the SEVEN Deadly Sins

What does the number SEVEN mean to you?

In a second, you would say seven is a lucky number or seven days a week or the seven virtues. Probably it is the number of numerous meanings, but what comes ino your mind when you see the number seven?

This is my first blog series that would last for seven installments and it is all about the number SEVEN and its relevance in the NUI Pintaflores Bodypainting Competition in November which will be presented by the Local Government and Tourism Office.

It will be another fun and enlighting moment for all artists and performers for again the Bodypainting will be supported and recognized.

In behalf of all those who hoped for your help and support...

Thank you.

O Lamb of God by Andrew Pell

A detail from the masterpeice of Hubert van Eyck and

Jan van Eyck from their work Adoration of the Mystic Lamb.

You cried out from the cross, why have you forsakened me;

Those who knew him did run and flee.

Drops of blood he shed on that day,

Those who were at the foot of the cross, had nothing to say.

A Wedding Album Sample

I have long been wanting to make a wedding album for the web, since busy time is still months ahead I tried his free software for practice sake.

Just click on the omage above and you will be redirected.

Thank you for the browse.

WHERE DID THE BUDGET GO?

"Do no write when you are angry" it has been written but for how long will one strntch one's understanding and patience so as not to evoke grudge or ill feeling towards others?

Six months have passed when we created a gown to be used for a pageant of beauties for our San Carlos representative in Kabangkalan, until this day the payment has not been fully paid. I know the budget for the certain gown was already been released by the City Government, half of the total cost was paid before the gown was released and I expected that the remaining half will be given when the gown is done. The City and everybody else was busy for their Sinulog presentation and when I asked for the remaining balance after the Sinulog, I was told by the Tourism Office representatives that the balance will be given after papers will be signed. Waiting again, I thought of how can the papers will still be waiting for signing when the gown has been used and probably been reused already.

A week after, only half of the half was released because of another reason - because they will still be waiting for the refund of whatever-do-I-care. Huh? Oh yes, the money inended for the payment of the dress was used during the Sinulog because they were lacking of budget!

It was about many months later when I was old that the money was used for personal reasons. If I haven't asked for what was due they I wouldn' have known.

Maybe this is a really personal matter tha I shouldn't be writing thos for all to know but who doesn't have the right to know? I have long been wanting to write about this but it seems that I am not the only one who hasn' been compensated for what we had done. Maybe the others are too busy or too rich to ask what is due for them but this is not a question of being rich but a queston of using the money of others for your own personal reasons especially that the money is from the City.

I guess this is not just a matter of personal ethics but work ethics as well which some of the employees were not able to comprehend well. If only they could just review what has been written in the code of ethics for those working in the government then they could really enjoy the beauty and the advantage of being in the City Hall and they would realize that whatever is paid by the Government should be given back with full heart and soul - may it be government money or government time which must not be used enhancing ones Friendster account.

ENGKANTADO ALBUM COVER

SPECIAL DELIVERY

Another Seven?

After the hardships of making the ENGKANTADO, The Nui Bodypainting Awards '08, we were asked of the budget for the NUI Pintaflores Bodypainting Competition (NPBC) for this year's Pintaflores Festival in November, it really is a good feeling if people are interested with helping us - the striving artists and the even hungry people of the city. We hope that this time we will not be informed weeks before the fiesta that we cannot be sponsored by the Local Government and the Tourism Office due to insufficient funds after six years of producing good quality performances for San Carlos.

We can accept the fact that the NPBC cannot compete with the attention a Miss SCC Beauty Pageant (like any other beauty pageants) gets from the viewing masses and the hungry wolves but if we dig deeper within each of us there is a blank space and a longing that wants to experience beauty at its truest form and it is ART. We need it and we must seek for is everlasting existence. But this post is not about art but about the coming seventh NPBC in November.

We are calling all artists, sponsors, female models, and others who want to take part of the rebirth of an almost dead beauty.

There is still no fixed date for the submisssion of Entries but we hope we can get earlier response from the higher level.

May the response be a "YES! We will support you all the way" or a "Sorry, better luck next time" or "Sorry, I cannot answer your call because I am already in the bedroom."

For the meantime, let us keep our fingers crossed and our minds open.

Life's Everlasting Eccentricities

The end of the century of the 1900's was a turning point of all of us who have been a part of a woman who was an image of many things, 1999 was an end this woman's rollercoaster affair with life as her struggle with diabetes, hypertension and the criminal heart problem proven that man cannot win over death. But what really is this woman's fight with life for? Or what are WE?

One's existence, they say, can be measured on how one leaves this world, it can be measured in the deeds may be good or bad or in the number of hearts one has touched.

