Rommel's Random Ramblings

2008-08-24T21:11:00.000-07:00

Thank You for Leaving a Legacy:

Roman Monzon
1/26/1984 - 8/1/2008

I'll miss you, but we'll see each other again.

Links:
http://www.myspace.com/romanuginobili
http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/news/local/missionviejo/crimeandsafety/article_2134636.php

2008-03-02T22:41:00.000-08:00

HappySlip:
Yay, Christine Gambito aka "HappySlip" of www.youtube.com/HappySlip and www.happyslip.com is coming to our church next Sunday!

For more info:
http://www.filamchurchirvine.org/youthblog/wp-content/uploads/2008/03/happyslip.jpg

2008-02-18T23:04:00.001-08:00

One Shining Moment:
You know that highlight montage they always show at the end of the final game of the NCAA Men's Basketball tournament, set to the song "One Shining Moment"? Well, the other weekend, the guys from church just finished playing their last game of the Irvine City basketball league, and I made my own version of One Shining Moment just for fun, using some highlights from the season. I figured with March almost here...

2008-01-31T21:54:00.000-08:00

Return of the Car Problems Blog:
It seems that it's usually around this time of the year that I have problems related to my car. Let's see...

Someone once drove across my front bumper while my car was stopped at a left turn lane, ripping a gash through it. This was after the driver of the other car drove on the sidewalk for about half a block and right before her car stopped by hitting a lamp post.
My car window was smashed into pieces twice. My car radio was stolen the first time, and my bass guitar was stolen the second time.
I've had a few flat tires, either from running over something on the road or from having a screw or nail stuck on the tire.

So what is it this time? Well, for the past couple weeks, I've noticed that my car was losing radiator coolant. Turns out there was this crack across the top section of the radiator, right underneath the cap. Whenever things would get too hot, coolant would sometimes leak out instead of going to the reservoir. Then the liquid would hit the spinning fan and get sprayed all over the place, sometimes accompanied with smoke or steam as the drops hit the hot engine.

Needless to say, I got the radiator completely replaced today. And I'm planning to go to the medical mission again this April. Why do such things happen when I'm preparing for something like that?

2007-08-31T22:17:00.001-07:00

Bye-Bye, Charles:

2007-08-02T23:32:00.000-07:00

Pictures Have Been Moved:

Since Yahoo! Photos is shutting down, I have migrated all of my pictures over to Flickr. Here's the link to the new site:

http://www.flickr.com/rommel4321

Tip: The pictures on this post change every time you refresh this page.

2007-07-16T17:07:00.000-07:00

Best. Safari Video. Ever:

2007-06-29T00:04:00.000-07:00

How Much Of The World Have You Visited?:

Create your own visited country map.

2007-06-27T22:24:00.000-07:00

How Much Of The Philippines Have You Visited?:

6 islands down; 7,101 to go.

2007-05-29T17:23:00.000-07:00

What I've been up to:

It's not much, but you can always check out my pictures at: http://photos.yahoo.com/rommel4321
I still update that quite frequently, unlike this blog.

2006-12-22T23:31:00.000-08:00

Look-Alikes:
Yay, the first post in almost 5 months!

Anyway, a lot of people have been saying that my girlfriend and I look a lot like each other. Hmm...

Well, it turns out that we have some common celebrity look-alikes as well.

What do you guys think?

2006-07-31T20:38:00.000-07:00

The New Yahoo! Photos (beta):
I switched my Yahoo photo album over to the new beta version. Check it out. Tags and comments and more...

http://photos.yahoo.com/rommel4321

2006-07-21T14:18:00.000-07:00

A Quick Haiku Update:
DSL is down
They'll ship me a new modem
Should arrive next week

2006-07-04T22:24:00.000-07:00

Teriyaki Bowl 2006:
Football tournament. This Sunday, July 9th, 2006.

See the production photos from the making of this video.

2006-07-04T01:11:00.000-07:00

Balut:
This is how we "initiate" new team members during the medical mission. :)

2006-06-26T12:33:00.000-07:00

INFJ:
I took the Myers-Briggs Personality Test a few months ago, and I got an INFJ: Introvert iNtuitive Feeling Judging.

INFJ Relationships

INFJs are warm and affirming people who are usually also deep and complex. They're likely to seek out and promote relationships that are intense and meaningful. They tend to be perfectionists, and are always striving for the Ultimate Relationship. For the most part, this is a positive feature, but sometimes works against the INFJ if they fall into the habit of moving from relationship to relationship, always in search of a more perfect partner. In general, the INFJ is a deeply warm and caring person who is highly invested in the health of their close relationships, and puts forth a lot of effort to make them positive. They are valued by those close to them for these special qualities. They seek long-term, lifelong relationships, although they don't always find them.

INFJ Strengths

Warm and affirming by nature
Dedicated to achieving the ultimate relationship
Sensitive and concerned for others' feelings
Usually have good communication skills, especially written
Take their commitments very seriously, and seek lifelong relationships
Have very high expectations for themselves and others (both a strength and weakness)
Good listeners
Are able to move on after a relationship has ended (once they're sure it's over)

INFJ Weaknesses

Tendency to hold back part of themselves
Not good with money or practical day-to-day life necessities
Extreme dislike of conflict and criticism
Have very high expectations for themselves and others (both a strength and weakness)
Have difficulty leaving a bad relationship

INFJs as Lovers

"To love means to open ourselves to the negative as well as the positive - to grief, sorrow, and disappointment as well as to joy, fulfillment, and an intensity of consciousness we did not know was possible before." -- Rollo May

INFJs are warm, considerate partners who feel great depth of love for their partners. They enjoy showing this love, and want to receive affirmation back from their mates.

They are perfectionists, constantly striving to achieve the Perfect Relationship. This can sometimes be frustrating to their mates, who may feel put upon by the INFJs demanding perfectionism. However, it may also be greatly appreciated, because it indicates a sincere commitment to the relationship, and a depth of caring which is not usually present in other types.

Sexually, INFJs view intimacy as a nearly spiritual experience. They embrace the opportunity to bond heart and soul with their mates. As service-oriented individuals, it's very important to them that their mates are happy. Intimacy is an opportunity for the INFJ to selflessly give their love, and experience it in a tangible way.

Although two well-developed individuals of any type can enjoy a healthy relationship, INFJ's natural partner is the ENTP, or the ENFP. INFJ's dominant function of Introverted Intuition is best matched with a personality type that is dominated by Extraverted Intuition.

INFJs as Parents

"You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth...
Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable." -- Kahlil Gibran

INFJs usually make warm and caring parents. Their goal is to help their children become adults who know the difference between right and wrong, and who are independent, growth-oriented individuals.

Along the path to that goal they are generally very warm and caring, and are likely to treat their children as individuals who have a voice in family decisions. They want their children to be able to think for themselves, and make the right decisions. They also can be quite demanding on their children, and may have very high expectations for their behavior. Although they are generally soft-spoken and gentle, they may become stubborn and sharp-tongued at times when their expectations aren't met, or when under a lot of stress.

INFJs take their parenting role with ultimate seriousness. They will make sacrifices for the sake of their children without a second thought, and without remorse. Passing on their values to their children is a serious priority in their lives. Children of INFJs remember their parents fondly as warm, patient, and inspirational.

INFJs as Friends

Although the INFJ is likely to put friends behind their God and their families in terms of importance, they do value their friendships. As idealists who have strong value systems, INFJs seek authenticity and depth in their close relationships, and especially value people who can see and appreciate the INFJ for who they are and what they stand for.

The INFJ is likely to spend a lot of time socialing with family members. If they are religious, they probably are social with members of their religious community. After that, the INFJ may have friends represented from any of the personality types. They are usually extremely intuitive individuals, who will have no patience for anyone they feel is dishonest or corrupt. They'll have no interest in being around these kinds of people.

All kinds of people are drawn towards the INFJ. They are usually quite popular, although they may be unaware of it themselves, because they don't place a lot of importance on it.

The INFJ is valued by their close friends for their warmth and consideration, their new and interesting ways of looking at things, and for their ability to inspire and motivate others to be the best that they can be. genuine article that they are.

2006-06-10T23:24:00.000-07:00

Little Drummer Boy:
If our drummer, Nikki (aka Pops Fernandez), ever retires from the worship team...

We've got a new drummer in my nephew, Landon.

Clearly, he's Phil Collins' youngest fan. :)

2006-05-31T21:51:00.000-07:00

2006 Philippine Medical Mission:

2006-05-02T23:45:00.000-07:00

Parañaque:
Arrived at Manila safely. Thanks for your prayers. A couple of things I forgot to mention about the flight over, though.

When we landed in Seoul, the plane was swiveling from side to side as it slowed down. It's like the runway was slippery or something. Then, as we were taxi-ing (how do you spell that?), one guy got up and ran to the lavatory. Before anyone could say "Hey, the seatbelt light's not turned off yet", we started hearing vomiting sounds. So okay, I guess he had a legitimate excuse. The next few minutes, though, were full of uncomfortable silence (except for the sounds coming from the restroom.)

