Libera Blog Philippines Tour Part 2

The only tourism ad Cebu needs!

Yay! Here is the "continuation of the blog according to Libera." :) It's great to see some of the pictures that the people in the videos were taking. :) I'm so glad we got to see the video of "Cebu!" and the performance at the hotel.

Shangri-La in Cebu - so beautiful!

Speaking of the hotel, the Shangri-La sounds AMAZING! I want to go and get "that happy, Shangri-La state you feel when you stay there." The picture of the infinity pool is breathtaking! Lucky boys! After some sleeping and eating "(I think you get the picture that every meal here is simply in excess)" lolol! they went to the indoor arcade and play area (again, lucky boys!). A snooker table is sort of like a pool table. Had to look that one up. :) Then they were off to another Meet & Greet. 

After that they had dinner and were serenaded by the Mandaue Children's Choir. I love that the kids taught the Libera boys "some of the moves they did in their performance." Go kids that can sing!!



The Mandaue Children's Choir has boys and girls in it and has won international competitions. I found this recent video of them where they have on the same costumes that they wore to perform for Libera. Maybe some of the songs are the same, too. :)

It sounds like the Cebu concert was amazing! I love how much enthusiasm there is in the Philippines for Libera. And I love how much Libera loves it, too! Go Filipino Libera fans! You guys are awesome!

Then it was back to Cebu and another hotel there and then off to Manila and then London. :( So sad you had to leave boys. Sounds like you had a great time! Hope you enjoyed every minute of it!

Libera Blog Philippines Tour Part 1

Awww...Libera boy(s) are having too much fun with the secrecy of who writes the blogs. If you ask them during an M&G, they will just give you this mischievious grin and say that they can't tell you that or it would spoil the fun. :) Well, whoever it was that wrote this, he (they) did an excellent job! You can read the whole "Philiblog" here.

I love the word "instantaneous" when talking about changing planes in Dubai. I would imagine it would seem instantaneous since they are used to hours of sitting around in the airport waiting for their connecting flight! Thank you Mystery Writer (MW) for giving into our American (and apparently Filipino) spelling of "center." lol :)  I myself always feel like it's wrong to type centRE...so there we go. We're even now.

The MW is quite descriptive when he talks about the amount of food that they all eat! Examples: "rather large breakfast" "piles of food" "We ate practically everything" "enormous roast pig" "sudden overload of food" "mammoth dinner" "colossal piles of food" :D Although Lala DID take us out for Filipino food in Toronto, so I can definitely understand how they would want to stuff themselves completely full! Shout-out to the Filipino fans: YOUR FOOD IS AMAZING! lol

Rehearsal

Amazing performance on ASAP Rocks!

It's pretty impressive that their appearance on ASAP Rocks to perform "Carol of the Bells" (brilliant, by the way) took less than an hour to do. But what does MW mean by "we couldn’t do our trademark moves?" What exactly are they doing while singing this during the concert?

Manila Meet & Greet at the Block. Do you see yourself?! :)

I'm really glad that THEY enjoy the Meet and Greets (because we know WE enjoy them). I also love the picture looking down on the tables and the crowd! So cool!

They got their own personal Crocs! That's awesome! Wonder if they're like specialized or different than usual ones or something. That would be so awesome!

Unveiling the plaque for the Libera Playground.

"After the unveiling of the plaque that will go up outside the playground, five of us were interviewed on the subject, and then on the concerts and the new Christmas album (WHICH YOU SHOULD BUY, by the way – thought I ought to plug it in somewhere)." Bahahahaha!!! This really made me laugh out loud...especially since it was right in the middle of something completely different!

