December 2006

Back home for Christmas and New Year

Note - Marieke's laptop crashed and we lost a lot of the pictures. Hopefully her sister Charlotte still has some, but at the moment we only have the pictures of the last few days...

Last year we had Christmas in Tokyo, which was brilliant of course but at the same time it's really a family thing and we missed that so this year we opted for going back home again - not in the last place because Marieke's sister who lives on Aruba would be there too. After a week of busy meetings in Cincinnati, I landed on Schiphol airport on Friday the 22nd. I went straight to my parents' house in Heerhugowaard. I wouldn't have much time to see them as they were going on vacation to Gambia on the 25th. On Saturday however they had an anniversary party of two good friends. So I dropped them off and with Marieke, who had come down to Heerhugowaard as well, I went to visit Oma, my grandmother, in Alkmaar, a big bag of Indonesian-Chinese take out under our arm. The next day mom and dad did their packing while Marieke and I wandered through the cozy streets of Alkmaar. We made reservations at a really cool little restaurant/bar called De Buren (The Neighbors). We had a great time there with Oma and my parents. If you want to eat in Alkmaar in a friendly, relaxed atmosphere with great food, friendly service and affordable prices, this is a real recommendation. Which was especially important to me as we've had some bad restaurant experiences with Oma before and we needed to get that out of the way.

The next day, on Christmas day, we brought mom and dad to the airport for their vacation to Gambia... Always in search of sunshine! We continued straight on for Losser to start our Christmas celebrations there. It was the first time since a long time that the family in Losser was complete - Marieke's sister Charlotte and her boyfriend Ernest, her brother Eltjo, the parents and us. We played our traditional dice game; we leave the gifts wrapped and then spend an hour or two rolling dice, changing rules, and, in the case of Marieke, Eltjo and me, cheating as much as we possibly can, to end up with a few nice gifts around the table and otherwise a load of... crap, pretty much!

On the 26th, we went over to our friend Emiel's house to pick up his Tubke (a wooden hot tub) and installed it at the house in Losser. All of Emiel's family came along and after dinner five of us, Marieke, Eltjo, Charlotte, Emiel's sister Nicole and I, all jumped in the Tubke... An extremely relaxing way to spend a cold Christmassy night out in the open!

# I'll post the photos here if I ever get them back #

On Wednesday Marieke and I went down to Amsterdam with Eltjo. Emiel was supposed to join us but because of a sinus infection he couldn't make it. Which was unfortunate: Emiel had been able to get tickets for Manifesto, supposedly the coolest and most popular party of the year. Only 1,000 tickets, all sold at just one store - the most prestigious Diesel store in Amsterdam, and completely sold out within half an hour. Good thing we have friends with connections! It was a dress up party and of course we didn't have anything with us whatsoever so the three of us trodded down to a party shop, ending up with a police helmet, a sheriff's star, some hand cuffs and crime scene ribbon. While not the most extravagantly clothed, our outfit, thanks to its sheer and utter cheesiness, was an unexpected success at the party. I guess even a 5 euro outfit can be hip among the hip...

Before going to the actual party, we met up in the apartment of the guy who got the ticket in the first place. We met him, his French girlfriend and another couple from Zaandam who were very cool people. We set off at about midnight and when we arrived, the place was rocking. The party absolutely lived up to its reputation and exceeded our expectations. We've been to plenty of parties in Amsterdam that were called the best this and the best that, although none as popular and famous as this one, and tonight showed us why. The people were all super laid back, the atmosphere was just great. All 25 to 35 year olds, which I guess was to be expected with a ticket price of 65 euros just to get in, The location was superb as well - it was held at Paradiso, originally a church building but used as a cultural center since the late sixties. It hosts a lot of concerts for about a max of 1,000 people, so all the intimate, not too big (yet) concerts are held there. Above the dance floor is a balustrade from where people can look down upon the dance floor. It's brilliant. The music was good but I wouldn't call it great. They did a very interesting mix between dance (mostly) and a few rock songs (in the style of Smells Like Teen Spirit) - a novelty and it worked well, although at times I thought there was too much rock. A question of taste I'm sure. The party ended at 5:00 AM; we did go to a place called the Sushi Bar for some more partying but we were outta there in half an hour - after Manifesto, everything else had to be - and was - a let down. What a party!

The next day we stayed in Amsterdam, slept in, relaxed a bit, walked through the Vondelpark, ate at Wagamama, and in general just chilled. On Friday we dropped by Eltjo at his work. He's gotten a job at a company called Ernstige Zaken, organizing parties, photo shoots, and more. Their office is great, it's big, tastefully decorated and there's a nice, relaxed atmosphere. We also met a guy they hire to work for them every now and then, an Israeli called Gil, who's been living in Holland for eight years - a Dutch girl, naturally, made him move here. The guys speaks excellent Dutch, in the beginning I didn't even realize he was a foreigner! We all chilled for about an hour, drinking coffee and talking about traveling (he had driven his jeep, with girlfriend and two german shepherds from Amsterdam through Europe, the Sahara and the Sahel all the way to the south of Africa). Cool! After this short interlude, Marieke spent a bit more time shopping in Amsterdam and then finally went back to Losser.

For new year's eve, we decided not to party in Amsterdam. Manifesto had set such a high standard that new year's would undoubtedly be disappointing comparatively. In fact, most new year's parties disappoint. I think it's all the building up of expectations that aren't often met. So instead we all stayed in Losser, again with the complete family - which we concluded was a first. At midnight we opened many bottles of champagne - too many to count. Emiel and his sister had come as well and we partied for a few hours in the house.

Oh yeah, I showed everyone the setting on my Sony DSC-T5 digital camera where it takes a picture with flash and then leaves the shutter open for a few more seconds so you can really play around with the light. We went kinda crazy with that as you can see here below.

Eltjo and Emiel feeling blue	Trace my mouth! ;)
Marieke and Charlotte	Marieke and Eltjo in swirling light
The police relaxing in the Tubke	Marieke pouring Ernest champagne at midnight

Later on, Marieke, Eltjo and I went to the house of some old friends in Losser where we partied for another hour or so. All in all we got home around 5:00 AM - and although it wasn't as much of a party time as it normally is, it was just right the way it was; with family, close friends, and with Manifesto still fresh in our memories we didn't even feel we really missed a party or so.

That said, we plan to plan something spectacular again next year...

On the 3rd, the day before going home again to Manila, Marieke and I traveled back to the west to visit Oma (my grandmother). I had bought her a new stereo as her old radio was broken; she was completely surprised when we gave it to her and she even got a bit emotional. A perfect gift for a perfect grandmother! We had agreed that we'd spend the night at Oma's place and she had prepared a wonderful meal for us with mushroom soup, a shrimp cocktail, Greek salad and fish in mustard sauce. A real treat! And to top it all off, Eltjo and Emiel turned up unexpected as well! Really cool. Of course Oma had made plenty of food and even with the five of us we were unable to finish it all. We stayed the night, in Oma's bed as she insisted to sleep on the guest bed because it was smaller, I mean, how sweet is that???, and set off back to Manila the next day.

December 8 - 12, 2006

Sinterklaas meets Typhoon

Two of our friends had friends, which was an excellent excuse to spend another weekend in Boracay, naturally. I took Friday and Monday off and we set of for a long weekend to where the beaches are white, the palm trees green and the cocktails plenty - at least, that's the usual grind, but this time it would turn out to be very different...

