t h e s p o o l a r t i s t

1961 transformations

2011-03-02T00:00:00.000-08:00

How 1961 looks before when we signed the lease and how it looks now...

The Norodom Gallery

The Nostalgia Gallery

Galerie V

Thy Kingdom Pop Gallery

Facade

More transformations soon! Four more galleries are being renovated together with the Cafe!

1961 is now open from 9 am til 9 pm...

1961

2011-02-26T10:08:00.000-08:00

Finally, the galleries+artspace at home that we've been working on since October last year has been launched!

Although only the 2 main galleries and 4 of its 8 artist's studios are ready, we were able to open the space already to the public. Here are photos from the launch party on Friday, February 25th...

Presenting 1961...

The Cold War Gallery by Russian artist Inal Kabaloev

The Kennedys Gallery by American artist Rachel Faller

The Thy Kingdom Pop Gallery by Kyota Hyoda

Jam & Don

Love Grace blending in with the Kennedy Gallery

Lomo photo-artist Tim Robertson with his works in the Vann Molyvann Gallery

Friends from Poland, UK and Russia

Friends from Germany and Japan

with Raffles Chef Mawa from Indonesia... our galleries used to be the Raffles warehouse!

Ines...

Kyo with his paintings...

Cambodian artist Ben Thynal and friends with his works at the Galerie V

Vintage bags and luggage at the Nostalgia

Ben Thynal with Tim Robertson... two of the most amazing artists I've worked with!

At the Norodoms Gallery

Furniture details at the Vann Molyvann Gallery... the glass table is the old switchboard from the house.

check out our website at www.the1961.com

Four other artist studios are opening soon with the cafe!

spoolartist & son

2010-12-14T19:20:00.000-08:00

10,000 questions a day, an unquenchable thirst to fill our serene,white walls with pencil and pen doodles, creating rocket ships out of empty pen cases, unbelievable obsessions of planets, trains, cities, maps, water, iconic architectural structures, chocolates & pepperidge farm cookies.

sometimes, seeing your self in a little person's body can be quite cute and scary at the same time...

SUPER SOVANN - episode # 1

2010-12-12T17:35:00.000-08:00

Here's the first installment of my Cambodian superhero project - Super Sovann!

SUPER SOVANN - a super fashionable superhero

2010-12-12T17:28:00.001-08:00

SUPER SOVANN - a third world super hero is born!

2010-12-12T17:16:00.000-08:00

I've recently doodled my way into creating a comic series in facebook and was happy at how my friends reacted to it. What was funnier is that how I get friend requests from random people I don't know but who just loved it! Here goes SUPER SOVANN!

freedom @ hope

2010-12-11T21:52:00.000-08:00

My son Freedom recently had their first ever Christmas theatre production at Hope International School where he studies. Unfortunately at that day, I had a photography class at Angkor Wat (which was booked since last year!) so I totally missed out on this! Fortunately, my wife brought the Sony camera with her and took some snaps of the play...

Freedom doing the greetings...

They performed "Hosanna Rock & Roll" which looked like they were dancing to YMCA by the Village People...

The play was rather politically correct... the three magis were all girls!

Even Joseph and Mary were Asians (Koreans) and they were just too adorable...

With me and my wife coming from a strong theatre background, we were just too proud to see our son up on stage...

Freedom was a cow in the manger scene (at least he's not a lobster, like the Hugh Grant's nieces in Love Actually) and according to everyone, he did an awesome job... his costume was made by Don Protasio no less!

ART BATTLE at the Alley West

2010-12-10T23:47:00.000-08:00

Got a challenge from Jam last week to participate in an "ART BATTLE" of sorts with the other artists in town. We were given the "holidays" as theme for our pieces and were each given a week to complete. Art Deli sponsored the competition.

I did an installation + performance called "Borderline Precious". It was my reaction towards how the festive season is celebrated across borders and how each culture, tradition and religion redefines Christmas to suit their beliefs.

Jam on the other hand, did a three piece work called iBuddha and iJesus, made on his ipad.

Mike Mahalo, a British artist, tackled the rapid commercialization of the holiday season and entitled his digital art piece "Chri$tma$".

Cambodian artist Savann Oun made a three dimensional piece made of mesh wire, a painting on a woven mat, candles and mosquito coils to depict "Christmas garbage", seeing how people would celebrate the holidays for months and end up with a pile of trash. His piece is a reaction as a Buddhist to an otherwise Christian celebration.

The main objective of the Art Battle is to resuscitate a dark, neglected part of the Alley West and turn it into a street gallery for the public. Another Art Battle is scheduled next month but with a different set of mechanics.

To vote for your favorite piece, please go to www.facebook.com/artdeli and click on "like" corresponding to the photos of the pieces that you love.

my emails hacked!

2010-08-07T02:26:00.000-07:00

Dear friends,

I am very saddened to inform you that all my outlook based emails have been hacked for the past week, as confirmed by my IT Consultant today, that’s why I haven’t been receiving very important emails. What makes it worse is that it was done by my former IT manager and two other people who worked for me:

Brewster Bonifacio – my former IT Manager
Vincent Rufo – my former Assistant Photographer
Kristian “KC” Enriquez – my former Sales Manager

The three of them have put up ArtWorx Studios to go against my company, Spoolworks Studios (see how close their name is to mine?) since November 2009. I have been aware of them but I welcomed them without holding anything in mind. This is even with the fact that they are using my works and photos as part of their portfolio. My IT Consultant traced the origin of the hack to their ip addresses.

I am deeply offended however, to find this electronic ad below promoting their works and what makes it funny is they emailed it to ALL of my outlook contacts in one go, strangely, even those they DON’T KNOW! Some of you might have never heard of them, and you’re probably surprised to receive their electronic ads. Some of you emailed them back to me asking if I own this company or if I am involved with them. The answer is NO, and for those who have sent me important business emails, kindly resend them to my other address: spoolworks@hotmail.com or iam@lovenramos.com

Thank you for your support.

Loven

This is the electronic flyer they sent to all my clients!
They even copied our family Christmas greeting lay-out for this ad!!! See below...

See the uncanny resemblance?

Now you be the judge. There goes intellectual property rights to you.

The funny thing is that these people used to work for me and they were part of my family at one point. I took Brewster in as one of my first employees because he was fired from his work at Shinta Mani Hotel. Vincent Rufo is Brewster's best friend and I hired him out of Brewster's insistence to give his friend a chance. KC and I worked together when I first moved to Cambodia and was one of my founding partners in Spoolworks. He left me twice without any explanation and a few months later, him and Brewster and Vincent put up their own company... ARTWORX STUDIOS.

I don't mind the competition and all, but with their efforts of trying to destroy me by hacking through my email servers and my client database, as well as buying my domain www.spoolworks.com and linking it into their website, that's definitely below the belt!

What should I do?

Any suggestions?

a new blog si born!

2010-07-26T04:35:00.000-07:00

Siem Reap Life is your virtual window into the latest happenings, the most interesting places and faces, the best bargains for wine, dine and local shopping as well as the most fabulous experiences you can possibly have in Angkor town.

More than a guidebook and definitely not a critique, it is honest, informative and straight out of the heads and hearts of residents. Our blog authors are of diverse backgrounds and interests. Thus, you get a whole collage of point of views and always a perspective you can relate to.
Whether your just traveling through or soon taking up residence, get in-depth and intimate with Siem Reap, check-out Siem Reap Life!

www.siemreaplife.com

spontaneous music at artdeli

2010-07-21T20:22:00.000-07:00

That's it. The Phnom Penh Post just called me the most eccentric man in Siem Reap in their latest issue. Does that mean I have to go around town in plaids and bowtie, sporting a Brit accent? I feel like I have to live to the hype. Maybe I could suspend myself in a tank of formaldehyde ala Damien Hirst too.

Forget that. What they really wrote about was the spontaneous music happening at the Art Deli, my newest baby with my friend Jam. For the past couple of weeks, we've been churning out instant gigs and jamming sessions with musicians in the kingdom...

Our first two jamming sessions were with Cambojam - already a known name in the music circuit here.

Then came the Siem Reap Jazz Quartet, which coincidentally was officially formed at the Art Deli. Their impromptou performances made such waves that the national dailies even took notice!

And our latest gig last week was an acoustic session with a guitarist from Quebec - Frederic, who brought down the house, almost literally. It was an absolute fun enjoying music with these guys.

This Saturday, we'll have the Siem Reap Jazz Quartet back again for the launch of Earth Organic Jewelry at the Art Deli.

Can't wait!

best kep secret

2010-07-21T06:03:00.000-07:00

I am hopelessly in love with this place, and the whole Cambodian coast as a whole. But me and my wife are definitely head over heels with the city of Kep-Sur-Mer, or Kep in short...

Established by the French as the premiere beach destination in the 1900's, Kep will definitely not win first place as best beach, but the appeal, lifestyle and mood that this place injects is indescribably surreal!

Dotted with countless villas from the French colonial era and the 1960's, the city was built at the time when Cambodia was on its golden years. Now, however, it is a living testament of the dark years of the Khmer Rouge and the Cold War. The grand old edifices that used to stand proud on its seaside avenues are but empty shells and rotting ruins.

The last couple of years however, saw the re-emergence of Kep in the radar of the international jetset. Now, it is slowly rebuilding its arms with a good number of eco hotels, exquisite boutique resorts and small luxurious hotels around.

We first came to Kep accidentally, after I burned out from a very tiring shoot in Phnom Penh. Instead of going back home north to Siem Reap, we decided to make a drive down south and found our way here. We first stayed at Khnai Bang Chatt which we thoroughly enjoyed. But on the next couple of times, we stayed at the rustic Champey Inn by the Rue de la Plage, a stone's throw away from Kep's famed Blue Crab Market.

We are just hooked to this place and are planning to stay here in one point of our lives...

my hiatus ends!

2010-07-20T21:03:00.000-07:00

Yes, I'm still alive! And I haven't disappeared from the face of the web... instead, I've sort of silenced my way into making a bang!

I've been working on the following websites for myself, for my business collaborations, and even for my city - Siem Reap, with the help of several amazing individuals!

www.lovenramos.com - my personal voyages through photography

www.artdeli.org - my new cafe/gallery project in collaboration with my friend Jam from Canada

www.siemreaplife.com - the city's first online portal. A collaboration with two amazing friends - Sarah and Philippe that has ballooned into a really fun project involving a dozen other bloggers around Cambodia's premiere holiday gateway.

www.youaremypoetry.com - my friend Don and I put up an Aladdin Cave of sorts (according to Phnom Penh Post) and this is it... this is still a work in progress!

www.spoolworks.net - still not live, but am working on this site day and night. This is my main business bloodline!

We will be launching our city's blog/website, www.siemreaplife.com in a fun party on Sunday, July 25 at the Alley West during the country's first ever Green Market - an organic fair!

full frontal

2010-04-08T11:20:00.000-07:00

Forgive the language, but I was ecstatic when I received an email from F Magazine Creative Director Franco Dionco that the dress I designed made it to the front cover of Cambodia's foremost fashion magazine!

It's part of my art / fashion experiment called "Fairytales" where I printed screens of a fairytale that connects from one dress / clothing to another. As this is my first foray in fashion, my cuts are really simple and basic, but my fashion guru Don Protasio has helped me tremendously along the way. And so did my wife who was my biggest cheerleader and patron.

Now having one of these dresses on the front cover of F Magazine no less, is utterly mind blowing and amazing! Thanky uo once again F Team... will have to open a bottle of champagne when you guys are in Siem Reap!

what comes around goes around

2010-01-28T20:40:00.000-08:00

Two amazing American artists opened a creative wonderland recently just beside our gallery/shop by the Alley West in Siem Reap, Cambodia. Featuring treasures and art culled from recycled clothes, fabrics and haunts from the junkyard, they've created such a trove of earth friendly clothes and accessories that magically defines their name - CIRCLE...

Rachel Faller, who owns KeoK'jay in Phnom Penh, provides jobs and skills for women living with HIV. Lauren Iida, on the other hand, creates fashion from recycled and vintage materials through another enterprise that empowers impoverished women through education and livelihood.

Having met in Phnom Penh, they decided to bring their talents together in Siem Reap to open up Circle...

The store is awash with quirky details and little nooks of art from found objects and scavenged treasures.

Necklaces and bracelets from fabric scraps and buttons...

This box frame with dinosaurs and bingo numbers is cool.

Iida, Laren's brand, is very feminine but each with a twist.

Rachel's style is very urbane with a touch of Boho chic.

Jam, left, is opening an organic cafe right above Circle in a few weeks called Samakki.

Leah, who provided sinful indulgences that evening with her amazing cupcakes will be partnering up with Jam on Cafe Samakki. We definitely can't wait for them to open up what will be our new hang-out!

Leigh, Jam and Don

Learn more about Rachel's work at www.keokjay.org and Lauren's at www.circlecambodia.wordpress.com

life's a fuckin' fairy tale

2010-01-20T22:41:00.000-08:00

It all begins with Once Upon a Time... and often ends with And They Lived Happily... but often or not, it ends with a not-so-happy ending, or sometimes, it just ends.

When my grandmother read my first bedtime story eons back, I knew that I'd be forever drawn into a world of words and tales woven out of one's imagination. That sheer magic of storytelling gave me my inspiration to try my hands into fashion for the first time...

The magic of the good is its inevitable relationship with the bad...
(Glitter Encrusted Skulls Necklace)

Once upon a time, there lived an evil queen...
(Evil Queen Cape Dress with Glitter Encrusted Skulls Necklace)

Her kingdom come, her will be done...
(Paparazzi Dress and The Other Birkin Bags)

But as she crossed paths with a man to tame her heart...
(Captivation Dress)

Don't we all wish for one?
(Fuckin' Fairy Tale Top and Pants)

Alas, the last page is turned...
(The End Shirt and Destiny Pants)

The full collection of the The Fuckin' Fairy Tale Series is on exhibit/sale at the mezzanine floor of POETRY at the Alley West, Siem Reap, Cambodia

what happened last year - thanksgiving

2010-01-19T10:47:00.000-08:00

Thanksgiving is primarily a very American holiday, but having been raised in a city in the Philippines where American Baptist missionaries took good roots, we have been celebrating it all our lives. And besides, thanksgiving is such a universal celebration these days...