Polo club?! Cool! And bowling and...LIAM! 5 STRIKES?! IN A ROW?! I'M GONNA BREAK MY CAPS LOCK ON THAT ONE! THAT'S INCREDIBLE!!! Get that boy on a bowling team! (But make sure he still has time for choir practice.)  :)

What a quirky store. Handicrafts, a piano & a giant Santa! :D

Oh to hear Josh and Liam play an improv piano duet! Video, Libera? Anyone pull out a camera? *hint, hint* ;) Can I play a piano duet with each of you someday, too? :)

And happy birthday to Josh! Man I would totally spend my B-Day in the Philippines if I could! Can't wait to hear more! Keep the pictures and videos coming everyone! And keep the blogs coming Libera MW!

Manila concert - beautiful stars, or snow.

Libera Blog USA Tour - Part 6 - "Hotel Life"

Our last and final installment of the USA Tour Blog is "Hotel Life." You can read it here.

While we fans will never really understand what it's like to do a concert or an M&G or even how things go on the coach, hotel life is one thing that we can understand. This blog is really good because it explains what staying in different hotels for a month feels like. For the super fans, this makes perfect sense. :) But it's really interesting from the boys' point of view.

The comment about the "nerve-freezing" air conditioning cracks me up. lol. And apparently one of the most exciting parts of the stay is the anticipation of finding out who you will be rooming with. But there are no drum rolls. *sadly puts drum away* And then, to bed they go. S.L.E.E.P. :)

Awesome looking waffles!!!

Wake up in the morning for FOOD!!! which our ghost writer seems to enjoy. He is, like me, very sad that all the food in the minibar cannot be eaten. I know that feeling...too bad I'm not rich. lol.

And I wish I had someone to make my bed for me all the time...I usually end up getting scolded for not doing that...I'm really bad about making my bed. Just ask my mom. And yes, I love the giant TV as well. Although we never have much time to watch it.

And so ends the US Tour blogs. Goodbye to you, too, mystery writer. ;)

Libera Blog USA Tour - Part 5 - "On The Bus"

Oh. My. Goodness. This blog had me laughing so hard! You can read it here. The beginning alone tells you it's gonna be a good one. "Eight wheels. A ton of metal. 28 choirboys. And one moose." So here's how the travel day goes for them.

1. Play an hour of Mario Kart on Nintendo DS. The cool thing about this game is that only one person has to own it for you to play it on “The Ds Download connectythingy.” This was pretty funny for me to hear, because the day the blog was posted I had been babysitting my buddies Nick and Nate (who some of you met in Chicago), and we played this game for quite a while on "The Ds Download connectythingy." All three of us have DS's (What's the plural of DS?) but only one of us has the game. Me! :) So far this is one of the only games I have ever found that you can do this with! OK, I'm now done ranting about video games. Back to Libera.

2. Goofing off doing whatever. Playing their own games, reading books, listening to music...hmm...sounds like what I do all day. :)

3. "Off screens." This is probably a good idea. It's like a pre-planned "put up the video games and go play outside" that I always hear from my mom. lol

4. Lunch. It's 28 boys. This is an important part of the day. Need I say more?

5. Quiet time. In other words the time for the big boys to pass out and the little boys to squirm around and ask how much longer before...

6. "Screens are allowed!!!"

7. Bathroom break. For those times when the coach bathroom is...not usable anymore...*awkward smile* lol

8. After the bathroom break look for cool things to take home to their families. :) This is usually the part of the trip where I buy way too much junk food and then proceed to eat it all in record time. lol

9. The "excitement phase." I TOTALLY know this phase! We take that trip down to the national competition I talk about, and the last half hour is always the most fun. We're wide awake, singing, laughing, talking, being generally crazy. On the way to camp it's the last fifteen minutes. We usually start singing the camp theme song as loudly as we can and doing all the cheers and screaming and laughing and...yeah. Basically it's the most fun for the kids, the least fun for the adults in charge. ;)

10. Get to the hotel. And here comes the feeling of standing up and walking around again after who-knows-how-long. Ugh...it's like your legs don't even work! Then we sorta check out the hotel, well as much as you can through your sleep-laden eyes. And then...

