SNS Challenger Project Picks Up

My voyage with SNS Challenger is picking up momentum. It's the project I signed up for last week to help Gary McLeod. A perfect opportunity to put some purpose into my recently resurrected initiative to pursue my writing craft a little bit more seriously. I have always said that photography helps me write. This project is digging into intellectual clutter and helping me find my pen.

I thought of doing a mirror post of my chronicles of this journey here as I would like to keep all my notes in "one notebook". Before that I just want to thank Gary for his log and want to affirm him by saying that his enthusiasm for this project has reached "these shores".

written November 21, 2010 | 10:43pm

I'm starting this voyage by figuring out where Bye Street Canal is exactly located. Out of all the photos taken from Manila this seems to be the most difficult to locate. Right now, I'm working from my room and tapping my network to help me figure out the clues I can decipher.

First I asked Marky who is a friend I first met in Multiply. Marky Ramone Go is a modern nomad. He likes to travel around the city and take photos and write about them. He probably knows the inner streets of Old Manila and can tell me a thing or two about Bye Street. Or if not, he can point me to resources that will help me.

Now I am trying to get help from Jarro who is our resident car tuner and navigator so that he can plan our route to this places this coming weekend.

Right now we are researching the web for information on Manila Canals. I found this site that talks about an initiative to fix the floodgates and canal system to be prepared for calamities like Typhoon Ondoy. This brings me to focus on answering the question: what are the canals near Manila Bay and where are they located?

Hopefully this will help in locating Bye Street. I'm looking forward to this coming weekend and experiencing this journey to a whole new level. I think doing a bit of research on HMS Challenger's voyage to the Philippines will help me appreciate the journey a little bit more. Also I think I need to understand Manila in that context and brush up on my Philippine History.

_____

I got the Zeteo group to join in and help me. This is a good thing as I have been trying to get some momentum in seeing how to mobilize them for start-up projects such as this. This will help me see how feasible a social enterprise or foundation can be rounded up as an evolution of a series of activities and projects experienced together by a group of young artists from middle class families in the Philippines seeking passionately to perfect their craft and find a way for their art to make positive impact in our culture.

It's really nothing new. People do this thing all over the world. But I suppose any attempt at making a difference that leads to some kind of social impact is very unique experience for aspiring philanthropists.