So it's only natural that we prepped up our Cambodian home for this holiday. I had an event organized for Guerlain Paris the month before so, I ended up with tons of scrap metal that I turned into two outdoor lounges.

We made and screen printed special throw pillows for the dinner with the names of our guests and guests-to-be (Obama and Hillary were too busy that evening)

We set our table with sculptures from Bill Bensley's Fantastical Creatures Exhibit and some bounty from the harvest (harvest at the supermarket, that is). We also made special placemats and coasters which stated things we were thankful for...

By dusk, the al fresco corner of the house was ready and so was dinner!

Me, my wife Faith, Don, Sheree (fresh from Newcastle, flown in especially for the Wanderlust fashion shoot) American authors Shannon and Jason and of course, Liz!

Our menu included stuffed chicken (turkey was too darn hard to find in Cambodia!), roast potatoes, buttered peas and veggies, battered fish, prawn cakes, pasta, stuffed pumpkin dessert, cream cheese cake, etc... Jason and Shannon brought a super cool drink that they concocted themselves!

Inside, we had our tree set up too for the holidays...

Guests got to bring their pillows as souvenirs!

A few days later, we had dinner with some new friends... Max, who's Vietnamese-French, Rachel, from the US, who's opening a boutique next door to us at the Alley West and Ruben from Mexico.

We definitely love welcoming friends to our home!

what happened last year - halloween

2010-01-19T09:28:00.000-08:00

2009 was such a whack and it passed like a breeze. So many things and projects here and there kept me up for so long that the blog world seemed like a distant universe away from me. So what I'll do is try to catch up with the past year's missed posts... so here goes Halloween!

We started the evening at Linga Bar...

Snow White

Martin came out as a mummy with disastrous results. He had a lot of wardrobe malfunction and was half naked before the clock struck 12.

Stuart came as Michael Jackson

Georgie was Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz. She followed the yellow brick road with a motorcycle...

Quite a drunk Ariel from the Little Mermaid

Ali G in da house!

Half of them came out as Greeks...

And this one's a Ghost Rider

Bonnie from Bonnie&Clyde, a ghostbuster and a UHC (Unidentified Halloween Costume)

Fairies and what-nots at Angkor What Bar

I came as an 18th century explorer!

Wild party at Angkor What. We can barely move!

I was with my Auntie Mida's friends from the US: Allan, Marlowe and Mark from Chicago and Seattle. They were on a holiday here and they definitely came at the right time!

louis & vuitton

2010-01-17T10:39:00.000-08:00

For Christmas, we got Freedom two new pups to play with. Last year, our Labrador Chocky, mysteriously disappeared in our front yard and our son was devastated.

So we got him these cuddly little poodles... Louis and Vuitton. Somehow, they remind us of the colors of the monogrammed classic luggage... and they're French, hence the name. But for some strange reason, they remind me so much too of ewoks from Star Wars. Maybe we should have called them Leia and Luke instead? HHmmm...

Vuitton's a girl and is the darker one - almost like the color of the monogrammed canvas. She's the reserved, behaved and elegantly calm pup among the two. She's almost very lady-like... might be Marie Antoinette on her past life. Yes, she likes her hair brushed and loves cake too.

Louis, the lighter shaded pup, on the other hand is mischievous, fretfully friendly and such an "Energizer Bunny".He can end up covering himself in mud in no time. He is definitely Freedom's favorite.

He is also such a flirt. On parties, he'd flaunt his cuteness to guests who couldn't resist his natural French charm. Our friend Kimberly from New York, just couldn't help it!

And my sister Grace acted like their adopted mom during her holiday here.

Our cat, Cartier was truly jealous!

family portraits

2010-01-15T22:18:00.000-08:00

Our not-so-little boy came home to Cambodia last month with Nanie, my mom and my sister and made our holidays the best we've ever had. It was our first Christmas and New Year altogether so we had to do our portraits!

My son, Freedom, all grown up!

The two of us doing a Lacoste ad!

Family snaps

Our Family! From left: my mom Love, my sister Love Grace, Don - the high priest of Cambodian avant garde fashion, my wife Faith, our son Freedom and Nanie.

cambodian connections

2009-10-14T11:02:00.000-07:00

The great thing about living in Cambodia is being able to welcome people you'll probably never have a chance to meet at home or anywhere else in the planet for that matter. I guess it's just a matter of being at the right place at the right time...

A couple of weeks ago, we welcomed the group of Ben Chan, creative director and founder of Bench, the Philippines' largest retail group with clothing stores stretching from San Francisco to San Fernando, Dubai to Divisoria, Beijing to Boni Avenue. He was with Miguel, the head architect of Bench; talent managers Arnold and Rey; Xander Tantoco and Mons, daughter of Foreign Affairs Secretary Alberto Romulo.

They visited our shop, Poetry, and did a big shopping spree. Ben got a couple of stuffs and was especially fond of the book I did. He asked me to collaborate on him on some design projects for Bench and Pinoy Lab. My designs will be available on Bench this December!

Had dinner with them on the last night at the Aman House. T'was such great fun.

The next couple of weeks, I got a call from the Philippine Embassy in Phnom Penh to welcome and help out Senator Pia Cayetano on her trip to Angkor. She came with friend Anne who happens to be a triathlete like the senator.

Senator Cayetano was here as a speaker for a United Nations-sponsored conference. A young driven politician, a great mom and a health buff, she is truly an incredible person that it's hard to believe she exists in the flesh... my wife and I have just become a big, big fan.

three countries, one calamity

2009-10-01T00:32:00.000-07:00

You've probably seen it in the news, or you've probably been one of those affected ones brought bu what is now dubbed as "Asia's Katrina" or the storm that broke records. Typhoon Ketsana will definitely be on everybody's books and until now, countless people are still picking up the pieces. I was "unlucky" enough to experience its wrath... in three countries nonetheless.

It started on the morning of the 25th of September, when I was still in Manila. I was preparing for my trip home to Cambodia, so I went to Greenbelt and Glorietta to do my final shopping as my trip is not until 2:30 in the afternoon. I left at around 8 am and the rain has already stopped. At around 10:30 am, the rain was absolutely beyond control and it was impossible to get a cab. After an hour of trying, I was able to find myself one but when we reached San Lorenzo Village in Makati to get my luggage, the house where I was staying at is already flooded to the waist. I was able to get my 40-kilo luggage from the flood waters all the way to the waiting taxi almost a kilometer away (the driver wouldn't plunge his car to the water even of I paid him a million bucks) and off to the airport we go. I was drenched to the bone. My Issey Miyake sneakers were squishing and I was shivering from the cold. I told myself I'll change when we get to the airport.
But as luck would have it, 80% of Manila was already underwater and we were stuck in traffic trying to find our way out in a little more than 4 hours. At 3:30, I gave up and asked the driver to take me to any hotel in Makati.

This is the scene right after the rain subsided, but it was just total havoc in the city.

The next day, I was able to get myself to the airport and was able to finally board the plane. The flight though was delayed for 4 hours as there was no electricity in the international airport. All baggages have to be loaded manually as the conveyors weren't working.

When we arrived in Bangkok, Ketsana has caught up on us and we were on standstill at the runway for an hour because of the lightning unfolding. I got out of the airport at almost midnight and Silom road was drenched to its knees.

When I went back, the airport was almost a ghost town. I finally made it to the flight the next day and was home in Cambodia at around 9 am.

But I was on for another surprise. Ketsana made it to Cambodia. This is the first time this ever happened as Cambodia is literally typhoon free. Everyone was caught by surprise when rain poured like crazy for 2 days. The river overflowed for the first time in history and this monk was trading the East River Road where theOrient Express Hotel is located.

Waters reached an alarming level and this motorcycle almost didn't make it.

Pub Street was still littered with toursits, but was also virtually a canal.

The Old Market Area is almost impassable and my car almost stalled in the middle of it this morning.

Don, my wife (both still toting Marc Jacobs and Vivienne Westwood in the middle of the calamity) and myself have to go out to shop for supplies as we have no electricity in the house in the past 2 days. I also had to get money from the bank to pay for my staff's salaries, so we had to brave the raging flood waters... in style...

Our fashionable New Yorker friend Eliz was still in vogue in the midst of it all. She deserves to be n the next cover of the September issue.

The biggest drawback here is that the Cambodians were totally unprepared for this storm. This has never transpired here and that was actually one of the reasons why we moved from the Philippines to here. I guess we all have to brace ourselves for global warming...

becoming boracay

2009-09-20T01:31:00.000-07:00

It's been more than 7 years since I last set foot in an island I almost called home. There was a point in my life when I savored trampling on its powdery white shores almost every weekend, and the best parties I've have had until now still screams the name Boracay.

I'm glad I finally made it back again on its arms, this time as a photographer for Fuego Hotels which has just opened a new property here called 7 Stones Boracay Suites. I came at the right time too as they were throwing a party for Channel V during my last night.

It was sort of like an after-party for the music channel as they were shooting their 2010 swimsuit calendar in the property.

Channel V jockey Alfie interviewing a Boracay local

I had to do some Tatler-esque shots as these photos are to be used for the Fuego Hotels Magazine... here's 7 Stones General Manager Dani (straight from Barcelona to Boracay!) with a guest and the Italian developer of the resort.

VJ Alfie with one of the models of the shoot

Dani with more models, stylists and Channel V people

Host of The Duke and Amazing Race runner up Rovilson Fernandez with another model

Guests from Spain, Australia and Taiwan...

'Twas a great night of party, booze and pool fun... I got myself a wealth of photos worthy enough for blackmail but I promised everybody not to post it here... or else... it's still unbelievable how such small island can cull that much euphoria in parties... must be the air... must be that amazing shot I can't recall (a shot of Sambucca, Cuervo gold and a dash of Tabasco), or maybe just because people forget the world exists once they set foot here. Whatever it is, wish every weekend is like this in Cambodia!

in search of a pearl

2009-09-14T06:21:00.000-07:00

Woke up one day and found myself in Makati where I started working 8 years ago. The next morning, I found myself waking up with the sound of the lapping waves, birds and an eerie silence - marooned in a series of islands called the Pearl Farm Beach Resort...

I'm here on the island's rustic arms - beaches fringed by coconut trees, impossibly emerald green waters and quaint traces of its Maranao roots. When I got a call from my former employer weeks ago to help him redo the brochures, photography and corporate identity of Fuego Hotels, it took me only a second to think and say yes.

So now, I'm on the lap of pure luxury, shooting the resort's many facets and charms. Its beaches and natural beauty are nothing short of captivationg, but sadly, the resort in itself needs an enormous facelift...

It's rooms and structures were breathtaking a couple of years ago, when I first came here, but of course, time and age takes its toll among everything created by man. At least, this room at the villa of former Miss Universe winner Margie moran is definitely not bad...

Pearl Farm's resident parrots were definitely a riot to tourists and were absolute charmers. They should be on the payroll too and should receive hefty tips.

And the Ylang Ylang Spa was still gorgeous, but like the resort, it needs touch ups in a whole lot of ways. Took me time to make it look like this on the camera.

But no matter what state the resort falls into, the most precious pearls you can find there are its amazing, warm people. They were there always to lend a helping hand, make you feel welcome, feed you a huge buffet of tuna sashimi, deliver a tuna melt sandwich on another island in 10 minutes, open the blutique at midnight so you can buy a pair of Havaianas, extend bar hours from 11 pm to 2 am so you can enjoy drinking more San Mig Lights, bring you to the airport on a speedboat at 4 in the morning in the middle of a storm so you can catch your flight (I can't believe I made it alive and I'm writing this), and among others, still smile wholeheartedly after all this.

I am definitely coming back. And hopefully next time, not for work, but with my wife and son... and yes, with flights in the afternoon so I don't have to have raging seawater get in my Louis Vuitton luggage again.

shooting the queen and wrestling a llama

2009-08-30T10:07:00.000-07:00

Okay, I admit. I need to get a life. I've been pretty stuck with work and the new shop for the past months that I almost forgot the existence of life beyond the office -that's the very reason why I haven't uploaded anything on my blog in like 5 months. I haven't touched my Facebook account since the French Revolution. I haven't upoaded anything on my Flickr account since Alexander the Great last tried conquering India. And my Friendster account (if that thing still exists), has been hibernating since the last Ice Age. It's sort of a llama (yes, the animal) of responsibility that I've been wrestling for the past months.

Recession has hit us pretty hard here that we have to sweat our asses more than the usual in order to make ends meet. And me, grappling with a monster (monsters actually) I've created (a design studio with an army of people to feed, and two shops/boutiques/galleries that we've invested on) have no choice but to be a slave to this llama of choice.

But as I'm hit in the head with the realization that I actually need to go back to things that I enjoy doing in the past before I lose passion with them completely, I am turning around my life by going back to my blog. Again.

Had a really cool chance of photographing Cambodia's Queen Mother recently as official photographer to her state visit to the Artisans d' Angkor.

Cambodians stood in unity to welcome Her Royal Highness, Queen Norodom Monineath Sihanouk in Siem Reap last week.

As the queen mother and the king father are these days, based in Beijing, China, their return to Siem Reap is truly a momentous occasion. They were greeted by an immense throngs of people from all walk of life.

The Queen Mother, originally named Paule-Monique Izzi, was born from a French, Corsican, Italian father and a Cambodian mother.

That explains her lovely bi-racial features... and her uncanny resemblance to England's Queen Elizabeth II.

At Artisans d' Angkor, she was presented with a gift of a finely carved gold leaf encrusted Buddha statue for her inspiring help to the project. In return, she presented everyone with gifts too!

But the clincher was when she asked to do an offering to the presented statue. She asked her staff for incense as offering, but no one in the crowd had a match to light it up. As everybody rushed to find her a match, I came to the rescue by offering her my lighter. She gladly accepted it, smiled and gave it to the Royal Protocol Officer (that's him lighting the incense with MY lighter) who gladly gave it back to me after the ceremony.

She left afterwards on board the Royal Benz #003. She wowed the crowd with her remarkable royal presence. And I, being scorned for being a smoker, learned one valuable lesson that day. Smoking can lead to royal connections.

