Christmas in Coron

Yes yes, it’s already June.  But you should be used to my late posts by now.

(I already blogged about how our family spent last Christmas Eve. This entry will be about how we spent Christmas day.)

Last December, our family booked a 2-day tour around Coron.  We arranged to have them on the 26th and the 27th, which meant that we had to leave LB on the 25th.  We originally planned on leaving on the 26th so we wouldn’t have to spend Christmas day at the airport, but we discovered that we would be able to save P5000 per person if we book our flights a day ahead.  There were 7 of us, this was a pretty considerable amount.  My dad was against the idea at first and argued that Christmas is a time for family. My mom pointed out that we would still be with family anyway and that it would just be a waste of money to postpone our trip, so he agreed in the end.

All set to go to Coron!

We expected the airport to be empty since we thought that most people would want to spend Christmas day at home  - we couldn’t have been more wrong!

It was super crowded!

We got to the airport early and had a few hours to kill before our flight so we decided to grab some food first, since some of us weren’t able to have a proper breakfast.  (I ate breakfast before leaving the house but I found Shakeys at the airport and ended up buying a whole box of mojos anyway. Yummm~).

As usual, I took vain shots of myself to pass the time

INSTABITS : April 2013

Posting this a bit late again.  May has been crazy so far, so I haven’t really had much time to blog.  But it’s the good kind of crazy, so I’m not complaining

Anyway, here’s my Instagram compilation for April

Started the month off by having lunch with my officemates at Bene Dalcielo.  I love their lengua

Since it’s summer, Camille, Tring and I have a little more free time to hang out than usual.  They usually visit me at the office and we would grab merienda somewhere.  This was taken the evening Camille craved Moonleaf.  (According to Tring, that was her first Moonleaf experience XD)

About a week earlier, Camille convinced me to install GoSMS on my phone.  I loved it so much that I ended up downloading GOLauncher as well. Supah kawaii~

Another random afternoon with Camille and Tring. I call us the “Agronomy Girls” because our dads used to work together at the Agronomy department in UPLB.  That’s actually how Camille and I became friends – our dads used to take us with them to the office and we would play together while they worked.  Tring’s a couple of years younger than us so I didn’t really get to know her until much later.

It was Aprille’s birthday on the 8th, so the girls and I got together for dinner on the 6th for an early celebration

Happy birthday to one of the sweetest friends a girl can have!  Mwaaaaah!

I attended Ian’s and Fjorda’s wedding last April 7, along with my colleagues.   The wedding had a garden theme and the guests were provided these adorable hats to wear at the event.

More picts from the wedding.  Congrats Ian and Fjorda!

The 9th was a holiday so Ezra and I went to SM Calamba to relax and escape the heat.

Old Multiply blog entries – part 6

This will be my last Multiply post since the site is now truly gone.  (It’s still there, but it’s not meant to be used as a personal site anymore.)  I was planning on doing another one after this, but I wasn’t able to copy my old blog posts before they shut my page down, so I guess this is it.  The only reason I’m able to post this is because I started writing this entry months ago, it’s just been sitting in my drafts folder.

Title: Have a Break …

Date: Aug 4, ’08 9:18 AM

Have a KitKat

Especially if they come in a variety of flavors ^____^

Ezra gave these to me this morning. They were actually given to her by Kurt. He bought them for her in Japan, and she gave me some (Actually, he only bought the strawberry and watermelon flavored ones. The regular chocolate KitKat were from Robinsons XD)

My sister has been extra generous lately. I guess its one of the advantages of having Kurt around. She’s always happy, and is much nicer to everyone (even to Ckloy XD). Aside from these KitKats that she gave me this morning, she also gave me a piece yesterday. But it was more of a bribe so that I’d let her play with my PSP. I didn’t really mind, she managed to level up some of my FF8 characters and even got the needed items to complete Selphie’s and Quistis’s final weapons XD.

