ang pasko ay sumapit

team kiko christmas

i got the chance to see old friends at the team kiko christmas party last dec.17 at the brickhouse in guadalupe. i brought my mom along, as we were scheduled to go to the noel bazaar at the world trade center in pasay the following day. a lot has changed, i felt a bit lost, but i still love my team no end :)
with my mom

with lizel

catching up with sen.kiko

with ditas

with team kiko

how (not) to send a care package to iraq

christmas is coming up, and i feel really bad that gary has to spend the holidays in a war zone. we first got together during christmas three years ago, and this is our first christmas apart. so i thought, it's time for a care package!

i've sent him a few care packages in the past when he was in kentucky and korea (hey, now he's in kirkuk...there's a pattern here...) and there is no way i'm letting christmas pass without him getting something from me so i just jumped right in. i knew preparing the box could be pretty tricky, but i didn't know it was a hazard to one's mental well-being.

1. get the videos.
    before deployment, he asked me to make a video of me singing a song for him, something he can put on his mp3 player for viewing while he's away. i wasn't able to do it because, well, i didn't really want to. he's the only person who insists i have a talent for it. recording myself is like leaving an indelible track that may haunt me forever and i don't want that. he was making tampo about it when he left, so despite myself, and in the spirit of the holidays,i reunited with my jurassic acoustic guitar and recorded a song for him, and another one with a christmas message. i got my brother's baby, and i recorded a video of him too, which was even harder to do. dealing with babies and videos needs perfect timing i tell you. at the end of all the recordings, i suddenly realized the format was .avi, so i had to go online and check what types of video formats are compatible with his player. i then had to download a video converter, and if your computer has had no taste of a virus scan for the past two, three years, this can be totally infuriating. i was able to make them into .wmv after some agonizing hours, but having no special technical knowledge of sound/video editing, the timing of the audio to the video didn't match. oh well.

2. ready the dvds.
    gary's even more bored than i am. and he begged me to send him dvds to kill time. he bought a portable dvd player because our laptop's up for repair.

3. develop photos.
    i just figured gary and i didn't have hard copies of our pictures. who keeps 8x10s these days anyway? so i went through all our digital photos and had them printed for him. some were taken when we were still going out, one was during christmas, and then i added some photos of jepoy, our nephew/inaanak. i also put a framed picture of us...where i looked the nicest, of course :P

4. hoard pinoy foods.
    i stuffed my grocery cart with chocnut, and cornick, and peanuts, and eggnog, and what have you, only to realize that they're pretty strict about the halal standard in iraq. the la paz batchoy cup noodles had to go.

5. don't forget the toiletries!
    gary has this oc behavior when it comes to cleanliness. so it will forever escape me how he deals with his current portalet situation. i sent him this axe chocolate  deodorant, some baby wipes, baby powder, lotion, insect repellant, nail cutters, a loofah, and some muscle pain reliever.

6. pack them with L-O-V-E
   i carefully put together similar products to make it easier to ship. to protect the letter, dvds and cds i made for him from snoopy eyes, i carefully emptied a sustagen box from the bottom and slipped all of my stuff inside, along with a slim packet of nestea iced tea (to make that powder sound when shaken), and sealed the bottom side of the box with mighty bond. voila! you wouldn't know the difference.

7. do your research.
    having worked as a writer, i should have known step number 7 must ALWAYS be step number 1. this pretty much messed everything up. i went to fedex with my angel of a friend, tina, who drove for me all the way to subic. when we got there, the first fedex store was closed, we had to go downtown and try shipping from the other branch. the lady said they didn't send to APO addresses. the last time they did, the package got delayed for weeks.
    but i was unyielding. i said i was able to send to an APO address via fedex before (which is true you know) and that i didn't care whether it's gonna take weeks as long as it's gonna reach my baby before christmas. she must've sensed desperation (besides the fact that i really wanted the package sent, the hard work of putting together everything was just too much to forget) and said yes.
   so tina and i stuffed everything into the fedex box, which was, for the price i was paying, extremely small. mary poppins would've been so proud! we were able to put everything in...except for the v-cuts (which gary loves) because they took too much space. we sealed the box, paid the shipping price that's twice more expensive than what was inside, and crossed our fingers.
    when i got home, i checked fedex.com and saw all the regulations that i should've known in the first place. no powders. i sent baby powder, and the sustagen powder drink that contains all that's essential in the care package will also be, technically, not allowed. no liquids. the insect repellant, the mouthwash, the lotion are all of course in liquid form.
     they also really don't deliver to apos in iraq. the best that they can do is bring it to fob warrior and if the mail people there are nice enough, maybe they'll bring it to patrol base doria. if not, gary will have to make a way for him to pick up the package, which has, by the way, reached parañaque, china, and dubai.
     today i click on track your package at the fedex website and the 4 kilos that i sent is now only 2.7 kilos. did they get rid of everything? what about my videos? oh it's gonna suck so bad if the really important stuff in there don't reach him.oh, and did i tell you that right after i sent the package, i learned that i can pre-order a care package online from the states to be sent to him via US postal service and it will reach him in a few days for half the price? oh well. as long as my fedex box will reach him, it's worth all the pain. the website says it'll be in fob warrior december 20 at 8pm. let's see how it goes.