The other incident occurred during the flight from Incheon to Manila. I was just sitting there basically being bored when I was approached by one of the flight attendants. "Can I help you?" she said. When she saw the "Huh?"-look on my face, she reached over, pushed the "Cancel 'call attendant'" button, and walked away. Hmm... I don't remember pushing that.

About an hour later, she came over again while I was reading. "Can I help you?" she asked. I thought, "Huh?", then looked up. Sure enough, the "call attendant" light was on. Lamely, I said, "Oh, is it on?" She then turned it off, gave me a look that seemed to say "Yeah, sure whatever" and went away. I think the person sitting next to me must be messing with me. I don't think she was really asleep.

Anyway, I'm staying at our house in Parañaque until I meet up with the team on Monday when the mission starts.

2006-05-01T15:19:00.000-07:00

Incheon:
It's about 7:15AM, Tuesday morning. I'm at Incheon Internation Airport right now waiting for to board the flight to Manila. That was a long flight. It seemed longer than the other times I crossed the Pacific. Maybe it was because I woke up with at least six hours left in the flight. Usually, I wouldn't wake up until at least three hours later. And I've gotten used to just five or six hours of sleep lately, so I'm still fine.

Anyway, I ended up getting an aisle seat at the very last row. I was hesistant to take it at first, but it turned out to be not that bad at all. Actually, it was a pretty cool seat. It came with some pretty nifty advantages:
- Being an aisle seat, I could get in and out of my seat without having to hop over everyone else.
- I was closest to the restroom, so I could just go as soon as I find out it was free (which was within a second or so.)
- The best part of all was that the two seats next to me were empty. So in that middle section of four seats, I was assigned the one on the right while the two in the middle had no one sitting in them. Someone was sitting on the very left seat, though. So I just lifted one of the arm rests and ended up also taking up one of the extra seats. Instant bed! Too bad that other passenger was there. Otherwise, I could have taken over all four seats in that section. But I didn't want to invade their personal space.

Now this is a weird part. While I was in the restroom, I started thinking about ghosts and stuff in restrooms. Okay, this needs a little explanation. At work last Friday, Ate Rada was saying that in the women's restroom, she saw some woman with long hair, wearing a white top and black skirt just standing in one of the stalls. She did a double take and saw nothing. Hmmm...

So back to my story. I got out of the restroom and went back to my seat. However, I found that some girl was sitting in my seat!

Me: Umm... excuse me.
Her: Oh, sorry, sorry.

She got up and let me sit down. But she didn't really go anywhere for a while. She just stood there at the aisle for at least ten minutes. *shrug*

Well, I have to go board my plane now. So, till next time...

2006-04-30T21:02:00.000-07:00

Off To The Philippines I Go:

2006-04-12T00:38:00.000-07:00

Ever want to ask a ninja a question? Random but funny:

More questions and answers at http://www.askaninja.com.

2006-03-27T23:17:00.000-08:00

Three Item Combo:
Okay, you may be wondering what's been going on lately. I'll make this quick. (I might edit this post later on to add more detail... or I may not.)

1. Got a new bass guitar. Kuya Mitch and the rest of the worship team got together and organized a fundraiser to get me back in action. Cool! God truly provides.

2. Had a get-together with the old UCLA roommate crew. Well, most of us, at least. Vince and Steph, Shauna (and Eugene), we missed you. Anyway, here are the pictures.

3. I'm going back to the Philippines for another medical mission. This time, we're going to Bacolod City and Tarlac (in Moncada, I believe.) It's going to be from May 8 to May 19.

2006-03-05T21:04:00.000-08:00

I have something to blog about again:
And unfortunately, it's not exactly the happiest news. Yes, you guessed it. It's car-related. So what happened? Well, sometime last night, my car got broken into again. "Again?" you say. Yes, again. As you may recall, it was around this time two years ago that my car radio was stolen. This time, thieves smashed into my driver's side window, popped the trunk, and stole my bass guitar from inside the trunk. It's as if I had a girlfriend taken away from me. Oh, how I miss those times I would put her in the passenger seat with a hat and jacket on her just so I can drive in the carpool lane. (Just kidding! It's an inside joke with some of my fellow worship band members. I think all of you non-guitarists would think I'm weird for saying that. Haha.)

Anyway, as I was cleaning up the broken glass from my car, I figured I should collect all of the pieces and pretend they were diamonds. Then I found out that someone else beat me to it.

Oh, and you know what else? There were cat paw prints all over my hood, too! Gah!

2001(?) - March 5, 2006
My dear bass guitar... You will be missed.

2006-01-23T22:25:00.000-08:00

Overcome - The Music Video:

A highlight video of the retreat
edited by Eric,
filmed by Jourdan,
and starring...

ME!

(Haha. Okay, not really... But I am in it for a couple of seconds.)

2006-01-09T22:43:00.000-08:00

Overcome:
1 John 5
⁴For everyone born of God overcomes the world. This is the victory that has overcome the world, even our faith. ⁵Who is it that overcomes the world? Only he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God.

Here are some pictures from the very first Youth/College/Mosaic retreat at Lake Arrowhead.

More pictures from the retreat
Even more pictures from the retreat

2006-01-09T21:33:00.000-08:00

My eyes! The goggles do nothing (Part 2):
So as you know, I recently broke my glasses. So about a week ago, rather than get a new pair, I went and got contacts instead. So now I went from this:

To this:

^_^

I guess I can now add "taking pictures of myself" to my list of non-bathroomly things I do in the bathroom. That'll fit in quite nicely between "reading a book" and "playing the guitar."

2005-12-14T22:28:00.000-08:00

Lanie's Confession:

A promo video for the Children's Christmas Musical.

Okay, so this was posted ~~a little~~ really late considering we just had the musical this past Sunday. I think it went really well though. Expect the dvd to come out sometime in March (hopefully...)

2005-12-14T19:13:00.000-08:00

My eyes! The goggles do nothing:
I broke my glasses today. I've been noticing a crack in the lens frame. Then today at work, my glasses finally just snapped in half. Good thing I still had my old glasses. So basically, I went from looking like this:

Back to this:

:(

2005-11-23T23:49:00.000-08:00

Dancing skills run in the family:

My 2 year old nephew, Landon, dancing to the theme song of Wowowee, a game show that airs on The Filipino Channel.

2005-11-17T21:17:00.000-08:00

Superman Returns:

The teaser trailer is out. That's all.

2005-11-13T20:24:00.000-08:00

A New Video:

2005-10-18T22:34:00.000-07:00

Stuffed With Stouffer's:
For the past couple of weeks, my mom has been buying a lot of Stouffer's Lasagna with Meat & Sauce in Family Size. It must be on sale or something. Anyway, I'd have to agree with Kevin that this is the best pre-assembled lasagna I've ever tasted. I'm a converted Stouffer's lasagna fan.

2005-10-12T21:36:00.000-07:00

20 Random Facts:
So I just got tagged by Kevin. Is this your way of telling me to update? Anyway, here we go...

I once got hit by a car during my senior year of high school. I was knocked unconscious for at least fifteen minutes. When I finally returned to school, there were rumors going around that I had heroically pushed a girl out of the way of a moving vehicle.

Not long after that accident, the city put up a stoplight on that street corner.

I once had a dog that got hit by a car. I think the neighbors ate him afterward.

I once gave John Singleton tips on how to play Virtua Fighter. He was filming a movie at UCLA at the time and was taking a break at the arcade.

My first car was an '89 Hyundai Excel. The transmission blew while I was driving down the 405 freeway. The car finally came to a complete stop right outside the Hyundai corporate offices.

I used to take a flashlight and go exploring inside storm drains.

When I was in second grade, I punched this kid in the face and gave him a bloody nose because I thought he stole my crayon.

I find myself inserting random quotes from The Filipino Channel into regular conversation even though not everyone gets them. I mean... "Why not?"

I didn't get my driver's license until I was 26 years old, 10 years after teenagers are allowed to have one.

There are more computers in my house than people.

I used to be a skater and a b-boy.

I used to live in an apartment two doors away from Jaleel White aka "Steve Urkel."

The one thing I remember about my first day in America: eating a Rocky Road candy bar for the first time.

I been playing bass guitar on the worship band for the past five years. However, I've never taken any formal music lessons. Maybe that's why I'm not that good. :p

If you have a van, don't let me drive it. I have a history of getting into accidents with them. On the other hand, I'm accident-free with my own car.

The very first skit video I was involved in was for my Economics class in high school. In the video, I played a pro wrestler who talked about the Pacific Rim economy during an interview. I also acted as the (female) host of the children's show, Romper Room. As far as I know, not a single copy of that video exists anymore.