11. Sleep. Glorious sleep. :)

Another excellent blog from a Libera boy! Whoever you are.  ;)

Cracker Barrel

There are a lot of Libera fans out there who are not from the US and may not be familiar with some of the things the boys were talking about in their US Tour blog. I remember asking some of the boys last summer what their favorite US restaurant is, and a lot of them said they love Cracker Barrel. Now in this summer's blogs, the boys have made reference twice to their "beloved Cracker Barrel."

So, what is Cracker Barrel? My dad described it as "if you wanted to build an American restaurant in another country this is exactly what it should look like." We decided that Yuki and her mum from Japan and Minyung from Korea just had to try this all-American restaurant. So while in Houston, 4 of us Americans took them there. :D

Cracker Barrel has a country store attached to it which has lots of oddities including clothes, decorations for your house, music, toys and old-fashioned candy.

One of our favorite things about Cracker Barrel is the peg game that they have on the table for you to play while you wait for your food. You start with one hole open and jump pegs over other pegs. Each time you jump a peg you take out the one you jumped over. It is very strategic. The goal of the game is to have as few pegs left as possible. Our record when we went was 3 (except when I cheated and looked up on my iPhone how to play it. Then I got it down to 1. lol)

The food here is really amazing. Most of it is "comfort food" which is basically like the warm, creamy stuff that makes your stomach really full and makes you feel really tired. :) They bring out hot biscuits and rolls at the beginning. If you ever go, be sure to ask for apple butter to put on your biscuits. It is delicious!

My mom and I both got the chicken and dumplings. We couldn't eat it all!

This is the chicken fried chicken with some fried apples on the side. The apples taste like the inside of an apple pie. Yum! 

If you are ever in the US, make sure to try this restaurant out! And then when your stomach is full, you can sit on the porch and rock in the rocking chairs! :D

  

Libera Blog USA Tour - Parts 3 & 4

Well, more great blogging by the Libera boys. You can read blog 3 here. I asked Liam at the Houston Meet & Greet if he was the writer of the blog. He smiled and said that he can't say. "It's a little game that we play." lol. Well, I'll play their "little game." It's fun to guess, and they do give you some hints. :D

We people of the "webworld" :) were treated to a description of their coach/bus/elongated car journeys. It sounds so fun with the "cluster of noise" going on. This journey led them to St. Louis and a visit to Grant's Farm. Although most American farms don't have elephants and bald eagles, this farm is owned by Anheuser-Busch and also has some of their signature Clydesdale horses.

I love the picture of Liam being attacked by baby goats! Good thing he had those milk bottles. My experience with goats is that they'll try to eat your clothes. lol.

At the St. Louis concert, the older boys sang "Te Lucis" from a gallery in the left dome. The writer gives us a hint when he says that "it was really funny to watch all these heads turn to look and see where the sound was coming from." Only the 7 big boys singing could have seen the audience looking around for them like that. ;)

In Arkansas they encountered a lot of locust (What we call grasshoppers or crickets). It could have been cicadas, though, and those are very noisy and freaky looking. It's not a wonder Ben's "insectophobia" came out! :p I think we had a lot of those insects stuck to the front of our van by the time we arrived in Texas!

And how cool that they got to stop off at a Wild West town! Is the writer a Clint Eastwood fan? "Go ahead. Make my day." On to blog 4...you can read it here.

Their hotel in Dallas was super nice - the Four Seasons Las Colinas which we learned has many "sporting areas of joy" and one very hot jacuzzi. lol.

This writer clearly cherishes his sleep. Waking up at 6:30 a.m. is way too early for him. (More on that later.) They sang for 2 morning services at Stonebriar Church and did not seem sleepy at all. It WAS a bit surprising to see them out in the lobby after the first service handing out fliers. It's funny, but I don't remember Liam being out in the lobby. Is the writer Josh or Sam?

He likes Barnes & Noble and books and Sherlock Holmes mystery stories. Me, too! :D

I also think that the Frisco concert was the best of the entire tour. The other concerts were great, but that one was just perfect! Remember if you get to go to a signing, bring something different to get their signatures on. He mentions phones and bags. I know for a fact that Sam signed a bag! :D I also saw ipods, a watch, and one kid had them sign his cast on his broken arm! Well, don't go breaking a limb just to get Libera to sign your cast, but you get the idea. lol.

