“Do we need travel bloggers?” A friend asked me on my Whatsapp one night, after a long talk about blogging, writing and such. I answered yes after 10 seconds of thought. After a few moments longer, I questioned myself again the same question. Then I took the question a bit further, querying why we should have the third #TravelNBlog, and all the way in Semarang I might add.

We got ourselves this cool #TravelNBlog t-shirt and roamed Semarang in it.

We didn’t have to, in the sense that we could have done something more significant with a direct impact, such as becoming Miss Universe to stop hunger and creating world peace. But, we did have the #TravelNBlog.

In the bigger picture, we’re helping more people indirectly by supporting tourism; a business we believe has a great future in Indonesia, considering we’ve traveled and seen the potential. The hard truth is, we just love to share what we see and experience in hopes the next person reading (which could be just our cousins) can enjoy what we did. It’s a hobby we love and, fortunately, has grown on us so much we’d like to keep doing it. Helping Indonesia tourism is an awesome bonus!

So, do we need travel bloggers? I think so. We’re definitely a travel blog user for reference on information, especially for information in parts outside of Jakarta or lack thereof. We also rely on local bloggers to tell us what they have in their area, as we do for Indonesia to the international world. This is what we’re trying to emphasize with bloggers outside of Jakarta; to help them promote their area to the country, and eventually to the world.

Travel bloggers, in general, are also more personal and honest compared to commercial writing. It’s about experience and not entirely about who’s paying for the post.

A session at #TravelNBlog where Ary Mozta was explaining about building a kick-ass blog.

Considering the #TravelNBlog in Semarang, I think we’re sharing better. The enthusiasm was high and capacity met its quota faster that we anticipated. It was also better planned. This time, we had a mini ‘familiarization trip’, getting closer to Semar Jawi, the tourism double decker circling the old part of the city. So the event was a good mix of classes, trips and on-the-spot blog competition.

Semar Jawi is relatively new, so expect to be the center of attention when you’re on it.

Add to that, so many people had faith in what we do with their support. We’d like to thank the parties that made it happen. The Central Java’s Tourism Department (@VisitJawaTengah) for their awesome support, the Ministry of Tourism for believing that blogging is a media for promoting tourism and a potential one for that matter, and Wego Indonesia that encourage people to travel more. Support also came from Urban Icon, which amplified the spirit to write, Ezytravel that helped with cheap air flight tickets, Smartfren with most of the digital connection during the event, and Blue Bird Group for the transportation.

Publication was awesome from Getaway! Magazine, hopefully it’ll a future destination for the participants serious in getting published, aside to book publishing with supporting publishers Gagas Media.

See! I think the team did great combining the right partners to make the event happen.

One of the winners of Blog On The Spot, Slamet.

I hope we get to see #TravelNBlog 4 and 5, and maybe more. We’ve been talking about it, especially to have it outside of Java. There should be more love to those across the sea.

Our first time publishing certificates!

So, where should we hold the next one? Suggestions?

By the way, we have an ongoing blogging competition till the end of the week. Check here for more information. Here’s also a video from Lostpacker.com on the workshop, and a good one!

• << Newer
• Older >>