Three Impressive Videos for this week

If you have several minutes to kill and want to be impressed, please watch the videos below.

Azul Spa Massage

It's been several months since I've had my last massage and my back already has lots of "lamig" (Sorry, I don't know what it is in English). I then decided to try the most decent looking massage place near my place.

Azul Spa is located at GA Tower 1 which is right along EDSA. This is really accessible for me since I take the MRT on a daily basis going to and from work. The spa is small, I believe there's only space for 5 clients at a time. They do not have a restroom so if ever you need to pee, you will have to use the one by GA itself. They have a shower stall though if you want to take a shower first before the massage.

I had the 1 hour Azul Pure Touch which costs only P300. The massage really was one hour and there was no "es" offered so that's good.

Below are the other services they offer as well as the corresponding costs.

 

Olympic medalist Tom Daley comes out of the closet

In a surprising move, swimmer Tom Daley admitted he is gay through a video. Below is the video he posted on his Youtube page.

He is sooo cute and brave to publicly admit who he really is.

MMDA Bus Segregation - not effective?

Going from point A to point B along EDSA was pretty much easy, hail a bus with the correct signage and wait to get to your destination. Travel time varies from a couple of minutes to a couple of hours depending on the traffic. This is mainly caused by the large number of vehicles both private and public that ply EDSA on a daily basis.

photo taken from Google

Because of the congestion, a segregation scheme was implemented. This is basically just like the number coding that is already in effect on private vehicles. The only difference is that the segregation is not based on the last number on the plate but in a preplanned allotment of buses in three segments: these are Bus A, Bus B and Bus C. With this, specific buses can only load/unload passengers in assigned stops. Pretty simple right? This in effect should lessen travel times as the buses will only have limited stops. A very good plan if you ask me. The site of MMDA explains the "rules" in more detail.

This segregation has been in effect for almost a year now and initially, people are complaining about it. Some say that it is difficult for them because they have to go to certain stops just to ride a bus. Commuters initially had difficulties adjusting to this since again, they are used to just hailing a bus where ever they feel like it. I for one had no difficulty with this as the stops that will get me home and to where I work are both assigned to Bus B. I just had to look for a Bus B from Boni then get off at the Ayala stop.

Now why did I say that people are "initially" complaining about it? It's not because they got used to the system, but because the MMDA is not implementing this strictly. Buses could pick up passengers anywhere they want, same thing with unloading. I heard from the news before that the MMDA said that they cannot implement this segregation completely because they lack people. I find this reason absurd. Even if they only have one enforcer in every stop, it will be easy to enforce it. How? By giving tickets to all those buses that do not follow it. If the bus drivers know that the scheme is strictly being enforced, it won't matter of there is only one enforcer. They will adhere to it so that they won't be penalised. They can't say that the passengers want to get on/off anywhere they want since they have control in that situation, just close the door if they are not yet in the designated stop.

The MMDA is already looking into other means of decongesting EDSA like removing all the provincial buses that use it as there is still too much traffic. I believe that before they implement another plan, make sure that the first one they launched has actually been tested fully. They can't say that it is not working when we have barely felt it's presence.

Two First Times

It was June 30. My team planned to have the Strat Session while we have someone rendering OT for the Saturday shift.

Started with a game called Guestures. Team was divided into two: Lawits and Butas. Haha. I believe you guys can figure that out. Fortunately the Lawits won by a huge margin. After the ice breaker game we proceeded in the session proper.

Once it finished, I was really excited for our next activity. We were going to shoot live guns! I have already fired a gun before back in college (M16) and after graduation (a 45). So why am I still excited? Because I was about to try a shotgun! haha. My teammates have never fired a gun before so they chose the less caliber weapons naturally. We underwent a brief safety training course at the Commander Shooting Range before the actual shooting.

Photo op before the actual shooting

The girls took the first few shots as they were graciously assisted by the safety personnel. They were a bit nervous since they have no idea as to how strong the recoil is going to be. One of them actually took breaks after firing several rounds as she got tired lol.

Then came my turn. I was really excited and a bt nervous as well. I checked with the safety personnel if my posture was correct as well as how I was holding the gun. I was corrected a bit and I am glad I asked. Below are the pictures before and after the shooting.

This is not the correct posture. The butt of the shotgun should actually be touching your cheeks.

May not have been all on the X but if this was a human body, you'd still be dead

After firing real guns, the team decided to play laser tag. So from Cubao, we went to Centris walk in Quezon City. This was my Second first time for the day. We opted to go for the 15 minute package at Lazer Maxx since one teammate who has already tried it said that it was enough. Luckily for us, there was another group there waiting to play as well. So it was our team vs theirs. The place was not as big as I expected or even hoped but it was ok. 

After the 15 minutes, we saw the scores that we had for the game. Guess what, I was the top scorer! I shot the hell out of those macho guys! Kidding, most of the members on the other team were kids lol. Eventhough, I was still happy that I ranked number one.

