2026.10.24 - One Zone Fest Day 1!

I just saw one of the best shows ever! OMG. or OZF rather. One Zone Fest is 1Z Entertainment's first festival. Think YG Family Concert. Seeing all of their artists perform on stage freely, express their own artistry, and overall just give performances that felt like rent's due for almost 6 hours - it was very much worth the ticket price!

One Zone Fest @ Araneta Coliseum

If you didn't know, 1Z Entertainment is SB19's company, which they founded after they left the agency-that-must-not-be-named. Apart from the boys and their members (note Felip is not part of 1Z as a solo artist), they also manage Xonara, J2X, and W3. During the event, they also introduced their trainees under 1Z Academy - which I found so cool and mind-blowing. It's full circle for SB19 from being trainees to now managing a roster of trainees. I was so proud when they performed Go Up!

Anyway, let me share my highlights of the event (in no particular order because it's so difficult to rank):

2026.10.19 - film # 2

I finally managed to get my 2nd film roll developed today. You may not know but I bought a Kodak Ektar H35 camera last year because I wanted to get into point-and-shoot film photography. The Ektar is a half-frame camera so a roll that normally gives you ~36 shots can give you 72! This is why I got this camera because value for money! This is more for fun because apart from nostalgia, I really like how film photos look. They have so much character and they seem to manage to capture the moment really well. Ok, it might just be nostalgia but you get what I mean!

I'll post about my 1st film roll next time but for now, let me share my fave photos from this batch.

Warning: Please do not steal my photos without permission. I don't have time to apply watermark! 

Kyoto, Japan - April 2025

Cute ojiichan taking a photo!

Rickshaw Man, Arashiyama

on moving forward

Pablo, Filipino Songwriter

There's no other song that hits hard for me at this point in my life like this song from Pablo. 

 'Di na malaman aking gagawin
Tila ako'y naliligaw na rin
Hindi ba kailangang may baliktarin?
Ayokong sisihin ang aking sarili
'Di naman ako nagmamadali
Mahirapan man ako'y tatanggapin
Pinasasalamatan ko pa rin
Lahat ng ito'y may balik sa huli

 In English (and my own translation) --

I don't know what to do anymore,
It feels like I'm getting lost
Should I already wear my clothes inside out?
I don't want to blame myself in the end
I'm not really in a hurry
It's hard to accept but I'll take it
I'm still grateful
All of this will bear fruit in the end

So yeah, the song is about feeling stuck, but still looking forward and being grateful for progress, no matter how little. Being stuck is something that is already familiar to me. It's frustrating and most of the times it leads to self-blame and self-hate even. But when I look back, I'm not really at the same place I was then. I did move forward. Still far from where I want to be, but already quite far from where I was. 

Uusad tayo - di man agad, kinabukasan. We will keep moving forward, not immediately, but eventually. 

Pablo, the genius that you are!

2026.10.18 - back down memory lane

I finally managed to find a way to "migrate" my posts from my website to here! I also did another back-up to my old wordpress page, where my earliest posts still exist (like, as early as 2005-2006)! Guess who went down the rabbit hole of his own lore? Guilty as charged!

I am grateful for my younger self for posting almost every day back then. So many things I've already forgotten and remembered just now by going through my old posts. And it inspires me to continue posting regularly here so that 60-year old me will have more posts to read through in his free time. Haha.

2026.10.12 - Nonki!

 My brother is in the city and he's craving for sushi, so off we went to Nonki for dinner. The traffic was so bad near Mactan Newtown because of roadworks - it took us almost an hour to get there! I was so hungry I ended up ordering too many food. 

Me hungry (Bro hiding from the camera)

Itadakimasu!

2026.10.11 - Was Concert Film

So, yesterday was a lot of fun! My friends and I watched SB19's Wakas at Simula Concert Film at SM City Cebu. It wasn't a block screening so there were only a few of us in the cinema, and quite behaved at that - but at least we got to focus on the performances. I attended that concert live so watching it again on the big screen felt like intentional deja vu. And I wish they show this on streaming platforms as well so that we can always come back to it anytime!

Readyyyy

After the show! 

2026.10.10 - hello from cebu!

Hello stranger (or not)! It took me a while to post my second entry, sorry for that. My website is a few days away from expiry and I am still anxious about deleting that thing. I need to keep posting here and make this site alive so that I don't feel any separation anxiety from my blog. Also, I tried to activate my Adsense here and it got declined because there's nothing here! Haha. Yes, you will see some ads here in the future but think of it as just helping a small time blogger out, OK?

Anyway, I am in Cebu now. I've been here for a week now to celebrate with my two sisters on their birthdays. I spent most of my days in Dalaguete (my mom's hometown) where I worked from home for the week. I enjoyed my time there, being close to nature, living a simple life surrounded by family and my cats. Our house is undergoing some renovations so it's not as comfortable as I wanted it to be but being surrounded by noise and chaos at home is refreshing. So different from my home in Manila! I made my mom's sari-sari store my WFH station, because the construction noise at home is not conducive for calls. My sister also works from home so I had an "officemate" for the week. Plus my cats who like to disturb me when I'm working. I miss air-conditioning though, it's hot when it doesn't rain. But when it does, wow, the coziness and vibe is unbeatable! 

So peaceful! 

My workstation 

Dayon kamo!

After many many years of moving my home on the internet around (from LiveJournal to Multiply to Wordpress, to my own website) - I have decided to come back to my roots and settle in Google's own Blogger. There was indeed a time when I used Blogger as well (and in fact, to my surprise, my old site is still alive, although missing most of the images already). 

Why have I returned? Well, I simply don't want to pay for a website that I do not have the energy or motivation to maintain and update. It's not cheap owning a domain and hosting a site, and this thought of me wasting money away is gnawing at the back of my brain for many years now. It became a frustration I couldn't shake away and so I got even more frustrated with myself for not posting regularly. 

Hopefully this is going to be my permanent address moving forward. I'm still thinking of keeping the domain name but I'll definitely host my site here on Blogger for convenience and for peace of mind. 

I hope to connect with people more here than on social media. As I build my new home on the internet, my goal is to disappear from the apps (i.e., Instagram). I'll slowly be posting about the places I've visited, memorable stories or experiences, thoughts on life and the current state of the world  - it will be all over the place, thus the title of this blog is "Saksak Sinagol" - a variety or mixture of anything and everything. It's been a while since I've been this excited about blogging. Posting without any pressure. And you can say it's also my way of looking back at the past 40 years of my life on this earth. Damn, it still hurts to say that! But at least I'm still here, right? 

If you're new to my space, or if you have been lurking in my old site - Welcome! Dayon kamo! 

Hello from the Philippines!