30-Year Old Writes To The Universe

Dear Cosmos,

Now that I'm 30, I know that...

...I'll never achieve the 6-continents-before-30 dream
...I'll never be that skinny bastard that I want to become
...I'll probably never be a lawyer like I always said I would be
...I'll turn 40 before I even know it
...I'll never have the excuse of youth for being stupid
...I'll never be that "hot new thing" ever again (whatever that means)

However, I also know that

...I've been on 4 continents and that's more than most people
...I've been eating anything I want and I'm still not fat
...I've built a comfortable life for myself without having to become a lawyer
...I've grown so much in the last 10 years, I'm excited to see what I'll be in the next 10
...I've never been stupid anyway, so why care?
...I've gained enough credence to mentor the upcoming "hot new things" (whatever that means)

I thought that I'd freak out when I become 30 but looking back, I've realized how much I've seen, learned and experienced. At first thought 10 years may seem like a blur but if I really think about it, 10 years didn't exactly just fly by. In those 10 years, I went from student, to board exam reviewee, to promdi-yuppie, to miserable banker until I finally became a happy Shell man (seriously, one of the best decisions I've made ever!). The friends I've made and the fiends I've met make up the best decade of my life so far. Now that I'm 30, I'm looking forward to finally losing that last bit of insecurity that I still have, to learn to be more generous, to become more positive, to be slower to anger, to be more patient and to become someone better than who I was during my 20s.

So I want to say thank you to my parents for putting a good head on my shoulders, to my younger sis and bro who never followed my orders (gave me an early sense that I cannot always have my way in the world), to my teachers (for making me realize what I want to become when I grow old) to my friends (high school friends for letting me learn early on how to have fun and not just not hit the books, college friends for letting me find in you my kindred spirits, and Shell friends for never making me feel like an outsider despite my being one in so many ways).

And thank you God for everything - for giving me just enough smarts, just enough looks and just enough talent. And I pray that one day, I will get to use these enough to make a positive dent in this world.

Truly yours,

Paul Angelo

Northern Exposure

This year, I made a personal vow to visit the three places in the Philippines that I've always wanted to visit but have never managed to: Palawan, Boracay (unimaginable, right?) and Batanes. Of the three, Batanes seemed to be the hardest to go to because it is the remotest (and there are no promo fares on SEAIR!). However, thanks to an HR policy change that spurred my office colleagues and myself to use up our leave credits, I suddenly had a plane ticket to Basco.

I felt like I wasn't stoked enough for my trip to Batanes and this is mainly because it came three days after I arrived from my trip to Australia. The holiday down under had long been planned and cannot be pushed back so in the end, I only worked 10 or 11 days in the month of May.

I have not ridden a 32-seater since childhood (oh those PAL Sunrisers that flew from Dumaguete to Cebu!) so I was a bit nervous when I boarded the plane. Good thing I was armed with a 1,000-page book and got myself lost in 12th century England through most of the trip. I caught more than a glimpse of the Batanes landscape as we were about to land and I realized that we were in for a treat.







With narrow streets and limited lamp posts, poblacion Basco can be dealt with in an hour or so. I am quite used to the rural life having lived on an island for the better part of 20 years so this spontaneous hieing off to the northernmost tip of the country was somehow nostalgic for me - the smells of early morning smoke coming from wood-fed stoves made of earthen clay, the aroma of damp soil ridded with a mixture of chicken and cattle dung, and the unmistakable whiff of frugal fish deep-frying in oil stirred up many memories from my childhood.





We spent the next three days going around the islands of Batan and Sabtang. The tour organizer ingenuously engineered the tour to build up to a breathtaking climax, showing the sights in order of awesomeness, the next sigt even more amazing than the one before! Batanes offers such picturesque backdrops that both photoholics and camwhores will be be swooning with sensory overload.







Batanes isn't the cheapest local tourist destination in the Philippines. In fact, it may be one of the most expensive, and this explains why he have not run into the usual lot of fellow holiday-takers during the whole time we were there. However, the +20k or so that I spent was very much worth it - seeing the famed stone houses of Sabtang Island for the first time and feeling the coarse, unfinished walls made of coral and limestone, taking in the vista of 'mountains tumbling into the sea' as many a song romanticize, realizing that the Philippines is such a beautiful country, a sudden burst of national pride stirring inside you not matter how undeserved you may think it is, and of course, being gently wakened by the sound of waves quietly making their way to the shore in the early light of morning.