I think I'll put my lighter up for auction on Ebay pretty soon. That may just be the end of the recession for me...

sweat in black and white

2009-04-28T09:43:00.000-07:00

Had a great time last Saturday shooting for Don's autumn / winter 2009 - 2010 collection and you can just imagine how hot it was, in the middle of the Cambodian summer, to wear jackets and layered clothes. Well, at least that's how Serge and Elodie, our models felt, but it was definitely a blast doing the shoot... even with sweat rolling down their cheeks and all...

Our models were Elodie from Paris and Serge from Russia who were really cool and game even if the airconditioner in the studio was on the brink of a revolution.

This is just a preview of what Don has n store for the Philippine Fashion Week in May. This collection will be available shortly after at POETRY by the Alley West.

11 reasons why i havent blogged in ages

2009-04-06T10:00:00.000-07:00

1.Did photography work for a New Zealand Magazine

I was commissioned by a Kiwi Magazine in Auckland to shoot Dean Williams, who used to be a big media personality in New Zealand before moving to Cambodia to open a funky cocktail bar called Miss Wong.

2.Sent my son to school for the first time

Yup, he’s officially a student at the International School of Siem Reap as we’ve been trying to convince him for the longest time that he is NOT Yet an adult.

3.We’re building a new store

We’re expanding and we’ve just opened a new store at the Alley West called POETRY. It’s a total lifestyle experience offering Don’s clothes, vintage finds, original jewelry from designer friends like Jor-el and Tita Jaki all the way from Iloilo, Philippines and a gallery for my work on “words” as well as for other up and coming artists based in Cambodia and the world over.

4.Opened up a solo exhibition at the Angkor National Museum

The Saffron Spirit makes its way to the Angkor National Museum alongside the kingdom’s ancient treasures. I couldn’t have been more thrilled!

5.Prepared for a trip home

Spent two weeks in Iloilo picking up pieces of my childhood memories and rebuilding our home after the devastating flood last year. Most of our family pictures were gone and my paintings and artworks have vanished into oblivion, but all is definitely not lost…

My mom, lost 90% of her garend and plants which is her source of life and income... but she has moved on quite well....

We had a reunion with relatives on my mom's side so we are slowly rebuilding our connections and lost memories.... all the lost pictures, books and what nots would have to be relished again... on a new perspective....

6.Turned another year older in Cambodia

Celebrated my 31st year of existence on this planet with family and friends. I actually shared the birthday week with Vincent, one of my photographers and good New Yorker friend Elizabeth Kiester.

7.Am being featured in a magazine with two great friends

Fah Thai Magazine, Bangkok Airways’ inflight magazine, is doing a feature on me, Don, and Elizabeth on our efforts to make Siem Reap the next best fashion destination in the planet. Hehehee.

8.Did a load of wedding shoots and temple shoots

Work work work. Need I say more?

9.I’m helping redesign the National Museum in Phnom Penh

One of the projects I’m really looking forward to do! Got in through the help of American friends John and Narisa McDermott!

10.Did a Suitcase Sale

One of the cool stuffs we’re doing on the Alley West…

11.Prepared for my sister’s graduation

After 4 years of gruelling tuition payments, and other miscellaneous out-of-this-planet expenses, my sister Love Grace has finally finished her Nursing degree...

The ceremony in itself was more suffering that you could bear than 4 years of school combined... the graduation lasted almost 7 hours and the keynote speaker spoke for more than 2 hours! To top it off, there were almost 500 nursing graduates alone! There were around 300 honor graduates (cum laudes, summa cum laudes and magna cum laudes)... the reddeming point is that my sister got an award for outstanding nursing graduate from the Baptist Church Organization in Ohio. She also got a loyalty medal for going to the same university from kindergarten.

I think they ought to give awards too for those who endured the entire ceremony...

siem reap fashion week

2009-01-26T03:48:00.000-08:00

Okay, so I guess I've exaggerated the post title, but we're almost getting there. A couple of weeks ago, the posh Arts Lounge of Hotel de la Paix hosted a fashion show of capsule collections by celebrated French-African designer Eric Raisina and Filipino avant garde designer Don Protasio which coincided with the opening of an art exhibition of Paris-based artist Thav Savann.

Backstage with the designers - Eric andDon

Don's bird series - he printed these images of birds and feathers in our workshop. A French model wore this ensemble with a muslin scarf and a cork necklace

On Vincent: Printed stripe hooded tee, scarf and cotton pants

On Cambodian artist Em Riem: Jesrsey shirt, printed vest and cotton skirt pants with suspenders

On Brewster: Hooded sweatshirt with printed vest and grey pants

On Soo Young (from Korea): printed halter dress with printed muslin scarf, On Kaoru (from Japan, via New York): printed dress and cotton necklace. Don sells his designs exclusively at the One Shop and One Gallery here in Cambodia and Backstage in Serendra in Manila.

Eric Raisina's funky and colorful silk-based fashion... Eric is originally from Madagascar but set up base here in Siem Reap after studying fabric design in Paris. He regularly goes back to Paris as he designs fabrics exclusively for fashion houses like Yves Saint Laurent and Christian Lacroix.

On Christian Larsson (from Norway): silk fur coat, silk fur hat and metallic pants

On Srey Pov: silk kaftan and silk fur hat. Would you believe this Cambodian model is 5 months pregnant???

French models galore...

And yes, the French start young...

On Heidi (from Australia): silk organza dress with silk scarf

On Barry (from Singapore): beaded silk Chinoise top and pants

the runway...

Don with New York designer Elizabeth Kiester

And with friends from all over...

So sleepy old Siem Reap is transforming itself from a dusty old backpacker town to a slice of third world cosmopolis... but don't worry, the character is still there!

obama, black outs and fairytale endings...

2009-01-20T10:33:00.000-08:00

It's just one of those days again...

...when a great moment in history is unfolding and you are there, stuck on the couch, contemplating how unfair life is because there is a massive black out in the entire neighborhood. You have an entire office and workshop to run and there is nothing you can do as you are on the mercy of the electrical current. Your 3 year old son is complaining because there is no tv and airconditioning in the house. Your fridge is losing ice fast and its filled to the brim with food that is turning stale fast! You have a mountain of things to print, lay-outs to finish and client deadlines to beat - but sadly, their destinies are all connected to the plug. Welcome to the wonderful world of black outs in Cambodia...

It's already 10 pm. We've just gone back from the mall to get dinner as it's almost impossible to do anything in a house which is darker than a cave. No power still. Then I remembered that it's the presidential inauguration of Barack Obama - a momentous new chapter in world history. And our tv is dead.

So with my family in tow, we packed our bags and searched the inner folds of Siem Reap for a decent guest house with air conditioning and cable tv. We thought of the $8 a night room Olive has found while searching last weekend for a place her friends from Vietnam could stay... or perhaps the dingy old annex guesthouse extension in the hotel where I used to work... or perhaps we could just camp out in the park in front of Raffles (it's cold anyway, so a blanket would be enough)...

Then as we thought that our lives are on the road to the pits, we found the answer staring us right in our faces as we drove down Achamean Street and Sivutha Boulevard - Hotel de la Paix.

A shining beacon of hope amid the dead of winter (I am quoting Obama's speech already), everyone's favorite hotel is a client of mine and owes me a couple of night stays for several posters I did for them. One of them was for the hotel's coverage of the Obama-McCain presidential race last November (which is strangely a coincidence).

So we tried our luck and asked at the front office if we could avail of our barter agreement. It worked, so we were quickly hushed into our gorgeous Bill Bensley-designed room.

So while several hundred thousands were waiting at the National Mall in Washington DC on the unbearable cold of winter on January 20 to witness history unfold, we watched it in the warmth of 300 count Egyptian cotton sheets in a lusciously indulgent hotel room for free.

Thank God for black-outs.

bag bug!

2009-01-16T07:05:00.000-08:00

My wife's obsession for Louis Vuitton is unparalleled, and as a loving, obedient husband, I have no choice but to fulfill her lust for the monogram every once and a while. But since the financial crunch has cast an uncertain twilight on the consumer-trodden world (I just love using that excuse these days!), it simply means I can't afford to give her a new bag every time Marc Jacobs releases a new line every season.

So it is with this bleak financial incapacity that has pushed my creative juices and my shrinking wallet into crisscrossing boundaries...

If you can't buy your wife a Louis Vuitton bag... then make one!

Or better yet, make a couple. Then sell it as an exclusive line of bags and make money out of it!

So the idea of making my own bags for my wife and for women (and men) like her came into being. I thought of designing the bag in itself in the shape of a pocket, so it conjures accessibility, practicality and well, just for the fact that I like that shape. And since eco bags are all the rage these days, it couldn't have fit more perfectly! Don's seamstress does the basic stitching while my Khmer staff does the silkscreen printing and detailing.

The first bag I made was the "can't afford Louis Vuitton" and it was all sold out in the shop in a matter of days. I had to make a 2nd series, this time on black stretch denim. "The devil also wears Vuitton" is a new batch.

This bag was inspired by my designer friend Elizabeth Kiester who moved from New York as a fashion icon to Siem Reap and opened her own shop. The NY side is on the other side of the SR side- so you can actually have two bag designs!

This is inspired by my friend Don who has been bugging me to give him a Balenciaga motorcycle bag for Christmas, but with a retail price of $1,730 (78,000pesos), I think it'll still be a while before I could afford to give it to him... so this is perhaps the next best thing!

Inspired by car bumper stickers...

This book-inspired statement has also been getting good mileage from buyers...

The Obama bag has also been a big riot in the shop the moment I placed it on the rack! One freaky buyer exclaimed: "Oh my God, I've got to have that in my life!"

Although I have never bought my wife a pair of Louboutins (or Blahniks), I thought that this would be cool... some bags like this have different treatments like beadworks, embroidery, tassels and what-nots.

My wife told me that when I get rich enough as an artist (as rich as Damien Hirst or Murakami), she'd like to quit her job and become a trophy wife!

So I told her also that if she gets rich enough as a marketing consultant for a global firm, I told her that I also would love to stop working, close my shop and be a trophy husband!

Each bag which comes in a limited edition of 3 or 6 pieces per design retails exclusively at The One Gallery by the Alley for $25 (1,250 pesos) each.

sundays with sarah

2009-01-11T22:57:00.000-08:00

Our Sundays are usually spent at home cooking up some experimental cuisine with friends, reading a book, catching up with blogs or doing marathons of Heroes or CSI. But this Sunday is special... aside from having really cool, crisp weather (the mercury tipped at only 16 degrees!) , it's also the birthday of a dear friend - Sarah, who also happens to be my wife's boss.

She was actually my boss when I first moved in Cambodia as a graphic designer for a hotel, but after a year, I decided to quit and put up my own graphic design studio. But unlike other bosses who would shake you off their lives after you resign from work, Sarah on the other hand, supported this decision all the way and loaned me ALL the money I needed to start up - from purchasing computers, cameras, printers and all! Now where can you find a boss like that?

So on her special day, we all ran our heads and hands together to give her a special bash...

We took advantage of the cold winter winds from China and set up our garden with a neo-Khmer barbecue- themed feast. I bought two ceremonial umbrellas from the market, 10 meters of fabric, and voila! Instant garden lounge!

The debutante - just turned eighteen. Again! :-)

Sarah has actually just recently returned to Cambodia after stints in China and Malaysia. Now, my wife works for her at the Sothea where she is the General Manager. Still looking cool after recovering from a major flu after returning from a weeklong trip in Cannes, France two weeks ago.

Faith, Freedom and Brother Bear

Don, down with a major upset stomach since yesterday still managed to pull his designer pants together to join the celebration. He took care of the cake.

the feast begins!

Fare consisted of grilled seafood, grilled pork, vegetarian elbow macaroni soup, couscous, tuna salad, fresh mangoes and strawberries as well as a plethora of ice cream and desserts.

Freedom had chocolate crispies for starters and had half a tub of ice cream for his entree.

Slam dunking a strawberry whole... my three year old eats anything and everything!

Chilling out after lunch. Sarah went to the orphanage with Olive and Savourn thereafter while Faith and Don went on with their usual vintage shopping ritual at the Psar Krawlajn.

We wanted to invite U2 for a private concert for her birthday but we couldn't afford that just yet.... so from the bottom of our hearts and our Havaianas... Happy Birthday Sarah!

wanderlust

2009-01-07T09:37:00.000-08:00

Another highly creative designer has recently made a big move from the bright lights of Paris, London and New York and made the dusty old town of Siem Reap her new home. Now our lives will never be the same again...

Her name is Elizabeth Kiester - former creative director of LeSportSac and Abercrombie & Fitch where she has elevated the brands through her youthful designs and innovative collaborations with artists and designers such as Stella McCartney and Toki Doki's Simone Legno. She has also been a stylist for brands like BCBG Max Azria, Cynthia Rowley, GAP, Banana Republic, and was also fashion director for glossies like YM, Marie Claire, Seventeen, Mademoiselle and JANE.

With an impressive portfolio like that, moving to a third world country to spread fashion would probably the last thing on anyone's sane mind.

But she did, and in a span of weeks, she has transformed Siem Reap into an exciting new destination for alternative fashion through her bright new store by the alley at the old market area- wanderlust. A fitting name for a fashion nomad.

I did a photo shoot for her for an article for my friend Don and for use in an international inflight magazine.

Modeled by Sheree, her clothes and accessories are bold, fun and awash with color. She also has a sombre and edgy line of avant garde pieces.

Being interviewed by Don, Elizabeth told us that she originally went to Cambodia for a holiday and to do volunteer work for an NGO, but ended up falling in love with the place. So she packed up all her stuff in New York and changed our lives for the better.

Cool, vibrant and always fun, her designs and her shop are a big source of inspiration for us!

Her shop also has a cool lounge on the far end littered with fluffy graphic pillows.

Her bedroom on the second floor is a play of black and white and a burst of luscious red here and there. A true homage to New York loft living.

Winding down after the shoot... we had fun!

Elizabeth and Don are cooking up a fashion show soon by the alley... so this is just the start of something big!

year ender

2009-01-05T09:28:00.000-08:00

Although the holidays wasn't as crazy as last year, it was still crazy nonetheless. I was juggling several shoots and last minute design works but was able to keep myself free for Christmas eve to prepare for a "white Christmas" feast.

