Sagada!

I've been wanting to go to Sagada for a while now but it's not exactly the easiest place to visit. It's about a 10-11 hour drive from Manila and once there, you need to get involved in a lot of physical activities like trekking and spelunking. My family normally stays in Manila during Holy Week. However, my mom saw that Tripinas was offering a Sagada tour that would leave Manila on Wednesday night and return on Saturday night and we felt that this was a good opportunity for us to see one of the best places in the country without having to take any days off.

Some highlights of our Tripinas tour were a trek across the Banga-an rice terraces,


a visit to the Bomod-ok Falls,


spelunking in the Sumaging Cave,


a nature hike in Echo Valley...


...to see the Hanging Coffins,


and a trip to the Banaue Rice Terraces!


I will be sharing details of my amazing trip over the next few blog posts, but suffice it to say that despite the extremely long and uncomfortable drive, this trip to Sagada (with a very quick side trip to Banaue) was definitely worth it.

Rio and Taio Cruz's "Telling the World"

Kid movies seem to have been a big part of my life recently. I watched Rango and Hop in the cinema. I also caught TMNT, The Spiderwick Chronicles, and Flushed Away on DVD. But I did promise my nephews (again) that I would take them to watch Rio. So that's what I did.

Rio was pretty entertaining overall. It has a pretty good storyline, fun characters, a nice mix of humor and romance, and great music. I found it really interesting that the antagonist was a vicious and incredibly strong cockatoo named Nigel who sported an English accent. The fact that the film i set in Brazil make a lot of the scenes colorful and vibrant. The music definitely adds another dimension to the film.

I discovered Taio Cruz's song "Telling the World" as it played during the end credits and I was hooked. It's probably my favorite current song (I'm thinking now whether I should get his album since I enjoy a lot of his other songs including 'Dynamite' and 'Falling in love'.)


uploaded in youtube by TaioCruzVEVO

I hope I can get to perform this song in some future event at work. It's a catchy and uplifting song with some pretty cool instrumentation. Add a few dancers performing with us and it the overall performance could be well-received by the audience.

Sports roundup

A new tennis record has been set. Rafael Nadal has won the Monte Carlo Masters title for the 7th year in a row. No other male player in the open era has won a tournament seven times, much less in a row. This is his first title of the year, and it's great that he finally snaps his losing streak in tournament finals (he lost his last three, twice against Djokovic and once against Federer). Hopefully he repeats his 2010 success on clay and sweep all the tournaments he plays, including the French Open.

***

Sebastian Vettel finally gets beaten in Formula One this season. A strategic mistake on the part of Red Bull allowed Lewis Hamilton to clinch a win in the Chinese Grand Prix and move up to second. The performance of the race for me, though, belongs to Mark Webber who went from 18th all the way to a 3rd place podium finish. It's unfortunate that Jenson Button briefly held first place for a few laps but ended up in 4th.

***

While Liverpool may not make it to the top four in the Barclays Premier League and thus miss out on a Champions League spot next season, they are at least generally doing well against the top 3. They beat Chelsea and Manchester United recently, but were in danger of losing to Arsenal after they conceded a late goal. However, by some miracle, they snagged a penalty late into injury time which they converted, giving them a 1-1 draw. Even if they don't finish in the top four, at least they are ending this season strongly. Hopefully, that gives them momentum leading in the 2011-2012 season.

SYTYCD Season 7

There's a dearth of dance-related reality TV shows on now. Starworld features Got to Dance UK as well as Live to Dance (the American version of Got to Dance which stars Paula Abdul). A lot of my friends really enjoy this show. While it is a great show that displays amazing talent, my favorite dance reality show is still 'So you think you can dance' (SYTYCD).

AXN picked up SYTYCD and has shown all the recent seasons, from season 4 all the way to the most recently completed season 7. Season 7 is different from all the past seasons in that it features all-stars or contestants from past seasons who have been standout performers in their particular style: contemporary, hip-hop, jazz, or ballroom. When the current season's contestants pick out a dance style to perform, they get partnered with the all-star for that particular style.

