And...

in case you'd forgotten what Bob looks like:

(I think he likes you.)

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Of prawns and a giant moth.

Part II of my Philippine sojourn is on its way, it's taking time cos I've had a banging headache since getting back to the Pore. And I want to be happy while blogging about my trip. I'm kinda worried that it could be some decompression-related problem, but whatever.

This evening was pretty exciting. A neighbour came round to give us a bagful of live prawns. Since this wasn't the first (or second... or third) time he's done so, we weren't too excited about the prospect of having them for tomorrow's dinner.

So now we have two pet prawns in our koi pond. (Well, we certainly released two into the pond, but after an hour of peering into the pond with the aid of three flashlights, I'm afraid the fate of Prawn 1 remains unknown.) Can I point out that prawns look really evil in koi ponds (assuming Prawn 2 is representative of all those who share its fate)? I'll post a pic when I get a good one, you'd agree with me.

Not to be outdone, Bob brought in his first kill in about a month - a giant moth.

I can imagine it being quite a stunningly beautiful creature, before meeting its tragic end i.e. Bob. Yes, that's a normal-size pen. I hope it wasn't an endangered species of moth. Ho hum.

Is it kinda sad that two prawns in a koi pond and a very large moth have defined an exciting evening for me?

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Palawan, Philippines, 2009 - (I)

Day 01, Singapore - Manila - Puerto Princesa - Sabang

The trip began rather ominously. On the way to the airport in a speeding taxi (despite my exhortations that we weren't running late at all), a large sheet of white suddenly loomed out of the darkness and draped itself across the windshield, causing the driver to dangerously swerve the vehicle to the left before deciding that perhaps it wasn't such a great idea. Fortunately whatever it was vanished as soon as it had appeared and I was relieved to note that an accident had been narrowly avoided.

Arriving at the check-in counter, my heart lurched a little as a niggling thought in the back of my mind pushed itself momentarily to the fore. The sense of panic became complete when I realised that I had brought along the wrong credit card for verification of my seat booking. This was the first time in my history of electronic air tickets whereby my passport and a copy of the e-ticket were insufficient to prove that I was the right passenger. But I couldn't really blame the airline as, upon closer observation, I realised that the fine print on the e-ticket did in fact request that the credit card used for purchase be made available for confirmation of booking at check-in.

I had all of 50 minutes to get back home, grab the right credit card, and return to the airport before check-in was closed. I made it in 45.

The 3.5 hour flight to Manila was fairly uneventful. I was seated next to a couple half of which comprised a moody girlfriend - the first of several such pairings that I was to encounter on the trip. She shared the same features as a severely disliked ex-boss - a gaunt face that forces the viewer to notice its narrow and protruding lower jaw, the downturned sides of a thin-lipped and disapproving mouth, a painfully wide-open pair of fearful and accusing eyes, the complete lack of cheekbones or anything that could be mistaken for strength of character... Okay, I admit that my interaction with others is largely influenced by physiognomy. Some call it shallow, I call it genetic hardwiring.

Fortunately "Nights in Rodanthe" (confusing billed as "The Notebook") was on and the inimitable chemistry and frisson between Richard Gere and Diane Lane ("Unfaithful" remains one of my favourite films) presented a surprisingly tearful diversion from my neighbours for most of the flight.

We arrived in Manila at 0400.

(Sunrise from Manila airport.)

Disembarking passengers at Puerto Princesa airport were pleasantly treated to welcoming fanfare from the military band, which somewhat made up for the chaos in the temporary arrivals and baggage collection... hut.

(The Welcome Band.)

(The hut.)

Distinctly foreign passengers (read: Caucasian and Japanese tourists) would find themselves suddenly pulled aside to join a "customs and immigration" queue. The operation was manned by a sole Filipino seated on a plastic stool at a rusty foldaway table, furiously penning each foreign arrival's passport details in a ledger damp from the man's sweat. I hesitated to join the queue since it looked hot and slow-moving and I had clearly passed for a Filipina, until flashes of me lying with a broken body in a makeshift hospital tucked away in the remote Philippine wilderness, completely ignored by the local authorities with my fate unknown to my family, changed my mind.

Emerging from the chaos, we found the sign declaring my name (spelt correctly!) and were hustled to the minivan that would bring us to Sabang, our final destination for the day.

(View of Ulugan Bay en route to Sabang.)

I had quite hastily made reservations at a self-proclaimed "nature park resort" in Sabang, the only one that had a website. (I found out later that the best way to get good accomodation in Sabang - or anywhere in Palawan for that matter - is via any Manila-based Philippine travel agency.) My optimism wavered a little when I saw where I would be staying, a stilted bamboo shack right on the edge of the Sabang jungle that did no more than provide walls and a roof for a small room with a mosquito-net draped bed. There was a hole in the floor that my foot went straight through, and I couldn't help but notice that the widely spaced bamboo bars in the windows would easily let in any number of wild creatures that were so inclined. Toilets and shower stalls were located minutes away from my doorstep.