I was especially inspired since we renovated and repainted the kitchen firetruck red and my wife came back from Australia with a treasure trove of holiday recipes and inspirations - thanks to Donna Hay!

Since everybody else was working on Christmas eve, I was left alone with Nanie and Olive (my office manager) to conquer the kitchen. We were able to whip up a little Grilled Salmon, Ham with Spicy Mango Confit, Steamed Garlic Scallops, Green Noodles with Seafood Brisket, Lentil Soup, Buttered Veggies (turned out to be a disaster but Don rescued it from oblivion) and Raspberry Cake with Caramelized Fresh Berries on the side for dessert. For a little Filipino fare, Olive cooked her famous embutido and leche flan which was truly sinful!

While waiting for everybody to come, we had some chardonnay, blue cheese and crackers which Freedom tried with his chocolate Smarties!

The gang after the feast... we gave our gifts at the struck of midnight. Freedom got a mini drum set (our sleep will never be the same again) among many other things while I got a travel folio and a full collection of Woody Allen films!

Come new year, it was just me, Olive, Don, Nanie and Freedom as everybody else had their own parties to go to, but by midnight, we were all together to greet 2009. The fireworks display was short, but the sight of hundreds of candles on paper balloons floating on air was a truly magical sight.

At 1 am, we were all shuttling our way between the street party at Pub Street, the revelry at Linga Bar and the live band at Cafe Central.

By 4:30, we were hungry as wolves from all the partying, so we went home to raid the fridge.

By 5:30, we made our way to Angkor Wat to catch the first sunrise of 2009. The freezing cold didn't deter us as we came prepared with our own thermos of coffee and tea! By now, the pack was now reduced to me, my wife, Olive and Don.

Then slowly, at around 6 am, a hazy blue sunlit sky made its way to the horizon... revealing Angkor Wat's distinct spires...

I have seen it a million times, but it is still a magical, exhilarating sight...

Happy New Year everyone!

christmas cheers!

2008-12-25T04:05:00.000-08:00

A very merry Christmas everyone!

photographing photographers

2008-12-07T11:19:00.000-08:00

How do you make portraits of professional photographers? The thought of matching wits with them on making the lighting perfect and setting your cameras to the most foolproof priorities is enough to give one a creak on the neck. That's probably how one would feel when surrounded by the world's top contemporary photographers like last week during the Angkor Photography Festival here.

We had a chance to hang out with the six photographers from the Philippines attending the festival and who are also vying for the festival's top prize - $1,300 cash and a chance to publish their winning photos to the Paris Match Magazine.

While throwing a party for them in the house, we thought of giving them a dose of their own medicine through photographs we probably would never want to have... mugshots!

Charles is a commercial photographer who works for an ad agency in Manila. He literally slept his way to the festival and is perhaps a walking irony for coffee ads. His affairs on the mats made him notorious here.

Carla is a fierce fashion photographer who does editorials for glossies in the Philippines. Well remembered for her emotional spells throughout the festival.

Akira Liwanag made history in the festival as the youngest photographer ever to qualify for a spot in the festival. At seventeen years old and still in high school, this kid who has barely gotten past his puberty is years beyond his age and is amazing with the lens.

Former London resident Sarah Encabo returned to the Philippines to further pursue her passion for photography and is now with Manila Times.

John is this festival's Romeo - breaking the hearts of countless Indian photographers during the festival with his wild antics. This shutterbug is the ultimate pro - on the roll with Reuters, which just happens to be the biggest news agency in the universe.

Candice is perhaps the most socially-relevant photographer in the group who believes that a photo is powerful enough to instill change. But that doesn't mean she can't be the wackiest as well!

Although not part of the festival, Vincent is a shutterbug who can give any Magnum photographer a run for their money.

Don is an avant garde photographer armed with nothing but a camera phone... but beware... his images are as potent as a Nikon D3X could deliver!

The gang before the storm... they are probably all back in the Philippines as of writing while Don, Vincent and I are left back here in the eye of a cyclonic week of countless photoshoots, editing, meetings, and endless work!

helluvaweek!

2008-11-25T09:57:00.000-08:00

High season has officially cast its blessed spell in sleepy Siem Reap and hopefully, all of Cambodia. Proof of this is the fact that I haven’t touched my blog in a week or even read any blogs at all! It started late last week with a photoshoot at a new boutique hotel that's opening soon - The Sothea.

Aside from the shoot, we are doing all of their marketing collaterals and promotions. This is a tough one since my client is actually my wife who is Senior Sales Manager of the hotel, so there is definitely no escaping this one! This shoot is for her sales trip to Australia in the next few weeks.

It's also the start of the 4th annual Angkor Photo Festival which brings in the best photographers around the world for a weeklong festival and series of exhibitions around. This year, I was helping out with two galleries - the McDermott Gallery with their marketing collaterals and the Friends Center Gallery of which my team handled a handful of things for - from the interior design to the marketing and even the installation of the new exhibition. The new artist featured here is Steve McCurry, whose portrait of "the Afghan Girl" is the most recognizable photograph in the history of National Geographic.

A team of six young Filipino photographers are also present to represent the country and we are making sure that they feel at home here!

We are also married to our cameras these past few days (and for the next weeks to come!) with a series of more photoshoots along the way. Yesterday, we did a wedding shoot for a Japanese couple at the Orient Express hotel. With shoots on the temples and a full day affair to cover, it was a back-breaking work.

We have two more hotels next week due for a shoot and a couple more weddings and corporate events to cover.

The Spoolworks photography team - Brewster, Kristian and Vincent. I don't think I will ever survive this season without them... and more so keep up with blogging!

It was definitely a tough week and more so in the next weeks to come. I now miss the times when I could linger longer in the office ogling though everyone's blogs or messing with mine. With my hard drive crashing down to oblivion last week, I also have to work double time to redo those lost files. These are definitely the times when you wish that there are 48 hours in a day!

So if I haven't updated my blog in the next three months, I hope blogger doesn't give up on me and delete my blog for good...

fashion calls...

2008-11-19T03:51:00.000-08:00

A new photographer from the Philippines - Vincent, has recently joined our SPOOLWORKS team straight from Olongapo to help me out with my photography projects for the high season. So we were out to test his skills and also to shoot the latest collection of designer friend Don Protasio who recently showed at the Philippine Fashion Week. Don was lucky enough to find a great model - Holly Grabareck who hails from Singapore. She is part Chinese, American and Polish but was born and bred in the island state. Models don't get more exotic than her!

We have been looking for a place to house Don's collections apart from our gallery, but after some frustrating attempts, we have decided to renovate the second floor of our house as both a studio for me and Don where we could welcome clients but by appointment only.

This shoot is actually for a brochure we are doing for him...

Don's black and white pieces layered on a symphony of jersey, cotton and knits...

These are part of Don's classic line but as of the moment, we are experimenting on printing our own designs on his fabrics for the next season...

Don's hottest pieces are actually the shoes. These gladiator shoes he designed are selling like crazy online and at the One Gallery. These are made here in Cambodia.

Don is cooking up a fashion show next month here in Siem Reap together with Madagascaran designer Eric Raisina who supplies fabrics for Christian Lacroix and Yves Saint Laurent in Paris...

Don sells his collections exclusively at the One Gallery in Siem Reap, Cambodia and at Backstage at Serendra in Manila, Philippines.

photos by Loven Ramos & Vincent Rufo

make up by Faith Famoso Ramos

model: Holly Grabareck
The team including Brewster Bonifacio and Kaoru Sato

shot on location at Friends Center, Siem Reap Cambodia

a series of unfortunate (and fortunate) events

2008-11-16T08:47:00.000-08:00

I don't know what on earth is happening, but this has been a weird day. It's started like any typical Sunday with us going to church and having our usual Sunday lunch with family and Filipino friends... but when I came back to the office to doodle a bit with some work and do some blogging updates, I couldn't boot my black macbook anymore... tried all sorts of things and what nots, but nothing happened. My black mac is officially dead after more than a year's worth of service... I just renovated the office into an all-white affair, so could it be that it felt out of place??? Do I need to get myself a white macbook as well?!

The sad thing is, I haven't backed up my files for the last 3 months since returning from Beijing. All those months worth of work - from ad campaigns, to corporate identities and a whole bunch of design work. Luckily, I saved most of my photos in our 500 gb network drive. But 3 months worth of work is still beyond repair... and I have a million deadlines to catch by tomorrow!

And it doesn't end there. After the misfortune, we decided to go out and do some vintage shopping (read:ukay) but as we reached our shopping haunt, the car overheated extremely that I thought somebody was cooking steamed buns in my hood! I was still able to drive the car to the car shop but they told me it's a lot of work so it's gonna take around 2 - 3 days to get the work done.

Great! So I don't have a car. I lost my macbook. What else could go wrong?

As I was walking out of the shop, the heavens poured so I was stuck there without a ride... and I have a meeting in 15 minutes! Yup, a meeting on a Sunday, and I'm stuck in the rain!

Well, I did make it late and all, but just as I thought that I'm gonna be totally bombed out the whole day, I got a call from the gallery.

I sold five artworks!

And losing things that I was totally dependent upon meant I began to look at life differently again... I took a tuktuk going home and I was able to see my neighborhood again in a brand new level. When I'm driving the car, I always looked straight.

When I still have my macbook, I was working like crazy - even on Sundays. Today, I was able to teach my 3-year old son Freedom how to paint for the first time...

if i married singapore...

2008-11-14T19:55:00.000-08:00

If you were a city, what would you be?

If there is a place that best represents your ideals, your aspirations, your personality, your deepest thoughts and longings, which place would reveal your true self?

For my wife, she can only be Singapore...

Asked why, of all the places on earth she's been to would she choose Singapore, a tiny island state which was a bastion of British trade in the colonial days, her definition is simple - she loves ORDER.

Like the city, my wife is a neat and a control freak. The kind of person who color codes all her reports in post-its, who arranges CDs alphabetically and zones things in any way imaginable.

Everytime I drive through Changi Airport to the city itself, I am amazed how even the bougainvilleas on the plantboxes by the freeway look like they have been ordered by the government to exude the same shade of pinkish purple that is almost crazily the same everywhere. The streets, the subways, the signs... they are all pristinely accurate, planned and placed to a tee as if they know the answers before you even ask for directions!

An amalgam of the west and the east, the past and the present, Singapore is a city of contrasts, of parodies, of ironies, of yin and yang colliding in a beautiful frenzy.

A perfect representation of my wife. Ask her what she wants for Christmas and you'll lose your mind.

Always hot, sexy and voluptouos, but that warmth she exudes is her biggest draw...

Her personailty is as colorful as a peacock gracefully hopping on the beaches of Sentosa...

A beacon of a hundred lights, Singapore and my wife can light up a path in the darkest corners of life's chapters...

She is very cosmopolitan... a city who is moving forward in every direction and urbanizes faster than our credit card can catch. Coincidentally, shopping is also the national past time of Singapore, which is also the full time profession of my wife.

Glitzy, boisterous, flashy and opulent, Singapore snags herself like a woman who has reached a certain level of sophistication that not everyone can understand but everyone wants to become...

Ruled by rules, controlled by controls... best of all, Singapore is such a "fine" city...

water of life

2008-11-12T08:24:00.000-08:00

Cambodia is home to Southeast Asia's biggest lake - Tonle Sap which for many Khmers, represents the lifeblood of the country. On its ebbing tides was forged one of the world's greatest empires - Angkor.

More than a thousand years later, life still goes on and living still exists on its waters. I have been fervently visiting the lake but am still mesmerized by its vastness and silent power... and more importantly, how the people have managed to survive it.

The most recognizable part of the lake to the outside world is the floating village of Chong Kneas...

Most of the homes here are floating, which means they are built on boats or on barges - making it easy for dwellers to transfer their homes wherever they want. Now who will ever evict you?

Shopping is also very mobile - why go to the market when the market can go to you? Now if only H&M's Comme des Garcons is peddled this way!

Here, only two things are essential - a sturdy pair of legs and a spool of courage to brave the unpredictable waters...

Friendships can be forged on water...

or on land...

Make your way to school or the school makes way for you (at the end of the day, the floating school brings its students home! No kidding!)...

Fancy a game of basketball on a floating gym? Now let's see if Kobe Bryant can still make a dunk while being seasick!

Waiting for the day's catch...

...sometimes, the waiting pays...

...but some simply wait... and wait... and wait...

The lake and its shores are throbbing with lost souls finding directions...

and its young souls...

...eager to find life's answers...

Here, one is surrounded by water, but thirst is still enevitable.

But for those who thirst spiritually, the floating karaoke church (a former karaoke pub converted into a catholic church!) is a good place to quench your souls...

designing the divine

2008-11-06T09:24:00.000-08:00

I had the chance to bring my back my passion for sculpture and installation art when I was invited by the Arts Lounge - one of Cambodia's largest and most progressive art spaces at the Hotel de la Paix to exhibit a couple months ago.

The exhibit was with another artist - a Cambodian named Koun Sothea - and was apltly titled Designing the Divine - as we both tackled our interpreatitons of Buddhism as a religion and as a universal culture. Sothea explored Buddhism more personally as it was his religion and he did it through color-rich oil paintings.

Mine was more of a discovery of Buddhism and how I relate to it as a Christian or as an outsider to this faith. I did it through sculptures and installations made of different materials like welded metal, cutlery, found objects, wires, manila hemp, plastic, paper, and whole load of things my kitchen and my stockrooms yielded (coupled with several trips to the local market!).

My work was more so an antithesis of divinity - wherein it represents things, ideals and beliefs that we should sacrifice and let go of - in order for us to attain real enlightenment...

This was the first piece bought from my series which tackles our search for eternal life, how to stop time and live forever - hence the clocks and the elements of time. It is that fervent search for ways to stop time that sometimes forbids us from making the most out of our lives...

See how you interpret Designing the Divine through my other pieces...

It's funny to note that I wasn't originally part of the exhibit, but the idea came up last minute from Hotel de la Paix General Manager Nick to invite me for the show.

So given the concept and such a limited time to put things together (barely three weeks!), I got back to the studio right away and started working non stop (stopping only to eat or catch some winks!) until I got this through.