More love for the Cracker Barrel restaurant! Here they are in the rocking chairs lined up on the front porch. You can buy these rocking chairs and lots of other stuff inside their store.

Yet another Four Seasons hotel, this time in Houston, elicited this description - "What rapture and delight exceeded the boundaries of the coach cannot be described as we pulled up outside.Oh, happy day! Well, night, as by the time we checked in and got to the rooms (which were outstandingly lavish) we just went to sleep. Ah, how comfortable those beds were! As you can see, the stresses of touring are just more than a man can bear." That whole thing just cracks me up! :D 

Here you can see Sam showing them the sound mixing desk before the final concert at Tallowood.

Now for the funniest part. On their final morning, 2 rooms got wake-up calls at the wrong time. Or was it? Sammy and Jakob apparently ignored their erroneous call. The room with Liam, Josh and Sam got their call at 6:30 a.m.! Doesn't this sound like a total prank? Maybe it was some of the other boys or even the crew? There they were, dressed and ready to go whilst everyone else was still sleeping. And you know our writer likes his sleep. Either that or some poor business man did NOT get his wake-up call. lol.

Thanks to the writer(s) for such entertaining blogs! And thanks for a great US Tour! Hope all the boys and adults had a great time. See you soon! :)

Libera Blog USA Tour - Parts 1 and 2

So, one of the boys has been writing! You can read the full blog here. And as usual, there is much debate over who it is. My mom thinks it's Liam. But whoever it is, they are very funny! I love the line at the beginning of the first blog, "So do tuck in to the glorious feast of words that shall now be laid before you, on this, the sweeping buffet of the Internet." Lol! This cracks me up! So dramatic. :)

Sunday morning church at the Cathedral of St. Paul was, as the writer said, "a sweltering pit of heat." lol. The heat really has been awful. But this makes me think that the writer is not (Mini)Ben, because he told us he likes the heat. Little deductive reasoning there, Watson. ;)

That same night was their performance at the Starkey Gala. They did such a great job there. I think I see Beatles memorabilia up for auction in the background there. Starkey raised a lot of money that night!

Cool picture with Miley Cyrus, guys! :) And then they also went to the Science Museum and saw a film about King Tut!? Wow! They pack a lot into one day!

Madden's Resort sounds like it was a lot of fun. We've already heard about the awesome banana boat. And we got hit by that thunderstorm, too. It was GINORMOUS! Glad they enjoyed it. Lol.

And OH MY GOODNESS! A picture of the boys in which they are not in their white robes or blue shirt/pants outfit! I think this is definitely a first! Well, recently anyway. :) It's a picture of Jude and (Mini)Ben playing croquet (Jude has a cute cartoon t-shirt on, and Ben looks like a Ralph Lauren model!), and it looks like Tiarnan, Sam, Josh, Jakob, Alex and Luke playing basketball in the background! 

A trip down the Mississippi River. I wonder if they went on a paddle boat. I've done that, and it's very fun! A lot of bald eagles hang out around the river to fish, too. :)

 I love the ending of this blog post! "The mid-West (which could easily be titled the mid-East too) would be our home for the next two more weeks!" True...I wonder why we do call it the mid-West...hmm...but no time to think about it now.

2nd blog! That's so cool that they got to see all of that music stuff! And shout-out to Simon...he got to play! Sa-weet! He's so awesome!

Glad they had movies to watch on the coach...although our writer slept... :) Ah, the "beloved Cracker Barrel." I love that place! They have really good food, and it's a nice, cozy atmosphere. If you're in the States for the tour and you haven't tried it yet, take the Libera boys' advice and go! It is amazing! I wonder if they all sat at their tables and played that peg board game with the golf tees. Now you have to go to try the food and the game. :D 

I'm so glad they said such nice things about Chicago. If you haven't noticed yet, I love my city. :) Sounds like their hotel, The Ritz, was very "posh." I've been in the lobby anyway, and it's beautiful.

