Dartegnian's Mood Calendar

Monday at work

Mon, 25 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good
Significant Location: Poblacion, Makati

I finally finished a bunch of my mood calendar entries today and I managed to clear my backlog. Even though it came at the cost of my sleep, I'm still glad I got to get it all and done with. After that, I planned to sleep, but I didn't actually get any sleep lol. I ended up being awake until the morning. I had this extreme anxiety and I couldn't really do anything about it like use my Mac because already turned it off nor use my main iPhone because it was charging. Eventually, morning rolled around and my sister got to massage my head and temples because I had this horrible headache going on, and I got sleep for around 2 hours or so. When I woke up, I was super groggy but I had food. I still had to go to the office today so I pushed through getting ready regardless of how tired I was. I eventually got to arrive in the office just fine, but it was so damn hot out. And it wasn't even close to high noon! The heat was insane and the Angkas rider even commented on how hot it was. For the rest of my time in the office, I just plowed through my usual start-of-the-week tasks. I had lunch out with my coworkers. We all ordered from the same fried chicken store, because why not, and my coworker and I also got some “coffee” even though they got a pistachio drink and I got a matcha one. I don't know why, but the service today was extremely slow, both for the food and for the drink. My coworker, who only ordered a little bit ahead of me, got his drink first and it significantly took a while before I got my drink and food. I just had to scarf down my meal so I could run back to the office for my meeting. After that, not much else happened. I tried sleeping at the sleeping quarters, but found it uncomfortable. I did feel a bit rested even though I was only there for 10 minutes or so. After work, I eventually talked enough to my coworker to convince him to get dinner at Koobideh Kebabs with me. We walked all the way there and just talked about work stuff. They also asked why I wanted to go there, and I just told them that it's been a while and that Jaze and I went to Poblacion before, only to eat *pares* and not here. We eventually got there after a bit of walking and we just ate and talked more about work. We used the hell out of the sauces served, though, and I loved the taste of their *biryani* rice. I even ordered another plate of *biryani* rice because it was just that good. I felt so full afterwards but it was honestly worth it, despite knowing I'm going to be burping like hell for the entire evening after this. We went to 7-Eleven nearby, and I bought some snacks (which I didn't even eat). I walked with them to their hotel just so I could complete my exercise rings today and then booked a ride home. For the late evening, I didn't do much aside from talk to Mon for a while. It was a funny coincidence how we both wanted a relationship and safe space, and also eerie how she just posted about it yesterday and I mentioned it today. But I'm sure it's just nothing but a funny coincidence. I sent some messages to someone but they didn't reply so I just worked on a new feature for my site which was just basic RSS functionality. It was long overdue, especially with 3 years' worth of journal entries, but I'm glad to have it done and deployed to production after fixing some minor issues.

Song of the day: Pretty Please by Heart2Hearts

Hard-Knock Life

Sun, 24 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

For Sunday, I just spent it at home and I just tried to make the most of my weekend by being productive. I told someone about my plans for today and I mostly just talked to them on and off about some stuff. I also mostly just listened to their life problems. I also began work on updating an old Material 3 Expressive redesign that I planned on my own. I got take-out for myself since my sister was out for the day and I also got myself some Monster Energy Drink, as well as some Dr. Pepper since I was surprised it was available, and that I haven't had it since my last day in Korea that was months ago. I mostly just worked on my personal website up until the evening. It got really frustrating to not do all of this myself, and it just made me realize that I like doing development on my own projects by myself. Eventually, my sister arrived after I booked a ride for her, and she got me that USB C to DisplayPort that I immediately hooked up to my MacBook and monitor so I could enjoy the full 180HZ refresh rate. I talked to Mom for a bit, and then kept talking to someone into the evening. After that, I mostly just finished my journal entries and wrapped up on development for the day.

