Last year of College: Loyola Mountaineers and my Mom

Good Lord... How did I get here?

The fact that I am actually called a senior and yet everything still seems to run at the same pace is concerning. Often times, I find myself doing things and then stopping to remind myself that this would be the last chance I'd ever have at trying to do something like this...

Real life is just around the corner...

Fuuuuuck...

I'd be more energetic in my cries of despair if I weren't so tired from my last 6km practice run for LM. Something I have neglected to update you guys on for some time now.

Yeah. This year, I've set myself up to have a meaningful last year. Actually, this year seems to be all about my LM (Loyola Mountaineers) application. Yes. LM application. I've been trying to get into that org for 2 years now but I've always discontinued application or quit open climbs because of several reasons. The first was plain physical fitness. Joining LM means being super fit and takes a lot of time and effort to train. The first time I tried a 6km run was during the actual test itself on my second year. Before that I had never run so far in my life. By the time I finished, I was just concentrating all my efforts in trying not to shit my pants. That's why for this year's application I've invested a lot of time and energy for training and I like to think that I'm doing pretty good for myself.

Click this to see my last run!

The second reason was the steep requirements that LM has for membership. Aside from being physically fit and mentally prepared, I need to have a lot of weekends sacrificed for LM activities. This was problematic because of the NSTP and JEEP requirements for 2nd and 3rd year. Those were uncuttable which meant that LM had to be dropped.

The second and without a doubt the most fearsome opponent to my application is my own mother. Woohoo! Lord knows that she and I have gone through many and episode and joining LM was just one of many things we did not agree with. I remember just a month ago at dinner, I was talking to my sister Toni about how I was applying to Loyola Mountaineers. Then she asks me if I even asked permission from my mom first. Puzzled, I told her that I didn't need to ask permission because she let me join when I was second year. Then she tells me that I should have asked first. Then I repeat what I told her and explain to her that I really didn't need to ask permission. Looking for approval from my mom, I turned my head to find her giving me a look that probably went like, "You better get what I mean already or I will drive my thumbs into your eyes!!!". As charming and endearing as I am I still proceed and tell her that I'm going to join Loyola Mountaineers. Then she goes, "Why don't you like to listen to me?"

And then I'm like this.

And she asked me that without even saying anything... Mothers...

Anyways, I am so fuckin' determined, I'm gonna push through anyway. One way or another, I'm gonna get there baby and there's nothing that's gonna stop me!

I've already been training for weeks now and I've made the 6km within the specified time limits multiple times. I'm gonna hit even bigger challenges when I start figuring out ways to tell my mom that I'll be gone for some weekends to go to the mountains. Wish me luck!

For What It's Worth - Buffalo Springfield

The Greatest List of Freshie Advice (not really)

Okay. So just a while ago, Aimee showed me her write-up in progress for the coming ORSEM planner. Going through some of them, I could see the good ones and the really fucking stupid ones. Some of them were the usual open your world things like: "Try everything." While others like, "Ateneans are known for being conyo and maarte. Prove them wrong."

Yeah. That one I had a beef with. I mean, if you're gonna base your personality on what people want you totally didn't fucking get the point of college.

In my opinion, high school was the worst shit ever. The kids were dicks. Bullies were everywhere. You're less able to explore and you leave it thinking that you know exactly who you are when in fact you have a LOT of growing up left to do.

College is a whole 'nother jungle, baby.

So I decided to try my hand at making my own list of tips and tricks to survive the jungle known as college.

It's not complete and I'm not sure if you'll find it useful but whatever. Also, this list is designed for Ateneo freshies so whatever.

Here it is.

1. Try new clothing. This is for those freshies who, like me, always wear just pants and shirts. I've been wearing pants and shirts my whole life and have only just recently realized in my senior year that wearing shorts is so much more comfortable. I feel as though I've suffered the heat of Manila summers innecessantly. And oh boy, did I suffer.

