Welcome to Hotel Ter Driezen in the charming little town of Turnhout, Belgium.
I actually forgot to take a photo of the facade of this four-star hotel so I had to resort to grabbing the above photo from their website. Don’t you just love small European hotels? They’re so understated and quaint.
Let’s step inside into the foyer, shall we?
The hotel building, dating back to the 18th century, is steeped in history. Prior to being converted into a hotel, it used to be the official residence of the town mayor.
If not for the engraving, I’d have thought the heavy brass key holder dates back from the 18th century, as well…
Today you turn 10. The little girl who used to say ‘min’ when she meant ‘moon’, ‘ibat‘ when she meant ‘ubat‘ (medicine), ‘yoyo’ when she meant ‘susu‘ (milk). The little girl who has always spoken with a decidedly American twang in a land where British English is the norm. The little girl who got mortified when I remarked “We should start planning the colour scheme for your wedding” a couple of months ago while driving past someone else’s wedding party (her reply: “Not for another 15 years!”). The little girl who eerily resembled me when I was young.
B&W pic of me, circa 1972. Coloured pic of OnlyGirl, circa 2002
Happy birthday, Princess! I know all you’ve ever wanted was a sister to play with, the one thing that’s, unfortunately, beyond my power.
But what I can give you is a heart overflowing with love, a shoulder to lean on and cry on, ears always ready to listen to you, arms always wide open to hug you and to cradle your own babies one day, hands to hold yours for as long as you’d like to hold on and to let go when you are ready to face the world on your own.
Mahal na mahal na mahal kita. (I love you very, very, very much.) Always have. Always will.
Your Mama
Tags: OnlyGirl
Today marks my release from the prison cell that is my bedroom.
When I was in quarantine, my only windows to the world were my mobile phone and my laptop. Only then did I realise just how much it means to a person who is all alone — especially when ill — to have someone say “get well soon” “hope you’re feeling better” “how are you today?” be it by email, SMS, or blog/Twitter/Facebook comment. It may have been a small gesture on your part, perhaps a passing thought typed at the spur of the moment. But it meant the world to me when I was feeling down and lonely.
Inasmuch as this experience made me appreciate those friends all the more, it also made me wonder about the others. Why didn’t they say anything? Does the thought of swine flu disgust them? Was it a simple matter of them not checking Facebook as often as I do? Or was it a case of not knowing what to say to me or feeling too embarrassed to say it? Because as far as I know, online communication has taken away the usual awkwardness from face-to-face situations. And you have more time to think of what to type. You can edit, delete, rewrite everything umpteen times until it sounds just right and you can finally hit ‘Send’.
However, rather than feeling bad about it and writing off those people from my list of ‘real’ friends, I did the complete opposite: I surprised friends whom I haven’t seen or talked to in years with short notes saying how happy I am to have known them. I wrote about my best memories of them. I thanked them for the small favours they’ve done for me in the past which made an impact in my life. I apologised for the little things I’ve said and done that may have hurt them, those little things that I’d take back if only I could.
I did put a little P.S. to each note stating that I’m not dying of any terminal disease or anything. I told them: why should I wait for a special occasion to say all these things?
And you know what? The response was just overwhelming. It’s amazing how much you get back when you give, no matter how little.
So reach out and touch someone today. Reconnect with people whom you haven’t talked to in a long time. You’ll find that it may just be the best thing you’ve done in a long, long time.
It began as an experiment. When New York times technology columnist David Pogue was giving a talk in Las Vegas, he thought of giving a little demonstration of how Twitter works to his audience. So he sent out a tweet: “Give me a cure for hiccups…right now!” Within seconds, the answers came pouring in. Later that night, Pogue was mulling about the limitation of Twitter, i.e. he gets all these amazing responses but he’s the only one who can see them unless he retweets them. When he mentioned this to his wife, she suggested that he ask a question every night and then publish the best answers in a book. And that is how “The World According To Twitter” was born.
Henceforth, the collaborative ‘writing’ process began. Everyday, Pogue would ask his followers a question. Simple things like “What’s your strangest habit?” “What was your greatest achievement (besides your kids)?” “Describe your Most. Embarrassing. Moment. Ever.” Occasionally, he’d ask people to caption some photographs. Sometimes he’d ask people to make up puns or think of sequels to famous movies or summarise a book in 140 characters (the Tweet limit).
Pogue would be online around 11pm his time so that he could catch “the night-owls on the East Coast, after-dinner tweets on the West Coast, and maybe even some early risers in Europe.” The schedule worked out just fine for me because that’s right about lunch time in Malaysia.
It was amazing how fast the answers would come in. Pogue re-tweets 5, sometimes 10, of the best answers and they’d come in at lightning speed. I was dumbstruck with the quality of the responses — clever, witty, funny. Of course, it was also frustrating not seeing any of my tweets being re-tweeted.
