Sunday, January 4, 2015

Singles' Camp '14 | DAY 3

Bittersweet third day. It's when it dawns on you that the last day is nearing and you felt like you haven't gotten in the zone yet. And it's also the day when you finally get the hang of everything and almost everyone (for me at least) and yet the camp is almost over. Noooooo!

The start of the day embraced me with cold Baguio morning mist and it was just aaaaahhhh brrrr! Ptr. Rex Dela Pena gave the talk for the day where he talked about the meaning of this year's theme "Level Up!" Some defined leveling up as a way of becoming a better version of yourself everyday, in other term... change. But Ptr. Rex pointed out that it's not about you making a constant change in your life whereas it's about you walking in your destiny. However, for us to level up, we have to have the idea of where we're supposed to go. But before that, we have to assess where we are up to this point in our lives and assess in what particular areas of our lives we want to level up. With that, we'll have growing awareness of who we are.

To fully grasp the idea of assessing where we are right now before we level up, Ptr. Rex made us take the "Myers Briggs Test Indicator". It's a test that lets us know more about ourselves, where we're coming from, and understanding the differences of everyone. Everyone had different types of personalities and the meanings of the personalities really justified everyone's personalities. I've really gotten to know myself more. It turns out I'm an INTJ (Introversion/Intuition/Thinking/Judging) and I'm the same as John and Solomon. 

The whole afternoon was up to our hands. We can gala all over Baguio for 5 hours. So I fought lethargy after lunch and went with Arvie, Kerri, Chloe, Dandan and Luigi for some Baguio explorin'. Usually, when I'm at Baguio, I go to the typical crowded tourist spots like Burnham Park, Mines View Park or Wright Park. Ayoko talaga mag-park. Char hahaha. But this trip took a turn, we first went to the Old Diplomat Hotel. It was legit old. I didn't care much of the history of it (haha typical me) but as I looked at the old photos from the hotel, some serious Dominicans lived there and eventually built a school in it. And the rest was history hahaha. Me going to that place was unusual because for starters I'm very duwag but I find it cool anyways. It was such a bummer that we didn't get to the second floor of the hotel. Manong guard wouldn't let us in for some reason. 

We decided to go to Bencab Museum instead and after an hour of Baguio traffic, we got to the museum only to find out it was closed. -_- We shrugged it off and went to Ketchup community to eat a decent meal and surprise surprise... they closed out early that day. Hoooo patience! Just across Ketchup, Arvie and I did our annual horseback-riding photo. Since we're on the back of the horse already, we became a typical Baguio turista and slowly made the horse go for rounds. It wasn't fun. Haha. We capped the trip off with a Volante's pizza topped with the hottest hot sauce.

Just in time for the dance night. :) Oh, you know how it goes.

After the dance night, my tummy felt funny and I was curling up in pain but that didn't hinder me to have a late dinner @ 50's Diner. 

Ptr. Rex discussing how to understand differences

How do you level up?

After lunch heart to heart with Cha

After almost an hour cab drive... we're here!

Diplomat Hotel

Greens

Wooooo

Heritage and Nature Park

Fog and flowers

Lumot

Photo Gallery

So old so cool

Okay lang kahit hindi mo kami pinapasok, manong Guard T_T

Byuriful

By the flowers and the tank

By the fountain of plants

:D

Dan? :D

Smiling in this photo wouldn't justify the place

Girls x 10 Commandments

Volante

Mmm mmm!

No pretensions. It was really hot

:P~

Horse poop group

11 years later :)

Dance night!

Kinect dance competition

Kuya Andoi gives the best dance!

After dance night

As if it's not cold enough... ice cream!

50's Diner!

With my pretty curly bbf 

Whaa

50's buddies

Love the 50's vibes

Pink lighting with Ayin ;)

Singles' Camp '14 | DAY 2

Woke up the second day feeling very poorly. It must've been the lack of sleep and anxiety, but I pep talk myself to not care too much of how poorly I feel and pray for it to go away. The day started off with the first talk by Ptr. Audie Santibanez. The main focus of the message is how God is relational and His image revolves around relationship itself. He pointed out that it's normal to feel the need to love and be loved. So in order to fill the gap of feeling unloved, one must know the five love languages. 