Song of the day: It's The Hard-Knock Life by Quvenzhané Wallis, Zoe Margaret Colletti, Nicolette Pierini, Eden Duncan-Smith & Amanda Troya

Journal entry for Saturday, May 23rd, 2026

Sat, 23 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent

Saturday had me and Jaze still out in Makati. We eventually got to The Original Pares Mami House Retiro, which we learned is a franchise of the same restaurant we kept visiting near Manila. I was honestly shocked, but also glad since they probably have the same *pares* recipe as the original place. We place our orders, some *beef pares*, *siomai*, and I wanted to be different so I got us stuffed shrimp. I quickly notice that the recipe was almost exactly the same, but Jaze says that it tastes a bit more watery compared to the original. We ate the other side dishes, but I couldn't eat much of the stuffed shrimp because it wasn't my thing, and Jaze didn't eat much, too, since apparently he had some seafood allergy that I just learned now. Afterward, we just had the food for take-out and went to Assi Fresh Plaza to just chill and grab some drinks. I got some snacks, and I just munched on them as Jaze was telling me of the latest drama that was going on in our Discord, which just shocks me because it seemed a bit extreme. But apparently it's just some minor stuff that'll blow over in a few days. We wrap it up after that and I eventually got back home safe. For the day, I didn't plan on much aside from catching up on my journal entries. I booked a ride to Starbucks 32nd Street and worked on some stuff, but for some reason I just couldn't finish my entries. I just parked them for now and eventually got dinner by myself. I tried to find a USB C to DisplayPort cable, that I know for sure Datablitz sells, but they said that they were all out of. When I stepped out, it apparently had started raining, and I was immediately glad that I brought my Cinnamoroll today. I walked down to One Bonifacio High Street and ate at Cafe Mediterranean since I was craving Mediterranean food anyway. I took a few photos and sent them to Mon, which she teased me about, but I enjoyed my food a lot. I **LOVED** the *lamb gyro* and I guess I just love lamb that much. I had some brownies, and had the leftover of my appetizer for take-out. I tried to look for a USB C to DisplayPort cable, but I couldn't find any so I just booked a ride home and then got some well-deserved rest.

Song of the day: NOT CUTE ANYMORE by ILLIT

Journal entry for Friday, May 22nd, 2026

Fri, 22 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Friday was pretty okay, I mostly just focused on work today and had the entire day to myself. I ordered some take-out for my sister and I in the afternoon because I wanted us to get some cold snacks. I also deleted my CMB profile because it was mostly useless at this point. Work came and went after I finished my remaining tasks for the week. In the evening, I mostly just waited for Jaze but I also talked to my other IMC friends. I reactivated an old Facebook account for mine and sent some of the pictures from that account. I also found an old classmate's address and I told Jaze that we could visit them in the future if we ever wanted. But I mostly just relived some nostalgia from that old account. After a while, Jaze arrived and we planned to go to Makati instead of BGC because it was getting boring to Jaze. I decided that we also try Koobideh Kebabs since it was good there, but Jaze opted for the *pares* house that had a similar name to the one we always ate at in Manila. We eventually drove there on Jaze's motorcycle.

Song of the day: Nobody's Son by Sabrina Carpenter

Lyrics that resonated with me:
Here we go again, crying in bed, what a familiar feeling
All my friends in love, and I'm the one they call for a third wheeling

Journal entry for Thursday, May 21st, 2026

Thu, 21 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Thursday was pretty chill. I mostly just spent it at home and talked to someone. We watched Good Boy (2025) but the pacing was too slow for someone since they said that they “could hear themselves think,” and we ultimately dropped it. We were on a call during my breaktime. But then eventually I had to focus on work. For the evening, I mostly just watched them play Kulo Niku, which was kind of similar to the cat cafe game that they were already playing, and I fiddled with my chair in the evening because it didn't support my properly. I ultimately gave up and that was it.

Rockwell Eating Out!

Wed, 20 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good
Significant Location: Rockwell, Makati

