By now, many of you have heard of, read about, or even blogged about Tara Santelices, the girl who was shot in the head during a jeepney holdup.
I have been remiss in posting this but I hope to make up now because friends and family of Tara are putting up a concert for this brave young lady.
The latest news I gathered from the blog of my friend Cathy is that Tara is now able to open her right eye and yawn. Baby miracles give us hope that one day we may witness THE BIG ONE for Tara. All these are by God’s grace and in His time. Meanwhile, you can do your bit for Tara by supporting the concert.
September 6 marked a milestone in blogging history in the Philippines as the first WordCamp in the entire Southeast Asia was hosted by none other than the Philippines (specifically Davao and Manila).
With most of my blogs on the WordPress platform AND with Mr. WordPress himself, Matt Mullenweg coming to the event, there was NO WAY I was going to miss this event! Even the ADMU-DLSU UAAP games took second place (even if only for a few hours!
Mica rode along with me to the venue site, the College of St. Benilde. We exchanged our campers passes for real badges (complete with barcode scanning!). I was excited to meet Ria and Blogie again and met Gwen for the first time (although we had been Plurk buddies already for some time).
Registration table complete with barcode scanners to record attendance
We opened with a plenary session that had the head of CSB and Blogie welcoming all the campers.While all this was going on, I spotted Matt sitting a few rows behind me and took this shot of Mr. WordPress —
Matt Mullenweg
and here —
The morning sessions were breakaway ones, depending on whether you were on the user or developer track. Obviously, I chose the user track.
My first session was Blogging 102 with Jayvee.
Several of us almost did not make it to Jayvee’s talk because we were told to go to Rm. 409. There we were, sitting in this room for over 10 minutes when Shari came dashing into the room to tell us we were in the wrong room! Apparently, there was ANOTHER Rm. 409 in another wing of the building! Yikes…we all half walked, half ran to the right room and thankfully still caught a great part of Jayvee’s talk which was so well prepared and so educational.
My 2nd session was with Ely Apao who spoke on Organizing and Optimizing Your WordPress Blog. A lot of what he spoke about affected those who were on WordPress.org so I could not relate to all of them but I did take down some notes and took pictures of some of his presentation and am filing it away somewhere for future reference.
The 3rd session for the morning was one of the most hilarious but very informative sessions — Video Blogging by Kring Elenzano.
Kring produces videos and took us through the pros and cons of video blogging (vlogging), how to make a vlog “kick-ass” as she called it. Her presentation was done in a very humorous way (combined of course with spiels from Kring that can only come from….Kring — including a not-to-be-named comment that got us laughing because she did not realize she was being live-streamed. But I did take pics of every slide she put up because they were filled with great tips (including where lights should be positioned so the subject comes out as well as how to reduce noise and amplify the subject’s voice). I absolutely did not regret going to this particular session!!
After a Chowking lunch, I made my way back to the auditorium for the afternoon plenary sessions.
Matt was first in line, regaling us first with interesting stats on the use of WordPress in the Philippines. (Trivia: Did you know that the Philippines ranked #24 worldwide in terms of WordPress users?)
He also talked about the future of WordPress including a live demo of WP version 2.7 which is coming out in November. WOW! We were all eyes and ears!
Aileen (aka Ms. Google Philippines) took us next through Google Analytics (very interesting things you can find about your blog, where visitors come from, what converts more visitors to your site, etc). I think I will spend the next few weeks learning more about this one!
A few more sessions followed after this. Matt later came back on for a Q&A portion (a much awaited opportunity for the campers to ask questions of THE MAN OF THE HOUR). Unfortunately, I could not stay long as the car was already coming for me. I missed the photo op with Matt but came away with a WP bag filled with goodies from the sponsors. And had a chance to get Ria (one of the Mindanao bloggers) to myself for this —
Thanks to the Mindanao bloggers who spearheaded this event. You managed to pull this thing off with aplomb! Looking forward to our next WordCamp Philippines!!!
