twas the week before Christmas...

its been quite a busy week before Christmas spent at the North (no, not Pole - hehe)...

first stop, Labey- to deliver some Christmas cheer and books for the school library :) a landslide went through the town and the school of Labey last year during typhoon pepeng. they are still rebuilding a year later but it is nice to see them smiling and celebrating again :)

books were mostly donated by twinpopats and her friends :)


a makeshift classroom at Labey school while the new one still being built...


happy Christmas kids :)




next stop, a 3-day bike ride around the mountains of Benguet - with looong downhills, steeep uphills, the most beautiful views and the friendliest villages :)

resting at naguey


looking back at the view after a long and steep uphill...


resting at the top...


stopping by the river at pasdong for a swim :)


the river actually looks like the marsyangdi in nepal!


spent the night at pasdong, a village in the middle of a valley, surrounded by mountains and ricefields... and with a basketball court right in the middle of nowhere :)




beautiful view of terraces on the next morning's ride...


cheery sunflowers waiting at the top of a veeeery long and steep portion...


the view from inuman...


our home on our second night at boklaoan


view from our window...


finally at kapangan, before heading back to baguio...


so who was i with this whole week? mystery man! ha! :)

azkals !!!!!!

last night, i watched our team draw the initially dominating myanmar team during the suzuki cup...

here's our cute, 6'3" goalie neil ethridge as he gets to the ball...

i must say, what a good looking team we have!!! from what i'm picking up from the commentators, a lot of them are from the UK... perhaps with filipina mums?

here are highlights from the game that made them famous... the li'l team beating the defending champs! (check out our cute team)

the vietnamese coach was such a sore loser...

and i quote:

"Football is not this, football is not putting eight players in front of the area with no offensive system...

...If they think they can win the championship bsed on that then poor football. If the Philippines think they can win playing that way then my dear, poor, poor football in this region."

read the whole article here.

here's the coach refusing to shake the hand of our (cuter and better-dressed) coach.

PFFFFFT!

with the draw with myanmar last night, we move on to the semis!

usually, semi-finals games are home-and-away... but it seems like we don't have a decent stadium to host ours here.

We don't meet the FIFA standards... so looks like the games on Dec 16 and 19 will be away-and-away.

SAD!

read more about it here.

i thought it'll be in panaad stadium in bacolod?

we'll know soon enough.

BUT i must say, it's really great that football is finally gaining some momentum here. we belong to football, and not basketball.

AND it's also so heartwarming to watch the game and route for, yes, your OWN team!

Go Philippines!

pam

last sunday, i went to the opening of PAM, or the pinto art museum.

can you imagine pinto now looks like this???

it's a sprawling spread of galleries, open spaces and gardens...

some of the galleries...

the museum shop...

a pocket garden.... looove the leeroy scuplture. can you spot it?

watching the auction at the pinto gallery from above...

a few auction pieces...

thought you might like this one called "babaylan"...

let's go!!! it's totally worth the trip :)

bye bye bed

i kinda felt bad having to say goodbye to our very first purchase as a married couple...

we've replaced it with this...

but we're a longs way from achieving the look of our peg.

will keep you posted!

dream big!

taking a break from the holiday rush (and from our blog delinquency!) by sharing you what was shared with us.

a few weeks back, i had a friend arnel casanova come to our office to share his story with us.

if there's anyone who can say that ANYTHING IS POSSIBLE, it's him.

he was born into a very poor family,

and against all odds, he was able to finish school...

learning english through the old pages of old Newsweek magazines that were used to wrap fish in the market he worked in as a child...

working in a bakery (to get through college), and sleeping on its floors since he had nowhere to stay...

all this (and more) didn't stop him from succeeding...

and when i say "succeed", i mean

graduating with flying colors,

getting a law degree

(while working for a law degree, winning an honorary award from President Ramos for some peacekeeping work he had done),

... and yes... getting a degree in Harvard.

anything IS possible!

read more about him here.

i saw red

binondo, november 2010

kalesa at tasty dumplings...


eng bee tin


cheongsam


art deco street posts


asado chong fan at wai ying


egg tarts


pot belly



altar


el hogar


malate church fountain


my little tribute to manila :)