I met Jonel last year, when we attended the Italianni's Bloggers' Event in June. Although we didn't become real good friends, I would drop by his blog from time to time to read his posts. With the advent of micro blogging (Twitter and Plurk), reaching out to fellow bloggers and Internet users became much easier. Jonel is one of my friends in Plurk (I am not much of a Twitter user), and last week I saw his Plurk message inviting bloggers if they want to be part of the Red Ribbon blogging event. I missed the feeling of doing this, so I signed up.

Yesterday, I received an e-mail from Jonel confirming my slot. Yey! My only concern was that I am not much familiar with the place where the event will be held. Also, I am having qualms about the time of the event. I am hoping I could meet up with my sister tonight so we could go home together. I don't want to miss this event, so despite the given problems, I will surely attend.

Hmmm, cake tasting at Red Ribbon! Me love it! Thanks for letting me be part of the event, Jonel.

*** Jenn ***

Last Saturday, my brother and I went to check out the Aliwan Fiesta in CCP Complex. Both of us were doing a Filipino photo meme every Thursday (Litratong Pinoy), and the admin invited members for a get together so we could also take pictures from the festival after the meet up.


Brother and I were set to leave, but when we arrived near SM Fairview Mall, the rain fell hard. I sent a text message to our blogging friend, JenL to ask if it was raining where she was. She said it was raining hard as well, so brother and I sort of second-guessed if going to the festival would still be a good decision. Going home was our decision, but we couldn't go home as well because we had to cross the road. We stayed at the convenience store until it was okay for us to cross the road. We received a message from JenL hoping we could still go to the festival. As brother and I left the store, he decided we would go to the festival.

Thankful for the directions JenL sent us, brother and I made it to the Harbor Square, where they were waiting for us. It was my first time to meet Missy and Marian, as well as Buge, who arrived after this group picture was shot. We ate lunch at Dencio's, took some group shots overlooking the marina.

From there, we walked to the CCP Complex where some of the contingents were preparing for the parade. The Aliwan Fiesta is an annual festival where all different festivals in the Philippines were gathered for one big festival. People from as far as Laoag City (Ilocos Norte) to General Santos City (South Cotabato) would come to Manila to showcase a slice of their own festivals.

I still haven't resized all the pictures (I took about 500 images - not all good, though), so these I can share for now:


The street dancers of Karatong Festival in Dulag, Leyte. When I asked them if I could pose with them, they told me we should do a "not looking at the camera" pose. They're so funny.


During the actual parade, we (my brother, JenL, Buge, Ronnie, and I) stayed in the streets, while Lino was near the stage. The stage was where each contingent was introduced and it was also where the street dancers would perform. While waiting for their turn, each contingent would stay in the road while we (the "photographers") would go on a photo frenzy.

These girls were part of the Kalilangan Festival of General Santos City.


The parade started at around 4:30PM, and towards the night time, the rain fell hard. I wasn't able to see the last 7 contingents as Buge and I took shelter in the lobby of Star City. This was my last shot of the parade - a group of people from the Lapay Bantigue Festival in Masbate.


Brother still took pictures even with the rain. At around 9PM, we head back home, but we went back to the Harbor Square to take some pictures of the marina. From there, it was a long walk for us - walking from CCP Complex to the LRT Station in Vito Cruz. I was tired from the long day of walking, dancing, and taking pictures - so I pretty much slept in the bus. We got home around 11:30PM, and it was immediately good night for me.

Tired as I may be, I was happy. I would still watch next year's festivities if given the chance.

*** Jenn ***

Since the start of the week, I have been waking up as early as 3AM. My sister is now having her training and because she has to be in Makati City by 5:30AM, both of us have to wake up at 3AM so she can leave the house at 4:30AM. Actually, we sometimes get out of the bed at 3:30AM because of one simple reason: we're still sleepy.

Both of us had to adjust. In my part, I have to wake up early to prepare her breakfast, otherwise she won't be able to squeeze in all the things she had to do in an hour. I know anyone can cook breakfast and prepare for work or school at the same time, but I have been in the same situation while studying in college until I worked in Makati City. It's my personal decision to get up and fix my sister something to eat because during my time my dad helped me, too. I guess in a few days time waking up at 3AM won't be as difficult as it seem be.

