Happy New Year!

Happy New Year from my family to yours (pictured in front of the Alberta Legislature Building in Edmonton an hour ago) It's 2014. I wish everyone a wonderful year ahead. I'm optimistic about this new year although I feel terrible right now due to intermittent abdominal pain. 

I may not know yet the cause of this, but I choose to believe God has a plan for my life so I can't be too downcast. Bloated but unbowed--and still doing touristy things--that's me! OUCH though. ;)

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Snowing...

I know I will regret this in a few weeks, but "Let it snow, let it snow, let it SNOOOWWWWW!!!" Singing at the top of my lungs & gingerly walking--trying not to slip--while taking these photos. 

My trick or treat plans with my nieces this Halloween might be in jeopardy if this snow continues...

I wonder why those birds were still happily yapping away on this weather though... or are they doing that because they are cold too? Oh, well. One of life's mysteries, I guess. Okay, off to church now. Happy Sunday!

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PNoy's SONA...

I watched this year's State of the Nation Address (SONA) and I feel a sense of pride that I voted for the guy. I admit I only did in honor of what his late parents did for the Philippines, but from what I heard, this administration is turning out better than anyone expected.

I have not paid attention to PNoy's speeches the past two years but I like what I'm seeing. I see more roads under construction in my travels around the country so going by that, this president is doing his job.

There are still a lot of challenges of course, but I think we are in a better position than we were three years ago. Now if only the DOTC would get off their butts and quickly approve vital projects like connector roads, MRT & LRT lines etc. then PNoy's legacy will be cemented (pun intended).

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Oh no...

I woke up annoyed at the incessant noise of what I thought must be a stuck ambulance near my window. Looked out and saw this instead.

A fire near Makati Med. I hope everyone's okay over there. 

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Never Lend Money to Friends

I should have known better but I didn't, unfortunately...

Neither a borrower nor a lender be for loan oft loses both itself and friend, and borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry. – William Shakespeare 

I should have heeded old Willy's advise, then life would not be so annoying for me right now. See, I have this friend who asked for a loan and swore she would pay me back within a month just as soon as her father gets money from some lending company and/or just as soon as her clinic gets enough patients.

I always try to accommodate my friends if I can at times like these, so even if this particular friend still had a $600 outstanding loan from the previous year, since she needed the money badly and I wanted to help her get started, I lent her another $1100... well, that turned out to be a really stupid decision.

Fast forward six months later and she'd been avoiding my texts and calls like the plague. If that's not enough aggravation, she's been telling common friends that she hasn't forgotten her loan and she'd pay me but I'm making life difficult for her by pressuring her with my (sporadic, unanswered) calls and (very polite) messages.

How would I know she still intends to pay me back when she's been ignoring all my attempts at communication? Shouldn't I expect my money back when she tells me she'd pay at least $200/week because according to her, her dental practice is now doing really well? The nerve of this woman, huh?

To make matters worse, I let her charge her expensive sandals on my credit card and I've had to pay that monthly for the past six months. Talking of being reminded regularly of my utter stupidity! That's the saltiest salt in the wound, I tell you.

I must admit this situation has happened to me before, so I know how it is to be used and discarded by so-called "friends". But this is by far the most painful for me because this one was my friend for more than 15 years, while we were still in school. We've been through so much together, I never thought a stupid thing like a loan would come between us, but it did.

So dear friends, heed William Shakespeare's (and your mom's) advise. Keep your money, save it, give it to charity, help your family in need... just don't lend it to friends because 99% of the time you will end up losing that friend and your money too. And don't trust them just because you've been friends with them for ages, read the bible and goes to the same church as you, okay?

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The Avengers and my bestie

I finally checked out the Avengers movie. Co-workers have been talking about it for days and made me feel like I'd be missing this huge cultural event if I didn't watch. So I dragged my cousin/best friend Rose away from her gorgeous 10-week old daughter Athena to watch the movie with me.

 I know, I'm a heartless godmother for doing that, but I just missed catching up with her the past few months. We hardly saw each other since I was busy with work and traveling (Singapore, Malaysia, CamSur, Albay. Ilocos Sur, Ilocos Norte within a month, crazy!) and she was busy lactating. ;)

This day was just a relief for both of us, ranting and raving about our situations. Sharing her joy at being a new mom, while I shared my disgust and disappointment at someone who wouldn't pay back a loan. It's just like old times. I'm thankful for the four hours we got to share a good conversation over pizza , pasta and a good movie.

The Avengers is a very good action film, with all the explosions, special effects and hot guys we've come to expect from summer blockbusters. Oh Captain America, marry me! But my absolute favorite is Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow, she totally kicked butt. It's also very funny in parts--I loved the various interactions between the superheroes--even Loki rocked it.