Before yesterday, I haven’t had a KitKat in so long. I used to eat them a lot in highschool. I was particularly fond of the orange flavored ones. Its sad that I don’t see them being sold here in the Philippines anymore. I used to buy them from a small shop near our school.

chocolates for breakfast anyone? ^___^

Title: Kupo?

Date: Aug 10, ’08 11:12 PM

I just wanted to share my “kupos” with you guys.

(My what???)

There has been a lot of confusion as to what a “kupo” is. Kupo (AKA Brinks) already posted an explanation on her blog, so I won’t be doing that here. I’ll just give you a link to the Final Fantasy Wiki for their explanation : CLICK HERE :D

Yes, “Kupo” came from the Final Fantasy series, but Brinks and I have another meaning for the word.  When we say “Kupo”, it means we’re talking about each other.  It has become our pet names for one another.  We’ve been friends since our 4th year of highschool and we discovered that we had a lot of similar interest, video games being one of them. (Although I think I forced her to play FF8 … I can’t remember …. she ended up liking it, so no harm done naman diba Kup?)

We started calling each other “Kupo” after FF9. We thought the moogles were adorable. And the way they ended each sentence with “Kupo” was just priceless … so we adapted it for ourselves.

Anyway, for her birthday this year, I decided to give her a moogle plushie. I ordered two so that we can have one each. So here’s Kupo and me with our kupo plushies ^_____^

Title: Raffy saves the day again! (My afternoon scare)

Date: Aug 22, ’08 9:27 PM

My dear cousin has once again come to my rescue.

Last time it was when I foolishly loaded the wrong version of FF8 Disc 2 into my PSP. (Read about it here if you missed that episode XD). This time, he bravely kept me sane after an unfortunate event happened to me this afternoon. An event that gamers everywhere would fear … an event called: memory card crash (play scary background music: *dun dun dun*)

Yes, it happened *sob* I have no idea how or what I did to deserve this. One minute I was enjoying the fact that I made it to Disc 4. Then I paused the game, surfed the net a bit, and when I came back … nada! This was all that was left of me 4gb memory card:

Four lousy files! FOUR! And I have no idea what they are! (Well, except for that ICON0 thing … that was obviously my menu icon for FF8)

Week 12/52 : You can close your eyes to the things you do not want to see, but you cannot close your heart to the things you do not want to feel

Another simple shot. I probably won’t be doing photomanips for a while, at least not until I’ve managed to catch up on my project. But I actually really like how this turned out. It was a lucky shot too. I was setting up my soft box and practicing how to pose when this was taken. Just this one shot. Then afterwards I changed into something nicer and started trying to pose more seriously. But after reviewing my photos, this was the one I liked the most so I decided to just go with it. It’s a bit dark and a little emo but I’m happy with it

I think this was inspired by all the book covers I’ve been seeing on Goodreads lately. Most of the covers that’s been popping up on my newsfeed/recommendations seem to have a similar theme – muted tones, gloomy aura and a girl who’s not looking at the camera (Reason to Breathe, Edge of Never, Captive in the Dark, On Dublin Street, Such a Rush, etc …). I haven’t actually read all those books (just Edge of Never and On Dublin Street) but I am fascinated with the covers. They say you should never judge a book by its cover, but there’s no point denying that it’s one of the first things we notice about them.

The title came from a quote in the book Forbidden by Tabitha Suzuma. I picked it up because it appeared in my recommendations and it had really high ratings. It’s about a brother and a sister who fall in love with each other, and I didn’t like it at all. I found it a bit disturbing to be honest.  But it did have some nice quotes XD

(EZRA) 12/52 : A teddy bear’s heart is as big as its smile

She looks like Pedobear’s little sister doesn’t she?  LOL~  But wait, that would mean I’m related to him too.  Nevermind…

She told me this was inspired by an anime she’s currently watching where the characters have these cute animal ears.  It’s called Cuticle Detective Inaba.  It’s about this werewolf cop (Inaba) who’s trying to catch this goat crook (Don Valentino), who’s after Japan’s money because he wants to dip it in soy sauce and eat it.  Sounds bizarre?  Believe me, it is.  She’s been forcing me to watch it with her every night.  Other characters include an overprotective detective, another werewolf with a brother complex, a guy who wears a sack on his head, a cross dresser, a wolf spirit who likes to pretend he’s a sheep and a cute mad scientist.  That’s not even all of them.  Oh, and did I mention that the werewolf cop has a hair fetish?

