Try Everything

Happy New Year!  I know it’s late but it’s the only and best way I could think of to start my first post of 2017☺

So, a new year.  Since the beginning of January, I've been wondering what 2017 has in store for us. What are my plans to make it an unforgettable year?  What am I going to do?  To tell you the truth, I don't know, and I'm not the type who makes resolutions at the beginning of a new year simply because I've always felt they were nice to see listed down on paper, but so difficult to achieve in reality.

Our Postponed / Extended V-Day

I know the Day of Hearts was a week ago, but I wanted to share how ours went. Humor me, ok? =)

Valentine’s Day fell on a weekend (for most) this year. It was a working Saturday for me, so while I was stuck at the office, Hubby was at the KFC monthly activity. At around 10:30am, he called me to go down the office building and I just knew he had something for me. I was right.

Satur-Date with Mama

Early this month, I saw that another rom-com movie was going to be shown here in Dubai. I wanted to watch it, but I wanted to watch it with someone who would enjoy the film. Hubby would be willing to accompany me, but I knew he would get bored. Then I had a great idea. It’s been ages since we’ve had a day out just the two of us, and since she finds Coco Martin really gwapo (second to Fernando Poe, Jr.), I asked Mama if she wanted to watch Maybe This Time on one of the Saturdays that I would be off. Of course she said yes.

So after work on the movie’s first day of showing (a Thursday), Hubby and I went to Deira City Centre to purchase the tickets. I was afraid kasi that if I left it to buy them on Saturday, we would run out of seats. 

Saturday morning, our family first when to St. Mary’s Church to attend the 9am mass. Then, on their way back home, Mama and I went down at DCC. We still had some time to spare so we window-shopped for a while.

By 10:50am, we were at the cinema entrance. We had just realized that it was Mama’s first time to watch a movie in a Dubai cinema so I wanted to take as many pictures as possible. Syempre, memorable experience ito! But she was too shy and hesitant, only allowing me to take pictures just once…no “isa pa!” to give me a chance to take a better shot because she was getting conscious =)

Upon seating ourselves comfortably in the chairs, we found that there weren’t that many people at all. Was it because it was the first showing of the day? Or it wasn’t publicized as much? Or the reviews weren’t good? Or the Coco-Sarah tandem didn’t have that many fans yet? I have absolutely no idea. At least we managed to enjoy the movie.  Our seats were on the third row from the top, right in the center...one of the best places to sit for the perfect view of the screen.

However, the voice of Ruffa was just…umm…err…not normal (for lack of a better word). It sounded ipit like she was talking through her nose.

In fairness though, ang gwapo pala ni Coco. And even though his character was jologs and baduy, he still managed to looked decent and be funny at the same time.

As it went on, you could already tell how the movie would end. Parang Starting Over Again with the kind of ending most of the audience wanted. My favorite part was the teasing conversation between Steph, Tonio and Mama Mae: Minekaniko yung makina ni Monica, and later when Tonio asked Monica over the phone: “Kumusta ang makina mo?” Everyone in the cinema was laughing so hard!

We were hungry by the time the movie finished so we looked for something to eat. Can you take a guess where?


Because we just couldn't get enough of Coco! =)

 

After seeing this shot, Mama said "Parang ako lang ang kakain ng lahat nyan ah!" =)

And to top-off our lunch, we ordered dessert

A slice of Red Velvet cake
Ako naman daw ang pipicturan. Kanina pa daw sya eh =)

We didn’t go home right away after eating, though. Mama is a sucker for cheap finds and she’s wanted to visit the Day to Day store near Union Station since the first time she saw their commercial on TFC that all items were 10 dirhams last month. So that's where I took her…and that’s where she bought some wallets that she said she’ll be giving as pasalubong to her friends and sister in Bicol. According to her, “Kahit tig-10 dirhams lang yun, at least imported; galing Dubai. Hindi makikita sa Divisoria o Baclaran. At lalong wala sa Bicol.” Sige Ma, sabi mo eh =)

Happy with her purchase, we went back to Union Station where we rode the metro and got down in Ghussais where Hubby was waiting for us.

Thanks for the date, Ma! Sa uulitin!

dubai 24 hours

For the second consecutive year, Dubai had malls open for 24 hours during the Eid holidays. And because we had two reliable people to leave our children with at home, we took advantage of the opportunity to go malling late at night on the second day of Eid Al Adha at the largest mall in the world: Dubai Mall.

As we were approaching the mall, we could see that there was a long queue of cars trying to get in. Fortunately, Hubby had already expected this and came up with a simple but great idea: he parked Pepper just outside Al Murooj Rotana and we walked across to the mall. No queues, no waiting.

Upon entering the mall, there were so many people inside…just like how it is on an ordinary weekend. Ok, it might not have been that late (we got there around 10:30pm), but I honestly thought there wouldn’t be that much people there. Obviously, I thought wrong. So anyway, we headed to Reel Cinemas (it’s one of the best ways to pass away the time, after all), purchased tickets, bought nachos and a big drink to share, and headed to the cinema showing "About Time" starring Rachel McAdams.

The movie wasn’t that exciting; it was just a normal romantic-comedy with the twist that the leading man could go back into time. Still, I enjoyed it. Hubby, on the other hand, dozed off about 45 minutes after the film started. Either he found the story too slow-paced, he was too tired, it was his normal sleeping time, or all of these reasons =) He did manage to stay awake during the last 30 minutes of the movie, though.

