The World Behind My Wall: The Beginning

My passion for traveling started in 2007 when I went on a trip to Puerto Galera with my AskMeNow officemates. Back then I still didn't have the passion for writing or even taking pictures. I was still young (well not that young), naive, careless and inexperienced with everything. I already had a blog back then but most of the entries that I post where just copy-pasted from forwarded emails that I find interesting or anything under the sun. It was mostly non-sense and just for fun.

Fast forward to 2010, the year when my love for travel was reignited. I met a lot of interesting people including the Bakasyonistas and learned a lot of things with every journey that I shared with them. I could even remember having at least 2 trips each month and with every trip I become less of what I was before. I became a better person. But there was one destination where I finally had the realization of starting a travel blog - Bandar Seri Begawan in Brunei Darussalam.

Brunei was my second trip overseas and during this time, the art of backpacking was still new to me. I was a newbie in terms of budgeting and it was actually my first time to try living in a hostel. It's a good thing that I got to share this trip with Tin who knows how to travel on a shoestring and loves the sense of adventure. And while we were killing time in a coffee shop somewhere near the Omar Ali Saifuddien Mosque, it hit me: Why not start my own travel blog? A memento of all my trips written with love and devotion as I share it with the rest of the world. I always love to write but the problem back then was that I never had a niche. And now I finally know what it is - traveling.

Ok, so now I want to start a travel blog but what would I name it? A lot of ideas went through my head at that moment and while Tin and I were waiting for the cheesecake that we ordered from the cafe, they played Tokio Hotel's "World Behind My Wall". 

"Whoa, whoa. They're telling me it's beautiful. I believe them but will I ever know. The world behind my wall?"

Voila, The World Behind My Wall was born. The lyrics, especially the chorus part was the reason why I chose to name the blog after this beautifully composed song. It's like the person keeps on hearing about a world which is so great, something which he truly believes is real but wonders if he will ever know what it is because there's a wall that hinders him from seeing it. And for him to see the world behind this wall, he needs to break free and take risks to learn and discover new things in life.

A week later after our trip to Brunei I logged on to Blogger, purchased my very own domain and here I am today, still continuing the passion of sharing my travel stories through this blog. I am very grateful to all the feedbacks and the messages that I am getting from people that I don't even know telling me how this blog has helped them also realize their love for traveling. And to be recognized as one of the finalists for the 2011 Philippine Blog Awards for the Travel Category National Level was something that I never expected. These recognitions have inspired me more to continue writing about my love for traveling. It keeps me alive and grounded.


For me, traveling is not just about discovering new places, adventures, ideas and inspiration. It teaches you more about yourself and the amazing things that you can do just to get there. How far can you go? How long does it take? The curiosity can take you to places you never dreamed possible. And as I continue on with this journey, I intend to continue writing these travel stories and share it through this online memento - The World Behind My Wall.

This is my entry to the July Blog Carnival hosted by Edmar Gu-Quibb of Edmaration on the topic "The Journey That Made Us a Travel Blogger". To see the archive of Pinoy Travel Bloggers’ Blog Carnival click here.