Filipino Friday: Introductions

As with every start of a weekly meme, we need to know a bit about you! Talk about your top 3-5 (or more!) favorite books of all time, the genres you read and would never read, the books that surprised you this year. You can also talk about how you became a reader and why you love it so much! And finally, if you were in the ReaderCon last year, talk about your experience too! If you weren't there, but you?re planning to go this year, then what do you expect for the upcoming ReaderCon?

Friday meme from Filipino ReaderCon

The 2nd Filipino Reader Con

There are far too many weaboo conventions out there, and it's about time us bookworms have something to look forward to. I got this tip from Kat about The 2nd Filipino Reader Con, and I'm so stoked to attend! 

And while we're at it, let's nominate some great Philippine-published titles for The Filipino Reader's Choice Awards! Here are some of my nominees:

Alternative Alamat - Short Story Anthology

Trese - Comics / Graphic Novel

Naermyth - Novel in English

Tragic Theater - Novel in English

I still have yet to think who to nominate for the Chick Lit category.

I really do believe Filipinos should patronize local books and authors because there's such a wealth of awesome stories that no one else could tell except a fellow Pinoy. Local myths, for one, have been a recurring theme for some recent novels/comics/anthologies that deserve to be read and shared to the world. And while owning a digital e-book reader has its perks, I still make sure to buy print versions of our local publications to support our publishers and authors. You should, too!

Books, books, books

I'm just gonna say this plain and simple:

So I'm learning Korean

From Wikipedia

Yes, and what a jolly good headache I signed myself up for. Haha!

I enlisted to take up basic Korean lessons at UP just because I'm so frustrated about learning Japanese. Way back when, I even hired a Japanese tutor to teach me the ropes, but I gave up when I got to the counting part. I also got intimidated about learning Kanji, so I thought since the Korean alphabet only has one way of writing stuff, I'd be cool, right? Right?

Wrong.

Vocabulary is a bitch, that's why. Unlike Japanese, I hardly watch Korean soaps or listen to Kpop (the ones I like, not the artists who look like carbon copies of each other). Grammar/sentence construction makes me want to flip my desk. Just recently, we started counting big values in Sino-Korean, and I practically balked when we had an exercise on listening. It was so difficult trying to comprehend how Koreans speak like they're eating their words. I'm gonna flunk listening tests for sure.

Learning is difficult in the sense that there's this avalanche of information that you need to memorize. I've stopped memorizing things since I graduated from college. I can keep up with the lessons, but I absorb things a bit slow than the usual. But I have to say that hangeul is really fun to read/write when you know all the characters, although I need to shape up if I want to pass this course.

안녕하세요.  저는안이에요. 반갑습니다!

A trip to the Singapore Philatelic Museum

Being an avid Postcrosser, I'm really into stamps, letter writing and sending mail the old school way. Just recently, I found out Singapore had a museum dedicated to the oldest and the most awesome hobby of philately. That and the fact they had an exhibit on The Adventures of Tintin.