Pain pain go away!

It has been more than 2 months since my head started hurting again. It started after a visit to my previous dentist that I finally decided to have a TMJ treatment. It has been 3 weeks that I'm wearing a splint but the pain has not completely gone away. It just shifted. Not the same place where I felt severe pain which has me worried earlier and not the same degree as before but there's still pain plus now there's stress on my neck and shoulders as I'm getting used to the splint (makes me ask myself why I can't be an EASY patient like most people). Although there's weekly therapy (TENS, don't ask me what it stands for! wherein a gadget is placed on my front jaws and on my shoulders that sends electric current to massage) I feel that the stretching exercises I do in the morning plus the forced stretching throughout the day when I feel my muscles constricting helps relieves pain better though it still comes back after a while.

I was thinking of my pain after coming from the dentist for the therapy and I somehow carried the thought on my way to church praying that it goes away soon. Then I saw the priest telling a group of people to pose in front of the church altar. He was happily showing them how and they moved to the direction. It took time for them to group together since many of them couldn't walk or had great difficulty in walking. Many were in wheelchairs with their disfigured legs and some were in crutches and other walking devices with disfigured bodies.

Suddenly made me realize that they were in more pain than I was yet they were all happy. I could hear their laughter and feel their joy. One of them in wheelchair was carrying her child in a long white dress whom I believed was just baptized. The mass started after their picture taking so they settled on the side of the church while the mass went on and headed for the door after the mass. I noted one man walking with two canes and being assisted by another, he was trying to walk fast but I could feel each movement to be painful (definitely showed in his disfigured body) but he was not complaining, in fact he was laughing as he was telling the person assisting him that they should walk faster. I wanted to stay to ask them about their group (hmmm nosey me) but I had to take a quick standing lunch in a convenience store so I could head for my next activity.

After my activity, on my way home. I realized that I haven't thought of my pain while focused on my activity and that I starting feeling it again only after I thought about it. Oh I knew that my body was still feeling the pain and stress all throughout my activity since I was stretching most of the time but it seemed more like a reflex of my body to remove the pain so it doesn't register in my consciousness. I guess it is the same with the happy people in church. They have adjusted to their pains and they are focused on other activities that they don't have to time to dwell in their pain.

I ask myself why I can't just be like them in dealing with pain. They seem to have accepted that their pain is already part of their life and they just live with it. I on the other hand, even if I could bear great pain (I don't take pain relievers for any pain) still thinks a lot about my pain.

Maybe because in my case, I feel that there is a clear solution to my case which I just have to pursue and my pain will be gone unlike them who no longer have a feasible solution to their ailments that they have no choice but live with it.

Or maybe my pain gets magnified because I worry that the cause might be something bigger and more dangerous even if it not really so(Ayayay!!!)

Well I certainly don't want pain (who does???) and I have to find out on how make it go away forever but I know that I should not focus on it so it gets magnified. And maybe if I am busy with other things yet it still persist then i'll just sing a song similar to what we used to sing on rainy days when I was lots younger...

Rain Rain go away, come again another day, little children wants to play, rain rain go away! except that my song would be Pain Pain go away instead of Rain Rain (geez I wish it is rainy season now though so it isn't too hot!)

Hmmm... the song might just do the trick!

Boxing bond

Manny Pacquiao won again and many Filipinos are happy!

Well, in a way I'm happy and I am sure that if my father was still alive that he would be very happy too. He LOVED boxing! Big boxing fights used to be family affair when he was still alive. Nobody does anything or goes anywhere on big boxing fights day as we are all glued on our TV set and oftentimes we are all cheering for the same man. And if the fighter is Filipino, then there's no doubt that we are all cheering for him.

The past fights of Manny, I was always out of home attending to my functions but I was able to watch part of the fight today. We have no cable TV so we were both listening to the radio and watching TV (definitely delayed telecast already) and we already knew the result even before seeing the fight but despite not having the excitement of seeing the fight progressed, we nevertheless were anticipating the round Manny would be knocking down Solis. Their game ended just in time before I had to leave home for another activity.

My love for watching big boxing fights somehow diminished after my father died. I used to be as excited as papa during big fights. Heavyweight fights used to be a favorite but eventually watching fights in the lower divisions became more exciting as there were more and better movements to see and there's more blood! Geez, you would ask why someone would love a bloody sport but there's something in boxing that draws you in.