Now I know why it's breaking box office records in the Philippines. It currently has the record for biggest opening and is on track to be the biggest grossing movie ever in the country. It's so good, it made me forget for a bit that friend who owes me money, who's currently ignoring my calls and texts. Thanks, The Avengers and Joss Whedon for that!

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Survivor USA is Filming in Caramoan

There are billboards like this put up in practically every major intersection in Camarines Sur these days. It says "This is to inform the public that Gota Village Resort and Hunongan Cove is fully booked from February 2012 until August 2012. The following islands: Sabitang Laya, Tayak, Pitogo, Catanhawan, Inayun-ayunan, Matukad and Lahos, will also be inaccessible due to a special project from February 2012 until August 2012."

no Sabitang Laya island...

no Gota beach either

                                   
Survivor USA filming in Caramoan is an open secret. We were supposed to spend the past Easter there with my balikbayan relatives but this notice from the CamSur provincial government made us reconsider our plans.

but Manlawi sandbar is open & worth the trip alone...

I have asked my local contacts there and they said these "inaccessible" islands are open for tourists if there are no scheduled shooting that day, but we chose not to risk it. So we went to Aguirangan aka Rose Islet in Presentacion instead. I would have loved to explore more of Caramoan this summer, but Survivor USA will introduce it to even more people, so no complaints here.

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Holy Week: More Fun In The Philippines

I'm spending Holy Week in CamSur for the first time in over a decade. I don't know, but since I left home for med school, I have always found myself busy working at this time of year.

I filed for a two-week leave because my nephew's graduating and they might leave for Canada by the middle of this year so I wanted to spend this occasion with my big sister's family while they are still here. Also my cousin JR is getting married after lent and assorted relatives from Europe are coming over so I was excited to spend time with everyone.

It's really nice to see folks participating in parades and passion plays. We even drove by one on the way to my hometown this morning. There were kids dressed as Romans and there were even two carrying crosses. I guess one represented Barrabas and the other one was supposed to be Jesus.

Things like this just take me back to my childhood. This kind of parade was a big part of my lenten season memories as a kid and it's nice to experience them again after all these years.

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Summer Rains and Flight Delays

It's turning out to be a weird summer for us in the Philippines. What with the unusual rains brought about by "La Niña" affecting travel plans etc. I had to go home to CamSur for my nephew Jian's High School graduation and getting there was challenging, to say the least.

My flight via Cebu Pacific that's supposed to leave at noon, left at 4:45pm instead! I arrived at the NAIA Terminal 3 at 10:30am so it was over 6 hours of waiting... The airline did not even give us water for our trouble, hmmph! Good thing I had my HP tablet and phone to keep me from going crazy.

And yeah, I also discovered Blogger has this blogging app for iPhones now so I can update this semi-abandoned blog while waiting for my flight to get called. I guess the hours of waiting was not a complete waste, huh?

Long story short, I'm still thankful my flight did not get cancelled due to the nasty weather & I still got to buy my nephew's laptop gift from his aunts (boy, kids these days are lucky!).

I hope I can figure out how to use this app properly though, so I can blog on the go & I can rant here more often. I wonder how this entry would look like when I hit "publish". Here we go...

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Happy Halloween!

boooo!!!

So sad that I can't go home to the province for the 4-day holiday weekend. I had to work! Luckily, I found several Olay facial treatment masks in my drawer and had my cousin Ima (who I wheedled into cleaning my apartment and ironing my clothes) take this scaaary picture of me.

Now I feel a bit better, being somewhat in the Halloween spirit.

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RIP Steve Jobs

creative genius...

 I'm really sad that Steve Jobs lost his years-long battle with pancreatic cancer. I am a late-blooming Apple fan. I was a loyal Palm handheld user for many years and was perfectly content with my Palm Zires. I've had maybe five successive models of the Zire since college! So predictable. I didn't quite understand my older sister's obsession with Apple products then.

But a few years ago, I finally succumbed and bought an iPod Touch and immediately fell in love. It was such a shock to go from the bulky Palm PDA to this thin, smooth and snazzy media player, personal digital assistant, game console, e-book reader etc. Now I couldn't imagine leaving home without it.

just the beginning...

Thanks to Steve Jobs, we can enjoy tech gadgets that are functional but also works of art. Not only that, his co-founding Pixar in my opinion, was the best he ever did. I just love Pixar! I watched every movie they ever made and they were all great (Ok, Cars 2 was merely good, but whatever). RIP Steve, thanks for everything!