In the morning, we met up with Megan and two of her visitors: Anders, a Canadian guy living in Macau, and his Swedish-Canadian mom Eva, who was visiting him. We immediately hit it off with both of them. They were laid back with a good sense of humor, and neither wore a checkered shirt.

Boracay started out as it usually does - the beach was drenched in warm sunlight and we soon settled down for some drinks on the beach. We took up shelter this time in a resort called Sand Castles, right in between boat station 1 and 2, an ideal location although the resort was nothing special. But who cares, we were in Boracay, and the sunset was as colorful as ever, the food and drinks no less pleasing to the senses...

Marieke, Megan, Eva and Anders	The view: a typical Boracay sunset

Pete and Joelene arrived later in the day and we went out eating and drinking all together. At the end of the night die-hards Anders and I tried to find a bar that was still open when the others had already gone to bed, but without much success. Weird, I would think that in a party place like Boracay, especially on a Friday, you can party all night long at least in a few places. Instead, it was dead quiet. That can't be said from the #%$@ roosters #%$@ cockadoodledooing all #%$@ night long. I mean, what's the deal with these #%$@ animals anyway huh? Waking me up at sunrise would be bad enough, but they actually start at 2:00 AM, when there's no #%$@ sun in sight for at least another three hours. I mean COME ON!!! This pretty much sums up how I feel about those #%$@ animals:

Also, what's the deal with a place like Boracay? On the one hand they say they want to become the number one tourist destination in Asia by the year 2016, yet the island is infested with stray dogs, spoiling beach fun, and roosters, spoiling sleep. Not to mention everyone starts hammering and talking loudly as of 8:00 AM. Not exactly a tourist haven!

Aaaaanyway, I had brought chocolate letters with me from Holland, which is a Sinterklaas tradition back home (click here for more info about Sinterklaas), and we decided that we'd do a classic celebration on Saturday night. Everyone was instructed to buy a gift of around 250 pesos (4 euros) and wrap it up. At night, we all went to Hey Jude's; about 15 of us. After putting a couple of tables together we all sat down in a big square, put all our presents in the middle and started the dice game. I made up the rules right on the spot, something like:
- Throw 1, take 1 (first from the table, then from someone else)
- Throw 2 take 1 from the table and 1 from someone else
- Throw 3, throw again, and move the 2nd number you throw seats to the left
- Throw 4, throw again, and move the 2nd number you throw seats to the right
- Throw 5, take all presents from someone else
- Throw 6, change all your presents with someone else

After a while we also added shots to the mix, some of which were on the house, and by the time we were done, we were all pretty happy. I don't actually remember what I ended up with, if anything, but that wasn't the point anyway.

And then it started to get windy. Debbie and Dino and their friends had just gone home for about half an hour when Marieke asked me to go have look outside to check out the wind. I stepped outside, wearing only my swim shorts, and immediately I hunched over, just to protect myself from the sand hitting my body at full speed. As if my skin was being sandblasted. There was just no way we could walk outside in these conditions. So we decided to stay in the bar some more; it was only 5:00 AM or so anyway. But an hour later it just got worse. This time we all stepped outside, but with the same result. So we stayed inside, the music had already stopped, the DJ was sleeping on the bar, but the beer was still flowing freely. It was only around 7:30 that the wind finally got less intense and we were able to start our walk home. The mess was incredible. Palm trees had fallen down, leaves up to 10m long were strewn across the path, complete store fronts were blown away. Boats lay upside down on the beach. It was light when we reached home, only to find our resort submersed in a 50cm deep puddle. Our room was soaking wet, our bed only had a 30cm dry strip on one side. We asked for another room but that took so long that Marieke said 'screw that' and took the dry strip. I waited for about one minute more and then cuddled up beside her, on the border of dry and wet, miserable but, at 9:00 or so, completely exhausted and happy to finally be able to close my eyes. We slept for about 4 hours.

A high and dry place	A canoo in our resort to get to the hut!!!

The next days were pretty bad. Pete and Joelene's roof was destroyed by a palm tree and apparently Pete had slept with coconuts next to his face. We moved to another hut but we had no water, no electricity. All flights were cancelled so everyone stayed, which was kinda cool, but at the same time, it rained continuously and with half the island destroyed and malfunctioning, there really wasn't anything at all to do. On Monday most people had to leave, but we decided to extend by an extra day so that we wouldn't have to deal with the airport situation: our friends took hours just to get there (most boats were destroyed) and then had to wait five to eight hours just to get on a flight. Apparently there were around 500 people on the little airport of Caticlan!

Pete and Joelene's hut	Upside down on the beach
A house completely destroyed	A bedroom with a view ;)

We were lucky to at the end suddenly get a bit of sun, so in the end we were able to actually enjoy Boracay the Boracay way again. Debbie and Dino and their friends also stayed till Tuesday, so we could hang out with them.

Me and Dino on the beach	Debbie, Dino and Jacky

Friday, November 24, 2006

The 8th wonder of the world

I think if you add up all self-proclaimed 8th wonders of the world, you probably end up with 800 or so. Still, the Philippines have something to say for their 8th world wonder - it is one of the few made by people because they wanted to, not because some megalomaniac king forced them to. Carved out of stone mountains about 2000 years ago, the rice terraces in Banaue are known to be one of the most beautiful tourist spots in the country

On Friday morning, Bep, Harry, Marieke and I were picked up by our guide and driver, Joseph, accompanied by Roland, who owned the car and tagged along basically because he had never been up north, or so we think. We were in for a long ride - Banaue is about 350 km north of Manila but it takes close to 10 (!) hours to get there thanks to winding roads that are simultaneously used as storage space to dry freshly harvested rice. Many times they use up half the road for this and when two vehicles approach in opposite direction, one of them will swerve and drive straight over the drying rice. Hmmm, nice. Still the drive up was pretty nice, we had great views of the Philippine country side, and Joseph kept telling us all kinds of stories about the things we passed. And when we finally arrived at our hotel, where Marieke's name was spelled out in big bright white letters outside the Banaue Hotel, we didn't feel all that mangled.

The Banaue rice terraces...	...truly spectacular!!
Crushing the rice drying on the road	Welcome Ms. Marieke Stopel & co. :)

The next day we got up early for another van ride, to Sagada. Sagada is a picturesque little mountain village about a 3 hours drive over a painfully bumpy road from our hotel, sporting a small museum, some caves and, the main attraction of the town, the so called 'hanging coffins'. The museum was all right, a few pictures of head hunters that live in the area, holding up cut off heads as trophies, carrying headless bodies on sticks, etc. Bizarre! We made sure we stuck to the main roads from then on...

The hanging coffins are short wooden caskets used to bury the dead. The caskets are then hung into trees or put in big rock crevices and left to wither. It's really quite a bizarre spectacle. The coffins are so small because they fold the dead up back into fetal position and once they are put at their final resting place, no one ever comes back anymore to pay tribute. So when there's an earthquake or so, the coffins may just fall down or break and bones will be left wherever they land.

There was also a cave to be explored and Marieke and I decided to go for it while Harry and Bep went with Joseph to a view point to relax for a bit. Which turned out to be a good decision as the exploring was quite adventurous and you have to be physically quite fit and not too scared of getting hurt if you want to make it out again! The cave was really amazing. I've seen stalactites and stalagmites before but this was quite different... The structures were huge and rather than walking past them we had to climb over them, crouch through them, water gushing over our feet, water falling down on our heads, wading through water a meter deep, and so on. It was really, really cool! Here are a couple of pictures and a video of Marieke climbing down the rocks.

