I hope my entry still makes it in time for the deadline. This is my entry to Ladies of Hive Community Contest #49. If this post still qualifies, I am inviting @jonalyn2020 to join. She is a new friend I met here on Hive and one of the Hivers I would want to meet in person someday.
1️⃣ Have you ever met someone from the Hive blockchain in real-life?
If so, tell us about the experience! If not, who would you like to meet
and why are they on your wishlist of people to meet?
As a matter of fact, I have met quite a few people from the community. Actually, it was from the previous blockchain but since that's that, I still would like to say they're my friends from the blockchain. We all became friends because of our love of writing Tagalog stories. We used to have weekly contests of what we call Tagalogserye. It's a series of stories all written in Tagalog, the most commonly used language here in our country. It's a competition between two teams, both assigned the same genre, topic, and all controllable conditions in the story. Each member of the team will write a part of the story, each will be posted on each day. We usually have 4 or 5 members, and then the judges will decide who wins. The price wasn't that much, we are but a small group of Tagalog writers afterall, but it's the fun we're all after back then.
After months of playing the contests, we discovered that some of us live in nearby regions. We're still around 30 minutes to 4 hours apart from each other but we all decided to meet up one day. Plans were made, we exchanged numbers, we talked through Facebook chat and discord and at last, we met each other for the first time. Present during the meetup were @tpkidkai, @czera, @beyonddisability, myself and @johnpd, may your soul rest in peace.
We had some classic videoke fun along with some booze and lots of food. I'm not sure what it is with Filipinos but when they say it's a meetup, it's almost always at a videoke bar. It's as if our friendships will depend whether we can belt a Mariah Carey piece or not. I think it's just the most fun way of bonding with new friends. It's a lot different when you just talk in front of the screen than when you're facing them. Maybe it's a way to ease into each other's presence gradually, thereby eliminating the awkward phase of first meetings.
When the videoke session was over, I can feel it in my heart that we all had fun and none of us wanted to part from each other yet. So we decided to have a late night coffee. And late night it was indeed. We only went home when we felt really too sleepy. I have a daughter waiting at home for me so I couldn't stay out too late.
Then we felt that one meet up wasn't enough so we once again scheduled another meetup. A few months after the first gathering, we decided to have another get together. This time, we stayed overnight. Since my daughter wouldn't sleep without me by her side, I brought her with me. She became the youngest member of the @tagalogtrail. Our second meetup was not without purpose. @tpkidkai was going to propose to his girlfriend, and he needed our help. @beyonddisability worked as an agent for condo unit rentals back then so we booked one room right away. Needless to say, @tpkidkai got a yes on his proposal and now they're living happily ever after with their cute little baby girl I can't wait to meet in person. I'm going to bite those chubby cheeks!
Within the same year, 2019, we had another meetup. This time, I brought my husband with me, and @tpkidkai brought his girlfriend too. We went nature tripping. We enjoyed our minor hike the last time we all met, we wanted to do it again. So we went to a farm somewhere in Rizal. Our rented kubo was right beside the river. There was no mobile signal, it was just us and Mother Nature. There were a couple of mishaps throughout this nature trip but still we had fun together. My family enjoyed the company of my friends.
Blockchain blogging has brought me new friends whom have met my family too. Although I always talk about my family in my blogs and in my chats, I don't usually bring them (and by "them" I meant my husband) in gatherings and meetups. The friendships I built within the blockchain has made my blogging experience even much better. Right now, not all of them are actively blogging, but we still stay in touch with each other. We check up on each other, making sure we're all fine especially these days. We try to help as much as we can when one is in need. We try to comfort each other even through our chats. I am happy to have met them and to have spent some time with them before all these lockdowns happened.
There are lots of new friends I wish to meet too. Although, I may have to travel by boat or by airplane to meet them. Some of my new friends are in Northern Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. As soon as these lockdowns are over and I am assured that it is safe to travel with a kid, I will definitely put meeting my newfound Hive friends on my to do list.
@romeskie is a full-time stay-at-home mom to a homeschooling toddler. Loves crocheting as a hobby. Maintains a mini food forest, aiming to grow more to achieve that farm-to-table homesteading. Learned how to cook after leaving the corporate world to take care of her family and is now starting to acquire basic baking skills. Learn more about her adventures and misadventures in the world of motherhood.
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