The Halo Halo Podcast

Bonus Episode - Listener feedback and our gratitude for it

At The Halo Halo Podcast, we believe in being sweet, charitable, tangy, biting, rounding up instead of down, but most of all expressing our gratitude when we can.  This Christmas season, Sigi and Jezzie give this bonus episode as an extra gift of thanks to their loyal listeners who have taken the time to listen, as well as join in on the conversation and make us believe that they can dream big. Thank you! Maraming Salamat!  
In this extra helping:
Junior - Montreal's Filipino Restaurant,
Cambio & Co.,
Filipino Fusion Desserts,
Marie Alcober, Filipino Canadian Journalist,
"Dual Citizen" docuseries,
Eric Tigley (Artist • Teacher • Storyteller),
Bayanihan Ottawa,
Pottermore's Discover Your Hogwarts House here

Episode 107.5 - Christmas Contemplations

We warm up this half episode by ruminating on our least favourite part of Christmas, a Christmas song that we could do without, and questioning whether a juniper latte is worth the sip.  We also discuss who our favourite Christmas characters are, what our favourite festive cookies we like to savour, and what the ideal holiday candy is.  Finally, we deeply contemplate the true meaning of Christmas.  Noche Buena!
In this extra helping:
Tasty's Peppermint bark recipe,
Taylor Swift's "Last Christmas",
The Waitresses "Christmas Wrapping",
"Rise of the Guardians" Official Trailer,
"Elf" Official Trailer,
"Elf the Musical" Trailer,
Corey Hart "Never Surrender Tour",
Gezellig and its Dutch meaning
 
 
 

Episode 107 - Best of 2018

We've got a bloated episode for you, as we head full speed into the Christmas/Holiday season and review the best of pop culture for 2018.  Hear Sigi and Jezzie, in their decade-long tradition, recount their favourite movies, tv shows, music and phenomenon this past year. Sigi and Jezzie not only reflect on the popular culture, but also take time to discuss what they love best about the Filipino Canadian expression and tradition of Christmas and the holidays.  Finally, they discuss how blending customs is the key to creating robust and strong traditions.
 
In the Mix this Week:
"Crazy Rich Asians" the movie,
"Ready Player One" the movie,
Guide to "Black Panther" Soundtracks South African Artists,
How "Black Panther" Composer Ludwig Goransson Found the Sound of Wakanda,
"This is America's" Childish Gambino's Kinesthetic Empathy Dance ,
Childish Gambino's "This is America" and its Meaning,

Episode 106.5 - These are a few of our favourite things!

Happy Holidays!  Malagayan Pasko! To start the Christmas Season right, Sigi leads us through a few of our favourite things.  See if you agree with our picks on who our favourite reindeers are.  We reminisce about our favourite gifts from Santa and the endless surprises that we experience when we get that popular Christmas toy trending that year. We also find out why Mariah Carey's "All I want for Christmas" is a modern classic and it's ties to another timeless Christmas song.  Sigi also finds out that there's a SuperFestive remix of Mariah's classic with the Bieber involved. And Jezzie serenades us this time with his rendition of "Come All ye Faithful."
In this extra helping:
Carpenter's "Merry Christmas, Darling", 
The secret chord that makes Christmas music sound so Christmassy, 
Why many classic Christmas songs were written by Jewish composers,
All I want for Christmas is You (SuperFestive mix),
Charice & David Archuleta "Have yourself a merry little Christmas" , 

Episode 106 - Filipinos and the Catholic Imagination

Each year the Metropolitan Museum of Art's Costume Institute hosts a fundraising gala. Vogue's own Anna Wintour chairs the event, where a theme is selected and its corresponding exhibit is revealed.  This year's theme, which comes to a close in early October, is "Fashion and the Catholic Imagination."  We discuss how Catholicism, Catholic icons and iconography permeate in popular culture, as well as within the Filipino Identity and its undeniable impact.  We revel and delight in the fashion of this past year's Gala red carpet (and yes, you can never be too late for the party).  Finally, we unpack and take a deep personal dive into how the Catholic tradition of discernment is the key to understanding and incorporating diametric points of view within ourselves and the world around us.
 
In the Mix this Week:
Pandesal,
The Cultural Impact of Kanye West | J. Bailey | Palgrave Macmillan,
Met Gala 2018 Live Blog: See Every Red Carpet Arrival,
Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination Gallery Views,
Flores de Mayo,
Flores de Mayo at Santacruzan,
Discernment of Spirits,
Catholic Cemetery Myths for Catholics

Episode 105.75 - Debunk this!

