the entry about siam revisited

i'm back in bangkok!

it's a titillating world peppered with some spicy food, or of every kind of imaginable spicy food at all; even their drinks i suspect have a tinge of piquant zest. to top that off, the cloudless, sweltering weather does not let up at any point of the day. do you know what it is like to hit the showers six to seven times a day and change underwear every other hour? showering sounds like a privilege in some parts of the world, but when you're loofah-ing so much more till the skin is sore, it becomes a chore.

because this trip is a pilgrimage to the mecca of asian ibiza clubbing, most of the days involved sleeping till the late afternoons, waking up groggily in the evenings, half-heartedly self wondering what the heck happened the previous day and guilting oneself to ponder upon and grasp the meaning of it all, then meeting up with bunch of like-minded friends for the only meal of the day, and then it's back to hitting the labyrinth of a makeshift club, grubbing for more and more alcohol, that holds over three days in bangkok till the wee hours of the morning, some parties even as early as mid-noon.

ruz and sherlyn all dressed to party it up

andrew, another close friend of mine, also all geared up

the club has a video montage of the songs whilst playing them.

can you guys figure out which music videos these are? i could!

(click on picture for an expanded view)

because of this mere reason, shopping has been crammed into the only two-hour slot i've managed to allot myself during the penultimate day of my stay here. nevertheless, i managed to procure this much of merchandise from siam square, mbk, siam paragon and along the dingy streets of silom.




the other few highlights was that i managed to bump into a thai actor, freud nuttapong, whilst schlepping around siam square, and oh, did i mention about having dinner on the roof-top restaurant of the banyan tree hotel dubbed vertigo, cos it does give one a sense of it to acrophobics like me when elevated sixty-two floors off the ground, with the architect, casey, of the said building himself?

freud, star of a horror flick, and me, both all kinds of cam whore.

kc, the architect and owner of the chain of banyan tree hotels and resorts.

does anyone notice the slant of the glass?

alright, i 'fess up. i was so hungry i had two main courses.

view from atop vertigo

picturesque panorama of the northern province of bangkok

Share |

the entry about possession upkeeps

if necessity is the mother of all inventions, then aesthetic pragmatism is the paternal extremities of re-inventions. still apparently harboring an insatiable appetite after color-customizing my brand new iphone (see three entries down), i decided some work on my macbook air was definitely in place. voila! comments are welcome, good or bad.

intently continuing in the fashion (no pun intended) of making all things non-chiaroscuro -- life is after all a gamut of colors -- i gamely upped the stakes and put shades of different colors to my room. i raked the originally glass-paneled walls with a lime green wallpaper one on side and another with the alphabet soup adjacent to it, schlepped a couple procurements from ikea and decked my room with spices of red and blue, and finally nailed on some tastefully bought paintings. the original room looked like this, but after a couple of touch-ups here and there, here's the outcome:

my advice to folks looking for a decadent change in their bedroom outlook with a moderate budget would be to go consult ikea. the shelf-life of their bits and pieces look decent yet affordable enough to last you till the next hovel makeover, which should be pretty soon all over again.

Share |

the entry of garbage-fied talk

pardon me for being poetically esoteric, but a sudden muse has inspired me to conjure the following pseudo-haiku: when chances and opportunities a-passes, fortunes thus dwell on one's personal perseverance and dexterity. passing clouds amidst the sunburst skies, enlightenment dawns like dew drops, for the maxim carpe diem lives truly.

alright, i admit, it's a little contrived and totally irrelevant, but i am writing at 3.30 in the morning and in a state of total inebriation, so you've gotta give me that. when i wake up the next morning, 'i'd be hands on cheeks and gasping at the extraneous gobbledygook i've penned down. i'm writing trash! anyhoos, here's some pictures though taken when i was still in a state of sobriety.

iruffcookiedough and the future superstar kenneth gilberto

me totally blase

me with bestie benjamin, the next big blogger

p.s.: beyonce is dropping in town together with black eyed peas for a collab concert. now we're talking!

p.p.s.: i'm having a dry spell for apparels. i seriously need a huge bout of retail therapy.

Share |

the entry written at 2:30

it seems that the entire planet has been conspiring a hush-hush ruse to divert my attention from blogging, my favorite pastime after excessive cam-whoring and shopping. i have joined the likes of many others in the dizzying chase to fashion a lavish, sophisticated restaurant in the online game restaurant city, had too many drinking binges, one too many meetings with directors from my current company and the potentially new one (apparently there's a counteroffer of sorts from both employments) and way too much time preoccupied with my new iphone.

a look at my recent addiction.

the main thing i've managed to accomplish in the past two weeks is attending the five-day core curriculum course by the new company and having an insight into their products and culture. of course it involved waking up in the wee hours of the day to the tune of feral cats mewing along with the cacophony of the canine barks. man, do i loathe getting up so early! i had to force my reluctant body up and swaddle myself in office garb. the lessons started at 9:00 in the morning, and by 1:00pm, everyone was gasping and giddy with the influx of information being chugged down our throats.

my temporary pass for gaining access into the prudential's labryinth

on the train rides home (yes, i took the commuters' favorite mode of transport during such times), as all the lethargy washed away and my self-consciousness slowly but surely resumed, i found myself positively simmering with fever. thank god there's always restaurant city to quell that off within the confines of my hovel.

this is a relatively short entry.

