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Archive for January, 2008

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it’s always nice whenever a friend from overseas comes back to the philippines. besides being almost assured of a free meal :lol:, we get to catch up with each other’s lives through hours of exchanging stories and lots of laughter. that’s what happened just recently when rex, my former roommate and selle’s former bandmate, flew in from california to spend a couple of weeks back here in our country.

instead of going to serendra where we originally planned to have our gimik, we opted to stay closer and just have dinner somewhere in alabang. sayang din kasi oras. the time that would’ve been spent travelling we’d rather spend eating, talking and laughing our hearts out. 😀 francis, my samsung batchmate and selle’s (and rex’s) former bandmate, picked us up here at the office and together we went to alabang. francis’ proclamation that he was a changed man when it comes to driving was all a lie though as we arrived in alabang in record-breaking time. 🙂 unfortunately, we couldn’t seem to find the meeting place, coffee bean. us being somewhat familiar with festival mall kept thinking, “san ba yun coffee bean?” pa-ikot-ikot kami pero d talaga namin mahanap. it came to the point that we even had to ask a security guard who replied to us, “sir, sa festival ba talaga?” uh-oh. we called up rex and, being the balikbayan that he is, what he was pertaining to all along was seattle’s best coffee shop. coffee bean pala, ha. well, at least, he got the coffee shop right. 😆

together with vena and neriz, who was already there, we went to the line of restaurants inside bf homes as rex, being a former resident there, wanted to try out a new gimik place. after driving by the resto’s, we decided to dine at n-lo’s.

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we were so hungry already so we immediately ordered. the staple crispy pata and sisig were ordered, of course. but what would probably would stick to our memory was the kilawing talaba at talaba 🙂 at ang hindi malamig na softdrinks in can na kahit maraming yelo ay pinapalitan ng iced tea na wala namang straw so humingi na lang ng kutsara incident. that surely got the waiter confused. 🙂

after eating, it was a couple of hours of non-stop laugh trip. grabe, paligsahan kami sa palakasan tumawa. afterwards, our jaws ached sa kakatawa. no kiddin’. it was that fun a night. 😀

so what did we talk about? when you put together guys who’ve been together for years and years in one workplace, you can’t help but look back at the early years. to get a hint of what we talked about, here’s a little game of guess who. to our samsung friends, let’s see how many you can get right. 😉

1) isang umaga sa dorm sa korea. pagka-gising ni ____ at pagkabukas nya ng pinto ng kwarto, nakita nya na may suka (vomit) eksakto sa harap ng kwarto nya.
question 1: sino ang malas na sinalubong ng suka (vomit)?
question 2: kanino nanggaling yung suka (vomit)?

2) sa washing machine area sa dorm. nalaman ni ____ na ang kanyang mga damit na hindi pa tapos malabhan eh nilabas ng washing machine ng isang koreano para mailagay ang kanyang mga damit at malabhan (obviously, hindi makapag-antay). sa asar ng na-biktimang eto, eh pinagtatapon nya ang damit ng may sala kung saan-saan. samantala, sa ironing area, pagkalipas ng ilang minuto, etong si _____ (ibang tao) naman, eh biglang sinugod ng isang hubad na koreano na galit na galit. apparently, kanya yung damit na pinagtatapon at akala nya eh etong nag-pla-plantsa ang gumawa.
question 1: sino ang nagtapon ng mga damit ng koreano?
question 2: sino ang sinugod sa plantsahan?

3) sa korea pa din. naglalakad ang mga magkaka-dept papuntang canteen. inasar ni ____ ang isa sa mga kasama at dahil dito, eh sinabihan sya ng, “one week ka sa akin.”
question 1: sino ang sinabihan nito?
question 2: ano ang ibig sabihin ng, “one week ka sa akin.”?

4) sa korea uli sa isang kwarto sa dorm. sa gitna ng usapang kasalan, meron nag-bitiw ng salitang, “darating din tayo dyan.” sino ang nagsabi nito?

5) sino ang napamura na lang ng nalaman nya kung sino ang magiging bagong roommates nya pagdating ng 3rd batch sa korea?