The morning before the exhibition opening, I thought that my final piece wasn't working, so I went around to look for a second hand mannequin and created "Desire".

This installation was featured in the last issue of Fah Thai Magazine...

The crowd during the exhibition...

The unveiling began with the lights off and the gentle humming of my friend Jessie and poetry readings by my friend Kristian. The show was curated by another friend, Don Protasio.

I don't think I could do a show as rushed as this ever again! All of my clients almost threatened to deport me as I had to shut down my entire world to dedicate my heart to this. I love the intensity of pouring your entire energy to one particular vision, but balancing it together with a business and work is truly a tough challenge...

*exhibition photos by John McDermott

God's little creatures

2008-11-03T07:07:00.000-08:00

Found this weird looking creature lurking in our garden one day... looks almost something straight out of Pan's Labyrinth or a Jim Henson production. It's actually almost like a cross between a blade of grass and a praying mantis - only that it stands in four legs.

Sometimes it just makes you think how God randomly creates things and gives it beauty in a strange yet wonderful way. Cambodia is such a treasure trove for such... and my yard is a zoo on its own. My home garden is so impressive in its biodiversity that in a span of a year, we have had found a couple of anaconda-esque snakes, a full grown beehive (both were eaten by my staff!), a colony of wasps and creatures you can find only in Animal Planet.

Just last week, I got bitten by an unknown insect which went inside my shoe while I was outside the yard. When I came home after shooting an event, my left foot was already swollen and I had difficulty walking. When I woke up in the morning, it was really bad that I could even hardly pull myself out of bed. My foot was so swollen it looked like a marshmallow (think Michelin man!). To make matters worse, it itched like the fourth of July!

A hospital visit and five days worth of medicine after, I am back to the gym, able to drive and am doing better. But it just beats the hell out of me what I will discover next lurking in our yard...

The yeti perhaps?

Or maybe I should lobby for my house to be a full nature reserve. That way, I can charge entrance tickets to guests!

a home for holidays

2008-11-01T18:06:00.000-07:00

Of late, most hotels have been bombarding us with overused lines and cliches such as "home away from home", "your home in + name of place", "feels like home" and all that crap that goes with it... even big chains with 300+ rooms define themselves as a "home" when all you see is actually an impersonal, factory type accommodation that sells itself to busloads of toruists from wherever. What the...???!!!

A coffee friend of ours (people you meet over coffee or you run into coffee shops) asked my team to visit their home here one day and see if we can help them market it as a holiday home. Meaning, they live there but they accept a small number of guests to try out their home and sample their lifestyle.

They call it Amatao - a marriage of Japanese sensibilities (the wife is Japanese), southern French flair for the simple yet out-of-the-ordinary things (the husband is French) and of course, Khmer lifestyle since their home is in Cambodia.

Located in the Cambodian countryside 30 minutes away from the city center and overlooking Southeast Asia's largest lake, Amatao is a collection of several house structures, mature gardens, ponds and a green tiled pool.

Inside, each "house" is crowned by large, muslin draped beds and wooden beamed ceilings. Bathrooms are also large and airy. As this place is stuck in the middle of a ricefield, spectacular views are on hand in every corner.

Right down below the main house is a dead giveaway of its Frenchness - a temperature controlled wine cellar with its collection of vintages and new world favorites.

There are reading nooks everyhere, and corners where you can lounge with your ipod.

There are also massage rooms near the Japanese garden and an outdoor bath to watch the stars while wash out life's worries away...

The tea house in the Japanese garden is also a great place to hang around and be lazy. As the owners are also avid gardeners, an orchidarium housing rare Cambodian orchids and plant species is a great showcase, as well as a rose garden with French roses blooming around.

When they first told us about the concept of different cultures and styles coming in together, we thought that it was too much of a hodge podge of things, but seeing them altogether as an amalgam of their personalities turned out to be a rather interesting mix! The biggest draw though is the fact that it is a real home open to guests - not a hotel that hard sells itself to any Tom, Dick and Harry. They cook for you, their personal house help tend your needs and their own kids wander around and help serve you...

Just outside is a real cambodian village where people live in houses on stilts, where people still graze their goats and cows and where things haven't changed for the past decades (except perhaps for the occasional mobile phone laoding centers!)...

I wish we have more places like these around, and if we have saved enough money hopefully (which will be a million light years from now), we would love to build something like this...

Donations are now accepted...

the nightmare before christmas

2008-10-28T07:58:00.000-07:00

Always, every year, I am compounded by one big nightmare and problem... designing our family Christmas card! If it's with clients, it will take me a breeze to think of a campaign or a design, whip up a shoot and voila! We have a strong pitch...

But family photos and cards are a different story.

One, it's quite a feat to handle the logistics... my wife's schedule is erratic (as well as mine!), it's a major effort (ala Mega Structures from National Geographic) thinking and doing our costumes for the shoot, and Freedom is such a tornado to be kept still for a click or two. Chocky, our labrador is also a formidable force to handle during shoots! That leaves me with only Nannie (my wife's aunt) to keep my sanity intact.

Our first christmas greeting shoot in 2005 was inspired by the turn-of-the-century sensibilities of Cambodia and it took us around the French colonial enclaves of Siem Reap - from the Raffles Gardens to the grounds of Victoria Angkor. Since I didn't have a car and a tripod at that time, our tuktuk driver was our photographer!

2006 was a rather easy shoot because we wanted everyone to be comfortable and casual... but since the temperatures here dropped as low as 9 degrees for a couple of weeks, comfortable means layering, sweaters and thick winter scarves! It was a perfect time to be playful and cool...

"The Golden Age of Travel" was our defining theme for last year's shoot... that meant rewinding ourselves back into the roaring decades of the 1930's. We bought some nice vintage leather luggage from Bali for this shoot while our clothes are an amalgam of vintage finds from around. We got Freedom's outfit from Chatuchak Market in Bangkok and I designed my wife's hat. I got my vintage bomber leather jacket from Hwang Yu - a second hand clothes shop in Makati and Faith's mink fur trim is from Don.

We did a second card last year for our clients. Our red square couch was the modern twist to this shoot... sort of an "advertisement" as well for my furniture design and interior design work! lol. Our outfits were mainly from Jasmine Boutique at the Aman shop.

Now this really gives me a headache thinking about this year's theme. To make matters worse, our friends are now expecting our greetings to be more and more elaborate year after year! I have been thinking from one end of the spectrum to another - from The Incredibles (us in superhero costumes! Too halloween, perhaps?) to full royal Khmer regalia or Filipino traditional outfits (too June 12?) or even something as crazy as an organically-themed, green shoot (too Inconvenient Truth?)... aaarrrggghhh! I'm losing my head already!

Any suggestions?

Help!

kids, calendars and ricky martin

2008-10-24T07:27:00.000-07:00

I got an email a couple of weeks ago about my celebrity clicks post from Julie - who was putting together a 2009 calendar for Ricky Martin to celebrate his 25th year anniversary in show business. She found me online and saw my photo of Ricky's foundation trip here in Cambodia. She mentioned that she would like to use my photos for the calendar - the proceeds of which will benefit children's programs at the Centros Sor Isolina Ferre in Ponce, Puerto Rico - a charity that Ricky has supported in the past. The photo(s) she said, would illustrate his continued work on behalf of children in need around the world.

With such a noble cause and the opportunity to work with people around the globe, then by all means, count me in.

So I am making this post for Julie who I am bidding good luck for the success of the calendar. For more information on Ricky Martin's work on the children of the globe, visit http://www.rickymartinfoundation.com/

Ricky's trip in Angkor started at the children's shelter of Friends International. At the gate, kids rushed out to greet him and give him the traditional Cambodian "sompeah" where you greet one another with a clasp of two hands and a bow.

Inside the center, Ricky took time to learn more about the center up close and spent some time with the kids... including a game of petanque!

This little kid did a Khmer rap for Ricky to his amusement... he's probably contemplating of taking him to his next world tour (just thinking out loud)!

After that, we made a swing to the Old Market for some shopping... Friends International had a great shop there that sold interesting items and recycled fun stuff that Ricky and the gang simply couldn't resist! I guess "pasalubongs" are actually a very Latin thing...

Next stop after lunch and siesta was a shelter and transient center that handes cases of abuse, traficking and maltreatment to women. Ricky was galant enough to remove his shoes to go inside!

Ricky doing his version of the Cambodian "sompeah"...

This is perhaps the most used photo from my shoot. Found this published in several newspapers and magazines here already...

Ricky was indeed a natural with babies and kids! He truly had a way with them...

The most hilarious thing that happened was him signing a CD for a fan which turned out to be a bootleg copy from the fake DVD/CD shop in the market! He did it anyway!

As far as I can remember, my only recollection of Ricky as a singer/performer are his massive global hits and their much publicized tour in the Philippines in the 1980's way back when he was still part of the group Menudo. Of course, I was up on my feet in Latin parties as soon as his tracks are played. But when I had an opportunity to meet him, I was indeed humbled by his presence and his conviction to use his fame and good fortune to be a force in changing the world. Meeting and hanging around with his entourage was also a refreshing experience - from his manager and friend for decades, his foundation president, and even the people from the US embassy in Phnom Penh who accompanied him for the entire Cambodian leg... they are experiences worth more than their weight in gold.

a home for strangers

2008-10-21T09:51:00.000-07:00

Prior to moving in Cambodia, I have lived in Manila - that bustling Philippine capital of 12 million souls (almost the entire population of Cambodia!), the centre of daring film festival scandals, 3 revolutions named after a single traffic thoroughfare, the teeming cornocupia of 300 years of Spanish rule and 50 years of Hollywood sensibilites from the Americans. For 5 years, I lived on its dangerous streets, glamorous enclaves and rode into its public transportation systems that would give sardine factories a run for their money... and boy, I had fun.

Had I not plucked myself from its toxic roots, I probably would have stayed long enough until my last breath. But just as I thought that I knew Manila by heart, I discovered that I only knew it skindeep...

The last time me and my wife were home, we decided to leave our boring Makati-tinged world - in itself a living witness of the nation's uncertain yet restless growth...

We took a cab, got ourselves caught in traffic and went to a place we would never imagined ourselves going... to the nostalgic walls of old Manila, where we hailed a horse drawn carriage and employed a guide to discover a place we ought to have discovered a long time ago...

So off we went and rediscovered the streets of home where we are strangers all over again...

we rediscovered its deeply rooted commitment and monuments to faith...

we discovered love fluttering around in pure contrast to the bleakness and hopelessness of its smog-choked skies

we discovered how people would sell salvation like cheap pancakes...

We rediscovered the proud tales of its heritage, succumbing to lonely years of decay...

We rediscovered the boisterous playfulness of its youth...

...and the poignant wisdom of its elders

We rediscovered that life and its superficial trappings begins and ends within a microcasm of society called the Sari Sari Stores...

... and we found out how faith and commerce blends in beautifully on its pavement stalls

We rediscovered a world hidden from the sanctity of its faith, and oveshadowed by glittering skyscrapers. We found real people fighting for existence...

...and even people willing to sell their very existence...

But the most important discovery of the day is that we should never ever, become strangers to our own home...

Although I have friends from India who have never seen the Taj Mahal, Cambodians who haven't been to Angkor Wat and buddies from New York who have never ventured out of Manhattan, I don't think it's proper for any Filipino to see the world without conquering our own shores... there is just too much stories, people, colors, characters and aspirations awaiting on every corner, calling and beckoning.

We might love the idea of being exhilirated with new sights, incredible experiences, exotic cultures and world wonders... only to find them existing in our own backyards afterall.

holiday with the beckhams

2008-10-16T09:30:00.000-07:00

In my line of work, I sometimes have a chance to experience what my clients offer in order for me to able to get a clearer depth of the concept and ideals they are selling. This is especially true with Amankila, an ultra exclusive Aman hideaway built on the hills of Manggis in Eastern Bali, Indonesia.

We stayed here several months ago - on a hilltop villa overlooking the spectacular Lombok Strait...

Tired from the evening journey by plane from our prior holiday in Central Java, we arrived at the Ngurah Rai International Airport but had to be shuttled for around two hours to the resort as the east coast is far from Denpasar. Although it was already 11 pm when we reached the resort, the breathtaking set up got us back into our feet.

With the bathroom bigger than the actual bedroom, we were almost tempted to stay here instead...

Traditional Balinese flavours abound in the villa - four poster beds (was so tempting we dove into it the moment we finished our welcome cocktails), alang alang thatch roofs, ornate wood work and the sweet smell of coconut around!

After that long trip, the tub was our best friend that night...

We started our first adventure in Bali onboard the aman 16th boat which took us on a spectacular tour of the island's east coast...

We hopped from one island to another and did some snorkeling on a spectacular reef. The highlight of the day was the breakfast prepared by our guide when we swam back to the boat. The Aman service is so legendary that they even knew that I was left handed and a vegetarian... they served my spoon to my left all the time!

We went back tot he resort and soon found our way to the Beach Club below where Amankila's private beach lays. Although technically, Bali won't win in the best beaches category (I'll take Boracay anytime!), their culture and their other natural wonders truly make up for it...

East Bali is THE Bali that everyone deserves to know. As the beaches and the lifestyle of Kuta and Jimbaran are now overrun by backpackers, it is hard to define what the real Bali is.

Manggis, the town where Amankila sits is a laid back and culturally-rich heartland. We strolled around Candidasa and took a fantastic tour of a town where all its citizens are not allowed to marry anyone outside of its walls...

For dinner, we dressed up nicely and went to the restaurant where Amankila's signature and often-copied three-level infinity pool is located...

During dinner, we were all strung by candle light and the cool sea breeze was wisping on our faces. There were other guests in there. There was a couple who was dressed in full kimono attire (so cool!) but what caught my wife's attention was this odd couple... the girl, short, but voraciously sexy was wearing a nice little black cocktail dress, but the man she was with was wearing a plain white shirt and a pair of board shorts! Also full of tattoo, he seemed almost out of place from among the crowd as we were all dressed up to the nines for the formal dinner!

We almost forgot about them but right after the dessert, the couple stood up and when we saw them up close as they approached the table, we almost dropped our dessert spoons out of oblivion...

