in the past, so he was not so excited as I was
when we received the invitation. I believe he tried to suppress a smile when I intimated that it
was my first time to go there, as if to suggest that I had missed half of my life.
We were billeted in Teacher’s Camp, a big complex of buildings for transients built by
Americans in the 1900s. we stayed in Romulo Hall, one of the earliest and most well –
preserved structures in the area. During one of our dinners, some of my fellow attendees
exchanged stories about ghostly apparitions – of a lady dressed in white, a Caucasian – looking
soldier dressed in colonial military uniform, of spooky shadows in the washrooms. Although I
am an obdurate nonbeliever in ghosts, the stories easily piqued my interest. I did not see any
ghost, but I did not get numb, not with fear but with cold while taking a quick shower.
The next day, the session ended rather early so my friend and I went to the public
market to buy some souvenirs for our friends and loved ones in Manila. For this first t – timer,
taking the non – air-conditioned Baguio cab was exhilarating. I was looking around the whole
time I was inside the cab, marveling at the houses that were precariously standing on the
edges of cliffs.
When we reached the marketplace, we wasted no time walking about. Although Baguio
is well – known for its ukay – ukay (that is, handed – me – down clothes which, if one is lucky,
could be signature brands), I did not buy any, thinking that I could buy ukay – ukay clothes
almost anywhere in the NCR. Instead, I bought two miniature versions of bulul, a wooden
figure used by the Igorots to guard their rice crops. One was squatting while the other was
standing and holding a spear and a shield. The cultural student in me was trying to figure out
how icons sacred to the Igorots could become commodified as souvenir items. I also bought
eight small clay jars, not bigger than the palm of one’s hand and sold at Php 5 each to serve as
my display items at home.
 We also went to a relatively big mall, the type I had never seen before. While malls in
Manila are comfort zones for denizens wanting to escape from the heat of the city’s brutal and
unmerciful summer, this big Bagiuo mall has no air – conditioning unit, with the city’s sleep –
inducing breeze as its natural source for ventilation. From the second – and third floor
balconies, I was able to get a panoramic view of the city – of the Baguio Cathedral, of the
University of Cordilleras, of parks dotted with pine tree, of rocky hills enveloped in fog and
mist.

Any first – timer should not miss strolling around Burnham Park. Now on my own
(because my co – teacher chose to take a nap instead), I enjoyed going around the park
without sweating so much. The temperature was probably 15 degrees Celsius or thereabouts.
And although I did not try the rowboat, simply watching the young and old (perhaps some
were from Manila like me) enjoy their time on the human – made lake could already be a
source of delight for any observer. For snacks, I devoured two sticks of banana cue. I walked
around again after eating and tried a ten – minute, half – body massage service at the center of
the park.

At night, my peripatetic friend and I walked down the Session Road and ended up in
open – air eatery near the public market where we wolfed down grilled hito while guzzling
some beer. A few bottles, we continued our drinking in a wholesome bar just a few steps away,
where we also sang our hearts out like spoiled, pleasure – seeking bachelors until 2 in the
morning.

On reaching Teachers Camp around 3, I hit my bed and caught a few hours of sleep
before coming back to Manila. While the Cubao – bound bus was weaving its way along Marcos
Highway, I promised to go back.

I immediately fell in love with Baguio --- so in love that since then, I have made it a
point to go back to the City of Pines at least once every year, this time with my wife and
daughter. Since then, I have also visited the other tourist spots – Mines Vies Park, Wright Park,
the Bencab Museum; and, upon the insistence of my seven – year – old brat, haunted buildings
like the Diplomat Hotel and Laperal House.

Even if I visited some of the Baguio spots more than once, I have not grown tired of
them. Every Baguio experience, to me, is always unique and memorable.

III. Engagement

ACTIVITY: Comprehension Check

Go back to the given examples of creative nonfiction (autobiography, literary
journal, personal narrative, and travelogue) then answer the comprehension
questions for each text.
Text A: Still Worth Living: How I Survived Life’s Uncertainties
(Autobiography) Questions:
1. Why did the narrator say it was painful to part ways with his elementary school
classmates?
2. How different was high school experience from the one he had in elementary
school?
3. What challenges did the narrator face in high school and college? How did he
cope?
4. What do you think does the writer mean by the last paragraph? How did the
career he chose restore his sense of self-worth?

Text B: CarCar City: A Literary Tour (Literary Journalism)

Questions:
1. Which experience in CarCar did the author enjoy as suggested in the
essay? 2. Why is CarCar tagged as a “literary tourist destination”?
3. Why did the poet Merlie Alunan (also one of the author’s companions during
the trip) say, “During the Spanish colonial era, everything belonged to the king”?
4. Was the trip a purely “literary tour”? Why or why not?

Text C: My French Village (Personal Narrative)

Questions:
1. How is the author different from her friend and fellow Filipina, Anna Liza? 2. The
author claims, “I am tempted to call my village simple.” What details in the story
indicate this simplicity?
3. What was it that the residents of the country had done “one hundred years
ago”? Why were the contemporary residents of the village proud of it?
4. What did the author like about the village?
5. As a personal narrative, what linguistic or literary strategies does the piece
employ?

Text D: Forever “Baguio-ed” on my Mind (Travelogue)

Questions:
1. Why did the narrator reach Baguio rather late in life as he claims? Which places
in Baguio was the narrator able to see?
2. Overall, how did the narrator find his first experience in Baguio? Cite textual
evidence to support your answer.
3. It is said that Baguio, like many other cities in the Philippines, is suffering from
traffic congestion, pollution, and even overpopulation. What do you think
should be done to retain Baguio’s reputation as a major tourist spot?