Here’s some link love to people who blogged about WordCamp (I “stole” an initial list from AJ who likewise got it from Jehzlau) and added as I came across other posts:
My kids grew up on Pampers — mostly. For many, many years, I had held on to this pink, carton Pampers box, which if I remember right, could hold 96 Pampers diapers. Too bad I disposed of the box some time ago in a frenzy of spring cleaning. Maybe it was an inner desire to hang on to their baby years that kept me from throwing away that box but when I did, it must have been my “letting go” and moving on to dealing with them as teens.
I have never forgotten my parenting days with Pampers so it was providential that I was invited to the launch in Glorietta of Pampers Stages and a chance to explore Pampers World (how the world looks from a baby’s eyes).
Jamie Endaya, Country PR Manager of P&G, explained the different features of the diapers. For the New Baby diapers, there is a cottony cover with hypoallergenic lotion and aloe vera extract. For the Active Baby diapers, they use Velcro straps around the waist. And for Easy-Ups diapers, it is made to be put on and off like undies. How different it is now from my time when the only difference in diapers was the size and weight of your kid.
Several doctors from the Pampers Parenting Institute, an international network of experts on babies, their development and health, were around to answer questions and guide us on a tour. We were taken to several “rooms” made for us to experience what it was like to be a baby again.
The first 2 rooms were for newborns. Newborns could only see a few inches from their faces and images are blurry. In one room, they had cubbyholes to allow us to put our hands in and feel different items (spongy, squeaky, soft, rough, etc) that a baby experiences as it touches things.
In the second room they took us to, there were 2 giant cribs complete with oversized pillows and mobiles. I lay down in one of them and overhead there was a mirror that distorted images reflecting from the crib to show what a baby actually sees at 3 weeks. It looks like this:
how the crib actually lookshow the baby sees the crib
The rooms for an Active Baby were made to look like you were in giantland. Oversized dining and living rooms! It is important then for parents to be able to imagine what the world looks like from this tiny tot’s perspective so that the home can be made accident-proof. For me, that was a fun place to take pics!
This is how the world looks to a babyIn the oversized dining room...and in the giant living room
And the last 2 rooms were for the toddlers (Easy-Ups). At this stage, toddlers like to try grown-up stuff: shoes, clothes. And they explore as they realize they can walk.
A baby would look like this in adult shoes while writing with a pencilThat pencil actually has lead!
The whole tour was interesting, to say the least. They have really come far in terms of developing baby diapers.
Buffet lunch was hosted by P&G for the press at Heaven ‘n Eggs nearby. Here we had a chance to meet up with more press people, including Paula of Good Housekeeping magazine, and other P&G people who I enjoyed talking with about the world of blogging. Thanks for the yummy, gastronomic lunch guys!!!
I have been blogging on WordPress for over a year now. It was at iBlog3 summit last year when I met fellow bloggers who spoke about its impressive platform and stats. While I consider myself an intermediate blogger, there are still aspects of WordPress that stump me and challenge me to learn more and more.
So it was a delight to find out soon after iBlog4 summit last April that the Mindanao bloggers who I met at the summit were going to organize the first WordPress WordCamp right here in Manila. Wow, what better way is there to pursue my desire to learn how to blog better on the WordPress platform than attend a camp precisely for it!!!
The WordCamp will be on September 6, 2008 (Sat.) at the College of St. Benilde on Taft Avenue, Manila.
For those of you already using WordPress or just thinking of it, here are some details:
– The camp is free of charge. However, in lieu of the fee, you will need to do a blog post containing certain information as outlined in their instructions after you register.
– The organizers will need to verify your blog post. Once you are confirmed, you will get a confirmation email which will serve as your ticket to the event.
– As of this posting, the organizers plan that the camp will have the following components:
It finally happened. An event unlike any other that bloggers have ever done.
Bloggers came together at the Vinyasa Yoga Center (where I practice) and did yoga for an hour and a half, followed by a vegetarian dinner cooked by my own yoga teacher, Pio Baquiran, who is not only a great yogi teacher but a fantastic chef as well.
PREPARATIONS IN FULL SWING
Chona and I were there early. Actually, Chona did yoga at noontime while I had to bring over to the center all the donated items from the sponsors. We ate a leisurely lunch at Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, then went back to the center where we packed the media kits and the other donations together with 3 lovely ladies from the ad agency, Aspac/Law (Ria, Kathy and Mia).