The cave getting narrower...	...and narrower!!!
Beautiful structures..	...and a couple of wet die hards!

Here is Marieke climbing down one of the wet walls in the cave. (If it doesn't load, just double click it and it will start in another window)

Marieke climbing down in the cave

The way back was one of the longest drives in my life. The road was extremely bumpy, the ride took 3 hours what felt like 11 as it had gone dark so there was nothing to see.

Waking up the next day was bliss. Early bliss at 7:00 AM, but bliss nonetheless. The view was beautiful, the balcony looked out over lush green valleys. After breakfast we went out again, with a new guide again, this time to visit a few traditional Ifugao (the tribe living in the area of Banaue's rice terraces) houses. I didn't mind seeing them, but it was all set up too touristy - we felt a bit like watching a puppet show... Afterwards we checked out a couple of view points to watch the rice terraces, which were absolutely stunning. Harry, Marieke and I went down to look at some rice as Harry had never seen it. Unfortunately we didn't have time to go trek through the fields, something we will absolutely do if we ever go back there again.

At around noon, we got back into the van, again, and started the journey home. Another 10 hours in the car... pffffff... It was a lot of driving for a bit of visiting, a bit too much. If you decide to go to Banaue, make sure you reserve at least four days, two to travel up and down, and two to visit the place.

Selling fuel in coke bottles	Selling meat drying on the road side
Walking the pet... ;)	Good times during the 10 hour car ride
Dancing on the rice fields	A carabau and rice farmer

You can find all the pictures in the photo album. And here is a video of a rice farmer ploughing his field with a carabau. (If it doesn't load, just double click it and it will start in another window)

Rice farmer with his carabau

Sunday, November 12, 2006

Antonio's with Harry and Bep

Antonio's is one of the most famous restaurants of the Philippines. It's in Tagaytay, about an hour and a half drive from Manila, so it's not exactly easy to get there, and consequently, surprise surprise, we had never been there. What didn't help was that it's very close to Sonya's Garden so we usually ended up there, under the impression that the garden walk there would anyway be better than 'just' the restaurant we thought Antonio's was. Wrong!! Antonio's has actually its own garden and after all the building that has recently gone on at Sonya's Garden, Antonio's is actually nicer!

Of course we needed a special occasion (duh) and what better reason than to take visitors from the west? Harry and Bep, Marieke's parents, had come to visit us for three weeks. The menu had all kinds of delights, meat, fish, pasta, the works. By far the best value is to take a set meal where you pay a fixed price for a starter, a main course and desert. I think they serve free dalandang juice and there may also have been a soup included. Whatever the details, the food was stellar! Definitely value for money and a place we will go back to.

Bep & Marieke	Harry & me
The inside of the colonial house	Cool plants in the garden

The restaurant building is beautifully laid out - very colonial with a few nice pieces of art. The building seamlessly flows into a garden full of cool looking plants and flowers. There was even a pond with koi carp that swam to wherever they saw visitors, clearly in the hope to be fed even more. Fat bastards.

Koi carp in the pond at Antonio's

You can find more pictures of Antonio's in the photo album.

Saturday, October 28, 2006

Thriller night

Halloween isn't much of an event in Europe. If anything, most Europeans regard it as yet another attempt by unworthy shop keepers to lighten our wallets just a little bit more... and of course get us into the spending mood for Sinterklaas & Christmas... I wouldn't be surprised if every couple of years they pull a new festival out of their high hat just a few weeks earlier until we have reasons to buy gifts all year round. But rest assured, I am a convert now. Halloween rocked this year. Let me tell you all about it.

Not so long ago, we met Megan and Sean. Megan's from Canada. In fact, she's the first person I really know from Canada and she has completely thwarted my comfortable preconception of the typical Canadian: she doesn't wear checkered shirts and she doesn't say Eh? all the time... Dammit, how can a man put the world in labeled boxes if no one will obey the rules? Anyway, being from North America, Megan is automatically a Halloween authority and when she suggested to throw a party, hey who are we to say no? We decided our place would be best as it's a bit bigger than theirs, and with the amount of furniture that we (don't) have, you only have to move the table and you have space for 60 people...

The first time Halloween. I got completely into it. Excited like a kid with a new toy. If you've celebrated Halloween before, and it's all just too 'seen-that-done-that', then imagine you're throwing, say, an Ice Party - with your whole living room made of pure solid ice and everyone dressed in their ski clothes. Or a beach party complete with sand, sea and surfboards - again, in your own living room. That's how I felt about this Halloween thing; we were throwing a party with pumpkins and vampires and gory drinks and blackness and candles and smoke and spider webs and witches and all the other good stuff!!

Megan and I set off shopping the week before while Marieke prepared for a job interview. And - thanks to Megan the Halloween pro - we got the works: blacklight, spider webs, pumpkins, candles, dry ice (the stuff that makes drinks smoke), black fabric to cover our furniture and enough black garbage bags to cover all the walls in our room. And when on the day of the party we put it all together, it looked absolutely spectacular.

But what really made the party was the effort everybody had put into dressing up. We had about 30 people, of which only about 3 had ever celebrated Halloween before. So we had all the classics you may expect, from serial (/cereal) killers to vampires, from witches to mummies, from sexy tigers to a head on a silver platter. Oh and we also had a miss wet t-shirt contestant (wearing a thong) named Sean - a sight I've fruitlessly been trying to forget about ever since. Marieke dressed up as a sexy Dark Angel with bat wings and a sort of tutu she'd made with Megan earlier, while I had put my own (previously non-existent) sewing skills to the test, making a Japanese shirt for my Kabuki Actor killed by Mad Sushi Chef outfit.

Debbie the witch	Marieke the Dark Angel
Nicki the head on a silver platter with Skeletor Dino	Sean the... well... sometimes a picture says more than a thousand words...
Me with a chopstick accident	Tigress Megan and Milenyo Sophie

We also prepared a couple of ultra cool drinks, you know, to give the party that little extra kick; we had Brain Hemorrhages (see the picture on the left; we used sweet vermouth, grenadine and Baileys), Megan had prepared jello shots made with vodka and candy works (that unfortunately had half dissolved in the jello), a bucket filled with a mix of Baileys and Blue Curacao with a block of dry ice so that it smoked nicely - only for the brave! - and I bought some food coloring to color beer red and green, although I think there was only one beer consumed the whole night, by a freaked out Alex who didn't seem too sure about the green drink I put in his hands. It all went down a storm. Megan and I had prepared the music the night before and we partied till about 3:30 in the morning before deciding it was time to change venue. To those that know me it will come as no surprise that we ended up in Embassy with about 15 of us, all in unadulterated Halloween attire, and with some of us, including yours truly, getting in for free because we looked so cool... Naturally our little freak show got a lot of attention, and everyone was curious to know how I attached those chopsticks to my body ("Just jammed them in real hard. Hurt like hell at first. But you get used to it really..."). I think it was around 7:30 when the taxi dropped Julian and me - the two die hards - off at Rockwell. What a party. Next year we will certainly host another Halloween party, wherever we are! Thanks to Megan for introducing us!

There are a lot of excellent pictures in the photo album, check it out!

