"Mabuhay" said Manila. And I said "Salamat" back. - Prem

Next Stop: Philippines

Congrats JB and Frances!

As Justina Chen says, "Getting lost is just another way of saying 'going exploring.'"

And what better "excuse" to go exploring halfway around the world than to celebrate friends getting married? After all, this amazing event is what triggered the whole trip in the first place. Thanks guys! 

(Check out their amazing video if you want to see more! It's quite extraordinary what their team put together in a few hours and since the bride and groom are gorgeous, it looked like a commercial for cars, watches, wedding dresses...)

I helped plan the Hong Kong leg, so I had no idea what we were going to do in the Philippines aside from the wedding. 

Intramuros

I must say, mis amigos didn't disappoint! First stop was Intramuros, a walled city that was once used as a fort. Now it is a historic center and Manila's oldest district.  One thing that seemed to be a reoccurring theme was that many of the cities churches and buildings were rebuilt because there were many earthquakes that made previous structures tumble down. And if it wasn't an earthquake, it was another natural disaster. 

View from Taal Volcano

Taking a break from the lovely city of Alabang (the Philippines Bel Air), we headed to Taal Volcano in Batangas. According to wikipedia, "the crater lake on Volcano island is the largest lake on an island in a lake on an island in the world." [I'm sure you can see why I didn't try to paraphrase that description...] I kind of think of it like a turducken, but in this case, I've dubbed it #volakano. 

Taal Lake

After a 25 ish minute boat ride across the fresh water lake to the volcano, we took a 45 minute hike to the top. It was a clear, hot day and we took our time, stopping to take pictures and enjoy the beautiful views. It's an active volcano and it has been designated a Decade Volcano because of its destruction potential. (It's active and near a large population.) Currently, only 15 other volcanoes have that designation.

 View from Leslie's

Aside from the wedding, this was my favorite part of visiting the Philippines. I don't know if I'll ever see anything like it again, and since it was when it really hit me that I was on a real vacation!

After we were had taken in the volcano and its beauty, we headed back into town for lunch. Our driver was a very nice gentleman, by the name of Rommel if I remember right. We knew we wanted to have lunch but didn't know where. He recommended Leslie's, along with their a Filipino special Bulalo.

Bulalo

This beef shank soup was delicious! It was the first time many of my friends had tried bone marrow, which I'm a huge fan of. Yum! We had some garlic rice and some tempura like veggies as well.

The weather here wasn't quite what I expected. Considering its location, I expected heat and humidity and to be sweating most of the time. Definitely not the case. It was quite mild and after our Taal Volcano excursion, we even got a little chilly. It's all relative, of course.

Manila American Cemetery and Memorial

As we landed into Manila, my friend and I saw the Manila American Cemetery and Memorial from the plane. More than 17,000 World War II soldiers rest here.

It is humbling to stand in front of the walls that list thousands of names of soldiers that fought for our country.

To end our time in Manila, we all decided to splurge and get hour + long massages. It's ridiculous how inexpensive massages are here. $10USD got me an hour long deep tissue massage! Since it was at a pretty nice spa, that included some piping hot ginger tea as well. If I knew it was SO affordable, I would have done it everyday!

Can't really complain though. It was great and it was the perfect way to relax before heading over to Bali.

“Not all those who wander are lost.” - J. R. R. Tolkien (Part 1)

Sometimes, those who wander were just too busy with work and life to help plan a vacation.

Instead those said people rely on good friends to plan out parts of the holiday so that said people know awesome things await without having to know all the details...

I've had the pleasure to travel abroad (Guatemala and India) with my fellow companions in the not so recent past, so I knew I was in good hands.

My travel companions

We packed in three destinations in a short, less than 2 week trip, spending 3-4 days in each locale. It was an AWESOME vacation. So good that the other day, I fell asleep right after I got off work, woke up in pitch darkness and wondered, "Where am I? What country am I in?" So yeah I'm a bit jet lagged, but it was worth it!

Just a little background:

I basically tagged along on this trip. Two of my grad school classmates were getting married and two of my other classmates were determined to go to the wedding. They set up the general itinerary and then convinced a handful of us to go. (Yeah, you can see the scars on my arm from having them twist it... um, not so much...) I had not been to any of the destinations and a chance to hang out with this crew, count me in!