A song in the movie RENT talked about 525600 as the number of minutes in a year and asked of how you spend a year of your life, my mother talked of how you spend your day and what can you offer God at the end of it. Life is too short to be wasting it with nothing, she says and she has proven in the end that hers was a life full of meaning and deeds done.

She came to San Carlos as an orphan from Janiuay, Iloilo and lived with her relatives who were prominent in the city in the 1950's and was trained to do house chores in the most intricate manner I have imagined which we (my brothers and sisters) have called so "OVER" that every weekend the time left for us is to eat bananacue at 3pm and everything would be a blur after - time becomes blurred of work until we realize it was time to fix the bed we had sunned and dusted.

These chores we thought were too weird or eccentric have brought us where we are now, we were unconsciously taught of the atention to details, to the importance of a job well done, to the use of your both hands and feet working simultaneously, and to essence of the word "multi tasking".

Who would love to turn over the garden (and semi-boulder size) stones every week and loosen the soil so the earthworms wouldn' have a hard time breathing, turn over the hanged clothes every hour to hasten the drying process and so with the "pinakas" or home dried fish which she loves to make, clean each bathroom corner with a barbecue stick and old toothbrush, while watching "Flordeluna" we should wipe each leaf of the indoor plants (I can only sigh when it is time for the five fingers plant to be wiped) with egg whites until you can see your reflection in each leaf or wipe the spoons and forks with dry cloth after washing until our distorted reflections mirror us or keep your feet busy as your eyes by scrubbing the floors, and even recycling food from fried fish from lunch into a colorful sweet and sour for dinner.

It was always a tiresome weekend for us children for the only compensation after the "hard labor" was a gallon of ice cream especially during "sweldo". We didn't have the luxury to go to the neighbor's house and sit on their chairs and talk of somebody else or to play wih others because if we ask the answer is always "The reason why you have a brother (Alvin) is that you don't have go out because you have a playmate."

Looking back at all we have thought to be weird in our younger days I can say that those requests or chores were not weird at all but they have made us more creative, more atentive to perfection and more eager to do better than what we can.

We were pissed by her constant reminder and unending speeches of little things magnified but when the loud speeches faded like the dusts on the dry and dirty leaves, we started to miss everything - the beautiful and lush gardens, the sparkling bathrooms, the sweet natural smell of dry cotton on our pillows. The noise and reminders have gone with time but we still do what we have been taught as if she will be there to check our work, we still work as if time is slowly eaitng our day that we have nothing to give back to God for another beautiful day He has given us, and we still strive to be better or be the best in what we can do. Maybe because she has not left us at all. Tomorrow, July 9, is her birthday, and if she is still alive by this time, the mos thorough general cleaning will be done today and we wouldn't mind at all beacause there will be lechon, sweets and ice cream.

Sigh is all I could utter but life is too busy to count one's existence through minutes.

525600 minutes 525000 moments so dear 525600 minutes how do you measure measure a year?

In Day Lights in sunsets in midnights in cups of coffee, in inches in miles in laughter and strife...

Happy 80th Birthday, Mama.

A Story of What Believe

Allan Dela Fuente, "Against", Kalibo, Aklan

Myton Ouano & Eric Cabales, "Can One Lose Faith"

Allan Dela Fuente, "Kalibo Cathedral"

Eric Cabales, "The Face of Faith", Kalibo, Aklan

Myton Ouano's "Sunrise"

Myton Ouano's MIAG-AO

Myto Ouano, "The Bell Tower"

Myton Ouano

Eric Cabales, "Someone to Watch Over

Eric Cabales, "Welcome Home", Ibajay, Aklan

Eric Cabales, "Reservations Not Allowed", Ibajay, Aklan

Eric Cabales, "Till Next Time", Ibajay, Aklan

Every tomorrow has two handles. We can take hold of it by the handle of anxiety, or by the handle of faith.

~Author Unknown

Planning to back up my files in my laptop, I came across pictures that I have almost forgotten. Images of travels of mine and my friends, images that move my inner saintliness as each one of us also have. These images speak to me about grace, grandeur, and even God's words that seem painted in the walls and in the faces of the pictures. Moving is a word described when an image describes not just the scene being taken but the more apparent emotion is the one of the image taker. This is a story of three people that took images of life that are inanimate yet have the power to bring hurt from within in the form of tears or joy in the form of ecstacy undescribed, this is a story of love for mankind and the journey taken separately and ending in one destiny.

Life is a story full of questions, twists and turns but no matter how we move our three cameras, where we focus our lenses, what exposure one uses - we all ended up with one story.

This is a story of the unexpected light distribution, accidental timing and maybe a story that was once told but never been seriously taken.

All of us has a story to tell and if these pictures are true to the saying then this story can be retold and revised a thousand times and still can touch each core of our hearts a thousand times more for this is a story of us.