Photo share:



To clarify, that's not a ghost, and I didn't digitally edit this picture. This picture came right out from my camera. Pretty creepy, eh? Actually, this picture wasn't supposed to be like this. I saw my cats - Teddy and Paborito relaxing by the rug and thought it was a sweet sight to look at. I took their picture, then I zoomed in on Teddy to get another picture, but she was trying to sleep. I wanted her to look at the camera so I focused my camera and called on her name. I guess I startled the cat and she thought I was already calling for food, so she rushed to check her plate. Since my camera was already focused, I hit the shutter out of shock that my cat rushed to check out the food (that wasn't there actually), and here's what the camera captured. Creepy, but I love it.

*** Jenn ***

... in my own way.

April 22 is Earth Day, and I really had no plans to go out and take pictures on this day, but as I upload some pictures on my Flickr, I saw a link to a website asking people to go out and shoot pictures on Earth Day, and submit to them "your best photo" as they are going to do a mosaic. I thought, "Why not?" However, my plans of going out and do a photo walk around the subdivision where I live didn't push through because of one reason: the rain.

It has been raining for how many days and it wasn't just normal rain.. it's a heavy downpour at that. At first, I consider the rain "a breathe of fresh air" as it has been so hot, but afternoon rains for four or so days is more of like a curse rather than a blessing.


At 11AM, I noticed that it was getting dark again. I left the PC for a while and took my camera to capture the dark sky, and the birds had been frantic trying to find shelter before the rain fall, but it seemed this bird was just keeping his cool as he sits comfortably in the electric wires. A little lesson learned from the bird there. =)

It rained hard practically the whole afternoon. I kept on praying for the rain to stop so I could go out and take pictures, and at around 4:30PM, it stopped - well, not really as there were raindrops here and there, but I still grabbed the time to check out what I can take pictures of.






Can you see a trend? Because of the rain, everything I see have water drops! Like what I said, I planned to do a photo walk around the subdivision, but seeing all flowers have water drops, I decided to stay and just take pictures of the flowers from our close neighbors' gardens. The first picture was from a house fronting ours, and the hibiscus was from a house next to the house where I took the first picture. The one in the middle was from our garden.


One of my cats was playing hide and seek with me, and I wanted to take a picture of him (Kitty Pogi) by the garden, but my cat has ADHD, because whenever I get quite near him, he'd run off and when I leave, he'd try to come near me. Ugh! Anyway, in my attempts to get a picture of him, I saw this fly and took a picture.


My other cat, Kitty Lilith has been one of my favorite cats to take pictures of. Sadly, she's not really fond of the camera. Often times, I had to hold her if I wanted to take a picture of her face. While I was playing hide and seek with Kitty Pogi, she went out and watched us. I didn't want her to run off, so I just zoomed the camera on her. Cats are part of nature and of earth, too, right? I wanted to put her picture here because my baby's no longer a baby... she's pregnant now.


It was a dark afternoon, and my time to take pictures went by so fast, so just after an hour of taking pictures, I had to stop as I don't want to use my flash in capturing pictures. I started my Earth Day with a picture of a bird, and I will end it with a bird picture. =) The cloud was dark, it was a different setting than I had with the first picture, so in order for the bird to be seen, I changed the white balance of the camera into tungsten. Zooming 4 times (optical) and 16 times (digital) to get this shot, it was a bit difficult as slight movement will result in a blur, but I think I did well here. This bird had an insect in his mouth, and as I watched him, I realized he was courting another bird - in a picture I took, he was giving the insect to the other bird. Oh sweet!

How did you spend Earth Day?

*** Jenn ***

In September of 2008, I joined an online forum told to be about an old friend who's now living in Saudi Arabia. It was a fun forum, and as I go through it, I realized that the forum is more than just adult talk. Through it I got to learn more things about photography, and one of the cool gifts about it was being friends with fellow photography enthusiasts and meeting up with them whenever there was a chance.

