Anilao, here we come!

With the wedding season winding down (or baka dahil konti na lang ang kliyente kong naka-book this march... hahaha!), I'm finally getting the rest I badly need. I feel that i wasn't able to properly rest since October when Jojie was hospitalized. I've been asking Jojie for a weekend away since December but our schedules just can't fit a three-day vacation. So I waited and I waited and I waited until it finally arrived! We're both free from March 3 to 5. Yey! So the next step was just to decide where we're going... Hahaha!

At first, we wanted Villa Escudero. But then not-so-good reviews from my mom and Jojie's dad made us change our minds. With Cebu Pacific's promo, pareho halos ang gagastusin namin sa Villa Escudero and Boracay so we decided to go to Bora instead! I spent one whole day jut researching on the flights but then I had to give up kasi no available flights na with the dates that we wanted. :(

Our next choice was Bohol. But same with Boracay, no flights na rin. :(

By then, I just wanted to go anywhere kahit na malapit lang so I told Jojie Baguio na lang. He didn't like it kasi kakapunta lang daw namin several months ago. He wanted Tagaytay. Ayoko nga! Feeling ko kasi wala namang pwedeng gawin dun. Jojie then said na gusto niya pala may dagat then he suggested Anilao. Since I also love the beach (remember my beach-themed wedding?), I immediately agreed and started my quest of finding the perfect resort.

My research (read: pagtatanong sa N@Wies) led me to Eagle's Point Resort. I was really excited when I saw their website. Perfect for me yung idyllic beach. So I immediately called them and made reservations for the two of us. Yipeee!

So we're leaving on the 3rd which is next Friday and as early as now, I'm planning the things to bring and the things to buy (hahaha!). I'm really so excited!

:)

Our Vigan Adventure

May 29, 2005

Our trip to Vigan was actually a side trip of our trip to Candon City. We needed to go to Candon because Jojie had a meeting there on a Monday so we decided to leave for Ilocos on Friday night to be able to spend some time in Vigan.

We took a bus to Vigan after breakfast at Jollibee in Candon. The trip was an hour and a half long. When we got to Vigan, we had no idea where to go or what we could do so we just asked the bus conductor to drop us off at the plaza.

We went directly to the church, said our prayers (and wishes, too), and asked for directions to their information office. No one we asked knew what we were talking about so Jojie and I decided to just walk around. Thankfully, we found the Information Office so we were to get a map and a list of the must-see places.

Armed with the map and with the bilin of the tourist officer, we hired a kalesa to bring us around the city.

First stop: The main street. Manong kalesa brought us to the main street with the Spanish houses and the cobble stones. Ang cool! We were able to have a few pictures taken and Jojie bought me a body bag in the color of our wedding motiff!

Second stop: The pottery places. Manong kalesa took us to the barangay where the main livelihood is pottery making. Nakakatuwa kasi pag tinignan mo yung lupa pula talaga! So it comes as no surprise that people there decided to make pottery their way of living.

Third stop: Hidden Garden. A really nice garden na parang Sonyas ang dating with wishing wells and water falls.

Fourth stop: Baluarte... The house of Chavit Singson. It has a mini zoo with peacocks and eagles and monkeys and crocodiles and tiger and little ponies. We even got free pony rides! A must-mention detail of the Baluarte is the giant mahjong tiles surrounding the veranda! Hahaha! Sugarol talaga!

By then, our kalesa ride has lasted for more than two hours so we asked manong kalesa to bring us back to the Plaza.

Of course, being the not-really-fond-of-food-couple that we are (hahaha! right!), we had to eat in Vigan. At first we just wanted to eat at the church-inspired McDonalds (with the bell tower, take note) but we figured that since we were there, we might as well try out the local fare. So we trekked to the main street again and decided to try out Cafe Leona, a restaurant in one of the old Spanish houses.

We ordered Bagnet and Pinakbet... ang sarap pala nun! Bagnet is basically lechon kawali na mas malasa served with kamatis, sibuyas, at bagoong isda. As for pinakbet, masarap pala yun! You see, I am not really fond of pinakbet before (did not eat it, in fact)but ever since tasting pinakbet here, I would always order pinakbet whenever Jojie and I are eating out. :)
After filling ourselves with the famous Ilocano cuisine, we hailed a tricycle to bring us to the bus station so we can go back to Candon. So endeth our one day Vigan adventure!