Hope they saved a few of those posh little toiletries to take home to show their families. lol.

The Moody Church service was awesome. Can't believe they felt nervous on stage. They didn't SEEM nervous. The place WAS packed, though. The writer modestly says their songs "all went down very well with the congregation." They got a standing ovation! Churches don't usually give standing ovations. :D

The writer is so kind about the concert at Rockefeller Chapel. It, like St. Paul's, was very hot! They did a great job despite the heat. And yep, some people from the church service were there as well as "our faithful fans who are always there." Aww, that's so nice of him to say! :)

I don't think it is possible to see everything in the Museum of Science and Industry in one day! I love that place! My mom and my cousin and I go down there sometimes together, and it is always really fun. They have, as the writer mentioned, a giant U-boat that the Americans captured from the Germans...well, actually it's really "small" for a U-boat, but when you get up close to it, it's really huge! This is a picture of it that my mom took.

I'm glad they enjoyed all of the inter-activity. They've been remodeling things to make everything inter-active, and I agree, it is really fun. I wonder if they saw the Swiss Jolly Ball machine. I love that thing! :)

The boat ride is amazing as well. It is fun going on the Chicago River, going under the drawbridges and seeing all the buildings from an angle no one gets to see. And then you go out onto Lake Michigan. You get a really good view of Chicago from there! This is an excellent picture of them out on the Lake!

Luke, Michael, Jakob, Tiarnan and Matthew Madine

And oh dear...where did they go for dinner?! :p Well, I'm glad they had fun anyway. :) Keep the blogs coming, sir! (Whoever you are.) Can't wait for more!

Libera Blog "Preparing for a Tour"

New Libera Blog! You can read it here. Aren't you dying to know which boy wrote this?! As always, it's really well-written and funny! :)

Getting ready for a tour sounds like a lot of work. I'm noticing the word "perfect" in there a lot. It's amazing they have rehearsals that last all day. Good thing they get lots of breaks. And even Libera boys practice singing in the shower! lol. (Yeah, I sing in the shower, too.) Love the line, "and my parents show their appreciation by telling me to be quiet as they’re watching T.V." Must be a loud singer. :D

I still can't get over the fact that they practice the choreography blindfolded! Well, we fans appreciate all that practicing. It really shows in how great their concerts are! "And hopefully for you lot, the interval won’t last longer than the show!" Ha! Well, the show does flyyyy by, but only because we're loving every minute of it! :)

Good luck with the packing! It's a long tour to pack for, and it's hard to remember everything. Can't imagine that someone wouldn't forget something. lol. Oooh, don't forget sunscreen! And short sleeves! It's HOT!!! :p

I'm glad Libera always seems to have so much fun on the tours. Hope they have an awesome time in the US! Can't wait!!!!! It's less than 2 weeks until the Starkey Gala in St. Paul! Have a safe trip and see you soon!

Libera Canada Blog Parts 2 & 3

Well, all of the concerts in Canada went really well, and now that I am recovered from the trip and back to my normal schedule, it's time to finish writing about the boys' blogs! You can read their blogs on Libera's website www.libera.org.uk

The second blog was really funny, and the part about "We...had our regular over-intake of food" made me laugh pretty hard. I agree with the boys; the underground mall in Toronto was amazing! It was huge and went on forever. We had the same experience as the boys, wandering around it and trying not to get lost. It was the weekend, so none of the shops were open, and no one was there! Spooky is right! We said we were like moles running around underground! "When we finally found life, we discovered that we were slowly creeping back up to the Earth's surface from the mantle. And also that Big Ben's scarf could swallow Barney completely whole." Lol! Sorry that it rained (and even snowed) so much. At least Libera still had some things to do - movies, underground mall, bowling, etc.