Share |

the entry about notwithstanding premises and bereavement

i'd like to think of myself as not a stupid person, or at least that's what i think. but i couldn't help feeling like a nincompoop after watching the dvd version of push, starring chris evans and dakota fanning. if push came to shove, i would have stayed away from that flick even if my life depended on it. unless you're planning to ingest a 111 minute mind-numbing picture permeated with perfunctory acting, plagiaristic plots, and cringe-worthy jargons (the characters are categorized under pushers, watchers, movers, bleeders, stitchers, etc), my advise would be you're better off just watching recaps of michael jackson's videos.

speaking of the late superstar, the news of his demise came as a huge shock to me. i was under the impression that this might have been one of the many internet hoaxes that we see these days, but alas, it was not meant to be. his premature death also drives home a poignant yet oft-shunned truism of life. for all the money he had in the world, the white-gloved entertainer proved to us that even the most sizzling, brightest star has a use-by date. we are reminded of our mortality and it exposes the frailty and vulnerability in all of us, that wherever we are born, however wealthy or healthy we might be, whatever kind of looks we are endowed with, our span on this planet is limited, is finite. we live, we age, and for better or for worse, we die. every thread of relationship we ever had, every wisp of memory we ever held, every facet of feelings we ever felt, it'd be all wiped out in the blink of an eye that never opens again. we fall into a chasm of darkness that we will never be able to climb out of, ever. in the most literal sense, it's the eternal slumber that no one, in his right frame of mind, would ever look forward to.

poetically speaking, death is a fact of life. the best we can make of life is to cherish it whilst it lasts. seize the day and live the moment, for life is short.

Share |

the entry about my new phone

blimey! forgive me for sounding neurotic, but standing in line under the wretched humid weather for an undivided six hours has really taken a toll on yours truly. let me get down to the story proper. so you guys know that the much-hyped iphone 3gs has made its way to singapore shores. being the veritable avid fan of all things pome-like, i decided that "the early bird catches the worm" prophecy has a certain level of verity. i arrived at the venue half-hour early, and much to my aghast, as much as the others who were joining on the bandwagon, the snaking crowd has definitely triumphed any others i have ever come across. think hello-kitty heydays, and you'd get the idea. being there and square, and practically nothing else to do on my hands, i decidedly joined the intrepid hundreds others to be the first to brandish the new phone.

but six wacko hours, i am telling you. i was so freaking miffed. and when i get miffed, it's not pretty. it's definitely not pretty at all. i need my anger management sponsor right now! but anyways, i digress. yet again.

anyways, three hundred and sixty god-damned minutes. with that abundance of time, i could have accomplished lots. i could have made my way to the gym, hopped over for a tanning session, sat down with my cronies for a drink, and even make time to meet up with a client to discuss some work. nah, but who am i kidding? i would just be at home wilting away languishingly.

but finally, i've got it. so goodbye, my distasteful laggy prada phone. i am sticking to iphone, that's an affirmation. here's some pics:

adieu lg prada and your quaint technology!

customized my iphone to a striking blue and yellow. nice much?

Share |

the entry about flying high

hi folks, i am suddenly having a reminiscent flashback to the days when i was a klutzy flight attendant and it's a shocking revelation how fleeting time is, besides the crinkling crow's feet and laughing lines that is slowly but surely surfacing. it's been a darn three years since i've left the trade of sloshing coffee or tea to perversely demanding passengers.

nevertheless, there's always the enjoyment of the camaraderie and shenanigans with my fellow colleagues, my group of coterie who perk up the otherwise oft lulling flights. so here's a trip down memory lane of living the high life in an air-dry cabin 30,000 feet up in the skies and bitching about the cattle-class passengers who expect more than what they actually pay for.

on a sidetrack, i would just like to dispel the frequent myths. myth number one: the ubiquitous mile-high club that every cabin crew encounters. fact: non-existent, as much as i know for that matter of fact. myth number two: working onboard is a breeze. fact: major misconception. be prepared to work your wedgies off. the only breeze one encounters is when you're sailing through the aisles with adept briskness to deliver the darned papers or serve a row of passengers a drink one passenger after the other.

anyways, the following are the pictures in my life as a high-class waiter with singapore airlines. don't fall off your seats; i used to be the epitome of dorkiness in my heydays.

my virgin experience donning the cabin crew uniform

training days with my fellow batch mates

slipping on the chief flight attendant uniform for kicks.

suits me much though, i think personally.

my usual slacking habits. i guess singapore airlines nurtured me this way.

the first plane i am trained to wreck all the passengers' experience onboard.

a final picture before we graduate. teary affair.

start of my inaugural flight with some of the crew. taken in tokyo.

fancy freezing your ass off? go to athens during winter.

gal-pal wah. still very good friends after all these while.

they say size does matter. i couldn't agree more.

a get together with my batch-mates after a five year hiatus.

meanwhile, the korean girl fluff "nobody nobody" is recurring in my head. i need therapy!

Share |

the entry about designer bags and walk of life

know this, investor-wannabes: take the wise road and park your money on french-originated, vintage label louis vuitton than place your bets on speculative rollercoaster-riding shares. the damned top of the line minaudiere boutique still sees trickling crowds lined along the velvet ropes outside of the shop's premises. i foresee a congenial, upward growth in the intrinsic value of zee bags.

bring out the bargain tables!!

moving on, in light of what has transcended over the past few weeks, i could only admonish myself for being languid in my work and overzealously partaking in societal matters which contributed to nothing short of a deficit in my bank account. speaking of career paths, the moral police in me still hovers: should i linger on in a company which promises nothing but a cul-de-sac in my vocation, though retaining my clients, or move on to a promising head honcho which could potentially bring my career to greater heights, thus risking losing my existing clientele?

am still thinking of my next step whilst munching on a timeout bar. sounds riveting already...

Share |