(Mia, Kathy and Ria of Aspac/Law)
Some bloggers came in early so we had a chance to chat and get to know those whose names were familiar to me but who I had never met yet, like Francis, Melanie, Janine, and Carl. I was particularly interested in chatting with Francis, who, it turns out, already practises yoga at Fitness First (my thought bubble: this is the perfect endorser for yoga for men!!!). Melanie, too, it turns out, has been doing yoga for some time now and in fact, took yoga lessons that same morning with Chona’s and my good yogi friend fresh from Riyadh, Jon Cagas! What a small world indeed!
Juned of Blog and Soul came by a little later from another “shoot” and became the event’s volunteer photographer.
Yogini mates Minna (also the VYC directress), her sister Therese and Trin Custodio dropped by to support the event and practice together with Chona and I. All in all, the shala was filled and energies were strong!
THE CLASS — ENERGY TO THE MAX
Pio informed us that he had designed a special sequence just for bloggers. Now that caught everyone’s interest. He began with a short meditation, taught the bloggers the proper way to breathe, then followed it up with eye exercises, rotation of the hands, fingers and shoulders, and shorter variations of the sun salutations.
Pio also made us go through simple forward bends, side bends and wide angle bends to stretch the spine (good for sedentary bloggers, right?). We also did leg raises for the abs as well as the Bridge and Fish poses.
Class ended with everyone sweaty but feeling good. We had a class picture and naturally with everyone being bloggers, we had a whole slew of cameras and smiling to get through before we could call it a night!
THE HEALTHY DINNER!
Pio’s dinner consisted of pasta, burgers (using vegetarian patties) and his eggless leche flan. Arpee had the time of his life trying to guess the ingredients of this one!
(vegetarian pasta)
(burger with vegepatties)
***realization*** – I just realized I forgot to take a pic of the eggless leche flan! Chona, help!
Each blogger came away from the event fully worked out, fed with healthy vegetarian food, armed with a bag of items from sponsors like Coke, RFM, Nestle and VYC. And also special thanks to a yogini mate, Lomen, for the iced tea donations (yes, we chilled them and drank them during dinner!!!).
NEXT: THE CONTEST!
Blog and Soul has also announced a contest where bloggers who did yoga could compose a blog, photo gallery, vlog or any other form of post about the event. Prizes up for grabs consist of a 1 liter aluminum bottle from Swiss company, SIGG. In addition, there are 3 yoga outfits (jacket and pants) for girls from Aura Athletica Rockwell. Judging will be done by Blog and Soul together with VYC and the winners will be announced soon. For mechanics of the contest, go to Blog and Soul’s website.
I did a random, ambush interview of some bloggers (including Francis who did a fantastic spiel on yoga for men — yey!).
And as I find blog entries on the event, I will post these below.
I grew up with Pinipig Crunch as my favorite treat. I love ice cream, no doubt about it. But my problem always was this. It would sometimes drip before I could eat it all. Some parts would drop from the popsicle stick if I was not quick on the draw. It could get pretty messy. And I still had a popsicle stick and wrappers to dispose of.
Nestle recently came up with the answer to my woes. Nestle Pops!
It comes in 2 handy sizes. the 62 mL plastic container (which retails at Php25) and the 211mL tub container (which retails at Php75).
(62 mL container)
(211 mL Tub)
Nestle Pops looks like Hershey Kisses (at least that was my first impression). Curious about it, I popped one into my mouth and just savored the chocolate-y flavor until it was soft enough to collapse. And delight of all delights, my palate tasted the vanilla ice cream which is inside each Pop!!! How ingenious!
No messy hands, no wrappers to throw away, no popsicle sticks. Problem solved!
At the moment, Nestle Pops is available at Shell Select Stations nationwide as well as at the MRT.
And….it has its own website! Check it out HERE. It has an online game for games young and old called “Pop’d Stars” which offers an Xbox 360 console with a Rock Band set as the grand prize aside from weekly prizes.
(Mia, Kathy and Ria of Aspac/Law)
(vegetarian pasta)
(burger with vegepatties)
