A Simple Christmas Greeting...

It has indeed been a busy month! Thinking of what gifts to give, buying stuff for my loved-ones, the excitement of getting the 13th month pay, Christmas parties! And preparing for noche Buena: buying the food and going to the grocery. Though I was not able to attend at least one simbang gabi…the spirit of Christmas would always linger within me…Just wanted to greet all of you a “Merry Christmas”!!!

JeLai'S Christmas '07Adventures-Part 5

Policarpio Street

Mr. and Mrs. Cabrera's Christmas would never be complete without visiting "Policarpio Street"!

One of the houses with such a cute manger theme

Neon house...

Believe me the entire house is filled with christmas lights!

The famous "House of Santa Claus" there are other miniature santa claus inside

Last year, we visited Policarpio Street, it was like hustle and bustle-there were a lot of tiange and a lot of people at the same time...But the homeowners agreed on keeping it low, but then again at least it's more serene...

JeLai'S Christmas '07Adventures-Part 4

The Starbucks 2008 Planner

“December 4, 1997- Starbucks first opened its first cafe in 6750 building”
Starbucks opened 10 years ago…Happy 10th year Anniversary Starbucks!

Starbucks Philippines has been doing this for 5 years now and has been giving away planners for at least 4 years…One of the most awaited times as the Holidays come in would be “passing the cheer” and redeeming the yearly Starbucks planner. This is a must-have for all coffee-addicts! It’s cool to have one of the planners…but there’s more to the “status symbol” that these planners create…behind is a helping hand that encourages us to reach out to the needy. For each redeemed planner Starbucks will make a donation to Project Sparkhope, a joint program with UNICEF Philippines providing early learning facilities and daycare centers for pre-school children in remote and underprivileged barangays all over the Philippines.

For the 1st time, we had the chance to collect stickers, complete it and redeem the starbucks planner!!! This planner is very special to us…Jeff and I shared in buying the drinks and shared the time drinking them! It was more of a bonding moment for us as we share sweet conversations and update each other before he goes to work. It’s not just the leather that appealed to us, I’m actually not so amazed with the design for this year but it’s more of the experience, the fun of collecting…as I open my wallet and peek at the card, I wonder how soon can we complete it. Plus the excitement it gives us as we fall in a long line mostly (btw, our compliments to Starbucks Herrera branch at the back of PBCOM-it is where we spent most of the time buying and it’s where we claimed our very first starbucks planner!). The anticipation before you can finally claim it! And we just woke up realizing that we are already raving about the planner…

The race started November 6, 2007, and since it’s Starbucks’ 10th year anniversary, they had this double sticker promo wherein if you buy your drink within 12-2:30 pm and 8-9:30 pm you get two stickers! And it’s even extended until January 1st!
It just deemed so appealing and more so addicting! You get a nice planner, you enjoy every drink plus you get to help the needy in time for Christmas! So allow me to say: “pass the cheer…”

JeLai'S Christmas '07Adventures-Part 3

World Bazaar Festival

As we search for gifts for both relatives and officemates, we visited the world bazaar at World Trade Center...

These are the list of all the participating merchants. Too many ayt?


Statues of the characters from Lastikman...(were not a big fan ok?)

JeLai'S Christmas '07Adventures-Part 2

Global Fun Carnival!!!

And for another christmas adventure...my hubby and I decided to visit "Global Fun Carnival"To enjoy it more, we bought ride all you can tickets! We went to the place on a Monday so its not crowded. Just a short info: Global Fun Carnival is a european carnival. How different would it be from Star City, Enchanted Kingdom and other rides? We are just so excited to find-out!

I guess what we did wrong was not to see how a certain ride works and try it! Out of guts, we tried the flipper and whoa!!! This ride is total "G-FORCE"Its like a cup and it revolves back and forth! After the ride, jeff and I both felt like throwing up! It gave us a feeling worse than a drunk man! Tha'ts how freaky it is-it gave us hell!

After the really head-aching flipper ride, funny but we tried the horror house! It was just me and my hubby, all the while we thought the statues were moved mechanically, I was more than surprised when a live "ghost" was chasing after us! I was freaking scared specially when we reached what I thought was dead end! I was shouting at the top of my lungs and I was holding my hubby's hand real tight! When we went out, my hubby ended up laughing at me for being so silly scared!darn-it!LoL!


Ok, it took us some time to convince ourselves to ride the "RANGER".Upon watching other's take the ride, it got us really scared, but then we said our visit to global fun would not be complete without having tried this ride! so we did, with other 4 guys...And our say...it was ok! The fear you'd have is that your cellphone might drop but otherwise it was fun. It would also make you feel dizzy but not much. Everything is secured and the boat-like ride is locked with metal bars while moving. Well, thank God we lasted 8 turns!




We enjoyed the rest of the night trying out other simple rides and our ultimate favourite"bump cars"! It was ultimately fun! Although there are only a few rides, a european type carnival would give you an exhilarating-breath taking experience...

