María Ana "Bambi" L. Harper

“Bulacan is full of cultural heritage,” said Bambi Harper, Filipino Heritage Festival director. “It would surprise people how all the architecture in the houses and churches were preserved, and how the traditions were upheld in a place this near to the Metro. It should be a matter of pride to all Bulakeños”.

Harper herself is a Bulakeño. “I have roots in Bigaa (now Balagtas), and I’m certainly proud of what Bulacan is,” she said.

María Ana "Bambi" L. Harper is a Filipino cultural writer and columnist, renowned historian, heritage conservationist, and socialite, who was  the founding President of the Heritage Conservation Society of the Philippines, and a columnist for the Philippine Daily Inquirer with "Sense and Sensibility", which focuses on Philippine cultural history.  In 2008, she became administrator of the historic Intramuros district of Manila.

A founding member of the Concerned Citizens for the National Museum, Inc., and festival director of the Filipino Heritage Festival, Inc., Harper has been involved in the preservation of Philippine heritage.

One successful endeavor is the annual Filipino Heritage Festival, which showcases the regions’ cultural delights and promotes heritage conservation.

Harper is also the commissioner of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco), and council member of the National Trust Foundation. She was also executive committee member of the Presidential Commission on Culture and Arts, commissioner of the Manila Historical Commission, and consultant to the Department of Tourism.

María Ana "Bambi" L. Harper was also the first Pama-as Gintong Bai awardee for cultural heritage conservation, an honor she received in 2005 during the celebration of the Centennial Year of the Feminist Movement of the Philippines.

Anna Maria or merely “Bambi”, launched her first novel “Agueda: A Ballad of Stone and Wind” on Oct. 25, 2012 at the Filipinas Heritage Library.

Bambi took graduate studies at the Ateneo de Manila and Georgetown U. in Washington, DC, earning a Master’s degree in English Literature from the latter. She is currently working on a degree toward a Doctorate in Arts and Letters at the University of the Philippines, and hopes to write and complete within a ten-year period two more novels on the Galleon Trade and the Second World War.