When the 2013 Bohol earthquake struck on the central island of the Philippines at 8:12 a.m. on October 15, I was riding a motorbike with a local friend right by its epicenter. After I began tweeting images of the immediate aftermath, I was contacted by the BBC to provide on the ground reporting, and images for their stories. The following evening, I joined BBC World Service’s show World Have Your Say as the opening guest in order to explain the feeling of being near the epicenter of the earthquake, and the devastation around me as locals scrambled to find survivors and recover the dead.