Saturday, October 14, 2006

Coming to terms with it all at The Farm

Every now and then one just has to flee the stress pit that is called Manila. In fact, one should do this as often as humanly possible. A couple of weeks ago, Marieke had gone to a place called The Farm in San Benito, Batangas, an hour or two drive south of Manila. Since she came back raving about the place, we booked a spot this weekend, together with Julian (the Mexican) and Megan (our kinda-new Canadian friend). They also do a shuttle service, but that stupid bus only leaves at 6:00 AM and those that know us will understand that is an unreconcilable hour, utterly out of the question, so we drove ourselves. Which of course turns the drive into a near-three hour trip, but coffee, an iPod and great company easily take care of that!

Welcome to The Farm

We took off at around 9:00 and arrived just in time for our first massage of day... And I can tell you, it was without a doubt the best massage I've ever had in my entire life!! Julian and I were in the same cottage, along one wall a little water canal with gold fish flowing in from the outside, on the other side a bathroom with shower inside but without wall so that you could walk straight into the little garden from it, amazing! And then the massage!!! These ladies knew what they were doing!!! The girls said the same thing so it's clear that the staff there is really well trained. Just this is worth coming back for!

After the massage it was pretty much lunch time - time for the next treat! Lunch was served in a vegan restaurant with a German chef that clearly knows his business. We had a five course meal that was as delicious as it was healthy, with drinks like Pineapple Mint Fizz, Watermelon Orange Juice, and so on. Really, really nice!

Inside the vegan restaurant

After lunch we were all ready for a swim. We had seen signs to the heated waterfall pool on the way to the restaurant so there wasn't a lot of discussion as to where we would go swim! The pool itself was set right in the middle of the beautful garden, in a secluded place surrounded by rocks. It was fairly small and shallow, the waterfall was more of a drip and the water wasn't really that warm, but despite all that it was a really nice little place to hang out with the just four of us... I wanted to do some Tai Chi classes but I was too late. Julian and Megan went for some yoga and Marieke got her massage (she had a facial in the morning), while I spent the rest of the afternoon at the spa deck with some mellow Massive Attack playing in my ears. We finished the day off with some ginger tea overlooking the palm trees at the end of the infinity pool... Pure and utter bliss!!!

The Farm's spa deck with infinity pool

Seriously, if you're in Manila, and you want to have some quality relaxation, drive out to The Farm in San Benito and get the full treatment. It is SO worth it!!!

Thursday, October 5,2006 - Monday, October 9, 2006

Boracay

It's been waaay too long since I've been to Boracay. In fact, I had to look it up in this very blog - May 2005! And that was on a team building trip - the last personal trip was in December 2004 to celebrate New Year's Eve with my parents!!! That's close to 2 years ago!!! Believe me you that will not happen again!

This time it was again a special occasion that had to occur in order for me to go. Apparently "Manila is a dirty stinkhole with little entertainment and Boracay is a white beached paradise filled with bars & clubs & girls in beachwear" is not enough of a reason to go. Poco loco!!! Now it was Marieke's 29th birthday that did the trick. On October 5, her very birthday day, we set off with Megan and Julian to the little island paradise.

When we arrived, the place we had booked was full and had lost our reservation... Nothing out of the ordinary for the Philippines... So we moved to the neighbors which was an absolute shithole and a rip off for 1,500 pesos a room a night. The only reason we took it was that it was just for one night and all we wanted was to drop our bags and get to the beach! Now before I go on, I have to tell you a little story. See, I had brought a nice bottle of champagne (Moet et Chandon, my favorite by now thanks to Emiel ) to pop on Marieke's birthday. But just about everything that could have gone wrong around this bottle of champagne did go wrong. First of all, right the day that I bought it, Julian came over to chill out and halfway through the night Marieke started to jokingly say that I had to bring a bottle of champagne for her birthday. Damn it!!! So much for the surprise element!!! Nevertheless I packed the bottle in a bag, wrapped a big plastic bag around it so she wouldn't know what it was and brought it to the plane as hand luggage. Big mistake! Because as soon as the bag went through the x-ray machine, one of the guys working there shouted, literally shouted, to the guy in front that he had to stop me as I was bringing a BOTTLE OF CHAMPAGNE!!! No liquids n board. I had to check the damn bottle in!!! Dammit!!! Anyway, I did as I was told and got the bottle to Boracay and to the beach that first evening. But it's not over yet. I gave the bottle to Marieke and for some reason turned around, probably to get some glasses. By the time I turned back, I saw Julian taking off the wire, "just to help Marieke". Sure enough, the wire isn't even completely off yet or POP goes the cork, flying off into the ocean with Marieke just looking at it!!! And to top it all off, not a single drop came flowing out of the bottle!!! COME ON!!! We made up for it later that evening by buying a second bottle at the bar and finally Marieke popped a bottle of champagne on her birthday.

Birthday cake on the airport	Champagne on the beach...
...in classy paper cups.. cheers! :)	Champagne again, this time at the bar

By the way, Julian ripped his short as we were walking towards the bars. He got a new one right away but amazingly he managed to rip that one the same evening as well!!! Muchos enchiladas combined with living in complete denial are a deadly combination... Size 28 my !!! Oh yeah, and we barely survived an attack of a killer coconut - damn thing fell in the sand with a loud thump only feet away from where we were sitting at Cafe del Mar (our favorite Boracay hang out - great lazy chairs, good chill out music, perfect to start the evening). Below is a photo of Julian with the apprehended coconut...

The next day we met up with a whole bunch of others - we were 10 in total. Party time!!! And that's what we pretty much did the rest of the time - beach, party and sleep. The weather wasn't bad, there was a bit of rain, but that was actually quite nice as we were in the sea at that time and the water was so nice and warm that the rain was a welcome cooling down. There was some serious partying with lots of free shots from the bar people: the first night all together when I ender up with Julian and Pete in a tiny little bar - the only one open - with 3 bar ladies that for some reason thought we were cool even though we didn't really talk with them, or anyone else; the second night in Juice Bar where Marieke and I knew the barman from Manila and he kept giving our group free shots from test tubes - sweet as hell but who cares when it's free? Megan took over some what I call Boracay Slings - sort of rhythmic gymnastics with balls on a string, you see lots of it on this island for some reason - and she did really well, drawing quite a crowd of bystanders, which is amazing if you consider that this was the first time she ever picked these things up!!! There was also some pole dancing, both good and bad, and a bit of a fight even, so you can safely say that it was a weekend to remember. Planning to go again soon. Very soon. I love Boracay!!!

Killer coconut	Top model Julian G posing with his ripped shorts... Mexican size 28... ;)
Megan working the slings	Me and Julian at the bar

Oh and look at this sweet video of Julian doing his Buddha Dance - excellent! (If it doesn't load, just double click it and it will start in another window)

Click here to see all the pictures in the photo album

Sunday, September 24, 2006

Of pigeons and salt

Right before I went for business trip to Rome, Julian told me that he heard that if you put salt on a pigeon's tail, it won't fly away. We both seriously doubted that statement but I told him that I was anyway going to have a stop over in Holland to visit my parents (my father had been hospitalized again; the stent had to be stretched up again - a big scare at first but fortunately it turned out to be a case of bad luck and easy, though painful, to set straight), and since my dad has pigeons, it would be my pleasure to try.

Once in Holland, I brought this up at my grandmother's place and she started to laugh uncontrollably. Thank you Julian for having my own grandmother lose all respect for me in 10 seconds!! (Yeah as if there was much to lose in the first place... ) In fact she had heard the story before herself; they used to play pranks on (gullible) people by telling them to go tot the store to get 'meek salt' to catch birds... after which the victim would spend half the day going from store to store to find meek salt... So when I told her that my Mexican friend started this idea, you can imagine she was in stitches.

