Work Travel + B'day Bowls + Fashion + Bball

I'm Pogi, I go whooooosh

Wow, it's been a while but I'll be off to Singapore from the 23rd March to the 1st of April. It's a work related travel, similar to what I had last year. But this time I'm there to train my peoples (our staff) and to help close down our SG office. Damn. But all is not lost as we hope to open a Japan office soon, hopefully in Shibuya, near all the shops. :) Then I'll be one of the peeps deploying that office there, how kewl.

Due to a convention my usual hotel Pan Pacific or the Conrad are unavailable, I'm stuck in the Marina Mandarin. So if anyone is from SG, please say hello. ^_^

I believe the fortune above rings true, I plan to do heaps of shopping there, and totally buy a new wardrobe....or two. ;p

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Wish me luck.

^_^

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Claudia's B'day Bowls

We were celebrating Claudia's b'day at one of her favourite hobbies, ten pin bowling!

I dreaded this night because not only haven't I gone bowling for like 10 years, I'm up against Neil who is uber pro bowler. He is a pro because a. he has his own special bowling shoes, b. he has a hand brace, c. he has his own bowling ball, and d. he has competed in tournaments before.

The only bowling I've ever done is with friends and for sport back at St. Gregory's College.

However, I didn't do too bad for my first game back, I clocked 108, then in the 2nd game 98. :/ And the third, 136! :)

I didn't beat Neil though. He wouldn't even let me beat him.

Poo.

Anyways, here are the funkii girls in their trendy straight/skinnies showing off their bowling shoes.

I forget which legs are which, one of them is Karla's, Maria's and Andrea's.

Here is Drea in pointing to the fabness in her jeans and shoes combo.

And some plush toys we won from those The Claw vending machines in the arcade games section of the bowling alley.

It was a fun night. Great to see old friends and also a shout out to Omar/Krist. You'll be fine man, get through this with your close friends, we all love you man.

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Fashion

Friday outfit. I felt very non-collar today so I hit it up with this one.

Top: 2 x singlets from Phils and U.S., Dickies tee from U.S., Abercrombie hoodie from U.S., regular jewellery.
Bottom: Samuel & Keith blue belt from SG, Levis jeans from U.S. and Sky blue Chucks from Phils (out of picture).

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Basketball

Due to my condition described above, last night was my last, yes, last, *weep*, basketball game for a long long time. I have taken the advice of my doctor's and my parents to discontinue playing active sport until my body has fully recovered, and after I have knee surgery for my torn ACL.

But last night was excruciating, as my arthritis kicked in, even with my pain killers. I had trouble sprinting across the court, and even had trouble controlling my motor skills.

Good news though is that we won, 48-34. It was a stressful game though against Battered Savs. I was in Raja Bell (Phoenix Suns, star defense player) mode, and played D all night. I finished with 3 points, 1/2 FG, 1/2 FT, 8 boards, 3 assists, 4 steals and 2 blocks.

To spice things up last night, I had a run-in with one of the sly bastards on the opposing team.

So the situation goes, I grab a rebound and had my back turned to him, he tries to steal the ball from my hands but instead connects with my jaw. I turn around and give him the biggest evil, crooked eye and tell him: To watch himself. Then he tells me: Whatcha gonna do about it? (T.I. song, hehe, well sorta). Then I point to the scoreboard and say: "See that, we're gonna win in double figures."

At our next possession, I posted down low against sly bastard, bumped him a bit and did a fade away shot over him and their tall centre dude (Kobe Bryant/Sendoh - Slam Dunk!). I banked it off the backboard and it when in to the dismay of sly bastard. I then pointed at him (not the finger! but a finger).

The crowd went wild!! heheehe

Let's win this division guys, finally.

Below is a sad pic, because it is my last game with these guys. I'm in the middle, looking kinda pumped up because of the adrenalin and testosterone, plus the pain killers I was on.

Thanks guys for a wonderful 5 seasons, there's a few missing in the photo but only because they have since passed on to other things, although I couldn't have picked a better group to be with.

Go Titans!

Excuse my red face, I was exhausted after playing for almost the whole game, plus feeling a bit high from the pain killers I took. [-_-]

Surgery, what it can do for you + Food + Fashion

Ayumi Hamasaki, an extremely popular Jpop singer, and also a fashion leader, idolised by many.

Almost to good to be true right? At least I thought she was perfect, but low and behold, a friend passed me some links and it proved that Ayumi was not all that she seemed.....
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After guessing what to click on various Japanese webpages, I bumped into this.....

