speaking of...

i've just hit the 3-month mark so work is getting to be more and more challenging. alavit.

speaking of work, i can't believe i'm the youngest guy in the department! in fact, i've never met anyone in my entire company younger than me. talk about a 180 degree turn from my previous job where everyone practically just got out of college.

speaking of being young, everyone outside my office thinks i'm still a student. whenever i meet someone new, they almost always ask "so, are you a student?". technically i don't mind looking young and all, but whenever i think about how long i spent studying, i get this urge to be treated like a working professional.

speaking of meeting random people, i find it a bit hard to feel like a foreigner here. everyone speaks to me in either malay or chinese! the super hardcore chinese folks here even tell me outright, "you look very chinese!". i tell them no and point out that i have dark skin so i really can't be chinese, but they insist and tell me "you're not dark skinned!". aba, maputi pala ako dito.

speaking of looking like a local, it's a bit interesting how people tend to ask me for directions all the time. it's as if i project this image of a walking map. i like it though since this is the point where i meet people who speak to me in chinese or malay and get surprised to know that i'm not a local and then ask me if i'm a student or not. the cycle has been going on since i got here.

speaking of directions, it befuddles me sometimes how i never get lost here. i take the public transport everywhere especially the bus and i even ride the ordinary fare type! i never take the taxi anymore because they charge you a downpayment for a house once you speak a word of english. it must have the been the excellent public transport training back in the philippines but i can actually just read the signs posted outside the buses and already know which one to take even if i haven't been to the place i'm going.

hmmm, i think taking the cab is the only time i feel like i'm a foreigner here. i feel like those poor koreans or white guys in makati getting conned all the time by the cab drivers.

i can't take this anymore. i promised myself to post pictures only when i've bought my own digicam. but what the heck, when your pinoy colleagues have been taking photos left and right, you're bound to want to share photos. here's one i took personally. this is the place i love here the most:

nice no? sometimes i wonder if they're real or not. i refuse to post a pic in front of these beauties though. at least, not yet. kailangan planado. i don't want some tourist looking photo.

well speaking of pinoy colleagues, i had a fun, fun, fun manny pacquiao weekend since all of us pinoys in the company decided to watch the fight in just one apartment:

i wore my elorde shirt to the fight. haha. i miss boxing! waah!

thanks to budget airlines, i'll be flying back home on december 27 and will stay until january 4! woohoo!