Fortunately, my father is a good sport so as soon as we got home he plucked one of the pigeons out of the shed while I got the salt. I put a table spoon full of the white stuff on and in the bird's tail - it was pretty much all over. Didn't want to leave anything to chance! Then my father let go of the pigeon... and........................... yep, it just flew away like always... up in the sky, made a big round and disappeared out of sight over the houses. One more myth busted I guess!

Saturday, September 9, 2006

In the freezer till daylight

It started really innocently. Marieke had heard of this new restaurant, called La Vigne, so we thought why not - it's not often that you get to do something new in Manila. We invited Debbie and Dino, Nicki and Alex and Julian (see the Three Musketeers story) as well, while Nicki and Alex brought Phil and Heather along. The dinner was OK, the place was a bit light and empty but the food was pretty good, although nothing to go out of your way for... First and last time probably. Then we moved on to Fiamma, a large, white, cool bar on Jupiter street. It was our second time there, but the first time that really counted as there were no people when we went before. It's a nice place, although it was only crowded downstairs and there is no dance floor, just a bar and a sit down area - a bit weird and a bit of a shame if you ask me. I think they can do better with the layout.

At around midnight, we were joined by Claudio, an Argentinean guy we met before in Embassy (no really? yes really! ) and we all chilled out for a bit. At one we started to get ready to call it a night. Like I said, it started all so innocent... Then Claudio suddenly said: "Hey there is this party in Pasig City. Wanna go?". Pasig? Nah... too far away, can't be bothered. "It's 1000 Pesos entry." 1000 Pesos, that's approximately 15 Euros. That's a hell of a lot of money for a party in Manila. And that means it had to be something special. Now like I said earlier, it doesn't happen very often that you get to do something new or exciting in Manila, so... Let's go!

We set off in Claudio's car to pick up two girls, one of which a Brazilian girl we also knew already from Embassy (no really? yes really! ) and from the three musketeer night, who knew where the party was. After an eternity in the car (30-45 mins at that time of the night is LONG! ) we finally arrived.

The street was empty. Closed shops on either side. Lots of parked car but no people. We got out and walked to where the party was supposed to be. A little parking lot on the side of the road, an old, deteriorated warehouse behind it. A plastic table in front of it with four girls behind it selling tickets. Dirty toilets to the right. A large generator humming loudly. No music. And no cool people in sight. Pay 1000 Pesos for this? I don't think so!

Here's where the Brazil-factor came in. Rosa either knew someone or was on the guest list - whatever the case, she got three stamps meaning three free tickets. Not bad but still three stamps short. Enter the Brazil-factor once more. "The stamp is still wet..." and with that remark she grabs my arm and presses the stamp onto my wrist. The others quickly repeated the gesture and we armed for the next step - getting our sloppy wrist prints past the bouncers. We moved to our left, through thick black rubber strips hanging in the door opening. Two bouncers with black light rods tried to check us out as we flashed our smudges, smoothly waltzing through. We were in!

Here's where things get really weird. We walk into a corridor the length of a football field. It's all dark except for a green laser beam at the far end projecting it's figures toward us. And the corridor is wet, musky and COLD ! Remember that we're in Manila, on average 30 degrees Celsius (about 90 degrees Fahrenheit), and this place was literally freezing! And quiet. Still no trace of music or a party... We continued down the corridor towards the laser and at the end found another doorway covered with rubber strips. We pass through to find us at the next level of weirdness in the presence of two major industrial elevators. Just big metal bars everywhere and a guy in a greasy t-shirt holding the up/down lever. No glass, no plates, just steel bars everywhere. We get in and the guy pulls the lever. With lots of noise the doors close and we start moving. Down. We got out at the basement where again it was dark and musky, but now we could clearly hear the thump-thump of some pretty good techno. Finally. Seemed like the party was finally happening. It sure did. We entered the final corner and looked out upon a crowded dance floor. The room was a large, undecorated underground storage space that seemed to have been burned down - all the walls were blackened. Steel wires were sticking out of the ceiling with glass icicles attached to them. Turned out the theme of the night was sub-zero - no wonder it was freezing everywhere! The DJ was perked on a small stage between two supporting pillars with on both sides a VJ projection on large screens with dancers behind them so that you only saw their silhouettes dancing. Every now and then the dancers would come out on the other side and clearly they weren't all 'pure' girls... Some scarily good looking ladyboys there!

The music was great and so were the people. Freaky dresses, spiky hair, and the main DJ was a girl from San Francisco with her hair woven into 30 cm long stems with flowers at the end, and a Kermit the Frog-eyed hat on. She played really really hard though, and when she mixed a fine Depeche Mode's People Are People into a hard techno pumpin' track, she could do no more wrong. She held up the record to me and some random Filipino guy as we were shouting the words, dancing to the beat.

Marieke arranged some free drinks in the VIP so it was a cheap night all in all, and a night to remember. I think we got home at around 6:00, my shoes and pants ruined of course. I never expected an underground rave party in Manila, let alone this night. At least that holds some good promises that there is more to do that I thought so far...

Friday, September 8, 2006

Even HARDer RAIN!

Oh man, you're not gonna believe this!

Marieke got us tickets to a show by a Frenchman called Adrien M.: "A poetic and magical show combining traditional fields of circus (juggling, ... etc) with new technology, lighting effects, electronic and classical music". Well, normally not something you can wake me up for in the middle of the night, but hey, when you're in Manila, any bit of culture is welcome and being picky is something you quickly realize you can't afford. Turned out that the show was actually really nice! It was a mix of dance and juggling, with normal balls as well as large crystal balls (remember David Bowie in Labyrinth?). The juggling wasn't your usual throw up 3-5-7-whatever balls in the air and keep 'em there. He did all kinds of cool tricks including a sort of front roll while balancing a ball on his eye! He was standing behind a see-through curtain upon which there were all kinds of computer projections (waves of balls, ball people, and many, many more balls) and a cellist sat in the corner all the while playing over electronic beats. All in all very unusual and original. At the end of the one hour show he came back to sit down on the stage and take questions from the public. I was amazed to hear that he had only been juggling for eight years! So if I start now, I'll be able to really impress my kids - once I have 'em.

But then... Debbie and Dino's driver, Boboy, picked us up from the theater. The weather had been bad again, like yesterday, with lots and lots of rain. Traffic was terrible so Boboy took us through some shortcuts, but in the end we inevitably got stuck somewhere. When we hadn't moved for 10 minutes, Marieke and I got out to walk ahead and see if we could see anything. Sure enough, the crossing ahead of us was completely flooded, 30 cm or more of water, and cars were hardly moving. But it wasn't all that bad. Another 15 minutes later we passed the crossing, and now traffic was really coming to a halt. We inched on a bit more and then we saw the street we were supposed to take. A guy was pushing a raft over it, up to his knees in water! We had no choice but to turn left. But there again the same problem. Two cars in front of us decided not to go and they moved to the side. So there we were, facing a 100m long street, flooded knee deep. What can you do? There was no way to turn around. There was no other road to take. The only alternative was to stop and wait, which could mean waiting the whole night - and hoping it won't start raining again! So... we decided to go. After all, it was only 100m and surely the car would take it. Worst comes to worst, we'd leave the company car behind and walk.