First stop: Hong Kong

Hong Kong Island Skyline

 I have a friend that lives here as an ex-pat. She was super helpful and gave me advice on how to get to the hotel from the airport. My friends arrived together from New York about 4 hours earlier, while I got in from LA around 11pm. With my friend's advice, I took a local bus to the hotel.

MTR subway

My friends thought I was quite brave to navigate the city alone around midnight, but I had faith in my ex-pat pal. She surely wouldn't have allowed me to roam around the streets in the middle of the night if she thought it was a bad neighborhood! :)

I felt a little like I was on my own mini version of Amazing Race. I had no idea what I was doing but figured things out. (Thank goodness that a lot of the signs are in English as well!)

We stayed at Eaton Hotel in Kowloon. Great location, close to a few MTR (subway) stops and lots of great places to eat! For help on that, I looked up Anthony Bourdain's excursions and a few other food blogs.

The MTR is an awesome subway system. It's very clean, the trains are seemingly endless and when you are in the station, they have well labelled exits to help you figure out where you need to go.

When we were looking at places in Tsim Sha Tsui (TST to the locals), I remembered this from Russell Peters:

That guy cracks me up! Ok, I digress...

We took a series of walking tours and different neighborhoods. While we were in Central, we stopped off at Kau Kee for some beef brisket noodles.

We had a core group of 5, but were lucky enough to have others join us at varying points of each leg to even us out to 6. Our Taiwanese friend joined us on our first tour of HK.

Kau Kee

As a party of 6, there were not enough seats for all of us, so we initially sat apart with other diners. This is quite typical in these smaller places, but when the table opened up, we got the guys to come over.

Even though the bowls looked small (especially compared to American standards), it was a hearty meal and delicious! The noodles started off a bit al dente, but the warm and savory broth softened them to a perfect texture. I'm craving a bowl right now!

Lunar New Year Lantern Display

Chinese New Year (aka Tet for my peeps) was at the end of January this year and lucky for us, we caught the tail end of the light display at the Cultural Center in TST. We took the Star Ferry over and got great views of the Hong Kong skyline (see above) and got to see the Symphony of Lights. Frankly, the skyline itself was more impressive, especially if you've seen things like the fountain show at Bellagio in Las Vegas. Just sayin!

The lanterns had a Love theme, showcasing various wedding related things, which seemed appropriate, since our next adventure would take us to our friend's wedding in Manila.

Tian Tan Buddha

But before that, we took a ride on a glass bottom gondola to see the Big Buddha. My recommendation would be to go up on a regular gondola and go down on a glass bottom cable car. We ended up waiting in a long line and if we reversed it, we would have been golden! You can also take a hike up to the top, but after seeing the path from above, I wouldn't recommend it unless you had a good half a day to get up.

It's totally worth it to traverse those extra 250+ steps to get to the top. The views are beautiful and it's not as bad as you might think! (Unless you have joint problems that is!)

Hong Kong is such an interesting place with a rich history. It's very humbling to walk around with the hundreds of skyscrapers looming over us. It seemed like temples were around random corners and much of the historic sites seemed to have been replaced by newer buildings.

In the Hong Kong Monetary Authority Center there is a library and free museum on the 55th floor that displays  a picture of HK in 1895 where the tallest building was about 3 stories high. What a difference several decades make!

Victoria's Peak

One of the best views of the city is at Victoria's Peak. Even with the fog that rolled in, we were still able to capture beautiful views. There are several trails around the peak as well as a mall where my friends were able to pick up some souvenirs. If we had enough time, it would have been an amazing to see the view at night.

We had the company of another friend who has been working there for several years and introduced us to another side of Hong Kong: Lan Kwai Fong (aka LKF).

LKF

We had done most of our sight seeing during the day and had yet to explore the night life. Filled with foreigners (like us), loud music and drinking on the streets, we were determined to live it up on our last night in HK. Such the party animals, we made it past midnight! =)

The worst thing about new books is that they keep us from reading the old ones. - John Wooden

And in my world, "new" is a book that I haven't read yet!

Last Christmas I got a Kindle Paperwhite. It truly is a wonderful invention. I admit, I had a hard time converting, especially since, at times, just the weight of a book is comforting (unless it's a textbook!).

I didn't read as much as I wanted to, but I still got over a dozen. Not too bad, considering one was 800+ pages. :) Thank goodness for goodreads for helping me keep this all straight!

