Mindoro: Iraya Mangyan’s 10th Kaaldawan Festival

10th Kaaldawan Iraya Mangyan Festival

Last October 25, I was assigned to cover the 10th Iraya Kaaldawan Festival in Puerto Galera, Mindoro. The festival is held every year to give honor to the island’s indeginuos people – the Mangyans. I’m sharing here b-side images that didn’t make it to the publication which will come out (hopefully) sometime soon this month and is ok to share.

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Ferdz Decena is Seair Inflight Infocus for Dec-Jan 2009

Seair Inflight Dec-Jan 2009 Infocus

Seair Inflight December 2008 – January 2009 is already out. Aside from the gorgeous and classy cover (shot by Daniel Soriano, Art Direction by Jocas See and creative concept by the Inflight Team) and the beautiful in-depth insider feature on their new destination Borongan in Samar, covered by my friend Lagal[og], yours truly was able to share a spread space in this awesome issue as the Seair Inflight Infocus Photographer.

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Marinduque: Sleeping in Pinggan

Pinggan, Marinduque

After shooting the impressive Cathedral in Boac, we just walked down the main street and bought some arrowroot pasalubong at Boac Hotel just across from the church. Hired a tricycle to take us back to Gasan. The mid-day ride seems long and I was dozing off through the ride. It took at least 40 minutes until we reached Barangay Pinggan. Finally, we arrived at Club Marinduque Resort.

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Marinduque: The age-old beauty of Boac Cathedral

Boac Cathedral

Waking up early and taking pictures during the break of light at Gaspar Island made us famished. Hunger beckoned around 7am that we no longer explored the other 2 islands nearby and decided to head back for our much awaited breakfast. Food at the resort was so-so. After resting a bit we headed north. Had a short stop at Amoingan for an errand and then headed further up north to the island capital of Boac.

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Marinduque: Morning splendor at Gaspar Island

We woke up at about 3:30 am to prepare for our trip to Gaspar Island. It’s great to have fellow photographers like Oggie and Allan on a trip since they understand the importance of capturing the best light in the scenery. Most locals would have wondered why we would want to sail to the island at 4 am in the morning not understanding the photographer’s view of things. Maybe one reason why our boatman missed our target departure of 4 am. Or he just probably overslept a bit. Still, we managed to arrive before the sun rises on Gaspar Island, …

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Marinduque: Chasing the setting sun and crossing bridges at Gasan

Gasan Bridge

Our jeep raced through the major highway of Marinduque coming from Sta Cruz. It was already late and we were hoping to get back at the resort by sun down. We sped through the Island capital of Boac and soon crossed the borders to Gasan. Our driver may have miscalculated the time or it took use quite some time taking pictures of each area as it was already past 5pm. The sun was going down fast and I knew we won’t make it in time.

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Marinduque: Falls on Sta Cruz

Kawa-kawa Falls

Kawa-Kawa Falls Cascade in Sta Cruz, Marinduque It took us almost an hour to reach the town of Sta Cruz coming from Torrijos. We headed into the market area where we also passed by the main Jac Liner station there. We saw the bus we rode already parked. We had a hearty lunch of sinigang with fresh fish and good ol’ home-cooked pork chop and calamares at one of the carinderias there. Followed by a serving of ice cream nearby. With the afternoon closing midway, we moved on to explore some of the town’s attractions.

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