2. Don't let people tell you what you should be. As a freshie, the peer pressure and pressures from your parents will be absolutely tremendous. During my first year, it took me to dark places and I ended up resenting so many people. Ultimately, you're gonna have to find a way for you to ignore these influences and figure our who you wanna be. Know when people are starting to control you and then put a stop to it when you can.

3. Don't think that college is about work. If anything it's quite the opposite. My Pol Sci prof once told our class that college is your last reprieve from the real world of enforced monotony and non-creativeness. You don't go to college to be good at a certain job. Everything you need to know for your future job, you'll learn on your first days there. You go to college because you need to expand your goddamn mind. You need to explore ideas that will make you question who you are and why you do these things. You'll appreciate the amazing world of fiction and poetry. Philosophy will make you think about what it means to truly love.

4. Make sure to use your offline password for EBSCOHOST. It's an online database of millions of journal articles, studies and books that will prove invaluable to research. Amazingly, some people reach senior year without ever once utilizing it. Also, if you find that an article you want is not readily available in full PDF form on the site, use the document delivery service form the lib and the staff will email you a copy.

5. This may sound stupid as shit but take pictures! You'll get through the 4 (or 5) years fast and you'll need those pics to take you through the tough times. They'll remind you of your friends and a more innocent age.

6. Exercise your management skills! Become a leader at something. There are two types of people in this world, the shepards and the sheep. The sheep follow the shepard around and are stupid as shit while the shepherd takes the sheep wherever he wants to go and sometimes gets to fuck them when nobody's looking.

7. In spite of what you may believe, people don't give a shit about you as much as you think.

8. Learn how to drive and park anywhere.

I'm gonna blast through the rest of these now.

9. Don't eat fatty food. JSEC serves the fattiest food in all of Ateneo. Do not get trapped in that cycle. Seriously JSEC food administration, get your shit together.

10. Read about science news.

11. Start to look for something you're passionate about.

12. Think about what you wanna do with your life.

13. Be good to your friends.

14. Know who your friends are.

15. Take weights as your PE. It may sound tiring and painful but you will seriously tack on serious mass.

16. Be an honest person. Phonies are like... bad...

17. Don't go home right after classes. (This advice came from the 2010 ORSEM manual. I found this to be very useful especially if you have helicopter parents)

18. Don't be stupid. Always put on a condom.

19. Religion is such a first year issue. Move on to more important ideas.

20. Complain about profs that slack off.

21. Sanuks look like preppy shoes but they're not. You can dress like a cool kid but still be a surfer.

22. Join LFC. Films are so good for appreciating music, art, stories and life in general.

23. If you're bad at sports, be proud of it. Basketball players have been having it too easy for far too long.

24. Yeah seriously. Fuck basketball.

25. Get a tablet and learn how to design. A useful skill in any project. The world is evolving a taste in design. Bad promotions for orgs will not be looked upon with favor in this environment.

26. Move out of your comfort zone. You might find that some of your decisions were stupid but it's these decisions that define you.

27. Find a way to stay cool. The Philippines is a hot country if you hadn't already noticed.

28. Take walks. Ateneo is a beautiful place. You'll be amazed at all the things you'll find if you penetrate it deep enough.

29. Exercise. You may not appreciate it on your first two years of college but once you hit your 3rd and 2th year P.E. will be something you'll miss sorely. Without P.E. gaining weight is too easy.

30. Once again, document. Take pics of even the mundane days. Blog. Write a journal. Plot your journey. Everyone says it but college is fast. You're gonna wanna go back to these things.

I'm gonna end it here but hey if you have questions, leave a comment or something.

Singapore 2: Night Safari

The evening after the City Tour, we were set for a Night Safari Tour. We rode a bus on the way to the place and the tour guide briefed us as to what would be happening. He was another Indian guy who had a very dramatic speaking voice. It was dramatic in the cheesy corny kind of way. He went like, "When I went on the Night Safari, the tapirs were so cute! But if you reach out and touch them, I'm afraid that your fingers will be... (hushed voice) missing in action..."

