Two of the most precious I tell my patients whenever I feel like they are taking things too hard.
Inhale through your nose, and exhale through your mouth.
And then things will get better. The nurse saved the day again.
I turn my back and look through the window and I see a reflection of myself and ask a question: When are you going to breathe?
A deep sigh follows.
Life has always been a roller coaster ride for me. The ride may never end actually. If I think about it, it’s thrilling; maybe much better than people who go to work from Monday to Friday, 0800 to 1700. At least I get to go up in the air and feel the wind rushing to my face, my skin, my body and then I can scream and before I know it, I’m in rock bottom, waiting for my turn to coast up again. Something like that. It’s not as simple as it sounds, maybe a little more complicated than that.
See, people say that if something’s meant for you, all the elements of the universe will conspire to pull you closer together. But in my case, it doesn’t work like that. It’s just unpredictable. And no, it doesn’t make me special. It makes me weird and strange and sometimes, apathetic, just because I go through heaven and hell that at times, I forget how to feel.
And I used to care. I used to.
So if you see me slumped in the corner, that’s normal. It’s one of those days. If I’m over-dramatic, I am still me, just the opposite version. And who knows what the next persona is?
So yes, I could ask myself a million times: When am I going to breathe? The answer is, I don’t know. Maybe I don’t have to.
I have been to La Union once and have tried surfing in San Juan, which I thought was really fun because the waves were bigger than the ones I experienced in Baler, Aurora. And like many people, I see La Union as just a place for surfing and nothing more than that.
But one recent trip proved me wrong! I had a planned vacation leave for holy week and being meticulous when it comes to traveling, I listed all possible places that I could go to considering various factors such as expenses, location and variety of activities. And while planning days were running out, I was also removing destinations on my list one by one and after thorough research, I ended up scheduling my trip to La Union. And based on the information I gathered, this was the game plan:
Go to San Juan and enjoy the beach (To surf or not to surf? That is the question)
Go to San Fernando and check out the different historical sites such as Ma-Cho Temple, Chinese Pagoda and Christ the Redeemer
Eat and eat at different famous restaurants in San Fernando and San Juan
Well that sounded just right for me.
So the adventure began!
March 21 – We left Cubao through Dominion bus at around 6 am. It was a long trip as there was some heavy traffic in some parts of La Union (hello election!) and ended up reaching San Juan at around 12:30 pm. We got down at San Juan Surf School and find the nearest restaurant to have lunch! Then we found “SURF SHACK” which was one of the more famous ones in San Juan according to my research!
Love their table!
We ordered buffalo wing and rice and I liked, especially the dip although it was a bit pricey for my taste.
The next agenda was to find a hostel and although The Circle Hostel was on top of my list, I realized that it wasn’t on the beach side (TYSM Google Maps) so the next one I had was Flotsam and Jetsam, however, we realized that we wanted a more comfy and private space so we had to look around (near Orbiztondo beach) but either the prices had risen up or they were just making up prices depending on the guests. LOL. At the end of the day, we settled for a nice private room near the beach which was 1200php for two people with TV and AC. Yey!
Then it was time for the real thing. The original plan was to just chill on the beach and watch the sunset. I have tried surfing at San Juan before so I decided not to do it this time.
Check out some of our photos below:
March 22 – Sorry. Everything I was thinking of was food and the plan was to eat breakfast and drink coffee at El Union. So we had a meal at Sebay.
Nothing beats Tapsilog for brekky
But when we went to El Union, man, it was Tuesday. And they are closed on Tuesdays. How lucky!
By the way, we also checked Flotsam and Jetsam to have breakfast but unfortunately they wouldn’t open until 8 am.
To make it short, we didn’t stay long in San Juan. We swam a little and had at lunch at Choka, which by the way is budget-friendly and is very accessible because it is along the highway. Check them out guys!
Next up was San Fernando, which by the way is a city so I expected people and crowds.
We rode a jeepney to reach the place and then looked for our hotel of choice. Research told me that Hotel Almira would be a good pick so with the help of my map, we made it there (with a lot of sweat though).
We got the 1700php room, which had a tv, AC and wifi (which didn’t work at the 4th floor 👎).
After a little rest, we agreed on visiting some notable sites in the city. And we shouldn’t miss the sunset by the way.
There were four on our list: Filipino-Chinese Friendship Pagoda, Halo-halo de Iloko, Christ the Redeemer Statue and Ma-Cho Temple. And I just said it in order.
So we first made our way to the Pagoda, which according to some blogs gives a good view of San Fernando Bay. It was an uphill slope and it was kinda hard to reach but it was worth the long walk.
What I didn’t like about it though was that there were many vandals everywhere. Not cool.
After that, we went to Halo-Halo de Iloko well aside from it was on our plan, it was also scorching hot! We ordered the Fiesta Halo-Halo and Pancit Palabok.