We then decided to eat at Yabu. Most of my teammates haven't eaten there yet so they had no idea what to order yet. Luckily for me, I have eaten there quite a number of times already so I knew exactly what I will order. We were all mostly hungry from the day's activities so it was nice that most of the meals there had unlimited Japanese rice and cabbage for coleslaw. It was mostly me and my manager who took advantage of it though. We ended the afternoon with lots of laughs and fond memories.

So there you have it, my two first times. Care to share your first time? *wink*

Easy Payment

I have always been a PC guy and rarely have experience with Apple with regards to computers. But this changed when my mom bought an iMac late last year and my partner having a macbook pro. I have learned to appreciate it and would like to have one. One thing that limits from purchasing one was the price. So after some contemplation, I ended up buying a Samsung Series 5 Ultrabook instead.

Then I saw a tweet the other day from Power Mac Center and I got excited. Just imagine paying for 24 months at 0% insterest.

I then went yesterday to a Power Mac store and found out that all the stocks for the said promo has run out. All they have is the 6 months at 0% interest.


I just bought a Samsung Ultrabook a couple of weeks ago and I was pretty sad that I didn't wait a few more weeks before the price of the Macbook went down. If I would have known then I would have definitely waited. So now, I am planning to sell my Samsung so that I can buy the Macbook Pro through installment or upfront cash. With this, I would like to take the opportunity to post the add for the said Samsung Series 5 Ultrabook here. For those interested please feel free to message me.

Bad Experience in Loreland

On March 31, 2012, the IB Asia desk held our Strat Session. First part concluded in our office at 2 WSQ since two of our team members had a Saturday shift.

At around 12nn, we left for Rizal where the second part of our activity will be conducted. We arrived at Loreland Farm Resort a little after 2pm.  We were escorted to our room by Rovie Rosaldo, the personnel who assisted us with the reservations. When we got there, housekeeping personnel were still in the room fixing the beds, bathroom etc. They said that the previous occupants of the room checked out late so they didn’t have enough time to clean/arrange the room before we arrived. It didn’t matter to us so we decided to go inside the room anyway and choose which beds we will be sleeping on later that evening. We were relaxing for a bit since we were advised by Rovie that the facilitator of the team building activity will fetch us at around 3pm. A few minutes after 3pm, Rovie arrived with Steve Villareal who she introduced to us as the one who will be conducting the team building activity. We were then advised by Rovie to leave all of our stuff (that is not waterproof) in the room since it is raining and some activities will involve water. We obliged making sure that the windows are properly locked as well as the door. We also closed the curtains to avoid tempting passersby / anyone looking into the room.

The team building activity area was not near our room, we had to go on a 300 steps steep stairs to reach the area. The activity took around two and a half hours to finish. During the team building proper, all of us were always together as seen in the video shot by Patricia’s driver who was also always with us.

Right after the activity, we proceeded to hike back up the stairs. My manager was the first one in since most of us didn’t want to enter the room yet since we left the air conditioning on and we are all wet and cold. He then proceeded to shower. A teammate went inside as well to get Robert’s wallet since he had to buy a new pair of slippers since he broke his during the activity. When they went to the store, they realized that there was no money inside the wallet. Both went back to the room to check. It was at this point that Robert found out that aside from his money his iPhone4s and DSLR camera were missing. At this point all of us checked our belongings. A team member also lost money and my manager discovered that he lost his mobile phone and some cash as well.

Patricia reported the incident to the Loreland personnel, and after some time some personnel arrived to check with us as to what happened. We had to ask them to call the police for us as well to investigate. We believe it to be an inside job since the door was still locked when we arrived and all of our stuff are still in order. When the police officers were there, they never bothered to enter our room and just asked questions from the outside. It was at this time when my manager found out that his watch was also missing. Myself and another member of the team also discovered that our wrist watches were also missing.

We had to stay in the room from around 6pm to 9pm waiting for someone who has the authority from the resort to take action. We decided that we won’t be spending the night at this place so we packed up our things and left the room. We then proceeded to the admin office where the General Manager (Ryan Marinas) was supposed to talk to us. He then arrived together with two other personnel to talk to us. Bear in mind that we still haven’t eaten at this point and we had to ask them to bring us something to eat. The discussion ended with Loreland not taking ownership of what happened but instead mentioned that they will be conducting an investigation. This is after the GM mentioned that he can assure us that his personnel were not involved in this incident. He even mentioned that we should have declared our belongings or left them inside their safety deposit box at the admin office. We mentioned that we were advised by Rovie to leave our things in the room and we were never advised to declare anything nor leave our valuables inside a safety deposit box.

As of this writing Loreland had said that they have submitted their findings to the police and their next action will be based on the result of the investigation of the police.