When we got to the place, we first had a buffet dinner which was part of the package deal. I stuffed myself with the tiny baby octopuses, naan bread and strawberries.

This is what the place looked like. Also, you can't see them very well but there were tons of Australians here.

A cool thing about this place was the bathroom. You'd open the door into the bathroom and find that it the lights were off. Step inside and the lights would magically come on! I was so impressed by this that I actually took a video of the lights coming on as I walked into the room. All the while I was thinking it sure would have been funny if someone were to walk in and see me taking a video of the lights? It just so happened that someone did and I had to quickly make my exit.

Even in Singapore, I'm a noob.

We left the buffet to go to the tour and we were greeted by a long line of safari-goers. Just then, Gabriel decided that it would be a great time to begin to whine about wanting to go home and about how he was so tired already. God, you can always count on this little guy to make a vacation difficult.

After much waiting in the hot humid line, we made it to the tram and as soon as we found our seats, we were off. The tram itself was a long series of cars connected together. The only protection we had was a roof over our heads, the rest of the thing was open air. Somewhat disappointingly, safety wasn't an issue though since the animals weren't free to roam around as I had previously imagined. Their areas were designed with water surrounding the enclosure or deep ditches on all sides for animals that were afraid of heights. Only the tiger pen had a full on glass divider between the tram and its enclosure, a testament to this animal not giving a fuck about heights or water.

The night safari itself was pretty cool. We got to see some Asiatic Lions and the much more majestic African Lions. I think my favorite animal was the Indian Rhino. It looked so powerful and the thick skin folds on its body made it look so impenetrable. I don't think even full-grown tigers would wanna mess this this guy.

Taken fron Wikipedia

It looks like it's wearing ass armor!

I also like hippos because they're so badass and they're the closest living relative of whales!

That enough animals for now.

I'll talk about Universal Studios next time since it deserves a post all on its own.

The Final Chapter of College and My Life Decision

Alright. I promised a Singapore part 2 but I gotta write about this now since it's a more pressing issue.

My life decision.

If you know me then you probably know that I've been in limbo for the whole of my college life. I never knew if I was gonna go to med or not. To be honest, it was never originally part of the things that I thought to do with my life in my senior year of high school. The only reason I even thought to go into medicine was because I thought that it was a great compromise between getting to study about biology and getting a "real" job as my mom and dad would look at it. After all these years of Health Sci and subjects like Org Chem, Biochem and Cell Mol along with the occassional med school horror stories of students that previously did well in college only to have a shitstorm of studying and mediocre grades in med school... It did not have the glamor of what it looked like when I was in high school. That isn't to say that the idea of becoming a doctor was ALL bad. I also saw the good things in med school: a chance to help people using science, a seemingly cool job where I tell people how to get better and a means to earn a decent living...

After all these things being put into consideration, I often end up getting no where with my decision.

In this final chapter of college though, I gotta decide fast and work so I can get there.

The best I have so far is a plan wherein I study to become a biologist and at the same time work a regular job for my dad. The idea came from one of my Philosophy teachers, Ma'am Nicole. She told me about how she went through similar experiences as I did where her parents would brush away the idea of her getting a masters and getting into academia. Eventually the glamor died down and she found herself wanting to make a little extra money along the side. So she worked for her family business while working for her masters. The idea of me working for my family business is about the last thing I wanted to end up doing but Ma'am Nicole assured me that it does become exciting as you get into it.

So here I am trying to work out a similar plan in life. I guess the next step at this point would be to find the right connections in the kind of work that I wanna pursue. I remember a tweet that I managed to get form Sir David Attenborough himself. He said that the cutting edge of biology was genetics. While I have had experience in Biochem and Cell Mol, my line of interest really lies in zoology in general. Maybe as I study biology further I can find something that really sparks my interest and then I can find a way to make a real contribution to society. Wishful thinking.