...

writer's block. nothing to write about. nothing new.

my good soldier

after two days of not hearing from each other, gary was able to call me yesterday. he finally reached iraq, and bought a local sim card to get hold of me. he said they've been moving around a lot, and are leaving their initial FOB to transfer to his final station 30 miles of Kirkuk. i read about this camp online, and well, let's just say it's still not IED-free.

people often ask me how i feel that my husband has the kind of job that he has, and well my answer is you really just don't think about it. well not NOT think about it, but i guess the human mind can condition itself well enough to reduce matters into just one equation: gary and me equals the future, everything else is temporary and is thus surmountable.

so we've been talking and talking last night to make up for lost time. it is INSANE how expensive it is to call iraq from the philippines. i called globe, and smart and sun (which doesn't reach iraq, by the way) to ask for their rates. contrary to what we expected, it's even more expensive if i make the calls compared to him placing them. despite the cost, our communication plan is still for him to text me first then i'll call him, because it's even harder for him to get by a phonecard where he's getting assigned. actually, we're not even sure yet if his new network has coverage in his next stop. the fun never stops! :P

he also went to the internet shop where everybody lines up to get 20 minutes online, and we tried to see each other on webcams. tried, because his cam won't connect to yahoo due to a faulty server. he was able to see me, but i still feel frustrated that i didn't get a glimpse of him even on the computer. as i already mentioned before, gary earns a lot of points for keeping in touch with me no matter what. this is what sustained us for the past years, and even now, he's still doing everything to make this easier for me.

he says he's been eating okay and isn't losing weight, so that's good. he and his troopmates stay together in a tent, on bunk beds. there is nothing at all close to home with his living situation right now. which gets me thinking, the army really has toughen up gary physically, mentally and emotionally.

i remember driving up to california for 24 hours from el paso with him. he of course did all the driving, non-stop. and i mean non-stop.i woke up, and slept, and woke up again in the passenger seat and he was still driving. he didn't stop at all to sleep. the only times he got off the wheel were during rest room breaks! he's also no-nonsense, he'd take whatever you give him (well he's not so easy to please when it comes to the food i cook, but that's another matter...) and he wants everything scheduled and systematic.

there was also this one time we ate at taco bell near our place in el paso from a shopping spree. the mall we came from was really far, and it was raining. so anyway, we ate, and drove home. when we were about to go to the house, i realized i left my bag behind. i just didn't know where. i. had. a. cow! all my important documents were there (okay, okay, 1, don't tell me i was careless, that's more than obvious, and 2, don't ask me anymore why i carry important stuff around, that's just me. end of discussion.) and i was thinking, if i left it at the mall, it'd be impossible to remember where, and even more  impossible to get back.

i was in tears, and i would have perfectly understood if gary got upset with me too. but i guess he's been trained with high tension situations, plus of course he really is a nice guy to start with, he just remained calm the whole time. he asked me systematically what was in my bag, and i winced, waiting for his reaction after i gave him an answer. instead of getting mad, he reassured me anything in there, we can apply for again, it's just we needed to get the bag back to protect my identity and also save us all the hassle. he then asked me to recall when it was with me last. everything to me was in a blur, i was scared i'd be delayed with my plans to come home here in the philippines, i was crying, i wasn't even responsive. he just didn't bother me anymore and did his thing. he drove back as fast as possible to taco bell, was gone for a while and was back with my stuff.

gary really takes pride with what he does for a living, and while i will be the first to say that i want him out of active duty, i will also be the first to say that i am really, really, tremendously proud of him and what he's become.