6) sino ang nag-away ng dahil lang sa salitang “titanium”?

7) sino ang ginising ng hr manager sa dorm kasi hindi pumasok?

marami pang iba, eh pero d ko na matandaan. so ilan ang nahulaan mo? 😀 note lang, wag masyado mag-isip kasi baka wala namang sagot yung iba dyan. 😆

sa gitna ng aming tawanan eh napag-usapan din namin ito:



konting trivia lang about this 8+ year-old music video:

  • hindi. hindi kami nag-dru-drugs kaya nagawa namin ito. 🙂 wala lang kami magawa talaga sa olympic park (seoul, korea) so rex had this brilliant idea to shoot a music video. game naman kami ni vena. si rene naman parang napilitan na lang. 😆
  • it took us about 2-3 hours of shooting this 3 minute video. no editing took place. straight shoot and record with audio.
  • to shoot the last scene which was at the dormitory grounds, we had to pull someone out of the dormitory to shoot us. hindi si rene ang nag-shoot nun. tinamad na sya para sa last scene siguro dahil na-realize nya na kalokohan etong ginagawa namin. 😀
  • because of the “success” of this music video 😆, naisipan pang gumawa uli ng isa pang music video ni rex. too bad i don’t have a copy of it so, rex, put it up on youtube and i will embed it here. 😀

that night was really hilarious. grabe. it was fun. next time uli, rex, ha. 🙂

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a grand wedding

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ten months or so ago, hestia and migoy‘s engagement news came to me… in a very unexpected way. i was at fol‘s house getting the raw files of our wedding photos and during our chat, fol excitedly mentioned that one of our guests at our wedding, hestia, just booked him for her own wedding. i didn’t know that hestia had a boyfriend then (yan resulta ng nawawala sa sirkulasyon 😀) let alone being engaged. so immediately after leaving fol’s house, i texted hestia regarding the news. ooops, it was supposed to be a secret pala… and fol unknowingly spilled the beans. 😆 ok lang naman. no harm done. it was great news anyway. 🙂

fast forward to this past weekend and it was hestia and migoy’s big day. if the invitation was any indication (ganda ng invites, ha. sabi nga ni christian, a college friend, pwedeng pang-display. 😉) and knowing hestia, this was gonna be a grand wedding. the expectations were way up high and the couple didn’t disappoint.

  • the church choir, mandaluyong children’s chorus, was angelic. note: it’s the very same choir migoy used as a front for his proposal. how’s that for added sentimental punch? 😉
  • the reception band, brass munkeys, was off-the-charts. we’ve heard about them a lot sa w@w pero it was the first time we’ve actually seen them perform. ang galing nila. to quote gosh, a hs/college friend, “parang nakikinig ako sa cd ah.” they were that good.
  • the venue styling was refined. pag pasok namin ng ballroom… wow.
  • the preaching was loaded… and to spice it up more, the couple wrote their love story (very well written at that) which was shared to everyone. cno ba nagsulat nun, hes? ikaw o si migs? 🙂

we could go and on but we’ll just let some pics tell the story. apologies though to hestia & migoy for i wasn’t able to capture that many images. the poor low-light performance and the limited zoom of our point-and-shoot limited my opportunities. plus the fact that a whole lot of the guests were wielding dslr’s kinda made our camera pathetic. 😀

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the obviously happy groom with his parents.

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photographers and dads anticipating the march of the flowergirls. that’s gosh and lazo doing their daddy duties. 🙂

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maybe they should’ve been called teddy bear girls instead. so cute… 🙂

side note: during the processional, i was only anticipating the groom, our friend kermin, the flower girls and, of course, the bride, hestia. everyone else i didn’t pay much attention to and just let ’em pass by. during the march of the sponsors, selle and i had this interesting conversation:
selle: bat d ka kumukuha ng pictures?
dyoks: eh d ko cla kilala, eh (i just assumed hence was not paying attention 🙂)
selle: d mo kilala si cory?
dyoks: (talking to himself) cory? sinong cory?
selle: si cory aquino yun, o.
and that is why i didn’t get a shot of our former president… because “d ko sya kilala.” 😀