We started driving. It went well, we stayed to the side of the road and indeed it wasn't deeper than half a meter. But we were relieved to reach the end of the street to turn right onto the major road, Buendia. But then we saw Buendia and relief turned to disbelief. The whole road had turned into a river, with water running as deep as a meter!! (That's about halfway my thigh!) There weren't many cars and the few that were there either had stopped running already or were smoking heavily trying to plough through the water. What could we do? We were literally in the middle of the river and the only option was to continue. I reckon it was about half a kilometer. All the while, Boboy kept the engine revving and kept moving ahead slowly. The wave we caused front of the car was about 10 cm higher than the hood but the car never stopped. Thank Buddha for Japanese automobile manufacturers!!! Whoooohooooo shouts and jeers from the car! The car did get quite wet inside, on the left side. The next day Debbie and Dino were still driving around with newspapers on the floors and a musky smell in the car. But that was all right - we traversed a river with success and for that it was worth it!

Thursday, September 7, 2006

HARD RAIN

I wish I'd brought a camera to work today. Unbelievable. I've never seen anything like it. I've seen tropical rainstorms, I've been to Scotland, I've lived in Brussels... but none of that could prepare me for the rain I walked through today. It's about a 15 minute walk from the office to my home and in those 15 minutes, I did not see a single car move (all were crammed in a huge traffic jam starting from the parking garage all the way to Rockwell), I had to wade through 20 cm (something like 8 inches) of water - on the sidewalk!, and even though I had an umbrella, my backpack got so wet that both my laptop and my Blackberry have short circuited and are not working at the moment! And I gotta tell ya, standing in a river, with lightning crashing right above your head, is not a comfortable place to be!!! If I'm not wrong, if lightning would have struck the water, I'd be toast by now...

August 16 to September 4, 2006

The best vacation EVER!!!

Or at least for as far as I can remember! I took off from work no less than a whopping three weeks to go back to the low lands to meet with friends and family and to do all those things we normally never do... you know, the really touristy stuff everyone that has ever been to your country has done already, but that you, who lived next door to all these attractions, shunned like the plague for the very fact that they are that, touristy, and of course because you can 'always go there' and there's usually something better to do - you think. At least, that's how I work. For me it took moving abroad to realize that I had been missing out on all these great Dutch treats (Van Gogh museum, Anne Frank house, Zaansche Schans, Wadlopen, and so on) and now I've made a pact with Marieke that every time we return to the Netherlands, we're going to do a couple of these touristy things so that finally also we get to know what our country has to offer!

Wednesday, August 16, 2006

Having flown around the world a couple of times for my work, I've amassed a handsome amount of frequent flyer miles, which in turn resulted in me and Marieke being able to book a free flight to Amsterdam. Of course we book economy class: who wants to spend precious free flights on upgrades to business, right? But guess what, economy was seriously overbooked and since both Marieke and I are KLM Platinum card holders, we both got an upgrade to business class! Can the Best Vacation Ever start any better??? Exactly! After making an emergency landing in Helsinki to drop off a very sick guy - thank god he didn't die on the plane , we landed in Amsterdam around eight o'clock, where my parents and Eltjo were waiting for us. It's so nice to come home and have people welcoming you at the airport!!

Thursday, August 17, 2006

My mom had heard of a perfume bottle museum, called het Nederlands Parfumflessen Museum, close to where they live. And since we decided to catch up on touristy things we went for it right away. It sounded nice enough, a collection of over 7,000 perfume bottles from the very start of the phenomenon till today. We went there early afternoon as there was a tour and when we saw the building, built in 1599 and completely renovated, it was already a success. The inside was no less charming and the tour, which was really one of the owners telling us about the history of perfume was a real winner! For example, did you know that the basis every (good) perfume is one of the four animal essences. Musk: from the Asian musk deer, Civet: from civet cats, Castoreum: from beavers - and so far they're all glands or sacs that are used to attract the females... nice huh? But the last one beats them all. Amber: (officially Ambergris) basically vomit from a Sperm Whale that has oxydized and reacted with the salt and the sun. And the funniest thing is, she made us smell the pure Musk and Amber, and for all its disgusting origins, it smelled pretty nice! At the end the lady showed us today's scents, how they are classified, and helped us find fitting perfumes for all of us. I got a bit of Lalique (very expensive so I only got a 5 ml bottle) and am still planning to buy Must from Cartier... unless someone buys it for me of course!!

... to be continued ...

Thursday, August 17, 2006

More Japanese fun

I came across this video with again some excellent Japanese fun. This time it's a prank show (like a hidden camera show). It's fascinating to see how far they actually can go in Japan. Watch the whole video and at the end you'll see people who are in serious physical danger I would say! I'm sure if something like this happened in the US, the broadcasting station would be sued till it dropped! Fortunately that's not the case in all countries, so that we get treated to jewels like this every now and then... Enjoy! (If it doesn't load, just double click it and it will start in another window)

Sunday, August 13, 2006

The Three Musketeers & A Night Of Pure Madness

Last night we had a birthday party from a very nice German guy called Ralf that we've met in club Embassy. He lives in the same building as us, still we hardly ever see him here. Guess our lives only converge on Friday and Saturday nights! Anyway, we got him a Gary Larson's edition of The Far Side - one of my favorite cartoonists, completely absurd/insane. We started the night at M Cafe with Debbie and Dino where Dino and I ordered what can surely compete to be the worst martini in the world... It was called the 3 Olive Martini and it tasted as if they had emptied a can of olive juice straight from the can into the glass! We tried to change it for a normal martini, but as simple as it sounds, things like that are tricky in the Philippines simply because waiters won't really understand you - yet they never say so. Also this time the guy walked off with a glazed look only to serve us the same drink again. Yuk!! We paid and left for a nice dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant called Hue, down in Greenbelt, where we ordered a load of starters to share. Excellent food and a good ol' San Mig Light (or 2) to wash away the olive taste! Debbie had already left us to attend a work dinner and we all met again in Bed, a little club with cheesy Manila music. A drink later we were on our way to the next destination: People's Palace at the ground level, where we later on met up with Julian, a Mexican guy we also met in Embassy (does anyone notice a pattern here?) and then re-met at the swimming pool last week. He lives in Rockwell as well, but in another building. After a great cocktail called Ping Pong we moved on to the next stop: Embassy. Ralf had reserved a portion of the dance floor and it was free entrance, open bar for us. Sweet deal! Needless to say, the wodka-tonic flowed freely all night long... (Again, does anyone notice a pattern???)

By the end of the night we were a bit wasted but not too wasted to join Ralf and his friends to an after party at someone's house. It was like stepping into a zoo though. Dogs everywhere, caged, chained, walking free. I think I counted 8 of them, god knows how many more there were! Not only were they visible, they were pretty smellable as well - I've been to more pleasant environments for after parties! Still, we had a great time. There was more booze of course and I have to say by the end of the night I really was ready to go home! I could hardly stand on my legs anymore, let alone think straight - a night of pure madness! Luckily I had Julian and Marieke to take care of me: The Three Musketeers - All for one, one for all!

PS When looking for Three Musketeer pictures on the net, I saw they are with four! I never knew that - I guess I'm gonna have to read up on my classics now... (Or work on my basic calculus?)

Tuesday, August 8, 2006

33

Aaand yes!!! I made it to another year! Thirty three is the current score - and counting! It all started out pretty good. Everyone at work remembered and after lunch, Tin and Bel even brought me a cake with a candle! It took them a bit of trouble finding a lighter but they did and none of the fire alarms went off so it really put me in birthday mood. And as if that wasn't enough, Marieke had ordered a big cake with clowns and happy birthday signs all over it. It was a nice break in an otherwise terrible day filled with work, work, work. I didn't even have a proper lunch; just grub out of a box behind my PC!

