I jumped to one event to another just within Makati but I needed to drive because my street parking meter is running down and my car would be towed away if I didn’t move it. Anyway, I was able to accomplish two missions.

I attended an early Christmas party yesterday, too. Corporate Christmas parties start early because once you get past Bonifacio Day, it will be hell on earth. Next week will be carmageddon. Well, Christmas rush super heavy jumbo traffic has already started. No one will be happy to attend Christmas parties by mid-December, a time when everybody will be spending 5 hours stuck on the road.

Then I won a PS5. It was a super random raffle draw and it was funny because I’m lucky when it comes to things like this. Several Christmases ago, I won an iPhone 13 or something. When they were drawing the names, I told Twin I to do a raindance to drive luck our way. Lo and behold, we did win! I sold that phone and bought a new Panasonic fridge instead.

But this time, I am keeping the PS5 because my girls are old enough for this. Plus they can now control themselves; they know they can’t skip studying and doing homework just to play games.

I would have wanted a Nintendo because their games are more my jam but of course, a PS5 is also welcome. Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, Sonic, God of War Ragnarok… A long time ago I had my PSP loaded with Diablo but nooooo, it’s not for me. My carpal tunnel syndrome worsened with God of War back then so I sold everything to my brother—including all the games I had loaded it with (bought from Greenhills).

This time I have a more ergonomic controller and have a higher capacity box. But the PS5 extra controller and games themselves are expensive though… 😅

I was already in the Rockwell area (I edited stories while in their sort of food court) so might as well do my Christmas shopping for things I wasn’t able to get online.

Mission accomplished.

I’ve been working my ass off since Monday and today was particularly rough. I got scolded again by my boss for raising a concern during a semi-townhall meeting because there seemed to be some miscommunication or misunderstanding on what we can or cannot do in terms of coverage. She told me it does not look good to raise that in public, I should have just raised it to her directly instead…

But the problem is she and I don’t really understand each other 🤦🏻‍♀️. It’s language barrier or I don’t know, there always seemed to be some kind of misunderstanding.

I should always remind myself to keep my mouth shut. Just do my work, forget about shitty stuff around me, then get paid. That’s it.

It’s Thanksgiving week in the US but I don’t give a rat’s ass about that. What I’m targeting is the Black Friday sales online. I don’t really do Cyber Monday sales because shipping electronics from the US to the Philippines is a lot of hassle. More or less I already have what I need and want when it comes to gadgets and whatnot.

Fashion accessories, however, are another matter. I just went crazy buying stuff online and I am now partially regretting my expensive purchases. How bad has it gotten? Well, I’m now included in the mailing lists of Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom, Saks Fifth Avenue, Saks on 5th, Bloomingdales, and even Macy’s. Oh, also Dillard’s. Why all these department stores? Because I was tracking down a particular style that has gone viral on social media, which is always sold out. When I finally was able to check out the item from my Neiman Marcus cart, my Philippine-issued credit card wouldn’t go through. I emailed Neiman Marcus several times, complaining about their technical glitches.

But long story short, I ended up buying another style from the brand’s official website. The same Philippine-issued credit card had no problem. 🙄

To assuage my guilt for having committed some unwise Black Friday-related financial decisions, I bought more ETF shares again. Good thing the share prices are lower than when I last purchased them, when I was racing to the bottom.

I should stop rewarding myself too much. 🥴

Is it only me who is not into content creation? Like everyone is doing all the social media content creation, trying to be an influencer or just plain feeding one’s vanity.

However, I do understand the content creators who do that for marketing their own businesses, like this amusing Aonsomrutai from Thailand. The character she created—as a socialite whose lavish shopping sprees are entertainment for the rest of us—is funny and you can’t really get angry or jealous of her because she is sweet. The funniest thing here is that she does her shopping in her own stores—but of course it’s not revealed in the skits (she owns luxury brand consignment shops in Thailand) as a way to promote her business. If you’re not aware of that fact, you would really believe that she buys out the entire stock of the stores she visits.

She is a brilliant marketer, that I have to say. She is lovely, too.

But you know, it seems like the all the people on social media are content creators in one way or another. I have not joined the bandwagon to create my brand, as some journalists are doing nowadays. I believe in the old fashioned mantra that journalists shouldn’t be the news, that we are messengers and not the message.