After the film, we just walked around the mall and bought a few things for the girls. We were toying with the idea of having a bite to eat, but then decided not to since we weren’t really hungry. So we continued window-shopping. By 2:45am, we were getting pretty bored. There actually wasn’t that much to do; the mall was pretty much the same as it would be on a normal Friday or Saturday. Plus, we were getting sleepy. So, instead of staying until 5am, we walked to our car and headed home 2 hours earlier than planned.

It was a good thing we did because as soon as we arrived at the apartment, we found that Caila had woken up a few minutes earlier and started crying when she noticed she was alone in bed; and no matter what Jovy did to pacify her, she wouldn’t stop. She very rarely wakes up in the middle of the night, so you can imagine how shocked (and maybe horrified) she was when she found we weren’t beside her. Upon entering the room, I changed my clothes as fast as I could and lay down beside her, apologizing and assuring her that she wasn’t alone anymore. Almost right away, she was sleeping soundly as if nothing happened. Whew!

If the malls open for 24 hours again for any special holiday, I don’t think we’ll try it again. Well, maybe we won’t go in the middle of the night. We’ll probably try malling in the early morning when our whole family can go and most of the people are going home or in their beds…err, at least, I hope so.  Maybe.

pinas trip: pinoy movies

As promised, I’m back! Ang bilis noh? Hahaha! Ok, honestly, as soon as I published my earlier post, my fingers were itching to blog. There’s a lot of things I want to share here kasi, and if I delay it more, I might forget about them or I wouldn’t be interested to blog about them anymore because my enthusiasm for them might die down or fade. Anyway, so, here I am.

fulfilling weekend: it takes a man and a woman

Friday afternoon (after having lunch and taking a short rest from the Dubai Terry Fox Run), Hubby and I had a group date at Sahara Centre in Sharjah with some of the other KFC Parent Coordinators of our cluster to watch the most awaited Pinoy movie of that weekend. To avoid the rush, the tickets had already been reserved earlier that week, and that morning, we had all given Tita Madz our payments so she was able to buy the tickets on their way home after the Run.

the avengers

Saturday, 5 May 2012

Just me and Hubby, after dinner at Dome

Dubai Mall

If it weren’t for Chris Evans, I wouldn’t have agreed to watch. I already wasn’t in a good mood because I felt guilty leaving Caila at home while she was taking her afternoon nap. My mood became worse when, upon arriving at the ticketing counter, we found that the only seats available for the 6pm show was right at the front (which I absolutely didn’t want) and the next show was at 7:45pm with seats five rows from the front at the extreme right side! Feeling my mommy-guilt grow by the minute, I wished that Hubby would feel the same and just reschedule our date, but since he was so excited to watch it, I just stayed quiet and watched him buy our tickets for the 7:45pm show.  After that, since we had loads of time to waste, we ate at Dome before window-shopping around the mall.

went on a date…finally!

After so long, Hubby and I finally had the chance to spend some quality time for ourselves. You see, ever since December, he’s been working overtime (or to make it clear, O-TY) practically every day; and during the times that he gets to leave the office on time, we would both rather stay at home. Add this to the fact that since the start of my pregnancy, I’ve been too lazy to go out again once I get home from work; and I always felt guilty if I went home and then left again, leaving behind my daughter. Would you believe that we didn’t even go out last Valentine’s Day because he had to stay late at work, and I just didn’t feel like joining the rest of the couples on the roads and malls? Fortunately, Hubby’s workload began to ease last week, allowing him to leave the office earlier than the past months, which made us consider pushing through with our long overdue date.

mi4: ghost protocol

I’m sure many people watched (or will watch) the movie because of the story and it’s the fourth installment in the Mission Impossible series. But I’m sure as well that, like Hubby and me, Dubai residents will watch it for the simple reason of wanting to see how the emirate and all its glory looked in a Hollywood film. I haven’t watched the first three Mission Impossible movies so I can’t compare Ghost Protocol with the others, but I enjoyed every bit of this one because it had just the right blend of action, thriller and suspense, Agent Dunn’s humor, plus cool gadgets...that coming from a person who doesn’t like action films at all!

monthsary date

My date with hubby pushed through last Thursday...and it was just the two of us as we planned. Right after hubby fetched me from work, we headed straight to DFC and purchased tickets to the 6pm screening of Rowan Atkinson's latest film.

kung fu panda 2 in 3D

Kung Fu Panda was the first movie hubby and I watched as husband and wife when we returned to Dubai after our wedding in 2008. We really enjoyed the film, so when we found out that the sequel would be released in 3D, we made a plan to watch it. Unfortunately, we couldn’t squeeze it in our busy schedule, and whatever free time we had, we opted to spend with our daughter...until last Friday night. On the way home after our household meeting ended, Caila dozed off in the car. This was the perfect opportunity because it was still pretty early and we wouldn’t feel guilty for not spending our free time with her. So, we dropped her off at home under Ate Cel’s care and hubby and I set off for DFC.

eat pray love

Thanks to popsie and momsie, we got these movie passes...

So last night after work, we went straight to Dubai Mall to watch this...

"Do not look at the world through your head; look at it through your heart" (Ketut)