Yes for Friday

Yes, I am at work blogging.
Yes, I have nothing substantial to say.
Yes, I appreciate + love my father [aka 'Tatay'].
Yes, I am so glad it is Friday.

Yes, this is another ONE [Obligatory Niece Entry].


"Faces + Gestures", 16 May 2k5
Photos courtesy of my brother

I work in a bakery?

Observation of the day.There is a guy here at the office who has a bread maker underneath his desk in his cubicle. It's kind of unusual. Normally, one would see a compact refridgerator or a microwave in fellow workmates' cubes. Every week, he bakes bread in the morning + lets everyone know, "Hey there's bread here if anyone wants some." I have yet to try this officemade bread [I would have said 'homemade' in any other case]. If you didn't know, I just *love* bread + other types of bread products. I would love to visit the little bake shoppes [yes, I did just spell it that way] in France + Italy one day. It kills me each time I walk into the office + it smells as if I am walking right into a bakery. Mmm.

my [Satur]day

Joshua was gone from 7 to 7 working his second job, so I had the house all to myself for most of the day. Got to sleep in until Av called me around noon about TLC's Trading Spaces because they were redecorating apartments in DC. Hmm. So, I warmed up some leftover spaghetti, got my vitamins + a Coke, then sat myself down in front of the tv to finally watch the Phantom of the Opera DVD that I borrowed from my mom. I somehow got distracted 45 minutes into the movie, pressed pause, + found myself in front of my laptop checking my email. Wrote my wedding photographer to remind him to give me my negatives, + then went on to other things that everday people do on the net. Nothing really eventful. Just a somewhat sort of lazy Saturday. I like those kind of Saturdays--like today. Seems me + J are always going + going, never having time to lazy around. He gets so tired from working all the time--the workaholic--we both talk about slowing our schedule down, but it's a bit difficult in making it happen.

Anyway, back to the movie. Oh yeh, I think I went to check the net to see who played the phantom because he looked awfully familiar. It was hard to tell since he was half-covered. When I looked him up on good ole' IMDb.com, I found that he worked alongside Angelina Jolie in Tomb Raider, which is how I recognized him. So, I sit back down on the couch to continue my movie. It was sad. I never quite knew the story of the Phantom of the Opera, so it was cool to finally see it. I can't say I'm a big fan of musicals though. I liked Moulin Rouge, but I guess that can be an exception, hehe. Sorry. It's late + I'm rambling.

After the movie, I began to sift through my boxes of stuff from SCAD that I never went through all those years after coming home. Now that I've moved out, I really need to make an effort to get rid of things I don't need, keep things that are essential, + donate whatever's usable. I've been doing that on + off since the wedding + it's been tough trying to finish that off with our non-stop schedules. I'm trying to at least take everything out of the boxes + then organize each thing into categories, so that it's easier to figure what goes where. Still more to do with all that. Still need to write up those wedding thank you cards, too. Grr. I also made a list of what we need to buy at the grocery store + what needs to be done for our day tomorrow. Yes, I do love making lists.

Soonafter, J came home. He was so tired. We needed to go grocery shopping tomorrow after church, so there was not much in the kitchen to work with for dinner besides leftovers. Leftovers that were all made of pasta. We weren't in the mood for anymore of that, so we decided to go out to China Wok for some good chinese food. General Tso's chicken, beef + broccoli, white rice, hot + sour soup, + some eggrolls. Gooood stuff made by good people. The chairs were upside-down on the tables giving us the impression that they were closed, though the sign was brightly lit to "OPEN". We asked them if we could dine in + they were cool with it. We saw so many types of people come in + out of the restaurant. We saw even more people make a pit stop into the liquor store next door. J said it seems they were getting more business than China Wok tonight. Depends on what you like, I guess.

Next thing you know, we are back at home + J crashes on the couch. I ask him if he wanted to watch a DVD + he said maybe after he rests his eyes for a few minutes. A few minutes turned into an hour. Whille he napped, I pulled out my resurfaced big black binder from college filled with tabbed notes of mainly Smashing Pumpkins songs + others like Tripping Daisy, Weezer, U2, + Temple of the Dog. Ah, those were the days. This binder dated back to 1996! Whenever I would learn how to play a song, I would put a check mark on that page + a date on when I learned it. I found that I had to relearn some of those checked off songs because it's been ages since I made the time to play my guitar. "Disarm", "In the Arms of Sleep", "Goodnight", "Beautiful", "We Only Come Out at Night", "One", "All I Want is You", were all coming back to my freshly pained + calloused fingertips. It's the kind of pain that you feel good about, like you just accomplished something worthwhile. Two hours of just that kind of made my night. Alright, time for bed.

Don't know if any of this will make sense in the morning. "Goodnight, my love, to every hour of every day. Goodnight always, to all that's pure that's in your heart." Playing my guitar again makes me feel like I'm back in my college days, back when time didn't move as fast.

*Big entry* : West End Village Trip

Hello to all reading.
Here is my long overdue post about my trip to West End Village in Grand Bahama Island, which took place about a month ago from April 30 to May 8. We traveled there by boat. On our departure to the island, the wave report said "2-4 foot waves". The waves got up to 4-6 feet average height during the trip. The worse got up to 8-10 foot waves. 14 out of 18 of our group members got *sick* + saw our breakfast right before us straight into potpourri-scented black garbage bags. But, on a lighter note, we all managed to survive the 4.5 hour trip that was only supposed to take 2.5 hours! ^_^

To read my previous post about the trip, click this.

