Day 179 - Boat Ride

On our second day in Bataan, we took a boat ride to a nearby "white sand beach" and "cave". I used quotation marks because the sand on the beach wasn't really that white (it was more golden brown) and I know that from this picture, the cave behind me looks quite big, but actually it's more like a hole in the wall. But I'm not really complaining. I'm happy to have taken the boat trip as it was at least something else to do (because looking at old houses can get a little, well, old) and look! Clear water! :D

P.S. Photo was taken by my cousin B (but using my camera).

Day 178 - My Parents Are Weird

For the last 2 days of 2010, my family went for an overnight trip to Las Casas Filipinas de Acuzar, a resort in Bataan, which features old style Filipino houses. I suppose I could've picked one of the many pictures of said old houses, but this was just too funny (for me anyway) not to post.

During dinner time, we watched the cultural presentation of the resort staff at the "plaza", which was outdoors. When it started to rain, my parents used the cloth napkins from the dining tables to cover their heads. We all eventually moved back into the restaurant, but not before I got this shot.

For more pictures of the place, see my dad's multiply post.

P.S. My brother is weird, too.

Day 177 - More New Stuff for the New Year

I finally redeemed my Starbucks 2011 Planner today. Got the velvet one because they were all out of the wood kind. It's OK. I like the velvet one, too. See here for a longer commentary.

Day 176 - Old Phone, New SIM

Following this, I have finally upgraded my cellphone's SIM card. After 10 years. The lady at Globe (my cellphone service provider) even sorta laughed at me for having held on to my 10-year-old SIM card. I don't think she believed me about how old it was until she saw my actual SIM card and noted that the serial number on it started with "0200". The serial numbers of the SIM cards now are at "4200". What can I say? I hang on to material things.

Actually, it is kind of remarkable how my 0200 SIM card has survived the test of time. When my phone fell into the ocean in 2005 (4 years after I got it), my phone was ruined, but my SIM card was not. I've changed my cellphone unit twice since that time, and still my SIM card remains functional. If only Globe didn't deactivate some functions of the older SIM cards (like international roaming) and therefore force me to get a new one, I'd probably have the same SIM card for the next 10 years, provided nothing bad happens to it/me.

Also, in case anybody's curious, I've been using the same cellphone unit for 3 years. You'll see from the picture that it's all worn out because the color's faded on some keys. Now, if only changing cellphone units was the same as changing SIM cards (which is for free, BTW)...

Day 175 - Santa Claus?

Wearing red? Check. Giving gifts? Check. Big belly? Check. Beard? Sort of... So, check. My dad has officially become Santa Claus. Hehehe!

Today is Christmas Day! I went to my grandfather's house in Makati and celebrated (in other words: ate a lot) with my family. We exchanged gifts, sang oldies on the Magic Mic and made funny faces to make the new baby in the family (my cousin's daughter, she's 9 months old) laugh. More details in my main blog.

P.S. Because I'm such a loser, I wasn't able to take any pictures on the 24th. Sorry about that. It's just that... My nieces and nephews in the Christmas party that we went to then were so noisy and hyperactive that I forgot all about taking pictures. -_-

Day 174 - Friends and Gifts

(Click on image for full view.)

I went to meet and exchange gifts with my oldest and closest friends today at Greenbelt 2 in Makati. We had dinner at Cyma (Greek food!) and dessert at Bizu (where these pictures were taken). To entertain ourselves while waiting for our chocolate cake and coffee, we decided to take a picture of each of us with our gifts. To be even more entertaining (at least, in our opinion) we decided that the person with the gifts wouldn't be the one the gifts are from. So clockwise -- that's J3 with the gifts from J2, me with the gifts from J1, J2 with the gifts from J3 and J1 with the gifts from me (Pulburon! Previously mentioned in this entry.) Confused? I am, too, sometimes. You see, my three closest friends have names that all start with the letter J. Actually, two of them have the exact same name (granted, spelled differently, but basically the same). But, that's the craziness of the world for you.

P.S. Hindi naman ako mahilig sa collage. Hehe. It's just that there are always a lot of pictures during the holidays. It's difficult to choose just one.

Day 173 - Anatomy of a Family Christmas Photo

(Click on photo for full view.)