Other roles I've played in skits include: an evil pharaoh, Larry H. Parker, a pastor, a bride, a football player, a conveyor belt, and more.

In my room, I have a katana, a wakizashi, a hardwood boken, a pair of nunchakus, a Ugandan spear, and the Green Destiny sword from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.

Although I haven't played in about ten years, I recently found my long lost Magic:The Gathering card collection. Sadly, I don't think the cards have appreciated much in value.

I love eating aborted duck fetuses.

Ok, Justine and Roman, it's now your turn. And you. Yes, YOU, the person reading this. It's your turn to write 20 random facts on your own blog. Then let me know about it in the comment box.

2005-09-11T20:24:00.000-07:00

Random Thought:
If I have a son, maybe I'll name him Luke. Just so I can say, "Luke, I am your father."

Okay, well he could be named after Luke from the Bible. Maybe he'll grow up to be doctor just like his biblical counterpart.

The next kid could be called John. And then next comes Acts. Yeah, I like the name Acts.

Then Roman... I mean, Romans. (Haha. Sorry, Roman.)

Oh! Acts could be a girl. Then she'd be their sister Acts.

Alright, that's enough of my corniness.

By the way, before I start getting comments from Star Wars fans, I am aware that I didn't quote the movie properly. I do know that the dialogue goes like this:

Darth Vader: Obi-Wan never told you what happened to your father.
Luke: He told me enough. He told me you killed him.
Darth Vader: No. I am your father.
Luke: (in "Tashi Station"-whiny voice) No. No. It's not true. That's impossible.

2005-08-21T20:38:00.000-07:00

2005-08-20T13:28:00.000-07:00

2005-07-30T17:43:00.000-07:00

Adventures in Housesitting:
This past week I've been housesitting for the ~~Cruz's~~ ~~Cruzes~~ Cruz family while they were in Mexico. I usually watch their house every year when they go on their family vacations. Now some of you may not have housesat before and are wondering what it involves. Nothing much, really, but I'm sure each situation is different.

There's the usual stuff like moving the bins around for trash day.

Oh, and bringing in their mail.

I also had to add some water-clearing bacteria to their koi pond.

Too bad I forgot to turn off the Scarecrow, the motion-detecting, water-squirting, animal-repelling, security device first.

But after all of this hard work, I get to raid their fridge.

And use their phone. I'm sure they don't mind me racking up inordinate amounts of long-distance charges. (Hi Lea!)

I tried to cook some food, but that didn't work out too well.

Oh well. At least I get to sit down and watch some television.

Zzzz.... wait, am I drooling on their furniture? ^_^

2005-07-27T23:04:00.000-07:00

Since I haven't really updated in a while, this might be a long one. So let's see... what's been going on the past few weeks?

During the second weekend of July, we had our Mosaic (Career Group) retreat. This was the first retreat we've had in over three years. Once all the carpool rides were organized, we all headed for a weekend in Palm Springs. I drove my car, taking Faye, Alanie, and Normita as passengers. Yes, nothing like driving to the desert on a hot Friday afternoon in the middle of rush hour traffic. Sometime in between listening to Parokya ni Edgar and M.Y.M.P. songs, Faye and I were joking around about the possibility of the car overheating. Stop-n-go traffic, 100°F weather, A/C turned on, broken temperature gauge... all the ingredients were there. But naah... the car hasn't had a history of overheating. About ten minutes later... haha! Smoke/steam started coming out from under the hood. So what was the first thing we did after we pulled over?

Yup, we took pictures. ^_^

Anyway, we finally arrived at the house we rented for the weekend. It only took us a couple extra hours to drive with the heater turned on while looking to buy a replacement for the radiator cap that just broke.

It was a good, refreshing retreat. We spent more time with each other, especially the relative newcomers like Merrychris, Joanne, and John Kidd. We also got to know Pastor Lito and his wife, Ate Loida, more. Lots of fun, fellowship, and getting into God's Word.

Oh, we also played this game which involves thinking of the longest word possible that uses each letter of the alphabet only once. The longest I could think of was AMBIDEXTROUSLY. Fourteen letters. Is there one longer?

Well, here's the token group picture courtesy of Jourdan and Joanna Tesoro.

More pictures from the Mosaic Retreat weekend.

Then, on the 16th, we had a party for my nephew, Landon's 2nd birthday. Wow, he's two years old already. Seems like it was only yesterday when I was in the hospital when he was born.

Even more pictures.

Last week was Vacation Bible School at church. This year's theme was Serengeti Trek. You can find the highlights music video here. Be sure to look out for the dancing skills of Benjie and Jiro, Carlos' drum playing, Shiela and TJ shying away from the camera, and many more.

VBS Pictures

This past weekend was also Roger and Lizette's wedding and a baby dedication for Rem and Coco's son, Benjamin on Saturday. On Sunday, there was also a picnic in the park after church. Been pretty busy, but so fun. Lots of pictures, of course. You guys know where to look.

2005-07-08T00:22:00.000-07:00

Videoblog?:
I added some more detailed descriptions or background information for the videos in the sidebar over to the right. Just hover your mouse pointer over each thumbnail picture for a second or two, and they should appear. I've actually reached the limit of web space that my ISP provided me with. So if I want to put up new videos, I'd have to either take some of the existing ones offline or find additional locations for me to store these videos on the internet. Does anybody even watch these? Statcounter doesn't have a way to let me know how often they're accessed. Or if there is a way for me to find out, I haven't figured it out yet.

2005-06-27T00:27:00.000-07:00

Hot Rod:

On the way home, I saw this big plume of smoke coming from around my exit. As you can see, it turns out that there was a vehicle on fire on the side of the freeway (but on the opposite direction, the on-ramp side.) As to how exactly it happened, I do not know. I just hope nobody was injured. Crazy...

2005-06-24T16:53:00.000-07:00

The latest addition to my DVD collection:
Can This Be Love starring Sandara Park and Hero Angeles. Fedex just delivered the DVD the other day. I saw this in the theater with a friend before I left the Philippines. Okay, so it's a cheesy "chick flick", but this one wasn't too bad. Typical story line, boy meets girl, the usual stuff. Okay, that sounded like I watch these types of movies all the time. Still, it's probably up there but not quite at the level of the masterpiece that is My Sassy Girl. Hahaha. But hey, it's got songs by Kitchie Andal, err... I mean Kitchie Nadal, Sarah Geronimo, MYMP, and of course, Sandara Park. I'm sold on the Kitchie songs alone. ^_^

2005-06-19T22:45:00.000-07:00

Weird Keyword Search of the Day:
Someone just stumbled upon this blog by doing a Yahoo search for the following terms...

"woman to whom a man is engaged to be married"

The resulting search obviously leads to this old post. Kinda makes you wonder what exactly they were trying to look for, doesn't it? (Ironically, I think just writing about this sort of increases the likelihood of receiving more related searches in the future.)

2005-06-16T23:58:00.000-07:00

Being a travel photographer:
I wouldn't mind having this guy's job.

The Joyride

Ahh... to be able to go to all of these neat places and take pictures for a living. Oh, and to be able to meet the cast of Darna and Encantadia, too! Haha.

2005-05-20T10:36:00.000-07:00

Pictures, Pictures, Pictures:
Five albums worth...
1. Palawan - At the island of Palawan with Jed the week before the mission trip
2. Medical Mission 1 - Pictures from the Philippine medical mission
3. Medical Mission 2 - Part 2 of the medical mission pictures
4. Philippines 1 - Pictures from my 3 week stay after the mission trip
5. Philippines 2 - More post-medical mission pictures

2005-05-18T22:46:00.000-07:00

Time to start clearing out the cobwebs from this thing...

New Video of the 2005 Philippine Medical Mission:

(Click on the picture to play the video.)

Pictures to be added soon.

2005-04-24T16:10:00.000-07:00

The medical mission's over, and I'm staying in my house in Parañaque. I miss being around the team members 24/7. I'm also not in the best of health. I'm also torn between: 1) wanting to go back to America so that I can work on the video/slideshow and show you all the pictures and relate stories, and 2) not wanting to leave just yet. (My parents are coming next week for a 2-week vacation.)

2005-04-13T21:05:00.000-07:00

Scariest moment of my life to date:
Having a power outtage occur while I'm taking a shower and being surrounded by pitch-black darkness. I was assigned a hotel room all to myself, too, so I know that it wasn't a roommate accidentally flipping the light switch. It wasn't the darkness I was afraid of, but of the mystery (at the time) of why it became so dark all of a sudden. With the shower running and the tub being so slippery, it wasn't exactly too safe to start feeling my way around. Longest couple of minutes of my life. Haha. Only in places where rolling blackouts are far too common like the Philippines.

2005-04-11T21:27:00.000-07:00

Mission Underway:
Be sure to also check http://facimission2005.blogspot.com for updates.

