Cebu Part 3: Virgin Island, Bantayan

Sorry for the delay, but here's the 3rd installment of my Cebu trip last May. Anyway this was our island hopping adventure with our Bantatay (our boat driver who is the coolest ever) and Kuya Jun (our hip-hop tour guide).

We got to wake up early this time cos we made sure we had a wake up call. Call time was around 8am, and even before that, they were already knocking on our door. We had a quick breakfast at the resort, then we walked to the shore to where our boat was waiting. Our destination: VIRGIN ISLAND.

The boat ride from Bantayan Island to Virgin Island takes about 30 minutes. Waters are usually calm in the morning, so it's going to be a smooth ride for sure. When we got there, it was beautiful! It was like Boracay, the sand was fine and WHITE! Plus it's really clean.


According to Kuya Jun the island is privately owned by some rich clan in Cebu - that's why the place is really, really clean. While we were swimming the said family arrived and had lunch and swam in the waters. Ain't that cool? Owning your own island and have people pay you to spend half the day in it? Hahaha!

After several hours in the water, it was time for lunch. Kuya Jun had the food that we bought in the market the previous day cooked in the island. Boy, did we have a HUGE FEAST! We had rice, hotdogs, fish, and liempo...and the best part is that everything IS GRILLED!! :))



To help our digestive systems and since it was too hot out to swim, we walked around the island to check it out. It's pretty big actually, and there were other families and barkadas having their lunch too. It was just a chill day at the beach. It was right smack in the middle of the day but the wind was cool. Really good to take a short nap with the waves lulling you to sleep. Even the dogs loved Virgin Island too!







After Virgin Island we went to another island with a Bisaya name I couldn't even pronounce. But since it was low tide, we had to just anchor off in the middle of the sea and swim around. It was so fun! I finally got the tan I've been lusting for since I was getting paranoid that I was losing the tan I've always had. Tan is LOVE!! :)

Oh and by the way, your stay in virgin Island is NOT FREE! You have an entrance fee per person, and if you cook food there you have to pay again. I think we ended up paying almost P400 for everything. Well kind of expensive, but vacations are really usually expensive anyways! Hahaha!

When we got back to Bantayan Island, we just showered and changed, then it was off to another destination: the town of Madridejos. It's at the other end of Bantayan Island, and that's where we took our epic habal-habal ride just to get there. Stay tuned for that! :D

You might want to read my past entries on our Cebu trip:
Cebu Part 1: The Cebu Pacific fiasco, NS Royal Pensione, Casa Verde and Tops
Cebu Part 2: Hello Bantayan Island

We Had 5 Colorful Visitors At The Office This AM

This morning we had a very colorful and sweet surprise: 5 M&M's raided our office! Blue, Orange, Green, Yellow, and Red - all of them vying for the title of the MOST POPULAR! Ain’t it cute? And apparently our office isn’t the first they’ve visited. They’ve gone to other offices here in Makati, and even in the Ortigas area to promote their Vote & Win contest.

My officemates and I crowded around them like they were celebrities. It surely brought out the child in all of us. We were all giggling and smiling. It was fun! Here are our funny pictures :)








Right now, I'm biased for ORANGE since it's my favorite color. But since the Orange dude felt up my friend, me no likey anymore! Hahaha maniac Orange dude! So I'd go for YELLOW since he's the coolest among the bunch anyways! :p

But thank you so much M&M’s for visiting our office! It made a slow day at work really awesome! :)

And for details of the M&M's Vote and Win contest, just click on the flyers below, or check out M&M's official website here.

Balaw Balaw: Art and Food in One

It was last Saturday, a day after the whole of Manila was submerged in flood waters by Tropical Storm Falcon, Ninya and I met up in SM Taytay to have coffee. But I was not yet in the mood to go home just yet, so I told her we could go to the art capital of Rizal: ANGONO.

I've been in the town of Angono once before when I was still a writer for our travel magazine, Travel Plus. We had a CALABARZON road trip, and the province of Rizal was first on our list. We visited a lot of museums that time, but one that really stuck to me was BALAW BALAW RESTAURANT.

Balaw Balaw is found inside a middle-class subdivision, and serves both as a museum and restaurant. Ninya and I first went around the museum. It was a trip down memory lane for me as I walked down the familiar corridors of the museum. It's cool that you have a new perspective of things when you re-visit a specific place, you get to see things you didn't pay particular attention to before. Although I would have to say that they really need to spruce up the place. It's dark, dusty, and is in bad need of a makeover. Maybe the artist's family should consider this to entice more people to come.

The museum showcases works done by Pedrigon Navarro Vocalan (photo above). You'd see hundreds of his paintings and sculptures on display. I'm not artsy person, so I just look at the paintings and the sculptures with an amateur eye.




As for his sculptures here are some that really caught my eye. This is found at the dining area, and it's a lady washing her hair in the river.

This is a life-size image of the Last Supper of Jesus Christ, complete with all of His 12 Disciples.

Amihan or the Northeast Monsoon

And if there's Amihan, there's Habagat or the Southwest Monsoon

And in the center of the second floor, is a collection of mini sculptures

One more thing that caught my attention is their antique collection of statues that clearly depict our deep Roman Catholic faith.