First: Gather round your family members. You do this by yelling "O picture na! Picture na!" Some people think that the louder and more annoying their voice is, the more effective this "call" is (I think not, but maybe that's just me).

Second: Find a spot near the Christmas tree.

Third: Make yourselves fit, no matter how many you are, and how small the area around the Christmas tree is.

Unfortunately, I don't have a copy of the actual photo of all of us on the stairs, because, well, because I was holding my camera while I was sitting in the middle of everyone and it was too difficult to move (or breathe). But I did take pictures while we were trying to fit ourselves in the staircase, while sitting down, and while we were getting out. I took a photo of the "photographers", too (That's the photo on the bottom, 2nd from left). Can you count how many cameras there are?

Edit (1/4/2011): As my cousin has uploaded the pictures from their camera, you can see the finished product of this photo here.

Day 172 - All Wrapped Up

ONE DOWN - the first batch of Christmas gifts to give for the first of the family Christmas parties. There are two to go.

Ever since my sister moved to New Zealand, I'd been the one to wrap the gifts that our family gives to relatives on Christmas. I'm not as good at gift-wrapping as she is, but my mom doesn't really have a choice as I'm the only one left whom she can assign this task to.

These are for the Christmas party at my aunt's house in Pasig. They're not a lot, but maybe my mom will give me more gifts to wrap tomorrow, you know, a few minutes before the party. We're usual victims of the last-minute thing.

Day 171 - Stop, Look and Listen

I was really in a hurry to meet with my friends for dinner, but there are just some things that make you stop, look, listen and maybe forget everything else.

At first I thought it was just a random band because they were singing Christmas songs, but then the last line of the song was suddenly "tulad ng dati..." and I was so happy to realize that my it was my favorite OPM band, The Dawn, who was at the middle of Glorietta performing. And Jett Pangan (vocalist) and I were both wearing red that day, too. (Haha! Ang babaw ko talaga!)

Anyway, I watched them perform around 3 more songs before I finally went to meet my friends. And when I saw them they told me that before they went to our meeting place they stopped and listened to a few songs of The Dawn, too. Awww, I love my friends who have the same taste in music as I do.

P.S. I know I always say that I'm a Rico Blanco fangirl, and I love his and Rivermaya's songs to death, but when talking of OPM bands and not vocalists/song writers, The Dawn is really my favorite. :)

Day 170 - Pulburon

I think the easiest way to save money during Christmas is to make your own gifts instead of buy them. Unfortunately for me, the only thing I can make is this -- pulburon. But I guess it's really not that unfortunate since these are delicious anyway. How can you go wrong when you put flour, milk, butter and sugar together?

Day 169 - My First Gift

The gift surrounded by the Christmas toys is the first Christmas gift I received this year and it came from someone I never expected would give me a Christmas gift -- my classmate in my Nihongo class.

It's unexpected because my classmates and I aren't really that close. I mean, we only see each other once a week, and for only 3 hours each time. Also, all of us in the class are so shy that we hardly ever talk to each other (really almost never) unless we're doing something class-related. It's actually kind of funny. All of us in the class are girls (even our teacher) and we all seem to just not like talking much, so we're pretty quiet, even (or especially) when the teacher's not around. We make ourselves busy by reading our books or anything else really, except talk to each other. Honestly, it's really my kind of class. :) And way better than my last set of classmates who were so "close" that they felt the need to ostracize the new students (namely me and 3 others).

Anyway, it was such a happy surprise when my classmate A handed me the gift. It makes me feel like there's hope for humanity yet (Is this proof that I'm overdramatic or what?) because it's possible that people who barely know you can still be so nice.

Day 168 - Coins for Carolers

Caroling season has begun! Or, it's supposed to. I still haven't heard actual carolers though. Is it me or are there less and less kids in our village who are interested in making extra money during the holidays? Granted they'll only get a few coins per house, but when I was a kid, by the end of 10 days, my friends and I would've collected about P80 each, which, you know, is pretty big for a kid back then.

Anyway, we're at least prepared if ever carolers come by our house. These are the coins we put near the front door. They're not much now, but maybe my mom will put in more when this supply runs out.

Day 167 - Christmas Coffee

Because I am a social loser, even at home, you're unlikely to see me in the living room or the kitchen (public places, you know). I just stay in my room, and bring everything I need so I wouldn't always need to go out.