So these are my goals now:
1. Find out how I can make the most out of a career in biology.
2. Find out what I'll be doing when I work for the family business.
3. Work out a clear plan for the next few years (what masters to take, what school to go to, what classes I need)
4. Pull up my grades so I don't look like such a jabroni when I apply.

Hope all goes well.

Here's some Akwafina.

Singapore: Day 1

Jesus, my last post was September of 2012!

Anyways, Singapore. (I'll make up for the lack of posts sooner or later. I still have a Hong Kong post and a Batangas post pending.)

So just last week, my mom, Toni, Karina, Gabriel, and I went to Singapore! Amazing thing too since we had just recently gone to Hong Kong last Christmas. However, unlike the previous vacation, I did not lose my shit in anticipation and excitement. I guess all the thesis work that came before it as well as the Theo Orals made it impossible to see anything beyond those things. God, remind me to make a dedicated Theo Orals blogpost. One of the darkest hours of my life...

Where was I?

Singapore. So on the eve of March 24, I packed my stuff and got ready to leave for another country. This was totally not as exciting as the Hong Kong trip packing. I just picked up a few things from closet and stuck them in my bag.

We left for NAIA terminal 2 at 3 in the morning and proceeded with our checking-in and waiting. I wish I could have gotten some sleep but sleep was impossible since there were no comfy places to sleep and I was already pretty excited to get on board. So I busied myself by enjoying the free internet and munching on a rather buttery coffee bun.

When we did get on the plane, managed to score a seat next to the aisle and two other empty seats. This meant that I had a lot of room for my legs since I didn't need to stuff my laptop and other carry-ons under the seat in front of me.

The flight there was pretty pleasant. Managed to get some delicious chicken (or fish?) curry for lunch and watched an episode of the first season of Dr Who c/o Andy Go.

Being a former flight attendant, my mom always has former co-workers chatting her up for extended periods.

Activity books for the little boy

We then made it to Changi Airport. Woohoo! I had mixed feelings about this because of the way the last travel agency meetup went. I'll have a dedicated blogpost for that but in the meantime suffice to say that we could have ended up taking down a few travel agents and getting thrown into Hong Kong jail if the situation had escalated any further. So for this occassion, we were wiser and I was on alert to keep things cool. I was the Sheriff of Abacantown.

Keepin' it cool

We made our way down to immigration and all the while I was documenting the first few minutes of Singapore. As I was very touristly filming everything, an immigration security guy comes to me and tells me to keep my camera. He points to a sign saying no picture-taking and he asks to see what I've been filming. Like it's some big fucking secret. Like I'm gonna use it to smuggle in drugs. It wasn't bad though, I have to admit. The guy was real nice about it. Just told me not to do it again. God. MAJOR difference from the goddamn Hong Kongers!

Okay not all of them... Just this one guy...

Anyways, we found our driver who would be taking us to our hotel and then we were off. One the road we made some nice conversation with the guy. We talked about durian and about what language people spoke. He said that people mostly spoke Mandarin but he was part of the minority who spoke Malay. Real nice guy. Not bad.

The surroundings were really clean and pristine just as everyone made it out to be. It looked like I was still in one big country club and for a while I was wondering when we would be leaving whatever compound we were in and entering the public highway. Turns out we were there already.

I have to say though, people should stop hyping up places like they're fucking paradise! I mean Singapore IS really clean but I was still able to catch cigarette butts and empty wine bottles in their reservoir! I also caught a man spitting some chewing tobacco on the street. And, yeah, he was a local. Moral of the story: no place is perfect. That isn't to say that Singapore is not a big deal. Far from it as I will elaborate on further in this blogpost.

So we made it to the hotel. Parc Sovereign. It wasn't very far because Singapore is so very small. They identify places by street which still amazes me. As me made our way down the van, the bellboy (I should say bellman or doorman), whose name I forgot, helped us with our stuff and he was a really upbeat and happy to help. My mom asked him how he was doing today and he just beamed and said that he was doing great.