Shell's Big Php20.00 Blow Out

I recently had the opportunity to become a Shell Brand Ambassador...signalling my foray into the Retail business hahah! Kidding aside, part of my duties as an ambassador was to spread awareness throughout my CoB (Manufacturing) regarding Shell's Get Php20 Blowout Ka Namin promo. During the CoB briefing sessions, I emphasized that Manufacturing has a huge stake at the success of Shell's retail business in the Philippines because one of the reasons why the Refinery continues to exist is because of it a being part of an integrated supply chain that gives access to a big inland market - a market that Shell could lose if it is not careful to sustain brand loyalty.

Together with other volunteers from different departments, I headed out to my assigned Shell Station in the morning of February 15.

Being in the forecourt was an eye-opening experience and with it came newfound respect for my Sales colleagues. Overall, it was a fun experience - engaging in coversations with motorists while they gas up, informing them of Shell's new promo and thanking them for their continued patronage of the brand.

Anyway, here are the mechanics to the promo. Be sure to fill up at your favorite Shell station and take advantage of Shell's Thank You to you!


1. For every Php 1,000 purchase of Shell Fuels (V-Power, V-Power Diesel, Super Premium, Super Unleaded, Regular) you get a Php 20 discount on all Select/Shell Shop items. Discount is also applicable to Shell Lubricants.

2. Redemption can be done in all participating Shell Stations. Inter-station redemption IS allowed (not limited to where the fuel purchase was made).

3. Php 1,000 can either be a single-purchase or accumulated purchases.

4. The receipt/accumulated receipts shall be presented to the Select/Shell Shop cashier for validation.

5. Promo runs from Feb 15 - Mar 31, 2011. Thus, all ORs issued within those dates are valid for redemption.

6. Last redemption date is 60 days after promo end-date (May 30, 2011).

Bye-Bye Econ Freaks!

After three terms of MBA, I must say that I only caught the "study" bug again this term. Because of new developments at work (I'm moving to a new job, yeah!), I decided to enroll part-time and take just one subject - ECOMAN. Needless to say, I'm tempted to do it part-time all the way! Having a full load and the weekly drive from Batangas to Rockwell and back (usually every Wednesday) stressed me out.

Anyway, I love Economics and though I must admit that I need to infuse more Econ-related literature into my reading list, the subject always fascinates me. I wrote 3 papers on the following subjects: Perfect Competition, Privatization and Comparative Advantage & International Trade. Economics is a pleasing subject to research because there is no scarcity of resources - no pun intended. In fact, text and web-based data are simply overflowing that I had to make an outline each time I started to write just organize my thoughts - something which I almost never do.


My final paper - The Economics of Oil, is very timely. With my move to Shell's Supply business, writing about oil econs reinforced my knowledge. It was actually funny that during handover, I recognized terms such as "netback pricing" and actually knew what they were about and what their margin impacts to the company were. I put in a lot of effort to my final paper (mainly because I crammed) and spent a whole weekend plus three long weekday nights to finish everything. However, I am happy with all the information I got from the research - I feel like I'm ending this term a smarter guy. No matter what my final grade will be (I'm hoping for a 4.0!), this was definitely one of the best terms ever!

My Family's First Engagement

My sister got engaged! Yeah, like I never saw it coming haha! Anyway, I wasn't there when her boyfriend (now fiance) officially asked for her hand but my sister told me that my dad acted cool about it (operative word: acted) and my mom was the one who had a semi-anxiety attack. Totally uncharacteristic for both of them, I tell you.

Anyway, my sister and her boyfriend are both good-looking people, I can't wait to have good-looking pamangkins! Heheh. Di bale nang makulit, basta cute kaya kong tiisin.





