Libel, Prison Love, Jokefest and How life can screw us over

I never thought that 2008 would start off so busy. I can hardly remember a weekend I spent at home since January 1. Last Saturday was packed: I have different appointments in the morning, afternoon and evening. It didn’t help either that I worked until 7 in the morning. But with a couple of hours of sleep sneaked in between projects, I was good to go.

Slander is oral defamation while libel is defamation in writing (People vs. Castro, 43 Phil. 842)

 
Saturday started off with the Blog and Soul Movement‘s first of a series of round table discussions. Atty. Butch Dado moderated the discussion and taught us the difference between slander and libel, and everything a blogger needs to know about libel (including how to avoid getting sued for libel. Very informative indeed).

Eric (byahilo.com), Fritz (fritzified.com), Jeff (blog.teknostik.com), and Benj (atheista.net)

 
The round table discussion ended at around 12 noon. I had time to kill, and Eric was hungry, so we joined the other bloggers for lunch at Market Market’s open air food court. Most of the blogging events I’ve attended were held at night and due to work, I had leave early so I miss the post-event events, which are often more fun than the actual event. It was great to sit back and talk about blogs and bloggers with people who know which blog and blogger you’re talking about (except me, who’s really out of the loop). The hot topic for that session was…well, let’s just say that life is unfair. And heh, I don’t want to get sued for libel.

Juned (baratillo.net) and Karlo (pinoyblogero.com)

 
I headed off to Robinson’s Galleria afterward to meet up with the Manila RBJ group to watch the 4:30 screening of the indie movie, Selda. I have to admit that I (and the others as well) watched this movie in support for our friend who worked in the movie. However, our friendship wasn’t the reason why I loved the movie. Selda really is a great movie.. It has such raw emotions that you can really feel. The cast was superb: Sid Lucero (wow. This guy is a very fine actor), Emilio Garcia, Ara Mina and Michael de Mesa. It’s a must-watch movie, even just to see Michael de Mesa wearing a wig.

I didn’t order this, but I wish I did.

 
What’s great about watching a movie that your friend help make is that you get some insight about what happened while they were filming it. It was fun discussing the movie with Mela and getting answers to our seemingly endless barrage of questions. After dinner, we made our way to the taxi queue and headed off to Intramuros.

 
Did you know that Club Intramuros is outside the Intramuros gates? Now you do. The Jokefest’s venue was certainly different from the events I’ve been to before (well, except perhaps Fort Santiago. At night). It was on the “roofdeck” which was actually just the second floor and is surrounded by the golfcourse. It was a fun event, made even better by my discovery of the band Unitiima. Unfortunately, the day was taking its toll on me, and I was zoning out during the Jokefest (I forgot to have our picture taken, Clare!). But I’m glad to finally made it to a YouthTRiP event. Sa uulitin!