Unfortunately, practically every recent video of SYTYCD on youtube has disabled embedding. So here are links to some of my favorite routines this season:

Robert and Allison's contemporary number - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xnguqsMQmg4 (jump to 0:53 to skip the intro). It's choreographed by Travis Wall who was Allison's co-contestant in season 2. I know Allison was looking forward to working with Travis so it's perfect that they get to do this number which was one of the best performances of the season. I do think Allison completely outdances Robert in this.

Alex and Twitch's hip-hop number - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLtSfYX8tJk.This is probably the most fun routine on the show I have ever seen! It's choreographed by Tabitha and Napoleon to the song 'Outta your mind' by Lil Jon and LM*AO)

Adechike and Comfort's hip-hop routine as choreographed once again by Tabitha and Napoleon to Alicia Key's Fallin - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5McyQQ29X5A. This is probably one of the most powerful hip-hop numbers I have ever seen. I would never have thought hip-hop could evoke such strong emotion.

Billy and Ade's contemporary number, choreographed by Stacey Tookey - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BePGx_KjvmM. Check out Ade lifting Billy at 2:43! Ade is one incredibly strong man!

Alex and Allison's contemporary dance number to Jeff Buckley's Hallelujah' (choreographed by Sonya Tayeh) - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B03TjhI40aQ (jump to 0:49 to skip the intro)

Pasha and Anya's hot ballroom number which they themselves choreographed - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjb57Zex5SM. Pasha and Anya were both all-stars this season, with both of them being contestants in Season 3. They actually auditioned together but never got to be partners on the show, or at least never got to perform ballroom on the show, so the producers thought it would be great entertainment to have them perform together. And it certainly brought down the house!

I love the whole all-star set-up because (1) it brought back Allison, who is probably my favorite contestant of all time, and who got to perform in some of the most memorable numbers this season, and (2) because it brought back a lot of amazing dancers who all seem to have grown and improved since they were contestants on the show. What I didn't like this season was how the judges judged. It was clear who their favorites were and the pimping was reminiscent of AI. I especially disliked the judges' blatant favoritism and what seems to be a combined dislike of Adechike, who was dissed and picked on so many times this season (in contrast to Jose and Robert for instance who had just as many technical flaws as Adechike, if not more, but who were rarely given any grief).

Nevertheless, I still love the show and will continue to watch it. I do wonder if season 8 will still feature the all-star format, and if so, which all-stars will they bring back.

A birthday and a movie

My grandmother celebrated her birthday this weekend and so my family headed over to their house for lunch. I got a large mango torte from Dulcelin because I was sure they would enjoy it (after all, they love the mango torte in Conti's and the mango walnut torte in Mom and Tina's). As is always the case, the food was overflowing and I stuffed myself silly again.

The week before, my nephews said they wanted to watch 'Hop' so I promised to take them. Since 'Hop' had already been showing for about 1 1/2 weeks, I knew its stint in the local theaters would only last a few more days. So I took my nephews to see it.

'Hop' is a fun movie for kids. Good visual effects, lots of cute and lovable characters, several fun and funny moments, and a simple story about having dreams and interests that are different from what your parents, or dads in particular, want for you that revolves around the universal theme of wanting to make your parents proud.

Here's a pretty cool 'Hop Featurette' showcasing Phil, the chick who can't stop from dancing, and Taio Cruz's smash hit 'Dynamite'.


uploaded in youtube by user HoptheMovie

DVD buying

I'm probably one of the few people I know who still goes out to buy CDs and DVDs (most other people just download music and movies). I haven't purchased CDs in a while, but I do tend to grab a DVD every now and then. Movie tickets cost about P200 now and a lot of DVDs tend to go on sale and end up in the price range of about P125 to P299 so whenever I miss a movie in the cinema that I really wanted to watch, I sometimes pick up the DVD.

So recently, I picked up 'Mission Impossible 3' and 'Pathology'. I tossed in a couple of other older movies, including 'I am Sam' and 'The Day After Tomorrow'. While looking for movies, I saw a couple of old Pinoy movie classics - 'Bona' and 'Tatlong Taong Walang Diyos' (both of which star the original superstar Nora Aunor). I know these two are brilliant films, so I decided to buy them as well. I now have a few DVDs of Pinoy movies from the golden age of Filipino film (the 1970s to early 1980s) - I also have 'Ina, Kapatid, Anak' and 'Tatlo, Dalawa, Isa'. I hope I have time to watch them all soon. :)

Running again

I have this bad tendency to rush my marathon preparation almost every year. To avoid another crash-course, I decided to kick of my preparations a bit earlier this year and start running again in April. I am starting slow, and covering only a short distance, but hopefully I can slowly build my strength and endurance better over the next couple of months leading to this year's marathon.

