Filed under events
I’ve been following American Idol since Season 3, but I never thought that I would ever get to watch it live. The Season 10 finalists came to the Philippines for the first time for their tour, and I was able to watch them for free! 
Here’s my proof:
I was randomly checking Plurk when Ade said that he was giving away a ticket to the American Idol concert that night to the first person who would reply. Of course I said that I wanted to go. I was the first to reply, but I really didn’t expect anything. I mean, Plurk is where people balahura each other. No one takes anyone seriously there. XD
But, a few minutes later he sent me instructions on how to pick up the ticket. It was real! I couldn’t believe my luck. I kept asking really? really? to make sure. I didn’t have time anymore to go home and get a camera, so I went straight to Araneta Coliseum. I was even more pleased when I found out that my seat was in the lower box, and on the side, near the stage! I am near-sighted, so it was really great to get a good look at the finalists from where I sat.
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Filed under travel
I just checked my Lakbayan grade again after so long, and I was surprised to see that I have been promoted! I used to be only a C last year, from being a C- three years ago. It’s not easy pulling up scores in Lakyaban, so my few trips this year must have pulled a lot of weight. 
Next on the bucket list: Baguio-Sagada (it’s embarrassing to admit but yes, I haven’t been there), Mindoro, Samar-Leyte, Siargao, and the Zamboanga peninsula. A friend is inviting me to tag along with him and immerse with the Mangyans in Mindoro, and my Trippers friends are planning a long road trip to Samar next summer, so yay!
There are still so many places I want to see, and so many things I want to do. I want to explore Asia next, the backpacker way. I really really want to go backpacking. I’ve been travelling for awhile now, but I was always just a tourist, the kind who goes to the usual places that people go to, takes photos, and buys souvenir items to take home. Something changed this year, though. I’m bored with resorts. I now prefer to sleep in a tent, to get myself dirty, to be inconvenienced. Still, backpacking needs funding because I’d have to leave my life behind for awhile.
Kaya universe, pahinging pera please!
Filed under current events, opinion, personal
I was up until 4 a.m. last Saturday, studying for my Legal History and Constitutional Law classes, while the rain pounded on our glass windows. It had started raining around the time I got off work at 7 p.m, and started beating hard around midnight. It didn’t cease until I fell asleep before daybreak. It was still raining when I woke up and left for school at around 9:30 a.m., but I didn’t think much of it. If anything, I was just a bit annoyed at the rain, because I didn’t have an umbrella.
By the time I reached Katipunan extension, though, the cab had stalled. We were not moving, and I was getting late for class. I found out that another classmate was also stalled. By the time the cab got to the Ateneo area, cars bound for the north were turning back, because the flood had risen to almost knee-level. There were a couple of cars that braved the south-bound lane, but they were swimming in the water. We turned around to look for alternate routes to UP, but then I received a message from my classmate that all roads to UP had been blocked, and that classes had been suspended for the day. We couldn’t go anywhere, so she and I agreed to meet up at McDonald’s Katipunan to pass the time and wait for the rain to stop and the floods to subside.
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Filed under career, personal
I grew up thinking that money was evil and that businessmen were shrewd. It didn’t help that I attended the University of the Philippines, said to be the bastion of the communists. I became a student activist, became an agnostic for awhile, and began to hate imperialist America.
But because of a twist of fate, I landed in the corporate world in a job I didn’t know existed before and never imagined to have. My employer was American, and so it didn’t come as a surprise that I had go to the land of milk and honey to meet the people I worked with and get some training. Anyone in my shoes would have jumped for joy, but I flatly refused to go. I did not want to go. I didn’t see the point in going, because I already knew how to do my job, and I did not want to sign the bond that came with the trip.
Fortunately for me though, I had a manager who had amazing convincing powers. She told me that I would come back a different person–that travel would change me, that there was an experience waiting for me on the other side of the world that I couldn’t get anywhere else. That was what convinced me to go. I signed the papers and packed up. That was how the shift began.
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