18 YEARS AGO, when a rare lull in our usual afterclass conversation presented itself, Maw broke it with a seemingly random musing. “Parang ang saya mag-travel sa US and Canada, ano? Gawin kaya natin.” And the only thing I could say to that was, “Hindi ko afford.” “Tange, hindi agad,” she said. “Years from now…
Overwhelmed by wonderful comments on our latest FB/IG post. But this one made me tear up. 🥹 It brought me back to my early years as a personal blogger. I wasn’t a travel blogger then, but I would comment on others’ travel-related posts a lot, wondering whether I’d be able to go to those places…
NAIROBI, Kenya, 2024. Sheldrick Elephant Nursery takes care of 20+ baby elephants orphaned in the wild. Each baby has their own story of survival. The most compelling are those of orphaned African elephants that were adopted by bull elephants. The bulls would still protect the baby elephant as much as they could. But sadly, protection…
Wearing 3 continents on my wrist now. 🇰🇪 a beaded band created by Maasai women in Kenya 🇬🇷 a bracelet from Tinos Island, gifted by a friend who hosted us in Greece 🇹🇭 a sai sin, blessed by a Buddhist monk in Thailand Too bad I didn’t purchase any bracelet in North America and Australia.…
I just realized that 20 years ago last week, I published my very first blog post. While 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐏𝐨𝐨𝐫 𝐓𝐫𝐚𝐯𝐞𝐥𝐞𝐫 was established in 2010, marking the start of my traveler era 😂, I actually created my very first blog in April 2004. I think it was my good friend Jerwin, who introduced the concept of…
Last night, the Benguet Indigenous Youth Arts Guild gave The Poor Traveler the 𝐁𝐞𝐧𝐠𝐮𝐞𝐭 𝐚𝐭 𝐇𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐀𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐝, an honor given to non-Benguet residents who contributed to the promotion of the province as a destination. 💙 It was a lovely surprise. We weren’t able to accept the award in person because we had a prior commitment,…
Whenever I conduct social media/travel workshops, I always say that in order to stand out in an ocean of influencers that we have today, it’s not enough to just start creating content. You have to find a niche that is close to your heart and through which you can add value to the online experience…
While organizing my old Japan files, I came across this photo and it reminded me of one of my biggest regrets — 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐠𝐢𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐘𝐨𝐮𝐓𝐮𝐛𝐞 𝐚 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐩𝐞𝐫 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞 𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐥𝐲 𝐢𝐧 𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐛𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐠𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐜𝐚𝐫𝐞𝐞𝐫. Google offered us a number of opportunities in the past. In 2016, they invited us to a YouTubers gathering in Japan to…