* Note: Hold mouse over each photo for photo description.


During our stay, we were housed in the recreational building of St. Mary Magdelene's Anglican Church in West End. It was situated right beside the church + mere steps away from the sea. Our group was in the care of two lovely ladies with great smiles by the names of Betty + Jewel. They prepared + cooked us food in the morning, noon, + night--except, of course, on Sunday morning before we left because they were at church service. Church is highly regarded in the village of West End. They take it seriously + dress up in their Sunday best each Sunday, so we've heard. We even attended service with them twice during the week.






Our group was also in the care of Ronnie, who drove us wherever we needed to be in the St. Mary's church bus. He also served as an awesome tour guide, telling us funny + interesting stories about certain people + areas of the village. Each place had their own little story to tell + Ronnie was our own personal narrator. He showed us how the fishermen of West End take the mollusk out of the conch shell + described each part of the body--it was our first lesson in conch biology! Conch is their main commodity on the island. They have many types of recipes for conch--in the manner of Bubba from Forrest Gump--they have fried conch, conch salad, conch fritters, even conch burgers! Delicious.






Our project of focus during our trip was to *build*, not repair, a government triplex in preparation to house the elderly situated in just walking distance from the ocean. The concrete foundation + framework had already been completed by contruction workers from the area, but they have done a very poor job on it. The foundation was not level + most of the studs were misaligned or warped from the weather. Now, none but two or three from our team of 18 people had construction experience to help lead the rest of us. So, this was a challenge in itself. Most of us were learning how to drywall + install hurricane clips on the frame of the roof for the first time. It was definitely a challenge that we all took upon ourselves with lots of patience, sweat, + hope. Everyone in our team remained to be very encouraging throughout our work days at the site by playing inspiring music on the sound system + singing aloud to the top of our voices. One of the perks of working at the site was being able to take a break from working + to gaze out to the beautiful sparkling bleu-green sea, which was within sight from the porch of the triplex.








Aside from working on the construction site, some of us from the team had the opportunity to organize a few programs for the local kids of West End during the week. These kids loved attention, so it was a real treat to hang out with them several times. On one afternoon, some of us retreated from the site early in the day to get back to the recreational building where we stayed to prepare our program for the kids, who ranged from ages 6 to 14. It involved bible story-telling [the story of Job] with a volunteer to act out certain parts of the story, as well as singing, arts + crafts, + a time of reflection to have the kids offer their stories, feelings, + experiences before, during, + after the hurricanes. Most of the kids said that they felt "bad" or "sad" after the hurricanes because Frances + Jeanne took their schools + things away. At the end of our program, we created a circle around the kids + said a prayer for them + their families.







One other afternoon, me + a few from my group by the names of Katy, Kelsey, Vickie, Jessica, Keishaun, + Derrick went to the local school to hold recreational activities with a first grade class. This involved face painting, making necklaces + bracelets, outside games, + lots of picture taking! These kids were so awesome--a couple of kids even recognized me from the program we held back at the church. Katy organized the kids + also lead the games with them; Jessica, Keishaun, + Kelsey painted faces, while Derrick + Vickie helped the kids with assembling necklaces + bracelets. I stayed back to document our time there, but believe me, this did not stop the kids from interacting with me. They would notice me taking photos of them, then come up to me + ask, or rather, *tell* me to take their picture. These kids, for their age, were surprisingly very familiar with digital cameras. After each photo was taken, they would say to me repeatedly, "Let me see! Let me see!" + reach for the preview screen on the back of my camera. Then, one boy asked me if he can take a picture with my camera. So, I knelt down, held the camera in front of him, + told him to aim + click. A few kids began to catch on to this new "game" + before you know it, they were next in line in front of me, asking, "Can I take a picture, too!?" Just hilarious.








Lead by Miss Katy, all of us headed outside for some fun games. When I got there, there were little boys already playing basketball, while a bunch of them were pushing behind broken upside-down classroom chairs up + down the pavement as if they were driving tiny sports cars. Kids really have awesome imaginations. Katy huddled the rest of the kids into a circle telling a story through song + hand motions with the kids copying everything she did. Then, it was time to head back in for the kids to go home. Katy gathered all the kids into a straight line + lead them back inside. I had such a fun time at the school!





I believe we helped to lift some spirits just by offering friendly conversation with the people we met + by giving someone a nice hug. It was such an awesome experience to be a part of. If all the cards fell into place again, I would definitely make another trip out there to help the people of West End or some other disaster relief trip in another country.

Downtime
Here are some photos taken during our relax time at Old Bahama Bay [the resort area of Grand Bahama Island] after we were done working at the site. We got to visit the resort at least twice--once for snorkeling [my first time!] + Junkanoo [the island's version of Mardi Gras] + twice for dinner on our last night there.







All photos were taken with my Nikon CoolPix 995 digital camera except "05-0507_enguardkatkaty.jpg", which was taken by Kelsey Linduff.