- michael scofield is back! -

the much-awaited season 3 of prison break has started!!!! *gasping ... squealing ... squealing ... gasping* ... hampogee pa din ni michael scofield!!!! ... but that's not the reason why i'm watching the series *believe it or not* ... prison break never fails to put me at the edge of my seat ... from the very first episode until the latest one ... power-packed action and suspense *that sounded just like a commercial* ... basta maganda ... maganda ... ubod ng ganda!

go here for more -> http://www.fox.com/prisonbreak/

- it's a happy day and i soooo thank god for the fab weather -

yesterday was a marvelous day in taipei ... it is cold but it's not raining ... best time to go out ... cheribee, farfar, papa d and i decided to go to madame chiang kai-shek's residence (http://th.gio.gov.tw/show.cfm?news_id=5746) near shihlin station ... the place is actually the family garden ... well, it's a very big park for me! i like ... and it's a stellar place to visit on a good-weather-day ... like yesterday ... some pictures courtesy of cheribee -> http://www.flickr.com/photos/santos1978/tags/xinbeitoutaipei/

it was also a great day to hit the hot springs .... no pictures from there ... but here are some info from wikipedia - http://wikitravel.org/en/Beitou ... we went to beauty age hotel ... their 1-hour private room with hot tub is not so bad ... at 250NT per person ... no free towels, though ... and no showers in the room - just sink, faucet at tabo ... you also have to fill the tub yourself ... pero pede na din ... when visiting, it's a very good idea to bring some wine (don't forget the cork opener!) and muchies ... di ba nu, cheribee?

- borat (cultural learnings of america for make benefit glorious nation of kazakhstan) -
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0443453/

when i first heard the title of this movie, the first thing that came to my mind is the word "burat" ... which, in my country - i just found out - is synonymous to a huge penis (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=burat) ... all along, i thought its used to describe something which ticks you off ... pisses you off ... "nakakaburat ka ha!" -> "you're pissing me off" ...

eniwey, when i first saw borat's trailer, i did not expect that i would like it ... it initially felt slapstick-y - nothing more ... but i decided to give it a chance ... and i was not disappointed! ... borat is a very funny movie ... don't get me wrong, i don't appreciate the racist/anti-semitic comments in the movie (i'm explaining myself ... i'm explaining myself ) ... but borat is blunt beyond belief ... and i like that ... i also liked the way how sacha cohen portrayed borat ...

what is the movie about? it's about borat sagdiyev, a journalist from kazakhstan ... who visited america to learn more about the country ... but ended up searching for pamela anderson instead ...

i also found out that there's borat on tv! (http://www.borat.tv/) ... i so love youtube for making this available ... see borat's guide to dating ...

- jackass 2 (http://www.jackassmovie.com)-

hmmm, i saw jackass 2 and ... hmmm ... i really don't know what to say about it ... let me organize my thoughts for a moment ... ... *chanting ... ohmmm ... ohmmmm*

dictionary.com defined jackass as "a contemptibly foolish or stupid person; dolt; blockhead; ass." ... and i saw a lot of that in the movie ... weeell, what was i expecting right? ... there were moments in the film when i was asking myself - "why ... why are they doing that?" ... only to answer myself with - "because it's a jackass movie, jackass!"

in fairness, i found the movie "entertaining" ... in an overtly gross and painful kind of way ... they made me wince several times but there were scences which made me laugh too ...

would i recommend this movie? sure thing ... as long as you're not uber-sensitive to puke/shit-action and you're not offended with masochism as a form of entertainment ... then go right ahead ...

let me know when you're done watching the movie ... let's swap thoughts on our favorite stunts!!!

- crystal (http://www.crystaldance.net) -

i just found this video of my belly dancing teacher, crystal ... she's my third teacher (i've been dancing for more than 7 months now) and i think i'm going to stick with her ... what i like most about crystal is her expression whenever she dances ... it's full of emotions ... she has so much passion for what she's doing and it shows ....

- learning hiphop 2 (shem shem shem shem)-

i just can't think of a second title ...

eniweeeyyy, attended another dance class ... this is definitely better than the first one ... i don't know if there are different types of hiphop ... if there is, i definitely like the one that i learned today ... sa awa ng diyos, i didn't feel dorky and forced ... our teacher is a japanese guy named ... hmmm ... cheribee and i have been calling him tarugo ... so now i'm having difficulty remembering his real name ... what does tarugo mean anyway? ... the teacher's name is ... taruko .... that doesn't sound right ... got it ... takuro!

takuro's pretty amazing ... the dance steps look very easy on him ... and he has this flowing movement ... really nice ... aside from hiphop, he also does breakdancing and something like popping ... here he is *with the black hat* dancing with some people from work ...

- learning hip-hop 1 (hopefully, not looking like a fool) -

i'll digress right away ... when i was thinking of the title for this entry, i thought about the "two-title-format" of some movies ... the standard being - first title should be like the "big thing" about the movie and second title MUST be enclosed in a parenthesis ... in the philippines, we have like "chorva massacre (god help us)" or "ako ang huhusga (kapag puno na ang salop)" ... hmm, how do i translate that second title??? ... "i will be the one to judge (when the coffer is full)" ... that sounded weird ...

anyway .... our company's welfare committee sponsored hiphop classes ... which is totally awesome ... i can't help it ... i just imagined dave navarro saying "awesome" when he was doing the rockstar supernova thing ... this is not to say that i liked it ... or dave navarro, for that matter ...

my friend cheribee and i love to dance ... and the lesson was for free ... so we attended it ... the teacher - ken - is a slim guy but for some reason, he is uber-bouncy ... and that makes his dancing look good and cool and smooth ... cheribee and i, on the other hand ... hmmm ... modesty aside, i used to think that we are good dancers ... above average, even -- we can mooove ... but during the class, i felt sooo ... dorky ... sooo ... forced ... and it's hiphop ... and i'm supposed to be a ... "hiphopper" ... for crying out loud!

but i decided to cut myself some slack ... i'll do my best to learn ... if i'm not successful ... at least i had fun ... and i had some exercise ...