happy day

the hubby called this afternoon with good news: they're moving to a territory in iraq where there's phone coverage (yes!) and internet (yes!). there won't be a PX store where he could get his dose of american goodies or buy phonecards but i told him he can always purchase online. he's happy. i'm happy. we're happy. :D

just when we thought things couldn't get any harder...

great. gary calls me tonight to say he had to tell me something important, but his line's so choppy we don't get to talk until after dialing a third time. they warn him that the area they're going to in iraq has zero phone coverage and of course, no internet. 'so, like, no word from each other for a year?' i ask, unable to hide my annoyance. 'i don't know babe, i hope not. don't get mad at me for this. what do you want me to do? i'm just as unhappy as you are about the situation,' he says. so we let it slide and hope for the best. i wanna cry.

camp buehring, kuwait

gary finally got to call me twice, first on saturday, then yesterday. he's in camp buehring in kuwait for a two-week briefing before going to iraq. the poor guy didn't even know what day it was. seeing satellite photos of his present assignment makes me want to make him come home if i could. he's pretty positive about everything though. he says he can handle it, and is just looking forward to getting it over with so we can live a normal civilian life.

guess who's back?

so i'm writing this entry at the ungodly hour of 3 am. third day back in the Philippines and I'm still nursing a jetlag. i would like to blame it all on this, but really, it's not just jetlag that's making me feel lost despite being home.

being away from gary makes me realize i neither belong here in bataan nor in santa clara with his family. i belong to him, wherever he is; which, i think it is now safe to say, is in iraq--he already left the states for his deployment yesterday. okay, so i'm speaking figuratively, but i literally feel like a piece of me is missing.

i really have to hand it to him. he does EVERYTHING to keep in touch with me. the boy was on the phone with me every step of the way, i felt like i was on a C130 heading to the middle east. even during refueling in minnesota, he managed to get hold of me to remind me he's always coming back for me no matter what.

i remember what he told me before we left santa clara. he said when he went back to el paso and i was left at his parents', he'd wake up in the morning and his instinct was to reach for me. "i feel like i'm about to lose my mind when i'm not with you." this is pretty much what i'm feeling right now. i enjoy being home, but i can't feel completely at peace with gary away. i'm still waiting to hear from him, which i hope is sooner than later. we have no idea how it's gonna be for us while he's stationed there but i'm confident he'll do everything in his power to touch base.

how was my trip back? unbearable, like i expected it to be. i cannot stress enough how much i dislike airports, and i always have airport stories to tell. for this outing, it was simply an episode from twilight zone. to begin with, all my luggages were overweight. i had a balikbayan box packed by gary, which exceeded the limit by 10 pounds. his brother's balikbayan box (which i was to bring to their other brother here) was a good 6 pounds overweight too. my carry-on luggage was 30lbs, when only 15 lbs was allowed. to top it all, i was hauling a 14.1" toshiba laptop that probably weighed more than i do on my backpack. in the middle of opening balikbayan boxes and weighing my stuff again, i just wanted to leave everything behind. the stress was just too much for a few freaking cans of spam and corned beef!

to make matters worse, the lady at cathay pacific was a total pain in the ass. she was at my throat, telling me she's about to close the counter and i might have to miss my flight. i wanted to give my 'is this the kind of customer service (fill in the company name) has?' speech, but this whole balikbayan business was too tiring i just decided to shut up. i was, of course, last to board.

the only nice thing about this trip was how surprisingly tasty food on cathay pacific was. definitely better than PAL or KLM. while i always thought plane food was bland, the meals for my flights were all really good.

i did not sleep a wink on neither my flight from san francisco to hong kong nor my flight from hong kong to manila. while waiting for my connecting flight at the hong kong international airport, i sat for three hours with filipinos going home from all points of the earth. it was so weird, almost like a ritual, to hear all these people ready to share their biography with complete kababayan strangers. 'i'm coming from vacouver...been there for X years, working as...' or 'i haven't seen the philippines for X years because my kids and i don't get along..' or 'filipino workers are trusted better here in hong kong...so i told my mother not to worry about me' they must've thought i was a total smuck for not wanting to share my lifestory. and as if this display of national bonding weren't enough, at one of the corners of gate 30 gathered some 14 (i counted!) filipino guys watching the replay of the manny pacquiao fight on youtube passionately. it was quite a sight...and i'm filipino!

past the really long trip, the immigration, the luggage retrieval, and all the other inconveniences, i'm happy to be home. i got to see my new nephew jepoy who is just soooo adorable. i got to eat siomai and tinapa. later my brother's coming home from manila and we'll probably be on the magic sing microphone the whole day. if only gary were here then everything would be perfect.