Let me walk you through the 5 love languages (char)... 
1. Words of Affirmation - when someone finds it easy to express appreciation and fluently speaks the 4 dialects (words of appreciation, words of encouragement, words of praise and kind words)
2. Gifts - when someone deliberately give gifts without saying, "I will give you if you will..."
3. Acts of Service - when someone gives service not out of fear but out of choice
4. Quality Time - when someone enjoy togetherness in general and loves to share the emotional connection.
5. Physical Touch - when someone believes that touches will speak louder than words

Everyone took the love language test and found out what love language fit their personality and what love language they prefer to receive from other people for them to feel loved. :)

The afternoon activity brought out the kakornihan in us. Groups of 3 were formed and were told to come up with any kind of joke and try to be a comedian for a minute in front of everyone. My group came up with a pick-up line that'll gross out the people. After the jokes were pulled off, we're told to come up with any story that we could think of. Some stories told were inspirational, situational, scary, and nonsensical. Hahaha but that's the fun of it.

As usual with camps, bonfire night is a must. But it's not about singing songs while sat on a log or sharing scary stories (ha ha typical bonfire night in movies). It's the time when we just talk about life in general. The topics went from what type of bird do you want to be to the non-negotiable aspects when you're looking for a life partner. I haven't thought of that until that night. Should I be concerned? Should I foresee na ba what my married life would be like? Nyaaaa.

The night is young! Off to night market. For almost a decade of coming back in forth in Baguio, I've never gone to the so-called night market so I went to see it for myself and... woah. Hahaha. Edsa revolution? I even got to see my high school classmate which is so bizarre. Of all places, dun pa kami nagkita. Arbs, Kerr and I couldn't handle the night market anymore so we sat by some statue somewhere and talked about how our parents got married after 6 months of dating. Haha wala lang. And by the time we met up with the group again, we took a lot of photos at almost every spot. Then we came back at the hotel just in time to surprise ate Mariane. 

Ptr. Audie walking us through the 5 love languages

Love Language Test by Dr. Gary Chapman

Concentration ;)

Bibi, Gayle, ate Yo, ate Miles

Dandan, ano love language mo? ;)

Joke time!

Hotdogs on fire

Bonfire chat

Cooking hotdogs on bonfire is a struggle

Pikshur by the tree

Walang katao-tao

Baguio street foods

Felt bad for the one day old chic (odoc) but I ate it anyway

Binatog sweet version that I didn't like

@ Burnham Park

Woooohite house

Takutan group

Happy birthday, ate Marianne! :)

Friday, January 2, 2015

Singles' Camp '14 | DAY 1

Just about when the year is about to end, our church, Grace Communion International, conducts an annual conference for singles. Singles' camp doesn't exclude those who are already in a relationship, they are still considered singles as long as they're not yet married. Some may say "Singles' camp? Eh hindi na ko single eh." Haha single ka pa din, friend. When you passed the age of being a youth camper, you're officially a single (19-50 y.o)!

Anyhoo babaloo, this year's theme is LEVEL UP which totally lives up to the venue of the camp. Waaaay high up the mountains of Baguio! This year took a turn from last year's scorching sun from the beach. As you know, Baguio isn't that close from the metro so we had to leave the night before the actual first day of camp. And considering that December 26 is when people got over Christmas and decide to go back home, our journey to Baguio wasn't easy peasy. All 19 of us stood in line for bus going to Baguio for 4 hours. It wasn't that bad though, it could've gotten worse but it didn't. But I never felt so happy when we finally got in the bus. 

6 hours later, the Baguio breeze welcomed us rather shivery. We got to the hotel finding familiar faces from the camp last year, from youth camps way way back and from places thousand miles away. My weariness is inevitable, I had 2 hours of sleep and I had to poo (tmi hahaha). The camp kicks off with the orientation, discussing the house rules and the schedule, followed by an ice breaker that lets everyone interact with unfamiliar faces corresponding with the question "Anong New Year's resolution mo?" After which, we all headed to our rooms and regained energy for 2 seconds, then went straight to the first activity... the Yellow Trail. 

I was one of the first ones to arrive at the trail and while we wait for others, we played the famous "Birthday ni Tarzan.." and "Baka ng Baka". As the trail is about to start, having the groups formed and division of tasks cleared out, the protectors of the realm (GOT reference) stopped us and the rain decided to make pasikat. As soon as everything's sorted out, they decided to no longer have groups and go on the trail altogether instead. It was quite a short trail, but I really felt out of shape after. Hahaha. 

First day!

Tita Tess giving testimony about her experience in Singles' camp with our parents

All smiles :D

Ice breaker "Ano NY resolution mo?"

"Baka ng baka sa pilikmata ng baka!"

Before yellow trail

Team Nyep!

Supposed scavenger hunt

Patintero while waiting for the protector of the realm

Here we go!

Litol ants

Hoooo! Hingal? No.

Yellow trail aftermath

Abbey road charr

Late night talks with Kerr

C Boutique Hotel