what else!

Horror some more...



One Missed Call


Scary. Well, it’s horror. That is what I like Asian horror films. They almost always successfully scare the shit out of me. I was glad I watched it with my brother.

The plot: A group of young friends receives strange calls on their cell phones which come from their own numbers with their own voices. Every person who receives this call, a missed one that when played the owner’s voice will be heard, dies on the exact date registered on that missed call.
This is really creepy and spooky.
I just don’t understand the ending.





When A Stranger Calls

I watched it with a friend last Saturday with butter-flavored popcorn I accidentally washed with salt.

The movie is not that scary although there are some scenes that successfully make you jump from your seat, or at least make you scream.

The story: This high school student Jill Johnson (Camilla Belle) goes to a secluded house by the lake to babysit two kids while their parents are out partying.

And suddenly she receives strange calls from a sadistic stalker. I really don’t get it why she was chosen to be the next victim. It was not even explained why this stranger would want to kill anybody he wanted to. Just sadistic, mad man on the loose?

Whatever. At least the house, where everything happened in one night, was amazing.

Maypa The Wild to.

Rodman and his ass

Ang ILONG. Bow!

Unfortunately, Thursday came. But, at least it's already Friday and I still have my job. AND, I had Rodman kissed my ass ;)

I woke up early that day, definitely not an ordinary day.

Before ten my friend and I were already in Mandaue City Hall comfortably seated at the Mayor's office waiting for the bad boy.

Both of us had only a piece of bread for breakfast.

Lunch time came, my anaconda was already seething with rage! American time huh!

Then the press people were told to transfer to the conference room (the adjacent room) as the Bad Boy (very bad, indeed!) was to have the presscon there.

But before we could warm our seats we were again asked to transfer to the other room, this time to the session hall. Hahay! And the obedient and starving members of the media "joyously" obliged.

There, we waited for a year.

Finally, the star and his party arrived. It was already almost 1pm, and my date with GMA was at 2. Talisay is a thousand miles away.

He first came to see the mayor. We never went to where he was as we were expecting him to join us in the session hall.

However, the bad boy (the baddest!) told the organizers he would not go to where we were, that if we would like to see him we could just go to where he was instead. Hmmm...

I'm pretty sure around this time some of my colleagues were already mentally constructing hard-hitting articles about the guy.

Because we were already there, we swallowed our pride and went to the conference room, where he and his party were eating Cebu's delis.

But before we could even say a thing, Rodman stood up and his manager said: "Okay, thanks for coming here folks!"

WTF! We only heard him say "s@#*!" twice and stood up. We were told later on he was actually irritated when he was told he should not eat the suman wrapper, the banana leaf. Hala, eat it!

He left us!

But, nothing could stop me. My friend wanted so badly to have her Rodman book signed so I grabbed it and asked Rodman to at least mark something on it. But his manager, a big guy who was shielding him from me, yelled at me not to push him. Huh! Push him? Was he crazy? He was like a big wall and I was just so tiny that he could even smash me anytime effortlessly.

They moved, leaving behind the dismayed press and went to the adjacent room, the mayor's room. I was trailing them, I-the big wall-Rodman. When the big wall did not budge when I incessantly asked him I should get Rodman's autograph, I then shouted at Rodman and when he glanced at my direction I handed him the book and the pentel pen. And done!

I felt so weak after that. I don't normally do that.

---

There was no presscon at the city hall.

Then everyone moved to Yo Latino (a restobar), where the real presscon would be held.

Rodman never showed up.

I was glad I was already in Talisay City at this hour. Bwahahaha!

---

Covering GMA is the most tiring coverage. You tag along with her wherever she goes hoping to catch her fall and break her neck, and ask later on what she can say about the economic problems of the country. She hops from one town or city to another but she never breaks her neck. But at least we can always ask her something. The heck with her PSGs, they, too (like most people), respect the press ids and the human carrying them.

The GMA coverage was over before I knew it. I was already able to breathe normally after that.

