Mud Slide

We were so looking forward to attending this year's Mudpack Festival, Jomi was already dreaming of all the great subjects he can photograph, and I was thinking how nice it was to just be outdoors surrounded by nature, feeling the sun and breathing the mountain air.

It wasn't a long drive up to Mambukal, took us less than an hour, and the roads were in pretty good conditions. There was the occasional traffic and drying rice grains on the side, but most of the time it was just us on the road.

We paid P75.00 for entrance and parking - that's P30.00 per head and P15.00 for the car - pretty affordable. We drove in and headed to the area marked as campgrounds and of course the first thing we did was scout for the restrooms, which were under construction. But was still useable if you did not mind being viewable, if someone took it into their head to climb a tree, as part of the roof was missing.

Near the restrooms were the wall climbing area and the food court, I did not explore the offerings there as we did BYOB - bring your own baon :) Further up would be the Ishiwata campgrounds, we'll later see that this was teeming with tents and busloads of festival-goers. If you were wondering, you can't see into the restrooms if you climb the wall, pervert.

We headed for the area where the competition for body painting would be held, it was partially covered and the atmosphere was anticipatory, people were already securing seats and staking out spots for better viewing. We still had a couple hours before the start of the competition set at 2PM, so we had time to look around, take photos of the preparations and just hang out with the other visitors.

There was the usual souvenirs of tribal-inspired accessories, henna tattoo artists, e-loading stations, and food stuffs. It was really festive, people were already getting drunk, cooking and eating al fresco, swimming at the hot springs, having some of their body-parts painted with colored mud, and walking around while the mud dried and flaked off. We even saw some Korean visitors having their whole bodies covered with it.

We met a few people, even an old classmate from college. People were really willing to pose for the camera, it was great!

Scouting some of the contest participants getting ready, Jomi took pictures while I noted how taxing it was for both the artist and the model to work with this medium. The mud came in different colors - bright red, ocher, brown, gray, white, black, dark and gray blue, and even green. Some of the artists' made their own colors by grinding materials available on the mountain and mixing it with the mud. This was the most important condition of the contest, only mud that came from Mambukal is allowed and no artificial paint should be used.

The participants were gathering near the contest proper, they were directed to go under a tent set up for them so the mud paint doesn't dry up, it was time...

2009 Mudpack Festival
Mambukal Resort
June 20-21
Mother Earth... Sanctuary of Life