It was David and Victoria Beckham!

if life is a car transmission...

2008-10-15T04:39:00.000-07:00

On our last trip to Phnom Penh, we took our 1992 Toyota Camry for a supposedly 6-hour spin from Siem Reap to Cambodia's capital Phnom Penh on an almost 400 kilometer stretch of good road. We've done the road trip countless times already so we know that before each trip, a complete car check-up is necessary. So we did, and off we went! With me were the Spoolworks Team (my design studio) - Brewster, our graphic designer who was on the wheel and KC, our creative sales director who was our beat boxing specialist at the backseat.

But an hour to the trip, we keep on losing our speed until the clutch couldn't hold it anymore...

Turns out our transmission finally broke after all those years of hard work. So what do you do when you have more than 300 kilometers to go?

Well, you start pushing of course!

Or better yet, sit back and inhale the best of the Cambodian countryside...

Or savor those seemingly dilapidated towns which seem to be trapped in the 60's...

Make friends with the brown-eyed locals...

or perhaps ride the moto with some monk brothers....

maybe settle down the pavement and enjoy a bite of green mangoes...

or stop by some houses for a drink or two...

Maybe enjoy a smoke or a puff by the roadside...

or do a full-scale fun streetfighter-inspired photo shoot...

or finally concede that we needed a new transmission afterall!

So for 35 bucks, we were pulled by a rickety Khmer Rouge - era truck to the nearest town which was another 30 kms away. We managed to find a decent hotel, had some dinner and woke up early the next day to find a car shop. A day and 400 dollars later (roughly 20,000 pesos), we got back our car and raced to Phnom Penh with a "brand new" second hand transmission tipping the 130 km/hour scale...

Then the radiator leaked and overheated. But that my friends, is another story of course...

yearning for china

2008-10-13T08:57:00.000-07:00

Was browsing through my China photos and couldn't believe that it's been two months! I really had a blast, and two weeks is not enough. I've been bugging Faith and Don to go back and this time, do the Trans-Siberian Railways... China - Mongolia - Russia. Might be next to impossible but hey, there are tourists now in space!

I simply miss China. Even without the olympics, I think I would have still fallen head-over-heels with it. Getting back to Beijing is enough...

I miss its hutongs and lively streets...

I miss the sea of faces... a billion and a half of humanity...

I miss street culture and the beat of China's youth...

I miss its mad rush to modernity and its priceless heritage...

I miss seeing nostalgia creep in like yesterday's papers...

I miss its daring contrasts...

I miss its love affair with its poetic past, its aching history...

I miss the vulgarity of its authority...

And I miss the rhum ice cream in this cafe! Yum!

I have almost a million photos of China awaiting to be uploaded, so it will be a hundred years of posts like this!

freedom's home for imaginary friends

2008-10-09T08:05:00.000-07:00

Raising a three year old is like unveiling a JR Tolkien soul on a teaspoon of butter.

Lately, we have been becoming master storytellers to put our son Freedom to sleep or to keep his relatively short attention going. Being so totally engrossed with the series Thomas the Tank Engine, we are also trying to give him a variety of toys to play by as not to stagnate his imagination... and this is the best we can come up with. It's not much but hey, we're trying to be creative parents here!

So ladies and gentlemen, we bring you our collection of bears and stuffed creatures... amassed through the years and brought to life by our futile efforts to entertain the dragon emperor of the house!

Panda Bear is a scholar on Chinese literature and communist idealisms propagated by the late Mao Tse Tung. Brought from China by my wife's former boss Donald, Panda Bear is the serious one among the brood. Here he is trying to compare the Chinese version of Mao's revolutionary little red book into the newly released English version sold for dime-a-dozen in front of Tiananmen Square...

Bear Lao (no pun intended for Beer Lao) is a gift from Freedom's cool designer ninong - Don. Like his donor, Bear Lao is a cam whore (a trait he also got from mommy Kawadjan) and is an avid subscriber of Vogue - Paris. He also loves designing (a true fashion vulture) and is supposed to show his latest collections in Bryant Park for the New York Fashion Week!

Kroma Bear is a true blooded Cambodian bear from the kingdom's most luxurious residence - the Amansara. His other brothers and sisters were adopted by a doting couple named Brad and Angelina and were given to their three children - Maddox, Zahara and Shiloh. They now live in hollywood but they still write to Kroma Bear and remit money back home to support several foundations for the betterment of the lives of Cambodia's cotton weavers.

Best friends BaaBaa Sheep (a gift from my buddy Karl) and Kiwi Bear (another gift from Donald) both hail from New Zealand and are the adventurous backpacker types. One morning, you see them prancing around the grass, and the next morning, they are clambering up the steps to the studio. Although notorious for finding only dirt cheap haunts and restaurants, they know how to differentiate a trying hard Australian Chardonnay from an opulent New Zealand Shiraz.

Polar Bear was a creature rescued from the harsh effects of global warming when the polar ice caps melted somewhere in Alaska. Given as a bday gift from Freedom's tita Wena, he survived the rising waters by clinging on a floating Louis Vuitton Neverfull bag which got dropped from a passing luxury cruise liner one summer. Eats only prime Norwegian Salmon and Japanese Wagyu steaks.

Pinoy Bear on the other hand is a devout Roman Catholic. He has worked one time as an engineer in Saudi Arabia, as a waiter in Dubai, as a cultural performer in Tokyo, as a teacher in Thailand, as a caregiver in London and a manager in a restaurant in New York. These diverse experiences have taught Noypi Bear invaluable lessons in life and so far has given him enough savings to put up his own convent back home. He also drives a jeepney during weekdays.

Greenie Bear is a certified alcoholic and party animal. Always a fixture in the hottest parties, Greenie used to be BFF's with Paris Hilton and the Olsen Twins until her parents, the Vanderbears, moved their steel factories to Cambodia. Greenie has also recently released her own lingerie and perfume line.

Angel Bear is a distant cousin of Pinoy Bear. Also deeply religious, they promote only natural conception and family planning methods for the ethnic minorities of Southeast Asia. Young as she is, Angel Bear is the chapter president of the Catholic Women's League in the upper Cambodian region... Her favorite perfume is tea-rose.

Yellow Bear loves spending time in the bathroom. Came free from a spa product set that mommy purchased from U-Care Pharmacy a few years back. Always mistaken as a scrub by dad, Yellow Bear lives in the presence of water an was formerly a pearl diver on a pearl farm somwhere in Vietnam... a true Pisces in every sense of the word.

Ranger Bear, a certified naturalist from Chattanooga, Canada was a gift from Ninang Sarah, probably on one of her trips from North America. Current president of the World Wildlife Federation, Ranger Bear is lobbying people here to turn him into the official mascot for the 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver... also a die-hard vegetarian...

Huggie Bear and Nappy Bear were both freebies from packs of diapers. They love to snooze around and simply sleep the day away. This is because of a curse endowed on them by their evil stepmother who thinks they are more absorbent than her.

Brother Bear bears the most beautiful story of all. After Freedom was born, we used to go to the Old Market on weekends to buy our food. While browsing around a sea of tomatoes, fresh prawns and imitation underwear, we found Brother Bear on a pile of second hand toys, with such droopy eyes that seem to scream "Adopt me!". With Brad and Angelina's exploits reaching far and wide, we decided to adopt Brother Bear for a cost price of 2,000 riels (US$0.50)! Brother Bear has since become Freedom's loyal sibling until Thomas and Friends came along...

coffee with supermodels

2008-10-08T22:32:00.000-07:00

Having spent twenty three summers of my life in a suburb in Iloilo, I always thought living in this provincial threshold meant you are left out from the rest of the world. I remember the time when even newscasts were broadcast a week late on our tv sets and the only sign of civilization you find in the city is the rickety SM department store (Iloilo had the 1st SM outside of Manila in 1979) and a Dunkin Donut store.

Living in a lazy, middle-of-nowhere former Spanish colonial outpost, who would actually think that I'd be rubbing shoulders and spending coffee breaks with future supermodels and super designers who will eventually grace the face of global catwalks? And what more do their first photo shoots?!

Grendel Alvarado, originally from Bacolod City, won the Robinson's Iloilo Fashionista Search. A year later, she tried her luck modelling in Manila and was eventually chosen as a finalist and grand winner of the hit reality tv show The Philippines' Next Top Model - hosted by Ruffa Guttierez.

She is now a regular face on most fashion magazines in the Philippines and globally.

This shoot was for my friend Don's magazine called OWN where we tackled musings and inspirations from the final last days of the Berlin Wall. Pieces by visiting designer Gian Romano who a year before had won the MEGA Young Designer of the Year Award and had just returned from New York on apprenticeship from the fashion collective AsFour.

Military-tinged dresses by barangay-kagawad-turned-jetset-designer Bo Parcon, uber cool and devil-may-care finalist to the Philippine edition of Project Runway in ABC 5. Episodes can be watched via You Tube. Apparently, he is one of the most memorable charcters in the show... and in real life, he really is!

Pieces here are by Yohji Yamamoto and the unimitable Don Protasio - otherwise known in the blogosphere as fuchsiaboy. Don has been designing art (he doesn't design clothes, dear friends - he designs wearable art pieces!) since we were in college and has grown into a fashionable monster since then - regularly showing and capping great reviews in Philippine Fashion Week and has even showed a full collection in Cambodia by invitation from the Kingdom's Silk Forum. Although he is now based in Cambodia like me, he goes home every season to showcase his work. Grab any copy of Mega or Preview and you'll sure to bump into his name!

The team during the Berlin-inspired shoot: Nonoy Mosquera, Bo Parcon, Shoebe, Grendel Alvarado and Don Protasio

Another supemodel who is a familiar face in Philippine and international fashion is Ria Bolivar who Don discovered in a Salbakuta concert in Robinson's Iloilo. Standing out from the crowd like a sore thumb at 5'10 and with an unbelievable body frame, Don asked her to model for him. The rest as they say, is history.

Ria first broke into the Manila scene after winning one of the top prizes in the MTV Fashionista Search and representing the Philippines in Turkey. Now, she is a regular face in Philippine Fashion Week and Fashion TV.

Ria has also appeared in countless ads and fashion spreads in several publications from home and abroad. Her catwalk stints range from shows for Inno Sotto, Monique Lhuiller and even as far as Hongkong. The last time we had dinner with Ria, she was being courted by agents for the Milan Fashion Week.

I did these shoots with them right before they hit it big time - way before when I was still doing my photography on a borrowed analog film Yashica camera...

Now, it's just overwhelming to go back to these and say "Whew, I used to drink coffee with them!"

saigon 101

2008-10-06T02:53:00.000-07:00

I was in Saigon to buy a birthday gift for my wife, and going around Vietnam's dynamic business heartland gave me a brand new perspective of how lucky I am to be living in this part of the universe - Southeast Asia - where a bus ride for six hours can take you to another world. It has been almost three years since I have last been here, and the changes you see around is utterly remarkable.

First and foremost, Saigon is not known as Saigon anymore - it has been renamed Ho Chi Minh City since the country was reunited in the late 1960's. But for a hopelessly romantic travel nomad such as I am, it will always be poetically-correct named as Saigon.

I roamed its streets again and was taken aback with an overflowing sense of nostalgia, from the vestiges of its French colonial past, to the American War, even to my personal connection to its history...

The gothic-spired Notre Dame Cathedral is a significant reminder that despite the country's solid stance on communism, it is still largely deeply rooted in Catholic faith - a gift of the west via France.

The Reunification Palace used to house South Vietnam's government before the Fall of Saigon. Now, it seems to be haunted by ghosts of the past.

The park facing the Opera House is also an outdoor art gallery - housing exhibitions of images and visions from around the country.

The iconic Opera House featured the Vietnamese Army Band outside when I came to Louis Vuitton to buy my wife's bag. I had a live music background while at the LV store in Opera View which conveniently faces the Opera House (hence the name). It was like they knew I'll be there to shop for love.

Coffee culture, a remnant of France's heritage in Vietnam is everywhere... Trung Nguyen Coffee is considered king.

The Vespa is also king of the road in Saigon...

The humble Cyclo comes in close second...

The Vietnamese are extremely skin-conscious people. I know the Chinese are notorious with their skin care but they cannot compete with the Vietnamese obsession in protecting their skin from going tan.

It's streets are littered with women (and even men!) who cover themselves from head to toe to escape the scorching heat, but not the overflowing perspiration!

And like an apple lost somewhere between a haystack and a peach tree, love exists in Saigon in unexpected corners... from the lovers French-kissing on a tree by the park or through a newlywed couple starting happily ever after outside of Gucci. Yes, love will always be in fashion anywhere you find it...

forevers and louis vuittons

2008-10-02T06:49:00.000-07:00

Four years ago, I married the girl of my dreams.

Being a penniless, starving artist that I was then, I had no means to give her the wedding of her dreams – a flowing white Vera Wang or a Vivienne Westwood dress, a sunset ceremony on a deserted beach, wedding rings by Cartier or Tiffany, a theatrical reception with a string orchestra, chocolate fountain, free flowing champagne and designer canapés and a dinner whipped up by three-star Micelin chefs from France.

Instead, I married her in our little house garage in Iloilo. She wore a fifty peso ($1) long skirt which she converted into a dress from Landmark in Makati. Our rings were bought for 200 pesos ($4) from Divisoria’s Tutuban Mall and our reception was catered by my own mom who cooked everything from scratch. Our entire wedding cost us 10,000 pesos ($400) which I got as payment for designing the uniforms of Club Noah Isabelle in Palawan. Our plane fares were free, as we’ve accumulated enough points from the loyalty program of Cebu Pacific, back when they still had the Summit Club. I also got some extra money from selling two paintings for only 5,000 pesos ($100).

Since that was all I could offer her at that time, I vowed to myself to MAKE IT UP to her as soon as I am financially stable. Through time, I have learned to keep myself abreast with the thing that has gripped my wife’s fancy into a growing obsession since time immemorial… LOUIS VUITTON.