Towards the end, Pogue provided a link to the complete list of all the questions so that people could still tweet their responses to any of those questions.
From this you can deduce that “The World According to Twitter” is not a book about Twitter nor is it about the world. Basically, it’s just a compilation of all the best answers — 2,524 from the original 25,000+ responses — to the 95 questions that Pogue threw out to his followers. Now don’t get me wrong here. When I say “just a compilation”, I mean it literally. I’m not putting down the book in any way. As a matter of fact, the book is a lot of fun to read. The responses are hilarious, ingenious, out of the box. Just take a look at these examples:-
Add 1 letter to famous person’s name; explain.
- Elvish Presley: Middle Earth’s latest rock sensation @alitheiapsis
- Hands Christian Andersen: Touchy-feely children’s writer @eboychik
- Malcolm XY: Civil-rights activist, definitely male @pixelshot
Take a common abbreviation and tell us what it *really* stands for.
- NATO: Newly Antiquated Tsk-Tsk Organization @danblondell
- DELTA: Don’t Expect Luggage To Arrive @tatopuig
- NASA: Nerds Are So Awesome @pumpkinshirt
Make up a greeting card for a modern situation.
- Saw the video of you on YouTube. I still love you. @MyCatIsOnFire
- To my Tweetheart on our anniversary. After all these years, you still make me say OMG. @mattboom
- I realized what happened when I heard that fateful moan.
I’m really, really sorry that the toilet claimed your phone. @scotthartman
There are also heartfelt answers, poignant regrets, sound advice, sad stories.
Who’s got the worst romantic-dumping story?
- Me, posed in lingerie, sexy music, candlelight, come-hither look…husband walks in, rolls eyes, says “Not again!” and walks out. @shelleyryan
- My girlfriend was showing me an appointment book she got for Xmas. Scheduled in for that day was, “Break up with Jay.” Guess my name. @jadawa
- Facebook Newsfeed: My girlfriend’s status was now listed as single. @JHKramerica
What’s your greatest regret?
- Hurting my dad during my rebellious teenage years. He didn’t deserve the hell I put him through. @fanfrkntastic
- Thinking I’d have a second chance to give my big brother a real goodbye hug. @MrsRoadshow
- I regret all the time I wasted regretting. Wise advice: You made the best decision you could with the information you had at the time. @susanchamplin
What’s the best advice your parents ever gave you?
- Life is not a dress rehearsal. Live it as if it’s your only take. @jcordeira
- Always shine the back of your shoes. It’s the last thing they’ll see as you walk away. @PeterWeisz
- Nothing is free in this world. Everything will be paid for at some point. @coolcatplayer
The book is entertaining and is an easy read. It’s perfect for people with short attention spans or those who dislike reading because the ‘chapters’ are short and the responses are all limited to 140 characters. You can open the book at any page and start reading. (I do, however, recommend that you read Pogue’s introduction on page 9, just to understand Twitter and the background story better.) You’d be surprised at how difficult it can be to put the book down once you start reading it. And I’m sure you will find yourself laughing out loud several times.
My only grouse is that many of the items are too US-centric. You’d have to be American, familiar with American culture and/or up-to-date with American news and history in order to understand them. This makes the book title kinda inappropriate for its content.
Disclosure:
I’ve written the above review as objectively as I could. Whether or not one of my tweets got printed in that book, I still would have written the above review.
However, I feel obliged to disclose to you that one of my tweets did make it to the book even though none of my contributions ever got re-tweeted. One fine day, I just received a DM (direct message) from Pogue that my tweet on my greatest regret in life got shortlisted for the book. In exchange for my permission to have it included in the book, I was promised a free copy, personally autographed by Pogue, whether or not my tweet got included in the final edit. I clicked on ‘Agree’ and a few months later, I got my free copy by mail, duly autographed: “For Mimi – Thanks co-author! – David Pogue”
Click on the thumbnails to see larger images:-
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| Book cover | Pogue’s autograph | My contribution |
Tags: reviews
Image from Kirtas.com
For years I have been haunted by images of places and people and things that I haven’t been able to take photos of, either because I didn’t have a camera at that time or because circumstances prevented me from taking them. Here is the list of the 10 photos I wish I’ve taken, arranged in chronological order.
1. The night sky, late 1980s, in the outskirts of General Santos City, Philippines. I grew up in a city originally called Dadiangas, later renamed to General Santos City or GenSan, for short. In the late 1980s, we lived briefly in a place called Tambler, located just outside GenSan (now close to the new aiport). In those days, GenSan was not so developed yet. There were not many buildings and not many lights, thus the night sky was always dark, providing the perfect backdrop for thousands of stars to shimmer and twinkle until dawn. That nightly star-studded canopy always seemed so bright and so vast, marking an indelible spot in my memory.