(Home for two nights.)

(Around and about at the "resort".)

(What used to be the in-house farm, clearly abandoned some harvests ago.)

(Flock of herons amongst the resort's trees.)

The rest of the day - what was left of it - was spent reassuring my parents that it would be a wonderful and different experience. However hard I tried though, my father decided that there was no way he would be staying there for all three nights, which meant that the entire family would have to return to Puerto Princesa a day early (ruining my plans to continue my onward journey to El Nido via Port Barton on boat).

I have never experienced a darkness as complete as that night, when the generator stopped running right about midnight. Imagine being enveloped by the colour black, not seeing your hand a mere inch from your face, drowned in the night's cacophony of jungle sounds. Having just drifted away to sleep, I was awoken by a honking sound in my room. It sounded something like a cross between a dog and a goose, with each series of honks punctuated by a sigh. I groped for my torchlight, switched it on, and was shocked to find a lizard the length of my arm on the wall. Surprised by my half-smothered shriek, it slithered out of my room through a hole in the corner of my room.

I honestly have never quite so looked forward to daybreak. I will never go camping, unless it's in the wilderness-free White Desert of Egypt, where I know the only non-human creature I would wake up next to is a resting camel and the only night sounds I would hear are the murmurings of other travellers marvelling at shooting stars in the clear night sky.

...

I AM THE SPINMEISTER.

Take THAT, WORLD!

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Cold Foobs.

I never made the link before, but since I got my foobs I've been feeling cold more frequently than usual. My chest in particular is really sensitive to any drop in the temperature and is the first part of my body to start shivering (do limbs shiver?). Pending the circumstances, my first reaction is to hug my foobs. And only this evening did I start to wonder if cold boobs were normal (having never really had proper real boobs I couldn't really tell).

So I looked it up on the net and whaddya know, I'm not the only one who gets cold foobs! There're quite a number of women out there who've noted that their implants are generally either distinctly colder or warmer than the rest of their bodies. Apparently it's because silicone conducts heat (and loses heat) slower than human tissue (which temperature is naturally regulated anyway by blood).

Something new every day!


...

Waiting

for caffeine to take effect. Meanwhile, see pic of where I'll be in just under 17 days' time:




Toodles!


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17.5

days to goooooooooo!!!!!!!!! PACKING LIST!!!


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Excess baggage.

Did you know that one Starbucks cinnamon roll has 620 calories? Even if we assume that's for an American-sized roll, an Asian counterpart at half the size would still pack a whopping 310 calories. That's not much more than its "low fat" blueberry muffin, which has 302 calories. And a double tall non-fat no-whip mocha still has more calories (174) than a double tall non-fat caramel macchiato (ok, that's probably because a macchiato has less milk).

On average, I've packed away 500 Starbucks calories every working morning. Which by itself isn't too bad since that's still less than a third of my daily calorie needs. Except that in the past couple of years - 2008 in particular - I've been chasing breakfast with meals saturated with grease, sodium and preservatives. Not taking into account sporadic beer binges, I've consumed an average of about 2,500 calories per day in the past three years. That's 156% of what I actually need. I feel... congested. Not yet corpulent, but rather more cellulite-y that I should be. Chemical-y.

I am a walking toxic dump.

So, in line with New Year's Resolution #2, I'm going to eat healthier and consume less calories this year. Bikini-fabulous and, erm, bounding up mountains like a light-weight goat. And I have a sackful of grapefruit to prove it.

...

Too Thousand and Nein.

I left right after the countdown last night, completely sober and looking forward to spending the first day of the new year bright-eyed, bushy-tailed and raring to go (where exactly, I hadn't quite yet figured out, but it would've been some sort of run, I guess). Instead, I woke up in the morning feeling like a sock being turned inside out, starting with my uterus. Hence New Year Resolution #1:

I will take my flaxseed oil supplements regularly.

In fact, this year will be all about regularity, in a way. Sticking to things, finishing off what I've started, making the most of what I already possess. Perseverance. Tenacity. Ardour. Words one commonly finds in a school motto. Because in the past few weeks I was forced to do a mental inventory of all my possessions and wow I do possess quite a bit. A lot of it was just clutter, objects used-and-abused and stuff which sentimental value had eroded completely over time. But several items did rather painfully stand out for representing desire without the willpower for execution. Dusty half-completed self-study courses in assorted languages, boxes of watercolours and empty sketchbooks, clothes a half-size too small for me, an army of cosmetics and toiletries promising a brand new beautiful me, etc. So New Year Resolution #2 would read something like:

I will not buy anything new unless there is nothing amongst my possessions that could conceivably provide for the same purpose.

It saves me money and puts less pressure on the environment too. #3:

Painting, physical fitness and Portuguese.

