greetings from singapore!

i'm updating my blog from a cybercafe along orchard road. irealized i wasn't able to bring with me my contact lens solution so i walked a couple of blocks from my hotel to the nearest convenience store to see if there are any contact lens solutions for sale. they only have eyedrops. which means i won't be wearing my contacts tomorrow.

but i found a cyber cafe, and it's $1 for every 15 minutes, $4 per hour. i didn't bring my laptop so computer access from my hotel room is out of the question.

had a hearty dinner earlier - everything singaporean. i consumed like five liters of teh tarik and come durian. it's the singapore food festival. who knew? hehehe.

will be back in manila in 3 days. i probably won't have time to update...

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palawan, again

and no, i am not complaining.

i'm beginning to really fall in love with palawan. after my coron/busuanga experience last year, i was very excited to venture into this trip to puerto princesa, where we visited, amopng others, different islands of honda bay, the vietnamese village and the nooks and crannies of puerto princesa city.

sample? here's the beach which is right within the entrance of the st. paul's underground river, which is so breath-takingly beautiful.




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friends, roman...friends

i slipped quietly in town (yes, manila) a few days ago. what? no announcements? no fuss?

well, my friends in manila seem to be not that excited anymore everytime i announce (this year, thrice already) that i'll be in town. so i decided to just be hush hush about it.

anyhow, it's been kind of a mixed-emotions type of feeling these days. it's good to be home again and i am happy but i couldn't be as happy as i would have wanted because my youngest niece is in the hospital. :(

i've been in and out of the hospital in the past 3 days visiting her and showing my support. i really, really pray for her to get well soon. it's devastating to hear her cry in pain as doctors and nurses take her blood every six hours and shift her IV from the left to the right every single day. the times i was in her hospital room, i wished that if i hasd the power, i'd rather that she doesn't go through this pain, that if i need to take all those pain for her, i would, no question.

she's 5 years old, in the first grade and a stage 2 dengue patient. she probably got that pesky mosquito bite from her school, or from the playground. definitely not from their home because my brother and his wife are very particular about mosquitoes. but at this point, it doesn't really matter as to where she was when bitten by the freaking mosquito.

for now, i can curse all the mosquitoes i want but it won't undo what has happened. at this point, all i can really do is pray.

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milo + fergie = hotness

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mayor v 'fesses up

less than a month after he admitted to the public his separation from his wife of 20 years, our mayor from los angeles, antonio villaraigosa admitted yesterday that he has a relationship with Telemundo (an NBC-owned network) anchor Mirthala Salinas.

Mayor V told reporters, "I have a relationship with Ms. (Mirthala) Salinas, and I take full responsibility for my actions."

Villaraigosa and Salinas wait out a pause in filming on the north steps of the state Capitol. Salinas is now a news anchor on Telemundo 52. (Robert Durell / LAT)

what's up with these big city mayors? first was new york's rudy giuliani, who had a very public feud with his wife when she found out that he was having uh, extra-curricular activities. then san francisco's gavin newsom was forced to admit a couple of months ago that he was carrying an affair with his best friend's wife.

and now this?

i covered much of mayor villaraigosa's political career, specially his oath-taking at the city hall back in 2005. his win was deemed historic because for the first time in decades, a hispanic man won the mayoralty post of the city of los angeles.

reading about him back then made me admire him. he triumphed over adversity because he was raised by a single mom who worked double- triple- jobs just to make ends meet. and when he married his wife, he took her last name too. back then, he was just antonio villar. his wife was corina raigosa. when they got married, it became villaraigosa. isn't that just sweet?

and now this?

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independence day

it's the 4th of july! yay!

i can't believe i slept 16 hours! after a super duper hectic slash emotional slash stressful day yesterday, i dropped by a resto to buy my dinner. to go, please. i was planning to have my dinner away from it all.

so i got home around 7ish. put the boxed dinner on the dining table. left my messenger bag by the couch. went up to my room. turned on the tv and the computer. the bed looked so inviting. i sat down, then i lied. responded to a couple of text messages asking me to go out (it's a holiday! people are going out! let's drink!). i asked for a rain-check.

i woke up 8 hours later, at 3 in the fucking morning, with the tv blaring with infomercials and the computer playing songs from my iTunes. my eyes were aching. i slept with my contacts on. went to the restroom and saw my blood-shot eyes. damn, this is not good.

i realized that i just woke up. was it time for breakfast? at 3 am? i decided to crawl under the sheets and call it a night. who cares. it was an almost-eight hour cycle when i woke up around 11.

i feel better. then i thought about yesterday's mayhem and my blood began to boil. not again.

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