The Intrepid Adventures of a Wayward Wandergurl

So far its been…

So I just woke up and am feeling incredibly lazy. I got up and just had a pack of chips (bad!) and two peanut butter slices. Am apparently recovering from last night’s after effects. Was planning to go to the gym today but I guess noooot! Maui has just left for her Christmas break in Manila so I have the room all to myself (yaaay!). As much as I love Maui there is nothing like solitude. I am an only child after all. Right now TL Chi is defrosting the freezer and finishing off our wine and we’re going to watch “Pretty in Pink”.

How have the past weeks been? I havent been able to update the blog as frequently as I would like, due to the lack of internet connection. I’ve resigned myself to the fact that we will never get a telephone and that for me to connect to the internet manually I will have to go to the boys place and use their telephone. In the meantime, its internet cafes for me. Thank God for memory keys.

Last night was the office Christmas party. Before I get into that, I must go into the events that lead to this evening. This week was pretty regular. I’ve found myself continously getting restless in the office, probably because its not busy enough. Here you can actually get everything that you set out to do done because no one interrupts you and im not used to that. The boys all had only 9 hours OT this DSR time, I still had 22 (I think this was because of *#&$&%^#% Resolution Bay). This week though, I haven’t done OT except for maybe an hour, twice, which for me is a big thing. The boys in Manila seem so bloody harrassed and we’re trying to take stuff away from them, but to no avail. They just keep getting these inpromptu things.
This week I had to take a split off to handle the Resolution Bay finals today. (Don’t ask what this is!) So fortunately, Lance & I aren’t due in until 4pm. My offs were Thursday and Sunday. There have been two days this week where all I did was totally crash and burn. As in I went home and slept through the entire afternoon – I think that was Tuesday – when I said I would go to the gym but never woke up. And Friday where I think I must have said exactly the same thing. Fortunately I was able to go the gym Wednesday. I walked to the gym Saturday as well, only to find that they’d closed early for the Christmas party… but more on that later.

Hey sister go sister go sister go! (aka Ang Kamandag ni JP)

Wednesday night my friend Car’s Uncle’s Best Friend Joseph, who had been introduced to me over text invited me to a despidida party at his house. Car gave me his number one desperate day when we couldn’t find a place in Cebu to gimmick and the boys ended up in “the gillage” (aka the village na nasa gilid ng office, thus the monicker, the gillage) to have some “dunzing” tonight. Joseph is gay, really funny, generous and helpful and an all around great guy. He’d given me advice on parlors to go to – entirely wonderful results, each time – restaurants, etc. So since he was going off for the holidays and we’d never met, I decided to go, taking Maui along with me. We ended up dragging JP (the L2 not the puput) along since we had no idea where it was and we felt it would be safer.

Joseph lives in a village in Banilad, in a house with two french people, Alexandra and Diom (?). They pay pretty good rent considering it’s a good sized house. He works for the same law firm my best friend Jenny works for in Manila and the Cebu branch happens to be in our building. The party was for his friend Mike, who was moving to head the spa in Shangri-La Dubai. (He previously ran the spa in Shangri-La Mactan) We spent the entire night mingling and having lots of alcohol. I managed red wine, some vodka, and some punch. With my ulcer in tow, I had only about four cups in total. Maui and JP packed a punch but we were all relatively sober. We met all these people – Serge, who runs a small 50 person call center, Bunny, who owns Oh Georg, a wonderful restaurant in Ayala (more on this later), Rachel, who owns Guiseppe’s this posh-ish resto near the boys’ house which they frequently nag us to eat in but we’ve never tried, and a whole darn lot of french people. We met this guy, Cheri, who runs an import or something business, Johann who is a french tutor somewhere south of the city – where I had no idea that french tutors were in demand! – and spoke Cebuano. His girlfriend was Marla, who we spent most of the night chatting with. She was Cebuana, still in college and she sang with a reggae/skaa band and gave us tips on beaches and places to eat and chill. We ate Guiseppe’s pizza (excellent), chips and got good tips as to where to go eat and hang.

The biggest hit of the night had to have been JP. In an entirely subtle manner that lead us to believe that most of the time he was not aware of what he was doing, he managed to chat up or be chatted up by every single French chick in the party, including a fourteen year old girl that we all thought looked at the very least, barely legal. Apparently we were all wrong and, despite the smoking and wine, she wasn’t legal at all. One of the french chicks even told him, “It’s so lonely here in the Philippines, I have to find a boyfriend.” (JP has her number) Being a naturally friendly person JP was having conversations and mingling with everyone… which lead to guys chatting him up without him noticing. He proved to be a hit on both sides of the ocean.


Why do you always find everything except what you’re looking for?

