Rowena Lei: Her Blog, Her Life

By Jing Lejano

Many, many years ago, I tried my hand at blogging. I was editing a magazine then, but ironically enough hardly had any time to write. I thought blogging would satisfy my need to write my thoughts on anything and everything, and I got so excited about it.

One of the first persons I approached was Rowena Lei, the mom behind the popular blog, Animetric’s World. We were doing a story on blogging then, and she was one of our resource persons, if I recall correctly. Apart from the questions related to the story, I also had all sorts of queries to satisfy my personal curiosity. She was extremely solicitous, generously sharing her knowledge about a platform she helped popularize in the country.

Fast forward to many years later and Rowena is still blogging, one of the top in her game, and I have long stopped blogging for the simple reason that it is hard work. If you don’t have the passion for it like Rowena does, then you might as well not get into it.

What makes Rowena’s blog always so refreshing is its constant and consistent evolution. It has grown as Rowena has grown, taking into consideration her many interests and pursuits, making it an animatedly living medium.

“Yes, my blog is me and I am my blog,” she says.

Looking over today’s blogging community, Rowena says, “Blogging has become something everyone can do these days, kind of like drawing, calligraphy, or even cooking. One day you think you want to create something and put it out there on the world wide web, and you have all the tools available. Blogging wasn’t this accessible to everyone in the earlier days because of the lack of know-how and tools that make everything easier.”

Rowena recalls making things up as she went along in the good old days. She says, “I wasn’t actually sure of what I was doing when I started blogging. I wanted to write and take pics so that was what I did. I didn’t even know there were such a thing as blogger events.”

But she did have her own internal rules.

“For example I decided not to dabble in politics earlier on. By that I mean my blog isn’t open to ads or writeups for specific politicians or political entities. I get asked a lot when election time rolls around. I went as far as to tweak my Google Adsense settings to not show political ads, ever. I never campaign for anyone.”

Because Rowena takes her blog personally, she is very picky about what she posts. She rarely attends events as well, choosing those that pique her interest.

Her followers have long known her passion for gaming and her obsession with skin care. Lately, she’s thrown herself into another pursuit, which has excited her readers no end. Rowena has gone cooking!

When their household cook left last June, her family tried to survive on food delivery. A couple of weeks later, however, they started getting sick. Rowena realized then that she had to start putting her pots and pans into good use. In her blog, she wrote, “It was positive thinking for most part. I figured if she (the cook) can do it, I can do it better. I’m smarter and I had Google to guide me. So I went from zero to hero in the kitchen. I don’t claim to be the best cook but I can whip up a decent meal anytime. I’m no longer threatened by the prospect of having no one to cook for us.”

Reader response has been great, a lot of whom ended up asking her all sorts of questions. Cooking has always been a challenge for most moms, and in Rowena, they found a glimmer of hope that they too can do wonders in the kitchen.

Cooking also gave Rowena the opportunity to work with even more brands.

From gaming to skin care to cooking, Rowena’s pursuits are certainly varied and interesting. This is what consistently draws visitors to her blog, along with the fact that she writes quite candidly and sincerely.

But readers are in for more surprises. Just as Rowena is constantly moving and changing, so is her blog. Having changed her blog’s layout, she is still in the process of fixing it up, resizing photos, and deleting irrelevant posts.  Indeed, much like life itself, her blog is always in constant motion.

Jing is a single mom of four and lula of one. She is the content head of Mommy Mundo.