---

I still went to Rodman's game that night. And I was glad I did. During the second half of the game he lost his balance while trying to catch the ball and fell towards our direction. I mean a few inches from us. He knocked the ABS-CBN Cebu lady reporter out. WAHAHAHA! He was apologetic after that, but he never posed for a photograph. Huh! mura'g cute!!!

My friend was actually praying he would fall again and this time to our direction. Pag-solo! Hahaha!

---

Rodman's team won, 124-96.

Not a bad day, actually. I won in our lil bet, pizza treat. And I got to see Rodman's butt. Really! Last night, he was wearing a big short pants (however you call their uniform) that were too loose for him that from time to time he would pull them up, but on one ocassion he was a second late. Hahaha!

I'm glad I did not skip Thursday.

creating a problem is not a problem

This Thursday Dennis Rodman will be here at around 10am. This same day, from 9:30am to 12nn, is the regular session of Talisay City Council. Talisay City is one and a half hour away from Mandaue, where I wish to see Rodman.

I don't want to miss any of the two events. I already promised a friend (bad boy's die hard fan) I should bring her to where Rodman would be. On the other hand, I have a job to keep.

I still don’t know how to solve it.

At 2pm, (I don’t know where I will still be at this hour...I just wish the Rodman thing would be over by then) GMA will be in Talisay City (my beat assignment). Talisay is very far away.

So it's Rodman then! Session and GMA later.

I’m almost tempted to feign sickness.

Can we just skip Thursday?

Problem solved. Not really

Okay, someone already taught me how to copy-paste that French text I've been crazy about. Thanks to the IT specialist a.k.a. rugby boy, Jute the problem was solved. I could not contain my happiness (char!) when I saw before my very eyes the English translation of the book. But, before my brain could notice I was actually in that state frustration sneaked its way to the frontseat of my heart (waaaah...balak na ni!) when in that almost the same instant I learned that that entire text was just a part of the book. I wanted to cry, but no, God is watching (aw, ang boss diay!). A teaser!!! Gggrrrrr...

The book, as published in the papers, tells how those tons of gold (part of Yamashita's vast treasure, interesting enough, aint it?) were discovered from that mountain. And things that talk about treasure maps, Imelda Marcos, World War II remnants, and so many others about the past. Yeah, I love old things (you've probably known that by now if you've been reading my blog. okay, you don't read, get out!!), antiques, gold bars, mummies, the Marcoses, and adventures.

Getting the real book would surely not be a problem. The problem is how to read it. It's French! And all I know is "Parlez vous français?" (i'm not even sure if that's how you say it, duh!). I cannot (and will not) for the life of me MANUALLY copy each word from the book to be translated online. That's just not me! I can wait for a pirated copy of it in some website (*fingers crossed). Or this craziness would be over soon before I knew it, I hope.

Hay!

HELP!

For the past days, I've been trying my damnedest best to translate this French text from the book "Il est trop tard pour etre pauvre" (It is too late to be poor) by Dominique Martial. This book, according to the best and oldest newspaper in Cebu ( The Freeman), talks about how Martial (Mister Do) helped a US businessman cart away the 5 tons of gold ingots hidden in a mountain somewhere in Codillera. I need to read the book. It's French and can be translated into English, or Cebuano, if there's any. My problem is I can NOT copy and paste the text to translation.com or to wherever there's free translation service. I'm asking the good Lord (and you!) to help me. I had already sweated out this afternoon for this and only came out with the Flashpaper thing, wherein copy-pasting method is not applicable as I said. The website is just as unfriendly. I tried "Edit with a notepad" but what appeared are the html codes.

I need help. Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Madonna, anyone please.

Vatski

another duh!

I made it through the Holy Week with movies...


Cats and Dogs

Amazing cats and dogs!






The Perfect Catch

Drew Barrymore and Jimmy Fallon. The guy has already fallen in love with the Red Sox for 23 years when the girl, who has this penchant for "real success", came into his life. Not a good match. But love, as they say, conquers all...
Sweet and funny!