CANDON: We had fun in Candon, too. Stayed at Smurf cottages, which was actually a motel! ;) The highlight of our stay was the time Jojie and I went to the beach (the sand was black!) and the wind and the waves were so strong that we had a hard time staying in one place. We held hands the whole time with Jojie saying “Hindi tayo pwedeng padala sa agos, hon! Kaya natin ito!” :)

Baguio Trip

May 1 to 2, 2005

This was a sort of an impromptu vacation. Jojie and I were supposed to go to Candon for a meeting there but it got cancelled. At the last minute, we were told that he has a meeting in Pangasinan instead and since his meeting is early Monday morning, we decided to spend a night in Baguio. :)
We went to the Victory Liner station in Cubao early in the morning hoping to catch the first bus out. To our irritation, fully booked sila until mid-morning! Grabe naman pala ang Victory Liner. So Jojie and I went to their branch in Pasay since the dispatcher in the Cubao branch said that we'd be able to catch an earlier bus there. Anyway, to make a long story short, we were able to catch a bus and we arrived in Baguio around two o'clock in the afternoon, just in time for our check-in at Hotel Veniz, our favorite Baguio hotel. :)

Since we were pretty hungry by the time we were able to check-in, we went straight to Veniz Grill where there's yummy Mongolian Barbecue. :) Syempre pagkain muna! Hahaha!

After eating, we went straight to... where else... SM City! :) I love SM Baguio! I love its architecture and the fact that its not airconditioned. I enjoy lounging in the veranda and just enjoying the Baguio view. Although some of our friends think it's a bit silly to travel six hours just to go to SM (and if truth be told, we also find this sily :)), who cares? :)

We went around the mall. Since I had to email someone, I went to find a net cafe while Jojie played games in the arcade. Before I met up with him again, I passed by Booksale and bought Dreamcatcher, a book by Stephen King. I figured it’ll help me relax. After that, we just fooled around by taking pictures and eating choco rocks in the veranda. Kakatawa si Jojie kasi binabato niya yung mga nasa baba kasi raw bato yung kinakain namin! :)

Early Monday morning, after the hotel breakfast buffet (pwede na pero mas masarap yung last time), Jojie and I proceeded to Victory Liner where he had to catch a bus to go to Pangasinan for his meeting. I proceeded to Seattle’s Best in SM to wait for him.

Once in SBC, I ordered Moccha Javakula and just passed time reading. After a couple of hours, I walked back to the hotel, buying manggang hilaw at bagoong along the way. This is what I love about Baguio… the streetfoods! This is the only place where I can buy binatog and mais and manggang hilaw anytime I want. Haaay! Yummy!

When Jojie arrived, the news was not so good, his meeting didn’t go very well so we decided, so as not to totally waste our time here, to extend our trip. So instead of checking out and going home, we decided to stay another day (actually another half-day since we had to check-out at 12midnight so Jojie can go to the office). Yipee! :)

The first thing we did was… you guessed it… eat Mongolian again! Hahaha! After which we took a cab to Camp John Hay. We just asked the cab to drop us anywhere and luckily, he dropped us near the miniature golf course. Where we played the whole 18 holes. Jojie won by 9 strokes. We didn’t really compute it using the par-par scores coz we didn’t know how! Hahaha!

After our miniature golf game, we had merienda at Chocolate de Batirol just beside the miniature golf. Batirol, we learned, is a 19th century blender used to mix hot chocolate. We ordered bibingka at tsokolate… ang yummy!!!!

After eating, we went around the restaurant and took several pictures. Ang ganda nung lugar. It was actually a garden with nooks and tables. Ang ganda talaga. :)

After eating, we walked around John Hay. We would have had more energy to cover more ground if only my husband didn’t think of this really silly way to tire himself out. He wanted me to catch a picture of him airborne so he repeatedly jumped and I repeatedly had to take a picture of him until we got the perfect shot.

After about thirty jumps, we got it! :) It was worth all the trouble just seeing my honey happy to get that perfect airborne picture of him. Yun nga lang, after all those jumping around, pagod na siya and he wanted to go home na! Hahaha! So we took a cab back to the hotel and settled in for the night.

