2009: A Year of Diving and Underwater Videos

Total Dives: 43
Total Time Underwater: 32 hours 30 minutes
Maximum Depth: 117 feet
Wrecks Penetrated: 6
Freshwater Dives: 1
Night Dives: 2

To my friends who follow my endeavors and bear with my underwater stories, this post is as expected. Easily, the highlight of my 2009 was literally beneath the surface. For me, and many others, diving isn’t just a hobby. It’s more of an epiphany that humbles your eyes to things which we aren’t accustomed to seeing.

I finished my open water course in April, advanced course in June and have fallen into the fever of dive addiction, apparent to many who have undergone similar experiences. I completed my gear, logged 43 dives invested in trips around the country, and most importantly opened up to a new circle of dive friends.

Diving in Coron

Paradise exists, and it is in the Philippines. Coron was my first major dive trip of 2009. Straight after completing my AOW course, wreck diving seemed more and more enticing as a break from the underwater flora. Coron’s beauty is ironic. Above the surface, the bay of Coron is a blue carpet that taints itself in a bloody sunset crescendo. Beneath, the remnants of the Japanese occupation remain preserved in the sand. Oil tankers, gunships and frigates are the biggest fish in the sea.

Diving in Puerto Galera

I did two trips to Puerto Galera this year and they’ve both been captured in the two videos that follow. My two trips to The Canyons were the hardest dives of the year as we’d literally be crawling on the ocean floor so as not to be swept away by the current. Puerto Galera is alive with big fish.

Clam Seeding in Anvaya Cove

Just like any endeavor, there comes a point when you want to put add a little more depth and meaning to your actions. The volunteer Clam seeding activity for UN Volunteers Day achieved precisely this — a free dive and directly helping the environment by planting clams around the Anvaya Cove reef. Think of these giant clams as the big oaks of the forest. A few of these will directly tip the point of the reef’s biodiversity, bringing in more fish and more corals. We brought in 79 of these and created a spawning network along the reef.

The Future
For 2010 I plan to invest more in quality dives rather than quantity. Hopefully I can find a group that will be doing Palau, Apo Reef, and Tubbataha (tough luck here as you’d have to plan this a year in advance). If you’re a diver (or want to learn how to dive), let’s go!

A short word of thanks
I’d like to extend a special thanks to the guys from Sony Philippines for lending me two Marine Packs and three cameras throughout the year — a T series and two W series for shooting my dives. All the videos above were taken using these two cameras.

Everytime Manny Pacquiao hurts someone, Nike releases a Trainer 1 Shoe

Manny Pacquiao whips Cotto = Nike releases a shoe. They’re launching this today at several Nike Park stores in Glorietta, TriNoMa, and The Fort. The shoes are in the colors of the Philippine flag — red, blue and white.

The Nike Trainer 1 Low retails at PHP 5,995. Go, succumb to the fever of consumerism and buy these shoes. Manny Pacquiao orders you!

Jinkee should have her own shoe line. In Janilyn.

How UNO Magazine helps us be patient for James Jean’s trip

This is a little online partnership I worked with Fully Booked and my “day job” with UNO as online editor. We’re giving away three works of James Jean.

James Jean.

Who the hell is James jean??!

Thanks to my fellow editor Luis Katigbak, we found this little paragraph that best describes him:

“Like Wolverine, James Jean is the best at what he does. Unlike Wolverine, James Jean doesn’t kill people with razors that pop out of his hand. You might not know James Jean by name but you’ve seen his work. His art’s all over the place. It’s in galleries, on Prada bags, album covers, in magazines and on the covers of DC comics. Tom Herpich and Kenichi Hoshine are simlarly talented and definitely blow minds with their intense talent and vision but James Jean is the king. James’ drawings have sophistication, power and delicacy beyond what most drawers can muster.”

– Nick Gazin, VICELAND

His art is all over the place, the ubiquity is overwhelming. So there’s a book signing and a “meet and greet” but we have something to help bide the wait. We’re raffling off some of his works. To join, click here.

The following prizes are up for grabs, courtesy of Fully Booked:

One (1) copy of Process Recess volume 3
One (1) copy of Fables Volume 1 Deluxe Edition
One (1) copy of XOXO Postcard Book

Contest runs from November 4 – November 18. Deadline for entries is November 18, 11:59 PM. Editors of UNO will submit a shortlist of contestants to Fully Booked. Fully Booked will then determine the 3 lucky winners.

Winners will be announced on November 20.

Prizes can be claimed at Fully Booked Bonifacio High Street. Prizes not claimed after 30 days will be forfeited in favor of Fully Booked.

You need to leave the comments on the UNO blog. Three more days guys! We have more than 50 entries so far, so good luck!

You’re all invited to this amazing UNO Fashion Event

On November 16, we’re treating you to a very special fashion event for the guys and gals. The invite above should give you context.

Do come. It’s open to everyone. This will be at 6:30 PM at the NBC Tent in Fort Bonifacio.

RJ Ledesma is inviting you to his second book launch

Dear blogging community! You are all invited to the launch of my newest humor compilation, “I Do or I Die! RJ Ledesma’s Imaginary Guide to Getting Married and Other Man-made Disasters (As told to him by his Yaya)” on October 22 (Thursday) 6pm@National Bookstore, Glorietta 5, Makati City. Please feel free to bring your friends, buy several signed copies of the book, and help me pay for my baby’s diapers! Thanks for the support. [source]

A good friend and colleague, RJ Ledesma will be launching his second book this coming Thursday at 6:00PM at National Bookstore in Glorietta. You’re all invited. He told me to invite everyone. Please go. No sign up required. Just go. Bring your yaya.

