Day Seven

Today was a long excursion, Nohemi, Harryl and I went to Pagsanjan Falls. It was about 3 hours to get there from Manila. The tour guide brochure thing said 2.5 hours but we had a bunch of stops, gas, food, pits stops, etc. The trek was totally worth it and is also a must see destination. The place starts off scary with a balsa, canoe type boat, ride up-river through the town towed by a motor-powered balsa. On the outskirts, the tow stops and the two guys start rowing. No more houses out there just the wilderness. I assume it's to preserve the natural beauty of the place. It is the number one tourist attraction for the province of Laguna. The surrounding turns to rainforest... the rain that fell while we were headed to the falls, through the now mild rapids, added to the awesomeness of the place. There were two falls, a smaller one and the big falls. During the rainy season, the boat ride upriver ends at the small falls. Not sure why they don't go all the way, maybe the current gets too strong during the rainy season. The water level rises a good 3-5 feet based on the river bank that was pointed out to me by our boat guy. The Pagsanjan falls trip is really all about the journey and not so much about the destination. The falls aren't that impresive. I guess, not many falls are that impresive after seeing the Niagara falls. But the way to the falls is as awesome as watching the Niagara falls.

Day Six

Mark's graduation ceremony. We were at PICC(Philippine International Convention Center) an hour before the recommended assembly time for parents and guests. We were there at 6 o'clock in the morning! The ceremony started at 8 AM and ended at noon. After, we had lunch at a fancy buffet in a hotel(Sofitel), across the street from the PICC, called Spiral. They had Korean, Japanese, Indian, American, Filipino, etc dishes. Along with my family, Printy's folks, couple of aunts and a cousin joined us for lunch. From what I've gathered, she comes from good people. I am genuinely glad to have met her in this trip.

After lunch, we walked around the grounds of the hotel then had drinks at the bar near the pool area. It overlooks Manila bay... lots of tourists in the pool and had a feeling of a fairly well beaten... nay, a paved... uhm super highway even... path. After that we went home. For dinner, we went to 4xForce, a restaurant by night, car wash!!! by day place, a hack a spit away from the condo. We had drinks more than dinner... we had tapas, in the Spanish sense of the word. We had drinks and ate sumsuman. We sat at a table adjacent to a python cage with an albino python inside. It was a good 15 to 20 feet long and hadn't eaten for a week. It could stick its head out of its cage and about a foot of its body. Mark had to move back some or risked being licked by the snake. We also witnessed them feeding the python, as mentioned earlier it hadn't eaten for a week. We were lucky to have gone there at the right time and seated at the right table. The python was slow in killing and eating the chicken. It didn't go after the chicken. A handler had to push the chicken with a stick toward the snake for it to kill the bird. He constricted it to death... well it looked more like sat on it to death then took another 15 minutes to eat it. You really don't grasp the slowness of the process when watching it on TV. After the bar, we dropped Nohemi off in the condo and went to a massage place. I had a Swedish massage with Harryl and Mark. It was deeeeelicious! I need to go back there before heading back to the states. Five hundred pesos for an hour and a half worth of pampering is definitely worth it.

Day Five

Nohemi and I went to the American War Cemetery at Makati. It is a definite must see when visiting the Manila. The place is beautiful and breathtaking. After the cemetery, we went to the business district in Makati. Walked a little bit around Greenbelt then another block. That was the morning activities.

Had lunch at home, then Nohemi and my mom went to buy plane tickets to Iloilo. I stayed at home for manicure, pedicure and foot massage. We were supposed to go to Quiapo, Chinatown, etc. It's not that I regret getting the massage etc just it seem to have been a waste of an afternoon. It's all good, we'll make it up some other day.

Day Fou'

Morning, we went to change moneys at Greenhills. Nohemi bought a fake Tous & Gucci bag. The fake Tous is a tiny fraction of the real one I got her for her birthday. I got Armani frames for glasses for cheap too. Then from Greenhills we headed to SM Centerpoint where I had glasses made for the frame got. The whole thing from them figuring out my prescription and making the lenses for my glasses was 30 minutes. Total cost for my glasses was $50 US which is probably less than co-pay.

After the shopping (around 16:30), Nohemi and I went for a walk at Bay Walk, a promenade on Manila bay. It starts near the U.S. Embassy and ends near the Manila Yacht Club. We continued to a Starbucks near the Cultural Center of the Philippines for a white chocolate frapuccino and water. After our little 2 hour stroll, we headed back home... traffic is ridiculous here.

Now we are waiting for Harryl and my dad to get here. Nohemi and I are staying home and my mom, Princess Mononoke & Mark are all going to pick them up.

Day Three

Nohemi and I went to Taal Volcano today. First was to Josephines, a restaurant, where we had lunch. We had chicharon bulaklak for starters and grilled seafood & adobong pusit. Ang sarap! The restaurant overlooks Taal lake and the volcano. Taal volcano is a volcano in a lake in a volcano. I never could tell before in pictures that the lake is pretty big. After lunch, we went to People's Park which is an abandoned building from the Marcos days. It was rather disappointing. Marcos was making himself a summer retreat up on Mt. Sungay(which is a part of the whole Taal volcano area). It was nicknamed little Malacañang. Malacañang Palace is the official residence of the president. Anywho, Marcos never finished little Malacañang and was left abandoned for 10 years then turned into "People's Park". It took about an hour and a half to get to Taal from Manila. Going we took the skyway/toll road and on the way back we took the Cavite route.