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so, so many dslr’s around…

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…and so, so many kids too. 😀

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my only clear shot of the couple (i told you i underperformed 😦)… with the aforementioned mandaluyong children’s chorus

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what’s a wedding coverage without details?
(top row) magnificent ceilings of sanctuario de san antonio (left) and manila peninsula (right)
(bottom row) color motif consistent mini cupcakes to greet the guests (left) and fun facts frames of the couple (right) (hmmm… i wonder where’d they got this idea? 😉
)

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always full of energy kermin.

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jigsaw puzzle making competition. last time we won. this time, i joined forces with my pisay batchmates, christian & mitch, but unfortunately lost. although feeling namin na-sabotahe and the winning table cheated. 😆 ayaw patalo, eh, no? 😛

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the brass munkeys. we instantly became fans.

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a guest congratulating the bride. this is my attempt at artistic photojournalism. 🙂

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selle with hestia’s officemate and our sister-in-Christ, tintin (to most)/cj (to her ofcmates)/mother (to us her close friends)

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(left) pre-ceremony shot of russ, fol & edong (left to right) of the fol rana jr photography team
(right) post-reception shot with bob nicolas
splendid job as always guys. 🙂

hes and migs, congratulations! it’s obvious that you had a grand time during your wedding and i’m sure you’ll carry that into your marriage. welcome to the married life and just enjoy the ride. 🙂

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one happy couple

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love, lessons and laughter. simply put, our first year of married life has been nothing but pure bliss. 🙂

days before our anniversary, we had our original plan pushed-back to a later date so i had to scramble and come up with another way of celebrating. for sentimental reasons, i decided that we just go back to where we got married, cool and cozy tagaytay.

the idea was just to have a relaxing afternoon and then cap the day off with a romantic dinner. given the limited time to prepare, this is what i came up with: a massage treatment at nurture spa followed by fine dining at antonio’s 🙂, both establishments we got to know early on during our wedding preps.

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nurture spa welcomes their guests in a rustic reception area. cozy, country chairs and sofas plus ethnic tables and stuff. herein we filled up our guest information cards while sipping thru some tea (ang cool ng tea pot & tea cups nila, ha 🙂). afterwards, down we went past through lush gardens…

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…into a relaxing waiting area. 🙂

the ambiance was a perfect setup for the massage treatment to follow. ang sarap ng hangin. ang music, nakaka-relax.

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and the flowers and decors were simply beautiful. 🙂

after a while, we were ushered in a room for our massage treatment. 🙂

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an hour and a half later, we left relaxed and refreshed (although nahirapan ako sa ibang parts ng massage kasi nakikiliti ako 😆).

off we went to antonio’s, a hidden restaurant in tagaytay. actually, isa ito sa mga venues na ni-visit namin when we were venue hunting and we were blown away by the beauty of it. kaso, aside from it being way beyond our budget 😀, the restaurant cannot accommodate our planned breakfast reception. we vowed to come back some other time to experience the reputed antonio’s fine dining experience… and what other day to do that than on our anniversary? 😉

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ambiance alone makes antonio’s a winner already. it’s a common thing that guests be seen going around and snapping photos while awaiting their orders. obviously, we did the same. 😀

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of the many photo ops around, we couldn’t resist having our photos taken at this colorful mural.

after all the picture-taking, it was eating time! 🙂

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after a sumptuous dinnner, we left but not before taking a few more snapshots.

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we bid farewell to antonio’s (vowing to be back again… 😉) and went straight home. here we ended the day by opening our wedding time capsule.