1. The Honest Trust About Dishonesty: How We Lie to Everyone - Especially Ourselves - Dan Ariely
2. The Virgin Suicides - Jeffrey Eugenides
3. Beyond Illusions: A Novel - Duong Thu Huong
4. The Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
5. Catching Fire - Suzanne Collins
6. Mockingjay - Suzanne Collins
7. Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Other's Don't - Jim Collins
8. One Day - David Nicholls
9. Ru - Kim Thuy
10. Running with Scissors - Augusten Burroughs
11. The Elephant Vanishes - Haruki Murakami
12. Gone Girl - Gillian Flynn
13. Wonder - R.J. Palacio
14. A Game of Thrones - George R.R. Martin
15. Bossypants - Tina Fey

If you compare to last year, you'll see I have some repeat authors (#2 and #11)

I think I slowed down a little because I started dabbling in my own creative writing. I've gotten a little behind on that because I started a food blog.

Why did I start all these side projects? The question really is, "why not?!"

"Time is precious, waste it wisely" - Jan Jansen

There is no better way to start a New Year than by showing gratitude for the past year. Fortunately for me, it was filled with family, friends, travel, and good food.

And in no particular order...

Disneyland

I rang in the Year of the Snake with my brother and cousin at the "Happiest Place on Earth!"

Living in SoCal for most of my life, I was definitely not a stranger to Disneyland. After this trip, I foresee cousin reunions draped in Mickey Mouse ears and standing in long lines waiting for rides reminiscing about the days of old, when we would be standing in long lines waiting for rides.

At least I'm hoping for it!

Portland, OR

Another cousin moved up to OR about 4 years ago. Finally, after all this time I was able to get up there and visit her in Portland. 

(Side note, when she told her mom she was moving, her mom thought she was moving to Poland! Another side note, my dad actually moved to Poland for a while... go figure.)

Goonies House, Astoria, OR

While we were in the beautiful state of Oregon, we also took a road trip to get in touch with our inner Goonie.

Seriously, they don't make movies like that anymore. (sniff, sniff) Heck, hardly anyone lets their kids play outside unsupervised and who can blame them? I digress...

Seattle, WA

On to the Seattle area, where we met up with some of my grad school friends for some great grub.  Some people may consider me a "foodie" because I LOVE food and even started a food blog. Some might poke fun and call me a "fattie" if it weren't un-PC. Let me put it like this, my goal is to be healthy because life it just too darn short NOT to eat. So skinny jeans be damned! I'm going to EAT and just exercise to balance it out.

Speaking of exercise... we ended up snow shoeing in Snoqualmie.

If you have never done this before, it sounds easy. Strap on a contraption with spikes on your own shoes and away you go... In theory that's exactly what happened. I even got to test these suckers on a mini hill before we went up a bigger one. (I lacked faith...)

Snoqualmie, WA

It was definitely a bit more challenging that I thought it was. Part of that was probably because the only "waterproof" shoes I had were some Puma sneakers. Appropriate footwear is key! (And I didn't have it... fail!)

We had fun none-the-less, although, truth be told, we were shown up by several 6 year olds that went down a pretty darn steep cliff. My inexperience made me very wary of climbing down a mountain backwards, especially when there was a tree waiting there to "catch my fall"... I wasn't alone in not wanting to go that way, which helped my ego a bit. :)

Now if I were on a snowboard... I still wouldn't have gone down that hill. Just sayin...

Washington D.C., Cherry Blossoms

In April, we visited the nation's capitol. I have never been in a city where duck fat was so prevalent. Not that I'm necessarily complaining because I definitely had some! Duck fat fries, duck fat mussels, oh my! I seriously believe the "DC" stands for DuckFat City...

We were SO lucky. The last day we were there, all the Cherry Blossoms bloomed around the Basin. It is truly a site and I'm glad we were fortunate enough to see it in person.

Catalina Island

One of my good friends owns a boat and in May, she decided that she wanted to move said boat back down to San Diego from Marina Del Rey. Our "crew" consisted of Amy, me and her Mini Pin, Capt'n Louie.

We were going to take our time and take about 5 days to get down, stopping by Catalina, Dana Point and wherever else we felt like on our way to San Diego.