Of course there are other things I want to do this year, like making the most of my digital camera and learning to ride a motorcyle, but these things don't start with the letter "P". But Philippines, Pemuteran (in North Bali) and Phu Quoc (in Vietnam) do, all relevant to #4:

Travel.

Fairly achievable resolutions for 2009, I'd say. Which apparently is a good thing, according to this recent BBC article cautioning people against new year resolutions because failure to execute them "could trigger feelings of failure and inadequacy". And I certainly wouldn't want to feel those. Like cockroaches. I would absolutely not want to feel a cockroach, or one crawling up my leg. I really hate cockroaches.

...

-

Do you know what annoys me?

The use of the word "gals". (It galls me.)

NOBODY uses the word "gals" in their day-to-day conversations, so why do so many feel compelled to use it as a substitute for "girls" or "ladies" or "friends" when conveyed in a text message, or e-mail, or caption for a photo on facebook?

You know what else annoys me?

SNOW.


...

Maybe it's because I'm not American.

Click, scroll, read, frown, cringe, gasp, suspend that last breath, feel your heart beat in time with the words, rush to finish it, then slowly exhale. Perhaps I would have felt faint if I hadn't already expected it. But like a tattoo, the pain only lasted as long as the experience. And then it's just... a fact.

Not my favourite - or a favourite, but thought I should share it as it appears to have gained some sort of "cult-like status". Hmm.


...

-

(Fire drill.)


...

-

Why you shouldn't suck face with a vacuum cleaner.


...

(bored@lunch)

One day I would like to risk being spat on and have a photo of me taken with a South American camelid (llama, alpaca, I don't discriminate) and an Andean caldera volcano in the background. Hopefully by then I would have figured out how to pronounce "Cotopaxi".

...

It's okey maam.

The Filipinos are such an incredibly friendly and patient people, and that's just on e-mail (and, well, the really nice service staff at a lot of shops and restaurants here who should totally slap the faces of their incredibly rude and condescending Shitsporean colleagues). I'll probably try and pick up some Tagalog before I go, if not for anything else then to discombobulate all the Caucasian or Japanese tourists who are bound to think that I'm a local there. Plus it's pretty slow in the office these days. La la la...


...

Too Fings.

1. I'll sign on for another year instead of going back because it makes more sense (viz. same shit different floor, more flexibility in personal travel schedule, bigger room, potentially more autonomy).


2. I'll get my motorcycle license by the end of 3Q09 so that I can rent a scooter to explore Vietnam. (Tanzania plan reposted to end 2010 due to not wanting to climb two mountains in the same year.)

I'm reading Elizabeth Gilbert's "Eat, Pray, Love" and I want to be her friend. (And yes, that is me confessing to enjoying a NYT bestseller with a blurb from Britney Spears saying it's a good read.)

My oil painting instructor is impressed by me. He thinks I'd be capable enough to paint people because I can see and understand shapes even though I'm still a beginner. Me me me me me!

I should probably e-mail McHale (yes, that's really the dude's name) and find out when the hell my underwater camera casing's gonna get here.

I seriously need to start training for the climb in March.

...

Psoriasis.

The next time I get asked why "women here prefer to date foreign men", all I have to do is gesture with one broad sweep of my arm towards my cowering colleagues and say "look - NO BALLS".

With regard to the average local men - "Sensitive" really means "unable to tolerate any sort of physical activity that may involve revealing a fitness level that is below average for fear of ridicule (thus perpetuating said reason for ridicule); unable to handle anything harder than a triple sec cocktail (and I mean just one triple sec cocktail); unable to tolerate the stress of having to tell the boss that he had made a minor error and instead getting you (i.e. me) to do it instead; and, probably, unable to get it up without the help of an iPhone (or whatever the latest gadget that fills the gap otherwise occupied by "character" is these days). "New Age" is just an excuse, and "Guy" is an all-out lie. Honestly, I probably have the biggest balls in this office.



...

Okaaay...so

getting hold of the latest issue of National Geographic Adventure while I'm already in a responsibility-averse state of mind probably wasn't the best thing to do... All I can think of now is whitewater-rafting in the Himalayas, searching for condors in Bolivia, rappelling down waterfalls in Colombia (while under fire from cocaine farmers no less), island-hopping in Belize, diving in the Galapagos, kayaking in the Antarctic etc etc etc... Total work-motivation-killer. Do you think I could marry a rich man who would be willing to pay for all my desired travels, for let's say an average of one orgasm a week? I don't even need him to be faithful as long as he uses protection. I mean, that sounds about fair don't it?



...

Stuff from my mobile.

Ha ha!

Reading the comments section on any website usually terrifies me with the realisation that intelligence is the privilege of a minority.

But occasionally I come across a really funny one and suddenly everything's better again.

I Heart working from home!


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