singapura - chapter V

february 29, 2008

graduation day

ok ok..we passed the exams yipee! gathering the exact same scores ahihi, we did not cheat i promise!

here's a grad pic w/ our shrewed teacher at my back. :P we were sent off training at lunch & ofcourse we already laid out our plans for the remainder of the day. we went to the night safari. elton joined us & paid for my ticket. thanks again ninong! :)

before we did, we had our lunch at kopitiam.

lunch at kopitiam..rochelle, lea's friend, fled to SG to join us

after a few hours of shopping & rest at the hotel, we took a cab to the night safari & got there before 5pm. the boys didn't join us for they leave for manila early the next day. khaye & myself filed for a day extension whilst lea filed 2 days.

the only attraction that can be viewed for free

this is the only picture we managed to take since flash photography wasn't allowed inside

the experience was fantastic. nocturnal animals just close to our grasps, most of 'em uncaged. imagine those singing hyenas just a few feet away from us, bats flying at the tip of our heads & more..amazing...really..

after the park, we took the commute back.

shots at the mrt station

we decided to eat dinner again at kopitiam & drank SG's local beer w/ elton.

icky..*:)

scarred warrior...you know

damned if you do

You can and you can't - You shall and you shan't - You will and you won't - And you will be damned if you do - And you will be damned if you don't.

i am finished with you

my on-my-way-to-work song.

screamin' at the top of my lungs...

singapura - chapter IV

february 28, 2008


3rd day training. 4th day singapore.

at this day, our teacher cooked up chapters that made us all want to go straight home hahaha! the 3rd day was basically his last day to load our brains so he quickly-paced several chapters while we all quietly murmured 'huh?'. our topics were about VOIP, DSL, ISDNs, VPNs, Frame Relay & all that rubbish haha. he left 2 more chapters to be discussed the next day, before the exams.

khaye had her own agenda. she met up w/ some old friends who work in SG & braved the reverse bungy ride at GMAX. woohoo!

the rest of us braved naman the indian community in SG at little india. we practically walked from our hotel to there, relying on our map, & eventually got there in 10 mins. before we entered the popular little india mall, where tourists or what-have-you, can snag cheaper souvenirs & chocolates, lea craved for another curry meal...photo below proves curry at little india, was awesome. *:) after the uber meal, we went ballistic shopping for chocolates! we shared dollars for the chocolates we'll bring to the office. bought them boxes of merlion mini-chocolates per team. then we reviewed for the exams when we got home.

singapura - chapter III

february 27, 2008

2nd day training.

we began to get bothered by the # of blow by blow jabs of our teacher against our homeland. he started his spiteful small talks about PI the very 1st day but we didn't really take it seriously. gradually, he became a philandering egoistic maniac. we could not ignore the looks he passed towards me & khaye. the irony too, of having a filipino wife, & pending residency in our country, he'd pass revolting judgement over our justice system, our government, although president gma deserved it, & the society in general.

there was this one time when he falsely categorized metro manila as the 'most unsafe city in the world'. since we're not a bunch of ding-heads, we quickly challenged him if it was a fact or one of his paranoid theories. we all googled & found out that the FACT IS, it was HIS city that tops the list! bwahahahahaa! what a jerk. it's detroit by the way, his hometown in the US.

nonetheless, we survived, had to, we were determined to leave singapore w/ our names etched on those shiny white pieces of thin carboards...the certificate.

moi beside a sleep slut. he's not asleep here tho. he's indonesian i think. he was sent there to learn how-to-train..

we took our lunch a little bit longer this time, unintentionally. we went to bugis to get another taste of their local grub. i believe this was where i had a sample of their bestest cuisine, the roasted duck. totally yummy, paired w/ their finest coconuty lemon drink c/o lea. thanks for the 2 'dalla' drink lilia! the boys went on their own agenda, probably missed the taste of mcdonalds hehe.

after lunch, we got tempted to do a 'lil shoppin in bugis!..hence, it cost us more than the 1 1/2 hour lunch break...teehee...

during lunch

before going back to training; a taste of their local block-shaped sandwiched ice cream

after 6pm, we went back to plaza singapura for more sight seeing & shopping.

plaza singapura princess hehe

singapura - chapter II

february 26, 2008

2nd day in singapore. 1st day training. dad's birthday.

i already knew i wasn't gonna be home on dad's birthday so i threw him a birthday dinner, eat-all-you-can, at the kamay kainan trinoma, 3 days prior. belate dad, mwaaahh!

back in singapore, apparently, sharing a bathroom w/ 2 others will make you late on your 1st day of training haha. thank god it was just a few blocks across our hotel. 5 mins late wasn't so bad.

our trainor evidently is a veteran of the subject. he'd just quickly pace the notes on the book & creates his own dialogues.