Capt'n Louie

I used to sail with her quite a bit back in the day. Before this trip, I could happily brag that I had never gotten sea sick. Let me just say, we can deeply sympathize with the Gilligan's Island theme song... What should have been a relatively easy trip from Marina Del Rey to Catalina was filled with 30 knot winds and "cresting mother-fing waves" to quote the Captain!

It was a relaxing trip, mostly away from all things tech related (although I got a little cell signal) but it put me off sailing for a bit. (I'm ready to go now if the opportunity presents itself, don't get me wrong!) Once I was back on land again, it took me a little time to get my land legs again.

San Diego

I didn't get down to San Diego as much as I would have liked, but every time I was there, it still felt like home. And how could it not? I am lucky enough to still have a lot of great friends that have made a life there and welcome me every time I am back.

There never seems to be enough time in a weekend to see everyone, so maybe this year I'll resume my once a month excursion down the coast. Most of these wonderful people I've known for over 13 years now, so there are many new additions to the family. (You should see all the family Christmas cards that are on my fridge!) :)

Mini Reunion, Boston, MA

Another place that will always be near and dear to my heart is Beantown.

Where, if you walk into Cornwall's, the bartender may not know your name, but he'll definitely know your drink!

Where clam chowda is freakin amazing even in some work cafeterias!

Where I've just been so incredibly lucky to have met some amazing people.

Cornwall's, Boston, MA

I'm looking forward to what 2014 has to offer.

Quotes of this TGI Friday!

I'll be honest... this past year has been full of good times and bad, crazy busy-ness and extreme boredom...

But for some reason today was full of all the above. Well, except the boredom, but I don't remember the last time I had so many good laughs in a day!

The price of a donut...

Quotes of the day: (all from different people)

• "don't you hate it when you cut yourself on a donut box?"
• "i hate it when i burn myself making toast!"
• "What's a DD?!" 

Let me give some context to the last one:

I'm snagging some afternoon chocolate in my friend's (Lil' A) cube.
My coworker (SB) was trying to coax me to go out because his girlfriend has plans tonight.
Another guy chimed in "it should be a boy's night out!"
I replied, "well, then you can't invite ME!"
SB says, " you can be the DD"
Lil' A looks at me and says, "What's a DD?!"
(Let's just say... she knows how to knock back a few...)
Me to Lil' A, " and THIS is why you are never asked to be a DD!"

Oh and here is the view of the sky from my parking lot as I ran to Friday freedom:

who doesn't like surprises?!

Lately, life has been full of tiny surprises.

I know some of these are silly, but I have to share my appreciation for some of the little things in life that have made me give big smiles!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

First off, who doesn't like getting legit snail mail that isn't a bill? I know I do! (It's truly a lost art... in my humble opinion.)

Anyway, one of my best friends got married last month. I got her letter in the mail the other day and it was a bigger envelope that was on the thicker side. I had to put groceries away and momentarily forgot that I received it. Mid-way through putting the contents away, I stopped because it dawned on me that she included PICTURES with the letter! It was like a lotto ticket! In this digital age, having an actual letter is like getting struck by lightning in a good way, and getting pictures too?! Double lucky!!! It was a beautiful wedding and I'm thrilled to be apart of it.

Beautiful bride and bridesmaids

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Another great surprise was a visit from one of my friends who lives in San Diego. She's a crazy one, and let me tell you why... even though she was welcome to stay for the night (weekend, too!), she decided to come up for the day. (Folks, that be 420 miles RT, and since there is ALWAYS traffic in LA, a 9 hour drive!!! In ONE day!) 

Who feels special? THIS gal!

And to top it off, where did we go for dinner?! American Ale! If you want to know what I think about this place, I've yelped about it and on a Happy Hour invitation too, at the amusement of my coworkers... The American Burger is a delicious mix of chuck beef and pork. Double patties, with grilled onions, cheese and if you ask nicely, mushrooms! (they also offer it with bacon and/ or a fried egg)... gee... here I go again! I seriously can't help it. It opened in May. By mid-July, I had already been there 6 times. After not being there for 6 weeks, I was starting to get withdrawals... Withdrawals!!! But, I got to go this weekend and it was just as I remember! De-freakin-licious!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I've been playing on my company softball team for the past year. If you know me, it's obvious I never played in high school or college. I have terrible form and honestly, I used to be afraid of the ball. I'd be the one thinking (and if I'm in right field saying aloud), "please don't hit it over here, please don't hit it over here!"

