Work & Play: Beach, books, and broken hearts

Got dragged (no, not literally) all the way up to San Juan, La Union last Tuesday to participate in SIFCare’s Earth Day activities which mostly entailed getting people to help clean up major waterways such as rivers and beaches. La Union is known for being the surfing capital of the Philippines, but do you also know that a lot of pawikans (sea turtles) come to their shores to lay eggs?

Yeap. Every year, hundreds of pawikan eggs are laid in the shores of San Juan La Union, and SIFCare’s CURMA (Coastal Underwater Resource Management Actions) program makes sure that these eggs are sufficiently protected until they hatch and the baby pawikans find their way back to the sea. 

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Hello, I am a blog tour #n00b.

Quick update to say that the #buqoYA blog tour is kicking off in three days, and I’m very excited to say that Tara Tries to Write will be part of it! Admittedly, I have no prior experience with regards to blog tours, but I’m determined to make my tour stop good anyway; I owe it to the authors whose stories I have already read and will still be reading.

As I’ve mentioned in my previous posts, it’s a very exciting time for a new generation of writers because a lot of avenues are being opened for us to put our work out there and get our stories to an audience. #buqoYA is one such avenue, and I can’t wait to see where it takes us–both authors and readers alike.

Here’s hoping for more opportunities like this for Filipino authors in the near future!

Read more about the #buqoYA bundles here, and (I believe it’s not to late to) sign up for the blog tours here.

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Let sparks fly!

If you are an aspiring writer residing in the Philippines (preferably the Greater Manila Area), great news! Anvil Publishing’s Spark Books is sponsoring a writing class called #SparkNA with Mina Esguerra at the helm. The class is absolutely free and will be done online, with two or three optional face-to-face classes which are still to be announced. Classes will run from April 6 to June 6, though when I signed up the other day, I already received my first writing task. If you’re scared about these tasks and challenges, don’t be. I’m pretty sure these tasks and challenges will mold us into better and more responsible writers.

Oh, and the best part? If Spark Books likes your piece well enough, they may offer to publish your book! Isn’t that great? I know I’d love to see a book of mine on display at local bookstores, so this is a real treat. To be quite honest, I don’t really have a solid idea on the story I’d like to write just yet, but I’ve decided on a theme, at least. My next step would be to create character sketches and a working outline so I don’t get swept away by deadlines come class time.

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