Exhibition Photostories

Welcome to the Look Out Loud virtual photo exhibition! Here you can check out the photostories that were featured at the exhibition in Puerto Galera, Philippines at the Stairway Foundation. We hope you enjoy seeing the incredible work that these 30 participants have done in just two months!  

We'd also love to hear what you think about these photostories! Feel free to share your thoughts with us and our participants underneath this blog post , comment on our Facebook page, or tweet @LookOutLoud !! 

And as always, the more people who see these stories the better, so "share" away! 

* Click on the photographs to enlarge them
**To see more photographs by a particular photographer, just click on his or her name! 

Juliet

I chose this photo because this is my best friend, Christy Joy Candava. She lives in town. She is tagalog we only are together in school because I live far. She is kind and goes to school because she wants to finish her studies like me. She wants to be  good HRM, Hotel Recourse Manager. She is making a joke, so I took the photo.

This is the house of my cousin and it is made out of bamboo. This house is near the village, Bangko. Christina is running and is five years old. She lives here with her mother because her father died of tuberculosis and my three other cousins.

I take a picture of my brother because he is a part of my family, he is 6. He is the 6th sibling out of 7. He was very cheerful and has many jokes. The traits he has, I have too.

I choose the photos of beads because beads is the first accessory of mangyans. Working with beads is tradition of the minority and it is a clue of the past.

Beads is used to make money like a basket. We are five years old when we learn how to make the beads. Boys and girls make.

annabelle 

This is a photo of my uncle, Amando. We live in Baclayan, Puerto Galera, Oriental Mindoro. I take this photo last week of February. He doesnt work because when he was born his knees did not work. Because of this his wife works for all the needs. I help my uncle by giving him money and food.

This is a photo of my house and I took it because its very important for my family. My house is made of coconut. My father built my house. I used to live in Baletero but I moved to Baclayan when I was 16, I am 17 now. Nine people live in my house, one of my grandparents live with me, my seven siblings and my parents. I am the 6th oldest, with 4 sisters and 3 brothers. 

This is my cousin, Princess Rashian, on her birthday celebration, she turned two. Every birthday we have pancit, glass noodles and sing happy birthday. She is wearing a new dress we bought in town.

This is a photo of the feeding program. I took it because it is very important in Baclayan because many children help by giving them food. The feeding program gives lunch and sometimes breakfast. More kids started coming to school because of program.

They have to eat at school because they don't have food in their house.

Zyron

This is my story of my family. This is my grandmother. She is sleeping in her bed, she lives in my house. She is 78 and lived in Baclayan her whole life, she was born here and her parents before her too. She was very happy for me to take her picture and she is proud of me because I was taking the pictures. This is her first photograph.  

They are a part of my family.

This is my Uncle. He is asking his wife for money to buy tobacco, nanga and cigarettes. Cigarettes is a bad habit. 

This is a story for all my friends. All my friends are very important to me because they are all apart of my life. We play basketball together. They all live in Baclayan. I’ve known them since I was a baby.

If want to build a home like a house you look for and find materials to use for the making. The first material is a hoe, then shovel, bar, hammer, lagari, buho, nail, wood. These are very important materials to work as a carpenter. This is my uncle and works at Stairway. I want to work as construction worker. I already make things. I helped build the camp house and solars at Stairway. He does not have slippers to wear. 

Melissa

My photostory is of making baskets. The materials in making the baskets are Nito and vine, knife and tubok. Some of the baskets are made by my mother and sister. The first step is you can divide the nito into four strands, then you use the knife to clean the big vine. After that you can make a basket with the tubok, a pointed tool. Many people make baskets to earn money and to buy food for their families. The basket is also tradition of mangyan people. We are seven or six years old when we start to learn how to make a basket. I know how to make a basket. My brother does not know how to make a basket.

Competition is hard. We sell to some foreigners. We sell directly to them in town or on way to baclayan with tourist guide from resort. More foreigners in the past come up. Jowen is other tribe and also they make baskets and they make competition. It takes two weeks to make a bowl and we sell for 1,500. It takes three hours to make a bracelet and we sell for 10 pesos. With the money we buy food from candava in town. 