Busted!!

After reading translated articles, the perfect Ayumi Hamasaki, is not so perfect afterall. It was found out that Ayumi has undergone much surgery since her early years and she actually had a bit of a weight problem too.

Notice below that her eyes have been "fixed" to look more rounded, more Westernised, compared to her naturally Japanese eyes.

But hey, I'm not against surgery, as the world is superficial and you are usually treated by how you look rather than who you are, and if you change any feature of your physique for the purpose of self esteem, there is nothing wrong with that.

Do what you need to do to make yourself happy.

^_^

Because of this discovery of my beloved Ayumi, I have thought more about the eye surgery. I honestly hate my eyes because they're so chinky and small. They are also light sensitive so bright sunny days require me to wear sunglasses all the time and the flash from a camera cause me to squint my eyes.
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Plus my ears are big....[-_-]...lucky I can hide these with my hair.

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Fashion

Casual Friday - started off a bit nippy early this morning but it warmed to its projected 28 degrees, the sun is out and it is a beautiful day, we are also sans cloud, which is odd because it was raining late last night.

Top: 2 x wifebeaters from Phils & U.S., RL polo from U.S.
Bottom: Levis jeans from U.S., Chucks "Vintage" from Singapore.

Speaking of Singapore, earlier this week I was informed that I will be taking another business trip to Singapore. To do some consulting with clients and training with staff there on one of our products, Goldmine Enterprise Edition (GMEE).

I love traveling but I honestly hate flying, because 1. it takes friggin' ages to get anywhere (can't they just fly as fast as they can up there?!), 2. the aircon in the planes affect my skin badly and cause me to dry up and be flakey.

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Food

I cooked these at work this morning for breakfast, how delicious. Notice there are 4 layers of waffles, with 5 love hearts to each layer. Hhmmm 4 x 5 = .....20 waffles!! :)

God bless my waffle maker.

On the topic of food, shout outs also go to Phillip and Catherine, thank you for showing me some junk food near your workplace and it was nice to meet your friends.

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Tonight, off to eat dindins and watch Rocky Balboa (finally!!) with bestie Gra-che (Grace) and her bf Joni.

Wish me luck for this Sunday's bball game, it's our final game for the season before the playoffs begin.

Go Titans!!

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Mood: content

Song of the moment: These New Puritans - Dior Homme

Team building + Pogi zombie + Fashion + Sport + SNES

Whoa, what a long weekend that was. 4 hr drive down from Sydney. Over 500km in total. Heh. Sounds like something the host from The Amazing Race would say.

I'm sitting here at my desk at work with relief that I am at work and not running around chasing kids.

You heard it. Pogi was "Uncle Pogi" last weekend. Which I should take in offence considering I am 22, and that is rather young for an uncle. XD

Somehow I think this weekend was a way for parents to "offload" their kids to their work colleagues who did NOT have kids.

Work mate Gary let his kids drive me crazy, Clarissa who asked a zillion questions about anything and everything then ended it with 'Blistering barnacles!' or 'Thundering typhoons!', which is a Captain Haddock (Tintin - Herge) quote. How cute.


Sean kept me busy always wanting to play soccer (football), gridiron (American football) and tennis. Suddenly I regret bringing these toys for them. :p

Here is a pic of them playing with bubbles.

We stayed at a lodge right next to a private beach with a jetty. Completely furnished with plenty of room for everyone. It was a palais, tranquill and very relaxing. Paradise from busy Sydney. But I do miss the busy city life. I prefer being busy, because I like to feel occupied in accomplishing a task.

Here is a view from the rear deck of the home.

I was on cooking duty, the day after we arrived (Saturday morning), so that, means breakfast. Luckily we went grocery shopping the previous day and I bought a heap for breakfast.

Unfortunately, I forgot to snap a piccy of the food I prepared, but let me entice you with some food porn descriptions. XD

I made fluffy pancakes with warm maple syrup, crunchy french toast topped off with powdered sugar, fried hotdogs with fried eggs (runny egg yolk) and two different kinds of corned beef (request by Gary). It may seem a lot but I like variety at meals plus more is always good.

Please note: I did not once use any non-fat ingredients. ALL FAT BABY!!!

The others on cooking duty made bbq chicken, pasta, chicken wraps, beef curry (Malay style), and chicken garlic (Malay style) which were all very tasty.