2005-04-09T17:08:00.000-07:00

I've been wandering around the hotel for the past few minutes while Jed is in the room getting a massage or something. I walked around the lobby, hung out by the pool, and now I'm in the business center using their computers. The front desk people are probably gonna be sick of me asking to use the Internet once the daily updates for the mission blog start next week.

Well, the Legend Hotel where we are staying at has some great tour packages. I forgot to mention Jun, our guide yesterday at the Underground River. He's a pretty funny guy. I don't know if you can request a particular boatman for the river tour. However, if you can, try to get in the boat that Jun is manning. The guy cracks me up.

Jun on a rock formation in the shape of a female figure: "Doesn't that look like a famous actress? That is our very own Sharon Stone."
Jun on a rock formation smeared with bat guano: "That is where the bats relieve themselves. It's called the bathroom."
Jun in response to one of the passengers stating that he's seen bigger bats: "Up and ahead is the biggest bat of them all. Bat-o! (lit. rock)"

Heh, him saying all of these in tagalog with his high pitched voice just made it all the more funnier.

Anyway, seeing the beauty of God's creation continued today when we visited the Estrella River Falls. On the way there, the tour guide asked us, "So which one of you is Dr. Santa Maria?" Doctor? Jed and I gave each other a glance. He's still just a med school student. Our guide told us, "Well, that's what the paperwork said." It did indeed state "Dr. Santa Maria" on the voucher in black and white. Needless to say, that made Jed's day.

So, yeah, back to the falls. I think it was only about 15-20 feet high. Definitely not as high as, say, that one in Yosemite. (You know, the one where you can hike up these stairs or rocky steps along its side. What was that called again?) You can swim around the Estrella Falls area, though. There was also what looked like a church youth group there with some kids getting baptized. I wanted to listen to their testimonies, but there were other people around that I couldn't get close enough to hear.

2005-04-08T20:17:00.000-07:00

The Adventure So Far:
Monday
The flight to the Philippines was pretty uneventful except for a couple of things. During our stopover at Incheon airport, I had just gone through the carry-on bag screening process. As I was picking up my backpack and guitar bag, I was approached by a Korean security girl who was monitoring a different line.

Korean Security Girl: Where you from?
Me: US
Korean Security Girl: *turns to her co-worker* LA
Korean Security Girl 2: Teeheehee. (Or so Jed tells me.)

When we got to our plane that was supposed to take us from Korea to the Philippines, we found that we were assigned these really nice and roomy seats on the upper deck. Cool. We still had economy class meals and entertainment, but still. Lots of leg room, only four seats per row (two aisle and two window seats). Very nice. The check-in guy at LAX wasn't kidding when he told us that he gave us good seats for this flight.

Tuesday
Jed and I finally arrived at the Philippines on Tuesday morning. We were going to stay at my house in Parañaque until we leave for Palawan on Thursday. So I gave Jed the tour of the house/dorm building. My family rents out the front of our house to some small businesses like a bakery and barber shop. Some of the employees also rent rooms in the house. So Jed got to meet my cousin's family and a few of the other people that live/work there. We then met up with his cousin for dinner at Makati and walked around the Greenbelt plaza for a little bit before we went back home.

Wednesday
What's a trip to the Philippines without stopping by a mall? A lot of times, people go to shopping malls just to enter the air-conditioned environment and escape the heat. But this time, we exchanged our money for local currency and split up for the rest of the day. Jed took a taxi to visit his uncle in Quezon City. I, on the other hand, just walked around the street corner to my ninang's (godmother's) house. She asked me why I haven't asked her best friend's granddaughter out yet. Heh.

Thursday
Early flight to Puerto Princesa, Palawan. Alanie, Jed got you your polvoron, so don't worry. Anyway, for the most part, Palawan's a pretty undeveloped island. The airport's essentially just a single runway strip. We even bounced when we landed. Kinda cool and scary at the same time. So as we were waiting for our baggage, it turns out the baggage claim conveyor belt wasn't working. So all of these airline passengers ended up standing around the cargo containers themselves while a couple of guys would pass out their contents.

For some reason, my cell phone can't get a signal here in Palawan even though I see other people here use their cell phones. I have a local sim card and it's a tri-band phone. It worked in Manila but not here. Hmm... oh, well.

As part of our hotel stay, we had an island hopping tour of Honda Bay. We saw, but didn't actually set foot in, quite a few islands like:
Bat Island - Home to thousands of bats
Lu-Li Island - From lulubog-lilitaw meaning "sink-float". This island is completely submerged during high tide.
Dos Palmas Island - Location of Dos Palmas resort where the Abu Sayyaf kidnapped a bunch of guests, including the Burnhams, back in 2000.
Snake Island - Shaped like a snake. We actually set foot on this island and went snorkeling by its shores. We saw a few giant clams and this really territorial fish that would bite my legs whenever I approached the rock it used as its home.

Friday
We had an early start today at 7 AM since this was the day of our tour of the Underground River. It was a 2 1/2 hour drive through at least 50% unpaved roads. Nice full body massage we got there. Anyway, the tour took us through these caves by rowboat. There were a lot of amazing rock formations that words just cannot fully describe. I hope to have these pictures up soon.

So tomorrow, we're supposed to see something called Estrella Falls. Sounds exciting. But still, I can't wait until the rest of the mission team gets here on Monday.

2005-04-03T20:10:00.000-07:00

Philippines, here we come:
Ok, I'm off to the airport in a few minutes. Jed and I have a flight at 12:30am. It's amazing to see how God has brought me to this point. From a huge tax refund considering I had a full-time job last year for only two weeks, to all the financial support that people have given, even the very last minute ones (you know who you are), it really is a great testimony of the Lord's provision. And so, I thank you so much for your support and prayers. And to all my readers in the Philippines (pati yung mga "anonymice"), I'll see you in a few hours, or days, or weeks, in some cases.

Haha, that sounded so much like a farewell speech, but it's not. I'll be sure to post again depending on how well I can get internet access.

2005-04-02T22:55:00.000-08:00

Why does it seem like the amount of stuff I have to pack steadily gets smaller as I start putting them away up until, oh, about 24 hours before I have to leave? Then, it's as if the amount of things I have left to pack begin increasing the more I pack away and the closer the time of departure approaches. Take into consideration the spring forward time change, and that takes away one hour from the time I have left. No time. No time! There's never enough time! I'm so excited. I'm so excited. I'm so... scared. You're cool if you get that reference.

Anyway, here are a few more pictures from the past couple of days:
Pancakes and People

2005-04-01T01:36:00.000-08:00

Works of Art:
Long day... I went to the Getty Center with Lanie, Justine, Aimee, and Faye. I haven't been there in years! So we first took a look at some 19th century paintings and some photographs. Then we went outside to the garden to take some pictures. Faye and Aimee then rolled down the grassy hill. It was such a nice day. At that point, we decided to split up for about an hour. Justine wanted to take a nap. Aimee wanted to prepare her lesson plans for the next day. This was, after all, Thursday, a weekday. Lanie wanted to get a little something to eat. Faye and I went to go look at some more exhibits and got carried away with taking pictures. After this, we all met up with other friends at the 3rd Street Promenade for dinner. I haven't been there in ages either. Good times, good times.

This is us on the tram back to the parking lot. Well, it's more like just them and a part of my face.

Yes, I am a work of art. Haha. ^_^

Some more pictures:

Faye and Aimee rolling down the hill.

I'm not sure how hard Aimee got kicked in the head by her sister, but I think this is right about the time it happened. Don't worry. They were fine.

Anyway, there's a lot more where that came from over at:
Getty Center Pictures

2005-03-29T22:24:00.000-08:00

Property of Ones:
One more project:
I'm almost done with the video projects I need to do. The two biggies, the wedding video and the children's musical DVD, were finally completed. I turned in the wedding video on Friday. For the MTV-style music video portion, I used Jagged Edge's "Let Get Married" as the background song. Yeah, with lyrics like "We aint gettin no younger so we might as well do it... Let's get married," I don't exactly think it's the most romantic song out there. But hey, they used the song in their wedding, so...

The DVD for the children's musical was released on Sunday. Woo hoo! Christmas in Easter! And of course, I also finished the easter video by Easter Sunday. It was basically a bunch of video clips put together to play while the worship band led the singing.

However, the last project on my list is a slideshow for Lighthouse Christian Fellowship's 1st year anniversary. Wow, it's been almost a year since they officially launched the church plant in Huntington Beach that some of our members in Irvine helped out in. They wanted a narration to go with the pictures, so for this one I'm putting on my radio announcer voice and reading my lines to the camera. I've never done this before so I hope it turns out okay.

One more week:
Well, it's really a little under a week until Jed and I leave for the Philippines right after midnight next Monday. The mission doesn't start until a week after that, but we're gonna hang out at Palawan for a few days to do some, umm.... advance scouting. Yeah.