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Instead of spending for things that don’t add value in my life, I decided to go the National Gallery and see art on my day off instead.

And oh boy oh boy! 🤦🏻‍♀️ I should have brought my press ID from a long time ago because journalists are free! They give complimentary tickets to journalists, like in Europe. I could have saved SGD 20.

But it was all worth it in the end. I saw some Luna, Hidalgo, Amorsolo, Botong Francisco, Ang Kiukok, Anita Magsaysay-Ho, and HR Ocampo. There were very beautiful art from Indonesia, Myanmar, and Cambodia as well. The Southeast Asia exhibition art runs until March and it spans 14 galleries.

Then I saw a couple of Amorsolos.

I loved the paintings from Myanmar.

I also liked the ones from Cambodia and a few from Vietnam.

I liked Georgette Chen’s style that I bought one print of hers from the souvenir shop. I will have it framed along with the earlier prints I acquired last year.

Meanwhile, more Filipino artists were exhibited across several galleries. The one below is a mural by three artists. A rare collaboration.

There aren’t much from Malaysia—they only apeared in the latter galleries when the time period was modern/contemporary. Same with Thailand. It’s probably because there aren’t many in the hands of private collectors that were lent to the National Gallery of Singapore or they don’t allow art to be shipped out of the country.

I wish I had more time to browse and go to other galleries but I had to go back to Chinatown to eat. I was famished.

This is the reason why I booked a hotel in Chinatown even though the rooms are tiny. I want to have foot massages but not have to take the train anymore to return to my hotel. I find the old Chinese uncles to be the most effective in easing away my aches.

A lot of adults with adult money to throw around toys are queueing up to buy in-demand toys from Chinese toymaker Pop Mart. I had been seeing its pop-up stores in Bugis for years now but this is the only time I paid attention to it since people are going crazy with the company’s ugly monster character Labubu. They’re paying thousands of pesos for the stuffed toy that they made into bag charms. This trend started with Lisa from the K-Pop group Black Pink.

As a special request from my bff, I queued up yesterday to buy her some editions that are constantly sold out in Lazada and Shopee Philippines.

Since it was office hours and I was just killing time before my next meeting, I was able to grant her wish. Once I got inside the store, we video called so she can see the merchandise. She was so excited to see the blind boxes that she couldn’t get her hands on back home.

She is so thrilled. While I don’t get the craze with Pop Mart, I understand the love for toys or merchandise from your favorite characters. I go nuts for Studio Ghibli Stuff and I search for them in places where I know they’re popular, such as Taiwan, and of course Japan. I used to have a Studio Ghibli shrine in our old apartment in QC just by the stairs top landing.

Speaking of bags, my mom requested me to buy her bags in Singapore that she will gift the staff at the agency she’s working with. Yes, she has retired from the university but she is still working as a scientist for the DOST. So anyway, I went to Charles & Keith in Marina Bay Sands because they have a bigger store there compared to Suntec. Plus I wanted to go to the Studio Ghibli exhibit at MBS.

While I personally don’t buy C&K (because they’re PU leather and don’t last like real leather does), I can say I didn’t do bad with my purchases. Yes, there are C&K stores in Manila but I wanted to make my mom feel special by exerting effort and buying what she wanted in Singapore. Plus the new styles is SG may not yet be in Manila. The purchases are complete with dust bags and one is in a box. I asked for three paper bags so my mom doesn’t have to wrap these gifts.

I was so busy jumping from one place to another that I wasn’t able to find time to visit this. I wasn’t able to buy tickets ahead of time since I didn’t know when I would be able to squeeze this in. 😭 I’m sooooo sad. I wanted to cry at the concierge.

I wasn’t able to visit the Studio Ghibli Museum in Tokyo the last time I was there because ticket purchases had to be made way ahead, like a month or so. And you can’t buy it online from abroad; you need a friend in Japan to do that for you.

The best substitute was Donguri Republic in Taipei, which I was able to visit in 2016.

Anyway, gotta prepare for three four meetings today. 🫠

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I’M SO EXHAUSTED.

I skipped a networking meeting because my social battery is already depleted. If I were to meet this VIP later, I need to recharge. I’m just sitting here at Fullerton Hotel, waiting for the world to swallow me whole. It’s raining so I’m stuck.

I’m just so tired.

I’m super hyper caffeinated that I only had about 4 hrs of sleep.