The Curse (or Cut, the original title)

With Kylie Minogue. Tackles about the curse of the unfinished movie. If you like "Scream" and the "I Know What You Did Last Summer" series then this is your movie. Yeah, the type where an ugly, masked guy, kills everyone in the film excluding the main character plus one, if lucky. It's old, 2000 (I did not recognize Kylie here), but it still has that horror appeal, and, typical of horror films, the unsolved mysteries. And of course, the hanging ending (waiting for the second part which never came...).

Into The Blue

Starring Paul Walker and Jessica Alba. Underwater adventure (makes me want to dive again...minus the two-piece suit Jessica always sports here and wherever). Only, I don't understand why that plane carrying cocaine had to crash in the same place where an ancient ship also carrying some treasures was!?! Okay, to give them reasons to dive. But the fight scenes are great! Jessica, oh so me! hehe
-----


Momets of Love (sorry no picture available for this movieso... let Pikachu rule!)

Iza Calzado, Dingdong Dantes, Karylle. Just fine. I watched it with friends almost two weeks ago despite some not-so-good comments of it I've read in the papers. Yeah, I took note (just like what one critic said) of the fake flowers surrounding that ancient tree where Iza buried her photo, and later on Dingdong's pic, so Dingdong could get each one of them later on (59 years later). The last local movie I've seen in a moviehouse was Anak (what year?), and in a video was Milan. I was not disappointed by this one, not great. Simple or whatever.

the old french in moi

vacation is over. well, for us! ...i even worked yesterday, a Good Friday (to cover Papa Cardi in action), tan-awa ra ko! Pero sige lang, part man to sa sakripisyo. o ha! :) until now, my entire body is still aching from the long walk we had yesterday. After that Church affair (and the Church hopping) in the Cathedral, we (I was with Caecent) decided to walk (bisag gitan-aw nami's mga tawo, ngali we looked like aliens unsa ba?! bahala sila!) from there to Mango Square (that's about 3 kms or so or ambot lang) to hopefully catch an open coffee shop ug part napud sa sacrifice. But there was none. Malas! Mayna lang na'y Greenwich ug Jollibee sa daplin. Pero it was strictly a no-meat-no-rice-no-coke diet (yez, binignit ra jud kuno ingun sa mga katiguwangan. samot biya kaniit). Sagdi lang panagsa ra bitaw.

So there, mao ni gatakiang ko ron kay nisakit ako bagtak. Saonz! Mingaw pa jud kaayo diri opis kay wa ngali klase. Kami ra man duha diri Caecent ug sir Lucky, who can't say "schedule people" coz the people are not here yet (aliens lagi mi). Hay ambot, nangatug pa ngali ang kadaghanan.

Mangaon nalang ta'g buwad nga nokus ug bahaw, nya paresan og coke (yum yum!) basin maulian ko. waaaaaaaaaaah

Holy Week and my crap

It's Holy Week and the heat is on (just great!) Everyone's planning to go to the beaches while I, for the rest of the vacation (we have that too) will be stuck in my place this weekend. Someone's invited me to Boracay, well, I don't have the money for it so why pretend. At least, what I'm planning to do: watch movies and do some painting (if the heat would not dry my brain out) is not against my Church's teaching. For the record, I interviewed yesterday a priest (a monsignor), who said against going out of the tradition (like partying in the beach and stuff). And I have decided to be obedient this time. The beaches will always be there.

--

Obedience

This is probably what most people bring themselves to the church on Sundays and pray during the Holy Week. This or simply the routine.

I have my own routine works, too. My everyday life is beat assignment, office, and home; and Sundays are either started or culminated by a Holy Mass (Catholic, yeah). Not an exciting life. But at least I have a life.

One thing I don't like about the Holy Week, except for its extreme heat, is the "passion" (however you say that) songs that are played over and over in the airwaves and even in the background...!!! I'm sorry they are not just my type of music. I wish MYMP would revise them sooner.

