remind me of how fun it was a little over a month ago, please?

cebu was more than a month ago, and as i was uploading pictures to my FB account for my friends, i was reminded of some lovely (yes, i'm entirely subjective) pictures i took while i was there.

while we were waiting for the boat, we decided to make our way to bantayan town and we chanced upon the end of the parade the school had to mark the end of nutrition month. apparently, all the pre-schoolers had a muse-and-escort thing going on and i fell in love with this chubby kid in pink who is THE poster child for a happy and healthy kid. the cuter part? when she saw me taking her pic, she even flashed me a smile! winner!

on our second day, we made our way to virgin island and this was the view from our side of the beach. our boatman said that years ago, a bunch of researchers rented the island to explore the possibility of oil (or some natural resource) and they built this hut where they stayed (or something like that). no sense to the pic really except the fact that i just love the variety of blues and greens.

it was virtually isolated ... exactly my kind of beach!

still, all vacations must come to an end, and this one did early sunday morning. i love how my new camera has this setting for you to easily take pictures from airplane windows. and, when i think about that and the new memories i've made with the new cam, i'm *almost* glad that i had a legitimate excuse to replace the old one.

i'm on a not-so-great mood right now -- i watched a rom-com and i'm feeling all why-am-i-alone-when-i'm-supposed-to-be-fabulous ... *sigh* but, it's all great. after all, all this a month ago, plus boracay less than a month ago ... and, guess what, possibly ormoc two months from now, so it's good, it's all good!

boracay views

while i am neither a travel blogger nor a photographer, i do enjoy visiting new places and taking pictures to document the experience. here are some of the things that caught my eye while on vacation

{diniwid beach}

we stayed at microtel boracay which was located beside nami. it didn't have the most pristine of beaches, nor did it have the fun that white sand had to offer, but it did have lovely quiet evenings for pretend contemplative thinkers such as myself.

{microtel boracay poolside}

i am not that much of a beach person so i totally enjoyed the serenity to pool offered me on our first night there. while probably all the registered guests were out somewhere, my aunt and i had a glass of margarita each and discussed life and what nots by the poolside.

{white beach from the plane}

admittedly, even the non-beach person in me was enthralled by the sand that never gets hot, the variety of people in various states of undress (and overdress, haha!), and the wares and services being offered.

{painted startfish magnets}

since it's part of our culture to bring home pasalubong all the time, i was happy i chanced upon these starfish magnets. they're pricier than your usual boracay ref magnets but since they're (seem to be) not as common as the usual pasalubongs, i got fifteen of these - one for me and the rest for select friends.

{one, two, three, four, five, six ... yep, six in one motorcycle!}

we were waiting for our ride at jonah's shake (yep, i couldn't NOT go there} when this family passed us by loaded on one motorcycle. truly, only filipinos can defy that law of physics which states that no two things can occupy the same place at the same time. imagine, a family of six on a motorcycle that typically rides two at most.

{fire dancer with amazing abs}

no trip to boracay will be complete without watching the now-typical fire dancers. we chanced upon a group of three across boracay regency who managed to elicit and couple of wows and thunderous applause from the crowd.

{local kids at diniwid beach}

while white beach has been converted into the hub of commercialism, diniwid remains to be your neighborhood beach. on our second morning, a couple of local kids invaded the beach and revealed that the water truly is an "attractive nuisance" even if it's something that you see every single day of your life.

p.s. pics taken using my lumix fh2 camera. i'd like to think that the pictures from the boracay trip are slightly better than those taken when i was in cebu. maybe it's cause i've finally figured out a thing or two about the camera settings.

cebu take 2

i came back from cebu late saturday evening.

early wednesday morning, i was on my way back there. so from having never gone to cebu before, i was back there twice within a week.

ironically, this was the trip that was brewing for months. the other trip, that was a quickie decision. of course, i was happy i was still able to get a round trip ticket for P2,000 and get to stay in shangri-la mactan for free, but i am still mourning over the loss of my pink ixus.

i traveled to cebu with two of my fellow volunteers: cathy and theo.