I remember seeing her face light up every time we pass by the LV flagship store in Greenbelt IV when we were still living in Manila. Her cheeks would gush at the sight of the monogrammed canvas, and when Marc Jacobs, creative director of LV, took bolder steps in collaborating with more artists in designing new bags and reintroducing the classics, the fire became unstoppable. Being introduced to the blog of another LV fanatic Cecile Zamora Van Straten (chuvaness.livejournal.com) didn’t help at all.

So after a successful exhibition in Manila last April, I took her LV shopping. But as much as taking Cocaine and a woman’s Louis Vuitton obsessions are the same, they will always crave for more. Lately, my wife has been bombarding me with not-so-subtle hints (see a comment on my last post!) of what she wants for her birthday.

So as my love for her is growing and getting stronger each day, I have no choice but to translate that love into a silly, materialistic, consumerist, capitalistic symbol of desire to spend forever by her side…. I AM EMBARKING ON A JOURNEY OF LOVE – a long, six hour drive from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh (it actually took me 23 hours on the road as my rickety Toyota Camry's transmission system broke down!), and a seven hour bus ride from Phnom Penh to Saigon (the nearest Louis Vuitton store) to buy another LV bag for the woman I am dearly enamored with.

How far will you go for love?

the sun shines in september

2008-09-29T19:41:00.001-07:00

In a span of a month, I had my second highest number of artworks sold in my gallery by the Passage (the most would be in April this year). Normally, September is a very quite month here, but just last week, a man walked into my gallery with his wife and decided right then and there to shop for art. That man turned out to be the owner of Formula 1, and apparently, one of the wealthiest men in the universe.

He bought a total of 10 artworks - six of them from my Khmao or black series

Four of them were from my Saffron Spirit and My Asia series. They found me through my friend Don (www.fuchsiaboy.blogspot.com) who happens to be the curator / artist extraordinaire of Hotel de la Paix where they were staying. I hurriedly packed the ten artworks in time for them to stuff them into their private jet the next day. They also commissioned ten paintings from Khmer artist Em Riem who was exhibiting at Hotel de la Paix's Arts Lounge.

I also sold a diptych to a couple from Venice, Italy a couple of weeks ago from my new series - Faith of Our Fathers.

Two nights ago, I also sold a bigger print (100cm x 100 cm) to a lovely American couple from San Francisco. This one is from the same series that I brought to Beijing.

Just last night, I was also able to sell another print from my Linga Bar exhibition to a couple from New Zealand who are now based in Singapore.

The unprecedented sales from my artworks and the amount of connection I have made to different people from all walks of life through my art has been truly amazing, especially during the time that you would least expect it - and I am so much thankful for this gift!

The sun really shines in September!

journeys with yesterdays

2008-09-25T23:52:00.000-07:00

I have been blessed with so many great friends - but these are two who are definitely worth blogging about... For my art exhibit in China last August, two long time friends who also happened to be my classmates since kindergarten all the way to primary school and high school (in college, we all went to the same university as well, but different departments) went all the way to Beijing to join me in my exhibition... We had been out of touch for a long time after moving abroad, but when I broke the news to them of my olympic invitation, they all found a way to meet up!

Karl, one of my best buddies, traveled around 10,388 kilometers from Auckland, New Zealand to Beijing and spent almost a day on the plane. He took time from his work in the land of Frodo and Middle Earth where he has been living for the past three years. Among us, Karl had the most relaxing journey to China - flying with ease onboard Air New Zealand bringing with him a bagful of exotic cheese as pasalubong for us!

Karl has the least possibility among the two to come because he had just came from a month-long vacation in the US and his boss is definitely not giving him another break from work... but with much persistence and convincing, his boss agreed and he even extended his China trip to a couple of days in Japan! Details are sketchy of what he did to his boss to get an approval, but he made it!

Elaine on the other hand, traveled from Iloilo to Manila, then Manila to Hong Kong - covering around 1,561 kilometers. From Hong Kong, she journeyed by train to Guangzhou, stayed a day, then took another train again going to Beijing. The train ride alone covered a distance of 1,887 kilometers and took her almost 24 hours! On the way back, since most of the train seats were fully taken because of the closing of the games, her trip had to take twice that long because she had to do stops in a couple more cities around China!

Among the three of us, her journey was the most gruelling and nerve wreaking (not to mention plucking heaven and earth just to get a measly 7-day Chinese visa in Cebu!) - and I truly admire her for that... think of it as a field training for her as she is preparing to move to the United States in a couple of months...

After my own gruelling journey of crazy flights (Siem Reap - Phnom Penh - Hong Kong - Beijing) covering around 3,490 kilometers, we met up in Beijing in the hotel and spent a couple of days roaming around - reminiscing how we used to take these crazy trips together back when we can only afford weekend trips to Boracay, Tagaytay or Manila!

Two years ago, when I started working in Cambodia, these two also took an arduous journey from Iloilo to Manila to Bangkok. Then, they took a seven-hour bus and taxi ride to the Cambodian border and all the way to Siem Reap to see me and my family (my baby was just born then)!

Since this has become quite a tradition for us, we are saving up for a trip to Vancouver in 2010 for the Winter Games and in London in 2012 for the next Summer Games! Since I ALWAYS pay for their hotel, Elaine has "promised" to buy our airfares to Vancouver and Karl has also "offered" to take care of London. Right, Karl and elaine???!!!

Now where do you get friends like them?

of fried frogs and dancing shrimps

2008-09-24T11:12:00.000-07:00

My friend Don (together with blog buddies Kawadjan and Gibo) recently came from Laos and was raving about their trip, from the photo shoot, to the stench-ridden 6-hour journey to Viang Veng and the food… oh yes, especially the food. It got me thinking about my last trip to Laos in Vientiane where, I was unceremoniously “forced” to eat some wonderfully exciting (read: super exotic) food that would give Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom a run for their money.

I was there for a photo assignment and overall redesign of a corporate identity of a backpacker hotel and the owner made sure that I try everything out that Laos has to offer…

The adventure started with a trip to the market where we looked at stuff to photograph for the brochure. While we were going around the wet section, I chanced upon a pile of live frogs and got curious about it. But sadly, curiosity not only kills the vegetarian cat… it feeds them food they are not ready to eat! At the hotel, the frog was deep fried in garlic. I couldn’t say I didn’t enjoy it, but it I don’t think I’ll gorge on it with fries anytime soon.

Another item on the menu was fried river snake which was also seriously good because of the drizzle of fried garlic.

The dancing shrimp salad was another adventure on its own. A trip to the countryside by the Mekong River brought us to this floating restaurant which served a salad which you had to eat quick because it's ingredients are jumping back to where they came from!

This used to be a Jurassic Park-looking fish from the Mekong river, but with a dash of red wine sauce, steamed vegetables and fries, this became on of the most decent meals I had.

Although I wasn't brave enough to eat these pile of crickets, I watched my hosts gorge them like Pringles on a sunny afternoon in June.

Apparently, these plates of insects are a popular snack item.

Any exotic food experience in Laos can only be enjoyed justifiably with their national drink - Beer Lao. Light and mild but equally tasty, I can drink this with any meal!

After a spin of exotic food and Beer Lao, take another spin around the city with this tuktuk...

...and venture out to bsorb Vientiane's sights like their national treasure and symbol... the That Luang stupa painted in gleaming gold.

Pathouxai is the "Arc de Triomphe" of the city. Often called the vertical runway, this monument was built using US funds originally meant for the building of their airport.

Wat Sisaket is the city's oldest surviving temple and is home to a huge collection of Buddhas.

Laoatian smiles and faces...

They say Vientiane is nothing compared to the world heritage city of Luang Prabang, but for me, this adventure was good enough as an introduction to a country as exciting as Laos.

missing mom

2008-09-23T05:35:00.000-07:00

My wife has just started working for a new company this month - a fantastic boutique hotel called The Sothea. As Senior Sales Manager, part of her work is traveling around the globe for sales calls. Last week, she was in Bangkok and she went home to Cambodia just to dump her used clothes then pack again for Saigon and Hanoi. Already, she has planned trips to HK, Singapore, New York, London, Cannes and Berlin.

I was so excited for her at first - to be able to trot around the world for free, but for the past couple of days and nights, me, my son and nannie are starting to feel the emptiness in the house. Also, Don, our dinner buddy extraordinaire and myself are also running out of ideas where to dine next as we owe a big part of our decisions to my wife's cravings. Last night, my son Freedom said his mommy is taking a very long time in the shower (he doesn't believe mommy's showering in Saigon) and it just breaks my heart.

Before, she used to complain a lot when I do trips abroad because I don't call, email or even send an sms to give her updates where I am. Now, she is on my shoes. She left last Sunday but until now, she hasn't called or given us any sms message of how she is. All I got was a short email asking me to pay up our credit card as she has maxed it out of oblivion. Now, I know how she feels!

This is becoming a bit uncomfortably difficult, but then again, I know she's gonna bring Freedom a huge Thomas the Tank Engine train set and the Louis Vuitton Damier Graphite Keepall that I've always had my eyes on...

...wabs u palangga... puli na di!

dinner with the gods and kings

2008-09-19T11:04:00.000-07:00

Do you know that for a price, you can actually rent out any of the temples of Angkor and relive the golden age of the empire? Well, with the modern conveniences of course- like a generator set, mist sprays and luxurious portable toilets. So if you are probably someone who has some scandalously big cash to burn and have a couple of nights in Cambodia, try these out for a change... real value-for-money dinners at the world heritage temples of Angkor!

(I shot these from different catering photography assignments from various hotels and events)

The experience begins with a symphony of lights...

Then the intricate set-up is laid: from candle-lit tables, wine bars, Michelin-star chefs at your beck and call and all that jazz... this is a full dinner setting at the Prasat Kravan temple

A courtyard dinner at the Thommanon temple where you are blanketed by the jungle...

A lounge set-up at the Banteay Samre temple by Amansara

A dinner set-up at the Terrace of the Leper King

Ice sculptures guard the gates to the inner sanctum of Wat Attwiya

The dinner set-up inside Wat Attwiya with classical performances on the temple's causeway

Cocktails and wine by the Bayon temple, Angkor Thom

Classical Cambodian dance performances or music can be arranged... or if you fancy to be serenaded by U2 or Madonna, it's your call.

...or perhaps float a thousand candles on coconut on the temple's moats?

Rental prices for temples range from $2,500 for smaller, far flung temples while Angkor Wat can cost as much as $20,000 for a 3-hour dinner schedule! And that doesn't even include your dinner yet! Dinners usually start at around $300 per person. For most Cambodians earning an average of $2 a day, dinner alone is equivalent to their life savings. Rental price in Angkor Wat can actually build you a house here...

A couple of years ago, a year before I came to Cambodia, Raffles Grand Hotel d'Angkor held a dinner at Angkor Wat with performances by tenor Jose Careras, a full philharmonic orchestra and the Cambodian Royal Ballet. Dinner cost a measly $2,000 per person. Not bad for a two-hour spectacle. Very very affordable indeed.

So what are you waiting for?

Live it like the kings!

celebrity clicks

2008-09-16T01:19:00.000-07:00

The great thing about being in Cambodia is being able to meet great personalities that not in my wildest dreams would even think of rubbing shoulders with - how much more having a chance to take their photos!

These are a compilation of recent portraits and photography work I've done with for the past couple of months...

I was official photographer for Ricky Martin's outreach visit in support for kids around the world through his Ricky Martin Foundation - the Cambodian leg, that is... He is just genuinely a very noble person! The only funny thing was people started asking for his autographs... on pirated cd's!

I did a photo shoot with Philippine Senator Loren Legarda on location at the 15th century temple Wat Attwiya... her top is by Ilonggo designer Jaki Penalosa and neckpiece by Don Protasio (http://www.fuchsiaboy.blogspot.com/)

with Wat Attwiya monks... top is by Romyda Keth for Khmer Attitude

I asked Senator Legarda to "embroider" the flag ala Teodora Agoncillo... this shoot turned out to be really fun! My friend Don Protasio helped out with the styling.

HRH King Mizan Zainal Abidin of Malaysia at Sofitel's greens. For a king of one of Asia's wealthiest states, was very casual, approachable and low key.

Celestina designer Tina Ocampo has conquered the pages of Vogue with her ingenious designs of exquisite accessories... I took this photo of her at the poolside of Raffles Grand Hotel... filled to the brim with glowing candles as she requested for an event.

The most powerful man in Cambodia - Prime Minister Hun Sen prepares for a swing of golf at the Sofitel Phokeetra Angkor Golf Resort at the opening of the Johnnie Walker Classic Tournament

We had a great opportunity to have christmas lunch with New York designer Rafe Totengco on his visit to Siem Reap. I took this portrait of him at Hotel de la Paix when he was sketching his latest shoe designs for the 2008 season...

President Ruth Dreifuss is Switzerland's first female president. I had a chance to photograph her when I was official photographer of Raffles Grand Hotel of her official visit to Cambodia

I have never seen an army and security of that immensity prepare for an official visit than HRH Thai Princess Maha Chakry Sarinthorn.

Some of the reasons why moving to Cambodia from Manila wasn't a bad idea after all!

a sizzling cookbook!

2008-09-11T08:11:00.000-07:00

I'm very lucky to be part of this very exciting project - a Cambodian Cookbook of which the entire proceeds of the sales go to helping Khmer street children find a better life through the organization called Green Gecko.

Headed by Aussie Tania Palmer and Khmer husband Rem, the couple started out the project by providing shelter, food and education to street children they've met begging and loitering the avenues of Siem Reap. Now, it has grown into a well-respected institution and is now giving gecko love to around a hundred kids! Buying this cookbook will help them a loooonnnggg way!

This cookbook project was initiated by another dear Aussie friend Yvette - who got me on board as photographer, food stylist and book designer. Fellow spoolworks teammate Brewster Bonifacio did the full lay-out with Yvette. The original printing of the book was done in Australia, but after a few weeks, got sold out! So hence, a Cambodian edition was done. This proved to be a pain in the neck because color separation here is not as prime as abroad, but after changing printers THREE TIMES, it is finally out!

SEAFOOD IN KAMPOT PEPPER - The kampot pepper used here is the star of the Kmer kitchen and is one of Cambodia's biggest exports. Haute French cuisine uses this fantastic pepper thoroughly. This pepper is better eaten whole and raw.

