Sunday, October 23, 2011

Fountain Pen Network - Philippines



Our group of pen lovers, Fountain Pen Network - Philippines, is three years old and keeps growing. It started with a handful of enthusiasts in a thread on analog writing instruments at (oddly enough) a local tech forum. It now has about 20-30 active members, many of whom are also members of the Fountain Pen Network forums. Our yahoogroup moderator, Prof. Jose Dalisay ("Butch" to his friends, aka "penmanila" on FPN), has written about fountain pen collecting, and the group, several times in the Philippine Star. Anyone who enjoys writing with fountain pens, wants to try them out, or collects them, may join. We meet about once a month, for lunch or coffee and pen talk.



What do we do? Eat. Talk. Make new friends. Doodle (that's Caloy Abad Santos doodling on the Amici restaurant placemat above). Show and tell. Try out each other's pens. Hold raffles of pen, ink and paper products. Buy. Sell. Trade. Exchange information - where to buy pens and inks, care and maintenance of pens, pen repair, info on collectible models, where to find quality stationery, etc. In short, we are a bunch of enablers!

A friend of mine in the US said, "I love looking at your pen meet pictures on Facebook. It's all so geeky." Yes, geeky and we love it.


Some members' collections focus on a certain brand and model. On the table in the photo are Parker Vacumatics.



In this photo, teddy bears Ivan and Trekker guard pen cases containing Pelikan M800 limited editions, Toledo models and "Originals of Their Time".



Here are some beautiful celluloid and silver overlay pens.



A number of members have special frankenpens created by honorary US member Tom Overfield. These are pens that are cobbled together with usable parts of other pens of the same model, even if the colors don't match. They each have special names - there's Frankensnork, Bride of Frankensnork, the Bridesmaid Pencil, Tuckenstein, Frankenthein, Thinenstein, Rafflestein, Pencigor, etc. Mine is the grey, blue and maroon Parker 51 Demi known as "Demistein". It's second from right - I love it because its parts have been rescued from somebody's cabinets and it writes a nice, broad, wet line. If ever there's a token of deep friendship and love of pens, it is that.



Colorful pen wraps! These were made for me by May Zayco (fuschia and aqua) and Hazel Gazmen (olive green).



We like to hold raffles at Christmas, and during anniversaries. Keeps the attendance up!




Here's Leigh Reyes, doodling.




And more doodling, this time by Jenny Ortuoste. Featured is my Swan fountain pen with the semiflex Eversharp nib. Isn't it inspiring to be able to write in all those gorgeous ink colors? If you wanted read a good ink and paper review, then visit Clem Dionglay's blog, Rants of the Archer.



I even got a lesson on how to resac a Waterman 0852 1/2 BCHR ringtop from the 1920s, from Butch Palma, at the first anniversary pen meet.




Here we are at the second anniversary pen meet. And that's not even the entire group...

Photos by Chito Limson, Leigh Reyes, Jenny Ortuoste, and Mona Caccam.

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