We got to the hotel room and set our stuff down. While we waited for our scheduled city tour, we made our way to some local shops down the road to get some food. On the way we saw this really amazingly designed college campus. It was Lasalle College of Arts and the whole place looked like a designers dream. The students were sitting around doing some yoga on artificial grass and the building was so full of angles that defied traditional non-angular buildings. I couldn't help but think about how boring the Ateneo Campus was in comparison.

Click for a better view of the campus!

Here's another panorama pic. Notice Toni and the rest of my family to the left of the pic.

After a heavy dose of admiring, we came upon this foodcourt with lots of different kinds of food. and Each stall was labeled according to the type of food. There was "Chicken Rice", "Indian Food" and even the aptly named "Pig's Organs" stall. We all got different dishes and I settled with some Indian food. And oh man. Let me tell you. This shit was something else. I got the lamb biryani with two pieces of naan bread. The owners told me that the biryani was only "medium spicy"... God. Never in all my years have I had food that was so amazingly sweat-inducing, face reddening, throat swellingly hot. It was so hot that I was crying and my jaw muscles were literally swollen. You could see it on my face and feel it because they were hard to the touch. I sweat so much that I looked like I had run a marathon. I mean. It was delicious food but GOOD GOD!!! WHEW!!! I'd definitely go for a second round the next time I go there. Great first meal!

Even just looking at it makes my mouth go all watery and mucus-lined. Also there was a non-spicy version available but it was a boring brown color.

After I recovered, we made our way back to the hotel to get picked up for the city tour. The city tour itself was pretty okay. We went over to the Merlion, a Taoist temple, and then a jewellery shop. It is interesting to note that the singaporeans do not have the marketing powers of the Hong Kongers or the Chinese. On our trip to HK and Shenzhen, China, we visited some jade factories and the people were so aggressive in their attempts to take your money. They would talk about fortune and mystical energy and whatever. They had whole spiels prepared. The efforts of these Singaporean jewel sellers were lackluster and really easily defeated. There was this one display full of badly carved jade animals and a woman approached me. She said that the animals ward off evil spirits and they're good for your office and stuff. That was the end of her spiel. In China, the saleslady went on about how the thing she was selling, a baby dragon known as a Pichou, symbolizes good fortune and yadda yadda. She even went on about how it has no asshole (or if you prefer, anus) because good fortune goes in and never leaves your home. She had a good 1:30 minute speech. This Singaporean lady was like "Okay..." when she finished. This was a good thing because after that trip I was so fed up with people trying to sell me bullshit fortune products!

Here's a pic of her pathetic product

This one looks like something from the Nightosphere!

There were some nice things though. Like this pagoda which was part of a giant mural  made from semi-precious stones.

Here are some Merlion and Temple pics.

The next stop for the tour was the National Orchid Garden. Not a big deal actually. Just lots of orchids. The best thing about it was that I saw real life squirrels! They were so cute and so inquisitive looking and adept at climbing! I was so close to them and they looked right at me. I was afraid that one of them would jump me but they just hung out on their branch, hugging themselves. D'awwww.

The last stop was Little India, a place that I wish I could have explored more thoroughly. We couldn't find any nice shops to buy from (probably because we didn't actually see the Little India marketplace but we did manage to find some nice buildings and a lot of pigeons.

Trippy

And that concludes the City Tour.

Since my writing gas has been depleted, I'm gonna go continue the rest of the Singapore trip in the next blogposts to come!

Like whatever, y'know?

RiB, Breaking Bad and Tears for Fears

Damn.

Blogger looks different. Nice change.

It's been how many months since I posted so I'll have trouble covering everything that was missed.

I'll just go ahead and break this blog into sections so that it's easier for me to list everything down.

Joining RiB

My swaggiest pose to date

As part of my efforts to expand my horizons and gain newer perspectives, I decided to join RiB. It seemed like a pretty cool thing to do since this contest was totally a big deal in school. Last year, people were all raving about how cool the Dollhouse was during their performance. I saw the video myself and it was pretty good. Very bold and funny.