The wedding is next year - and my sister got first dibs on that same chapel where I wanted to get married in (shame, oh, shame on you). This week, however, she texted me that there were major changes to her plans - that she's getting married in the Cathedral (the Catholic Church won't allow weddings in small chapels anymore). Also, her venue changed from Casa Grande in Bais to the Convention Center in Dumaguete (resultant of the change in the church).

Okay, so in 5 years or so when I decide to get married, maybe the rules will change and I can get married in Mojon Chapel. Hahah! I know it's mean for me to be excited about this, but can you blame me? It's like this little chapel was beamed from an English countryside onto the sugar plains of Negros. A little grass cutting wouldn't hurt, though...hehe.

photos grabbed from: http://multiply.com/mu/silakangnegros

My New Old Wallpaper

Going home after the Gin Blossoms concert in Araneta, my friend began lamenting about how he lost all his cassette tapes from high school. The conversation brought back memories from those days when I had to save a portion of my weekly allowance to come up with an extra Php 120 so I can buy a record. LOL!

Unlike my friend, I know exactly where my old tapes are. They're safely stashed in the topmost closet in my room back in Sugarland - in their pristine condition (I hope!). Anyway, when I went home last Christmas, I had this inspired idea for a new wallpaper for my laptop. Using my dad's new S95, i took a couple of shots and behold! My very own wallpaper. :)



Note: I have lots more, but these are the ones that are the least embarrassing to show haha!

I now realize two things: 1) I transitioned from tapes to MP3s (did not really have a CD phase) and 2) I do have weird taste - no, more like incoherent. Oh well.

For some reason, I've received a lot of flak in MBA class this week - mostly because I work for an oil company. It's not the first time I had educate people on how "Big Oil" is not synonymous to oil cartel and I have explained to more than one person how Shell is merely a transporter of products through the FPIC pipeline and is not responsible for its upkeep and maintenance. Oh, and with regard to the stockouts that are consequence to the unoperational pipeline, it's not because Shell is hoarding products so it can jack up the prices come holiday season! People, we simply cannot get enough products to the terminals and consequently the retail stations, hence the shortage! I hate ignorance.

Tsina Chinabank

It is quite serendipitous that my birthday month falls right after my hell quarter. After frying my brains bananas in August and September, I flew to China and decided to forget about work, schoolwork and the other stark realities of the Philippines

An ensuing super (take note: SUPER) typhoon was threatening to cancel my plane ride but after spending 6 hours in the airport and finishing half a Stieg Larsson novel, I finally boarded the plane bound for Beijing. A trip to China isn't exactly at the top of my bucket list (maybe not even at the bottom) but this is the first time I'm travelling with my parents, titos and titas - meaning there's a big chance for this trip to be a free ride, so what they hey, I was up for it!

The Chinese embassy made a huge deal with the fact that it's my first time to go to China and decided to reduce my validity to just 7 days. The nerve. Even though I have US, UK, AU and Japan visas, they still feared that I become an illegal alien in their country. Pfft. I had to miss the Guangzhou leg of the trip which should have been interesting because the older folks and I were supposed to visit the town where my grandfather was born and grew up in.

So anyway, I landed in Beijing on my actual birthday! Yahoo, my mom and dad woke up in the middle of the night when I arrived at the hotel just to greet me "Happy Birthday" and offer me Skyflakes. Hehe. I willed myself to sleep right away because the next day should be exciting - we were going the Forbidden City and the Temple of Heaven.

The following day, I froze my butt off in 6-degree Beijing ambient temp. I was ill-prepared for the cold. I camped in Pulag at the same temp with drizzle but I was wrapped like a spring roll then. I underestimated the nearing winter in China and did not even bring thermals. Yikes. But the Forbidden City was awesome and I was amazed at how the Chinese mastered the art of twisting tree trunks and branches into pretzel-like shapes that surely don't exist in nature.



On Day 2, we were bound for the Great Wall. This should be the highlight of the trip - I mean if you've gone to China and did not see the Great Wall, you ought to kick yourself. It was freezing again and we were in the mountains! However, the sun was shining really brightly that day, no clouds, no drizzle so it was a comfortable 9-dgerees that day. I made it to 4 or 5 towers before my tito, my fittest tita and I decided to hit home. My dad and the other ladies opted to stay behind and enjoy the view in a less strenuous manner. My dad actually has a chronic knee problem so the fact that he was even there - hats off! Hey moon man, can you see me now???



