The day was Saturday, 31st of May 2008, I was
getting ready to catch the last flight of Cebu Pacific to Singapore. The flight
was 8:50 PM and arrived in Singapore at approximately 12:20 AM the following
day. And from that day on, my venture outside of my home country began. I left
Manila quietly with the knowledge of my family and some friends. I wanted to
tell my other friends too but then I decided not to. I wanted to wait for the
time I settled in Singapore before telling everyone that I moved. Yes I was
full of surprises but there were many things that surprised me too during that
time. Who would have thought that I would bump into a good friend, well the
husband of my good friend, in one of the most awkward places in Singapore? And
that friend happened to be unaware of my whereabouts since I left my first job
in Christmas of 2006. So then I have to tell everyone on my current diaspora
and thank God for social media that reaching out to them made it quite a smooth
transition.
Today is July 10, Wednesday which means tomorrow is my birthday. It is my first time talking about my birthday which I happen to celebrate with people I know like Kathryn Sabalza, Jimson Uranza, Zyra Sotto and of course one of my favourite and a revered author Mr. Bo Sanchez. Who would have thought I will know a lot of people who celebrates the same day we were all born. Anyway, so I do not really celebrate my birthday except for going out of a small dinner or lunch or whatever with the special people I carefully chose. I do not really like to be the centre of everyone's attention but there is nothing you can do. People know its my birthday and I can't do anything about it. But on this day of my birthday I only have one terrible wish. I know it is a long shot but I have always been a big fan of "The Little Prince" and I want to be the first Filipino to establish something that has relevance to this book. I am sure many has read the book and are aware of the morals presented. But I dream of something else. In Brazil, there is a hospital named Hospital Pequeno Principe which translates to Little Prince Hospital. In Taiwan, they have City Cafe which is decorated with everything about the Little Prince. There is The Little Prince Museum in Hakone, Japan while Korea has Petit France which proudly honours St. Exupery's works and the Little Prince. And In Europe, there are so many I do not know what else to mention. The book has been published and printed in 270 languages world wide and still counting. It has been printed in Tagalog as well although the translation and book is somewhat a dismay to me compared to the books from other countries that I have seen. For a start, I wish I can publish the book in an English and Tagalog version side by side and I want the book to to look presentable. After the book, I will put up a cafe aptly named The Little Cafe. And then maybe after the cafe hits off then I will put up a foundation and this one I am sure to name it Ang Munting Prinsipe Foundation. The main aim of the soon to be founded foundation is to help less fortunate children to learn how read and write properly. Let us just start small. Humble beginnings have great rewards in the end. Anyway, Happy Birthday and I wish me many more years to come to accomplish these dreams someday. Someday.
“My first trip to Bangkok and it was great. The
places I've seen are awesome. The food is gastronomically delectable. And the
people are nice and will always give you a smile. Bangkok has preserved its
richness in culture as they have maintained most of their temples and palaces
which is the cradle of their religion, which is Buddhism. You will be impressed
with the grandiose of all these temples located far from the other side of
Bangkok's central business district. You will also be amazed to see a lot of flashy
neon coloured taxis (like pink, green, blue and orange) that it would be so
hard for you to hail the taxi as you will not be able to see whether it is
available or not because they are just too bright to look at.”
It has been 3 years since I last had an entry on my blog.
I am wondering what kept me busy. Well as you may know I am a teacher. I teach
children with special needs and have been in this profession for 5 years. I am
not blaming my job that I didn’t get to write. I wanted to write but was quite
lazy to do so. Then Facebook came so I kind of lost my interest to blogging and
just ventured to writing notes and stories on my photo albums about the things
I have done. But now I have a lot of time to spare to update this blog. I have
left Singapore and moved to Jakarta about a month ago. (Well the Singapore
story will come to you in a later time) I am quite not busy these days so I
decided to rekindle my forgone affair with blogger.com. I want to focus on my
writing about travels and life experiences since I left the Philippines last
May 2008. That decision to leave the country gave me a different perspective of
how I should see life. The last five years was a whirlwind of sort. I have had
many experiences, surprises, made a lot friends and saw many places. But as
what all Filipinos would say, “There is no place like home”, it is quite true
unless you find a better place to start a new life.