One more blog:
To keep everyone updated about the mission trip, I've set up another blog, Short-Term Memories. It'll focus on what the team's doing day by day and include prayer requests, photos (hopefully), and other things. I'll still post over here, too, but there might be some overlaps in the material between the two blogs. The other one will probably be configured to accept posts from multiple contributors.

2005-03-28T18:28:00.000-08:00

But you DO know me:
I was at Wal-Mart today shopping for blank videotapes and other things to bring to the Philippines. At one point, I was looking through the new DVD releases. Remember Ryan Starr from one of the previous seasons of American Idol? I didn't... until I saw that she has some horror-type movie out on DVD. Anyway, jumping to the main point of the story. Suddenly, this random boy comes up from behind me and grabs my arm with a tight grip.

Random Boy: Excuse me?
Me: *thinking it's one of the little kids from church* Oh, hi Ji... [wait a second, you're not Jiro.]
RB: Hello.
Me: Hi. [He must think I work here or something.]
RB: Can you buy me that movie? *points at some DVD on the kids shelf*
Me: Umm...

I look around for his parents or whoever. Of course, no else is in that aisle but the two of us. How convenient. *sigh*

RB: I've been a good boy.
Me: I, I don't really know you.
RB: I'm Joshua. My name is Joshua. Now you know me.
Me: ...

At this point, he finally lets go of my arm. Yes, all this time he was inhibiting my blood circulation. He then walks off and disappears around the corner.

Random boy: *muttering* But you do know me. I'm Joshua.

And there you have my little Kathy Bates, Misery-type experience. "You WILL buy me this movie, Mr. Man!"

o_O

2005-03-24T14:34:00.000-08:00

U.S. Issues Philippines Travel Warning

Please continue praying for the Philippine mission team. A couple of us leave on the 4th. The rest of the FACI team will be flying at various days during that week.

2005-03-23T12:00:00.000-08:00

Ok, I'm done. For real, now:

2005-03-21T17:21:00.000-08:00

I've really got to stop playing this game. It's got me having dreams of being hit by a girl on her bicycle and flying through the air for thousands of meters. It's like dreaming of a waterfall of oddly shaped blocks or bursting bubbles with a crossbow. Oh well, something to do as I burn at least 30 copies of the children's musical DVD. Multitasking at its finest. ^_^

2005-03-21T15:40:00.000-08:00

Current Nanaca Crash High Score:

by Kevin, the Skitguru

2005-03-20T17:14:00.000-08:00

What I've figured out so far about Nanaca Crash:
(Mainly from trial and error, but being able to make a little bit of sense out of the instructions helps. There are a lot of kanji I don't know or don't remember from the instructions, but anyway...)

You can use an aerial between a height of 3-10 meters. Basically, when the guy is above the trees but not too high that the red arrow pointing up appears.

Red aerials are possible when he's falling. Clicking the mouse button gives him an upward boost. You can use this up to three times. Useful if you want to avoid running into a certain person like the "stop" girl with glasses.

Blue aerials are possible on the way up. Clicking the mouse button gives you a boost downward. You have to wait until it recharges back to 100% for each use. Useful if you want to hit someone that can boost you further.

There are four girls that light up with "special". (A) Girl with glasses, (B) long brown haired girl, (C) short blue haired girl, (D) long blonde haired girl. At certain conditions, some of these light up on the "special" indicator. When you run into them while in their "special" state, click the mouse button within 0.7 seconds to get a super boost.

Girl (A)'s special state activates after you run into (B), (C), or (D). It lasts until the next time you bounce on the ground.

Girl (B)'s special state activates after you run into her. It lasts until the next time you hit someone else but her.

Girls (C) and (D)'s special states activate whenever they are in line next to each other. The individual that is lit up depends on who comes up first.

Running into the girl with long blue/black hair doesn't do anything at first. However, I think she cancels out whatever effect normally occurs when you run into someone else after that.

One of the guys changes your angle (either up or down) while the other guy slows you down.

Oh, and this might be obvious to some, but it took me a few tries before I realized this. You don't have to have the mouse pointer at any paarticular area of the screen whenever you click the button. Just make sure it's within the confines of the flash game.

I think that's pretty much all I know. I'd like to know if anyone has figured out the C.F.F. stuff (whatever that means). What triggers it, and what determines what type you get? I've gotten one which is basically a second chance whenever you stop completely and another one that gives you a boost whenever you hit the ground. I think it has something to do with Block girl, but it doesn't occur often enough for me to find the pattern.

Yup, this definitely has more depth than that Santa slingshot game or that penguin game. ZuBaaaaaaan!

2005-03-15T23:44:00.000-08:00

Yet another way to procrastinate:

Nanaca Crash!! - The best. Flash game. Ever.

Hold down the mouse button to select the angle and then release to select the power. As your character bounces along and flies through the sky, click the mouse button to give him an upward or downward boost. Running into other characters gives different effects. Try to get a special combo.

Well, that's my high score (so far.) I've seen some scores in the tens of thousands. I have a long way to go. How far can you get to? (No photoshopped screenshots, please. *cough*cough*Mando*cough* heheh.)

[Edit: Yes, I update my screenshot.]

2005-03-13T22:39:00.000-08:00

I changed the layout. Well actually, I just changed the color scheme to make it more consistent with my MySpace page.

2005-03-13T19:42:00.000-08:00

Random Character Sketch:

I had a rare burst of creativity today and drew a quick sketch. I think I'm going to continue working on my comic about a bunch of junior high kids who play dodgeball. I kinda set it aside about 3 or 4 years ago when I had writer's block. But even though I've had all these new plot points in mind for a while now, I've been too lazy/busy/overwhelmed to draw them out. I should probably scan what I've done and put them online a la MegaTokyo. However, I would have to redraw the first few pages since I lost them. Hmmm... if I do that, I'd probably have to redraw them all since my drawings progressively improved/became more consistent as I got into it. (The first few sketches were actually a bunch of stick figures anyway.)

Well, time to work on:
1. Wedding video for dotDV
2. Christmas musical DVD
3. Video(?) for Easter service
4. LCF's 1st year anniversary slideshow

All due before I leave the country. Hee hee. I hope the creative juices keep flowing. ^_^

2005-03-12T14:57:00.000-08:00

Ice Hotel:
While looking through Worldisround, I saw some pictures of a place in Sweden called the Ice Hotel. It's a full sized hotel made completely out of snow and ice. They have to rebuild it every winter because the whole place melts once spring comes. The place sort of reminds me of Superman's Fortress of Solitude or that Iceland place in the James Bond movie, Die Another Day. I wonder what their rates are. They might have some really good discount packages during the summer.

2005-03-06T17:58:00.000-08:00

Encore:

2005 Philippine Medical Mission Promo
Today at church, we showed what was essentially a remixed version of last year's medical mission video with rearranged pictures and different background music.

And now, a picture from the video outtake archives:

To spare you guys, I put up a blurred, black and white version instead. Click the picture to display it in all of its full-color glory. Yes, that's my roach-bitten ankle from last year's mission trip. Isn't it pretty? "How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!" Yeah, that's an example of how not to quote Scripture.

2005-03-06T00:20:00.000-08:00

Maps:
I have this fascination with maps. I like looking at them. We have this map of the Philippines taken from a 1986 issue of National Geographic. It's framed and hanging on a wall near the kitchen and dining room. Many times, I have found myself just staring at it for more than just a few seconds. One of the books I bought when I was in the Philippines last year was a mini street atlas of Manila. I didn't really get much practical use out of it since I only had about two days left in my stay. Still, I'd look at it from time to time and try to make sense of the places I'd visited.

I remember in the months leading up to my family's move to America, I would look at a map of Southern California. I knew we would be staying in Tustin at first. I imagined my friends and cousins living in cities like Hawthorne or Chula Vista. I'd imagine hanging out at each other's houses after school. I didn't really have an accurate perception of scale and distances back then. I thought those places were just down the street from each other.

It's not restricted to just places I've been to or even actual locations for that matter. One of my favorite parts in fantasy books like Lord of the Rings or Dragonlance are the maps they usually have in the back.

Anyway, I'm starting to realize that I enjoy looking at maps. I'm not quite sure why. Some people like to read dictionaries for fun. I'd say that an atlas would be my reference book of choice. One thing that's becoming more and more real to me is that for the most part, a map isn't just made up of blobs of color with dots and names of places. Those dots represent real locations where real people live. People who may not have heard of the Gospel and what Jesus has done for them.

I wonder if they'll have maps in Heaven. Hmm... Heaven's probably not even mappable nor would there even be a need for maps. Ahh... maybe I'll write about my fascination with planes or flying in general next.