IV. Assimilation
Directions: Using these guide questions, write an in-depth analysis of one (1) of the
sample texts given. As your guide, follows is the rubric on how your analysis will be
checked.

Guide Questions:
 1. Clarity of the idea presented
1.1. Were the information accurate and based on facts?
1.2. Were the ideas presented arranged in chronological order
considering the type of nonfiction used?PIVOT 4A CALABARZON 44
1.3 Were the ideas used make the readers understand the flow of the
piece? 1.4 Were the ideas presented consistent in providing the purpose
of the piece?

2. Appropriate Choice of Literary Elements

2.1 How and why did the author choose the literary elements?
2.2 What was the genre used by the author?
2.3 Were the chosen elements appropriate to the genre used by the author?

3. Appropriate Use of Element

3.1 How was the structure of the elements used in the text?
3.2 How did the literary elements affect the emotions of the
readers? 3.3 How did the author use imageries and symbolisms?
3.4 Why does the narrator choose certain language, report details that
he/ she does, reveal the characters in the manner that he/she does,
offer or not offer interpretive comments, and/or tell the story in a
certain order? 3.5 Why is the work set during a certain era, season or
time of day?

4. Effective Combination of Ideas and the Chosen Element

4.1 Did the reader understand the flow of the piece because of the
literary elements used?
4.2 Were the literary elements enable the appreciation of the readers
to understand the story or the piece?
4.3 Were the combination of ideas and literary elements help the readers to
go along and be hooked with the flow of the piece?

Title of the chosen Text: (Still Worth Living: How I Survived Life’s Uncertainties)
Form: (Biography)
Analysis:

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Criteria Exceptional Proficient Average Needs Improvement
(4 points) (3 points) (2 points) (1 point)
 Critical The writer uses literary The writer reflects an The writer shows The writer seems
Technique approaches wisely and acceptable level of some understanding passive in presenting
and obviously shows understanding of of literary arguments using
Perspectiv mastery of literary literary approaches perspective but literary theories. The
e theories as and theories as struggles to essay hardly
evidenced by the shown by the quality effectively use possesses literary
presentation of of the arguments literary theories and theories and
arguments/ reflection presented. language. perspective, and is
points. more like a literary
The analysis and The analysis and review.
There is an apparent conclusions are conclusions are
fluency in literary relatively strong with somewhat Analysis and
language as shown by very minor debatable with few conclusions are
careful flaws. inconsistencies. highly questionable.
analysis and
conclusions.

Accuracy The essay conveys an The essay conveys an The essay conveys a The essay conveys a
and accurate and in-depth accurate although partly accurate confused or largely
Objectivity understanding of the somewhat basic understanding of the inaccurate
topic and purpose for understanding of the topic, audience, and understanding of the
topic, audience, and purpose of the topic, audience, and
the writing task. It
purpose for the writing writing task. purpose for the
shows evidence of task writing task.
strong skills of
It offers very few or
analysis, There are partial superficial It offers unclear
synthesis, and explanations and/or interpretations of interpretations of the
evaluation. somewhat literal the text with a text and no attempt
interpretations of the tendency to retell to
There are insightful text with some instead of analyze. analyze.
interpretations of the analysis. There are a
text that are few lines lifted from No line was lifted from
supported by the text to support the literary piece to
actual lines lifted from the provide support to
the literary piece. analysis. the essay.

Focus The writer provides a The writer provides a The writer provides an The essay lacks a
clear thesis and thesis and topic acceptable thesis and clear thesis which
appropriate topic sentences which are topic sentences, makes it
sentences for each generally supported, although some incoherent and chaotic.
paragraph. All though there are supports are not
supporting snippets of off-tangent connected to the
statements are aptly statements. topic.
connected to the
thesis and topic
sentences.

Organiz The essay is highly The essay is well The essay is The essay lacks clear
ation organized with a keen organized with a somehow organized organization with a
and sensitivity to logical approach to with a logical haphazard approach
Transition building an building an argument. though uninspired to building an
argument. There is approach to building argument.
a Transitional devices an argument.
smooth and logical are generally used, Ideas float around
flow from one though there are Transitions are the essay
argument/ some abrupt sometimes pointlessly and
observation/ point of transitions between insufficient to provide transitional devices
analysis to another. ideas. a smooth flow of are either lacking or
ideas and misused.
The essay shows arguments.
skillful use of
transition words and
phrases.

Style The writing shows The writing contains The writing, though
passion. moments of generally functional,
individuality, but lacks passion and
Clearly, the essay there are some parts individuality. The
belongs to this writer of the essay that are essay is completely
and to no evidently mirrors of patterned after a
other. previously shown previously shown
analyses. analysis.

Diction The writer uses words The writer uses The writer uses
and that are precise and appropriate words language that is
Language engaging, with a and language, with imprecise or
notable sense some unsuitable for the
awareness of awareness of audience or purpose.
audience and audience and
purpose. purpose The essay reveals a
confused
There is a variety There is some understanding of
sentence patterns to attempt to include how to write in
reveal syntactic different complete sentences
 sentence patterns and little or no ability
fluency. but with awkward or to vary sentence
uneven success. patterns.

References:

Moratilla, N.A., Teodoro, J.E. Claiming Spaces: Understanding, Reading, and

Writing Creative Nonfiction. Phoenix Publishing House

SHS Creative Nonfiction Pivot 4A Learner’s Material