Christmas in Discovery Shores Boracay and Club Paradise Palawan

It's not yet "that" too late to book! This year's Christmas and New Year weekend might not be longer than last year but it'll definitely be longer than next year because in 2016, December 25 will fall on a Sunday. This year, December 25 falls on a Friday so you have a little bit of extra rest before you get back to work on the 28th. (I took the photo above last July 2015, beach front of Club Paradise Palawan)

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Celebrate the Holidays at Discovery Primea

It’s the most wonderful time of the year! It almost wants you to sing out while reading it. It really is the greatest season as families get together, spend time with each other, and celebrate the birth of our Saviour!

While some go out of the country to take advantage of the long weekends, some who opt to just stay around and rest would rather find a lot of good places to dine in whether it’s for New Year or Christmas! To tell you the truth, usually, you need a vacation after your vacation during December trips as they are usually the most stressful ones.

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Manila Hotel - Christmas Edition

Stayed overnight in Manila Hotel a couple of weeks back. It was far from the old Manila hotel. It's been some time now ever since they renovated that place but this is the first time I was able to stay there because I didn't think they can improve much based on the old looks. Well, it looks like they did improve a lot.

Here's the view from our room. We can see part of Fort Santiago and some greens. Above is a less-smoggy city since it's a Sunday afternoon. I'm pretty sure the skies would be different. Brownishly different.

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100 Days of Christmas by Kraft Eden Cheese - Vote for Balayan Batangas!

Every year, a lot of people are looking forward for this one joyous and festive season. This year, Kraft made the Christmas 100 days earlier!

ABS-CBN and Kraft Eden Cheese partnered to hold a cook off with several towns. Each town will make their very own original and unique dish using indigenous ingredients that's famous in their own respective towns.

I'm going to start campaigning for  a town -- Please do vote for Balayan Batangas. :)

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A Christmas City with Meaning (My Christmas Blog)

Christmas is the most awaited season of the year. This is also one of the most happiest events to cap off the year. BUT before everything else, I hope we can all have a reality check to remember the true meaning of Christmas.

Most often than not, families and friends gather together to celebrate and the festive mood is heightened. It's not all about eating and eating and drinking and drinking. The gatherings purpose is to bring people closer to bond.

We have a yearly tradition at home. I just want to share a bit of our Christmas story. We have a collection of miniature houses that we setup every year. This is part of our Christmas bonding experience.

What I want to say here is that, those miniature figures not only are good to look at but, they also give us lessons.

Please be reminded that Santa Claus is a legendary figure. Legend is defined as "An unverified story handed down from earlier times, especially one popularly believed to be historical." Whereas the true meaning of Christmas has Jesus in the center of it.

Jesus Christ wasn't born on December 25. That date is just used to commemorate the birth of Christ.

This is also the season to "develop" the habit of giving and sharing.

As a new year approaches, let us leave our selfish ways behind.

Again, do bond with your family. Take the initiative! Go the extra mile to be with them. Please do not exchange your time with your family with your work or job.

Let us act like humans with logical thinking. Be quick to forgive and slow to anger. Peace on earth starts with you (us).

Lastly, we aren't barred to enjoy this season. This is just a small reminder that we celebrate Christmas because of Jesus (Christmas is soo commercialized these days.).

"Life is a gift from God BUT how we live it is our gift to Him."

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YugaTech Contest #1: Merry Tweetmas

Starting today, YugaTech will be hosting contests sponsored by Globe called "YugaTech Great Gadget Giveaway!"

For this week, they called it, "Merry Tweetmas".

There are 3 ways to join the said exciting contest ;)


I, Twitter

1) Follow @abeolandres and @talk2globe on Twitter.

2) Post a tweet “Just entered to win a Modu Phone. Quick! Go follow @abeolandres and @talk2globe and retweet: http://bit.ly/6e2q7O #thanks2yugatech”

Prizes: 1 Modu phone, 10 Globe Tattoo and 20 Php500 prepaid call cards randomly. That’s 31 winners in all for the Twitter giveaway.