Pero syempre, hindi dun nagtatapos ang istorya. About 7pm, my ever-hungry handsome hubby wanted to eat again so we went down to Veniz Grill again and ate eat-all-you-can Mongolian Barbecue for the third time in two days! :)

We checked out at midnight to catch a bus back to Manila. It was a short yet a very romantic and sweet vacation. :)

Bangkok honeymoon

Note: For our anniversary (yiheee! one year na kami!), I gave Jojie a travelogue -- an account of the travels we had made in our first year. So I'm just publishing what I wrote there since tagal ko na ito promise sa sarili ko.

===

Looking back, I realize that our trip to Bangkok was one of the happiest times of my life. That was when it really dawned on me that we were really married. Six years, six months, and ten days after we first met (we first met June 8, 1998), we were on our way to "happily ever after". What could be more super than that?! :)

Our official honeymoon started with a two-hour delayed flight -something which would have irritated a lot of people but not us. We were on our way to Bangkok! After thinking that all we could afford was a trip to Baguio, we were actually going to board a plane to have our honeymoon in another country!

We walked around the airport the whole time. It was our first plane trip together and we were both very excited! Ang dami naming pictures na kinailangan naman naming burahin kasi konti na space sa camera! Haha! :) Because of the delay, the airline provided sandwiches and drinks before going onboard. Sayang, nag-dinner na kami! But, of course, we still availed of the free food! Hehehe! We played thumb wrestling while waiting for our turn to board. This was one of the first things I liked about Jojie and our relationship. We can be anywhere and not be bored because we'd amuse ourselves by playing thumb wrestling or sawsaw suka or pitik bulag.

We got to Bangkok around 1am, local time. Our tour guide, Gina, met us at the airport together with the others who availed of the same tour. She dropped us off our hotel (it turned out that we were the only ones staying in Bayoke Suites) after making arrangements for the city tour the following day.

Our room was so-so. We didn't take pictures kasi feeling naman sayang! Hahaha! It was supposed to be a one-bedroom suite but instead of having a receiving room and a bedroom, we have a bedroom opening up to another bedroom. Weird! Also, the reception desk staff on duty that night was not very accommodating and he said that the room he gave us was the only available room with a queen size bed and since that size of the bed was a priority ;) we were okay with our "two-bedroom suite".
Breakfast the following morning was good! At least, dito sulit yung binayad namin. The Bayoke Suites was the tallest building in all of Bangkok and I guess for that reason (and for its cheap price), they have many foreign guests. The breakfast buffet, then, consisted of international and continental food. We ate so much that morning (and actually all mornings of our stay there) that we never had to eat lunch during our stay there. Hahaha!

The half-day city tour consisted of trips to millions of Buddha images! Hahaha! Exagg! Seriously now... :)

First stop: The first stop of the city-tour was Wat Trimit, the temple of the Golden Buddha. At 10 feet high and weighing 5 1/2 tons according to our guide, the statue of the Golden Buddha was amazing! It was covered in plaster during the Burmese invasion in order to protect it. They (whoever was trying to protect it) must have protected it more than they intended because they forgot that it was actually made of 18 karat gold! It was only in the 1950's when the statue was accidentally dropped that the plaster in the nose of the image was chipped and they (a different set of people now, of course) discovered the gold underneath! Cool eh! :)

Second stop: The second stop was again another wat. We didn't take any pictures kasi feeling namin pare-pareho naman! Hahaha! But we were able to ring the bells. From what we gathered, the bells are used by the monks. For what purpose, we don't really know. :) We wanted to do Third stop: The third stop was Wat Pho, the largest and oldest Wat in Bangkok (by then Jojie and I have deduced that "wat" means "temple"). Wat Pho was mainly famous for housing the Reclining Buddha, a really huge, huge, HUGE gold-plated Buddha image! The reclining Buddha is 46 meters long and 15 meters high, and illustrates the passing of the Buddha into nirvana. The feet and the eyes are engraved with mother-of-pearl decoration.

Wat Pho is also famous for having the most number of Buddha images. 1000 plus ata. Imagine!
It was in Wat Pho where we saw a group of monks in orange monk robes. Jojie wanted to have his picture taken with them but we were too shy to ask them. When we finally had the courage to ask them, they were already gone. :(

Fourth stop: Leather shop. We didn't know that Bangkok was famous for its leather products. The fourth stop was in this leather shop which featured designer leather stuff. Of course, this is all a ploy to have us shop but it was okay since they also taught us how to distinguish genuine leather from fake ones. Also, we were able to buy an RL wallet for Daddy (Jojie’s dad) so the trip to the shop was okay.

