Hi there! It's been a long while (again). What a shame I'm starting this blog with that phrase again. Ever since I started blogging, I always had the feel the need to post about particular events that don't usually occur in my life as a couch potato-slash-homebody individual. However, these days, for whatever reason, I'm losing that desire. For the most part, I'm just too tired or really not in the mood for anything other than eating and sleeping. It sucks losing that passion to do that one particular thing I've always enjoyed and never thought I would get tired of doing. But then again, it's maybe because I've found something else that now helps me in healing, that is K-pop or music. I don't want to start with it, for God knows how that would take me forever to finish having all these thoughts and admiration for my home (BTS) and my escape (SEVENTEEN). Looking back, I've never really imagined supporting them the way I do right now. My teenage self could've raised eyebrows at this adult girl who was completely smitten with twenty Korean men who didn't even know her existence.
Anyways, I haven't posted anything much for 2023. I'm glad that I was able to publish my 2022 wrapped blog, to sum up the previous year so that I can start writing about 2023. Unlike 2022, 2023 is more laid back for me(I think). It's maybe because the previous year has been so eventful that I chose not to be burdened by anything in 2023. I'd like to say it was a healing period too as I was too devastated by the loss of my grandmother in 2022. Moreover, adulting is already catching up on me and I'm not interested in doing anything anymore other than eat and sleep.
(Edit: I realized my 2023 wasn't as laid back as I thought it to be as I was scrolling through my gallery and realized that many things have actually occurred. So, I decided to post this year-end wrap-up thing into two parts)
Recalling how 2023 went by... To start the year, we celebrated the New Year like we always do. Here in the house, together with our immediate relatives, sing some videoke, have some drinks, eat much delicious food that we either prepared or bought, and chat while waiting for the new year to unfold. It's all happy and everything until we missed someone's presence--Lola's. It's been just a few months since we lost her during that time, and it's really during those delightful events when we missed her a little extra.
During this time I was still high in my PCD mood with the recent Be The Sun in Bulacan concert. I think I've already said enough about it on the blog that was intended for it, but honestly, it was probably the highlight of my 2022. Well, seeing The Script should be one of the best things too because I've been dreaming of seeing them perform live since I was a teenager. To strike that off my bucket list is something I felt so proud of. So my January was filled with more or less my PCD and some dine-out with friends and family.
February is probably the most uninteresting month of my 2023. I wasn't expecting anything anyway as a single person who's still looking for someone I can spend the rest of my Valentine's Day with. Honestly, there were days when I wanted to have someone but there were also days when I was contented with just being by myself. Somehow I'm also now being pressured to look for someone I want to be with since I'm already at that age when I'm supposed to marry and most of the people around my age were already there. I'm taking it that if there's truly someone out there who's meant for me, I'm letting the universe handle it. If the universe tells me I'm better off alone then so be it. But if there's someone you can refer me to, please do. (Ehem, Kim Seokjin, Kim Mingyu, Jeon Wonwoo)
Then comes my birth month--March! As usual, I didn't have any events prepared for my birthday. I'm used to celebrating it with family and closest friends by preparing food in the house so the other immediate family members could come over or eat out. This year, I had a series of celebrations with family and friends.
March 12, 2023, was when I celebrated my birthday with my family. It was my cousin Ella's birthday the next day too, so we decided to have a joint celebration. We actually do it almost every year since our birthdays are only a few days apart. It was also our barrio's feast that day, so we prepared a little more than usual.
March 15 is my actual birthday but since it falls on a Wednesday and I don't have significant plans for the day I chose to spend the day working. My officemates prepared decorations in my office area and gave me a cake and gifts. The decoration was pretty, styled with white and blue-colored balloons of different shades and pictures of my BTS and Seventeen. They know I would really love it. It's really heart-warming to receive those kinds of gifts that you know they hand-picked because you're interested in them. I feel like choosing gifts is somehow a difficult task these days as almost everything is accessible, most people can buy the small things that they want, and there's nothing more a gift-giver can afford to give. But for me, anything K-pop-related (BTS and Seventeen specifically), coffee, or anything sweet would do.