2. Mayon Volcano, early 1990s, from a Philtranco bus in Legazpi City, Philippines. My roommate Hazel and I were both impoverished college students who couldn’t afford plane fares to go back home for Christmas break. So we took the bus from Pasay City all the way to Davao City. What an unforgettable 48-hour bus ride it was! From Pasay City, the bus wound its way towards the south of Luzon, stopping briefly at Legazpi City to refuel, giving us, passengers, a chance to admire the world’s most perfect cone-shaped volcano, Mt. Mayon, while the bus driver’s assistant cranked away at an old manual petrol pump!
3. San Juanico Bridge, early 1990s, from the same Philtranco bus, but between the islands of Samar and Leyte. The ferry from Sorsogon, brought us to the island of Samar, joined to its neighbouring island, Leyte by the famous San Juanico Bridge. San Juanico Bridge, formerly known as Marcos Bridge (named after the ousted former President), is the longest bridge in the Philippines spanning a body of water with a length of 2.16 kilometers (1.34 miles). The Philippine government spent $21 million on that bridge just because Former First Lady Imelda Marcos hails from Leyte. The sheer length of the bridge was quite a sight. How I wish I had a camera back then!
4. A moonlight beach, early 1990’s, from the same Philtranco bus, somewhere in Samar or Leyte. We passed by Samar and Leyte at night and most everyone was asleep. Somewhere in those two islands, I woke up and glanced out the window and saw the most beautiful moonlight beach I’ve ever seen in my whole life. Its beauty haunts me to this day.
5. Waterfalls, late 1990s, near Interlaken, Switzerland. DH and I took the train from Geneva to the town of Interlaken. The train ride involved several stops. One stop just outside Interlaken was in a small town with a magnificent waterfall cascading from a rocky cliff in the distance. It literally look my breath away.
6. Great Ocean Road, late 1990s, Melbourne, Australia. DH and I were flying back to Malaysia only in the evening. Our hotel required check-out at 12 noon and rather than paying them for a late check-out, we decided to rent a car and drive as far as we can get along the Great Ocean Road, then drive directly to the airport where we could drop off the rented car and catch our flight. It was totally worth it! The view of the ocean pounding against the cliffs, set against a magnificent sky, stretching out along a winding road was a sight that can never be forgotten. I did take photographs but I didn’t back them up. The only copies I had were in my old laptop which got stolen from the house. Bummer!
7. Marine Park with two giant tadpoles, 1999, Pulau Redang (Redang Island), Malaysia. We were on holiday with our Omani friends. I was 5 months pregnant with OnlyGirl and had no plans of going into the water. When we reached the marine park, I was flabbergasted to see that one only has to go down a small flight of stairs from the jetty to get into the water and frolic with the fish. So I decided right there and then to go snorkelling, as well. I asked for a life jacket and went into the water with my equally pregnant friend (she was 7 months pregnant!). What a sight we must have made — two giant tadpoles swimming among and feeding by hand beautiful tropical fish of every colour of the rainbow!
8. Tribal headdress and laptop, early 2000s, Schiphol Airport, Amsterdam. DH and I were practically running to catch our connecting flight to Geneva. On the way to our gate, we passed by one waiting area which was teeming with people waiting for their flights. One man easily stood out of the crowd — he was a tall black man wearing what seemed like African tribal headgear and he was sitting on his chair…typing away on his laptop! Who says tradition and technology can’t go together?
9. Piglets, 2005, ferry from Kapatagan to Ozamiz City, Philippines. In 2005, I went to the Philippines with Lola (my mum), MyEldest, OnlyGirl and RoundBoy. We went to several places and traveled several times by plane, by bus and by boat. The ferry ride from Kapatagan to Ozamiz was a short one but it was made unforgettable by the sight of several men carrying by hand banana trunks tied up with strings, with what looked like fat sticks jutting out. It turned out that they were carrying piglets! Each piglet was covered with the sliced banana trunk to keep it cool as well as immobilised, with just the snouts, tails and legs showing at both ends.
10. Good Samaritan, 2008, Russin, Switzerland. DH and I wanted to try something new and decided on staying in a farm in a little French-speaking town called Russin, just outside Geneva. The train ride was short and a direct trip from Geneva Central Station. What I didn’t count on was the walk from Russin train station to the farmhouse that we’d be staying in. It meant an uphill climb between grape vineyards, quite a formidable task for two out-of-towners wearing suits and dragging one Samsonite bag each. A kind stranger in a red car stopped and insisted on sending us to the farm. He turned out to be the mayor of the town!
Tags: Travel