At Music Plus in Kitchener "some people bought manuscripts and novelty music things," (probably the older ones) "while others decided to get the loudest percussion instruments they possibly could" (definitely the younger ones). "The noise in the coach afterwards was deafening. Anyway, after that musical interlude," (lol) "we drove to the Centre in the Square theatre to perform our only theatre concert." And now comes the phrase that I have never heard before until now! Am I just a crazy American, or has anyone else heard this phrase - "Any road up"? I guess it means "anyway," but I have seriously never heard it before!

Any road up...I agree with the statement about the instruments being in the balcony giving the Chatham concert a really cool effect. I loved that! Poor older boys! I'm an only child and have to wear my earbuds to not get distracted in my own house! Can you imagine trying to study in that bus with the "musical interlude" going on and boys talking and laughing?! I wouldn't get anything done! Good for them for doing it though. We're glad they came.

Only 22 boys. Where's Jude?

They got to go to Niagara Falls! yes, I got that extra A in there. =) The revolving restaurant sounded pretty fun, as long as you were careful not to lose your camera as you spun around the walls! Gosh that picture of Mini James with the seagull is cute! I love that kid! Apparently birds do, too!

Blog number 3! They got to go to the CN Tower! (which I've taken to calling the Cartoon Network tower). Whoever is writing this blog, and I have it from a very reliable source that it is Liam ;) , is obviously not too fond of heights. The elevator being like "reverse sky diving" did give me a laugh. =) This made me laugh too: "on our way back down from the lithosphere we saw signs for record-breaking attempts from the tower - for example, one person yodeled for 7 hours 29 mins from the top of the tower! How useful that information's going to be to you I don't know..." lol!

Great picture!!!

They went to Central Island to do some "serious tree climbing", and then back to the hotel.

And another great picture!

The service on Easter Sunday went very well! As the writer said, they did get great applause after they sang the Hallelujah Chorus in church. The concert that night was really great, too. But they didn't get back to the hotel until "half-midnight-ish, only to get up again at four to go to the airport." Wow!

They ate breakfast at Tim Horton's in the airport. While in Canada we saw a great commercial for Tim Horton's with some people coming out of a wedding and talking about how they needed something light like a sandwich before the reception. The punch line of the commercial is when one of the women asks, "Do you think there's a Tim Horton's around here?" Then everyone starts cracking up laughing. Being from Illinois where we have NO Tim Horton's anywhere, we naturally thought that that was extremely funny. =) But there really IS a Tim Horton's on every corner! lol.

I love the little reference at the end of the blog to Jude's speech where he said, "That last song was called Going Home, and soon it will be time for us to be going home - well back to our hotel anyway." The blog says, "and soon it will (be) time for us to be going home – well yes, really!" lol! So glad they had a great time in Canada! It was great that they could come! Thanks Libera!

PS - I still don't know what Orange Squash is...  =)

Libera Blog About Canada Part 1

Libera has started writing a blog about their Canada tour! You can read it here.

Libera seems to be eating pretty well here in Canada, with buffets, huge breakfasts, and ice cream. One of my friends from Chicago who is a huge hockey fan was telling me about the ice hockey museum. How neat that Libera got to go there! Leave it to Kavana to think of a question when no one else could. That kid is so outgoing! I wonder if the kids liked "Hop." I haven't heard much about it, but it seems pretty cute. Lol, love how it's "Not London, England, that would have been the shortest tour, and also the longest (and wettest) coach journey." I had the same experience as the Libera boys when we reached London. It looked so warm, but it was so cold! Can't wait to hear more from them! Whoever is doing the writing is very good at it! :)

The Filipino restaurant we ate at last night was Max's. It was incredible! I was so full! I didn't get a picture of the fried chicken or desserts (too happy eating), but here's some of the food.

Potato bacon soup - yum!

Egg rolls of some sort

Really good beef

Garlic Rice

We also had plain rice, egg noodles with shrimp & vegetables, a spicy tofu (I tried it!), halo-halo dessert and buko pandan dessert. I want to go eat there again tonight!