II, Blog

1) Blog about the “YugaTech Great Gadget Giveaway”. Include the photo YugaTech posted and link to his contest page.

2) Don’t forget to include in your post the mechanics for the Twitter contest above.

3) Leave a comment in YugaTech's blog with the URL of your entry.

Prizes: 1 Modu phone, 10 Globe Tattoo and 10 prepaid load cards worth Php500 each. That’s 21 additional winners for a total of 52 winners this week.

III, Comment in YugaTech's Merry Tweetmas post

1) Leave a comment on his contest page with the answer to this question — “If you’re stuck in an island with a phone and only have one call left, who would you call and why?“.

Prizes: Ten most witty or creative answers will each win Php500 worth of prepaid load cards from Globe.

For a total of a whopping 62 prizes just for this week!!! You can join in all 3 but in the event that you or I win in all 3, I would only get the highest valued prize.

According to Abe, this is just the warm up for a more grander prize!

Thanks to Globe for sponsoring Abe's (YugaTech) contest!

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Privado | SM Private Sale

Presenting Privado.. SM's private sale, made public by me! hahahaha!

Click the image to enlarge

It's a 1 day exclusive luxury sale on November 13, 2009 (10am to 10pm) at One Esplanade.

Up to 50% off on ALL ITEMS!!!


Additional 20% discount when you use your BDO credit cards or when you present your BDO rewards card, SM advantage or SM prestige card!!!

They also have 0% interest plus, up to 6 months installment on all major credit cards!!!

To check which brands are participating in the SM Privado sale, please click here or click the image above.

Advanced Merry Christmas to all!

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5 reasons why Santa Claus is bad

I just want all of you to know that Santa Claus, is not real. He is just a figure (he does have a figure... round is a figure.) made up to make kids happy. For a more accurate description of Santa, according to Wikipedia:

Santa Claus, also known as Saint Nicholas, Father Christmas, Kris Kringle, or simply "Santa", he is the legendary and mythical figure who, in many Western cultures, brings gifts to good children on Christmas Eve, December 24 or on his Feast Day, December 6 (Saint Nicholas Day). The legend may have part of its basis in hagiographical tales concerning the historical figure of Saint Nicholas.

Magical enough as the tale of Santa Claus is, some Christian churches are increasingly worried that the bearded man in the red suit is overshadowing the more significant message at this time of year of hope, peace and forgiveness embodied by the birth of Christ.

Christ, they say, is being cut from Christmas. And Saint Nicholas, the fourth-century bishop renowned for his secret acts of kindness, has been hijacked by commercialism.

At Christmas, the celebrations of the Christian and secular world overlap, each holding to different heroes who carry slightly contrary messages: Santa Claus gives gifts for those who are good; Jesus Christ is a symbol of unconditional love to believers no matter the sin.
(source of the last 3 paragraphs)

That is just one of the main reasons why he is bad. Read this other reason:

The specific history of the festival serves little purpose except to show that it isn't a Christian origin. The real question is whether or not it is good to propagate this myth at Christmas. These are some characteristics of Santa Claus. He:

• is immortal.
• is omniscient, seeing all things that happen.
• is good and loving.
• can cause miracles.
• rewards people for doing good.
• demands belief that he is real.

These are all attributes that are shared with the Christian view of God. One might ask then, is a belief in Santa Claus equivalent to a belief in a god? To a child's eyes, it must be very similar.

The Effect

One may ask whether it matters about teaching a myth about another God to small children. One could argue that it prepares them to understand the nature of the true God. Alternatively, it may be considered that once the myth is shattered in later years it will become a source of distrust.

One can't help but think of the many references in the Bible to the service to other gods.

Joshua 24:20: "If you forsake the LORD and serve foreign gods, then He will turn and do you harm and consume you after He has done good to you."