... so much for trying to make myself feel better ...

- cringing at the exchange rate -

jeni and i were talking about financial matters when she told me that the current PH peso to US dollar exchange rate is at 48.65 Php = 1 USD ... according to the news, this may be the "highest in nearly 6 years" (http://business.inquirer.net/money/topstories/view_article.php?article_id=40440).

i'm supposed to rejoice, right?... because this is an "indicator" that my country's economy is improving .. doing well, even ...

contrary to the expected reaction, i cringed at the news and then i got pissed ... i don't know if i'm pissed because my "alkansya" is in USd or because the numbers were terribly misleading ... farfar, cheribee and i discussed this over lunch and there were two nagging questions -
1. are the lives of the poor/middle-class citizens actually getting better? *the lives of the affluent are better already so i don't really care about them*
2. are the prices of commodities getting lower?

i'm guessing that the answers would be a big NO ... so much for having an "indicator" ...

- on rotation -
(sequel to on evolution - http://demensya.blogspot.com/2006/07/on-loving-people-i-have-always-been.html)

farfetch -> farfar
chireh -> cheribee

- chic-ness -

my cellphone has been fucking-up ... messages are ok but calls - its performance is awful ... i don't always receive all the calls ... jeni has been complaining ... she has to try reaching me like 3 times before i get to answer ... and it's because i don't receive her first two calls ... weird no?... what's weirder still is that i was supposed to get 2 missed calls ... i do get it but like, after 2 hours from the actual call ... awful ... the network maybe? ... maybe not ... farfetch has the same provider as mine ... and he doesn't have any problem ...

i now have a compelling reason to buy a new cellphone ... and my fab friends were fabulous enough to prod me ... and convince me by saying that if i buy one, they will buy too ... and so ... our new phones

.. v3i ... epitome of chic-ness

- habla español -

i was in the midst of completing my first major technical document when i was gripped with the need to learn spanish ... i know, it's weird ... what's weirder still is the fact that i am in taiwan and i've been berated for my lack of mandarin skills and here i am ... trying to learn spanish ... in fairness to me ... i come from a country conquered by spain for like 300 years ... and so my native language is not so far from spanish ... ergo, it's easier to learn spanish than mandarin ... blah .... i'm making excuses ...

in my pursuit to learn spanish, i downloaded a 2-hr mp3 called "learn to speak spanish" ... and i think i've learned a lot ... in less than 2 hours ... i didn't get to finish the audio book yet ... here are some samples of what i got ...

es - it is
no - not, negation
porque - why, because
para mi - for me
para usted - for you
*ible - read as eee-ble (possible to po-sib-le)
*able - read as ab-le (probable to pro-bab-le)

es aceptable para mi - it's acceptable for me / no es aceptable para mi - it's not acceptable for me
es posible para usted - it's possible for you / no es posible para usted - it's not possible for you
*if you need to make a question, just change the inflection at the end ... just like english*

porque no es aceptable para usted - why isn't it acceptable for you? *inflection may or may not be needed because porque is a question word*

no es aceptable para mi asi - it is not acceptable for me that way

i told jeni about this new interest ... we agreed that we'll both learn it and then we'll converse in spanish ... exciting!!!

- RSS??? what??? what??? what RSS??? -

-> this is soooo me right now ... i've been hearing about RSS for a long time now but I got curious about it only 2 weeks ago ... and so i've been trying to understand what RSS or "Really Simple Syndication" is ... but i'm lost ... sooo lost ... and all along i was betting on the "Really Simple" idea ...

i guess RSS is supposed to keep track of updates on web content - which includes blogs for that matter ... and then? i mean - ok, something (or someone???) take notes of the changes on my blog and then??? do i expect anything to happen??? is it supposed to improve my blogging experience??? ... is it supposed to make my oh-so-few-you-can-count-with-your-fingers blog readers more aware of changes in my blog content?? but how??? and then i added this "Subcribe to Posts [Atom]" on my template ... now i have a new web content on demensya.blogspot.com and then????
seemingly endless questions ... seemingly elusive answers ... i guess i'm just being stupid

on a happier note, i'm starting to love www.smileyarena.com where i get to download all these cute emoticons - for free!

- mini-world -

when i was in 6th grade, my home economics teacher asked the class to create a diorama house (http://www.ehow.com/how_12761_make-diorama.html) ... one of the members of my team - whose mom was working in japan at that time - brought these mini-whatnots to use for our mini-house ... these mini-whatnots made me drool from wanting ... made me green with envy ... by mini-whatnots, i mean these -

(http://www.re-ment.co.jp/)

don't you agree that these shits are soooo fine, uber-cute and just plain fab??? and so to stop myself from drooling and turning green whenever i see them, i decided to fulfill my dream - one mini item at a time


i felt a certain attachment to my new "puchison" printer ... who promises me an output of "calardays"

- hapi nyu nyu!!! -

we kicked off 2007 with a bang ... from barbecued chorvas to macaroni salad to home made siken sopas to feels like home leche flan ... on top of that is one of the best views of taipei 101's fireworks *tenks to cheribee for the pictures!*



here's wishing everyone a fantabulous year ahead!