I don't know what has changed, actually, I guess I do. I'm not longer afraid of the ball. Maybe it's because I usually play catcher and my senses have become more aware so that I'm not in danger of having "balls fly at my nose" (or bats fly at me in general, if you play catcher in co-ed slow pitch softball, you know what I'm talking 'bout!) 

In any case, this season has been a great one for me! My batting average has improved (it is still pretty darn awful though!), and whenever I hit the ball, I sprint my little heart out. I've even been called "fast!" (Again, if you know me... that has NEVER happened.) Sometimes I even get on 1st! (Thank you kiddie cleats!)  I've caught some fowl balls at home plate. Heck, I've even hurled the ball at third base, to help get an out that ended the game with my team winning our third straight game. (That was unexpected from all and people were talking about it at work for over 3 days!)  Don't get me wrong. I'm not good by any means, but I'm definitely improving. :) And I even got on the Top 10 Fielders Stats list to prove it! Woot!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Isn't this just the cutest?! I had to take a picture because every time I look at it, I smile.

I saw it in the window display of a local bookstore, Granada Books. This is a lovely one, too. (Yes, the still DO EXIST!) Ok, so I admit it, I loved Despicable Me and the minions. My favorite short right now is "Banana". Gotta love that "hehehehehehe" laugh! I mean seriously?! It's so freaking cute! And every time I hear it, I have to smirk. Personally, I think they made the movie, but this isn't supposed to be a review, so... moving right along!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 I took a walk to the beach today. It was an overcast day (YES, CA does have some mediocre weather, sometimes...) but I like to use that time to clear my head. Sometimes I reflect on the day, sometimes I'm developing story ideas. Sometimes it's about people and dog watching.

On this walk, I went down this industrial street that sometimes has a few odd characters on it. Today seemed to have a few more than usual. Right before I reached the boardwalk, I was walking towards a guy with a bike (who could have been homeless) and his two companions, a couple.

They were holding hands and bickering a little, but in a somewhat playful way. They looked a little dingy, him in a dirty blue sweatshirt, and her in a dirty leopard print coat that one might find on an old Hollywood set, hiding a red dress.

When I saw them, my gut told me that I should put up my guard a bit. They seemed a bit sketchy. As I walked by the boyfriend looked right at me and said, "Can I ask you a personal question?"

A bit surprised, I said, "Um, sure..." with a hint of uncertainty. I mean, that's a weird question to ask a random stranger, no?

"What nationality are you?" he asked.

"Oh, I'm Vietnamese." I replied with relief. Is that what he wanted to know? That's not so bad! :)

This is where I was caught off guard. He then said, "You're BEAUTIFUL!" With his girlfriend nodding in agreement saying, "Yeah!"

"THANKS!" I blushed. (The fact that I had to document this should tell you how often this happens in my life; um, like NEVER!)

As I continued my walk. I heard him say, "I love that $hi+!" which made me chuckle.

Diversity in Santa Barbara is a little on the low side, with "my" people making up 0.2% of the population (as of 2010, anyway), with Asians as a whole making up a whopping 3.5%! Regardless of the statistics, it's nice to see that snap judgments are not always needed and that people can surprise you in some really sweet ways. That right there, pretty much made my week!

"there is nothing to writing. all you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed" - Ernest Hemmingway

Alrighty, then...

And as much as I want to believe in that quote, I know it's not true for me. Not because typewriters are practically an endangered species (and let me tell you, I have many nostalgic memories from sitting at a typewriter, but I digress...), but because I'm logical to almost a fault.

Personally, I find creativity to be challenging. I am decent at taking other people's ideas and running with them, and at times, making them very much my own, but other times, I sit and think and come up with nothing inspiring enough to get me to sit in front of a computer and have verbal diarrhea that is worth sharing.

Nothing has really changed, except the willingness to share. On that note, I created another blog: Adventures in Kreativitee to do just that.

I have challenged myself to write a short story or narrative at least every 2 weeks for a year. They may not be long, and it's very unlikely that all of them will be good, but the goal is to force myself to wake up and rattle the creative side of me, since the left side of my brain is used so heavily at work.

So, here's an unofficial official invitation to join me on this adventure. Prompts and feedback are welcome. But just remember, my major was Animal Physiology and Neuroscience, not Communications or Literature. Ahem...