Remember the first commandment of God?

ONE: 'You shall have no other gods before Me.'

It may seem pleasant to deceive children with myths about Santa Claus, but one has to ask whether it is really worth the price. (Source)

3 more reasons why he is bad...

The Reward & Punishment System of Santa Claus is Unjust:

There are a number of aspects to the whole Santa Claus “system” which children shouldn’t learn to internalize. It implies that the whole person can be judged as naughty or nice based upon a few acts. It requires belief that someone is constantly watching you, no matter what you are doing. It is based upon the premise that one should do good for the sake of reward and avoid doing wrong out of fear of punishment. It allows parents to try to control children via a powerful stranger.

The Santa Claus Myth Promotes Materialism:

The entire Santa Claus myth is based on the idea of children getting gifts. There’s nothing wrong with getting gifts, but Santa Claus makes it the focus on the entire holiday. Children are encouraged to conform their behavior to parental expectation in order to receive ever more presents rather than simply lumps of coal. In order to make Christmas lists, kids pay close attention to what advertisers tell them they should want, effectively encouraging unbridled consumerism.

Santa Claus is Too Similar to Jesus and God:

The parallels between Santa Claus and Jesus or God are numerous. Santa Claus is a nearly all-powerful, supernatural person who dispenses rewards and punishment to people all over the world based upon whether they adhere to a pre-defined code of conduct. His existence is implausible or impossible, but faith is expected if one is to receive the rewards. Believers should regard this as blasphemous; non-believers shouldn’t want their kids prepared in this way to adopt Christianity or theism.
(source)

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Watch this video... 6 year cancer survivor crushes bricks!

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Watch out for vampire employees getting government bonuses!

Well, ghosts are now ghetto. Vampires are the new ghosts because of the Twilight phenomenon that just hit the world.

The Cullen Family - Twilight

Why am I saying this? It's because government employees will be getting 10,000 pesos bonus this Christmas and guess what... it isn't far from reality that some of them might be fictitious persons (that is why they were called ghost employees -- teh now vampire employees as I call them.)

If this happens in our elections, it is not far from reality that it might happen again in the season of giving. I *hope* they don't do such. I don't know why I just don't trust the Philippine government.

Budget secretary Andaya (in english, this means "unfair"? am I right?) said that "A few might say that the 10,0000 is too little, but to them let me give this bottomline so they can see the big picture: This cash gift will cost our employees, for NG (national government) workers alone, about P11 billion."

A few days back, I was handed a survey about our government. I saw the results and guess what? Plenty believed that the Philippines has a slim chance of improving AND corruption in the Philippines is like AIDS or HIV. It cannot be cured anymore.

tsktsktsk.. Poor Philippines.. such a beautiful place handled by selfish leaders.

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What would I do with the webcam? - Yugatech webcam giveaway!

Honestly, I've only had one webcam before. A generic one from CDr-King which didn't last long. (About 2 months or so).

I use it for video conferencing and stuffs but, ever since it was not functioning anymore, we just used Skype for meetings - voice only.

I would definitely want this Creative webcam because I am pretty sure that this will last VERY long. Sooo long that my laptop might have been changed for ten times already but the webcam would still work. I know the quality of Creative products.

What will I be doing with the webcam??

1. Stop the voice conference and start video conferencing again.

2. Chat face to face with my cousins abroad... I miss 'em!

3. Record my funny musings in video (like the one below) and maybe start a vlog :)


4. LIVE BLOGGING for everyone's viewing pleasure! like what my friend did last May (is that right? May?) broadcasting the Pyrolympics in Mall of Asia live online!


5. help save the earth! - I still don't know how but, yeah... maybe there is a CREATIVE way to use that WEBCAM YUGATECH is giving away.. :)

Try joining the contest if you want.. but please, don't beat me to it because I really want that Creative WebcamYugatech has..

Thanks in advance for the early Christmas gift, Abe! :)

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