Week 11/52 : You were born to be real, not to be perfect

Something simple since I really need to catch up on my self portraits. This was another shot taken earlier this month.  It took a while for me to be able to upload it because I couldn’t find time to edit it.  That was during the last week of classes when I was swamped with deadlines.  To save time, I decided to go for a shot that required minimal editing. Mostly I just added some digital makeup to make myself look more presentable.

The title I chose this week tells us to keep things real, and I normally do.  I’m fine with my imperfections, but that doesn’t mean I have to go flaunting them on the internet.  Thank goodness for Photoshop and digital make up XD

(EZRA) 11/ 52 : Be like the flower, turn your face to the sun

I apologize for neglecting to update my blog these past few weeks.  It’s just been so hectic at work.  But things are finally starting to slow down, so hopefully I’ll be able to write more.

Ezra and I are terribly behind on our 52-week projects again.   I think we’re 3 to 4 weeks late already.  But we’ve got a few shoots planned this week so I’m hoping we’ll be able to catch up soon.

This was taken earlier this month.  She wanted a “summery” SP, so here it is. We’re really feeling the heat here in the Philippines!  Every time I go outside it feels like I’ve stepped into an oven.  I spend most of my days hiding out at the office and enjoying our air conditioning there  I actually spend my weekends looking forward to work days to escape the heat!

(Quote in the title is by Kahlil Gibran)

INSTABITS : March 2013

Posting this a bit late because the semester is ending and I’ve been busy checking exams and lab reports.  I really shouldn’t let it pile up like this, but I can’t help myself T__T

My parents went to Thailand for a business trip and they brought us back some of our favorite Thai desserts : chendol and red ruby (AKA chewy chestnuts and green uod XD)

I’m so proud my mom. She won the Outstanding Teacher Award for the Social Sciences category this year!  They had the awarding ceremony last March 6 where they gave her this awesome Oblation trophy.

Ezra and I took turns posing with Mama’s trophy.  Maybe one day we’ll win one for ourselves *crosses fingers*

I’ve been obsessed with this game for weeks now.  I play it all the time!  I even got some of my officemates hooked on it XD  I strongly encourage you to download it if you can and give it a try (Unfortunately it’s not available for Android users yet, but hopefully they’ll fix that soon.)

I convinced Ezra to download it for her iPad too XD

Week 10/52 : My thoughts are stars I can’t fathom into constellations

This is my copycat version of Joel Robinson’s (AKA Boy_Wonder’s) photo. (You can see his original photo by clicking HERE). I’ve been a big fan of his work ever since I discovered him a two years ago on Flickr. He has the most amazing concepts.  Sometimes when I can’t decide on a theme for my self portrait, I head over to his photostream for inspiration. (But this is the first time I made a copycat version of one of his photos. I couldn’t help it, it was just so lovely.)

The title for this week’s self portrait came from the book The Fault In our Stars by John Green. I read it about a month ago and it turned me into an emotional, slobbering wreck. It was sweet, funny, sad, heartbreaking and beautifully written.  (Read my review HERE.)

It’s a little hard to tell because of the dark background, but I’m wearing a wig in this shot. One, because Hazel Grace (the main character in TFIOS) has short hair, and two, because my hair was a mess when this was taken.

(EZRA) 10/52 : I’ll chase your nightmares away

My sister and I gave my mom this dream catcher years ago for her birthday.  There came a time when she had trouble sleeping and we thought it might help.  She still ended up having to take sleeping pills, but it’s the thought that counts right? XD