My 18th Birthday at Crown Regency

Last April 12, 2008 I celebrated my 18th birthday! Lolz! Any violent reactions? Well I consider myself 18 years old… 18 times 2 that is.. now do your mathematics! Hahaha! (TRIVIA: I celebrated my 18th bday on a Good Friday) Why did I choose Crown Regency to be the venue of my celebration? The place is safe and it can accommodate my family, friends and officemates. I also thought of the kids who love to swim, so this place is perfect for them.(FYI: there is no limit to the number of persons who would use the pool for free)

I would have opted not to celebrate because I have had so many expenses lately. I paid my annual life insurance fee of almost 10k and I'm still paying 2k monthly for the installment of my cellphone but I thought.. my birthday just comes once in a year so I deserve to celebrate with the people I love and care for. The room was worth P4300(but I was able to get a 20% corporate discount c/o the company that my sister works for).



I got a lot of help from my visitors who were willing to help me with the food. My brother Mark donated buko salad, my good friend Sharon donated shrimps, my officemate Jocel donated fresh vegetables for the chopseuy, Odrale a bottle of champagne, Karlo a jelly roll, and the rest bought 2 pcs lechon manok. Their donations were a big help to add to the food that I prepared for all the visitors.





I reminded my officemates to bring along some swim wear so they could swim in the pool or use the Jacuzzi but they don't feel like swimming. It was a good thing I took a Vacation Leave a day before my birthday so I could some sleep and help my mother prepare the food.





I was really happy coz my entire family was there (except for my bro in law who was in Manila for 2 weeks) and my best friend Jean was able attend my celebration. I invited her but did not expect she would be able to make it because of her busy schedule(she texted me asking for directions at around 5pm but an hour after there is still no trace of her so I expected she could not make it.. but she surprised me when she stepped inside the room with her son Ahren). Most of my officemates arrived at around 10pm ( duty? Hahahaha!). I asked my friend Sharon to bring her magic sing so we would have something to keep ourselves busy with throughout the night. I could not believe it I stayed up for more than 24 hours on the day of my birthday! Whoaaa! I was already awake 5:30am that Saturday and I was only able to sleep after all my officemates went home and after I ate breakfast, 8am Sunday.




It was good that it was kinda cloudy that Sunday morning coz the kids still had ample time to swim before we checked out. I would really like to thank all of those who remembered me on my birthday. To those who greeted me thru text, friendster, email, YM... I won't mention all your names.. mahirap na baka may makalimutan ako mag tampo pa.. hehehe.. also would like to give special mention to Sharon for the shrimps, Odrale for the champagne, Karlo for the jelly roll, Jocel for the fresh veggies, and to the rest of my officemates for the lechon manok... and of course Amie and Jay who helped me clean up the mess.. to Amie who cooked rice for our breakfast and to Jay who helped wash the dishes.. thank you so much from the bottom of my heart.

mOre PiX aNd sOmE viDeoS beLow

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Canibad, the Hidden Paradise

Last April 6, 2008, I had the opportunity to visit for the first time a very beautiful beach in the Island Garden City of Samal. This resort is known as Canibad and it is situated in Baranggay Aundanao in Samal.

It is quite a long trip going to this place. It takes about an hour from the pier in Babak to reach this place, not to mention the very rocky and steep roads that you will have to pass through. The kids who were with us kept complaining why the travel took us too long.

Plus you need to hike down a few meters from where you will park your car. It is not advisable to bring along pregnant women and old people who cannot manage going down and up coz it can be pretty exhausting. I myself had to stop several times to catch my breath as we were climbing our way back up on our way home.

This paradise is on the other side of the island of Samal and it is facing Mati Davao Oriental. I was playing with the white sand on my feet and i can feel the very fine white sand compared to the white sands in the other beaches in Samal that I have been to. If you love corals and shells then this is the place for you!

If you hate to travel by land, you also have the option to hire a private pump boat in Sta. Ana wharf. It would be best to travel with a large group to make the trip worth it, since you will have to pay P270 one way for the barge plus the gasoline that you will have to spend for that very long travel.

I would not advise taking a motorcycle ride going to that place after seeing the road that we traveled on. Hikers and mountaineers love this place. While we were there we saw several groups of mountaineers who passed by the place. It was a Sunday and several people were at the beach.

Protecting ourselves from sunburn with a very big umbrella!

with my good friend Sharon

kids looking for stones and corals at my back

with Tata (Sharon's Cousin)

OUR VIDEOS IN CANIBAD

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Proud of My Nephew

My nephew was given 3 special awards and a bronze medal for a meritorious award last Sunday at the CAP Auditorium during the Recognition Ceremony of his school Exegesis School of Davao.

He received awards for: Most Reliable, Most Thoughtful and Best in Reading. I am proud that my effort last summer of giving him tutorials and teaching him how to read paid off now that he is already very good at reading compared to other kids his age. It was good that he was trained of the phonetic sounds when he was still in Nursery.

As a tip to mothers who want to teach their kids to read, I would suggest that they start with the phonetic sounds then follow it up with A, E, I, O, U. After teaching them the vowel sounds, teach them by combining it to the consonants, meaning let them read ba be bi bo bu, da de di do du, fa fe fi fo fu, ga ge gi go gu, and so on… then slowly teach them to read words by combining it like SOFA, PAPA… it would of course be good if you buy a small blackboard and play with the kid so that they will enjoy while you are teaching them.

I made my 5-year old nephew read this post.. and below is the video of him while reading this blog post:

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Amie’s Birthday Celebrations

It was indeed a memorable birthday celebration for the celebrant Amie! The original plan was a beach outing but there were last minute changes and we ended up celebrating in a VIP room of Visa Videoke located at Victoria Plaza compound. We were supposed to occupy a 2k consumable room but there were problems with the player so we had to transfer to a bigger room that was supposed to be worth 4k.

It was good that they transferred us coz we certainly would not fit in that small room. Of course some people got groggy after a few shots of beer and started to do funny things. As usual, I had to settle for Cali coz of my allergy (thanks Amie for providing me with a can of Cali.. hehehe). One of our female companions kept dancing.. in fairness.. she was a good dancer.

The crowd went crazy and were screaming endlessly when Raquel belted out songs, not to be intimidated by the presence of 2 band singers. The center of the commotion was of course Jay when he started to sing his all time fave “Di ko na Mapipigilan” by the Sex Bomb Girls. We were shouting and teasing him as he sang and dance. We were even more surprised to see Joel stand up and dance in front of Jay for a very few seconds. It was the first time that we saw the very quiet and shy Joel do that.

The 2^nd celebration took place last Monday (the date of her birthday) at Amie’s residence. Her mom prepared a sumptuous meal for us.

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