Djoko on a hot streak

Novak Djokovic started this year in amazing fashion, notching his second Australian Open title and thus becoming a multiple grand slam title winner. Not wanting to rest on these laurels, Djokovic has used that AO win to build momentum and steamroll past everyone else. In fact, he has yet to lose a match in 2011. His 24-match winning streak is the best start to a year since Ivan Lendl won 29 consecutive matches to kick off 1986 (McEnroe holds the men's record with a staggering 39 wins before his first loss in 1984). This streak includes three wins over Roger Federer and, unfortunately, two over Rafael Nadal as well.

(That those two wins over Rafa came in finals of Masters tournaments are rather awful for any Nadal fan like myself, but its good to know that Rafa remains immensely competitive on hard courts, especially when you consider the fact that hard courts are Novak's best surface.)

Djokovic's amazing 2011 has allowed him to firmly supplant Roger Federer as world #2. He's now nipping at the heels of Rafa, who is ahead of Novak by less than 4000 points but has a ton of points to defend over the clay court season leading to Wimbledon. Hopefully Rafa can defend most, if not all, the points he won between April and July and thus remain at #1.

"Tonight" by FM Static

I had to learn this song last Valentine's Day for our 'harana' activity in the office but no one requested it so it ended up being shelved. It's a really difficult song to sing and if you listen closely, you will notice that vocalist Trevor McNevan has incredible breath control (he takes very short and light breaths and has really long phrasing in the second verse)! Nevertheless, I was looking forward to singing it since it's a good song. Who knows, maybe we I still get the chance to perform it as some point in the future.


video uploaded in youtube by user xaace

F1 season begins

The Formula One 2011 season kicked off with the Qantas Australian Grand Prix. Picking up from where he left off last season, Sebastian Vettel blazed ahead of the pack and won the race ahead of McLaren's Lewis Hamilton and Renault's Vitaly Petrov. With 18 more races in the season, it should be interesting if both Vettel and Red Bull Racing can build on their 2010 success and win both the drivers and constructors championships this year or if Hamilton and McLaren, or someone else for that matter, can steal the show.

Name a movie that begins with 'R'

I'll give you two: 'Red Riding Hood' and 'Rango'. I got a chance to watch both these movies recently, which is great given that my workload has been immensely hectic. I wanted to see 'Red Riding Hood' because I found the trailer and the concept really interesting, while 'Rango' had a really high rating from critics in Rotten Tomatoes so I thought I should go see it as well.

Strangely enough, my reactions to both films were quite the opposite of the ratings they got from both critics and general audiences. I though 'Rango' was just okay. The story was good and the animation was fantastic. In fact, it is probably one of the most well-animated films I have ever seen, and the man in that scene where Rango talks to the Spirit of the West looked so real that it had me - and still has me - wondering if the man is real or animated. Nevertheless, I wasn't as entertained by it as other people who have seen it. I guess that might be partly due to the fact that I've never really been a fan of Westerns.

On the other hand, I found 'Red Riding Hood' really entertaining despite the film being panned by critics and most other viewers who watched it. I liked the fact that this werewolf film got its inspiration from, and built its story around, a fairy tale from which it took its title. It took several elements from the classic children's story - from the big bad wolf to the grandmother and her house to the actual red hood - and weaves all that into a murder-mystery framed against a love story. I wasn't necessarily inspired by the romantic angle and I correctly guessed who the werewolf was early on. Despite this, I liked the drama, the tension, and the conflict in 'Red Riding Hood', and I thought the period setting, along with the stunning cinematography and visual effects, made it a really good watch. When I think about it, though, I think the solid performances from the cast, specifically Amanda Seyfried, Gary Oldman, and Julie Christie (who played the grandmother) truly sold the film.

I still tend to miss a lot of movies that I want to see (example: Adjustment Bureau). Hopefully I can find time to visit the cinema more often.

