juju-panda.com | Arts and Photography by John Contad

How I Came To Hate Photoshop

I had a contract some time ago for graphic design for a poster, but they haven’t emailed me back yet. I assume it’s a polite way of saying “Fuck no, we need some actual graphic designers!”

Ah well. I’m not too bothered about it. It’s one of the first few times I tried to do graphic design, and I learned a lot in the process. It’s certainly a lot less predictable than web design work, as the parameters you have to work with are fewer. The ideas put forth by people are also much more abstract - and there’s very little concrete/solid information given. In a way, it played out like a mental lottery for me.

Here it is:

Filed under: Photos by John Contad
Comments Off

So I got BORED in the backyard…

…so I decided to take some photos. The same, tired, over-focused, under-exposed stuff, but whatevs.

Filed under: Photos by John Contad
Comments Off

Nepean River

April and I went to the Nepean River last week to check out the view, as my mom said. I was initially not-that-enthusiastic, as April’s parents have this habit of going to places to check out roads.

Yes. Roads. Don’t ask.

Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised. The atmosphere was semi-gloomy, semi-mellow - enough to send my mom and Kevin to bliss that closely mirrors that of teenaged kids.

It looked great, though a bit grey.

Then it got a bit darker, and things started to look like a Goosebumps episode:

Filed under: Blogging, Photos by John Contad
Comments Off

Sunshine Coast

I went to Sunshine Coast last week for work. It was a somewhat important part of my career, but I was more excited about seeing the sunrise there.

Sunshine coast is at the very edge of a timezone that first greets the day - there’s something cool about the idea of getting to see the first rays of sun for a new days, while the rest of the world sleeps. I was so excited about it, I braved 3-degree-celcius weather in a shirt, just to catch a glimpse of it.

When I actually saw the sunrise, I was surprised that I felt more lonely than elated. The sheer enormity and beauty of it made me feel small; a mere cog in the colossal machinery of the world.

…Or maybe I just needed coffee.

Filed under: Blogging, Photos by John Contad
1 Comment »

July Fourth

It was my first Fourth of July. From what I’ve heard from friends, Americans usually eat hotdogs and watermelons during the day - but we had none of that! Instead, we had some potato salad, and spent the rest of the day watching the fireworks with my girlfriend.

My nephew came with us, but only lasted a few scant minutes. The bangs and booms and the mayhem was too much for the little tyke; it reduced what was once a manly man to tears. That WUSS.

Filed under: Photos by John Contad
1 Comment »

Waikiki Beach, and the Perils Of Hawaiian Time.

In the first few minutes of me stepping into Hawaii, my girlfriend educated me about the intricacies of Hawaiian time. “First things first”, she said. “Hawaiian time is not just a different timezone. It’s less of a set, concrete time. It’s an idea - and like all ideas, is highly malleable.”

I did not get it at first, that is, until the first few appointments I’ve attended. The time of when things are supposed to happen is very different from time of when they actually happen. We attended ceremonies thirty minutes to two hours late, doctor appointments, bus arrivals. EVEN TV SHOWS!

…It’s insane.

Anyway, I’ve since then tried to keep my arrival time about thirty minutes after they’re supposed to happen. Then I realized yesterday, after we went to Waikiki for a niece’s dance-show-school thing, that because of the…pliant nature of Hawaiian time, it can at very rare and unforseeable moments, be actually on time.

But while we turned up late, I got to take some kinda-okay pictures!

April, my delightful girlfriend, is one of the very few species of Homo Sapiens that belong to the subset of Super Cute.

Two words. Bad Ass. Gods in Hawaiian mythology are generally awesome-lookin.

And, your obligatory Waikiki Beach picture.

Filed under: Blogging, Photos by John Contad
2 Comments »

Honolulu Lights

I’ve always had an infatuation with city night lights - the yellow, white and red glare of cars, the somber color of sodium lamps diffused via the slightly polluted air. I think it has a lot to do with my childhood in Manila.

Filed under: Photos by John Contad
No Comments »

On Eating Chilli

I have never, ever appreciated the taste of chilli - much less, its horrendous aftereffects that come as salvos fired from my asshole to our poor, poor toilet; its sides melting with the sheer corrosive strength of post-chilli poop. I feel sorry for the thing, really.

Last week, my friend decided to order some chilli from Zippy’s - for me. It was an exercise of sheer horror from me. When my plate arrived, my face turned into a caricature of Edvard Munch’s Scream. But I did not protest. For there are matters far more important than gastronomical disasters - friendship, for one (not anymore).

“MMMM, it’s good!”, I said, as I downed spoon after spoon of that horrendous goop. I did my best not to look at the plate, lest I imagine it turning into a bowl of severed appendages, blood dripping from my chin.

“YUM, this American food sure is GREAT”, I said, through gritted teeth. I tried to think of happy things. Like fish and chips with chicken salt; steak sandwiches laced with beet root.

“Really?”, my friend said. “You should try it with biscuits!”. She broke her crackers and laid it on the bowl. She pushed me to consume more of the Unfood, and my sphincter contracted to a pinhole out of terror.

I came home thirty minutes later, my body tired from all that chewing and masticating and swallowing. I laid my body on the sleeping bag, and prepared myself for a long, good rest.

Suddenly, a sound. It was of something I dare not imagine; my mind conjured images of slimey, black monsters from a moist dungeon.

I tried to close my eyes and will myself to sleep. But the sounds kept coming, like bass drums from a throbbing, pulsing monster-flesh mound.

The sound again. This time, it came with a scent. The scent of rot; the funk of twenty thousand years. I felt my nose shriveling to tiny stubs of unuseable flesh - soon enough, I will no longer be able to smell.

I tried to cover my nose, to protect it from smell-horrors. But the abomination will not stop, and it dug through fabric like acidic vapors.

I steeled myself, and looked for the source.

It was me farting.

*events, people may have been redacted from what actually happened.

Filed under: Blogging by John Contad
3 Comments »

Diamond Head, Hawaii

I went to the Diamond Head Crater in Hawaii a few days ago, and it was quite rad - if not punishing for my nerdy, bloated, uber-frail body. It’s not that the hike was hard. I mean, the first few hundred meters were /paved/ for chrissakes. They had a hotdog stand. The incline could be barely counted as one.

It’s just that years upon years of alcohol and smoking have finally taken their toll, and are chewing away at my body - this I realized, as scores of women over 50 were RUNNING past me to the top. I felt utter shame and embarrassment and regret speeding through my veins! That is, when I was sitting down, and having a smoke (my second out of my three-a-day quota, btw).

But it was way worth it, maybe. The view was quite rad.

Being that the Hawaii I’ve seen is composed mostly of drab buildings and overcrowded beaches, it was a pleasant surprise to find a large expanse of vegetation.

These stairs are cruel; they feed off the misery and pain and misery of travelers. They crush the spirit, and suck away at the constitution like LEECHES.

The insides of the Diamond Head lighthouse looked rustic. I don’t know if it’s deliberate or not.

RANDOM PLANT

The view from the top, as with all hikes, is great.

There was this dude who stood at the edge of a rock that jutted from the lighthouse, and led to a straight drop to the sea. He just stood there for an hour, looking at the waves. I dunno, but I thought it was pretty badass.