But I realize now that more than the sport, watching big fights lured me more because of the sense of being together with the family. More than the actual fights, Boxing now reminds me of my father and the time when the whole family would be together just watching. Funny, but we actually bonded while watching the game!

Everytime I see a boxing match I would also remember us watching amateur boxing on TV (I saw some fights of Manny when he was just starting out), I would remember papa's smile when he enjoys the fight (i think they were titled Blow by blow at one time sponsored by Beer company) or when he has to pay one of my nieces or cousin for waking him up if he is taking a siesta and there's a boxing match on TV (any match!)

My fondness for watching the game may have diminished but I would say that BOXING will always be TOPS in most Filipinos heart! I guess it is the fighter in us that makes us love the game! :-)

Cinderella!

I was going to post some pictures on my earlier entry to my trip to Hongkong and Macau but I was having difficulty putting together my pictures and text and I decided that I was not going to be on my machine beyond 12:00 midnight that day! Kinda like Cinderella having a curfew except i had no glass slipper nor a fairy godmother (and instead just had the desire to fast from my machine for a few days!) But all the tryings (to post and put together pictures in the earlier blog) had to stop before 12:00 so unlike Cinderella I had my eye on the clock (Ok i cheated too since i was actually able to publish my post a bit past midnight too...hehehe but my post was dated before it though!!!) and immediately shutdown and hid my machine after :-)

Anyway, I hope I am able to present some pictures and text properly this time...

Here goes...

Beth, welcomes you to HongKong and Hongkong Disneyland!!!

that was taken at the MRT station were we bought ticket for Disneyland

Hongkong has a very good transport system. Their trains and MRTs are interconnected and you could hope from your hotel to one shopping mall to another shopping mall in a far away location just through the MRTS. Geez, I think you could survive there not seeing much sky but merely train/MRT hopping

Getting to Hongkong Disneyland is also simple. You could easily take the bus or MRT/train and the airport is nearby! And take a look at the neat disney train...

and inside the train! cool seats and nice Disney decors!

Okay, don't mind me.. Disney's garden picture is nice. That's the side of the train that goes around the park and at the back is the station! I am not posting much on the park since you could easily visit the site there. But here's the entrance to the theater I first saw my 3-D film! Hurray!!!

and of course, there has got to be a photo with Mickey!!!

Side trip to Macau!

Macau is the Las Vegas of China. It was once a Portuguez colony so there is a lot of Portuguez touch in the area. I was going to post a shot on their Larga de Senado (Senate Square) so show the Portuguez touch, were you see the streets pretty much similar to those in Portugal. At least that's what my friends say who have been there. I have to trust their words since, I haven't been there. Anyway, I missed posting the picture and if I add it goes to the start of my post and the sequence will be gone.. sorry!)

Anyway, here's a shot on one of the casinos there. Not the inside. You are not allowed to take photos inside. So it has to be just the facade!

This is Wynn, the newest casino there (i think), we went inside and tried our luck on the slot machine. Definitely no luck for me there. I guess the machine easily felt my dislike for easily and easily got my tokens and took a break :-(

Oh we had fun at one of the tables though, not a card table but a numbers table. We had to watch several tables to see how the games are played and decided to settle on one table with no gamblers. We were going to experience how it is to be gamblers.. hehehe...

We decided the Hi and Lo game was very easy and got two tokens. Tokens could be expensive there. There were several number option on the table but the HI and Lo seemed the easiest. The dice combination could either be Hi or Lo (split) so if you bet on the Hi and the number combination is low you lose and vice versa. My friends are pretty smart! We wanted to experience without any risk of losing (okay of winning either) so one would place on the Hi and the other on the Lo and we would be cheering and laughing after each drawing. The dealer easily got our trick since we after one wins, she gives her winning to the loser who place the same dice on the bet. She did not mind though and actually was smiling too. Her table after all won too since some people start coming in and placing their bets and in the end she got most of their tokens while we headed back to the booth to redeem the same token we got. Pretty cool! My friends after all belong to the "Friends of the Most excellent order" (okay, we got that from the horoscope in a newspaper on our airplane ride back home but it is a pretty appropriate description for my friends. I just cannot post their pictures here or they will surely kill me and I don't want to die nor lose thier friendship. Even if they don't know about this blog, i know that they don't want any public appearance on the NET and I have to respect their wishes!)