JeLai's SHIP tRip!-Part 2

MANILA BAY CRUISE by Metrostar @ MOA

With the Manila Bay Clean-up Project by Mayor Lim, together with the bars, and restaurants…the Manila Bay Cruises were eliminated. ..
But the good thing is! Its now back and it’s located within Mall of Asia premise!
From Doulos, we rode a cab again (good thing we decided to take a cab instead of the LRT) it was a lot faster!
The terminal is not exactly located in Mall of Asia, it is actually quite far since it is past San Miguel by the Bay. The terminal is located at Shrine of Jesus, The Way, the Truth and the Life- the church across yet a little farther from mall of Asia.
We bought tickets and discovered that the terminal also bring people from Cavite back and forth to Mall of Asia.
We are taking the Manila Bay Cruise which has actually two options: the Sunset Cruise or the Evening Cruise. Since we arrived at 6, we took the evening cruise which turned out to be the best!
The trip was scheduled for 7pm. We boarded in the small ship and it started to slowly sail…there was actually a recorded narrator during the start of the tour. We were situated in a not so good area…and the crew where much accommodating to transfer us. We were placed at the open space after the captain’s cabin where we can entirely see the bay. The first thing we saw is the SM Mall of Asia Façade.

In a few minutes, the Mall of Asia Fireworks Display started- it gave both me and my hubby a totally different experience of watching fireworks display! We were like so near…it was awesome! (Below is a video of the Fireworks Display)

Next was a view of the Global Fun Carnival… then we passed by Sofitel as well. As we cruise back, the little ship was a lot faster this time.

The entire tour was amazing, fun and relaxing! This is can be great with your barkadas specially with your loved-one-for a cute date.

JeLai's SHIP tRip!-Part 1

We never experienced riding a ship…so one Saturday my hubby and I planned to take a “ship trip” and this is the first of our adventure…

Doulos: The Floating Bookstore

FYI: “The MV Doulos is the world's oldest active ocean-faring passenger ship since 1914. She is now owned by the German charity Gute Bücher für Alle (Good Books for All), and is used as a floating bookshop. It was named "Doulos" in 1977 and it is a Greek word for "servant". All the international crew - from the captain to the cooks - serve as volunteers.”

We heard of stories being told about this, we saw it in the net. And sought to see it…We took a cab and we informed the driver to take Roxas boulevard and bring us at the back of Manila Hotel to Gate 1 of South Harbor Manila Pier 13. We reached the place but the taxi can no longer go yonder the gate so we walked, asked a few guards and follow the arrows where it says “Doulos”. And we finally reached this place: Eva Macapagal Super Terminal and there was the the historical ship…

It is an open air bookstore. Entrance fee is cheap-P10. We are welcomed by the international crews- and it speaks for itself “international” since the crews have different nationalites. It was more than just interesting…It showcased huge collection of books: children, chrsitian life, music, cookbook, general health and well being. They also have Christian cd’s,little trinkets like erasers and balls. And for souvenirs, they sell books which tell the story of Doulos, Doulos caps, keychain and mugs.



Bookworms and booklovers should visit Doulos to check out their books. On the other hand, you could also visit Doulos to simply get an experience to board one of the world’s oldest ocean-going passenger ship. We are just so privileged to board the ship!

Doulos would be docked in Manila until December 26, 2007. The opening hours are 10am-10pm Tuesday-Saturday, and 2pm-10pm on Sunday and Monday.

Jelai watches AKON live in Manila!

Last year 2006, The Filipinos danced their hearts out to Akon’s songs and his album “Konvicted”.

2007- Grammy nominated R&B superstar, Akon had his live concert at the Araneta Coliseum in Manila, Philippines last November 29 entitled “Akon – Live in Manila” as part of his “Smack That!” concert! And we were there!!!
Despite imposed curfew due to the alleged Manila Peninsula Mutiny, the concert turned out to be a success! And after watching I had very high praises for Akon-such a great perfomer! He sang songs from his former album and what’s great is he sang all his hit songs even the collaborations!!! Amazing!!!

Below are videos of Akon during the concert...

Akon singing a Sweet Escape and his sorry song "Blame it on me"

Akon singing "Don't Matter"

JeLai'S Christmas '07Adventures-Part 1

It’s Christmas time again! When this part of the year comes, we get usually bugged out thinking of gifts to give for our loved ones. We get stressed and get to experience Christmas shopping rush. And get puzzled on what to wear on the many Christmas parties. We’ve all experienced that, but my hubby and I are making it different for us this Christmas.
This was not at all planned. We went to Greenhills, last November 24 to simply stroll around and look at prices of gadgets, cell phones and what’s in store in the tiange but I never thought we were just there in time for this traditional and heartwarming puppet show!
I remember when I was a kid whenever Christmas season comes in , my mom would never fail to bring me to COD. But the yearly show was then moved to Greenhills now. And yet it still constantly amaze me up until now that I'm an adult. It never fails to touch the soft spot in my heart and remind me of the true meaning of Christmas...And next year we'll continuously look forward to watching the show again!
You could check out the link fo the story behind the show: http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/inquirerheadlines/nation/view_article.php?article_id=101589