sms & emails

it started out with an early sms which affected the entire day. followed by the opening of that mail.
the bread with chizwhiz made up for it somehow.. and the quick chat with a dear sibling.

the butterflies in my stomach caused it to miss my lunch with a very good Pa-lady friend.
and the delay that night caused me to miss my dinner/drinks with another Pa-lady friend.

i feel so terrible for missing chillax hours with these beautiful, fun Pa-ladies. next week, i'm totally setting aside quality time with them.

colder than LA

i'm in hayward, california for the past 5days and tomorrow i'll be flying off to new jersey to face the reality of my purpose why i'm here.

anyway, the 1hour flight sucks as it was so bumpy and all windy so we were all buckled up the entire journey. of course you know me, the girl with the ever-ready med kit who never runs out of white flower and candies during travel. yes, i really hated it coz i felt so dizzy and i was thinking, i should've taken the 6hour train ride. so i got off safely, thank god and christen and hubby ryan and baby kyle were there to take me home to their nice place. grabe, the wind was blowing cold in my face and body.

the following day, we went to fisherman's wharf to stroll around. there was heavy traffic coz of the airshow so parking was a disaster, imagine 2hours to find a space! finally we got late lunch from tarantino's restaurant and had the famous clam chowder soup and pasta. then we went around pier39. the place was packed with lots of people. and btw, my camera broke huhuhu *big time sob*. it fell when we were inside the wax museum. we weren't able to go view the alcatraz but we just took some pics.

the following day, our college buds, bien and lesther, picked us up to go wine tasting in napa valley. it was kinda far but when you get there, it feels like a sossy suburban area hehe! lots of tourist trying out wines from every vineyard. we went to two, one is very famous for their wines and the other one was where they shoot some scenes in walk in the clouds movie of keanu reeves. of course, the wine tasting session was the most fun of it. i think i got tipsy after trying 6 kinds of red/white wine.

my experience here was awesome! a break on the buzz and hustle of the city of LA. i'm so thankful with my friends who made my 1st month here in the US very awesome! pictures to follow =)

hbd eram!

since friday is our usual night out and eram's birthday is on a sunday *which she would most likely spend with her family*, we decided to give her a pre birthday celebration in clarke quay. we ate at cuba libre, kind of a mixture of mexican, spanish, cuban food i guess hehe! nachos and quesadillas are perfect to d taste buds. eram and i tried d shiraz wine while ami and dadi rak took the mojitos. ulrik, *pa-girly effect ata* drank the pink guava vodka ata un! haha! then ashoeshwal we had coffee at the coffee bean, surprising the birthday lady *who btw turned 23 for d 7th time? hahaha* with a mudpie cake.

happy birthday dear blessie! =) pictures --> here!

a101-ers

ava, mae and me

mae, carlos, ava and me

it's been a while since we got to spend time together. the last time i've been with ava was 5years ago... when christen left for the states and i went to sg. we had karaoke and beer at kbox in greenbelt. while mae has been here in sg for more than a year already, we haven't gotten the time to chit-chat and catch up. same goes with carlos who has been here since last dec07 and gerome, who got here a few months after i did.

ava made it a point to have a one day stopover here in sg going to penang just to be with us. isn't that sweet! even if we haven't been communicating for years, she still contacted us and i was honored to have her stay in our house even for just overnight.

ava and i go way back in our 1st day registration in college. we got into mapua and was scheduled to register to acknowledge our slots as comp eng freshmen. she was the only person in the room who i thought was nice and pretty so i sat beside her and we kinda got along. we ended up as classmates for class a101 coe freshman year. mae, carlos and gerome were also part of the class. sadly, by 3rd year majoring, ava shifted to ie and mae to ece. but we still see each other, but not that often.

so when ava announced that she'll be coming by, i was so happy! and more so, she was getting married this october! bad news is, i won't be able to make it... good news is, we were still able to spend time here in sg, so i kinda made up for it. another good news was that carlos' wife and baby will be staying with him come september, while mae and chris will be having their church wedding come jan08. i'm so glad we were able to spend time together. gerome couldn't make it but then of course he tried.