Rowena

This is a photo of my sister and coconut trees. My sister's name is Rosalina and I love her. The coconut trees are very important because they help build houses,  give work to people and for medicine to help against sickness. If you have a fever, you rub the coconut on your body. You make a copra and put coconut in the fire to start it. Can help with broken bones by rubbing coconut on break. 

This is my cousin, Abegail, standing by the water pipes. She wanted to pause by the pipes for a photo because they are very important to the people of Baclayan. The water begins at the top of Baranguy Baclayan and is brought down through the pipes to the rest of the town. Water is important for all people and their bodies. 

These are my brothers at my house. They go to the Baclayan School. 

The Baclayan school feeding program is important because many children are industrious to get to school. I chose this picture because it helped many children when the feeding program was built in 2011. Sometimes we get both lunch and breakfast. My 3 brothers goes to Baclayan School, they are 12, 9 and 6 years old. My parents are very happy with the feeding program. You graduate when you are 14 years old, grade six then go to school in town. 

Ibarra

Family is in these pictures. I like these photos because of their style.

Playing basketball is known as my game. I like it because I really always win in this game. 

Giselle

There are only two sari-sari stores in Baclayan. One belongs to my Aunt Lucena and the other belongs to my family and my mother manages it. It is hard to manage a sari-sari store in Baclayan since we are so far away from town and groceries are hard to bring up. The store is very useful for our family because it decreased some of our expenses and helps make money. I have a brother who is in college right now, two in highschool and one in elementary so we need money and the store helps with that. My oldest brother just finished his studying and schooling because of the sari-sari store so we are very thankful. I also work when we are not at school.

It is so hard to go to school from where I live in Baclayan. You have to wake up at 3:00am for cooking food and preparing for school. It takes longer because I have to wait for my sister, then even still it is dark outside and we will start our walk to school. Some students stop studying because they dont have money. We are continuing schooling because we have a dream. A dream that we want to finish schooling for a good future.

Mari Vic

Everyday, everytime I will cook breakfast in the morning, in the afternoon for lunch and in the evening. I cook delicious food.

My cousin and I are very close all the time. If I have a problem with my cousin, we solve it together. I take a picture of us in my house. It was a good morning. 

Every Saturday and Sunday there is a basketball game on the Baclayan court. The senior and juniors will fight on the court. The audience will watch easily because watching is fun to do. The team to win makes the fans so very happy. 

Joanna

When making baskets you start by gathering nito from the forest and mountain. Then you start working with the vine and nito and tubok, a pointed needle. The nito is dried and then weaved together in a circular and designed way. The baskets are important for other mangyan families because its its the basics of women’s work and is inherited from our ancestors. After long ago the baskets have become part of the culture of mangyan people and is part of their minds. I have love for baskets.

My friends are very kind and honest. I have friends that are not only mangyan but also one that is tagoalog.

Riza

It all started when I was 10 years of age. I am dreaming of something I thought was impossible but I decided to continue the dream: fashion designing.I used to make pieces of sketch and looked for unused fabric that I may use in making a beautiful dress, growing more and more. As the days, months, years passed I came to learn much more about designing. I can make my own designs now and I can make my own costume for our school programs.  And now, this talent is what I am proud of. 

John Mark

LyNn

Never reject a friend in your life because good friends give us happiness and bad friends give us experience. Both are essentials to life so enjoy every friend you have.
In our life, we have different kinds of friends. Different attitudes, personalities and many more. Sometimes they make us laugh with their jokes, help us in terms of problems and give us support

MICHELLE & SHARILYN

In San Antonio, to wash the clothes you need to seperate the color clothes with non-color clothes. Girls wash clothes, not boys. Because the boys do boating and other things. I think to wash the clothes you don’t need to be a certain age, if you know how to do it, you just do it. In washing clothes you need to be out of the sun or else you skin will become dry. When you finish you should hang the clothes so they become dry. And sometimes others use a machine to wash clothes, those who do are rich. most of the girls in San Antonio do wash the clothes because all the girls in San Antonio or industrious. 

JOHN CARLOS

I take a photo of different hairstyles because I want to share why people have their different styles. One reason is that hair is their main asset so they want to look good with their hair. It makes people look different to others. There are different hair styles, for women here in Barangay they choose straight hair. Men dare to be different so they want to look cool, others want simple. They make their hair up at different angles and positions. Some people here in San Antonio are copying their idols.
This is why people here in San Antonio have different hair styles.