When I told Aimee about this she was all, "Woah! Cool!" Little did I know that she was secretly betting on me to quit. (Thanks, Aims. And for that matter, thanks, Deo.) To be fair, I almost didn't push through just as they had planned. I thought that I was going to be too busy to keep up with the practices. A lot of them would run all the way to late at night. Sometimes ending at around 10 pm everyday. The fact that I didn't quit was mostly thanks to the team's friendliness and willingness to put up with a noob like me.

Yes. I was very very nooby.

When I first started out, I was totally lost. I thought that everybody was like a pro and I was totally bringing the team down. Somehow though, I managed to get the moves and I could follow. I even carved out a reputation for myself as being particularly good in the... expressive moves.

We didn't get past the eliminations which isn't too bad. On the plus side, it means that I don't need to keep on coming home late for practices. Also, it's okay because I already learned a lot along the way. I learned that I'm not the best dancer in the world but I can be pretty decent if I practice enough. I learned that it's alright to leave your comfort zone because you'll always find something new and awesome to learn about. I learned that parking late at night in a dark corner of the road is always gonna fucking scare the shit out of me. I also learned that I fucking need a GPS for finding far away unknown dance studios.

All in all, it was a great experience. I'm glad that I made the decision to join. I'm glad that Santi, our team captain, was so cool and let me join even after missing the first few practice sessions. Yeah.

Here's the video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iVwaW4wS83U

Werk dat shit.


Breaking Bad

Breaking Bad is the best fucking show ever. Everything about that show is amazing. The evolution of the characters. The drama. The action. The suspense. The amazing montages accompanied with great music. Damn damn damn damn damn.

It is so good, I actually made fan art. Fan art that I probably won't share here.

The reason I did that was because of a certain someone that's good at art and everything else. So I figured that I'd give it a shot too... Yeah.. Nevermind.

Tears for Fears

A few weeks ago, maybe even a month ago, Aimee and I went to watch Tears for Fears! Woohoo!!! My dad's friend gave my dad the tickets and he gave them to me since concerts weren't really his kind of scene. I'm into oldies most of the time so I was pretty excited about the concert. I didn't know a lot of their songs though. The only ones I could remember were "Shout" and "Mad World". After that, they were totally unknown to me.

A big part of the memorableness of the whole thing was the fact that I drove to Araneta myself. If you've been to Araneta during a concert or during an Ateneo-Lasalle game, then you'd know that it is extremely congested going there and finding parking is next to impossible. Finding the place was hard enough. Thank god Aimee had a GPS on her phone!!!

Luckily though, after many trips around the malls at Araneta, we found parking near a well-lit condo unit. The parking was god-sent. I was afraid that I'd have to park in a dark alley putting my life and my innocence at risk. Phew!

We got to the concert in time for the first few acts. We missed Fra Lippo Lippi's performance as the opening act. Eh. No big.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQO3Ma1BfT4

I remember finding the door to the stage itself right next to the men's washroom. If I was so inclined, I could have snuck into the concert and jumped on stage. I would have probably been tazed the shit out of myself though. So I stayed put.

Aimee and I got in just in time for another opening performance. This time it was Carina Round. She sang songs on her guitar and somehow, she managed to sound really modern. She had that style that Aimee was really into. I think. She was great. She even taught us the chorus of her song for us to singalong to... The chorus was not that well-written... But whatever.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrZLaxSmY44

Then came the show.

Carina Round center stage.

Tears for Fears

People waving around their Globe light sticks while watching Tears for Fears

I remember before the concert, Aimee and I were wondering how we were supposed to rock out to Tears for Fears since they were a nu-wave band and not the traditional rock band. We did get to do that though. For some songs. The other ones were too nu-wave.

Also, when the concert first started, we were really full of energy. Towards the middle, we were about to fall asleep or at least I was. It's like they have a like a trillion songs!!! Man!!!