Here is a pic of me and Dario (Flavio's eldest son) at Bateman's Bay when we stopped for groceries.

Piccy of the fog in Wollongong on the way down.

Stingray that I caught.

Don't worry, we plucked the hook out and let it go.

I'm a fan of fishing but not a fan of when crazie people, ala Richard, drives one. Here is the boat we used.

On my way home, avoiding the traffic in Nowra and Dunmore, I passed this.

It only applies to Prison Break (TV show) fans.

Hotties status: Sorry no hotties, because I was with work people, which means, pretty much everyone is married, or is coupled.

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Fashion

Dior Homme denim.

These are premium denim in the pieces of 19 cms Japanese style cuts, raw used denim, orange over dyes and new dust wash jeans, pretty much just distressed and washed denims.

But what Dior Homme specialise in is the fit. These are mainly straight rise but are incorrectly associated with Levi's anti-fit style.

Now I don't have a pair myself, aM@$!J# R%T#@JRJ @, but I will sure have one seeing how great they sit on Hedi Slimane in the pic below.

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Titans whooped some ass last night again, against the Rippers, 63-33. wham!! Pogi killed it big with rebounds, assists and blocks. But only 1 basket, from 2 attempts.

I didn't have the energy but I wanted to play sport, especially after all the tennis I watched over the weekend, plus the NBL game of the week, Brisbane Bullets vs West Sydney Razorbacks.

Meanwhile, last night in tennis, Roger Federer (Switzerland) has one the Australian Open again for the 3rd time (I think?) running. Even though it was a win from straight sets over Fernando Gonzales (Chile), 7-6 6-4 6-4, it was a high quality match with power, finesse and entertainment.

Roger with his trophy.

The underdog Fernando Gonzales, whom my female friends have all fallen in love with since his spark in the limelight. They totally forgot Rafael Nadal. XD

And to poke fun at Roger, here he is in a rather unflattering picture.

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SNES console

I want one of these. I have 2 but need 1 more for another room.

*prays for the SNES*

B'days + Clubbing + Bball

Yay for work on Fridays, because at my workplace it doesn't really mean much work. :)

Lunch time, work colleague Flavio was raving about this tightass lunchies place near work at a place called Station Hotel. $8 steaks! I had the sir loin with black pepper sauce and chips. Very yummy. Not bad for $8 but the catch is that they charge you like $3.50 for a drink, my small glass of lemonade was overpriced but no biggie.

Had one more hour in my lunch period so we spent the remainder of it fragging (geek speak for killing) eachother in Unreal Tournament 2k3. I won ofcourse because of my awesome hand coordination. I love hearing Richard, another work colleague, cursing and slamming on his keyboard and mouse when I kill him. XD

Now Friday was when, as a family, we celebrated my sister's birthday, her's is actually on the 23rd (Michael Jordan's Bball jersey number, also LeBron's). I met them at my mom's Singapore Airlines office and then proceeded to go home, to change, then drive back out to eat at Sydney Madang's restaurant for a late dinner.

It's a Korean BBQ place. Other than it being a 40 degree day (celcius, slight exaggeration), and barbequeing, the entire dinner was great, I had my usual pork belly strips and pork meat, then tried their eel, I can't eat it. Everytime I think of eel, I think of the uglee, gross looking ones from the Little Mermaid.

Knowing that Eric's b'day is also on tonite at Verandah bar, I bid my family fare well and proceeded to meet Bao, fattyboomstick, at Verandah.

I changed into this for Friday nite:

Disclaimer: ignore my Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles quilt, it's my childhood memories and Ninjas are kewl, therefore Ninja Turtles are ze best!

Top: white Dickies singlet from USA, white Puritan singlet from the Philippines, white Ralph Lauren Polo from USA,

Bottoms: black CK denims from Sydney, can't see it in the photo but under the jeans is a sky blue Samuel and Kevin belt from Singapore.

Shoes: And for my shoes, I chose my white canvas Umbro pair from Singapore. Later that night, I spilt some melted cheese on it. :/

Regulars: wooden feather token necklace with replaced leather necklace, silver necklace with tv show Charmed token, TAG watch and gold ring.