I fell in love with the first scoop! It had a lot in it and the taste was definitely worth the price!
It was almost sunset so we had to hurry to Christ the Redeemer Statue. We rode a tricycle (20php) and luckily we made it with the sunset. The statue was on top of a hill so we had to walk up again.
Indeed, timing is everything!
After spending some time there, we realized we could not make it to Ma-Cho Temple anymore so we had to move our visit to the next day.
March 23 – Last day in La Union. Time went by so fast! So after breakfast in the hotel, we did some charging and packing. And then we went to Ma-Cho Temple through another tricycle (20php). We ascended an uphill road to reach the temple.
Upon arriving, I only expected to take some photos but I realized that there was something worth doing there. We went inside the temple as encouraged by a Chinese man inside and we saw some instructions on the table.
So I did. And I wished. And the answer was YES! THANK YOU MA-CHO!
By the way, these are some of my photos of the temple:
And then time for lunch (my favorite). I did a little research once again and found Kaw Bin’s which was a chinese restaurant.
I think we order too much though!
It was satisfying overall! We paid just around 500php for all of these.
Then it was finally time to go home as I had another trip for the next day.
At the end of it, I proved myself wrong. THERE WAS MORE TO LA UNION THAN SURFING. 😉
So… this happened. I had my first ever travel to Jakarta, Indonesia to visit my sister! All I can say is that Indonesia is a place where rich culture and tradition are prominent. The people are very welcoming and helpful (although I had to learn a few Bahasa terms to get by). Check out some of my photos below!
It was around 5:37 pm and my brother and I decided to do a very spontaneous photo session before it was dark. By the way in the Philippines, 6 pm is as equivalent as the start of the night because it usually is coindentally getting dark.
This is the first time that I am using VSCO fully to edit my photos. I used different presets in my three photos. And yes, I am using my phone while doing this blog.
Check out my photos below:
Hello there. It’s Sunday and Manila has been experiencing all sorts of weather including sunny, too sunny, rainy, too rainy and windy (if all of them count) and for some reasons, I managed to take my OOTD’s without my shoes getting wet (and wrecked). This week was all about adapting to the weather and I picked three ootd’s to share with you guys.
This photo was taken during an extremely rainy day and I had no choice but to wear my rubber shoes from Adidasand matched it with my hoodie from Forever21Men. The pair of jogger pants was definitely a perfect choice to finish the look.
This next look was taken on a windy and drizzly weather so I thought it would be okay to wear my long-sleeved shirt from Forever 21 Men paired with my skinny jeans. And I was so happy to have worn my new pair of brown boots from Flossy Footwear, which was very comfortable to wear! And I hope notice my very Asian hairstyle too!
My last look is very casual since the sun kind of shone yesterday (there were some drizzles too). My top from Forever 21 Men looked so nice I had to fold the sleeves and tuck the front part in. I paired it with a black pair of pants from Bench and ultimately, a gray pair of sneakers from Penshoppe.
Which one is your favorite? Like, comment and subscribe!
Yesterday was one of the most special days for my blog since for the first time, I shared its existence with many people in my workplace. The event was called “Preceptorship Training” where preceptors or in layman’s term, trainers from each unit in our hospital gathered to gain more knowledge and skills in guiding novice nurses to be more skilled and competitive in their crafts. Luckily, in my almost two years of stay in the hospital, I had the opportunity to be chosen as one of the preceptors in the Critical Care Unit.
It was a three-day workshop and on the third day, we were asked to do a teaching demonstration abouy anything under the sun. Upon hearing about it, I did not think of anything but sharing blogging to my colleagues. Of course I was a bit hesisant at first because I was anxious of their acceptance to this. However, something inside me told me to just do it so I did it.
Top, pants and shoes from Penshoppe
In my demo, I shared my blogging experiences from 2007 to present and taught them how to start their own blogs. We had a workshop where I split the group into two and asked them to create ootd blogs entitled “Summer ain’t over” and “Sunny Friday” respectively. Honestly, I wasn’t expecting too much not because they weren’t stylish enough but because I thought no one would buy my idea that much. When the final results came in, I was really thrilled with my eyes saw because they had extremely wonderful outputs and I didn’t think twice on placing them right here. Check out the two groups below!
This is from Sophie with the title "Summer ain't Over"This is from Reyza with the title "Sunny Friday"
This training experience actually taught me that everyone is writing and as I said in my demo, you just have to write from the heart.
Through the help of my brother, I found a way to have my photos taken during the “golden hour”, which is around 4-5 pm – just the perfect time for the camera to capture you in your best skin tone.
Anyway, aside from just an ootd post, I am also showing a natural side of me that people rarely see. So check out these photos.