Tin & Bel's birthday cake with candle...	... and a big birthday cake from Marieke!

When I came home, half an hour late because of course right on my birthday I had a very important meeting running late, Marieke had lit all candles in the house and cooked a sumptious meal with fish, veggies, salad, wine - the works. Unfortunately though, Marieke got very ill with stomach cramps shortly after we finished and she had to lie down already at ten thirty or so. I spent a half hour reading a book but I just couldn't enjoy it. So I ended up going to bed myself at eleven. So, apart from a few good moments, not a great birthday I have to say... Fortunately Andie had a worse story about bad birthdays. She lives in an area in Manila that floods all the time and she had to spend one of her birthdays locked up in the house, eating delivery chicken... At least I got to eat good cake and a great dinner!

Saturday, August 5, 2006

GO GO GO !!!

I once went go-karting when I was living in Germany, somewhere back in 2002. It was with a bunch of colleagues/friends from work and what I remember is walking out of the kart all stiff and bruised, but no less exhilarated! But for some reason, I never got to do it again. Until Saturday... Marieke was fed up being bored in the weekend so We booked 1 round, which was 12 minutes. Sounds short but that's actually quite OK (although next time we'll probably do 2). After a flying start for all of us, except Marieke whose car took forever to start, Dino and I went head-to-head to take the lead. We already expected this after discovering before that we both had done it only once before, and that we both suck. You know, not the worst drivers in the pack, but definitely not top third either - more like the guys in the middle. There was 1 spot on the track where it was wet and where I invariably skidded, turning around my axis 2 or 3 times and thumped into the side boards - every single time. Well, pretty much. Fortunately Dino suffered the same issue so we stayed pretty close most of the time, taking turns for the first spot. And then it started to rain. Oh man! Suddenly the whole track was made of liquid soap and I was all over the place. Dino had to wait up for me a couple of times (because just driving on your own is BORING unless you're a nerd trying to get a 'best time'), but after while I got the hang of all the skidding and I was able to turn it to my advantage a few times by sliding right into Dino's kart, preventing him from a cunning take over a number of times.

Here are our best times:

I'm not noting down the average lap times as they don't make sense with all the slippin' & slidin' and Debbie even had to change karts at one point as hers was broken. (Female drivers!!! ) Let's see if we can do better next time, when it's dry all the way! The race is on!!!

Thursday, August 3, 2006

Fastest strip tease in the world!

Last night, Eltjo sent me a link to a hilarious website with all kinds of ridiculous world records. I couldn't sleep anyway so I decided to spend some time on this site to check it out. And it is hilarious! Look at this video for example: the world's fastest strip tease - a man that can undress completely in less than 8 seconds! Properly sensored of course! (If it doesn't load, just double click it and it will start in another window)

Only in Japan!!! There were a whole bunch of other cool things and I've decided that I will start posting some of these random, cool videos and pictures on my blog when nothing else, interesting is happening in my life. Which of course is never because I'm such a terribly interesting person having all these great interesting experiences all the time!!!

In fact, I'm going to set up a poll to see what my beloved readers want. And then I'll still do as I please 'cause me the boss on this blog, but at least you'll have the illusion of input, which, they say, is a powerful thing on the internet.

Friday, July 28, 2006

Team meeting in Tagaytay

I try to have a team meeting with all people in my group (11 in total by now) every month or so, although I'll be the first to admit that the goal is ambitious at best. Still, we do it fairly regularly, especially if you count in our offsites (like the one in May to Bohol, see here). On top of the normal meeting, where we discuss things that are of interest of everyone and individuals explain to others what they've been up to, we have an extended team meeting every second month. The extension is for team building activities, which is work-talk for FUN!

This week, we planned such an extended team meeting. But this time it was made more special because of 2 reasons. Firstly, it would be the last team meeting with Me-ann. She's moving out of our team to a new assignment (with promotion, congratulations Me-ann!!!) as you can read in the previous post. The second reason was that we had a visitor from the US, Dave, who is going to take over from Me-ann until her replacement in Manila is finalized. Lots of reasons to make it all the more interesting! We put the new hires in charge: Tin, JB and Bel. This is the common rules, really new hires are treated like slaves when it comes to organizing. But before they come complaining to me: guys, it helps you getting to know other people and no matter what you do, the rule will not change!!!

So we decided not only to have our team meeting/building offsite, but to stay overnight as well, all in Tagaytay. On our way there we stopped at Sonya's Garden for lunch. It's always nice to take first timers there as the food is great. Or I should say the salad is great - I don't care much for the pasta that comes afterwards. ) After lunch we continued our journey to our resort. It was excellent, nice and small with only 4 houses (I think) next to each other, a small pool in the middle and a great view of lake Taal on the back. We were with 12 so we rented the whole house. There weren't enough beds but fortunately there were couches (and I made sure to immediately claim the longest one! ).

The day was spent with a tiny bit of serious talk, but really the big objective was to do team building. It was the first time we were together as a complete team since JB, Bel and Lukasz joined us, and with Dave thrown in the mix as Me-ann's replacement team building was really the goal. Again the organizers did a great job - well worth some elaboration!

First of all, we divided the teams in 2: Siebel vs. WBCM. So much for cross-service team building, but hey, you can't win 'em all, right?

Game no. 1 - One size fits all Concept: put a newspaper on the floor. Get your team on the newspaper. And hold for as long as you can. Since we were both teams of 6 we didn't have a referee so we decided the teams would take turns and first try to get to 1 minute. Siebel was first. Excellent tactics with a solid Lukasz in the middle, lightest male Zandro on his shoulders and the rest of us around them on 4 sides. One minute was easy! Then WBCM. Strategy was a bit unsure with a lot of feet on 1 newspaper and even more feet on top of feet. We'd need instant replay for exact timing but I think it's fair to say it was close to 0.2 seconds!

Game no. 2 - Command & Conquer Concept: All team mates are blindfolded except the Commander. Each team gets a number of water bags. The Commander directs his army to hit the opponent with the water bags. The team with the most men standing wins. Oh yeah, army folks can't talk! Here there was clear strategy on the WBCM side. Unfortunately, that's not necessarily a good thing. They decided to all stand in line, thus creating an easier target for us to hit! Which we did, but unfortunately our Commander, Zandro, was so sucked in by his newly attained leadership position that he completely (and I mean completely!) disregarded the Game Master, Tin, and every time we hit WBCM it was disallowed because of this. In the end it was a tie and we turned the tables: now the 2 commanders had to fight each other. Jayan shot his ammo way to quickly and it was just a matter for Zandro to find him, grab him, and smash the water bag into pieces on him. He succeeded in the finding and the grabbing. But to our entire team's dismay, instead of giving Jayan a good old smash shower, he pulled off his blindfold (!!!) claiming victory! Shakespeare would have written "My kingdom for a killer instinct"! So a tie it remained: Siebel: 1, WBCM: 0.