Thursday, Maui & I went shopping for the Christmas party because it was her off. We tried to find a dress for me but there really wasn’t anything nice on the racks. The dresses were all prom-y or, worse yet, in the kind of clingy lycra fabric that turns my tummy into a tiyany-tiyan. So never mind. I walked away with another mini-skirt, my shortest yet, I think, in black with the words KIKAY on the back in nice flirty little script, a whole lot of CDs and a pink embellished corset top from sari-sari to wear to the party. It took us a really long time to find it – two malls included – since there really wasn’t much to choose from. I even went to Rustan’s and was willing to shell out a large amount of money for desiner-esque (read: Jessica, colour eighteen or something) clothes but to no avail. Nothing. The teens/young people section in Rustans was probably the size of our room in Keppel. (The bedroom, not the living room) Everyone seemed really into sweaters besides, as I was looking for shorts as well, not thick furry things just yet.

I started out the day by paying all my bills – hello Globe! Hello Credit Card! – and am now debt free, except probably for the monthly gym free and the four hundred peso cd I got because the atm lines were too long. No matter, Im glad my huge bill is gone. Then I met up with Maui at SM where she changed her ticket, I checked my mail for a bit and then we booked an appointment at a spa. We had the volcanic stone massage which was absolutely worth it. It was 700 bucks (cheap given manila prices) and they put stones on our backs, legs, hands, which were absolutely warm and they helped improve circulation. The massage was great, too. It was so good Maui fell asleep and I could hear her snoring in the next room. After that we went to Ayala and that’s where I found my corset.

Friday I had another lovely ulcer attack which reduced me to eating chicken stars soup and crackers. Saturday I woke up for work to find Banana had just arrived with Jon from another gimmick at Vudu, and they were about to watch dvds. When I got home that day he was still there, wearing the same thing as apparently he drunk so much beer he fell asleep on the couch and didn’t wake up until then, prompting me and Banana to rib him to no end because “yun pa rin ang suot mo!”. I went off to the gym, did a little trashy romance novel shopping, came back as the gym was closed and found him gone because according to Banana, “hindi na niya ma take na maabutan mo pa siya na ganun pa rin ang suot niya!”.

Dead Bugs & Forts

In lieu of my gymming I decided to try out one of the exercises in my National Geographic Adventure. Having taken pilates before, I thought it would be a good idea to try one of the moves described there. The move was called the dead bug, which involved you lying on your back with both your legs and arms straight up in the air and then you move your left leg down and your right arm down simultaneously slowly. Without hitting the ground you move them up again and then switch legs and arms. You do it about 8 reps. It requires some coordination but not much and it fucking hurts your core when you start out. I wasn’t expecting it to have that much impact, which is why I was slightly writhing in surprise from the slight pain.

At which point I called Banana to tell her what I was doing. Now in fairness to myself I was doing it right but I must have looked entirely hilarious lying on the ground of my bedroom floor with legs and arms in the air (Oliv are you reading this?!?! You had better try this at home, in honour of our efforts at pilates!) with my fingers and toes spread out like a dead person, prompting Banana to burst into gales of laughter going, “Hindi mo pa madikit yung mga daliri mo, ano ba yan!”. Of course she had to go and try it and having no coordination she couldn’t get her arms and legs to match. Then she had to go and tell Cathy and Gae who were eating Jollibee in the dining room and I had to explain the whole Dead Bug thing all over again, and more hilarity ensued.

Banana and I seem to have many moments of hilarity together. I think the most priceless moment for her is the one about the forts. One day, we were having lunch and I was walking around the living room and eating at the same time, which I do when I’m restless, and I was looking out our massive windows at the lovely views from all angles. Looking towards the port area, I said, being the history nerd that I am, “Nani, why aren’t there any forts?”. And of course Banana drew a complete blank and not being familiar with my history nerdoks thing combined with the fact that I was walking around and eating, she had this impression that I was drunk without any alcohol. “What forts?” she said. “Well,” I pressed on, “this used to be a Spanish colony and they you know, had lots of enemies. How come there arent any forts in the port area, I mean shouldn’t they have had forts to defend themselves?” pause. Banana, as she said later, was at a loss for words, prompting her to reply, “Maybe they’re in Mactan.” (on the other side of the island) at which point I argued that it was a major waterway before finally concluding that they were either gone or in Mactan. I will admit that if you don’t know that I have major moments of history nerdoksness you will find this conversation weird. Banana of course just found the entire episode drunkenly hilarious and will bring it up given the opportunity. I think, though, that my question made sense although it would have been best brought up in more academic circles, which I will do next time I find a freaking historian :P

Anyway, later that Saturday the boys called as we were supposed to go out. Banana didn’t want to go out until much much later so I finished a trashy novel while waiting for her to get up. The boys were really insistent about going to Vudu – since they hadn’t gone the week before, we’d all been too tired – so they kept calling. When we finally got dressed at around eleven, they had given up and Lance was already asleep. I felt that they could have gone ahead, since well, you know we could have found each other there anyway, and besides I didn’t want to stay too long, as I am more of a chiller than a clubber. In the end, the boys slept, I read another trashy novel and Banana… went to work.