in denial

gary's 10-day official leave before deployment just ended, and he's back in texas while i'm left here in california. he's getting shipped out next week, and things have just been crazy. we've heard non-stop of how difficult deployment could be but we always brushed it off, thinking two years of long distance relationship prepared us for it. not.

we've been fighting and fighting about the smallest stuff (of course he can't beat me on the being difficult factor, but he's a mess too). the uncertainty of the coming year is so heavy that instead of spending quality time together, we just chose to annoy each other endlessly. yesterday while we were talking and killing time before he got dropped off at the airport, we kept on disagreeing and disagreeing that we suddenly both said "ok, let's stop!" at the same time. it's so draining. now that we're apart, i've been analyzing why i've been a nightmare, and i realized that was my form of denial. because i was too busy being a smartass, i didn't have to think of the fact that i won't see him for a duration that's longer than the time we've been married.

he was not happy with how things went too, so now, inspite of the expensive airfare, he's coming back here this thursday on a pass. we both want this to be a better goodbye, but how can something be better when it's not even a good thing to start with? it doesn't matter. i just miss the boy really bad, and i'm happy i'll see him again for a few days.

oh. and i'm flying back to the philippines. maybe the same day that he's flying back to el paso next week. i know i'm supposed to find a job and stuff but i really can't handle being here the first few months that he's gone. i need a break. and the lucky bitch that i am, i'm even spending christmas in the philippines!

for those who give a rat's ass...some photos we took at the western playland in el paso (new mexico actually, but close enough) and during halloween. notice we didn't have legitimate costumes, we just got to california from a 24-hour drive from el paso and were too tired to go all out. the husband grabbed leis lying around the house, wore one and gave me one that matched what i was wearing. voila! instant ignorant tourists. the kids are gary's nieces and nephews :D

HELP FOR TYPHOON ONDOY VICTIMS

my friend pia from the united nations world food programme is calling for donations for the victims of typhoon ondoy. please visit www.wfp.org/donate/ondoy for more details.

double yey!

the husband called last night with good news: they're releasing him earlier than expected from training and could be home in texas by today. my flight is not scheduled until saturday though so i told gary we'll have to wait til then. rebooking costs an arm and a leg, especially if you do it the last minute. i called southwest airlines just the same to check their fares, and for the record, southwest is now officially my favorite airline everrrr. thanks to their military dependent fares, i just added $10 to my ticket. where else can you find that? so the husband has no idea i'll be home in el paso tomorrow lunch time. haylavet! :P

yey!!!

only one more week to go and i'm going home to el paso. this morning i made my usual pre-departure trip to the filipino store to get all the products we can't find in texas. can't wait til saturday... :D

more pictures

kakagigiiiiiiiiilllllll!!!!!!!!

it's amazing how i've never seen my brother's youngest child jepoy, but i love him sooooooo much. it's breaking my heart how much i've missed--he's so big already! i can only watch him grow from afar, through photos and videos online. tell me, is he adorable or what?

luv sic

the husband has been training for more than half a month now, and it's starting to be pretty difficult. he's at the national training center in the middle of nowhere (the closest landmark is nevada, but even that is about 3hours away), and he's not allowed to use his phone. we're paying for 700 unused minutes this month.

this is supposed to be training for both soldiers and their families. ntc is pretty much a replica of a village in the middle east, and the conditions there are as close as they can get to iraq or afghanistan. as for us family members, this could be how seldom we hear from our soldiers. it's hard.

it wasn't long ago when gary asked me to go with him to fort bliss. i knew it wasn't a happy bring-your-wife-to-work kind of invite, but the dreaded pre-deployment briefing. it was something both of us would rather not hear, but we needed to. while at the auditorium along with hundreds of soldiers with their wives and other family members, i couldn't help but look around and hope that everyone will make it back safely after 12months. it's too stressful just to sit there and listen.

gary's tentative deployment date is nov.17 this year. we wouldn't be spending christmas, our first anniversary, his birthday, my birthday, and all other important events together. but more than this sad truth, i'm worried about him being out there. just yesterday, when he was able to sneak a call using his troopmate's phone, he told me he hasn't been sleeping well, hasn't been able to shower, and hasn't been eating enough because they were in some desert, firing. it really is heartbreaking being apart, and i have to convince myself to be strong for him when he can't. we both have our work cut out for us.

                one afternoon after work, he was running late. turned out he got me a little something :D

i love this picture. disneyland, july 3, 2009

this was taken during one of our movie dates. the story goes that before going to the movies, we checked the lotto ticket we bought a few days back, and realized we won. $5. haha we got two of the numbers, and were among the hundreds of thousands who won five bucks that draw. then we went on to watch the time traveler's wife, where the lead male, who can time travel, bought a lotto ticket with the winning numbers. gary tells me he should have stayed long enough in the future to get all the numbers right. corny, but we had a good laugh :)

my boobtube hunks :D

there are very few people on TV that you can go on watching over and over and over without getting tired of their faces. well these two guys make my couch potato days bearable.