2005-03-01T22:41:00.000-08:00

Bowling:
Last night, I was in Tustin Lanes for the bowling night between FACI and Lighthouse church. I didn't play. I just hung out, eating some pizza and stuff. A couple of the youth and I were messing around with my camera. After about five pictures, we heard this announcement over the PA system, "No flash photography please." Oops. So we had to take a whole lot more pictures with the flash turned off. Without the flash, the shutter speed had to be slower in order to let in more light, but this made the camera more sensitive to shaking. So a lot of the pictures were blurry, but there were some cool ghost-like effects on some of them.

Family Bowling Night Pictures

2005-02-28T11:18:00.000-08:00

Worship Team Retreat:
The first ever worship team retreat was this weekend. It was great. The whole team never really hung out together outside of practice sessions. One of the things that stood out was the adventure we had trying to drive up to the Lake Arrowhead cabin. We all had different schedules so we decided to carpool up at different times and meet at the cabin on Friday night. I was in the first car with Pastor Jonathan, Nikki, and Aimee. We were supposed to stop by the rental office first by the village and pick up directions to the cabin from their mailbox. It's like the Amazing Race! Anyway, we were driving up the mountain when we saw a sign that said "Hwy 18 closed except with CHP escort." Interesting... we still kept driving and saw another "Hwy 18 closed" sign. Now at this point, we were thinking, "Is it really closed? There are all these other cars here. They're all passing us even." And so, we kept driving along. And yes, we encountered more "road closed" signs.

We finally came to a point in which the traffic going uphill came to a standstill. We were stuck. We couldn't move any further forward. Cars came up behind us and stopped as well. We couldn't turn back either. There were all of these other cars going downhill in the opposite direction.

We decided that the situation we were in would make a really good illustration some day. We were suffering the consequences of not following the warning signs. Sort of like the warning signs God gives us to keep falling into sin. Just because everyone else is doing it doesn't necessarily mean it will be okay. We couldn't say we didn't know the road was closed. We got plenty of warning. We just decided to ignore them.

After about half an hour of just waiting there, we finally started moving. It turns out that Hwy 18 was closed to due damage from all the rain. It was probably covered with boulders from rock slides or something. Thankfully, we got to that section during the time slot in which one side of the road was open. They were allowing one direction (uphill or downhill) through for about a half hour at a time. Well, we finally got our turn and ended up in unfamiliar territory after a detour. Needless to say, we somehow made our way to the rental office where they had a map for us. We obviously made it to the cabin eventually... after about 6 hours. We could have gone to the Bay Area or to Las Vegas within that same time. ^_^

Worship Team Retreat Pictures

2005-02-25T11:44:00.000-08:00

I'll be going up to Lake Arrowhead in a couple of hours for the worship team retreat. It's the first one in a long while. Maybe the first one ever. So no updates until the end of the weekend. Not that I've been posting everyday recently anyway.

2005-02-22T00:23:00.000-08:00

God's Promise:

2005-02-20T22:42:00.000-08:00

What is Mosaic?:

Mosaic - The Reason

2005-02-18T12:09:00.000-08:00

Search strings:
Blog topic to write about when you can't think of anything #23:
Write about search strings people use to find your blog.

1. "Any Romantic Story in the Province of Nueva Ecija...." - Sorry, I don't know of any offhand. I wonder what brought about this inquiry, though. I didn't know Nueva Ecija had a reputation for being a romantic place. Palawan, yeah, but Nueva Ecija? That's central Luzon, right in the middle of the island. That's like saying North Dakota is romantic. But hey, you never know. I'll be going there in a couple of months so I'll let you know if I find out anything.
2. "rommel abesamis" - I'm sure it's not too hard to figure out why my blog would come up from this. I asked Faye, Aimee, and Joe if this is someone they knew, but it doesn't look like it. Maybe if Joe and I get married, I'll change my name to Rommel Abesamis. Ewww... Or maybe I'm their long lost brother. I did have a neighbor up in Westwood with the last name Abesamis. His roommate was my old roommate's brother. Plus, he was also Faye, Aimee, and Joe's first cousin. And I knew all of this before there was even Friendster. So ha! Take that, Friendster and your degrees of separation.
3. "Are duck eggs okay to eat" - This is almost self-explanatory, and I don't think a lot of people would appreciate me posting up more pictures of balut. *evil grin*

2005-02-16T16:26:00.000-08:00

Naruto anime licensed for American release:
Read the article.

So this means a few things:
1. No more fan subbed episodes (or they will be a lot harder to come by.) No more episodes within days (or sometimes hours) of being aired in Japan. :( Although I'm glad I don't always need subtitles. ^_^
2. Dubbed episodes.
3. Naruto on TV.
4. Naruto merchandise everywhere... action figures, clothing, posters, plastic shurikens, contact lenses. (I only really care about the videogames.)
5. Naruto fans everywhere. Little kids dressing up as Naruto characters for Halloween.

I'd rank Naruto up there with Macross/Robotech, Akira, Dragonball Z, Pokémon, Yu-Gi-Oh, meaning it's one of those anime shows that has the potential to go "mainstream". Here comes the next wave of immensely popular anime. But as of today, they have 122 anime episodes to catch up to with translations. I'm calling it right now. I'm a Naruto fan before it was even "cool". You heard it here first. ^_^

Sharingan eyes of the Uchiha clan. Haha. What a dork!

2005-02-15T21:45:00.000-08:00

Jewelry store and the O.C.:
I went to Tito Jules' jewelry store in Newport Beach to arrange my flight to the Philippines. It's a jewelry store and a travel agency. So, as I was booking my flight, I also browsed their inventory and saw some prototype wax models for the jewelry. Anyway, my parents are also going to the Philippines for separate reasons this May. So after the mission trip officially ends on April 23, I'll hang around for a few weeks and fly back here with them come mid-May. Hopefully, I'll have more chances to share my faith with my relatives over there, especially those on my Mom's side. I didn't get to see much of them the last time I was there.

So as I was driving past Fashion Island, I thought of how supposedly the Newport area is pretty much the only part of Orange County represented in The O.C. (I've never really seen the show, by the way. ^_^) Sure it's a distorted picture. I also heard the show is filmed in Malibu instead. Ah, but somehow, the show has become popular enough that residents of Orange County have started referring to the county as "the O.C". Before the show came out, the only times I've ever heard anyone say "OC" is during Friday night bible studies at Grace on Campus.

2005-02-13T23:32:00.000-08:00

On Saturday, I spent over 12 hours at the marriage enrichment seminar, and I was the only one who wasn't married or engaged. My task: video coverage, of course. I got a lot of "Who are you here with?" and "You should take lots of notes." Haha. It was pretty interesting at times, but I couldn't really tell you much about it. I wasn't really paying too much attention. I was filming mostly random shots of the people and the place and was making sure the camera stayed aimed at the speaker. I felt kind of bad (or it was kind of sad ^_^) because I was falling asleep at one point. At that time, I was in a corner at a table by myself doing nothing but panning the camera back and forth. It didn't help that they served a pretty big lunch, and I was sinking into a food coma. How I wish I had a tripod with a remote control so I could pan in comfort. What would be even cooler is if they had a camera/tripod combo that could auto track the subject. ^_^

2005-02-09T21:13:00.000-08:00

My hour of TV for the week:
"I know you. You know you. And I know you know that I know you." - White Goodman, Dodgeball

Chloe was acting more like how Pete Ross was in the comics with knowing Clark's secret. Clark, not knowing she knows, would do double takes whenever she'd say something that would hint at the fact. I liked her "destined for greater things than making touchdowns" line. It reminds me of the "You're here for a reason, and it's not to make touchdowns" line from the movie. There wasn't too much interesting that happened beyond that. At least there probably wouldn't be much more football related storylines.

Next week: Krypto. I didn't know he was a Golden Retriever. I thought he was supposed to have white fur. Haha.

2005-02-09T00:04:00.000-08:00

Happy Birthday Amy!

2005-02-08T18:21:00.000-08:00

Of Photography and Chloe:
Hmm... it must be difficult (at least for me) to be some sort of reporter or photographer and not get attached to the "story" in some way. For example, during last year's medical mission trip, it felt strange at times taking pictures and filming the people that were sick instead of doing something else that helps them more directly. Of course, that was part of the job I was assigned to do, as part of the media team. But still, there was this one time when Faye and Aimee's dad pointed out to me a bunch of guys carrying an old man. I thought he meant for me to help carry the old man. No, he was actually trying to tell me to take a picture of the guys carrying the old man. So in my attempt to help out, I ended up missing a good photographic moment. Not that I was able to help out anyway. These were all big military men the size of football players. I think I actually ended up getting in the way when I approached them.

There was also this incident at the last basketball tournament a couple of weeks ago. A few minutes into the first game, someone sprained his ankle really bad. He looked like he was in a lot of pain. I debated whether I should keep taking pictures or help out somehow. I don't know what I could have done to assist, but I ended up not taking pictures at that point anyway. I sort of just stood there and watched as others did their thing. I don't know... I guess I'm glad that I'm not completely a cold, unemotional observer when I act as historian. This must have come from training myself not to say anything or laugh out loud whenever I film a skit or wedding. (Having the cameraman's voice recorded is a bad thing in these cases. Although not showing emotion might be good for playing Poker or Mafia.)