Amazing Race: Kids Edition

CSR, or Corporate Social Responsibility, has been a really huge part of my life these last 4 years. I currently lead the CSR initiatives of my entire company and also of my department. Obviously, the company-wide efforts are more major and our department works on supporting this. However, once in a while, our department organizes our own CSR activities to provide opportunities for more employees to volunteer and to enhance organization-building.

Last March 19, the CSR team of our department organized an event for kids from the Children's Joy Foundation. We fetched 35 kids from their home in QC and took them to the La Mesa Eco-Park. Our activity was inspired by the reality TV series 'The Amazing Race' - five teams composed of kids and adult volunteers had to go through six different tasks before making their way to the pit stop. As such, we named our event "Amazing Race: Kids Edition". All tasks were all simple enough for the kids to do and were designed to maximize interaction and cooperation among the kids and the volunteers. The final task each team had to complete was putting together a simple jigsaw puzzle.

After all tasks were complete, food was served and prizes and loot bags were given to all the kids. I put together the loot bags and made sure that they had items that would help aid in the learning and development of the kids. As such, the loot bags contained pens, pencils, colored pencils, a notebook, modeling clay, an eraser, a sharpener, a small toy, and some biscuits. That way, they could enjoy these items even weeks after our event which would make the impact of our event more long-lasting than just on that day. Before we left La Mesa Eco-Park, the kids surprised us with a beautiful song number that expressed their gratitude to us and left a few volunteers teary-eyed.

It took a couple of months of planning, organization, and execution to pull off this event but in the end, it was a massive success. The 57 volunteers was the most we've ever had for a CSR event for our department and on our way home, I overheard a lot of kids say this was the most fun activity they ever had. One of the adult supervisors from Children's Joy Foundation sent me a text message thanking us and saying this was the first time the kids attended something like this and it made them truly happy. I'm just happy that I have the opportunity to be involved in efforts to give back to the community.

Lucky year?

In early February, I managed to catch a ponkan during a Chinese New Year lion dance while I was in Singapore. Apparently that meant I would have a lucky year. Well, it looks like I'm going to get even more good fortune.

I was in church last Sunday but there were no more seats inside so I stood outside, underneath a tree. Then, SPLAT! Something fell on my shoulder and when I look at it, I see bird droppings. Ugh! I had to clean the droppings with what I think was dirty water from a large water container in the restroom (there was no running water from the faucet) but it was the lesser of two evils. I made sure to get cleaned up right after mass. It is said though that having bird droppings fall on you is a sign of good luck. I guess my luck is already starting to show. The droppings could've fallen on my hair and not on my shirt. :)

Big eating

Food seems to be such a big part of my life nowadays. A lot of it. Started out with a buffet lunch in Heat on Saturday with my high school friends. Lia, Ferdie, and their son JC were in town and were staying in Edsa Shangri-La hotel so they suggested we just have lunch there. Joyce, Anna, Mitch and Aidan (plus Ferdie's sister) and I joined them and feasted on the wonderful spread of food in Heat. I think the buffet costs about P1,250++ which I felt was a good price for the quality and variety of food there, but lucky for us, Lia and Ferdie took the bill.

Immediately after lunch, I walk over to CPK in the Shangri-La mall to attend Lexi's first birthday party. Raffa and Joh always have really cool parties for their kids, and this was no exception. They had a kid-friendly puppet show with a whole variety of very colorful and entertaining puppets and someone who made the most clever and unique "balloon animals". They also prepared more than enough food for all the guests. I was still full but managed to have some pasta, pizza, and salad.

Later that night, I had dinner with Tim in Empire Deli in the Piazza in McKinley Hill. We opted to split a burger (50/50 I think it was called because it is a split between beef and bacon and it was pretty sizable) and a salmon dish. I had Eggs Benedict in Empire Deli before and I thought it was pretty good. The burger and the salmon were equally delicious. Looks like I will have to try the other items on their menu soon.

On Monday night, Joyce organized a night out with Lia and Ferdie since they were leaving in a few days. The initial plan was to go to Music Match in Ortigas Home Depot but a lot of people backed out at the last minute so it ended up being just Lia, Mitch, Joyce, and Iona (minus Anna who had already left for SG). Mitch suggested we just have dinner in her house and as is often the case, she prepared a lot of food, including lasagna. I love Mitch's lasagna, and I ended up stuffing myself silly with it plus a lot of the other dishes there.

