}
Saturday, January 01, 2005
holiday hullaballoo
Updated. I'm killing time here in the office. So I'm going to somewhat update this update:

December 24 (Christmas Eve): We went to mass early (7:30PM) and ate a whole lot. We had to spend time packing for our trip tomorrow. Bangkok here we come! We brought two luggages. One of the luggages had 2 smaller luggages inside. And the other one had a smaller one inside as well. Anyway, for noche buena we had spaghetti (as in happy-birthday-spaghetti), fiesta ham, buko gello, chicken mozarella, red wine and keso de bola. Liam, our shih-tzu was so cute too. We let him out to the lanai (usually he's just inside the house) and he was utterly amazed. He was probably wondering where he was and why the house got bigger. Hehe.

December 25: Flight to Bangkok. Yeaaaahhh!!! Land in BKK and go on a city tour (though deep inside I wanted to jump off the bus and hitch-hike to Chatuchak) and see a whole lot of gold and buddhas. Joanna accomplished dream #1: have a picture taken with a buddhist monk. We had a gay tour guide named Thom. He's so entertaining. The tour ate up most of our day so by the evening the stores were closed already. Our hotel was beside the Pratunam market, which was a good thing. We just strolled down the night street bazaar to get a whiff of what's in store.

December 26: Head to Chatuchak. Get lost, separated from our parents. My sister and I were together and we feared the risk of being orphans. Dad wasn't texting. We go along shopping, with the hope that we would eventually bump into them. Nuh-uh. The likelihood was slim to none. We eat pineapples for lunch and marvel at the abundance of cute Australians (and a whole lot of other nationalities). So from 11AM to around 4PM, we were walking in a labyrinth of shops. From section 27 we somehow end up in section 3. We trudged back into the jungle hoping that we could find where we came from. We finally get in contact with Daddy's phone and learn that they're all the way in section 26. Our knees were shaking from fatigue. But the shopping was utterly marvelous.

December 27: A tour to the old capital of Thailand, Ayutthaya. This time, our tour guide was a short, stout man who knew a little bit of tagalog. Very cute. On the way to the province, my mom purchases 5 kilos of Sampaloc. The tour guide is very amused. Here, Joanna gets dream #2: a picture with an elephant. We also get to photograph more monks. Since females can't touch them, they were just in the background (oblivious to the picture-taking). We went to the king's Summer Palace as well. Absolutely beautiful. I felt so digitally impaired. I take as much shots as I could (hope that they turn out well) with our Advantix camera that is naked of any zoom capability. We again visit the Pratunam streets for the night market.

December 28: Shopping at MBK and Pratunam. Get shoes and hunt for jeans. Clothes in Bangkok insult you. My sister and I actually get size 30 jeans and large skirts (hindi manlang medium!). I then get a digital camera - a Casio Z-55. I know, I said I was getting the Canon... but well, the cheaper price (by around 2.5K Php) and the big-ass LCD talked me into it.

December 29: Flight back to Manila. Our flight was at 1PM so we had to be in the airport by 11AM. Dang. No more time for shopping. Foreigners bound for Phuket were diverted to Bangkok. So yesterday, there was a great flood of cute guys. Damn. Just when we were leaving. We land in Manila at around 6:30PM. Chips and I have dinner at Recipe's in Greenbelt. I gave him the kilo of Sampaloc I brought for his family. I also hope that the jeans I got him fits, considering the difficulty we encountered with female garments.

December 30: Long drive to Dingras, Ilocos Norte. Our butts hurt. Long, long drive.

December 31: Go to Batac and eat the best empanada for mirienda. Firecrackers galore. Note that our house is adjacent to a gasoline station. A demented kwitis actually made a bee-line for the gas station and we feared for our lives. Good thing it poofed before it got too close. Watch Jericho, our german shepard, go crazy with all the cracking. Pretty, pretty fireworks. Later, they whipped out a long, long, long sawa. It was probably as long as the house and took a good two minutes before the last five-star popped. We also had this canon with "bombs" the size of coconuts. One didn't want to light up and we again feared for an unplanned bloody explosion. The boys finally got it out of the canon and it now still sits on the street. We later gulfed down lasagna and crema de fruita.

January 1: Lounge around. Rent a Videoke machine. Watch the grown-ups dance Spaghetti Pababa. I've got it on video. Bwahahaha. The videoke machine didn't rest until 1AM. It had yucky visuals of Maui Taylor, Katya Santos and Patricia Javier. My grandmother shakes her head at the sight. She is worried for the children. The boys and dads drink and enjoy the show (which is not of us singing).

January 2: Have lunch and leave Ilocos at around 2PM. Another long, long drive. We drive thru Mcdonald's for dinner. Upon arrival in Manila, we smelled like garlic (mom bought 4 kilos), bagnet and sukang iloko. Liam was jumping for joy at the sight of us.

So there's my holiday for you. Hectic, yes. But very much fun. Strangely I didn't even gain weight despite eating in Ilocos almost every 2 hours. Hehe. With occassions like these, nothing's like being with family. The last update will be of the pictures. Or maybe I'll just create a new post for those. Hmmm. Bahala na. Happy Holidays people (or what's left of it).
dezphaire strapped in @ 1:17 PM  

5 Comments:

  • At 11:23 PM, Blogger drivebyshooter said…

    Firecrackers galore. Note that our house is adjacent to a gasoline station. lovely. just lovely.
    happy new year!

     
  • At 1:15 PM, Blogger Cat said…

    Wow, only until you posted in my blog did I realize that you were in Bangkok when the tsunami hit Thailand on Dec 26! I read your post earlier but didn't think of it. What is wrong with me? Anyway, you're so lucky Bangkok was spared. In the state of panic, did you guys even think of going home instead?

     
  • At 3:20 PM, Blogger dezphaire said…

    Cat - we got messages from relatives asking if we were okay. at that time we didn't even know about the disaster. the next day, we still went on with our tour. and all tourists bound for phuket were dropped in bangkok. so gwapo galore. ang priorities nga naman :p

     
  • At 3:12 PM, Blogger drivebyshooter said…

    i've been scouring the papers for news of a terrorist incident in ilocos involving a makeshift bomb planted in a gas station. i guess the coconut bomb is still rolling along the streets of batac. =)

     
  • At 3:28 PM, Blogger dezphaire said…

    i will try to get an update from my grandmother as to the wherabouts of the coconut. i will pray that no stray dog or stupid person deems it an ordinary edible but burnt coconut.

    if it did roll away, i hope that it's far away into uninhabited territory.

     

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