——

It’s so intimidating. A good number of my colleagues in UNO have books and / or have won Palanca awards. Me, I just have this cute blog with a lot of bugs.

Guess Who: UNO September 2009

Tadah! We’ve got the cover up on our Facebook page and the blog as well. I’ll post the “cover lines” version soon. In this issue, I wrote a piece titled “How to pick up girls underwater” and this was inspired by actual events courtesy of Benj Espina. Watta guy.

Click for the bigger version.

UNO’s Funky Online Challenge! aka UR FOC!!

So here’s a social experiment. We shot it impromptu right after the cooking throwdown in Serendra the other day. So here’s how it works — it’s sorta like a bet with Erwin Romulo. If I can get the UNO Facebook page up to 1,000 friends or more (it’s at about 600–something as of last count) he promises to give away a treat for the readers, involving some of our UNO girls. Even I don’t know what it is, but he swears that it is going to be something really worth the wait, involving the UNO ladies. And it’s happening only on the Internet.

Remember, facebook.com/unomagazine. DO IT!

Cory Aquino on Philippine Free Press 100th year Issue

A note from Erwin Romulo on the 100th anniversary of the Philippine Free Press. The reason why you should buy this issue is highlighted on the second paragraph:

The FREE PRESS celebrates its 101st anniversary in this issue. We also take this occasion to pay tribute to the late President Corazon Aquino. Cory!—the private woman who was thrust out of her domesticity to the arena of politics, the prison cells of the Marcos regime, the parliament of the streets, the leadership of the Philippines and the world stage. Manuel L. Quezon III’s “Filipino of the Century” is an inspired retelling of this now-legendary story—one that resonates even amid the flamboyance and machismo prevailing in our culture, as the late FREE PRESS editor Teodoro M. Locsin pointed out in his eloquent editorial on Mrs. Aquino. The highlight of Mrs. Aquino’s international acclaim is, of course, her triumphant 1986 address to the US Congress, which we reprint here.

A tribute to Mrs. Aquino also serves as a tribute to her martyred husband, Sen. Benigno Aquino Jr., whose association with the FREE PRESS is underscored by Locsin’s being thrown in jail together with Aquino (and nine other critics of the Marcos regime) in 1972. Teodoro L. Locsin Jr.’s interviews with Aquino are fascinating chamber pieces that hint at Marcos’s impending dictatorship. Another cellmate of Aquino and Locsin Sr. is the brilliant political analyst Napoleon G. Rama, whose article on martial law has unfortunately become more relevant in our time. With the articles by Rama and Locsin Jr., we also reprint the classic political cartoons of former FREE PRESS art director E. Z. Izon.

It’s Ciara this August

I sent her a Facebook message.

Hey Ciara, I’m flipping through the latest ish, hot off the presses, I said. She replied, and told me she was nervous as she hasn’t seen the article. I said:

The article written by Aldus is as always brilliant. If you’re wondering if it it follows the usual “what turns you on,” ” what do you like in a guy” sort of format that typical men’s magazines go for, then let me put your hesitations to rest.

I went on to tell her that I was about to enter my class in AIM and was going to conveniently display the new issue as part of a case study for UNO’s rebranding to 60 of my students. Had RJ along as well to talk about the rebrand while I discussed the online strategy (it was an Internet Marketing class).

It’s age I guess. Seeing a college friend on the cover of the magazine I write for. Good times. Grab a copy. It’s a great issue.

Oh and don’t mind the slight camera distortion. I was shooting in wide.

Dispatches: UNO, Bloggers, Fully Booked — July 29 at 7PM BHS

On page twelve of the magazine, there is a short manifesto tha describes the heart of the publication I work for. Let me write it down for you.

UNO is a monthly magazine for the discerning man (and woman). There are features on women we admire, occurrences worth covering, art forms we appreciate, objects that inspire acquisitiveness, and ideas that deserve attention, among other things.

There are also jokes, which may or may not always be in good taste. We value writing and images that are extraordinary. We love women. It is our belife that digital tools should be used to emphasize natural beauty and/or enhance a specific aesthetic– not for turning people into wax models.

Again, we love women.

We think that there’s more to men (and women) than their surfaces.

UNO: Dispatches for the Discerning Man

As serendipitous as it may be, I find myself knee deep into something that I truly love doing, becoming a cyborg of sorts combining the very best talent in local glossy with the journey of the Internet. It is no secret that the blogosphere has been more than interesting for us as a community mechanism, which is why we want to push that even further. Starting with this:

So here’s the deal. Let’s take a break from the usual clubbing routine for something different. On July 29 at 7:00PM we’re holding an informal meet up with our blogger friends and contributors at the Fully Booked FORUM (4th floor!) at Bonifacio High Street. What’s going to happen? Well we’re going to bare all and answer all the questions you may have and perhaps have you going home with a little bit more knowledge about the publishing industry, marketing print, and how print transitions to the Internet locally. We’ll talk about why we revamped UNO, how exactly we did it, and the new design philosophy behind the new and improved magazine. Let’s talk paper stock. Cover shoots. Refocus on our events. Our blog and the community behind it. [read more here]

Hey, we really want you to come. And Arnold Arre will be there too with his brand new baby titled Chapter One.

See you!

Cindy Kurleto: Two Versions of UNO July ’09

I guess one of the conveniences of the web is being able to post our cover girls sans the cover lines. So here are two versions of the cover — Cindy Kurleto on both of course — for UNO’s July ’09 issue. Also in this issue are Ellen Adarna and Gretchen Fullido. And a little something from Norman Black. The other version of the cover after the jump.

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