Who’s Who in Bataan – The Miclats of Orani

The Miclats of Orani

ALMA CRUZ MICLAT is a native of Barangay Masantol, Orani, who gained international prominence in the fields of arts and literature. The book “Beyond the Great Wall: A Family Journal” which she co-authored with her husband Mario Miclat and two daughters, Maningning and Banaue, was a 2006 National Book awardee for biography.

Ms. Miclat was born Alma Capuli Cruz on December 15, 1950. Her parents were Vicente Cruz and Paz Capuli of Orani. After completing her elementary education at the Orani North Elementary School, she graduated as class valedictorian at the Jose Rizal Institute. She enrolled at the University of the Philippines (UP) for a course in Chemical Engineering. It was at UP-Diliman where she met and fell in love with Dr. Mario Miclat, a native of Olongapo City and a UP professor, writer and poet.

In 1971, at the height of student activism in the Philippines, Alma and Mario, along with other student activists, were shanghaied from Manila to Beijing, China. In the midst of China’s Great Cultural Revolution, they served as foreign specialists at Radio Peking for 15 years. The romantic union in China produced two daughters: Maninging and Banaue.

Right after the EDSA Revolution of 1986, the Miclat family returned to the Philippines and reunited with kins and close friends.

Alma Miclat was employed as senior vice president of Data Center Design Corporation in Makati, while her husband founded the Maningning Miclat Art Foundation Inc. (MMAFI), in honor of their daughter Maningning who was already at the height of her popularity as a trilingual poet, writer and painter when she took her own life in September 2000.

– – – – – – – – – – – – – – –

Beyond the Great Wall is a selection of personal essays on the Miclat family’s 15 years of stay in China. It covers the periods from Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution, the death of Premier Zhou Enlai, the downfall of the Gang of Four, to the reforms initiated by the new leader Deng Xiaoping. The book was published by Anvil Publishing, Inc. and won the 2006 National Book Award for biography. It was initially launched at the National Book Store in Mandaluyong City. Thereafter, it was launched at the Library of Congress in Washington D.C., USA. The launch was sponsored by the Library of Congress’ Asian Division Friends Society. It is the second Filipino activity in the Library’s history coming after the Carlos Bulosan Syphosium held a month earlier. The same book was also launched at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in Virginia, USA.

BANAUE CRUZ MICLAT is the younger of two daughters of Dr. Mario and Alma Miclat who were born and raised in China for 15 years at the height of Mao Zedong’s Great Cultural Revolution and the Philippines’ student activism era.

Banaue, named after the great rice terraces of Mountain Province, grew up to be an excellent actress, singer and dancer. She studied at the University of the Philippines after returning to Manila with her family. She was mentored by topnotch UP professors and directors like Antonio Mabesa, Alexander Cortez and Jose Estrella. She has appeared in several dramatic plays, such as “Palasyo ni Valentin,”“Blood Wedding,”“St. Louis Loves Dem Filipinos,”“Ang Paglilitis,” and“Divinas Palabras.” She also played the character “Huling” in Lav Diaz’s multi-awarded film “Ebolusyon ng Pamilyang Pilipino.”At 22 years old, she sang in Tokyo and Hirosaki, Japan where she joined an international cast in the play “Indian Summer,” directed by Koji Hasegawa and sponsored by the Japan Foundation.

After undergoing training with the Ramon Obusan Folkloric Dance Group in Manila, Banaue went to the US to finish her two-year study of Master of Fine Arts (MFA) in Acting at the City University of New York’s Brooklyn College. She earned membership in the Vangeline Theater which boosted her talent as a dancer. She also performed as a lyric soprano on Broadway productions of “East Meets West” (with Philip Glass), “Memoires of a Geisha,”“Tokyo Scope,”“C.A.R.O.U.S.E.L.,” and “Bleu, Blanc Rouge”and “Hanae Mori: A Paris-Tokyo Love Affair.”

She has had vocal training under JudyIce Vivier, and later under Robert A. Carpenter, as well as in Master’s classes under F. Murray Abraham, Ruth Maleczech, Agniezska Holland, Andrew Wade, Dee Cannon and Vernon Morris. Banaue qualified for a stint at the famed Metropolitan Opera in New York, in the productions of “Faust,”“La Boheme,”“Don Carlo,”“I Puritani”and“La Traviata.” Banaue Miclat returned to Manila and continues to distinguish herself on stage.

MANINGNING CRUZ MICLAT was a trilingual poet, writer and a visual artist who won the grand prize in the non-representational category of the Art Association of the Philippines Art Competition held in 1992. She celebrated her 28th birthday in 2000 by launching her trilingual book of poetry, “Voice from the Underworld,” which was published by Anvil Publishing, Inc. It is the first book of poetry in the world written in Filipino, English and Chinese languages solely by one author.

Maningning was born in China on April 15, 1972. She, her parents and sister Banaue returned only in Manila after the fall of the Marcos regime in 1986. A year later, 15-year old Maningning held her first solo exhibit of Chinese painting at the Cultural Center of the Philippines. She was the youngest artist who exhibited that year at the CCP. Her abstract oil painting entitled “Trouble in Paradise” was the 1992 grand winner in non-representational painting competition sponsored by the Art Association of the Philippines.

“Voice from the Underworld” was chosen by the Manila Critics Circle as finalist in the 2001 National Book Awards. The book includes Maningning’s poems in Chinese. She was one of the world’s “Top 39 Women Poets” writing in Chinese. Some of her poems were anthologized in a book published in 1995 during the International Women’s Year held in Beijing.

Maningning Miclat’s colorful life was cut short when she when she took her own life on September 29, 2000.