this seat is taken

Hello, little space. Time to dust you off. It’s one of those rare moments when I feel like sharing. So as long as my shell is 3 feet away from me, let me tell you a story.

Well, not really a story but a pile of (scanned) film photographs I took during my trip to Palawan last year. Boy, how I miss the place right now. I took  a 3-day leave off Manila just to breathe some fresh air and unwind from the stress and mundaneness of my current life, that is, my job actually. Besides, I’ve always been lying around in my shell after work and that’s not healthy. In the comfort of your own shell, life can be drab.

Leaving Pandan Island, where I tossed my vanity aside because I fell in love with the sea and the life underneath it.

Arwa. One of the two strangers we befriended on our trip. She was collecting shells on the shore.

Everything cerulean.

Mangroves. Brackish water that reminds me of crocodiles and nasty creatures.

Those rays of sunlight that calmed me.

A stranger crashing with the ripples.

My favorite photo of the trip. An abandoned boat.

Who wouldn’t be spending a memorable trip without your best buddy?

I have to admit this set of photographs is the second roll of film I had developed since 2010, when I first acquired my first ever vintage manual camera. I’ve just ventured to film photography in 2010 and did not immediately dive into it.  I got busy with work, the usual lame excuse of lazy uninspired people like me.

Three months have passed and I still long to visit that place again. It feels like home. I know it’s probably too early to claim such affinity with a small town. But I don’t know. I have a gut feeling we’ll meet soon.

Puerto Princesa, Palawan

November 11-14, 2011