Earlier this month, Halie (whom I first met last March when we had a photo walk) organized a meet up. All members were invited, but the meet up was primarily for the people who's always in this thread called "MTC World." I wasn't supposed to attend, but I don't want to turn Halie down, so I decided to meet up with them. After all, this is my chance to see the people behind the handles and the avatars!

The meeting place was at Starbucks in SM Megastrip. I was the first one to arrive, but soon after, they arrived one by one. It was just sad that Joel, Rasc, and H couldn't stay long as they have other obligations to go to. I told before that I will ask my sister to drop by where we were so I have companion traveling home, but it was only 8:30PM when my sister arrived and the night hasn't even started yet! I asked sister if it's just okay for her to tag along, and glad that all's fine with her.




We decided to eat dinner at Congo Grille in El Pueblo, just walking distance from the Megastrip. All of us were really hungry, and we decided to order foods by ourselves, although five of us (Tim, Leo, Eric, my sister, and I) had their table for 5 meal so we could just share the food and the tab as well. Our meal included - pork sisig, crispy crablets, beef bulalo, adobong kangkong, chicken pandan, and for desserts we had mango float cake. I am not sure what the others had, but Halie and Doc Aileen had nachos. I also got to taste the Cerveza Negra for the first time, courtesy of Halie. I saw that she ordered a bottle of it, so I asked if I could get to taste it, too. It was delicious! Way much better than the Pale Pilsen.

Eating dinner with them was a riot! Never have I been in a company of crazy (in a good way, I meant that as a compliment) people! Most of them are already good friends since then, but the great thing about it was that no one was left behind. Majority of the people attended I haven't interacted in the forums yet, and for someone who always felt she's being left behind, I didn't feel it at all while having dinner with them.




From El Pueblo, we went to Metrowalk in Pasig. Some of us already left for home, but my sister and I wasn't in the mood to go home just yet, so we went with them. We shared the cab with Tim and Leo, and being gentlemen that they were, they took care of the fare (thanks guys).

The main purpose of coming to Metrowalk was to have a round of drinks and serious talks that would reveal more of us. However, just a few minutes of our stay, it rained - and it rained hard. The restobar staff just guided us inside the establishment (we were primarily staying outside). The environment inside wasn't a good place to do the talks, but Halie and I were able to talk amongst ourselves. She and I have been slowly becoming closer and closer, and I am happy that I got to know her as a real friend.

It was hard for all of us to talk about just one topic, so we have different little groups to whom we share talks with. I also got to have a long, serious talk with Tim. I have already talked to him in the forum before, but it was short lived - as he wasn't online always. When he arrived in Congo Grille and I introduced myself he said, "Finally, I have met you." He and I have hit it off almost instantly, and despite the fact that we barely know each other, we were able to throw jokes at each other without hesitations.

I was having battery problems, so Halie did most of the photo shooting. And since we cannot do the game they were planning to do, we just took time to take pictures:






Big thanks to Halie and my sister for taking the pictures. Halie had more pictures, but I just took those of me in it! Hahaha. It was a fun photoshoot! I admire men who weren't shy to have their pictures taken, and not only do these men like being photographed, they love to do poses and looks, too!




It was past 2AM when some of us left. The ten of us still love to hang out, and Tim said that it might not be a good time to commute back home, so sister and I decide to just stay until it is safe for us to go home. We walked to the nearby Starbucks shop to have some wee hours in the morning snacks. I ordered their strawberry Belgian waffle, and their very berry frappuccino. I really loved the waffle, but the frap, I didn't. It tasted way too bitter, and the berry sauce on top was the most disgusting berry flavor I have ever tasted. Still, I finished it off.

During our stay in Starbucks, we (or they) were talking about their lives working in call centers. Jayson was a very animated person, and I loved how he acted while he shared stories. I was able to work at a call center, too, but it was locally based, so I cannot contribute to their topics.

At 5AM, it was time to call it a day. This meet up had been a great moment for us to open up a friendship, as well as to strengthen existing friendships. We are all hopeful that there will be another meet up. But of course, I won't tag my sister along next time.

Sister and I shared the taxi with Leo, and we just asked the driver to drop us in Kamias. From there, we took the bus and got home at 6AM.

*** Jenn ***