Flurriousity

Many things benefit with the gifts of patience and time. As I believe that neither are on my side I hope instead that they unfold in you.

Bookthings

While most girls my age have an obsession with boutiques, and clothing stores, I sheepishly admit that I’m rather a fan of bookstores.

Mostly I browse those books I can’t afford: those vivid, glossy, inches-thick art books.

Because I live the life of a Googler nowadays, I’m partly convinced that all the knowledge I’ll need is available via search engine. I hardly buy reference books, nor graphic novels, nor classic literature anymore because I can “DL” them anytime I want.

But I still love going to bookstores. I love seeing the rows of books I want to but can’t read in my lifetime. I love gently tugging at the spine of a title (or typography) that catches my fancy, love the glossy surface of paper which anonymous thumbnails have stamped and traced. 

 

I had to run errands for the day, and I was exhausted from my trip. Yet I still bothered to enter the newly-renovated National Bookstore mall in Cubao, and walk through all glorious four floors of it. Seeing all the names and titles and covers made me forget of my own, and lose myself in imagining the books’ complex stories I’ll never live through in my life.

Swifturbanjungle

Fwooosh. And I’m back again.

 

Funny what the first thing we craved for as soon as we landed: Jollibee.

Cebu: Bridges

The Marcelo Fernan Bridge, connecting the Cebu City to the Mactan City island. Gorgeous solid lines, breaking the sunset!

Noticeably in Cebu, most public transport drivers, market merchants, security guards, street patrollers, and most locals hanging out in the streets know how to talk to tourists.

“Ahh! Tagalog pala kayo,” exclaimed one security guard to my friend who was attempting to converse in Cebuano. 

They’re really friendly and accommodating, and hardly would they go overboard with their enthusiasm to welcome strangers in their home.

Like on the way home, a cab driver excitedly talked to us about his “pakikipagsapalaran” (survival) in Cebu. He said that a lot of locals came from neighboring provinces, just like him, in search for the “better life”.

As with most Filipinos, as soon as he was able to somewhat live comfortably as a taxi driver servicing film people from the Bigfoot studios and other foreigners, he considered himself happy, and willing to help others out when needed. 

This relaxed pacing of lifestyle was quite surprising to me. In Manila, practically everyone’s on the anxious “go” towards something.

Ruminating about life after internship near the Lapu-Lapu marker sands

It’s a good thing I went on vacation to remind of things I’ve forgotten from too much working ^^.

A dazzling place I never knew

You'd so want to share the stars and the lights with someone (but who?) from Tops View in Busay Hills, Cebu.

Jeepney and taxi rides mostly sustained our exploring of Cebu for the past days. To get to Tops though, you’ll need a ride because it’s about thirty minutes without traffic from the main city. Luckily, our host offered to bring us there with her husband and kid :).

Travel tip: Go when it’s dark or around nighttime already, and bring a jacket (seriously, it’s freezing up there!).

Also, come with your closest friends, or a favorite person, then ring the famous three-clangs of the Tops friendship bell for “everlasting” friendship. Yeah, it’s a bit embarrassing to do that nowadays but because it was so dark up there anyway, and the romantic, starry night mood was everywhere, my friends and I gave in to the cheese. (Wenever talked about it afterwards, haha.)

Cebu: The feel of an old house

We visited two places that reminded me SO MUCH of Jose Rizal’s Noli Me Tanghere. This is one of them, the Cebu Archdiocesan Museum. (The other brilliant place that made me feel like I’m Maria Clara was the Aboitiz’s Casa Gorordo, where unfortunately cameras weren’t allowed.)

“Suyuan sa Asotea”, anyone? :P

Cebu: Monument

Piso per mineral water

Hehe, cute! No one would have to lug around water bottles with this one around.

Imagine my happiness when the cheapskate tourist in me found this in a nearby sari-sari store!

Cebu: Basilica

Basilica Minore del Sto. Nino

Magellan's Cross.

Cebu street

This Chinese tin bus in the main streets offers free a ride to children.

Jeepneys there were made out of converted trucks, with solid-abstract-shaped designs, and CMYK colors (yup, they're not RGB unlike here in Manila).

 

I think they have better graffiti there. The Cebuanos somehow select colors that blend in the walls. More elaborate wall art exist, only I wasn't able to shoot them.

Jeepney rides aren't as scary here, and the "breeze" isn't as, err, grainy like in Manila. You can naturally blow-dry your hair all you want! ^_^

Looks like old Quiapo, and sells stuff like them, too! Only, it feels much safer here.

"Ms. D. Hair salon: Keep in touch"

Naturally, the first thing I looked for in Cebu was food. A P5-rice triangle and P10-soda is enough to keep me walking the entire day.

Hitch-hiking, emo little girl

Then I’m off to Cebu

To cut the story short: I wanted to escape Manila, be somewhere with people I haven’t been with for a long time, and, oh, to accompany someone on her first plane ride ^_~

Cebu Pacific was the cheapest way to go, and yes we were on time (down to the exact minute even) ^^. Hooray for my friend who works there and kept on selling me his company (haha!).

Since I only slept for an hour or so, I immediately fell asleep on the plane, forgetting that I was beside someone with a mild phobia of flying..

 

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October 27-29, 2008, Cebu. For more pictures from the trip, please visit this page.

Return to bliss

Kanya-kanyang bayad

Some confusion, bad math, and crayon computations in my reunion with classmates from grade school, people I’ve known for over a decade already.

We lost track and fell out of each other’s lives, but being childhood friends it’s effortless getting back together again ^^;

For dessert, we got more confusion, more surprising revelations, and luckily rekindled promises of friendship.

I quote a friend’s reply when I told him he was becoming too cheesy: “Bkla ka dyn..Ang drama nyn lang sa buhay. Hahaha I hope 10 or 20 years from now we still are the closest friends ever.”

 

When I’m thirty, I wouldn’t be surprised if I’m still hanging out with these guys.

Dancing penguins!!!!

…Such crazy hip-hopping Penguin mascots with superpowers that turned me into mush!

Yeeeaaaaargh!

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