Ladies' night

Hanging out with former officemates

Coron, Palawan pictures

Greens and blues and hues (Hidden Lagoon)

Pristine Malcapuya Beach

Travel buddies, Romina, Joyce, Ryza and Paolo

Snorkeling, lovin' it

Picture perfect moment during hike to Kayangan Lake

Friday Letters: Amelia Earhart's love for freedom

Today, I decided that Friday would be my day for sharing some letters whom famous people wrote that inspired and transformed the world. These letters are very relatable and relevant, although some were written decades ago. I remember watching SATC movie part 1, where Mr. Big, to get her back, sent Carrie some love letters written by famous and beloved musicians, thinkers, philosophers and authors. I cannot help but be curious and intrigued by how these great minds feel about love and sacrifice, faith and failures, challenges and triumph.

There is something about letter writing that makes us all very human. Maybe because we tend to pour our hearts out onto these pages trusting that the eyes reading them are in league with our minds and emotions. Maybe because writing private, much more intimate, letters is an art of marrying our heart and mind ~ a very powerful and compelling combination. Perhaps, letters also give us a context of the society that the author and reader belong to ~ the age, moral standards, milieu. Through these written letters, we will also see how they defied traditional customs, how they struggled to fit two or more inconsistent truths, how they tried hard to establish their convictions amid the great transition of their times.

We are lucky to be part of this generation where we have access to these intimate self-portraits of great thinkers drawn through words ~ their sensibilities, idiosyncrasies, pleasures, guilt and perhaps universal view.

~

Amelia Earhart's radical view of marriage is as liberating as her historical air expedition across Atlantic ocean. I never knew Earhart that much before, except when I heard that line from New Radicals' song Someday We'll Know ~ ok, 90s kids lemme hear you sing it ~ whatever happened to Amelia Earhart!

Anyways, being a curious kid back then I searched the books and found out that she, aside from being an author, is the first woman pilot (aviatrix) who fly solo across the Atlantic. She also attempted to circumnavigate (fly around) the world but she disappeared over the Pacific Ocean in 1937. From the looks of it, she sees flying as a very liberating experience, which unsurprisingly becomes the backbone of her life conviction - freedom. More than a very independent spirit, Earhart also has this radical conviction about marriage. Written February 7, 1931, our letter today is written in the morning of her wedding to George Putnam, her publicist. Seeing marriage as a threat to her freedom, she started the letter directly emphasizing their deliberate discussion of sharing life together and managed to finish it with firmness and careful stress of her love for freedom. She drew a very brave set-up of marriage for her and her soon to be husband. 

There is by the way a film entitled Amelia (Mira Nair, 2009) starring Hilary Swank. You can check here

Also, Amelia refused to have her last name changed, so she continued using her name until the very end. 

Sources:

1. Amelia Earhart official website http://www.ameliaearhart.com/

2. Brainpickings: Amelia Earhart on Marriage http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/12/11/amelia-earhart-on-marriage/?utm_source=buffer&utm_campaign=Buffer&utm_content=bufferd6940&utm_medium=twitter

Post, interrupted

Time passes by so fast. Since we are now half way across 2013, I want to post an entry about my adventures in the past 7 months but as I was typing this my mood suddenly changed.

I dunno if it is the doughnut I ate awhile ago or perhaps something on the water, but I suddenly feel sentimental. Must be the weather. Outside the window, the sky looks very quiet, muted white clouds cover the usual blue; the grey-ish-thick-cover echoes city sounds perfectly, pointlessly, just like an empty well that apathetically swallows coins into its dry stony bottom.

Maybe I will think about my mid-year review later... I will lament the melancholic sky first.

Embracing big gifts

Burn it down

Burn it blue ~ the truest blue that I will ever see while all that are important to me are dissolving, crumbling, falling down

Good. 

I feel new bones.

I feel reinvigorated.

I feel like am seeing the world in a new perspective.

Disorienting at first.

But that is the beauty of new horizon ~

Fresh, wild, unexplored.

Waiting for its guests to find its abundance

I arrived to learn, 

Feeling tight my stronger backbone ~

stable foundation

Solid core

Who said it is easy to grow?

Small step after small step.

Measure progress with the depth of emotions that I feel, that I recognize, that I respected, that I understand.

As long as I feel, I know I will be fine.

~

Of transition

click here

Keeping up with the tides of change

So my best friend and I are going south this month. And we are going about the usual motions of pre-vacation preparation. Just now, we have not been receiving any reply from accom people that we are emailing. Then I suggested to my friend why not couchsurfing? And she agreed.

It is my first time to send couch requests to people. I wrote a very dramatic message, I dunno why. Haha, but I hope that the people I sent it to will heed the sincerity of my request. Here is the message:

For me, this trip means a lot because it is my first time in Coron. I had been to Palawan, but in Puerto Princesa and that experience alone made me a different person. Looking at the mountain formation, the blue ocean ~ it profoundly reminds me that the nature is really here, alive and flourishing even before me and actually even after me. This realization grows in me day by day and it made me believe that my worries and problems are just little compared to the big big world/nature. So whenever I feel down and sad, I turn my thoughts and emotions to nature and its vastness. I am simply a small creature under their magnificence.
But lately, I lost my 'path' in life and I am seeking myself again. So now I am travelling Palawan again. My friend and I will tap the power of travelling, nature and meeting new friends. We will definitely climb Mt. Tapyas. It is also our dream to snorkel and witness lakes, aside from island hopping. I want to learn about the culture too.

Mmm, now am just hoping for positive reply from one of them.
Mt. Tapyas, Twin Lagoon, Kayangan Lake etc, I believe you are as beautiful as I saw you in my dreams. I will arrive soon ^^

Feeling nostalgic here is a photo of mom and me at Kapurpurawan Rock Formation in Ilocos Norte

 And this is me perched on solid rock

Coming soon: New destination this month ^^