first weekend home
I flew into Manila from Hong Kong on midnight early today, and in a few hours will be flying back to Hong Kong. I had such an unexpectedly happy feeling when I saw the lights of Manila twinkling below right before landing. I wasn’t exactly excited about coming home after just a month and a half in Hong Kong, but it came to me when it sank in that I was coming home.
Tomorrow, I’ll be flying back to HKIA, but rather than from Manila, I’ll be coming from Clark (two hours’ drive away from the capital) as I’m currently in Pampanga (the central plains of Luzon) for my Lola’s (grandmother’s) 80th Birthday Celebration.
At the airplane last night, after I had accomplished my Arrival Card for the Philippine Immigration, my seatmate, in a painfully awkward way, asked me in broken English if I could help her fill out her Arrival and Customs declaration cards. She was apparently illiterate in English, and had been gathering the courage to ask me for help with it. I immediately obliged, of course, and asked her, in similarly broken Mandarin, for her details which I needed for her cards.
Another random thought - I was thrilled to completely surpass Hong Kong Immigration at the airport last night. It was my first time to travel with an HKID, which allows me to pass through an electronic gate instead of lining up at the immigration counters. I was trying to act cool and oh-so-casual when I did it, but I was ecstatic when I, MTR-like, swiped my card at the electronic gate, scanned my thumb, and just walked into the boarding gates zone. I mean even in the Philippines, where I’m a citizen, I still have to line up for immigration.
With barely any sleep, I drove my sister and I to Pampanga at 8AM this morning, where we practiced our performance the whole two hours on the road. My eyes were bloodshot and swollen from lack of sleep, and my vocal chords were barely functional anymore, so I downed two capsules of Vitamin C and forged on.
Here’s a shot of our performance during the event (held at King’s Royal Hotel and Resort Leisure Park, San Fernando, Pampanga):
We opened the program in front of around 270 people, mostly family and family friends. We opened with “Cabaret”, followed by Joyce’s rendition of “All that Jazz,” mine of “Roxie” (from Chicago as well), and then concluded the number with Amy Winehouse’s “Valerie”.
My sister and I doing the can-can
Our shiny costumes were purchased from the Mongkok Night Market (I bought them with Debbie last Sunday and then exchanged an ill-fitting white dress for the blue one with Dutch Alex on Monday… I bought him a drink for his praiseworthy negotiation skills that night..).
Minutes before the performance, I had to rip apart the inner seam of my dress (with a blackberry charger, no less) to remove the pads, which made my boobs look inordinately and slaggishly huge… you would think I would have appreciated that after living without all my life, but I actually hated it.
And to our insecurity, the upcoming and professional trio, the Opera Belles, performed right after us.
Got to catch up with Jam, one of the Opera Belles, my kabarkada and close friend since Elementary! <3 (Excuse the terrible cropped picture, I’ll probably be replacing this with the decent shot Karla Gutierrez has on her camera when I get my hands on it)
with my cousins Cath, Jacq, and Ange (plus Joyce, my sister, of course)
My God, I missed them so much, I am going to be downright desolate tomorrow spending an entire Sunday in solitude. I idiotically booked the 7am flight and not the 7pm flight. Incredibly depressed about that.
And lastly, me. With my wounded lips, new hair, and slagdress.
xx,
Yeni