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About James Soriano and Pointing Out the Obvious

English signs in the mountains... hmm

This Manila Bulletin article by James Soriano has created a firestorm. Some say it's arrogant, offensive and not at all appropriate for August, our "Buwan ng Wika". Personally, I don't think there's anything wrong with what Mr. Soriano wrote. He's just sharing about his experience and opinion about our two official languages.

We need to accept the fact that if you want to get ahead in this country, you have to at least be able to speak good English. It's the language of higher education, government, business and law. There's no getting away from it and it's counterproductive to yell at anyone who prefers English over Filipino. We can't help how we were raised and educated.

I have to admit I find it easier to read, speak and write in English--not that I'm elitist or anything--but because I grew up speaking Bicolano with English as my second language. Although I speak Tagalog very well,  it's still hard for me to appreciate Tagalog books, teleseryes, movies and sermons (I had to find an English-speaking church). But it doesn't mean I'm not a proud citizen of this country.

I'm sure the Filipino language will be just fine. I have two nieces who didn't learn Tagalog until they were in school (which is strange, sorry ate B) but they learned fast from their classmates. Filipino is here to stay and so is English and we just have to live with that.

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Birthday Week...

wonderful...

       Finally got to spend my birthday on the "happiest place on earth"... so tired, but it was worth it. I have some "birthday resolutions" I'm determined to follow through on--like writing on this blog more often. Thanks for still caring to spend time here. ;)

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Sunday Scripture Verse: Psalm 103:11-12

                   For as high as the heavens are above the earth, so great is his love for those who fear him;  as far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us. ~ Psalm 103:11-12 

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Boracay here we come...

I'm off to Boracay today with my girls. Paid far more than we should by doing this at the last minute but hey, we're all determined to enjoy ourselves.

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Sunday Scripture Verse: 1 Corinthians 6:12

"Everything is permissible for me"-- but not everything is beneficial. "Everything is permissible for me"-- but I will not be mastered by anything. ~ 1 Corinthians 6:12 (NIV)

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Hello again

back for good... ;)

Happy April Fools' day everybody! Kind of a weird date to show up after 8 months of silence, eh? I know I told you guys I'll only be gone for a "few weeks" but I guess time just got away from me. I've been really busy... with work, putting up a business, island-hopping, learning how to paint etc.

It made me feel really sad to let this blog die completely though, so here I am. Many thanks to my blogger friends who still visit--so sorry for the long absence guys. Thanks also to my new followers (I'm quite surprised to have gained followers even when I wasn't updating!).

I promise to do better this time. So that means you'll be reading about my (mis) adventures and opinions again... (cue the scary music).

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Sunday Scripture Verse: 1 Peter 1:24-25a

For, "All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord stands forever." 1 Peter 1:24-25a (NIV)

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About this water crisis...

Heck no!

First off, I've been really busy these past weeks and will be for a few weeks more... so please bear with me for not updating this blog as often as I used to. Anyway, it's just my luck that I'm currently stuck in a part of Manila under sucky water concessionaire Maynilad.

Thanks to the geniuses at the National Power Corporation or whoever, we're smack in the middle of a water shortage... so we only had sporadic water supply for more than a week now. I've been waking up at 2am to wait for water that looked like it's been salvaged from flood water. My gosh, I don't think I can bathe in that thing--but it's early yet. I'm thinking I may get to a point where I can get over my squeamishness and just do it!

I completely understand how people who haven't bathed for three days would bust a pipe in the streets just to get clean. Thank God, I have cousins in a nearby village that still has continuous water supply so I have somewhere to go if things get more desperate. For now, I just pray for more rain so the Angat Dam's water level will rise and this would be over.

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The Twilight Saga: Eclipse and drooling...

Team Edward... err... Jacob!

I finally watched The Twilight Saga: Eclipse last weekend when I got together with my cousin and her girls. I haven't paid much attention to the brouhaha about the Twilight series though I've read all of the books... I liked it well enough, I just thought Bella could have been more assertive and kick-ass, but whatever.

Pia, En and Marivic

This movie was action-packed and quite funny in places, so I was a happy camper. And I have to admit, that Jacob (Taylor Lautner) boy's abs was unreal! Talk about drool-worthy... looking at him makes you wonder what's wrong with Bella picking Edward over him. :)

move over, Bella...

I couldn't help but tease (and pinch!) En because she's absolutely on "Team Jacob" and man, he was almost always shirtless the whole movie. There were even girls who chose to sit on the theater aisles to get a better look at his undeniable hotness. Gosh, the squealing from the girls had my ears ringing... but it was really fun watching the Twihards thoroughly enjoy themselves.

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