Looking back at 2012

So I've been doing this every start of the year now for the last couple of years and it's a good tradition to keep. As such, here are some of my 2012 highlights:

TRAVEL

• I visited Batanes for the first time and I had an absolute blast. Check out my posts about Batanes (including Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, and final thoughts and travel tips).
• I also took my family to Cebu and Bohol, although I failed to write about that! I'll do so within the next few weeks.
• I went to Singapore twice. Both of which involved some firsts. Trip #1 was the first time I flew out of the country mainly for shopping purposes. Trip # 2 was to attend my first-ever Malay Muslim wedding (and this was the first wedding I attended where neither the bride nor groom were Filipino).

SHOWS

Several high profile musical artists came to the Philippines, including Lady Gaga, J Lo, Maroon 5, Keane, The Fray, James Morrison, Sting, and Tears for Fears, but I didn't see any of their concerts. Instead, I saw Phantom of the Opera, four operas (La Traviata, Madame Butterfly, The Barber of Seville, and Carmen), and the Cirque Du Soleil show Saltimbanco. Great shows all!

ONLINE DEALS
I have now purchased 248 deals from sites like Deal Grocer, Cashcashpinoy, Groupon Beeconomic, Metrodeal, and Ensogo. These purchases allowed me to discover and experience a few new things, such as:

• Photobooking - I have always wanted to created photobooks of my travels and because of online deals, I finally achieved this. I have now created 17 photobooks - 11 for myself, 3 I gave to my mom, and 3 I gave as gifts.
• New hotels - My family and I stayed at the Holiday Inn Ortigas a couple of times, once for my birthday and another for my nephew's birthday. My family and I also stayed at Widus Hotel in Clark, Pampanga. I also spent a night at the F1 Best Western hotel earlier in the year.
• Food - I got to try Shi Lin, Relish at Ponte, and Harvest Gastropub for the first time because of vouchers I bought for all these places. And while I have been to Old Swiss Inn many times before, my discount vouchers for fondue here allowed me and my family to try out and enjoy their Fondue Bourguignonne and Walliser Fondue for the first time.

WEDDINGS
I've mentioned the wedding of Ben and Laila, but I attended several more: Val and Louie, Allan and Cami, Audrey and Primo, Alvin and Doray, Chachie and JM, and Jim and Mira. My cousin Charmaine got married in Boracay so I missed the ceremony but I did attend their reception in Manila.

OTHERS
Aside from all these great experiences, I also won an HTC phone in a raffle. And just a few weeks ago, I also won a 1 Tb external hard drive! Talk about luck. Of course, not everything was positive. I also ended up being knocked out of commission for long periods of time due to a sprained ankle and then conjunctivitis. And while Liverpool are doing very poorly now, some of my favorites had pretty good success. Meryl Streep won her 3rd Oscar, Rafa Nadal won his 7th French Open title (before being out due to injury the rest of the year), and Adele won 6 Grammys.

Of course, a lot of what made this year great was being able to spend time with my family and friends. I also continued to work on and build our Corporate Social Responsibility organization at work. I've got a few things planned out already for the coming year that I am really looking forward to (I won't mention them yet as I don't want to jinx things). With my 2012 being a great year, I'm hoping 2013 can be just as good if not even better. :)