I think this topic somehow came about because of last week's episode of Smallville. For those who don't know, Smallville High's resident reporter came across some super secret information that she wonders if she should report about or not. That episode was better than the last oh... 5 or 6 episodes. This new plot development might be interesting. We'll see how the WB takes it in tomorrow's episode.

2005-02-05T17:23:00.000-08:00

Philippine Medical Mission 2005:
Well the other day, I went to the Missions Committee meeting. Yes, I'm planning to go back to the Philippines this April for the medical mission trip. It's going to be from April 10th to the 23rd. During the first week, we'll be on the island of Palawan. Then for the second week, we'll be going to the town of Gen. Tinio in the province of Nueva Ecija, the same place we went to last year. We will be providing free medical and dental care to the poor people in those areas as well as sharing the love and gospel of Jesus Christ. I'm not quite sure what exactly I will be doing, but from last year's experience, I might end up being mainly a photographer, videographer, and translator. Quite exciting, I must say. I wonder if the local kids would still remember me. Aimee and Faye won't be able to come this time, but Jed is still going. I guess I have to keep an eye on Jed for Aimee. Heheh.

As a side note, Palawan is where that one missionary couple, the Burnhams, were kidnapped back in 2001 by the Abu Sayyaf. Gracia Burnham went on to write about their ordeal in her book, In the Presence of My Enemies, which is a great book, by the way.

Anyway, I just did my taxes last week, and it looks like my refund amazingly covers all my expenses. God definitely provides. I'm just not sure how soon I'll get the refund but not to worry. My boss is pretty cool about it when I told him, too. We're going to juggle around the schedule for future video projects. Well, I'll put up more updates in the future. Before I go, here's a map so you can see the locations I'm talking about:

2005-01-30T22:05:00.000-08:00

Return of the Stick:
After a 2½ year hiatus, the wooden stick returns in a new video.

Did You Make Your Payment?

2005-01-29T23:58:00.000-08:00

Shaved Ice:

With mango. And extra milk. From tonight's trip to Guppy's in Cerritos with Joe, Roman, and Mando.

2005-01-28T09:24:00.000-08:00

An update to the $9.95 scam incident: I called my bank again after the $9.95 was cleared. They had no problems reversing the charge from Jermarshe. I believe they will be investigating this as well.

Useful links:
Federal Trade Commission
Internet Fraud Complaint Center

http://www.kilikina.net/archives/2004/07/06/the-amazing-995-credit-card-scam

2005-01-26T23:00:00.000-08:00

Happy Birthday Roman:
21, huh? Man, you're getting old. Tanda mo na. Grabe. ^_^ Thanks for inviting me to Jollibee (mmm... Chicken Joy) and Guppy's (mmm... shaved ice w/ mango and strawberry).

2005-01-26T13:39:00.000-08:00

Where did the tagboard go?:
Some of you may be wondering where the tagboard/chatterbox went. Well, it seems that NVNCBL Chat has some domain or web hosting problems. It's not the first time this has happened. Anyway, I took the code for the tagboard down since it was slowing the page down a bit everytime it tried to load a tagboard that it couldn't find. Maybe I'll try another tagboard service. I didn't really like Flooble or Tag-Board, though. I suppose I could just put the code back when/if NVNCBL gets its issues straightened out. In the meantime, there's still the Haloscan comment box.

[update] The tagboard is back and hopefully to stay.

2005-01-25T16:18:00.000-08:00

Basketball Tournament Pictures:
I present to you all ~~125~~ 119 pictures from this past Sunday's 5-on-5 basketball tourney. I was playing around with the rapid fire feature of the camera so there are more than a few that are blurry. Sorry, I haven't sorted them out.

http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/rommel4321/album?.dir=fdf5

2005-01-21T10:00:00.000-08:00

hax0rs:
Someone hacked into our church's website and defaced the main page. Crazy! I let our webmaster know so hopefully it would be back to normal soon. I wonder how long the page has been that way. It could have been a few hours to a few days. First I get hit with identity theft, and now I find this. Dah! What's the (computer) world coming to?

2005-01-20T23:00:00.000-08:00

Errand Boy:
I drove around most of the day to run errands and do other stuff. Most of the stuff I had to do was either related to video promos or related to medical mission preparation.

Today's itinerary: Home → Church → Home → Pastor Vince's house → about to go to Church → detour to Abesamis residence → Church → Pastor Vince's → Sonshine bookstore → Abesamis house → Chow residence → Home → Church → Home (finally).

Ahh, that's what I get for having such a flexible schedule. Heheh. Well, I got some good use out of that rent-a-car. I'm picking up my car tomorrow! Okay, understandably, I'm tired now. Time to sleep. Good night.

2005-01-17T10:50:00.000-08:00

A New Car:

I got so tired of all the troubles I've gone through with the Civic that I got a new Acura RSX Type-S.

Okay, not really. That's the car my 16 year old nephew just got a little after Christmas. In the words of Napoleon Dynamite: "Lucky..." ^_^

As for my own car, it turns out that the woman who ran into it did have insurance. She just didn't have proof of it during the accident. So I just dropped off my Civic at the body shop earlier today to have the bumper repaired. Her insurance is going to go ahead and pay for it. They're also covering the rental car usage. So I guess I do have a "new" car to drive for a few days. I get a... umm... Kia Optima. Hey, at least it doesn't cost me anything.

Check your credit card statements closely:
So I was checking my checking account statement last night and saw a suspicious transaction. There's a pending charge of $9.95 to Jermarshe in Wausau, WI. Their website shows them to be a web design company selling web logo templates and other things. What is this? I've never seen this before.

A little Google action brought me to a discussion over at www.kilikina.net. There seems to be an intricate credit card scam going on in which the scammers charge a small amount on your card (like $9.95) hoping you wouldn't notice. Not sure how they got my info in the first place, though. It looks like they operate under a number of fake company names and fake websites.

Needless to say, I called my bank to report the transaction. They told me that at this point, the transaction is still a pre-authorization and not an actual charge yet. They wouldn't be able to reverse it until the card is finally charged. I'd have to report back after a couple of days when it is finalized. Well, I guess I'll just sit here and watch as I go through the actual process of being scammed. Haha.

Reference link:
http://www.kilikina.net/archives/2004/07/06/the-amazing-995-credit-card-scam

2005-01-11T21:39:00.000-08:00

So I've been wondering:
What's the weirdest food you've ever tasted?

(You can define "weird" any way you want. It doesn't necessarily have to taste gross.)

2005-01-10T18:48:00.000-08:00

Stupid Joke of the Day:
Q: What's Bruce Lee's favorite drink?
A: WAAAAAAAAAAAAAATTTTTTTTTTTTTTAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!

Okay, I don't know why I thought of that. I'm not even sure if I just made that up right now or if it's an old joke that I just remembered. If it truly is an original and you find it funny, then I'll take credit for it. If either of the above is false, then you didn't hear it from me. Haha.

2005-01-09T19:40:00.000-08:00

Driving Shoes:
I tried driving while wearing a pair of Converse All-Stars. I don't know about any of you, but it feels weird. For one thing, the soles are relatively thin compared to shoes I normally wear. So I could feel the pedals underneath my feet better, almost like driving barefoot or wearing flip-flops. But then, I still have a sturdy heel to rest my foot with. Since they're hi-tops, I'm not used to a restricted range on bending my ankle either.

Hmmm...:
This topic of conversation came up on Friday night regarding ovo-lacto-vegetarians, those who eat no meat but still eat eggs and milk. I guess King and his cousin, Mark, officially switched to vegetarian diets this year. Anyway, we were discussing duck eggs. Since they're eggs, they're okay to eat. Once they're prepared into balut, would they then be off-limits? And what about penoy? Like balut, they are also fertilized duck eggs. However, they aren't incubated as long as balut so as to form a distinguishable embryo. No feathers or beaks or other body parts here. Still, there's definitely a different taste from a regular egg.

Okay, I don't really know why I talked about that. Maybe I just wanted to post up pictures of balut. I would have loved to have been on Fear Factor during the episode in which they featured this tasty delicacy. Yum!

2005-01-08T20:57:00.000-08:00

And the Trogdor comes in the night:
Over the past couple of days, I've somehow become nocturnal, going to bed as the sun rises and waking up as the sun sets. This is probably due to a combination of three things:
1. I tend to work on editing my video projects late at night. There are less distractions when everybody else in the house is asleep.
2. This rainy weather makes it hard to determine what time of day it is from the amount of sunlight.
3. I'm feeling sick. Bleh...! If I didn't have stuff to do or if I didn't get hungry, I would just want to sleep and sleep and sleep.

