Chronicles of Maia: 34th Manila International Book Fair

Going to the Manila International Book Fair has been in my (invisible to the eye, visible in my head) yearly must-go-to-with-the-kiddo list. The kid is turning 5 next month and yet I still couldn't find the time to bring her. I thought last Saturday that we could squeeze in a few hours to spend at the fair after Sam's birthday party but the weather wasn't very cooperative it forced us to choose to go home instead of heading straight to the book fair. I slept with a broken heart that night.

I think the husband must have felt my sadness because one of the first thing he told me when we woke up the next morning was "go, I think you will really enjoy it there. It's your happy place".

A bubble thought went "awwww" in my head when I heard that but I wasn't in the mood to really take it seriously because the weather remained gloomy. I really want to take the little girl with me. So better for me to stay home if we can't go together. "Better luck next year", I thought.

But after breakfast, Mr. Sun peeked and the hubs decided he'll go with us so I finally gave a little squeal, grabbed a few things for the kid and readied her for our trip to a 'BIG' bookstore. The mention of that made her excited as well. In the beginning she thought we're just going for a bookstore date at the nearly National Bookstore.

Luck seemed to be on our side because it rained hard while we were on the road but when we were nearing our stop, it was only drizzling and we didn't have a hard time commuting to MOA at all. It just took us a little over an hour to commute from our place to MOA despite the heavy downpour and slight traffic in Baclaran.

When we got to SMX, the kid was just too eager to get inside I didn't get the chance to scan the floor map to check which side was Lampara and Adarna books are located. Well, the kid was really only after finding NBS because when we entered Hall 1, she made a beeline towards the NBS arch totally dismissing the colorful kiddie book stall that was just right beside the entrance. I guess she figured, she will find every kind of book anyways inside NBS. She immediately raided the kiddie bookshelves, I think we spend more than an hour just going through each of the books on display. Some of the books, she took out and pretended to read on the floor. Good thing we got there early so the crowd was still manageable and she still was able to get a space on the floors.

I would've gone through each of the stalls if the hubs was with us but he wasn't in the mood to go inside the fair so I had to just pick the stalls that we'll check. After spending a good deal of our time in NBS and burning almost half of our budget on workbooks, we also went to Anvil Publishing's area. We bought 2 books there but I seriously wanted to splurge on the textbooks most of which were being sold at 80% off but I had a tight budget and I really wanted to see the Lampara and Adarna stalls first.

Found these trivia books at the Anvil display. I was tempted to get the entire set.
My siblings and I were trivia addicts and we really enjoyed Brain Blitz when we were younger.

It was past 1pm when we got to the Precious Pages area (where Lampara books is located). Sadly, they were only selling at 20% off. I had to pass else I end up buying just two books each from them and Adarna. The kid didn't push, she contented herself with leafing through the books she liked and making me read the pages that interest her.

This was one of the books that caught her attention.
IT HAS YOUR NAME MOMMY!

After leaving Precious Pages, we headed straight to the information booth because I was already dizzy from looking around searching for the Adarna stall. Turns out it was just near the Precious Pages booth. The kid found it first actually. While my eyes got transfixed on the Cultural Center of the Philippines booth, kid grabbed my hand and shouted "THERE, Mommy! ADARNA!" That sounded amusing. I didn't know if she read the sign right or if she just remembered what the Adarna logo by memory.

Adarna was our last stop so I let her pick books she wanted to check and didn't press her to hurry anymore. Sadly, there wasn't much left on those books that were previously being sold for 50% off. I was aiming to spend half of my budget on those. Still, I was quite happy with what we came home with from Adarna.

When we were about to pay for our picks, I caught a glimpse of Russell Molina (one of the Adarna authors that I really like, no bias, he tells stories that are very reflective of the realities in the Philippine society). I excited told the kid she can have one of her books sign by the author himself. She gave me a wide grin and proceeded to bring her books to the counter. She handed the book to Russell to sign. (Happy me, she isn't shy anymore!) I also asked Russell for a souvenir photo and he happily obliged.

Ahhh someday Maia I hope we can publish a children's story for Adarna. A mom and daughter colab perhaps? Just the thought of it makes me giddy. But really no pressure there. That's just one of my silly wishful thoughts.

Anyways, back to this super sulit trip. I had a thousand bucks to burn here's a breakdown of my spending for the:

NBS (8 workbooks, 1 storybook) - 523.75
Anvil (1 book and 1 box of Dora stickers)- 123.50
Adarna (7 books) - 430.00
Total P1,077.25

snapshot of our MIBF loot

I overspent a little but brought home a total of 15 books. I think had I gone earlier, I would have bought more with the budget I had but still the daughter and me were happy campers on this trip. And yes you bet I'm going to save for more pesoses to burn next year!