Kick up your heels!

Sunday dawned bright and early, as I am Maui’s alarm clock so I got her up at 5am. I knocked out again and missed mass because the only morning mass I knew was at 11am. I had lunch with Roy at Oh Georg’s where we had bacon & mushroom dip, 2 different kinds of pasta – Pasta di Marco (really salty, I only had a tiny bit) with capers and tinapa, Beef Lasagna – Salad, and dessert. We were joined by JR & Lance who were in search of formal party clothes. JR finished off my pasta while Roy had cheesecake and I had the charlie brown – peanut butter with oreo cookies in a cheesecake. Lance had been trying to find himself a decent top for the party but he couldn’t find any in his size so while the boys went off in search of party clothes (I was honestly relieved to find out that I wasn’t the only one having a hard time) and to check out the car show, I went to buy girlie stuff.

After fielding numerous troublesome calls about Super #$#%$#%$# Grover (don’t ask what this is either) I ended up going to the office to check my mail for a bit before heading off to JY with Maui to go to the parlor. We ended up in Bridges, another one of Joseph’s great recommendations, where we had stuff done for the company Christmas party. It took about two hours, and I ended up with bright shiny pink toes to match my corset and a lovely french tipped manicure and brushed & blow dryed hair, among other things. Maui grabbed take out at Mc Donald’s and we headed home to get dressed and changed to make it in time for the presentation.

Our group, TSBU had prepared Moulin Rouge. Mirrel, our housemate was going to play Satine (nicole kidman) and Veejay, this TL from Bulldog was going to play Ewan Mc Gregor. Oka, trainer extraordinaire was Harry Zidler, and several of the TLs/L2s from the group were dancing as well. Mirrel had several costume changes including a corset and pair of high boots that I had to have sent from Manila, thanks to Alnair. We were all imagining the site of a butchy squat guy carrying a bag with a corset and high heeled boots in the airport, as apparently he had had to hand carry the whole thing. Thanks to Alnair, Mirrel had something to wear for the first act.

When we got to Waterfront hotel we made it just in time for the raffle. The biggest prizes were a trip to Boracay for two and an overnight stay at the Shang. Unfortunately we didn’t win anything, not even the plantsa or the industrial size electric fan. (Imagine taking that home.) We had a pretty okay buffet, then they had the first team presenting, Stealth, who did the Grammy Awards complete with a pseudo Britney Spears who sang Toxic and got lifted into the air – still singing – ala Lovliness. The other groups were Stealth, who did a nice tweetums-esque Grease number and the Support Group where three men dressed in drag did a variety of gay theme songs including “It’s raining men”, “I will survive”, etc.

When our turn came, our group did “Diamonds are Forever,” “Rhythm of the Night,” “Elephant Love Medly,” “Hindi Said Diamonds,” and “Come What May.”. They came complete with belly dancing esque costumes and winner dancing. Oka’s impression of a pimp was priceless, complete with expressions and the boys turned out to be pretty good dancers, especially Dyl aka “Loverboy” complete with acrobatics. The Dyl & Dih partnership turned out well. All the girls were great dancers and the image of Mirrel in a corset complete with fur scarf drag thingy surrounded by boys in bow ties will forever be a winning but hilarious (boys in bow ties?!?!) image for me.

Of course we won. After all the presentations were over there was some dancing involved, where loverboy and Dih showed off their dancing prowess, Lance did his dance thing with his hand in the air as if to simulate flying, JR stood there and watched and everyone else sort of bobbed around. It was fun even if my heels had no grip and I was forced to limit my steps even if it didn’t stop me from jumping up and down at certain points.

At some point Maui, Roy, Lance, JR & I headed over to Tinderbox for some chillin’. They have a deli and an excellent Wine Cellar and Cigar Bar where the waiters all know what they’re talking about. When I asked for wine recommendations they gave pretty good ones, resulting in an excellent Australian Merlot. Roy had a chocolate cigar and we all had fondue. Kenman joined us for a bit and the girls (Goldine, Russel, Joy, Migs) all passed by on the way to Vudu. Maui & I enjoyed ourselves but I think the boys were rather restless because a) it wasn’t beer (or Tanduay) and b) there was no dancing involved so they headed off to Vudu while we headed home to chill. I knocked right out while Maui packed for her flight, which was in the next few hours.