Also that day, my friends wanted to celebrate my day by having dinner in a rooftop restaurant around Binondo. We chatted, ordered our food, and took photos. A few moments later, they surprised me with a bouquet of flowers and a mini cake. I was so surprised because I really thought we'd just have our dinner.
Well, the next celebration isn't really a birthday celebration, but I met up with my long-distance friend who's been residing in the US last March 17, 2023. He wasn't really planning on being back here in the Philippines but things happened and he had to go so we took that chance to see each other. I was surprised when he brought me a cake as my birthday had already passed. We ate and have life updates even though we've been in touch through chat.
Then, to wrap up my 28th birthday celebration, me and my college friends went to Starbucks Santa Maria to have some coffee and catch up last March 20.
Next is the month of April, when we celebrated my mother's 60th birthday. We held it in our home and invited our relatives. We availed catering services, cooked some dishes for the food, and decorated our living room with hundreds of balloons that served as the photo area. Most of the guests came in at lunch, although some still went at dinner. Our house is not that big, not even the space around it but we tried to accommodate everyone. Our extended family is really extensive, we only invited our immediate relatives and my mother's closest friends but the number of people is already so many. My father was born in our homeplace, so are both of my grandparents and my great grandparents that's why most of our relatives were also living around in the same town. My mother, on the other hand, is a native of Occidental Mindoro which is hundreds of kilometers and nautical miles away but his brothers/my uncles' families were also residing in our hometown, hence, the huge number of people. The celebration was really simple but I think my mother enjoyed it.
The highlight of June 2023 was when our family went to my mother's province to celebrate my aunt's birthday. As mentioned earlier, my mother was born in Occidental Mindoro then she moved here with her brothers when given the opportunity. Anyway, her deceased eldest brother's wife / my aunt is also from a town in Occidental Mindoro. Last June, my aunt celebrated her 70th birthday and my cousins thought of a different way to celebrate it which is for us to go back to and visit their hometown. We were about 30 in the family who went on with the trip. We were crammed inside the 2 vans together with all our luggage. It was a first-time experience for us so everyone was elated. We first went to Batangas Port so we could ride a ferry going to Oriental Mindoro. It was around 4pm when we rode the ferry. It's a ship with 3 floors; the first floor is where the vehicles are parked, on the second floor are tables and chairs for the passengers, and on the third floor is the navigation dock and viewing deck. For the most part, we stayed at the viewing deck while taking pictures and watching the sunset.
After the ferry ride, we rode the van again to travel at Occidental Mindoro. We arrived at around 9pm, then first went to my cousin's home to have our dinner. After eating dinner, we went to our booked accommodation and were surprised because there was no electricity which has always been an issue for the entire province. Most of the places have generators for backup but then the staff said that their generator wasn't working at that time. We tried looking for other places that could accommodate us. The province isn't that much of a tourist destination so there were very few hotels and nothing much to choose from. We were forced to stay the night at a nearby hostel that looked more like a gruesome motel. They have a generator but the place is really awful, far from the usual hostels from other places here in the country. We tried to sleep even in that state and looked for other accommodations the next day.
June 24, 2023, is our Day 2 at Occi Mindoro. Most of us were up early to witness the sunrise at Aroma Beach which is just across the place where we stayed. It's a long stretch of gray-sand beach, and it's usually where the locals would go for some ocean breeze. Some of the family members went swimming while we waited for the breakfast that my cousins prepared. When they arrived, they put a small table on the shore and placed our food on a boodle set-up. It was kind of fun, nothing fancy but it's a new experience. After having our breakfast, my cousins decided that we should go look for another place to stay in. We looked around and figured that the first place where we booked was the best choice for us. It's also across the beach, there are more rooms and amenities and it's more family-friendly so we decided to go back there.
After settling our things on our accommodation, we prepared to go to my aunt's sister house for her birthday celebration. It's on a nearby town and just a couple of minutes away. My cousins and I first bought dishes for our lunch while other family members were already there. There was nothing really prepared for the celebration, except for our presence haha. We only planned to spend a couple of hours there but then they called almost every family member to gather because we were there, so we ended up
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