I'll take the Gap T-shirt and, oh, that painting too

Flipping through the newspaper for local events, I spotted a photo exhibition by local photographers called My Manila. When the taxi dropped my friend and I at the address for the exhibition, I thought he'd sent us to the wrong place. It was a shopping mall. We went inside and sure enough, red cubes displaying the fotos were scattered throughout one mall entrance. And the crowd that had gathered were young, teenagers even. Couples held hands as they strolled through the cubes. Little kids with their parents were pointing at the fotos.

My friend Tita says mall art is a common thing in some of the big malls. It was really cool, without pretension -- and enjoyed by folks who probably would never go to a gallery. Now, if they'd only had a cash register nearby where you could ring up the art...