That night, my tito (a well-known restaurateur in Cebu) took us to Da Dong, a somewhat pricey restaurant in Beijing that boasts of the best Peking Duck. And true enough, the duck doesn't just melt, it disintegrates in your mouth! Oh, and Da Dong has these really cool interiors straight from a James Bond movie.

Our third day in Beijing was spent going around the Summer Palace and a Beijing Hutong (aboard a rickshaw).

Mom: So how do you find the trip so far?

Me: It's different when you're with older people. Relax lang. Not like when I travel with friends, we rush, try to cram in as many things as possible and we stay at the cheapest places. Unlike now, we're in a service apartment. So yeah, I'm having a good time!

I missed the Olympic Stadium leg of our Beijing trip (thanks to our friends at the Chinese Embassy in Manila) but the remainder of the trip almost made up for it. And so we're off to Shanghai.

Shanghai was more cosmopolitan than Beijing and with a friendlier temperature too. We arrived in our hotel a little before noon to dump our luggage, take quick showers and eat lunch. Now we've been gorging on Chinese food for days already so when my tito found out that there's an Italian restaurant in the hotel - I died and went to tomato heaven. The assistant manager was Pinay so we got a complimentary bottle of wine. Yeah!






Our first day in Shanghai took us to the TV Tower and to the museum at its base and of course, the requisite river cruise which I absolutely loved. I saw for myself that building which Tom Cruise scaled in M:I III. I've always found skyscrapers to be breathtaking so Shanghai was a dose of pure oxygen for me.



Our first dinner in Shanghai was in this upscale-ey restaurant called Din Tai Fung which, according to my tito, served the best xiao long bao (soup dumplings) and was well-renowned even in the West. Slurp. Yum.

The second day in Shanghai was spent in the World Expo. Guess what, the Pinoy expo won the Most Relaxing (or something like that) award - it offered massages. I wanted to go into the German expo but the queue was four hours long! I will not subject my parents to such torture (alright I tried, we stood in line for about 20 minutes then gave up) so we walked around instead, taking pictures of the exteriors. At this point, I've already had it with the Chinese people's bump car mode so I decided, "What the hell, I can play bump too!". And the World Expo was the perfect place to start haha! I probably walked 10 kilometers that day (in circles) with my parents so we congratulated ourselves with a nice Thai dinner in Xintiandi.



Our last day in Shanghai was spent - you guessed it, shopping! Alright, I'm merely mirroring the excitement of my titas since I'm not really a big shopper myself. I suddenly panicked when I realized that I have not bought any pasalubong yet (yup, obligatory). Thankfully, a half-day at Yuyuan Garden will fix everything. I grabbed a couple of stuff for myself and for my friends. I realized it's green tea palooza in this place! My dad, bought himself a mahjong set which spelled "excess baggage"! Heheh.

We left Shanghai amidst a raging storm - yup, that same typhoon that attempted to foil my trip followed me all the way to China!

My first trip to China was different in many ways. I was travelling with older folks so the pace was more relaxed. There was none of those eat-while-you-run scenes. Photo-taking was kept at the minimum (waaah!) and we stayed at really nice hotels, dined at the fancier restaurants and enlisted the services of tour guides (something which I've never done in my previous travels). In fact, I enjoyed it too much, I can't wait for the next time I'd travel with the oldies again!

Not Just Driving Through

I was starving when I got to Cafe Ysabel for a very, very late Palm Sunday lunch. It's good that I was there to eat this time, having driven past this joint a couple of times before when I lost my way in San Juan. From the outside, it looks like an old house from the Spanish colonial period and if not for the dozen or so cars parked outside, one wouldn't know that it's a restaurant. Needless to say, it's the place's exteriors that bear the "come hither" factor that a passerby's curiosity cannot help but be spiked (like me when I drove by a couple of times before).

There were a lot of diners at such a late lunch hour (2PM) so we made our way to our table by the big window. The interiors were very interesting - I was particularly thrown off by the frescoes on the ceiling - women who wore the traditonal baro't saya but drawn with, in my opinion, an Egyptian sway. I liked the dark, rainy-day-but-you-are-warm-inside atmosphere that the the place evoked.

