CROSSING BRIDGES 7 – Western Visayas Philippines 18-28 Nov 2010

1 Dec 2010 – We had just gotten back from Crossing Bridges 7 trip on Sunday……. an epic 11 day trip where 7 days was the official trip with an additional 4 days extension

We flew Cebu Pacific Air and the tickets were really cheap at about $170 roundtrip all in if you booked early enough

I’ll start this thread as a central location where participants from Singapore can upload their images for sharing………. I’ll kick it off with a whole bunch of informal candids and set the ball rolling

These 2 image below just about sums up the crazy fun time we had during our visit to Cebu, Toledo, Tabuelan, San Carlos, Bacolod, Iloilo and alot of other places in between

Total group size among 5 countries was about 80 photogs and yes it got crowded at times but thankfully almost everyone didnt want same same pics so everyone scattered whenever they could

Thank you Panasonic Singapore for supplying dri-fit t-shirts for the ENTIRE group and paying for one of the lunches ! Appreciated!!!

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Photoinc with Ted Adnan (Malaysia) got the ice-breaking efforts going early

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Its unbelievable how MANY people are on facebook nowadays……. of course we took the chance to collect emails and facebook nicks from many many people

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PLENTY of ‘Journalists’ (Ha Ha !!!) too tracking our activities all day and night…..

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Clubsnap and sponsors got plenty of exposure as well……… we were 11 Vans, 1 Luggage wagon, 1 Ambulance and 1 police car to keep things nimble and ALL vehicles carried the CB7 banner

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There was SWAT, Police or Army escorts for us ALL THE WAY provided by the kind Governor of Cebu Gwen Garcia and other officials in Bacolod and Iloilo. We had fun posing with them along the way .

But it was TOTALLY SAFE…. there were SO MANY occassions in Cebu and many other towns where we wandered away from the escorts deep into slums and squatter areas always
greeted with smiles and laughs …. and utter curiosity

The policewomen ….. just one word….. HOT ….

7. Without models …. some of us improvised with our security escorts …. like Bananadiver here…

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ha ha…. we had ‘guns’ of our own too….

It was good…….. everyone was mixing with everyone everyday at every opportunity

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Viet and Philippino photogs

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OF COURSE the Nikonians had to have their traditional group photo ha ha !!

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Even the Olympus users insisted on their own group photo (Viet, Malaysia and Singapore)

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THEN the iPhone users …….. ok never mind!!
notice the Ho Chi Min look-alike (he’s Sonth from Vietnam) whom we call Uncle Ho ha ha !

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the Canon users could not just stand around and not react….
notice the Ho Chi Min look-alike (he’s Sonth from Vietnam) whom we call Uncle Ho

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being the Philippines, we had a couple of locations with model shoots this year…. on Panasonic Day where they sponsored a great lunch(which explains why everyone was wearing a Panasonic shirt that day)

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Borg from Cebu ….. a totally nice and fun guy

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Team Philippines…… these were very fun people who were great hosts and fantastic organizers!

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Manny from Manila

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Icky Salazar from Cebu with Kathy Angeles and Dennis from Indonesia flanking to him

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Shinta from Indonesia

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OK just some sample images for sharing
Around Bacolod

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Outside the ferry arrival terminal at Bohol
Bought a pair of Ray Bans (ha ha) from this nice vendor

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Market area in San Carlos city

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The gun-making workshop visit was totally out of this world. Local gunsmiths did not use a production line………. a gunsmith was responsible for crafting a SINGLE gun from zero to completed product….. a process that takes weeks

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Boatman beaching at Aloguinsan in Cebu

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In the mountains somewhere between San Carlos and Bacolod

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PhotoInc face-painted in mud at Mambukal before Bacolod

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with great weather almost everyday like this….. keeping the pace up was easy……it was like getting hooked on a constant high….. took me about 3 days after getting home to come off the high…

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Island hopping was fun …… here we were resting in our air-conditioned bunks between the short 2+hr ferry Toledo to San Carlos
We took the time to catch our breath and a little sleep

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This looks just all-wrong ha ha ha
Macro-Photography Master , Stevewhy (Steve’s Macro works in Flickr)in all his glory …… the laughing and horsing around stopped only for a few hours every night only when we were snoring in bed

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MOST importantly…… many many of us…in our own ways, came in touch with real lives and real people in the Western Visayas

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At a Sugar plantation and Hacienda in Silay
Someone brought out a couple of cocks for an impromptu fight !
[IMG]http://gallery.clubsnap.com/data/744/****_fight_photogs.jpg[/IMG]

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at San Carlos the body-painting models did a great show for us that evening