#AprilFeelsDay2020, because we need this
Adjusting is a thing we do. The first ever April Feels Day in 2016 was itself an adjustment, a thing we started when existing spaces and events felt like they were not for us. Each April and October event after that, and those in between, were experiments in everything from program to venue to entrance fee to event hours to sponsorship model. FeelsFest2019 was, I remember thinking, the most efficient event we’d run. (Efficient is a complicated metric, but that event hit all the right targets.) I started planning April Feels Day 2020 based on that model, and it was working out.
And then COVID-19 happened, and a quarantine, a lockdown, and changes to the way we do events that I haven’t even started to sit with and really figure out. I just know that this is serious, and we are going to adjust.
So this year, April Feels Day will be an online event. (Sign up here to join! It’s free. Attend from your home, or anywhere! But please sign up so we can send you details.)
We were already as a community rolling out various “virtual events” so we can be more connected to readers and authors who aren’t in Manila, and actually to just be more connected to each other even if we are in Manila, insert traffic complaint here. In August we had an entire month of Twitter lectures, “virtual panels,” author Q&As. We’re always thinking of how to fold these into the April and October events, and let more people participate. Our “extras” for April Feels Day 2020 became Plan A all of a sudden–and now we have new things to be excited about.
If you’re a #RomanceClass author launching a book, you will still get to do that (and I should have emailed you your assignment by now). If you haven’t told me that you’ll be launching (LOL), please do, so I can tell you what you have to do.
What about the program, the live readings? We haven’t announced what happens with that, but I can hint that it’ll still involve Gio Gahol, Rachel Coates, Jef Flores, Gab Pangilinan, Migs Almendras, (and more, hang on).
We can still take orders for print books, as well as connect you to the artists and sellers we usually have. Fulfilling these orders will depend on the safety and supply situation of our printers and crafters, but we’ll offer online options as much as possible. (Easy for ebooks and digital giveaways and art commissions!)
If this is your first time attending a romanceclass event, and/or you want to help us test a thing, and/or you just want something else to do soonish, how about you drop by at twitch.tv/romanceclass on April 4, 6 PM PH time?
See you, I hope!
Does it seem like this is a lot of work being done right when we’re facing lots of anxiety and uncertainty? Why yes, it is a lot of work–and it also isn’t. I do this because it’s always a bright spot in my day, my week, my half-year, to plan something for romanceclass. It’s so easy to do now because the people we do this with, and for, is a group that keeps growing. This is the result of people sharing a little bit of their time, and a lot of their sincerity. This show will go on however way it can. We adjust. 🙂
Miles Tan made all the cute graphics.