Fifth and last stop: Gem Emporium. I was never one to drool over jewelry. In fact, I never had the urge to buy jewelry. Seeing the diamonds in this shop, however, made me want to spend money -- big, big amounts of money -- on diamonds and sapphires! The sparkle and the glitter of the stones were amazing! As in super, super, super kumikinang! Nakakalula! But, of course, since Jojie and I were clear on the no-shopping policy (aside from the fact that we didn’t have enough money with us anyway to buy diamonds, mwahahaha!), I was able to resist the urge to buy! Am proud of myself. :)
After the gem emporium, Gina asked the driver to drop us off the Grand Palace. The Grand Palace was not part of the tour but since this is a must for every tourist, syempre punta kami dun even without a guide.

The Grand Palace was formerly the residence of the Thai royal family. Ang laki, laki, laki niya! The place was simply overwhelming!

The Grand Palace adjoins Wat Phra Kaew, the most important temple in Thailand since it houses the Emerald Buddha, the most revered Buddha image.

After our very tiring tour inside the Palace, Jojie and I decided to explore the streets across. We window shopped and then we decided to eat real Thai food ("real" kasi nasa Thailand talaga eh! Hahaha!)! So we entered a restaurant / pub (which we were pretty sure turned into a bar at night) and ordered food. We were so excited to eat and when the food arrived, we weren't disappointed... super yummy!!!

After eating, we took a taxi back to the hotel. Hay, parang Pilipinas din yung mga taxi dun! Lolokohin ka rin kung kaya. :(

We met with Gina again after an hour or so. I forgot to mention that in between the second and third stops, we asked Gina how to go to the nightclubs which features the dancing Thai girls. Instead of giving us directions to the place, she arranged a tour for us and for whoever who wanted to go with us (syempre siningil niya kami ng mahal!). Most of the people in our group also wanted to go so Gina set the time when she'll pick us up from the hotel.

Before going to Patpong, Bangkok's red-light district, we went to Suan Lum Night Bazaar first. Grabe! Dito ang sarap mag-shopping! Everything we were looking for before the wedding to buy for the house was there! As in! Parang dun kinukuha ng Real Living lahat ng naka-feature sa kanila. If only we had the money (kasi gusto na naming bilhin lahat!) and the means to bring all those stuff back home, we would have shopped till we dropped!

In spite of our self-imposed no-shopping policy, Jojie and I bought an outfit each. Ang ganda-ganda nung pinili niya for me! That's also one of the things I like about my husband, he has really nice taste in clothes. And of course, as usual, the outfits we bought were very similar (this is one of Jojie's kabaduyan, he likes it when our clothes match :)).

After our Suan Lum adventure, we met with the whole group again to go to Patpong. Gina bought us to a hidden nightclub. I say hidden because it didn't have signs. It looked like a normal run-down house outside but inside, it's a club with a stage, colored lights, and even a dancing pole!

The show that we watched was just plain shocking! Jojie exclaimed "Put**g ina!" several times while watching the girls slice bananas, smoke, throw darts, draw, and shoot pingpong balls using their pussies! Personally, the most shocking for me was the part where a dancing girl casually pulled a really long nylon rope from inside her pussy... this would have been nothin-out-of the ordinary but the nylon rope had blades tied to it ever 12 inches or so! The finale was sex between a man and a woman and believe me when I say there was absolutely nothing sensual about what they were doing. It looked like they were just really doing it for the show which I'm sure was the case anyway.
We went home that night with me feeling a bit under the weather. So we had to tell Gina to cancel our Dream World trip for the following day.

Wednesday, day two of our honeymoon. Ayan na, I woke up with a slight fever. After breakfast, Jojie went out in search of medicine for me. Kawawa naman asawa ko, ni walang makapagturo sa kanya ng matino kung nasan yung drugstore. Wala kasing marunong mag-ingles sa hotel eh.
We stayed in the hotel room the whole morning and most of the afternoon just resting. It was probably the stress of wedding preps and the wedding day itself catching up. Kaines naman sa Bangkok pa ako naabutan ng sakit! But it was okay, at least we were able to just lie down. It was a really good thing that we scheduled a four day stay, at least we had the luxury of having one day to rest.