Okay, enough of the Casino. Macau is also famous for the St Paul ruins where only the facade of the church remains.

Bye-Bye from Hongkong and the cute PIG!

There were so many Pig decors there, this being the Year of the PIG and we going there on a Chinese New Year. I would have like to say Porky Pig's goodbye but that's from Looney Tunes and I don't think Mickey would like it one bit! :-)

Fast FAST!

For 2 years (I think) I would tell myself to refrain from going online in the internet during the Holy days (Holy Thursday to Easter Sunday) as part of my FASTING.

The internet is one of the things I really enjoy and I figured it would be better to abstain from things I enjoy rather than from food since that could be very easy for me. I find that I really don’t crave much for food during these days. Oh I could consume a lot especially if there’s noodles or pasta but there’s just not much desire for food during these days (maybe the heat is one of the factors too, gosh it could be very HOT during these days!). I also noted that if I focus on fasting from food that I actually tend to eat more (and become grouchy if I don’t eat) so I learned to just trust my body (when it comes to food) and think of other ways of abstaining and fasting.

Anyway, the past years I’ve thought about fasting from the NET and my system was telling me that it’s going to be one big struggle, yet as it would turn out there is no struggle! For the past two Holy weeks (i think) somebody stole our the telephone lines in our area (twice or was it more?) and I ended up not having a choice on whether to go online or not since there’s no way I could use the internet without our telephone. It made my fasting lots easier for me BUT others got affected in the process. My siblings got affected since they have a computer shop and that meant no service for more than 4 days. Our neighbors got affected too since they had no telephone service for a long time.

So this time I figured that I’d do my fast without affecting other people and decided that I would NOT go online starting Holy Monday (April 2) to Easter Sunday (April 8). I packed my portable PC in my bag after Palm Sunday and placed it far away from my desk. In the office, I had to open my machine to work and check my mail but definitely no surfing, not even to click on the attached link to professional and spiritual sites I’ve subscribed to (I clicked on one link once but was fast enough to exit before I got through). It was rather easy not to surf since I had LOTS to do from Monday to Wednesday. I wasn’t really worried about not surfing at work but more worried on whether I could survive not using my machine at home during the HOLY holidays. But time really flies FAST. My fasting from my machine is over and it was a good thing too. It is really nice to be silent during the HOLY days.

I actually like the HOLY week better than Christmas season. I find the months of November and December chaotic and stressful especially since my office is in Divisoria, the bargain capital of the Philippines where it could be so full of people, vehicles, goods and what have you during the Christmas season.

Except for the heat, I like Holy week. A lot of people go on vacation during this time with some people going to their provinces to join their family in the religious festivities and some to really take some rest and indulge in recreation and the beach.

In the office, they would ask me where I’ll be going for the Holy week and I’ve been saying that I’d just stay home and go to church for a couple of years already. I used to go with my friends during the Holy week but I find that no matter how solemn our intention is, we’d end up having some loud times too. I always enjoy being with my friends yet there is a part of me that would want to just be silent on this season. So for many years already I spend Holy week at home and church (ah yes, there’s always a trip to the grocery too to buy goodies for our Easter egg hunt which is part of our family’s Easter celebration).

This Holy week has been good, it was a bit tiring since we had to take in a nephew and his sister for a few days since their mom got hospitalized. It was not really silent at home since there were 9 kids (aged from 6 months to 9 years old) most of whom are hyper with some alternately getting sick also (due to heat and probably craving for attention). There was great temptation to watch non-stop the DVD of JUMONG, the Korean series I am following (my brother and sis-in-law were teasing me) yet I was able to refrain from it! Ahh yes, the family got to pray together, even the kids! It was nice for the kids to be silent (not really still, gosh that would be a miracle, I think) for a few minutes with some joining the prayer. And church, I really like attending the service and just being there. I was alone for the most time, oh yes there were so many people in church (it is amazing and awesome to see so many Filipinos going to church during these times and really heart warming to see families doing their Way of the Cross) yet I felt alone with my Beloved most of the time. Those are precious times!