Now having driven from Batangas with no breakfast, I devoured the bread which was absolutely piping hot. The bread dipped in olive oil and balsamic vinegar tated so good but I reckon that it's my ravenous (read: patay-gutom) state that made it such.

So anyway, here's what we ordered for lunch:



Appetizer: Jake & Christine's Crisp Smoked Fish (tinapa) Wantons in Salsa Verde. Now this one I loved. Fish and salsa went so well together.



Main Course: Spicy Lamb Kebab. I was a bit disappointed. When I order lamb, I expect that "lamb smell" in my meat but there was hardly any trace of it. I'm not sure if this dish was calibrated to fit the not-too-adventurous Pinoy palate but I would've wanted lamb in my lamb. Also, when the menu says "spicy", it ought to end up with sweat on my brows after eating. Again, if there was any hint of spiciness, I did not get any of it - and I did not have a cold that day.



Add-On: Longganisa Mushroom and Roasted Garlic Risotto. My bad- my brain did not process that there's actually longganisa in it so when the dish ended up as a "sweet" surprise, I was unpleasantly surprised.

If there's anything that I would rave about, it's the price. For a place that has a fancy menu and is oozing with ambience, you will definitely get your money's worth.

The place is also known for it's eclectic coffee concoctions and someday, I might go back for them AND for the desserts that we haven't had the chance to try.

Anna Wangen and Woodstock

While feasting over isaw in UP, we decided to go to Anawangin. Jake's friend Chezka had been dying to jumpstart her summer and since we found ourselves free for that weekend, we decided to make the long drive (since we're coming from Batangas) to Zambales.

I switched cars with Yang so Trina (my car) was in hibernation at the Park & Fly for a week. Meanwhile, I drove the Bitch (Yang's car, not her).

We drove up on Friday night and reached Patio Beach in Pundaquit, Zamables at around 1AM. This was our jump-off point to Anawangin Cove which is about 20 minutes away by motorboat. Other than the fact that we were all on the verge of dozing off, it was pitch dark when we arrived so there was nothing we could make out of our surroundings.

That morning, we woke up to this gorgeous sight:



No, I did not mean me, you dummy! I meant those hills around me! Heheh.

We awakened to such breathtaking view that I was half-tempted to stay in the resort and not go anywhere else. However, such a beautiful sunrise held the promise of greater things to come for that day - enough motivation to get my butt out of bed and board the banca to Anawangin. The boat ride was smooth thanks to the early morning calm. Traversing the waters near the coastline, we came face to face with the majestic hills that seemed to carelessly tumble into the sea. I silently mumbled to myself "Ang ganda pala ng Pilipinas". Thankfully, before I could utter any more corny musings to myself, Anawangin Cove came into view.



From afar, it seemed like the beach was deserted but once we reached the shore, I realized that the place was abuzz with people, mostly campers. There were tents and mats everywhere and everyone was just lying around and being lazy. The atmosphere was light and hazy, everyone seemed to be in high spirits and there was this inexplicable calm in the air that I had to fight off the urge to randomly say "Peace, man!" with a silly grin pasted on my face. "This is probably how Woodstock felt like", I thought. Now I'm not sure if anyone was smoking pot that day but one can never be too sure, especially in the company of campers. My friends and I took posession of a picnic table, which you get for free with the Php 50 fee, and strung a hammock between two trees. However, sleeping was the last thing on our minds since we came here for only one thing: The Beach!













Overcrowded beaches don't do a thing for me so when I saw this, the opening notes of Moby's Porcelain started playing in my head. I fell in love.




I've been dying to go back to Pagudpud since I went there 4 years ago but Anawangin, which is a study of the atypical - with out-of-place pine trees and browning hills made even more otherworldly by the ensuing drought, definitely holds its own charm!

We started back for Pundaquit at around 5:30 that afternoon, just in time to catch the sunset as we disembarked from the same small boat that brought us to Anawangin that morning. Once more were beheld by a breathtaking vista:



Not me, you fool! The sunset!!! Heheh.