by lunch break, we ate at one of the noodle houses inside the building. the ordering portion was dreadful. the menu was written in mandarin & the chinese owners couldn't or likely refused to understand any word we said. but we didn't back down, didn't allow the language barrier hinder us from filling up our almost upset stomachs. aside from using very weird sign languages, we just ingeniously pointed our fingers to the appetizing (by the looks) dishes the other customers were havin'! brilliant ei? ultimately, we got served. bravo. hahaha

at the noodle house; mine was screaming hot & i dislike spicy foods arghh!

the front door of the training venue

during an afternoon break, we called shaun, a former workmate, to let him know we're in sg & to treat & tour us in the evening.

it was a relief when shaun showed up. he directed me to a music store where i can score cheap sabian cymbals. finally, that was off my checklist. after that he took us to dinner at the marina. we ate at 1001 islands, a classy filipino restaurant. although we opted for something local that day, he might had unconsciously assumed we missed the taste of filipino food?? shaun, we were just in manila 2 days ago! hehe. nonetheless, when we had a taste of their 'sinigang na baboy', 'crispy pata', 'kilawen', etc, there was no room for regrets. the food was sooo good.

posing while walking to the music store

after marina , we walked towards the merlion park & took pictures in multitudes. we stopped only when our jaws started to ache from all the smilin.

posing at bugis

behind me is the marina square facade

at the hotel

here are photos at the merlion park...

shaun's the bald guy. hihi..thanks shaun!!!

we took a cab to the hotel. the brilliance in sg cabs, they got these tiny receipt machines, so we got receipts on every cab ride. we were able to include it in our reimbursement report back home!

singapura - chapter I

february 25, 2008

was sent to singapore alongswith khaye, lea, joel & edward to train & be certified for basic telecommunications. it was an expensive 4-day course, thanks to the 4 years i've held my breath at work, enough to establish my uncorrupted loyalty to them. this is just the most impelling perk my company offers for my department, opportunities to be sent abroad. others were sent to our european callcenters like in france, italy & uk. & on my earliest posts, i went blogging about being sent to the US for an application training, on my own.

we all agreed to meet 2 hours prior our 8am flight. we flew PAL, which was my first time. the take offs & landings were smoother & there was lesser turbulence compared to cebu pacific's aircraft. i flew cebu pac twice, for bora & HK. oh, if any of you gets amused by their on-flight parlor games, i would say that it's annoying & disruptive for those who naps during the flight & that includes moi. *:)

after our 3 1/2 hour flight, i looked for a public phone & immediately called a friend to let him know we've landed. my old friend, elton, whom i worked with before, is also rayne's godfather. he emailed me 2 days ago, if i could bring him some 'boy bawang' & 'polvoron'. i was able to buy 'boy bawang' only due to time constraints. at the airport, we headed over to duty free to snag lots & lots of inexpensive alcohol. we were already warned that alcohol & cigarettes amount to almost twice the price when bought in SG. carol, a friend who worked in ours a year ago, asked a favor if we could buy her 2 bottles of absolut vodka (i've not seen many of the flavors of vodka displayed there here in manila). and ofcourse we got ourselves one too, if in case we all pass the exams & celebrate before heading back home.

NAIA; Changi airport in Singapore

we didn't waste enough time unpacking. we bolted & explored the city right off. elton showed up by afternoon to tour us. ty elton!!!

lea, edward, moi & khaye; joel, lea, khaye, moi & that's elton beside me

at the mrt station; i forgot where this was taken hehe

the popular tiangge in SG, located at bugis street

my brother constantly sent me sms, bugged me to check out zildjian & sabian cymbals in SG which were sold cheaper, as he was told. another old friend, louie, who recently left SG to finish studies, asked me to get him contact lens solution in a mall he frequented in SG.

we had starbucks in the afternoon, had to chill down for a sec, for we only walked the long stretch of orchard road under the scorching sun! the humidity in SG's relatively warmer than in manila!

having elton w/ us, getting to places i needed to be was easy. like the plaza singapura mall, where i was effortlessly able to locate a big yamaha store & canvassed ian's cymbals & the optical shop louie instructed me to get his lense solution from.

..........waaaahhh. been digging through my brain what happened next for the past hour! what an airhead! all i remember is that we left the mall before 7pm (still daylight in SG) & lea ditched us to be w/ some local friends. we went back to our hotel, at the fugly summer view hotel hehe, located along bencoolen street. albeit the fugliness, it is still strategically situated just a hundred steps away from the training center & 8 mins from bugis street. very practical if we wanted to snag some cheap 'pasalubongs' during training breaks or after...

i remember we had our dinner at burger king haha. it was the closest, just 2 blocks away from our hotel, & we opted for something that would boot in our system (we could still taste it!!!) the very eccentric local grub we had for lunch haha.