“Alab ng Puso” was supposed to be a zine about the new coronavirus disease (COVID-19), a five-article mini magazine borne out of the desire to commemorate “this tumultuous period of our lives,” said Kim Jao, editor in chief of British School Manila’s Winston magazine. But that wasn’t going to be enough.

“We quickly realized that there were too many stories to tell for this to only be a zine or even a normal-size magazine,” Jao said.

Deciding to make it a bigger project and to include more student voices, Jao and her team reached out to International School Manila’s Bamboo Telegraph, Xavier School’s Stallion and Beacon Academy’s BA Publications. The four student publications collaborated over Zoom and Messenger.

“I became increasingly overwhelmed by the sheer amount of dedication, talent and creativity of the editors and writers we were working with,” said Jao.

The result of their hard work is a remarkable book of artwork, stories, interviews and poetry in English and Filipino about and inspired by the pandemic.

In the next couple of weeks, our pages will highlight some of their work.

The team behind “Alab ng Puso” is just getting started. Jao said, “We have starry-eyed dreams of producing more copies and selling them for charity. Other than that, Winston is currently working on a more graphic design- and photography-centric zine, as well as an upcoming issue on taboos. But it would be incredibly exciting to pursue a volume 2 of “Alab ng Puso” to capture even more stories, perspectives and the perpetually shifting circumstances of the pandemic.”

To read the entire book, visit issuu.com/winston9/docs/alab_ng_puso.