“Your blog name sounds stupid. Why coolkidandy?” My good friend asked me that during one of our conversations about putting up a blog. For someone as timid and inarticulate as I am, a description of a “cool kid” might seem inappropriate, eh?
The handle coolkidandy was bore out of boredom. When I first registered on Pinoy Exchange in 2007 to join a forum about Pinoy Idol (the local version of American Idol), I thought not to use my name for privacy reasons. But why coolkidandy? Actually I couldn’t remember the reason why. Maybe I ran out of ideas. Maybe I thought adding “cool kid” in my name would sound cool.
Speaking of blog, my first ever one was on Friendster (if any of you can still that social networking site). Technically it was just a collection of mindless thoughts during my transition years at high school and college. I wish I had saved my first blog because it was written in a super silly manner. When Friendster started allowing users to customize blogs, I self-taught and learned CSS and HTML. My Friendster page looked anime-ish with Flame of Recca backgrounds. Friendster’s popularity diminished by 2009, the year when Multiply, Twitter, and Facebook boomed.
I maintained a Multiply blog in 2009, where I extended my knowledge of CSS and HTML. Like Friendster, Multiply allowed users to customize their pages, so I decorated mine with a lot of anime- and video game-related stuff, from, again, Flame of Recca, to Fatal Frame, to Tekken. In fact, I was tapped by my Tekken playmates to customize our local team Multiply site. My blog site, however, did not have anything of journalistic value; the things I had posted there were just some usual teener stuff.
When I set up my Twitter in 2009, I thought of using @coolkidandy instead of trite ones like @iamandy or @mynameisandy. The same thing happened to my Tumblr blog, which I set up mid-2011 and my public Instagram that opened November 2016.
Blogging, then, I thought was a part time thing that I could do whenever I want. But ever since I maintained blogs, my problem has been the same — getting an article published. Maybe I lack an inspiration, or a driving force perhaps. It’s quite funny to think that I find it difficult to write something when I’m working as a news writer/producer. Oh well, news writing is different from blog writing.
I’m almost on my seventh year of working in the communications industry in the Philippines and China. Working as a journalist in both countries has given me the breadth and depth of experience in domestic and international affairs. My stint in the public relations industry meanwhile has taught me to produce content that was tailor-made for specific audiences. But I can’t find enough motivation to maintain a blog until I started my Russia and UK travel in 2016. When I put up this blog, I thought I wanted to document my journey through pictures. But I felt something greater — that blogging has brought out the cool person inside a timid and inarticulate Andy.