Game no. 3- Forgot the name ;) Concept: Each team gets a sponge and an empty coke bottle and forms a line from the pool to half way the bottle. The first person fills the sponge with water and passes it over their head. The next person passes the sponge under their legs, and so on. The last person runs down to the bottle and squeezes the water from the sponge into the bottle. The team with the fullest bottle after 5 minutes wins. This time there was little strategy on either side. More than anything else, this was a test of squeezin' skills and steel nerves. And when it comes to squeezing and nerves, WBCM was clearly no match for Siebel. Even though Bel once managed to pass an empty sponge (we still don't know how much WBCM paid him for that), we still won by a comfortable margin. End result: Siebel:2, WBCM: 0.

The rest of the day we just chilled out a bit at the pool, while some of the others went to watch a movie inside. In the evening, I had promised to cook pasta. Marieke had bought all the ingredients the day before and I got a-cookin' with my 2 sous-chefs for the day: Bel and Zandro. It was definitely a challenge to cook pasta for eight people on only two burners! I was going to make two different pasta dishes and accordingly brought two different kinds of pasta: penne for the penne al salmone and fusilli for the fusilli al pesto. But with only two burners to cook both pasta and sauce, the penne and fusilli just had to merge into penilli... I always find it hard to cook large quantities, I'm just not used to it. But I have to say that all in all it turned out not too bad. Some others had gone out to get a bit of KFC as well (we were twelve and I didn't have enough for twelve, nor was I all that sure they'd actually like my pasta... After all it's modeled after Western taste... and I know how I like pasta modeled after Filipino taste!

After dinner, following proper tradition and protocol, it was board game time. All the old favorites were there: Taboo, Guesstures and Pictionary. For the last game we just had to break up Andie and Me-ann as the two of them are ridiculous when playing together. They don't even have to say a word, they just breathe in sharply as if they're gonna talk, but before they do the other already guesses the words. They're like two psychics - or maybe they just play too many board games.

At the end of the night we went on to our favorite card game: 1-2-3 pass. For those that don't know what this is, a short explanation. For each player there are four matching cards, one of each suit. After a shuffle, everyone is dealt four cards. Then everyone says "1-2-3 pass" and on pass, everyone passes one card to their right. The first person to get four matching cards, e.g. four 9s, puts their hand in the middle, palm flat on the table. Everyone else does the same. The last person (so the top hand) loses and is punished. It doesn't get much simpler than that! The punishment is normally a shot of something and this time we had Mezcal from Jayan and Vodka from me. However, we had some alternative punishment as well. For me there would be something called chicaron, a Filipino delicacy: fried pork skin. People here, most notably Jayan and Marc, have been trying for the longest time to get me to eat Filipino delicacies. So far I've kept the damage under control: only century egg and Sisig have tortured my taste buds. But this night I unavoidably had to eat the deep fried skin of a pig. It tastes like crispy bacon but then extremely fatty. It's pretty bad. And the taste lingers in the mouth. It's hard to wash away, it seems as if beer has no effect upon it whatsoever. But I had my revenge. I brought some 'salmiak' candies from Holland, knowing how much they'd hate them. On the one hand I was a bit reluctant to do so as Marieke and I brought these candies with us for over 10,000 km, but we're going back in a few weeks anyway so I thought what the hell, we'll buy new ones when we're in Holland again. And it was worth it! The looks on my Filipino friends' faces was priceless. Here's proof of our collective agony (thanks to our professional team photographer, Marc, and my newly acquired Flash skills! ):

I also am learning how to do this really cool pokerface-shuffle that everyone here seems to know. It's really difficult, but I'm trying my best. Here's what it currently looks like:

Thanks Tin, JB and Bel for organizing this - I think it's safe to say - best team meeting ever!!! Looking forward to the next offsite, it simply must be spectacular! (Yep, that's what happens when you set the bar high... )

Saturday, July 22, 2006

Christian & Me-ann's despedida

Christian has taken the big step: he has resigned from the company. It was amazing to see the change in him, the last couple of weeks he was walking around the office smiling and singing... Good for him! And as of August 1, Me-ann will leave our group to move to a new role, so we decided it was time for a good old overnight despedida. Me-ann booked a place called Leo's Leisure Park. It looked awesome on the pictures even though when we got there, it was not quite finished yet. Still, the place was nice and we got a great house with 2 bedrooms and a waterside veranda. And even the geese that were all around the house behaved nicely as well...

After a quick lunch we changed to jump into the pool. Of course we were completely unprepared but fortunately there was a family with little children that brought stuff for 5 families and we (Lukasz) quickly confiscated a small Little Mermaid ball. We first volleyballed the ball around trying to get as many hits as possible without dropping it. I think in the end we came to like 25 or so. With a note that JB's main contribution to getting to this amazing score was to hit the ball full power straight into Lukasz' face. But being the competitive bunch that we are (hey we are Proctoids, what would you expect?? ), we moved on to a form of water polo where we annihilated the other team thanks to Tin and Me-ann and their strategic position play. Their ball handling may have been a bit frenzied but they made up by scoring goal after goal. I think the others gave up at 5-1 or so. Just as well 'cause I was beat! Need to go to that damn gym more often, clearly!

We also did a couple of photo sessions (after all, many of us have blogs and Marc has just finished a photographer's course, so...) Memorable was the joke we were going to play on Marc: he was using the timer to take a shot of all of us in the pool. So we agreed that as soon as he had swum to us for the pose, we'd duck down under water right at the time the photo would be taken. And so we did, at least most of us, but there was only 1 guy quick enough to actually be under water when the flash went off! And yes, that 1 guy of course was me!!! Dammit!! Look closely and you'll just see the top of my head.

At night we played Taboo (a board game) and cards (123 pass). What gutted me was that the great drop (Dutch candy) I brought all the way from the other side of the world to share with my Filipino friends, ended up being the punishment for the losers of 123 pass that didn't drink alcohol. Grrrrr!! But fair enough, it's a hard candy to like if you didn't grow up with it. One of those love-it-or-hate-it things... In the end Lukasz, Me-ann and I lasted till the sun came up again. All in all it was a great overnight getaway and a despedida in style with drinks & games.

Click here for more photos in the photo album.

Sunday, July 2, 2006

The final wall pictures - finally!

A long time ago I posted here an art project that I undertook to put something nice and meaningful on our wall. Now I've never tried my luck at painting or so (other than painting walls, which pretty much any imbecile can do), but I do know a thing or 2 (though still not much!) about photo editing on a PC. So, I went through my photo library to find nice pictures of family and friends (one close friend in fact) and let loose my Photoshop skills on them. The result was, in my humble opinion (and Marieke's), pretty good! The only thing was that I couldn't find a suitable picture of my mom, so we kept the bottom row empty. Until now! I found a beautiful, albeit tiny!, picture of my mother in her 20s, and gave it a nice retro look with concentric circles, just like an old vinyl LP record. I added a photo we took in Hong Kong of the world's largest bronze buddha and a collection of 6 pictures of shadows of me and Marieke, boozing and dancing (pretty representative for us I guess ). In case you were wondering about the rest - we're in the shadow of a red dot light we have in our room!

Here's what we have on the wall today... Click a picture to see a bigger version!

						1. Charlotte, Marieke's sister 2. Shadow of me and Marieke in Rome 3. Hein, my dad
						4. Harry, Marieke's dad 5. Devlin, Marieke's family's dog 6. Bep, Marieke's mom
						7. A Maria corner stone in Rome 8. Eltjo, Marieke's brother 9. Emiel, our best friend
						10. Marieke on a bridge in Rome 11. A car in Malta 12. Oma, my grandmother, and me
						10. The big buddha in Hong Kong 11. Marieke and I partying 12. Corry, my mom

To read on in the next archive, click here