may27, day2 in bohol

The following day, we had garlic rice, tocino and fried bangus with coffee and local chocolate tablet. We lazed around the beach the whole day and took lots of pictures. Good thing we’re here on a weekday so not much people are present. The water was warm and clear. Even if we were surrounded by small bangkas, we didn’t mind dipping into the water and feel the healing waves behind our backs. I think from the shore, you can walk up to 100meters with the water just on your waist! It was amazing! I thought that somehow the waters would be deep, but good thing it wasn’t so we had plenty of space to swim in. And the best thing was that I learned to do floating and a little backstroke… hehehe!

After a while, we strolled along the beach and took some pictures. It was almost sunset, and the kids in the neighborhood were playing around the beach. For dinner, we were served with lechon kawali and chopsuey then we strolled along the beach again and rested on the duyan (hammock) on the tree. It was a quiet night; dadi and I had a nice time talking about things and the latest happenings in our lives. We talked about the kids and our plans for them. We went back to our hut afterwards and started packing for our next day trip to Cebu.

alooohhaaa!

i'm back, good thing work nowadays is tolerable *i think* so i can go back to reading my books and blogging of course. presently, i'm finishing the 3rd installment of the dark materials series. (for those of you who's not familiar, it's the northern lights series or as the movie had it, the golden compass.)

before i go on, i'd like to include in my entry the 2nd birthday celebration of my noahby last feb15. yeah yeah, its so late already. it was just a plain and simple celebration with the blowing of the candle in the cake and a quiet dinner at home. nevermind the valentine coz i spent it blowing my brains out in the office. its a leap year as well,some friends and i had a simple dinner at a new restaurant in raffles mall. nothing fancy, food was ok and doesn't really have that wow factor. we met hanipay's sister apple and welcomed her here in sg.

by end of feb to early march, everything just came by like a blurr because overtime work was inevitable and i couldn't even keep track of time properly. anyway, i was still able to squeeze in a little time to go and buy myself my own 1st camera! wiippeee! after 7years of working, i finally got my own digicam hehehe! got it from the IT show in suntec. originally i was eyeing on a new macbook for my own personal use but unfortunately, dadi and i agreed that my camera is much needed in the future events of our plans. we'll be watching maroon5 tomorrow at kallang stadium and of course its difficult to bring dadi's dslr, yehey maroon 5 live in sg!!! my 1st ever concert show to watch after 29years hehehe *oo na sobrang oa na hihi* i'm so excited to finally see the vocalist adam levine.

we also plan to go island hopping in pinas when we go home for our 2week vacation. that too has been booked already yiippee! we're off to pinas on may23 then flyback june7. dadi and i will drop off the kids then transfer to another plane for our cebu-bohol-bora trip. this one i can't wait to experience! as in finally we'll be able to have a vacation by ourselves, the two of us enjoying the sun and the views across visayas hehehe...we haven't arranged on our cebu-bohol-bora trip yet, hopefully the weather will be great and airfare will be cheap. we're also training for a running marathon, the singapore passion run, come june8 so dadi is training me for the 5km run *oo na, fun run lang sya.. keber e first timer po! hehe pagbigyan na!*

btw, i'm now doing a regular hosting job every sunday at the arena in clarke quay for the pinoy sunday entertainment show. it's organized by our friend ulrik and his colleague, ronald. it's like a variety show with bands and live performances. the audience can participate and jam with the bands and join the contest. april will be a busy month as there will be a pinoy amazing star contest coming up. its sort of like american idol style with the elimination and judges and voting thru sms. please do try to come down on sundays if you're in sg and watch great pinoy talent.

eram's sister, debbie, and niece, sam, also came for a week's vacation. we saw them on the eve of their flight back to manila. we had some coffee at citylink after ami and i went to the chinese temple in bugis to seek some 'divine intervention' hehe.. then we celebrated ami's birthday at our pinoy sunday show in the arena last march23. o diva, sosyal!