Saturday was another maniac crazie day, I drove to Centennial Park for Maria's (work colleague) b'day. She's Indonesian and she prepared a helluva lot of Indo food that I had no idea about. Now I'm not much of a chilli fan, so I needed help on identifying which dishes served were chilli/spicy or not. I'm a wuss. I still found their non-spicy food spicy. :/

I hope she likes the silver JAG earrings I got for her. Actually, I know she will like em. :)

Now taking from Seinfeld in the chocolate babka episode, at any "adult" social situation held at a meeting place, one should bring a food or drink item. How awesome to learn from Seinfeld. Don't hate! I learn a lot from Seinfeld, like Jujyfruits, Junior mints, etc.

I ended up bringing a passionfruit cheesecake from the Cheesecake shop. One of my classic favourite cheesecakes. Perfect combo of sweetness and cheeseness.

Later that night I failed to make it to Gibb's set at the Art House, due to a nap turning into a 12 hr sleep. :/ But from what I hear, he had a great set, props to Gibson. Now whether to go to Lupe Fiasco's this Tuesday? hhmmmmmz. Pretty cheap for $40-50 bux though.

Titan's this Sunday whooped some Filo ass once again! Titans toppled Fil-In with a 58-50 win, considering we started 8 points down because we were late. >_< And finally, part of my Sunday unwind, the newspaper! My favourite is to read the comics. Comics are for adults too!

Here's a good Garfield one. Enjoy!

From a convo with Bao tonite:

Bao: man i cant believe i hadnt seen u in so long
Bao: forgot how tall u was
Pogi: i forgot how fat you were.

>_<>

Lostie [-_-]

I lose things. Don't know why I'm cursed this way but I'm very prone to losing things.

Let me remember which memorable items I lost.....
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My dad's college ring - this was a pure gold college ring he received when he graduated back in the Philippines. I was wearing it at school and took it off temporarily in class because jewellery such as rings were prohibited. After class I checked my pockets and it was missing. Went back to the classroom and it was nowhere to be found. It was Thursday (our sport day). I've avoided the topic with my dad ever since and have yet to own up to it. :/

My wallet - gee, how many times have I lost this? 5 times during highschool? it was such a pain to cancel all my debit cards and reapply for my school ID, train pass, etc. Plus my coupon cards that got me free subs or slurpees. But this does not compare to the scolding I received from my parents. It was so severe that at one point, my parents would not let me take my wallet with me when I was out, on the rare occasion when they do, I had to keep it in my front pocket (how uncomfortable) than where I prefer it, my back pocket.

My Samsung Digimax camera - after meeting up with friends to Krispy Kremes in Orange Grove, I left it at the tables outside, headed off and drove for 30 secs, noticed it was missing, drove back and it was gone. @R(AR #R*#Q $(QR$ #QDJAED SA#@$! #@*. That camera had photos of when my cousin Mark was here, visiting from Canada, all was lost. :( Some bastard/bitch thief out there has my camera and photos of my friends and family, who in particular I feel terrible about.

My Diadora tennis sweater - my beloved, lucky tennis sweater. This was the first item that I lost whilst overseas. I was in Bellingham with family at a camp site. Was freezing cold that night and drank a bit so I wasn't alert. I scuffled to the shared men's shower area and proceeded to get ready. As soon as I was done I walked out, only to realise a few hours later, after we've left the camp site, and inconveniencing my cousins in the car, that I'm missing my sweater. I retraced my steps and we thought it'd be in the showers. The camp site dude would not let us enter the site anymore, so they asked one of their staff to check the men's showers, no dice, no sweater, no tennis luck. I won one championship, and came runners up once in SDTA (Southern Districts Tennis Association) with that sweater. What a shame. I loved that sweater.

Hate Pogi yet for being retarded? >_< Titans (our basketball team) had their first game since the holiday break last night.

We lost 38-60 to a team called Tribal, unfortunately we were undermanned with only 5 players in total, the others were unavailable, injured or overseas.

My knee (considering I have torn my ligament and cartilage) surprisingly held up, but without regular exercise I was panting the whole game, felt like I was going to throw up. Pogi needs to exercise more the lazy fatty. But I made several some really kewl Rukawa (Slam Dunk!) styled plays, dribbled into the key and made a fadeaway, then made a killer half court assist, grabbed some rebounds from taller opposition players and broke some ankles including to get to the basket.

Below is an old pic of me in my bball uniform with my game face on, har har har, and my attempted short Korean/Taiwanese hair cut. :) luvo?

Oh and a shout out to Maria!! Happy Birthday bub! We had great fun at Skygarden, hope you like your pressie, lemme borrow!

Also Happy Birthdays to Henz and Nina as well. We don't get old, only older. XD