Anyways, the entire concert was really great. It was a great experience. I'm really glad my dad gave me those tickets. I'm also happy that Aimee agreed to come with me. It was a great night.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajy1xNB-LkI

My Shiny Teeth and Me (terrible) *and other things*

Fuggin' got a wisdom tooth extraction.

I apologize for the title of my blog.

That's the upper one.

The dentist got the two from the right side of my mouth. So now, my face is slightly swollen and I am confined to having only chocolate milk and sherbet for my nutrition. That part totally sucks balls.

The operation itself was rather unpleasant. It was not excruciating. But whenever the dentist dug into my jawbone with his drill to get to the embedded tooth, I could still feel it in my jaw. That part was a little scary because I kept imagining what if he snaps my jaw in half.

Evolution totally screwed us over in this respect.

Moving on.

Before this whole dental surgery thing Aimee and I went over to Greenhills for some birthday walking around! First we snacked on some food at the foodcourt. Lucky for us (or maybe just me) Aimee chanced upon a simple stall that sold kwek-kwek and other delicious streetfoods! YEAH!!!

I never get to eat any of this kind of food so it was a welcome treat for me. And when I saw that they had 1 day old chicks, I was like "AHAAWWW YEAHHH." Aimee and I were just talking about how she's never had that before and how weird it was to eat an whole baby chick. I'm guessing because she feels sorry for them.

On that note, Aimee protested against the selling of chicks in front of her old high school. She told me that they were dipped in coloring and kids would buy them and toss them around and torture them. I wonder if these chicks are given a nice clean death before they're dunked into the deep fryer... Yeah. I suppose they die faster this way.

Anyways.

We blasted through a quick order of kwek-kwek which is quail eggs fried in orange colored flour. Here's a file photo.

Derishash. Holololololol...

This is making me hungry... And all I can have is liquids... FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUU

...

After the kwek-kwek we decided to try some of the chicks. Aimee was totally grossed out by them. She talked to me about how she hated the taste of the chicken heads that I made her try. Chicken heads are fuckin' delicious by the way. Don't let anyone else tell you otherwise.

Upper left: Fried Balut, Lower right: 1-day old chicks

As you can see, we also tried some fried balut, something that I have never had before. Man, I love trying new foods.

So for the taste... They tasted great. Real chewy and the marinade made it taste gooooood. It tasted just like chicken and did not feel as bony as one would expect. The stomach part of the chick tasted a little bitter but I didn't mind. I ate everything from the head to the feet. Deep frying everything made that possible. And with that vinegar sause... mahaaaaaaan oh man. So good.

Aimee on the otherhand, did not find it as good as I did. She bit off the head and ate everything else but the feet. She liked it though. So she tells me... Haha.

Man this is making me hungry for more.

This stall was really handy. Food was very very cheap but tasted great! Perfect for 15 minute breaks at the office or something!

After snacks, Aimee and I headed off into the 2nd hand PS3 game store. It's where I buy all my games since  all of them are damn expensive.

Even there I buy the relatively cheap ones. The cheap one here being Little Big Planet 2. I remember when the trailer came out and I was like, "wow..."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oy_a3oCDzRA

It took me 2 years to buy it since it's release... I am a cheap mofo...

Aside from the game shopping Aimee and I went around looking at clothes. More correctly, she looked around for clothes while I graciously accompanied her. I'm not complaining. That wasn't bad at all. But I did make this face when she said that she wasn't really going to buy anything... >8U

My mom used to take me to malls and do that. Make me sit down on the fuckin' bench while she tries on shoes and clothes. And I was bored to death. I had to make time go by. And my brain would wander into weird places among the patterns of clothing and wooden panels on the shelves... It is so weird when you look into patterns and you think about what it would be like if they were their own separate world...

Anyways, she did find a shirt to buy. So it's all good. 

I also finally bought myself a copy of Dead Space. I never finished the game myself but I loved the atmosphere in the game. It reminded me of Event Horizon. Only problem is, the game can get a little too scary.

Fuckin video games.