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time capsule? yah, isa sa mga gimiks namin sa kasal namin. the idea was we’ll have a boxful of letters, stationery and what-nots and it will be kept unopened until our first wedding anniversary. we hand-picked selected guests whom we liked to participate… unfortunately only a few complied. 😦

nevertheless, we had fun opening and reading through the few we got. so many thanks to anna for the warm note; vena & neriz for the creative packaging of sports headlines; red and roju for the digitally created trivia. 🙂 much, much appreciated.

and so that’s how anniversary went. not bad for a plan B, right? 🙂

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whoa!

we were just surfing through the net and look what we found…

2007 weddings of the year

an interesting topic. imagine our reaction when we saw our wedding on the list! 😀

who would’ve thought? we certainly didn’t. when were planning our wedding, we didn’t set out to wow our guests. of the so many grand weddings around, ours was not even close to being one. due to these, some may argue that ours had no business being on this list. but bob nicolas thought otherwise. 🙂

this is heart warming to say the very least and God deserves all the glory. what a nice surprise recognition just in time for our wedding anniversary. 🙂

kudos to the other couples who made the list. most of you look familiar as you’ve been featured in your respective supplier’s blogs (yes, we’re blog hoppers. 😉).

and, bob, salamat, ha. 🙂

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…and around this very minute, our wedding ceremony has long been over, the venue’s empty, all the guests have left and we’re already off for our honeymoon .

to celebrate our first anniversary, i made this audio visual flashback of our honeymoon as a surprise gift for my wife. 🙂



i just started this project about a week ago, editing late into the night when selle’s already asleep as to not ruin the surprise. this proved to be tricky and i almost was not able to finish due to lack of time (and opportunity 😀) but thankfully i was able to render it all just last night (past midnight to be exact. buzzer beater talaga. 😆).

therefore, i was able to greet selle as she woke up with this video… and she loved it. 🙂

in a few minutes we’ll be off to celebrate our anniversary. we pushed back our initial plan to next month but we’ll celebrate today nonetheless. more on this on a seperate blog post. 😉

ps a bit of trivia about this video. early this week, i mentioned in passing to our videographer, bob , during one of chats that i was editing this video for selle. imagine my surprise when bob volunteered to edit the video… for free! ah, grabe. syempre, i politely declined kasi nakakahiya naman knowing how busy he is with his numerous clients. besides, i wanted to do this myself kahit na alam kong mas maganda ng d hamak kung si bob gagawa. 😀 bait talaga… 🙂

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we haven’t done a list post yet. since we want to kickoff the year with something a little different, we thought this would be the proper time to make one. 🙂

so, here goes… our first list post.

17 interesting (and some not so interesting) facts about today:

  1. start of the translation of bible from hebrew/greek to english and now known as the king james version (1604)
  2. first publication of don quixote (1605)
  3. nine old women burnt as witches for causing bad harvests in kalisk, poland (1771)
  4. a breakthrough invention was patented in the name of thomas crapper, the flush toilet (1861) 😆 now you know where the word “crap” originated. 😀
  5. new york state introduced a bill to outlaw flirting in public (1902) – now that surely didn’t last long… 😀
  6. birth of professional golfer association (pga) (1916)
  7. popeye makes 1st appearance, in comic strip “thimble theater” (1929)
  8. the united nations headquarters officially opened in new york city (1951)
  9. debut album of led zeppelin released in usa (1969)
  10. section of memphis’ highway 51 south renamed elvis presley blvd (1972)
  11. end of martial law (1981)
  12. us supreme court rules (5-4) in favor of private use of home vcr’s to tape tv programs for later viewing stating that it does not violate federal copyright laws (1984)
  13. british telecom announces the retirement of the united kingdom’s red telephone boxes (1985)
  14. kodak got out of the instant camera business after 10 years due to a loss in a court battle that claimed that kodak copied polaroid patents (1986)
  15. operation desert storm begins (1991)
  16. nba suspends dennis rodman indefinitely for kicking a cameraman… in the groin. (1997) – ouch.
  17. born today:

1706 – Benjamin Franklin
1899 – Al Capone
1928 – Vidal Sassoon
1942 – Muhammad Ali
1949 – Andy Kaufman
1962 – Jim Carrey
1971 – Kid Rock
1975 – Coco Lee
1982 – Dwyane Wade

you can add my name to that list because today happens to be my 33rd birthday. 😀

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