Part two of today's excursion involved National Geographic's Taboo and a lot of fighting traffic. We went to North Cemetery in Manila. It's the one where people lived in the cemetery. It is big and driving inside it almost makes it seem like any town. Except for the tombs & mausoleums. We headed to the famous tombs first. We stopped at Manuel Roxas' (a president) tomb then Fernando Poe Jr (an actor & presidential candidate). We also stopped at where our driver's grandparents & other relatives are buried. I videod the guy that lives/takes care of the aforementioned graves. It was creepy. If I ever had to spend the night there, migh as well dig a hole for me because I would die!!! I was surprised at the number of kids that live there. They were all out and about, playing tag, basketball, etc. All sorts of kids things. It's because they don't know what a zombie is, is the reason that they all aren't shitting their pants, I think.

After the cemetery fun, a uniquely Hywell & Nohemi type adventure, me thinks:) We headed home. My mom and Mark went to get groceries and we waited for them to get back. Nohemi and I both passed out for about an hour and a half from waiting. We had dinner then my mom, Mark, Printy & I went for a dip in the pool. While I am writing this, there was a power outage. It's great that the condo complex has generators. The place has 4 buildings, two 21 storey and two 14 storey buildings. I don't know how many units altogether in the complex but there are a lot of people that live inside its walls. Lots of security guards, all packing heat, and there's no way anyone can come in from the outside. This is my cue to end this, the power is back up. And it is almost 1 o'clock in the morning.

Day Two

Nohemi and I went on our own with this day's trip (with Mike, my brother's driver). We went to Intramuros (old city) and saw Fort Santiago, Manila Cathedral & San Agustin church & museum. It was nice to see some historical type stuff. It's funny/sad to see that parts of Intramuros has become a part of a golf course.

After a couple hours of walking around the old city, we drove to something that was to the extreme end of the spectrum. We walked around Mall of Asia which is the biggest mall in the Philippines. It opened last year or this year and was huge. Had lunch there... at Mc Donalds:) Then looked for a car charger for Nohemi's cell phone. After walking around a minute part ofthe mall, we decided to sit outside to wait for the sun to set. We did the typical watching of the sunset on Manila Bay. It was pretty and Nohemi and I took lots of pictures.

I posted some pictures from Day Zero & Day One on Flickr.

Day One

We started today shopping at Greenhills. I got a SIM card, fake Converse, flip flops, fake Chanel purse and squid balls for less than $30. We went home for lunch but before eating I jumped in the pool. After lunch, we headed to SM Mega Mall to go to a car show. We also walked around the mall. I found Sans Rival at Goldilocks. After the mall, we headed home for a potty break and went to Luneta park. Pretty active first day, and I hope that it's enough to give me a good night sleep.

It's amazing to see the contrast of living. We saw people living under a bridge. There was, what would have been, an awesome picture of dilapidated houses and the background of the high rises in Makati.

Weekend

This has been a pretty mellow and relaxed weekend. The only notable thing that we've done so far is taken a bath. The weather is crappy so I cannot even go to the driving range and hit balls.

I believe that this summer will rain a lot. I just had to put that in writing. It will be a crappy, rainy summer because I bought a convertible. That is how the universe functions.

Rachel Corrie

Wiki

Caught Up

I have finally finished watching all of The Sopranos last night. I have never seen the last episode and was never interested in watching the ending on YouTube. I liked it, I like how it is just like life. I like how it isn't wrapped up into a nice little package for the unimaginative.

Decaffeinated

It's amazing how long and gradual the weaning process is for caffeine. Granted, I have cheated a little bit by drinking coffee and had a glass of Coke last Saturday night. The drastic reduction in caffeine consumption is only prolonging the headaches, I think. I wonder, if a zero intake will get rid of it? The no carbonated drinks was somewhat of a ruse to fool myself. It's easier for me to stomach an altogether ban on carbonation than preparing to say good bye to caffeine.

Birthday Presents

Belated happy birthday to Daniel. His birthday was yesterday. However, the cop from the freeway gave me a present instead. 80 on a 70.

F1 - The newest British Soap

Lewis Hamilton gets away with everything in an F1 race. He does whatever he wants, while other drivers would have gotten penalized for actions like his, he walks away scot free. Crashing into walls. Crashing into cars. Spearing his car across the track without regard for other cars and drivers. I am almost certain that the marshals will all look the other way for him.

F1 has changed format from a world racing event into a British soap. Why not just give the championship to him now? Saves all the other teams hundreds of millions in budget. What a farce this has become.

Update:
So the British press are saying that Alonso slowed down to screw with golden boy's race. Too bad telemetry showed that Alonso was actually accelerating. That the mistake was made by Hamilton.

Delayed

Happy Birthday Tom!

Realized that April Fools was my 4th anniversary of my quitting smoking.

Happy Birthday Esther!

Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday to you
Happy birthday dear Estheeeerr
Happy birthday toooooo youuuuuuu

YAY!!! Blow out the candles....

... what did you wish for??

Day Two

I have managed to avoid Coke for two days now. I have been drinking juices and water instead. I have never seen my refrigerator with such a variety of juices. I have mango, grape, tropical fruit, lemonade, and guava.

Today, Nohemi sympathized with me by not drinking Coke. She is currently sleeping on my shoulder from the caffeine withdrawal headache. My headache yesterday wasn't much of a headache but more of my eyelids not able to stay open.

Sin Gas Por Favor

I am experimenting with my body. I stopped drinking carbonated drinks starting today. Carbonated drinks includes my most-favorite-bestest drink Coca Cola. This means, I wont be drinking Coke, a beverage that I have been drinking non stop since my childhood.

The experiment started today so I only have a little something that seems to be the start of a really big headache. I want to do this for a month just to see if I can do it. Maybe I'll last until tonight or maybe until May. We'll see.