Quest for the True North

PhotoHunt: Purple

Filed under Photohunt, beach, travel

My feeble attempt at catching the sunset in Bantayan Island, Cebu. This is purple, right?

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PhotoHunt: Triangle

Filed under Photohunt, beach, travel

Hooray! I am back in the blogosphere and in PhotoHunt!

I celebrate my comeback with my favorite element—fire. This is a bonfire we lit on a weekend getaway to a beach in San Remigio, a town on the northern tip of Cebu which boasts of having the longest shoreline in the island province. It takes around three hours to get there from the city. I made the mistake of eating a rather heavy breakfast before we hit the road, so on the way there my stomach felt funny. I puked twice on the road. It was embarrassing, but all in all the trip was great because I was with great company.

San Remigio is also a great diving spot, but I was such a coward that I didn’t try it even though I really, really wanted to. The diving instructor said I need to learn to swim first before I should try diving (maybe because he didn’t want to be responsible for me).

Believe it or not, I grew up in a coastal city and the beach is my favorite place to be, but I have not learned to swim after all these years. No one taught me to swim when I was a kid, and I think the fear grew bigger as I grew older. Now I wonder if it is still possible for someone in her early twenties to learn such a basic skill?

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PhotoHunt: Scary

Filed under Photohunt, the good earth, travel

Brace yourself, because even I, don’t like looking at this photo:

See the green coils around the tree?

These are green tree pythons or Morelia viridis. They are a non-venomous, arboreal (refers to animals that live in trees) snake species found in Indonesia, the island of New Guinea, and Australia. They like coiling around tree branches to rest there, as you can see. They sleep during the day and forage for food at night.

I don’t like snakes. Just looking at them (and even their photos) make me cringe. There were several kinds of snakes at the Singapore Zoo, the famous Anaconda included, but I wasn’t able to take lots of photos because I was in a hurry to get out of the area where the snakes were.

But, looking at this photo now, I must admit that I like the color of the green python—vivid green (I like green!) with spots of white that look like crystals when viewed under a certain shade of light. It makes them blend well with the trees. Fortunately, there aren’t green pythons in the Philippines, so no worries about mistaking them for leaves.

(This is my third PhotoHunt entry about animals. I seem to have taken my animal protection realization to heart, eh?)

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PhotoHunt: Family

Filed under Photohunt, family, the good earth, travel

One of the reasons my Singapore trip was memorable was because I had a reunion with my distant cousins. Look, we have a lovely photo together!!

Sorry for the yellow splash in the middle. I try not to post frontal photos of myself here, lest someone takes my photo and paste it on a porn star’s nude body. (Or maybe I just don’t want you to see how my cousins and I look alike! LOL).

Okay, serious now. They are orangutans, the largest species of arboreal animals (in other words, monkeys). They can only be found in the rainforests of Borneo and Sumatra. In fact, Orangutan means “person of the forest” in Malay and Indonesian.

I remember this kind of money very well because I used to call my second brother orangutan. When we were kids, we had contests of who came up with the worst name for the other. His nickname is Atan, so I called him orangutan. He, in turn, called me Badak. I don’t know where he got that, but I’m sure it’s not a monkey’s name. Technically, I won, right?

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PhotoHunt: Lazy

Filed under Photohunt, human interest, the good earth, travel, trivia

This is what white tigers do on a lazy afternoon:

“I am bored.”

“I wish I could get away from these people. They are starting to annoy me.”

“I should just go down to the water and cool off.”

“Whew! I love this!”

“Now my coat is squeaky clean.”

This white tiger can be found at the world-acclaimed Singapore Zoo, which is known for its open animal dens. I was one of the annoying people who kept staring at him. I just really loved his beautiful white coat.

Trivia:

• White tigers have blue eyes and pink noses, and no, they are not albinos. White tigers resulted from a rare genetic combination.
• White tigers descended from Mohan, who was caught by an Indian Maharajah in 1951. He was bred, and became the proud father of many cubs.
• There used to be five kinds of tigers in the world. Only three remain today. The other two are extinct.
• Only 7,000 wild tigers are alive today. They are being hunted and killed at an alarming rate for their coat. They are also losing their homes in the wild to real estate development.

Before I went to the zoo, I didn’t care so much about tigers. I only thought of them as animals to be feared. Now I think of them as beautiful creatures to be saved. I think I am going to adopt wildlife as another advocacy.

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PhotoHunt: View

Filed under Photohunt, human interest, travel, trivia

This is the aerial view of Chicago as seen from the sky deck of the Sears Tower. I just love that beautiful loop of roads in the center. It’s called Circle Interchange, one of the worst places to be stuck in traffic in the world, and it’s an example of a Spaghetti Junction.

But still, I love Chicago! I hope to go back there someday.

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PhotoHunt: Road

Filed under Photohunt, travel

I am back playing in PhotoHunt!

For my comeback, I introduce my beloved brother and his twisted sense of humor:

He is mentally okay, in case you are wondering if he is. He just thought it funny to pose and pretend to be asleep in the middle of a country road. This photo was taken in Bukidnon, a highland province in the Philippines known for being the “Pineapple Capital of the World,” where he travels a lot to for his job. The traveler streak obviously runs in the family.

P.S. I hope he forgives me for posting this in my very public blog.

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PhotoHunt: Colorful

Filed under Photohunt, people, travel

It’s midnight where I am, and I can’t go back to sleep. I’m still on Philippine time, I guess. I thought I’d better do my PhotoHunt until sleep comes upon me.

I am featuring here some paintings made by children for the Art for Heart, an exhibit set up by the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey for the children who lost loved ones at the 9/11 tragedy. It was intended as a therapy for the kids. Look what they’ve come up out of their loss, and notice the raw emotion in the artworks.

Click the photos to enlarge.

The exhibit, by the way, was put up at the site of the World Trade Center. I’m not sure if the paintings are still there today, though.

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PhotoHunt: Dark

Filed under Photohunt

Those are my hands. It looks like the photo was set up, but it is candid. One of my college organizations used to meet on Monday nights outside our dormitories. We used candles at our meet-ups because we were cheap like that. I was playing with the candle one Monday night when a friend caught my hands on camera.

Photo taken by Alex Pataray, and edited by yours truly.

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PhotoHunt: Clouds

Filed under Photohunt, human interest, travel

Do you see what I see?

I snapped these photo soon after taking off from the Legazpi Airport. It’s on the northern part of the Philippines, by the way, right where the world-famous cone-shaped Mayon Volcano is.

I thought the clouds looked like a bear hiding in the bushes.

Look, he is standing up and scratching his right cheek!

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