--

Kill Me. Now na!


Dennis Trillo and this alien

I swear I didn't mean it. It was so damn hot (obviously) and I needed a shield, that's it.




Dennis Trillo experiences real horror on set of movie
By Vatski
The Freeman 04/13/2006

Matinee idol Dennis Trillo speaks of his spooky experiences while filming his latest and incidentally, first horror movie, "Pamahiin."

In this suspense-thriller, Dennis plays the role of Noah, a balikbayan who investigates the real cause of the sudden death of his bestfriend, Damian (Paolo Contis), with his clairvoyant-girlfriend Eileen (Iya Villania).

Majority of the film, which is produced by Regal Films, was shot in an ancient house, which according to the actor has never been inhabited for more than 50 years. The house doesn't have electricity and water supply.

The place itself, he told The FREEMAN Entertainment, has this "eerie look," which makes it the best location for a horror shoot.

"Kikilabutan ka talaga," he quipped.

But it was not just the look of this old house, where the cast and crew stayed for the duration of the shooting, that made everything spooky.

Dennis said there was this one incident when one of the talents of the movie asked to have a photograph of him taken through her cellphone camera. And on that picture, they were surprised to see a shadow, which resembled a hooded figure.

Another incident, he narrated, involved Iya, who actually saw a "ghostly form" in the staircase of the house while doing one of her scenes.

This image, in a "pugot na ulo" form, was captured by the set's camera.

After that series of unexplainable events, everyone started to go in groups. He said they could not just leave the place because they had to complete everything, and they were able to do it for 10 nights and days.

There was even one room, of which not one of the members of the cast and crew ventured again after knowing its mysterious history from the house's caretaker.

Dennis tagged it as a "cold room" after he personally went inside it and felt the chill, which on a hot day was puzzling.

While he was saying this to TF Entertainment, Angel Locsin, who might have felt Dennis' intimacy to the story he was telling, could not help but asked him what was wrong with him. He then showed her his left arm, which was already covered with goosebumps.

Dennis would have loved to tell more about the stories behind the scenes but he, along with fellow "Majika" star Angel and the first "Startruck" Final 4 finalists, had to hurry back to Manila to attend to their previous engagements.

They were here last March 25 as guests of "Eat Bulaga" during its live show at the Cebu City Sports Complex.

it's hot!

waaaaaaaaaaaah....
i'm still biiiizzzzzzzzzzzy.
can't blog! no life! woh!
so help me God!

(this is really serious, y'know!)

malling under the sun

Eat Bulaga was here again this afternoon. Not to do a show but to share some cash to its beneficiaries.

In going to the many places they provided the party three vans, one for Tito Sotto and the Eat Bulaga staff, another for the crew, and for the media pips. There were also two escort motorbikes with their noisy wang-wang sound.

I'm telling this because I was enjoying and hating this coverage altogether.

First stop was a public grade school in a very populated part of the city.

Our van arrived first. The moment it stopped, all of us inside, including the driver, were shocked when the children and the adults started crowding it, and tried looking through the tinted windows who were inside! They were surely thinking we were stars of Eat Bulaga because of the EB posters around it. Syet!

We could not move out yet! Not when there seemed to be a stampede outside. I'm not kidding! I was really laughing at the situation, while our photograhers were enjoying it and waved at their "fans"(buot2x!). We decided to stay even if the crowd had already shifted its attention to the arrival of the second van, where Tito Sotto was aboard. Bwahaha.

When we finally got out, the expression of the people we met was like "ngek!"

---

Even those two escorts were fooled by our van (I dunno why). Instead of paving the road for Tito's van, they were with us when we moved on to the next stop. We even suggested our driver to bump on one of those riders so he would know he was in a wrong van.