Shirt from Forever 21 Men
Pants from Bench
Sandals from Otto
Watch from Swiss Army
It’s March and what’s more to expect in the Philippines than the beginning summer heat. It’s just time to say goodbye to the über dawns and breezy nights. So I’m kicking off this summer with my lazy summer-y ootd! Check it out!
This tank top from Penshoppe is just so unique and just gives the right amount of summer vibe.
My new favorite! This pair of sandals from Sledger is definitely a must-have this summer season. It’s cool and comfortable!
This pair of pants from Penshoppe is not the usual skinny jeans that I wear. It’s cool inside and out.
We now live in a world where boundaries seem to be the size of a needle; where lines are crossed without warnings and privacy is just an invisible coating of our lives. One day, we would wake up naked – – stripped by the armors of extreme gossiping and owned by everyone’s selfish desire. Short to say, we are a public property.
Most of the time, we tend to be oblivious of one of the first few values that we learned from home, that is respect, which, if we try to ponder on, is one of the easiest to practice. When we were children, as Filipinos, we were taught how to say the words “po” and “opo”, “ate” and “kuya”, the practice of “pagmamano” and allowing adults to talk by themselves. More than those, we were also taught how to set boundaries among people and which words should and should not be spoken in public. We were taught to accept personal differences – that some people were born the way were – because we had to respect God’s creations. Respect was like our pen and paper – we didn’t go to school without it.
However, in this time and age, where social media eat more than half of our lives, we can’t help but do things that oppose our values and characters as people. We say things that we know we should not but we have to anyway. We do things that necessitate us to cross paths with other people, even to the point of creating scars within their hearts. WE SPREAD RUMORS LIKE WILDFIRE, WITH NO DIRECT INTENTION TO DISRESPECT, BUT BECAUSE WE WANT TO BE POPULAR. We have to just because we have to.
But come to think of it.
We are creating a world where words are unsafe and actions create pain. We want to be teachers of values and character, but the simplest of virtues are the ones we leave unnoticed. We are building generations of liars, of thieves and of criminals. And as much as we want to create peace, we can’t – because we, ourselves, are troublemakers.
Come to think of it.
If we want to cultivate a fruitful life, then we should go back to the basics of our values; those that give importance to the essence of what humanity should really mean; those that should bring about positive change; and those that could create a substantial future.
So this is my first ever movie review, which I will feature on my blog and I chose to do a review on a recent Filipino movie I watched, “That Thing Called Tadhana.” Anyway, I saw the trailer of this movie a couple of weeks ago and I really had no plan of seeing it on the big screen because I thought that it would just be the usual Rom-Com Filipino movies that we see (And I didn’t want to waste another 220php for an undeserving film.) However, a few reviews had me think twice and last Monday, I finally decided to see it!
To create a more detailed review of the film, I thought of collecting a few questions (that I created myself) and give my most honest answers. Here we go!
What can you say about the film as a whole?
Well I’ve seen a lot of stories like this and the movie is no different but I got to say that this film made something different by making things more realistic. For example, the dialogues of the actors are a reflection of how normal people naturally talk – the expressions, even the bad words. The scenes, I can say, portray how people fall in love and get hurt but choose to love again. It wasn’t a “Fairy Tale” movie where a poor girl falls in love with a rich guy. It wasn’t. Rather, the movie capitalized on conversations, which I believe, are what people (especially the heartbroken ones) are looking for. Finally, the ending was not predictable (I won’t spoil you on this one.) I kind of liked it actually.
Did the movie affect you in any way?
To be honest, I haven’t really experienced what Angelica Panganiban (Mace) underwent in the film, however the movie still affected me for the reason that I learned how desperate people can be when it comes to love. I haven’t been in an eight-year relationship that suddenly ended but I was able to see in the movie how it could turn out and for me, the acting was believable. Ending any relationship probably hurts so much for people who are deeply in love with each other and I, for one, don’t have the right to judge people who undergo such terrible things.
Technically, was the movie good?
I should say yes! The cinematography, for one, was good! I still remember that moment they were running towards the clouds in Sagada – that was surreal. The music, as well as all the other sounds, was considerably good as well. Well, I’m not an expert movie critique but I could tell that it was technically nice.
Was the movie worth your money?
I’ve seen a lot of movies (local and international) where after exiting the movie house, I would say “Damn, I should have just eaten some stuff.” but for this movie, I simply told myself that it was worth it. The movie didn’t need special effects or cinematic views (although Sagada was featured in the film in a good way) to capture the people’s hearts. It was packaged beautifully for people to relate in a similar situation as the actors. (And I believe many did!)
If you would score the movie from 1 to 10, what would you give? Would you recommend it to others?
An 8.5/10 for sure! And you should watch the movie to know why!
Bigger, Bolder, Blither 