So time really flies fast. Holy week is over! There’s still one more day before going back to work (good thing April 9-“Araw ng Kagitingan” fell on a Monday so that’s an the extra vacation day) but it has been a good week. And my fasting was real fast! I hope that the fruit of the Fast last long! Yup, hope that Holy week and Easter bears good fruit!

Meet the Robinsons n Hongkong Disney and Macau

I clicked on the ad in yahoo which featured the new Disney movie Meet the Robinsons. It is going to be in 3-D in some cinemas in the US and actually started showing already but I don't know when it is going to be shown here.

There have been showing of 3-D films in our country in the past but I have never seen one so that I had a really great and fun time watching an animated 3-D film in Hongkong Disneyland of one of the misadventures of Donald Duck. You could hear footsteps going around the theater like it was really coming from the backstage, on the sides... then there was a time when there were water splashing and you actually feel being wet and the flying instruments and foods floating around you that you could almost grasp them! And the characters were not flat, you could see their structures properly like they were in front of you! It was really amazing that I was wondering how those 3-D glasses could make a difference in a film. What was their magic? I did not really check out about 3-D films again until i saw the ads on yahoo and realized that 3-D films are made differently from ordinary films even if they are the same movie (did that make any sense?), it was not just on the glasses! You could wear the glasses in an ordinary film and you'll see the same falt thing. 3-D glasses only work on 3-D movies!

Anyway, this 3-D film also made me remember my trip to Hongkong and Macau last February. I was not able to blog about them due to lots of things but it will be nice to post about them now. We came there for the Chinese New Year and got to see the parade. We could not make it for the fireworks display since it was scheduled the day after the New year already and we had to go back by that time.

This is my third time to be in Hongkong but I am still amazed by the tall buildings that seem to go side by side by the mountains. There are always new buildings everytime I go there. I'm not really a shopper (my friends are though) but I enjoy looking at their interconnected malls that never seem to run out of people. Even if their malls are so many floors up, you'll see people even in top floors. It is something I envy.

Oh, how I wish we could get the volume of tourists they have over there! We have nice malls too and bargains and we have white beaches and eco-destinations that are great yet we could never get their share of tourists! One factor is because of the transportation.

It is not only their malls and buildings that are interconnected but their MRTs and trains as well and they could get you almost anywhere! Geez, they even have airport trains (not just trains within the airport, they have that too but trains from the airport to the city and vice versa!) and you don't have to keep on getting different token or pass cards to get into MRTs and trains, you could just use their octopus pass. You don't even have to swipe the card since you could just place them in your bags and swipe the bag in the reader and it will be able to recognize! (makes me really wish we already have them here, but i'm sure in time we will also be able to have them!) and the octupus pass could even be used to purchase goods in some establishments. Pretty neat I should say considering that it is so easy to add loads to your pass (i don't think e-load though maybe we are still ahead in that aspect?).

It is quite easy to move from Hongkong to other parts of China too since you could just take a train going to Shen-shen or a fast craft ride going to Macau which terminals you could access buildings with MRT stations also.

There's another thing that is good in HongKong, it is a pretty safe place. On one of the nights we were there, my friends were already tired after our trip to Macau. There were few days left and I have never been to the Night market. They have been there and they say it is just like our Divisoria here but I have never experienced it so I thought I'd go there and I did. I went byt myself. I did not really know where it was but i knew the place i had to get off so I went down from our hotel, walk a few steps to the subway and got off on the stop and checked their signboards for the proper exit and viola i was there! Lots of people walking along the streets it was easy to track the place after i went out fromt he entrance. It was pretty late but I was safe. Makes me wish the same thing here , I like walking at night but I really have to be alert and that somehow diminish the joy of walking!

Ahh, there's one more neat thing I discovered in Hongkong. Their Disneyland! It was not really very big but there were really great shows (the Lion King show was fantastic). It was a neat place and it was so easy to get there! In fact we went there only by MRT and the disney train. Geez, the disney train was cool!

I had a good vacation. I certainly did not meet the Robinsons there since they are still from the future but I had a good time! It would probably have been better if I had my own camera, better yet my own photographer... hahaha, maybe if I become a millionaire I'll bring my own photographer in my next trip? That would be way cool!!!