{cathy i went to KL with. this is my first trip with theo}

we were supposed to go to bantayan as soon as we landed, but the weather was unpredictable. no one in her right mind would want to get stuck in hagnaya (a three-hour trip from cebu city) for nothing. so we did the touristy stuff...

like light a candle at the basilica del sto. nino (run by augustinian friars ... my favorite kind!)


and go to the magellan's cross

of course, no trip to cebu would be right if one didn't partake of the goodies (aka food!)

so i tried the kamias at zubochon as recommended by my good friend tin

and i followed my long lost twin's advice by eating at larsian

and at golden cowrie

and the bacon siomai at harbor city (which i mistakenly tweeted as golden harbor which caused him to panic lest i find myself eating at a place without bacon siomai)

it was a relatively long trip (for me) so i was pretty happy when it was time to go home.

more details to follow! am having problems uploading pics using my broadband wireless stick :(

stuff

remind me to tell you about:

{the most expensive buko i've ever had ... and i don't even like buko}

{basking in shangri-la goodness}

{the reason why i spent majority of my impromptu cebu trip inside the hotel room}

i've an early trip tomorrow, and i'm keeping my fingers crossed it pushes through, that the ferry to bantayan won't be cancelled, and that everything goes as planned.

goodnight world!

i'm getting ready ...

today i ended up going shopping for clothes for my dumaguete trip. a bit of a background: i'm not the type who actually shops before a trip. in fact, when i went to bohol for the first time, i packed at 1 am (after coming home from a prayer meeting + fellowship that ended really, really late) and left the house soon thereafter. as with all of my trips, i rely on friends who pack light since i end up with overweight baggage due to the fact that i just stash anything and everything i could think of and keep my fingers crossed that i had packed okay for the trip. and, notwithstanding having overpacked, i always end up not having the exact kind of clothes i want to wear. i think the only time that i ever lucked on packing perfectly for a trip was when i went to puerto princesa with friends and i totally hit the jackpot the afternoon before when i did last minute shopping at robinsons manila and sm sucat. ☺

i've always envied this girl i know who just looks so put together all the time. i found out from her sister-in-law that she's a MAJOR planner. for example, weeks before she and her then-future hubby flew to bacolod for their pre-nup, she carefully shopped (and not all at the same time!) for her outfits -- some from her existing wardrobe and some from the malls -- and planned each look in great detail. another girl i know is almost the same thing and packs outfits, not individual pieces, so there's no guesswork when she gets to her destination.

so, inspired by gay -- a friend who recently channeled her inner goddess-diva and shopped her heart out before her trip to kota kinabalu -- and by emily -- an apparently uber-famous who i stumbled onto because of apartment therapy -- i did a bit of shopping to prepare for dumaguete.

i was planning on getting this brown floral dress -- similarly styled, but sweeter looking and a bit more expensive than this -- but this just fit perfectly. it's actually longer than the dresses i usually wear, but it's bright yellow color is just l♥ve! i love the ruching in the boob area (not itchy at all!) and how it's sexy and yet modest at the same time. perfect for those places where you don't exactly have a place to change in. slip it off for a dip in the ocean and slip it back on for the trip home ☺☺☺

as you must know by now, i have a thing for multiples of the same thing. at least this dress isn't exactly the same, although the genetic material is: tube dress, with a tie that could either be a bow in front or be tied around the neck for "security". i love how its tiered and how it's sort of like denim but with a lot of other fabulous colors and prints. the ruching isn't as generous as the yellow dress, but it was too lovely to pass up.

i've always loved the combination of a blouse and shorts. it just feels so luxurious to my (limited, at least fashion-wise) mind. when i saw this silky top, i just had to have it and imagined how the soft material would billow gently in the breeze while i'm aboard a banca getting to some tiny island with gorgeous white sand. the zipper in front could be opened up to reveal a gorgeous suit underneath, and the long-ish sleeves can protect me from unwanted sunburn. it was too short to wear as a dress (although i had hoped it would be long enough, boo!) so finding shorts that don't make my thighs look like sausages was just the best thing in the universe.

shopping loot = ♥ ♥ ♥

now if only i could lose the sausage around my waist, life would be perfect.

... or at least this vacation would be.