After all the walking around the museum, it can really work up an appetite. So on the first floor, is the dining area of Balaw Balaw Restaurant.


Balaw Balaw, for folks who may not know what it is, is actually an appetizer. As written in the front page of their menu: "A delectable appetizer or sauce the Tagalogs serve together with Sinigang. It is made of small shrimps mixed with gruel and "angkak" a herb that gives reddish coloring. This mixture is preserved and fermented in an earthen jar for three days. After 3 days, the BALAW BALAW is ready to eat or sauteed with young bamboo shoots."

Would really, love to give this a try. Although am not really a huge fan of fermented stuff ever since I had a really bad tummy ache after eating a couple of spoonfuls of Pampanga's BURO! :(

But what made Balaw Balaw famous are their EXOTIC FOODS. Some of their exotic dishes include, Uok (beetle larva), Nilasing na Palaka (frogs marinated in wine), Kamaro (crickets), Soup No. 5 (butt and balls of COW), Sizzling Butt and Balls, Sinabawang Balot (fertilized duck eggs cooked like bulalo), Sizzling Balot, and Bibingkang Abnoy (duck eggs cooked in banana leaves). CAN YOU GUYS HANDLE THIS?! HAHAHA! Although I remember the first time I was at Balaw Balaw some 2 years ago, I ate something with FLOWERS. I think it was their salad, but it had actual flowers in them.

No Ninya and I didn't eat any of these, although it would've been cool for me to eat another round of exotic dishes much like when the BFFs and I went to Everybody's Cafe in Pampanga. Ninya and I settled for a safe and much-loved Filipino dish: ADOBONG MANOK AND BABOY (Chicken and Pork Adobo).


It was really good! The sauce was perfect with the rice, and the chicken and pork meat were all tender. We inhaled it in minutes (plus we were really hungry, too)! We even ate the pork fat (yes, it was that good or we were just THAT hungry hehe). And the serving size is really good for 2.

So why not visit Balaw Balaw Restaurant when in Rizal? You guys could get some Filipino culture and art appreciation. The museums of some of Rizal's famous artists are all close together, so it's not really that hard to find. And then after your visual arts trip, you and your family or barkada SHOULD make that detour to Balaw Balaw Restaurant! :)

Balaw Balaw Specialty Restuarant and Art Cafe
#16 Don Justo St., Doña Justa Village
Angono, Rizal
Telefax: 651-0110

Oxygen x Roy Macam

For the past months, Connect Agencie has been sending me e-mails about Oxygen. But it was only YESTERDAY that I realized it was all for me to blog about about hahaha

Anyway, this is all about Oxygen's X Series. They first featured Doc Marlon's photos in their shirts. For the next series of shirts, they are now featuring up-and-coming photographer, ROY MACAM. His works have been published in Preview, Garage, and other publications.

Here are samples of the shirts' designs. For the X series' 2nd collection, 5 designs will be released and produced on 100% cotton shirts.





Here are some pics with the models.





So don't miss out on these awesome tees, guys! :)

Available in all Oxygen branches nationwide for only P499!

We Work Hard but Party Even HARDER

You read that right! Here at Solar Entertainment we take that to heart! We work our asses off for 10 hours straight, but afterwards we reward ourselves with a really good time hahaha

For the past 3 Friday nights now, I've been on a liver-damaging spree with my officemates. But last Friday we took this spree a step higher (we've gotten sick and tired of our usual Trellis) and brought the party to Fiamma. This wasn't even supposed to be our night. It was Elaine and Leah's girls' night out, but since we love butting in we all joined! But it was all good since we got to meet new peeps! :)

Here are our suspects: Skyy Raspberry Vodka (c/o David from the liquor stash), Bacardi Limon (c/o me and Marvin from Ralph's), and Homenaje Blanco (c/o sosy Elaine from an equally sosy Terry's Selections). Not in the picture are the 2 bottles of Jagermeister (c/o Josh and Paolo from Distillery).

But first we had dinner at Whistlestop over at Jupiter Street. You'll notice how these sane smiles will turn to wider, toothy grins as the night wears on (hahaha).


We left Whistlestop at about 9.30pm so we could get a decent table at Fiamma. From here on out, I'm gonna let the pictures do the talking, cos it pretty much sums up the fun we all had. GOOD VIBES! Note to the other people involved THESE ARE THE SAFEST PICTURES IN THE BUNCH! NOTHING EMBARRASSING ALRIGHT! JUST CLEAN GOOD FUN!! :)














See how different those smiles are already? Hahaha GOOD TIMES!! :))

Oh and my BFF Gladys also joined us! Small world too, cos I had no idea Gladys knew Leah and Elaine from our DLSU days! Love you bru!! Nice seeing you!! :))



'Twas a fun night you guys! 'Til next Friday!! :D

Whistlestop Bar and Restaurant
#28 Jupiter St., Bel-Air Village, Makati
Tel No. 897-1352

Fiamma
#32 Jupiter St., Bel-Air Village, Makati
Tel No. 896-1989