I never thought I will be able to do this sport. When I was in Seoul for a Christmas Holiday, I made it a point that I will experience how it feels like skiing. We signed up with an agency that a fellow Singaporean I met in Kyung Hee University referred to us. We paid about US$80 for a two-hour beginner lesson which includes a full-day use of the ski and ski shoes. It was actually quite expensive but the four of us really wanted to have a try. From the city, we took a chartered bus and we are on our way to Jisan Ski Park.
Carrying the ski while you are on your ski shoes was just painful. it's heavy and the roads are slippery so you have to walk slowly. I think it took us about 30 minutes just to cross a 500 meter distance. Looking at the ski slope, it was very majestic. It was my first time to actually see snow-covered mountains and seeing so many people skiing. They made it look so easy but when we started the lesson, that is when I found out that skiing is the toughest sport out there ever.
The temperature was -15 C when we were having our lesson but damn I was sweating. I was sweating a lot. In the beginning, whenever I slip, it was so tough to get yourself up but later on I got the hang of it and managed to move from one point to another. Eventually we were moving up about half a meter high on a slope. Once you stand on a slope, you will slide right away so you have to be very alert. And always be on a ready position.
I think I will do this again and also try bob-sledding. But I don't think I will be doing this skiing always.
I have been dreaming of seeing snow and experiencing winter
so when I finally had the chance to make this dream come true, I was definitely
uber excited and could not wait for that big day. My friend Calice and I, we
are both teachers had the whole month of December for school holidays and as
early as August, we have been planning what we can do. We did not really expect
that we will be travelling just the two of us but who cares, Calice and I were
quite okay and got along well during the 13-day trip to Seoul. Our main
objective in the trip was to attend the Fun Korean Lesson Trip (FKLT) Program.
It is a week-long program of learning the language, culture, people and their
way of living in Korea. Well it was quite an interesting thing to do especially
my interest with different languages of the world. Although its difficult be
become a linguist but trying to learn some of the basic words and not to
mention the Hangul characters (Korea’s National writing system)
I am gonna write this as if I just got out of rope holding on to my life as I jumped off that 50 meter high crane to do my first ever bungy jump. it's just a big and crazy "WAAAAAAAH". When I was a kid I remember visiting Subic Bay, Olongapo, in the Philippines with the whole family and I already heard of this bungy jump activity that they have there. Of course I was like 10 or 11 during that time so doing it is still a no no and no one would actually pay for it so I could jump.
I was already enticed to do that jump although it was scary by merely looking at it. The crane going up with this square cage carrying you and once it reaches its designated height, you only have 3 choices. You jump. You let someone push you. Or you go back down which is probably the most embarrassing thing to do since you were so brave to go up, the only way you should go down is by jumping off. Well you are not gonna die anyway. Unless the unlucky faith of that rope snapping off right when it's your turn is just the unluckiest timing of all.
Later on I heard that the bungy jumping in Subic has closed down. Did somebody die? I never really found out but I guess it closed down at the same time that Subic Bay was crumbling down when the Americans left. When I started working I heard about the Macau Tower doing that bungy jump as well. I had a friend who visited Macau and encouraged me to go to Macau but not jumping off the Macau Tower. The trip never materialized and I can not remember why. I guess I was not really prepared back then.
Come 2012, after five years of working in Singapore, my colleagues Jen and Calice planned a trip to Phuket, Thailand for the three of us. and this was it. I finally got to do this bungy jumping things. It was morning of our 2nd to the last day, December 2012, when we went to this bungy jumping area. I was dead scared but I was ready. The owner is a guy from New Zealand, who was not really friendly, accommodating and was very discreet in answering my questions, I did not like him to make it short but then, he is not the one bringing me up, he just owns the place so I just paid him and talked to the guys who will actually prepare me for the jump. I paid like USD 50 for that 50 meter jump.
The video is a bit long so you may want to forward it. Upon reaching the top, I really thought I could not do it. The guide actually offered if he can push me instead but I said no and then just dropped myself away. IT. WAS. F*CKING. CRAZY. It's crazy and I would do it again.