So, at this point I've only been awake for less than four hours. Yes, I woke up a little after 5 PM. Somehow, that just doesn't seem right. ^_^ Anyway, I should go to bed (and hopefully fall asleep) relatively early today in order to wake up in time for church tomorrow. I'm glad our service doesn't start until 1 PM, though.

Speaking of being sick, it was a little frightening yesterday morning (at least, I think it was morning). I woke up, and I was having trouble breathing. At first I thought there just wasn't much oxygen left in my room. Usually, the air would get stale when there isn't much circulation, especially on warm days. But no, this day was a cool, rainy day. It felt more like one of my lungs wasn't working. An air passage might have been clogged, or I was having some sort of reaction from taking Tylenol before going to bed. But I've experienced reactions only if I mix Tylenol with caffeine (from coffee or Coke.) Anyway, I had to get out of my room and stand outside, trying to breathe as heavily as I can. Everything went back to normal after a while. I think at one point my dad was asking me a question, but I wasn't able to respond. I was still too sleepy to understand and was still having trouble breathing to give a reply. Weird.

King's 30:
There was supposed to be a surprise party last night for King's 30th birthday, but somehow the secret was let out. Anyway, that didn't diminish any of the fun. I saw a lot of old friends. Good times. At one point, someone put on the Napoleon Dynamite DVD, and the laughter just wouldn't stop. Some pictures:

http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/rommel4321/album?.dir=f1ad

2005-01-06T01:14:00.000-08:00

First Post of the Year (finally):
I haven't updated in a while. I've been busy working on a project for dotDV. Not quite done, though... almost... but just a little more tweaking required. Hard work? Yes. Enjoyable? Yes. Stressful? Sometimes. Also demanding, but challenging. Okay, one goal for the year: develop better time management skills. It'll be much easier for me to meet deadlines. ^_^

Philippians 4
¹³I can do everything through him who gives me strength.

C.S. Lewis Revisited:
"I've never had an original thought in my life. Once, I thought I had an original thought... but then I read C.S. Lewis, and he took away any original thought I could possibly have. Ever." - Mike Erre (paraphrased from memory?)

I have a few C.S. Lewis books sitting around that I haven't touched in years. Watching that mini-documentary of the Chronicles of Narnia movie got me rereading C.S. Lewis's stuff. Mere Christianity is amazing. I was also skimming through the Narnia books, and I took notice of one line. This was at the beginning of The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe when the kids were exploring this house, trying to find something to do while it was raining.

Susan: "Ten to one it'll clear up in an hour or so. And in the meantime we're pretty well off. There's a wireless and lots of books."

What the? Wireless? I thought the story was set in the 40's. This was before I learned that wireless was the British way of referring to a radio, not a wireless phone or wireless network.

Miscellaneous December 2004 Pictures:
Finally, I present to you some random pictures from the last two weeks of 2004 that I didn't get a chance to put online earlier. A big portion of these photographs were taken by a little girl named Jamaica.

http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/rommel4321/album?.dir=/2366

2004-12-31T23:13:00.000-08:00

First thing's first:
I told Jessica I'd put this picture up:

Crazy teenage girls with their pop idol crushes... Haha. Anyway, that's the Korean actor, Won Bin, in a scene from Taegukgi, a really good movie about two brothers during the Korean War. Unfortunately, it had a pretty limited showing over here a few months back. I think it was only at a couple of theaters in the area for a few weeks. Anyway, I wouldn't be surprised if it gets nominated for Best Foreign Film during the Oscars.

Japanese Food - The Sequel:
I had Japanese food for the second time this week when Kevin Q., Marli, James, Mae, Lanie, Eric, Justine, and I had all you can eat sushi and stuff earlier today at O-Nami. Those of us (myself included) who got there when it opened ended up staying for the entirety of their 3 hour lunch period. Hey, we gotta get our money's worth. I don't remember the last time I felt that full. Good stuff!

Well, I thought eating sashimi during New Year's was a Hawaiian thing so I asked Kevin about it. He was the one who brought up the idea to meet there today. He's originally from Hawaii.

Me: Isn't eating sashimi in Hawaii a New Year's thing?
Kevin: Huh? No, I think it's an everyday thing.

Haha. So I guess for those of us who love raw fish, who needs a special occasion to eat it?

Things I realized this week that I should probably change next year: ^_^;
1. Windshield wipers - They're so worn down that it's really hard (and dangerous) to drive in the rain.
2. Tires - ditto
3. Bass guitar strings - I haven't changed them in three or four years. I guess I never noticed how bad they sounded.

Okay, so they weren't exactly New Year's resolutions. Happy New Year everyone!

2004-12-29T17:57:00.000-08:00

A couple more screenshots from the video footage of the musical:

2004-12-28T22:48:00.000-08:00

Okay, I've been watching a bunch of entries for the Yellowcard music video contest on ifilm.com. I think the scoring system for the contest is a little weird. Out of 150+ entries, the top five are chosen based on votes from the general public. Then Yellowcard looks over these five videos and chooses one to be their official video for the song "Breathing". I think it may be a little skewed because the band would probably only get to watch the top five videos with the most votes. These may not necessarily be the best videos. They would just be the most popular videos. Think of it as the same as say... using the top 5 movies with the most box office earnings as the Oscar nominees for best picture. Then again, marketing and publicity are part of the business as well.

Anyway, here are my Top Five selections (in no particular order):

Flaviu Mann - Probably the best camera work out of all of them. Cranes/jibs and dollies?
Philip Wang - I liked the plot in this one. It reminds me of Korean music videos. I could relate to it, especially with the ending scene. Haha.
Bracey Smith - This had a creative way of incorporating a storyline unrelated to the lyrics with the song.
Jeremy Lassetter - This one's animated. Pretty creative interpretation of the lyrics.

Okay, make that Top Four instead. Nothing else really stood out. There are are few weird ones, though, like the one with the triathlon training and another one that had a Lego version of Yellowcard and random movie scenes recreated with Lego figures. Anyway, that's enough "research". Time for me to get back to work with my own music videos.

2004-12-27T19:14:00.000-08:00

Yellowcard Music Video:
Mando told me that ifilm.com is having a contest to see who can make the best music video for the song "Breathing" by Yellowcard. One of his friends, Flaviu Mann, has an entry in the contest. I was looking through the names, and I recognized the name Philip Wang as one of the guys in UCSD's Wong Fu Productions. These videos were cool. There were a few others that were really good as well. However, there were some that sort of made me wonder a bit. O_o Anyway, it's too bad the deadline for entry submissions has already passed. I would have loved to see how I would fare. Oh, well. Maybe next time. Oh yeah, that song always reminds me of Burnout 3, a racing game for the PS2. Maybe because I first heard the song on the game's soundtrack. Yes, I realize that a lot of things I know about pop culture, I learned from video games or the internet (instead of from TV like most people.)

Broken Strap:
I also broke my guitar strap yesterday. The leather sort of just tore apart. Don't they ever perform any stress tests on these things? This happened right before the service started. Good thing Josh had an extra one at home that he had his family bring over. Now I have to buy a new one. I'm looking for quality this time. No more cheapo straps that rip in two.

Lunch with Amy and Manny:
Yay, Amy and Manny came down for the holidays. We met up for some lunch at Genkai, a Japanese restaurant in Irvine, the same place we ate at about a couple of years ago. (or is it three?) This was only the second time I had ever eaten there. They got me a Jelly Belly tin can (with jelly beans, of course.) ^_^ Good stuff, good stuff. Thanks, guys. When it was still wrapped, I thought that the bean-shaped can felt like a couple of cans of vienna sausages. Haha. Well, no Kevin this year. He's snowboarding down Italian slopes and viewing pieces of Persian walls in French museums. Anyway...

2004-12-25T23:32:00.000-08:00

So... Christmas Eve, I stopped by church for one of the Christmas Eve services. Quite a few people were already asking about the status of the musical DVD. Eeek! ^_^ Then, my family spent Christmas Eve at my sister-in-law's parents' house.

Today, Christmas Day, we went to my aunt and uncle's new house in Corona. A funny thing was that they bought the model home in the community along with the furnishings that were already there. This included the faux computer which was essentially a plastic keyboard and LCD screen. A lot of objects were also glued to other things. I suppose that this was supposed to deter people from taking stuff during open houses. But, because it was the model home, I think they got a good deal on it. Plus, it was already furnished, too.

As usual, pictures may be found on my Yahoo! photos site:

http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/rommel4321/album?.dir=/910a

2004-12-25T13:53:00.000-08:00

Merry Christmas everyone! Gotta go for now, but I'll put up another update later. In the meantime, try the Santa Slingshot game. Can anyone beat 334.3 meters? I've gotten it several times, but I could never seem to surpass that barrier.

Also, check out the featurette for The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe due out next Christmas.