Late afternoon, Jojie and I ventured out by ourselves. Baiyoke was in the middle of Pratunam area, THE shopping district of Bangkok. Imagine Divisoria. Now imagine it cleaner, twice more siksik, and four times larger. That's Pratunam for you. Actually, when I stopped and looked at the clothes for sale, I realized that this is really where all the biyaheras go to buy clothes they sell in Divi. Ang galing at ang mura-mura! But since I'm not much into clothes anyway, standing in the middle of millions of clothing items didn't affect me at all. :) Jojie and I just walked and walked. Armed with our reliable Bangkok tourist map, we went malling and then afterwards looked for Chid Lom Street, a street we passed by the night before and which we promised ourselves we'd explore. We reached Chid Lom, a relatively uppity street. When we were tired walking, we rested by having coffee in, where else... Starbucks! Hahaha! We stayed in starbucks for less than an hour and walked back to the hotel. And that endeth our second day.

The following morning, we had an early breakfast (syempre super dami na naman naming kinain like the last two days! Mwahahaha!) and then we waited for Gina's driver to pick us up. Today was our schedule to go to Dream World, an amusement park located in Pattaya, a couple of hours from Bangkok. Ever since we knew we were going to Bangkok, I spent hours and hours researching what we were going to do (that was why we made sure that we would get to visit Grand Palace and get to eat in a real Thai restaurant, as opposed to just those frequently visited by tourists). I had to choose between Dream World and an animal place (parang zoo na may shows and stuff... can't even remember what it's called). Since Jojie's very fond of roller coasters, we chose Dream World. We actually made arrangements on our own with Dream World but since Gina offered to arrange something for us, we figured it would be easier. At least with Gina, we'd be sure that the driver spoke English.

We arrived in Dream World and immediately started exploring the place. We were like kids, riding all the rides that we could and going to all the shows that were open. The day passed by in a blur. Ang saya-saya lang!

I enjoyed the Giant’s house of Jack and the Beanstalk. Sobrang nakakaaliw kasi ang laki-laki ng lahat ng gamit. Pang-giant nga eh! Hahaha!

Jojie rode the Anchors Away ride alone kasi takot akong samahan siya. Also, if I rode, he would have forced me to ride in the dulong part of the ship. Call me a coward but the last time he was able to trick me into riding that particular ride, gusto ko nang bumaba in the middle of the ride at gusto ko siyang awayin kasi tuwang-tuwa siya samantalang pakiramdam ko mamamatay na ako! Hahaha!

I think the highlight of the day was the Snow Town. It was this huge place where there was snow and we tobogganned!!! Nakakatakot pala yun! Ang bilis-bilis kasi ng pagbaba!!! Jojie enjoyed it immensely but that was to be expected because he loves thrill rides.

We spent the whole day just like that… playing like kids. We rode basically all the rides and watched all the available shows. Kahit nga yung mga walang kwentang vintage cars kunyari, di namin pinatawad. Hahaha!

Oh yeah, the Dream World package included buffet lunch but the food was so yucky that all we managed to eat were the fruits. :(

We also shopped. Jojie bought this really nice shirt with elephant print. Ang cool! My husband’s so gwapo! :)

We went to the pick-up place at 4pm. When we got back to the hotel, we just rested for a bit and walked around again. This time, we were able to explore the Pratunam Center and the shopping districts. We had dinner at KFC, Jojie’s most favorite chicken but oh no! the Thai version of KFC doesn’t have gravy. We had to buy gravy separately and their gravy didn’t even taste so good. Beech!

After dinner, we had coffee at Starbucks again, had my picture taken with the Ronald McDonald statue (the Thai Ronald has his hands held together in the traditional Thai gesture of respect, cool!), and generally just walked around. We went back to the hotel by riding the Tuktuk, the Thai version of a tricycle.

The following day was Friday, December 24, Christmas eve! Our flight was in the afternoon so for the last time, we ventured out and bought some pasalubong for our family. We bought shirts and Thai sampalok.

Gina’s driver picked us up in the afternoon and drove us to the airport and that endenth our romantic and very memorable Bangkok honeymoon. :)

Welcome back to me!

Hehehe! :)

Haven't blogged for ages. So much has happened. Have tried blogging a few times but, I dunno, I'd always end up just deleting what I wrote.

Anyway, will really, really, REALLY try to blog more since this really relaxes me. I just hope that I get enough time but since the wedding season is soon over, matatapos na rin ang mga weddings ko! More time for myself! Mwahahaha!

:)