---

One of the many stops we had was a dumpsite. My first time. We had to walk several meters to get to the shack of an old woman, another beneficiary. While walking I felt I was covering for I-Witness (hehe!) but Jay Taruc (?) was so game when he played "basurero" in that coverage. I just could not stand the putrid smell of the place. Even the kids and the adults had that kind of smell. They sure have water within their reach! Just lazy lot they were. Their very surrounding was littered with plastic things. And the women were just sitting in one corner screaming upon seeing Tito. Grrr...visitors! Don't you get it?!!!

I am totally against laziness, I'm going to make that clear. I'm partly it, that's why. hehe

Sensing my disgust to the place, well, I was covering my nose with my hanky which made it very obvious, one woman, on our way out, shouted "Ma'am, humot sad ning among lugar oi!"

I had to uncover my nose. Nauwaw pud kaha ko sa akong gibuhat.

My point is, it's a fact that a dumpsite really stinks. But the place, being an open dumpsite, has already been ordered closed by the DENR. Meaning the smell left of the old basura should not have been that intense. But it was, and mostly coming from the people. And they could have swept their backyards clean (the houses were actually planted at the foot of the mountain of basura and not on the very place where the heap of basura was). But they left it the way. I've seen an equally poor community but it was not this dismal.

And take note these houses have TV sets and other household appliances. I'm sure they can afford brooms, too. I'll sweep for them if they like.

who says i know Cebu better than anyone does?!!!

frankly, i still am an alien to the very place where i was born and grew up. Proof of that is most of the time I still don't know what PUJ to take to a certain place, which most of the time, too, I don't know where that is. Not that I am used to being driven around by private chauffeur or something, I'm too poor to avail of such treatment, I think, I'm just consistent in failing to locate places.

Since I've discovered that problem in me everytime I'm asked to cover an event, of which venue is someplace I've never been to and the company's service vehicle is in the shop (it's vintage) or the driver is not around (always!) a cab would be the best alternative. But, I still find it comforting to have someone with me, someone who knows Cebu better than I do.

Just last night, I was at a mall to watch Kitchie Nadal perform. It was still early to go home, and the two people I was with followed Kitchie to her hotel (I can't believe you Jen, I swear! haha), so I was left alone.

Then I lingered in National Bookstore and bought some stuffs: a CD bag, oil pastel, water color and some paint brushes. It's summer time and I think it's the best time to study painting (hay, I wish I really could!). Or I'll bring my things in the newsroom, Wengkat will surely love it (don't you dear? I don't care about Run for your Life!).

It was still very early to go home so I decided to use the gift certificate of Wengkat. It was worth P500 and woud expire on that very day, sayang if we would not consume it.

So I was already inside "Cafe Havana" (where the GC was for), ordered some food (in fairness, barato ra) and texted Wengkat to join me.

She was still writing her stories at the newsroom and I told her to hurry up before it would be April 1, or the GC would be expired (hahaha!).

About 30 minutes or so she arrived. But she did not come in yet to where I was even if I told her, through SMS, I was inside the cafe. She was just sitting in one of the chairs outside the cafe when I checked to see her because she refused to get inside.

My meal was already a history when she joined me. I already ordered hers so she would not have to wait forever for it.

But before she could start eating her meal she asked me what I was doing in that place, I belived was in Cafe Havana. Then I started looking around for signs that I was really inside that cafe, but all I saw were Table 7 logos, from the table napkins (which I took before as the "manufacturer") and some little signages I just ignored when Wengkat was still not around.

To make the long story short, I was in a wrong cafe!

Cafe Havana is just adjacent to where I was.

I did not notice the signage in its facade because I don't know. What made me think I was in the right place because I saw the umbrellas outside with CH tags. And I did not know there was this Table 7 resto bar in that particular side of Cebu. Gad, no one can beat this! Not even the East, West story!

So of course, we had to pay our bills. Much! And although I hate spending that much for a single meal I still call it an experience for a lifetime. I was giggling at such stupid mistake. Grrr!

But, of course, we still hopped in to the neighboring cafe, which is the real Cafe Havana. Pakme!