I've said it before and I'm saying it again, I need to start hitting the gym again to make sure I don't start gaining too much weight. Its all talk right now, though, so I need a lot more discipline to make sure I lead a healthier lifestyle despite my very busy schedule.

Junior MasterChef Australia

One of my favorite TV shows now is Junior MasterChef Australia. I find cooking shows interesting to watch because (1) I love food haha and (2) it's amazing to see people's creativity and what they can come up with in a kitchen and under time pressure. So when you see kids ages 8 to 12 put together dishes that look like they can be served in a top-level restaurant.

The cool thing about this show as well is that the judges are very positive in their critiques without being patronizing to the kids. It would be so easy to overpraise the contestants because they are so young, and obviously you do get to hear a lot of compliments given out for fantastic dishes. And obviously, the contestants are still in their pre-teens so it doesn't make sense for the judges to give out scathing critiques. Instead, you get to hear the judges provide very constructive feedback to help the kids improve, like "if you had a bit more time and kept the pastry in the over a bit longer, it would've been perfect." The show really does maintain a very positive atmosphere and it focuses on the actual talents and output of the contestants. I wish more reality TV contests would take their cue from Junior MasterChef.

"Never miss a beat" by The Kaiser Chiefs

Ace tune from an ace band! And the video is pretty cool too. :) video uploaded in youtube by user LiberationMusicAus

Liverpool beat Man Utd!

Liverpool are not having a good season right now and the odds are slim that they make the top 4 and get into the Champions League next season. Still, this season has had a couple of high points. Beating Chelsea back in Feb was one of them. Thumping Manchester United is another. Woo-hoo! It was a convincing 3-1 win, with Liverpool the dominant team throughout the match. Man Utd managed to score a consolation goal at the 92nd minute but this result is a truly great result for Liverpool. While they may not have been stellar against lesser teams, they've managed quite well against the top tier teams. I just wish they could display a bit more consistency throughout the season. If they played this way most of the time, they'd be near or at the top of the league.

Keeping house

I've been staying in my place now for more than 5 years and I guess at some point things are bound to break down and need maintenance or repair. My flat is no exception. First to "go" was my bathroom sink. It started to get a bit clogged and I tried to de-clog it myself by pulling out stopper and clearing all the stuff that had accumulated there over the years. The only problem was that when I pulled out the stopper, a tiny piece of the pop-up assembly fell into the drain which prevented the stopper from popping up when I needed it to. I had to ask for a plumber to come in and fix it LOL.

Second was my microwave. It stopped working. Thankfully Whirlpool do home service so I didn't have to leave my house for them to take a look. Apparently my microwave keypad was broken and needed to be replaced. Cost including labor would be P1200++. Ouch. But well I guess that's better than buying a new microwave. So I had the defective keypad replaced a few days later.

Then I had to have my washer-dryer cleaned. I found that out when I went to use it one day and realized that the fabric conditioner I put into the tray in my last wash was still there. I had LA Germania service (which once again does home service) check out my washer-dryer and they said that my machine needed cleaning. It would take a week so I made sure I washed all my laundry before having them pick it up. They returned it the week after - cleaning cost P1,850 but I was thankful for the P500 discount since the quoted maintenance cost was P2,250 - and it was great to see my machine cleaning and drying my clothes better than it has in the last couple of years.

I also needed to replace a couple of light bulbs and have my aircon cleaned. So all in all a lot of stuff in my house that needed some sorting out. Took quite a big chunk out of my paycheck but it is nice to have things in order again.

My new iPod Touch

The major project I completed with dozens of other people at work a couple of months ago was a huge success, arguably our biggest success last year. It was a incredible effort but the great thing about it was that everyone who worked on it got a pretty snazzy gift. I was one of the dozen or so key contributors, and all of us ended up getting a 32Gb iPod Touch. Cool! I haven't been able to set it up yet, though. Hopefully, I manage to do that in the next few weeks. After all, it'll be a lot easier to use than my current iPod.

"Bartender" by Dave Matthews Band

One of my favorite DMB songs.


video uploaded in youtube by user mrneonshuffle

The song is a bit long but I love the passion in this song, especially when Dave wails from around 5:43 to 6:50. Awesome!