BANANA BLOSSOM SALAD - This is definitely a beautiful dish - with the perfect balance of herbs and chili without overwhelming the taste of the banana blossom.

GLASS NOODLE SALAD - The shrimp version tastes better (since I don't eat other meats!) but I had fun putting this together on a stone knife sharpener! As in most Asian salads, the basil is the supreme flavor innovator on this dish...

FISH SALAD - This is another favorite of mine. What sets it apart from the other 'ensaladas' are the herbs and the freshwater fish!

SEAFOOD CURRY - One of India's best gifts to the world - the curry... every nation has probably a version they call their own! Our Khmer house cook makes a wicked version of this!

GRILLED SEAFOOD - It may look just like any grilled seafood, but the secret here is the marinade and the pepper sauce!

The hardest thing here was "arranging" the noodles in such a way that they curl up gracefully yet naturally. The vegetables were stir fried separately for arrangement purposes.

I purposely excluded Cambodia's national dishes - the AMOK and the LOK LAK so that leaves you to discover the book fully...

Contrary to popular belief that Cambodian cooking is a shadow of Thai and Vietnamese cooking, let us remind you that a thousand years ago, Siam and Vietnam were mere provinces of Angkor (Cambodia), that's why I don't think the similarities in their cuisine were copied by Cambodia... but whether you refuse to believe it or not, Cambodian cuisine is an adventure you should not dare to miss!

the wedding photographer

2008-09-09T22:08:00.000-07:00

I can never imagine myself being a wedding photographer. Back in the Philippines, my training in photography has always been photojournalism - from frontline news to socially-sensitive awakenings, I've always imagined my photographs to have substantial meaning.

But actually, I discovered that in shooting weddings as well...

I never thought there is so much joy and meaning in recording other people's happiest moments and the beginnig of their journeys together - even though without assurance that they are going to be together forever or not. But capturing that very essence and force that have brought two tides together as one ocean is a fulfillment I never thought I will enjoy.

Also, it helps that my clients are not demanding at all... as a matter of fact, I am the one dictating everything... from the locations, poses, and props!

After their traditional Khmer wedding ceremony, there was a shadow puppet performance done on a 17th century pagoda for the couple and their family. After the show, I asked the bride and groom to play around with the large leather puppets...

This was a rain-soaked photoshoot as it rained the whole morning in Angkor Wat, but instead of ruining the shoot, the weather added more to the mystical mood of the temple...

The Japanese couple in ful traditional Cambodia garb...

In contrast, this shoot was done on an ultra humid day in summer - we have to wipe the couple's faces every five mintes and retouch their make-up! We were all melting in the heat of the sun! But we couldn't complain though... the sky was gorgeous and the colors crisp and amazing...

Goofing around at the poolside of Amansara - the former holiday residence of the Cambodian king in the 1960's...

Prelude to a blissful life....

Don't you wish they all end in happy-ever-afters?

mystical moyo

2008-09-08T01:22:00.000-07:00

The Island of Moyo is the jump-off destination to the famed Komodo Dragon islands (it is not advised to stay on the Komodo islands in itself as the dragons are fierce human-eaters!) but the sleepy Island of Moyo itself off the Flores Sea is a treasure trove of wildlife and lush beach-fringed forests.

We stayed at this amazing tented reserve on the island called Amanwana (thanks to our dear friend Toby) - a true beachcomber/diver/naturalist's paradise.

Although just technically canvas tents, it's got modern luxuries like aircondition, h&c baths, and the legendary Aman service...

The late Princess Diana loved it here so much, so it won't be hard to fall in love with this place for ordinary mortals like us...

Wild birds making the beach their hunting grounds...

The pool deck directly drops to the coral reef where you can feed hungry Nemo's and Dory's.

Handmade maps to the island and naturally-harvested Moyo honey as welcome presents

A masseuse leading you deep into the forest where you have your massage treatments!

Organic spa potions...

Early morning at the restaurant for breakfast

Bumping into wild monkeys who are also having their early morning meals...

The only way to get to the island is a breathtaking ride through a 9-seater sea plane which lands directly to the beach of the resort. The resort has a couple of yachts and small ships to take you around outlying island chains and the Komodo islands but with a resort like this at your feet, the last thing you want to do is leave...

*Photos shot with Sony Cyber Shot DSC R1

new toys...

2008-09-05T21:55:00.000-07:00

Been trying out my new gadgets recently - a 10-20 mm wide angle and an 18-200 mm Sigma lens for my Nikon Camera which I got from Hongkong and so far have been really enjoyning how improved my photos were especially for the wide angle ones.

This is a shoot I did yesterday for a client - the Pacific Hotel.

These have been shot in very close range but the wide angle lens captured them from end to end. Normally, with my old Nikkor lenses, I had to do a composite of 2 to 3 photos and merge them together to create a good panoramic photo from close range, but the wide angle solves everything!

With these two lenses on hand, I don't have to bundle myself with too much variations of lenses for shoots and for photographic journeys.

Here I come, planet earth!

bye bye beijing...

2008-08-29T09:43:00.000-07:00

So were able to make it to the closing ceremonies but you all probably have seen this...

and this...

and also this...

but do you know what happens after the captivating performances are over, the flags been lowered, the olympic flame extinguished and the curtains closed?

We went back inside the Bird's Nest (still refusing to believe it's all over) and caught glimpse of the ones that actually made these games possible and more human...

the VOLUNTEERS.... 1.7 million of them (from the 2 million people who originally applied) which is a staggering number in the history of the games... they are even big enough to fill a country!

You see a sense of pride, honour and joy from the thousands of maintenance guys...

to the formidable Chinese army....

and the student volunteers...

not to mention the Miss Universe-worthy ushers....

the stadium chefs....

and the red guard who is just to eager to kiss a comrade...

to the death-defying performers....

more volunteers....

the extra clean-up committee...

and did I mention more volunteers?

there were bonds made... from Russia to Australia...

and there were even foreign volunteers...

and even one in a wheelchair (kahit di sya mukhang masaya)!

and a lovely Chinese cheerleader who proudly waved the flag I so wanted to see in Beijing...

Of the 1.7 million volunteers in Beijing, 100,000 of them were on the sports venues as "games volunteers". Another 800 were especially chosen as cheerleaders or "ceremony hosts". Another 400 are chosen as "medal hosts" which were trained to present medals, flowers and the like in stiletto heels in hours!

Some 400,000 are stationed around the city in groups as "city volunteers" and have to do a quick crash courses on 5000 years of Chinese history, the subway system, how to get to the nearest Starbucks and even first aid.

The remaining 1 million+ volunteers are stationed across the city as "social volunteers" who are in a lookout for troublemakers, taxis who refuse passengers, illegal peddlers and even just to make sure the traffic flows smoothly...

Never has this amount of people been mobilized in history just to make sure that each single guest experiencing their city will have the time of their lives... and we sure did!

So from the bottom of my hung-over heart and my tattered wallet (I truly overshopped and overspent my budget) THANK YOU BEIJING!

More than winning, more than the show, more than countless stories of rise from nothingness to a beaming symbol for victory, I guess the olympics is more so a triumph of the human spirit...

...but enough of the drama. I am now back in Cambodia stealing time blogging while I am suppose to finish a flash movie of which the deadline is tomorrow!

visions of the east

2008-08-29T09:17:00.000-07:00

As my reason for being in China, our group exhibition - Visions of the East opened at the Capital Library in Beijing as part of the cultural ctivities for the olympics.

The exhibit was opened by officials from the Ministry of Culture and from different consulates and embassies...

Being flanked by the organizers with my work

My other piece being filmed

There were works by over 60 artists and one of my favorites was this huge "sculptural" painting on the left by a brilliant Japanese artist named Yayoi Kato which had prints as comical quote boxes floating over 4 huge blank canvases...

and this really cool work by Indonesian artist Made Wianta who installed razors on canvas and formed dramatic shadows cast by the light...

With the Japanese artist Yayoi Kato. She has ongoing exhibitions as well in different venues around China!

I met again with the organizers of the exhibition a couple of days after and they treated us for a grand tour of the city and the Great Wall and great traditional Chinese food!

Thank you Zhu Sun and the rest of the organizing committee... hope you could visit us soon in Cambodia so we can return the favor!

the games of my life

2008-08-22T09:42:00.001-07:00

So I was lucky enough to find good friends in Beijing who gave me free tickets (some British dudes at the hotel were selling theirs for 500 dollars!) to the Athletics Finals on the 21st. This was supposed to be a big game for China because their national sports hero Liu Xiang, was suppose to compete for this event, but since he was injured, this was totally unpredictable.

My Beijing friends Jessie (from Adidas- Beijing, who gave us the tickets!) and Lan (Coordinator for International Students at the Peking University)

The stadium was packed to the brim but we got good seats on the 1st tier.

The only problem was, I only had a 70-210 mm Nikkor lens which was pretty useless even with its range considering how massive the stadium was

The finals of the women’s 400 m relay

Finals of the men’s triple jump

The men’s 400 meter run where USA swept all three medals

And the much anticipated event of the entire games – Liu Xiang’s 110 meter steeplechase (sorry but the event was on the other side of the oval! Grrrr!)

Dayton Robles of Cuba was eventually crowned winner but didn’t break the world record.

The Bird’s Nest on spotlight

Spectators going out after the event

Even the lights around were inspired by the stadium!

And from afar (this was shot almost at midnight already, but the crowds just refused to go

And of course, the Water Cube

Michael Phelps and the water cube were like coffee and cream

The lit Teflon surfaces up close

The spectacular media center which was also an astonishing structure unto itelf.

The Olympic line subway station. You can only ride this subway if you’re a ticket holder!

Now if only we can get tickets too for the Closing Ceremonies! Last time I checked, the cheapest one was resold at $1,500!!!

olympic fever

2008-08-22T09:29:00.000-07:00

So finally I had a chance to get tickets to watch the games (Athletics Finals) at the Bird’s Nest – for free! A friend of a friend of a friend who I met in Cambodia happens to work for Adidas which is a major sponsor to the Olympics so I managed to get in the park and the stadium.

But even just in the park alone (it’s so massive, I’m not kidding!) you have so many things to do. Unfortunately, not everybody can come in. Only those who had tickets can go in or those who have Olympic IDs. But since I had both of them, you can go in to any sponsor’s halls and just have fun!

Glimpse of the bird's nest

There were sexy drumbeaters clad in space suits performing on the Lenovo stage

The giant Chinese national Olympic jacket and my tiny self. The jacket was sold out so I had to literally grab the last one from the mannequin!

Spectacular spiraling screens showing the Olympic history on the Adidas Hall

Lit Chinese drums on the escalator up the McDonald’s Cube (yup, they have a version too of the Water Cube)

Dribblers and Chinese acrobats at the PICC (Insurance) stage

The spectacular GE hall which featured an electronic water screen

The Formula 1 Hall of BMW, Audi and Volkswagen

China Mobile’s Electronics Hall (You can watch the games through your phone!)

And the State Grid’s “Light” Hall

Now if only they had spas inside the park! You couldn't imagine the amount of walking we had exploring the area!

To my friend Lan, thank you so much for the chance of a lifetime! Beijing totally rocks!

been there, beijing that

2008-08-20T19:52:00.000-07:00

So I can finally claim that I am now really in Beijing and immersing in the pinnacle of an empire of enigma called China. Well, instead of treading from its roots with its 3,000 year old history, I did exactly the reverse. My first day in Beijing started with the modern beat of its humanity as a misunderstood nation – through modern art.

And by modern art, it doesn’t get more monumentally on the edge of our age than this.

I visited the 798 Art Center with very little expectations. For one, the international media has been inaccurate in its reporting – I always thought that this was one giant gallery made from a former ammunition factory. Little did I know that this place is an entire ART CITY by itself! It wasn’t made up of one but a whole lot of communist-style buildings and structures that used to make weapons of mass destruction for Russia and China during the years of the cold war.

Now, these factories and ammunitions depot as well as its supporting quarters have been given new lease of life as cutting edge art galleries, auditoriums, theatres, art cafes, conceptual restaurants, bookstores, shops, and almost anything that has art on its core.

A photo gallery with a collage of portraits of former workers in the factories

The Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (UCCA), one of the biggest and most exciting art complexes in the area, was founded by collectors Guy and Myriam Ullens and houses perhaps the most groundbreaking exhibitions in Asia. Over 60 artists are represented in its ongoing exhibition called Our Future – an open dialogue between what will come together to Chinese creators and the other communities around the globe.

One of the most breathtaking concepts is by an artist named Yin Xiuzhen with her exhibition called Introspective Cavity – a cavernous tent made of pinkish / flesh colored used (ukay ukay) clothing that she stitched together. She is known to use her own clothes in past exhibitions as medium for her art.

Inside the cavity...

I walked into another "cavity" this time its a tunnel with television screens beaming on you on four sides. The concept feels like being eaten and driven into a digestive system of mass media...

The tunnel leads you to the end where you have to slide down. Once out, you are on the main exhibition hall already....

This dragon is trying to get itself out of the wall

This huge piece is a collection of calligraphy painted into sheer, delicate fabrics

Chairman Mao's gigantic hand lies on the floor... almost like that scene from Cloverfield!

This piece makes you look to it like a mirror, but the "reflection" you see is astually the other people looking into the exhibition on the other room...

This piece is made up of canvas and worker's gloves

These ones are screen captures of famous Nintendo and PS2 games

the cafe is absolutely cool!

caged red dinosaurs installation outside

Another cool exhibition is by a South Korean artist who seems to be too passionate about Louis Vuitto Speedy bags and its fake counterparts...

hmmm... my wife would have definitely loved this show.

This tea place on the other hand offers al fresco tea experience inside a giant bird cage!

There was also an exhibition showcasing ancient and contemporary art from Tibet

the 798 art space was one of the first ones that opened in the area. This exhibition houses a unique show of photographs printed in reverse.

JoyArt on the other hand featured video installation by artist Joyce Hiller and featured girls that have telekinetic powers...

798 Art DistrictNo. 4 Jiuxianquaio Lu, Chaoyang District, Beijing

beijing finally...

2008-08-19T18:31:00.000-07:00

spending my first morning in the olympic city and until now, I can't believe I'm here.

this is simply surreal....