I have a schoolgirl crush on Anthony Bourdain, who could very well pass for my father thank you very much, except he's caucasian. haha he's smart. and funny. and he cooks.

I start my day watching Emeril Live. I love Chef Emeril Lagasse so much in fact that i buy Emeril tomatoes at Albertsons even when i don't need them :P he's smart. and he's funny. and he cooks.

i <3 kids

here with jude (6), kiana (4) and amber (2). i miss my jelo (7) chay (6) and jepoy (0) back home... :(

pictures!!!

gary's baby sister debra only had a few days left before going back to school in california. so we decided, along with gary's elder sister loulou whose family is now based in texas too, that we were gonna get debra down to texas for a vacation. so deb arrived in el paso and the three of us drove 16 hours (we made too many stops) to houston. because gary had to work the next monday, he and i had to travel ahead back to el paso. ate loulou, her husband kuya don and debra followed a few days later. debra, of course, flew out of el paso back to santa clara. here are just some photos we took along the way.

neither here nor there

i am not filling this blog with any more grievance. i'm not going to complain that i'm here in california while gary's on a 12-day field training in el paso. i am not going to bitch about how this disrupted our simple life in our own little corner of the world. i will not gripe about how neither of us knows whether i should head back to el paso after the 12-day thing--he is, after all, going to a month-long intensive pre-deployment training shortly afterwards. nope, i will not fuss about the fact that i don't know when i'll see him next before his deployment, for how long, and what we're supposed to do from there. i won't. i have no right to whine about the travails of an army wife. no nagging, no muttering, no grumbling. yeah. none of that.

kaloka!

the lease on the apartment is up, and gary and i are moving to a new place on the other side of town.

as if the universe conspired, gary's field training fell right on the date of our lease signing and move-in day. so the husband went to pay the deposit before he left, two days ahead of schedule. now the catch: i had to pack everything on my own. since we have to settle in tomorrow, gary couldn't help in putting away our stuff. he felt pretty bad about it, but we had no choice. i had to do this one on my own.

so now i have a mound of luggages, boxes and plastic containers in the middle of the room. i'm ish-ting-ky and i'm pretty beat. but i did it. and i'm really excited about our new home. :D

kiligs!

i am so not in the position to announce this to the world but i'm just so happy for one of my bestest best friends, i can't help but blog about it!

i got an e-mail from tina today, saying the usual how-are-you, things-here-are-ok. then at the end of her message, she gave me the biggest shock (well it's not like i didn't know about what has been happening, but it still comes as a shock that she finally gave in--if you know her, you understand what i mean :) );she and neil are an item!!!

okay, what's all the fuss about? well, neil has been courting her all throughout high school and they were inseparable then. but see tina is tina. we shared the same nbsb record back then and it pretty much looked like it was gonna stay that way...at least for her. she's christian, and was really, really choosy like you would not believe.

college happened. they even went to the same university, so neil could be close, if i remember correctly. they somehow lost touch, and well, neil had a girlfriend.

tina is a very secretive person. even as her closest friend, she would not tell me how she felt about things. but i'm psychic, and she will tell you so now. i somehow always knew neil would come back, and that tina, in her heart, has never loved anyone but him and would eventually want to be with him.

we graduate. we work. the years just pass by, our other friend mina (yes, that's tina, mina, ina to you) gets blessed with two kids, i met the love of my life. there were signs that neil was making a comeback but tina always dismissed the 'rumor'...until now.

it just goes to show, however cliche, if it's meant to be, it's meant to be. they are just sooo good together. they look good together, and it feels good to see them together. this is another one of those cases when you just know, you know? no questions asked, you just know.

so tins, if you ever read this, i'm sooo happy for you and neil, and oh my gosh mina and i were always scared you'd be an old maid. we are proud of you for proving otherwise :P


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on to another subject, the husband has an inspection today in his class a suit. so! we went shutter happy.