Welcome to to our first three-quarter's episode!  No, this isn't a tribute to Harry Potter.  This is a snack-size (meryenda) episode to help tide you over when there are three weeks between our full episodes.  In these episodes, we try our best to debunk a Filipino custom/tradition or stereotype/myth. In this meryenda episode, we do our best to explain why Filipinos walk with tsinelas (slippers) inside one's house. We take a closer look at why we have alot of Titas. We do a bit of a history dive as to why Filipinos love karaoke.  Finally, why do we eat with forks and spoons? 
In the Mix this Week:
Tagalog Lang's take on Tsinelas,
Filipino Titas on Thanksgiving,
Filipino styles and honorifics, 
Karaoke-Inventor Roberto Del Rosario ,
Westlife's Uptown Girl,
Bobby Brown,
Sonorant,
Spoon over Fork,
Ponderosa and Bonaza Steakhouses (They still exist!) 
 
 

Episode 105.5 - Love Letter to Stan Lee

In honour of Stan Lee, we express our heartfelt feelings and thoughts on the pop cultural impact that he has had.  We recognize how he not only entertained us, but also taught us that adopting a measured approached to power is responsibly managing it; that embracing who you are is the key to anyone's identity; that love can transcend any put-upon barrier; that exposing hatred in its most grittiest and implicit forms is how to diminish it entirely; that representation  has mattered since the 1960s; and he offers us a master class on how to do a cameo. We have no doubt that his impact will continue to resonate with us for generations to come.
In this extra helping:
Spiderman's Greatest Gift, 
X-Men's (film series),
Firestar and Sunfire (Spiderman's Amazing Friends),
Stan Lee Denouncing Racism and Bigotry,
Ned's discovery,
Stan Lee's King of Cameos 
 

Episode 105 - Fashion x Collaboration x Filipino

We take a dive into fashion collaborations and the H&M x Moschino Collection on this episode.  Before we spring into, and break down the collection, Sigi tell us about the Filipino comfort food, ukoy, and shares the recipe here.  We reminisce about Target Canada and try our best to understand it's untimely demise.  We then encourage you to analyze along with us by declaring either "Toot or Boot" or "Nay or Yay" as we pick 10 images from H&M x Moschino lookbook and discuss how the designs thrill us or not , and how the collection references the nineties, Disney and MTV. We also explore the Marie Alcober's docuseries "Dual Citizen" series and how she's profiled Filipino Canadians, like a conscious-raising musical artist Han-Han and the creative director of modern Filpinana wear at Vinta Gallery, Caroline Mangosing.  Caroline's approach to fashion makes us realize how fashion not only references styles, but also references regions.  We meditate on how regionalism in the Philippines reflects the particular emphasis and expression of being Filipino in that area, and invite listeners to appreciate those differences.
In the Mix this Week:
H&M Collaborations over the years, 
Jeremy Scott Short Bio, 
News of Adidas Originals by Jeremy Scott, 
Jeremy Scott Webstore , 
Diane Von Furstenberg for Gap,
Dual Citizen Series, 
Han Han,
VINTA Gallery - Modern Filipinana
 
 
 

Episode 104.5 - Roommate Icebreakers

Sigi warms us up by returning to our university residence life roots with "Roommate Icebreakers," in this extra helping of the Halo Halo Podcast.  Learn which one of us might be the clumsy one, and hear us regret our fashion foray in using safety pins during the 80s old school punk movement. Listen to us contemplate which words we would like to see retire from the English language, as well as discover which celebrities' lives we would most want to snatch!  
In this extra helping:
Joe Fresh,
Rupaul Charles,
Ryan Murphy's IMDb,
The Late Late Show's James Cordon,
Why Wrestling is important to high school students
 

Episode 104 - Let's Eat and Then Brag about Filipino Foods

Kain Na!  Let's eat!  We invite you to unpack and process, with us, the recent arrival of Filipino-centred retail food chains to Canada.  We examine the cultural significance of Jollibees; the importance of fried chicken at Max's restaurant; and the meaning that Seafood City brings to a Filipino pantry in Canada. All this talk of food creates an appetite for us to understand how Filipino foods reflects our cultural values, and wonder why it hasn't been more mainstream.  We discover that Filipino Food is the original fusion cuisine that focuses on the balance between sour and sweet (or more rightly, saucy and sweet), cooked lovingly in an acidic, tomato, or coconut broth.  We discuss how Filipino cuisine is poised to go from humble and regional food, to more mainstream in recognition. We just need to brag (a little bit) about how great Filipino food is.  Again, Kain na!
In the Mix this Week:
A Star is Born (2018), 
Madonna's 20/20 Interview where she says "It's Reductive" and not what Jezzie remembers,
Jollibee Canada, 
Max's Restaurant, Cuisine of the Philippines,
Seafood City,
Crispy Pata Recipe at Kawaling Pinoy, 
Pork Sinigang Recipe at Kawaling Pinoy,
Dip better: Top 5 Filipino Sawsawan you need to know by Chris Urbano,  
Ulam, the Movie