ayun so that's how life is at the moment. happy easter! =)

noche buena

our house warmly welcomed some of our friends for the noche buena feast last dec.24. it was my first time to cook and prepare roasted chicken, fortunately it went well and i complimented it with some steamed veggies. of course ham and grapes would always be served, then the ever famous sopas, bistek and fish escaveche, and our favorite puto. after dinner, we exchange gifts, watched a movie and some picture takings.

please visit our multiply site, i've uploaded the pics there.

one fine swimming day

mareng faye and ffg were kind enough to invite us over and take a dip at their condo. some of their friends from sgx were there also with their kids. thank you very much mare for letting us have fun with the kids on the pool... they really enjoyed it. well, nixon did hehe.. noah was so scared of the cold water.

the swim team

candid faye

with nixon *on top* and noah *below*

go figure! =D

surprise story #2

the following day, dec1, we gathered again to give a surprise baby shower for ati twix. we initially had our meeting after our dinner last rockNshoot event at clarke quay. we opted to bring food by potluck. the other ptv4 pips were informed the following week about our plan. i emailed buru about it and asked him to make up an excuse so that ati would go out that day and go to ulrik's place.

we were all set at around 4.30pm that day. when they knocked on the door, we were lined up behind the table and as they entered the flat, we shouted a big surprise and happy birthday! hahaha!!! twix was so shocked, you could just imagine the big smile on her face and everybody was laughing! she said that buru told her it was yanah's birthday *ulrik's daughter* but actually it wasn't and yanah is vacationing in pinas. she insisted on buying a gift for her but good thing buru was very convincing hehehe... faye and ffg almost bumped into them at the bus stop in lucky plaza, mareng faye and ffg just backed out and rode on a different bus.

it was really a nice get together party and we were all so excited and happy for the coming of the new addition in the kid's group. to ati twix and buru, we're all wishing for the best!

welcoming a break

Last Saturday, Nov. 24, our friend Ulrik has organized an event in The Arena at Clarke Quay. Out of no choice, he asked me to help in hosting few bit parts of the show. Our friends, Hani, Eram and Ami also helped Ulrik in the registration and selling out of show tickets. We arrived around 3pm on the venue then the show started around 4pm. There were lots of pinoy bands who graced the event and they really performed well. Among the band included was Ulrik’s group, Quiverpool... he was the drummer. My portion came before their set, I introduced one of the contestants in the 50 most gorgeous people here in SG. Her name is Jacyln Chan. She was there to promote herself and gather some votes from the audience. All I can say is that she’s smart and nice and beautiful. I got the chance to know her more backstage and after presenting her to the audience, we had some picture taking. There were also some invited models for the PinoyCSers members shoot. The ladies helped me hand out the prizes for the raffle draw and congratulating the stars of the night. It was pure music and fun all night.

After the show, we had dinner at Boat Quay. Finally, we had our chance for some peace and quiet. We had a delicious beef hotplate, baby kailan veggies, fried calamari and chicken ala max hehehe! We reviewed the event and planned some things to do in the next few weeks. All in all, it was a fun night, and the break was very refreshing. I miss hanging out with my friends. I'm very thankful for dadi's presence, it made the night much more fun and easy. He was so supportive that night and I know that he also enjoyed taking pictures.

at the stage with the models

backstage

at the vip lounge

at the registration booth

*from left to right* esther, naomi, natasha, jacyln and moi

latest

after coming back from my pinas vacation, i was immediately rolled in to another project in sgx. my other project was in UAT (user acceptance testing) phase so the ball was with the users. we were waiting for feedback and approval. the new project entails more program changes and cumbersome tasks since we were assigned to make official documentations as well. the worst part was that i got sick with tonsilitis for a week so my performance was not at its peak.

we had a small celebration for blessie's birthday at surfNturf in suntec. we also helped faye and rommel moved out from their condo. we met some friends and had lunch to welcome them here in sg. i went back to my yoga classes just last week.

blessie's birthday celeb @surfNturf




the best thing that happened lately was that i had been pronounced by our company as a permanent staff after 4months of my probationary period. yiippee! it's nice to enjoy the perks and of course it would mean assurance somehow for our future here in sg.