This is my Starbucks Christmas mug that I bought around December of 2 years ago, and it's what I use to bring water/coffee into my room. It's placed on the small shelf beside my bed, because that is one of the few flat, solid surfaces (aside from the floor of course) in my room.

Day 166 - Bago Ang Belen

OK, so 'yung mga piyesa hindi bago. Pero bago 'yung bahay kubo nila. As you can see here, this is the aftermath of the making of the belen house, courtesy of Ate M. Ang galing niya, marunong siyang gumamit ng itak at magtirintas ng dahon ng niyog!

These were eventually sweeped up after the Belen (Nativity Scene) house was finished. I was going to post a picture of the belen itself, but I want to save that for another day.

Day 165 - Graduation

(L-R) Kuya, Papa, Mama, Tita, Pinsan, Lolo

Today is my brother's graduation day. He now officially has an MBA. Since I already talked about this in my main blog, I won't go into detail about it anymore here and just post a link to that blog:

Happy Family Day

P.S. Day 165! Only 200 days to go and I will have completed my project! :D

Day 164 - Christmas Choir 2

I will now assume that SM malls have a choir perform Christmas songs at least every Saturday for this and last month. This is another one that I had a chance to watch/listen to today. They're pretty good. :)

I actually took a video of the song they performed after I took this shot (sadly they didn't sing a Christmas song on their next number, Kay Ganda ng Ating Musika, but they did have dance steps) but the video from my cellphone sucks (as do the pictures, actually). I really shouldn't forget to bring a proper camera when I go out of the house next time.

Anyway, I was a bit more fascinated with this choir as opposed to last time, because this choir had more people in the audience. Or maybe that has something to do with the time, because this performance was around 6PM. The other one, I took that photo around 3PM.

P.S. I'm sorry I skipped a lot of days. There's just not much to take pictures of at home.

Day 163 - Mutt in Boots

Admittedly, that is not the best title for this picture. I was going for a parallel with "Puss in Boots" except that it's for dogs, but I guess it doesn't work when you make changes like that. But I can't think of any better title right now so that'll have to do.

Brigham's got himself new shoes! My mom bought him shoes in the hopes that he can walk better, see he's got a birth defect -- one of his feet doesn't have toes, so it gives him sort of a limp. It's not major, though. But we hope these shoes can help anyway. Plus, they're very cute shoes.

BTW, I caught him yawning! Doesn't he look so weird? :P

Day 162 - College Campus

I don't want to say what I went to my old college alma mater for today because people will probably ask me about it later on, but you can probably figure it out if you're privy to the "world". What other reason is there to go to De La Salle University in Manila on the first weekend of December when you're not/no longer a student there?

I took this photo when I was on my way out. I didn't love the DLSU campus much because I always think that college campuses should be more like the UP Diliman campus with big football fields and lots of trees, but it does have its merits, like this area. It's not clear here, but there's a small amphitheater on the left, and the big tree that you see there, it's got wind chimes on it such that when the wind blows while you're walking under it, it sounds real nice. :)

Day 161 - Christmas Party!

Because I'm now an ex-employee and have no office Christmas parties to go to, I volunteered for the Christmas party to come to me. Haha! :P

These are my friends from the office I used to work in. They went to my house after the company Christmas party to exchange gifts and play board/card games. Lots of fun. :)

P.S. The company Christmas party was actually last night, but they got to my house at around 1AM today and stayed here 'til 9AM so this counts as my photo of the day for December 4 Saturday and not Friday night.

Day 160 - Birthday Party!

Another one of my godsons, J celebrated his 2nd birthday today. :) And because I wasn't able to stay at his party last year, my friend/ex-teacher Miss L insisted that I stay this year. But she must've sensed that I'd have nobody to talk to seeing as all the guests were her friends and relatives and co-teachers (none of whom I'm close to) so she gave me the role of photographer. So I wouldn't be bored. I fully embraced my role, which is why I'm so close to them here while they were singing the Happy Birthday song.

P.S. Special appearance by Captain Shakey. Or his name Captain Shakey's?

P.P.S. A Shakey's birthday party isn't bad at all. :) The food was two different kinds of pasta -- red and white sauce, mojo potatoes, garlic bread, and fried chicken. And it's unlimited, too. :) Way way better than the Jollibee/McDonald's birthday parties with the styrofoam containers.