I had to work on-site today and I started my day bright and early enough. I booked a ride to the office. I got there fine and I had just set up my stuff. I just focused on my major tasks today and pretty much had lunch out with my coworkers. During this time, I also opened up to someone that it's been getting difficult since I have a bit of money troubles and that I've been giving them so much money since September. It was kind of a heated discussion and it went on as I was having lunch out with coworkers, but thankfully it kind of simmered down when I told them my upcoming plan for it. Still, it was fun and having my coworkers there lightened up my mood since they were just teasing another coworker. After lunch, we just went back to our respective desks and I focused on my tasks for the day. In the evening, we met up with one other coworker in the office and decided that today would be the day us 3 got ramen together. I was happy to hear it since I wanted to have dinner out with my coworkers anyway, and eating out after work is the reason why I like going to the office in the first place. We decided to have ramen in Ramen Ron in Rockwell, and they even teased me to book a ride to Ramen Ron in BGC, but we still got a ride to Rockwell. I eventually got us a ride there and we were eventually there after a while. I forgot the name of my dish, but it was their best-seller supposedly. I ordered a side of noodles, too, since I expected that I'd eat a lot. We ate for a bit and I'm not sure if my coworkers liked it, but one definitely didn't. They also got made fun of because they didn't know that the paste would be similar to *gochujang*. I mostly laugh at it and laugh at him for making that mistake, but after that we just walk and talk until we get to our next stop, which was Wildflour Cafe. It was just in time that we got there because they had their usual 50% off pastries. I managed to snag the last cookie, which was a red velvet cookie, and it was funny because the girl behind me was supposed to get that. I visibly heard her cry out a bit when I told the server that I would get that cookie. I got one more pastry and then we just ate inside the restaurant to eat it. After a while, we were directed outside because the indoor seats were reserved for diners, and we were directed out by a nice waitress. I tell my coworkers that the waitress looked pretty and sweet and they tease me to her. After that, we just talk amongst ourselves and I got to open up to my coworker about my dating life since he didn't know about it. I told him how I liked this girl and how I gave her a Google Pixel, and then how I don't like her anymore. Then they get into this heated argument about meeting up in Cubao, but how their stories differed from each other. It was a funny argument to just be a listener in. We spend quite a bit of time just talking amongst each other. Eventually, my coworker had to leave and we booked a ride back to the office because we left our stuff there. My coworker books a ride this time and we eventually get back to the office. I just pack up my stuff and then my coworker and I sit next to our coworker and I open up about the girl. They shared their story and experience with that person and it surprised me that they agreed to be my wingman, even though I didn't really have any plans of approaching that girl. They tease me about that girl for a bit, but eventually my coworker and I decide to leave since it was getting late. For the rest of the evening, I just walked with my coworker and accompanied him back to the hotel they're staying at since I promised I'd walk with them if they also went back to the office. We just talked and I mostly asked them about work stuff and work drama. I just wanted to get my steps in and we eventually got to their hotel. I booked a ride home after that and just chilled for the time being.

Song of the day: Cum on Feel the Noize by Quiet Riot

Lyrics that resonated with me:
So come on, feel the noise
Girls, rock your boys
We'll get wild, wild, wild
Wild, wild, wild
Come on, feel the noise
Girls, rock your boys
We'll get wild, wild, wild

Journal entry for Tuesday, May 19th, 2026

Tue, 19 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Average

Tuesday was pretty boring. I mostly just talked to someone and spent the day at home. I had work today which just came and went.

Song of the day: STYLE by Heart2Hearts

Journal entry for Monday, May 18th, 2026

Mon, 18 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Mon and I stay for a while at Starbucks and we honestly just pass by the time there until we decide that it's getting too late and Mon and I walk from Starbucks to a bench in front of Adidas. We just wait for a while as Mon books a ride first, and we just talk about life stuff until her ride arrived and picks her up. I just stay for a while and it takes me quite a while to get a ride and Mon asks me to send photos that I took of her, which I do. Mon tells me that she found one photos of us cute, which was flattering because I didn't think that it was a good photo of me. I eventually booked a ride home and then got rest after that. For today, I just had work and it was a pretty normal, chill day in the office. I actually just had lunch by myself and work passed by as quickly as it had started. When I got home, I was bored so I just watched Ocean's Eleven (2001) by myself. I liked it a bit, but I kind of expected more. I guess it was revolutionary at the time, but it didn't really stick out that much to me. Further in the evening, I just talked to someone and they revealed that they had an iPhone Air as well, we both have the same phone, in the same color, and in the same case, which honestly just surprised me. I kept talking to them about life stuff as their flight was delayed due to the weather.

Song of the day: NOT CUTE ANYMORE by ILLIT

Sunday and working with Mon!

Sun, 17 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Uptown and Mitsukoshi Mall, BGC

Sunday was finally Mon's day and it's actually the last day of my long weekend of just spending it with friends. Mon talked to me about changing plans and that we should just not push through with going to MoA today and I decided on someplace else instead. I found a good cafe in BGC, which was Key Coffee Kissaten inside Mitsukoshi Mall, and we agreed to that. I watched Fast Five (2011) just to pass the time and then I got some well-deserved sleep after that. I didn't do much in the morning and I just slept for most of it and then prepared to leave in the afternoon. It took me a while to book a ride to Mitsukoshi Mall, but I eventually got a ride and I told Mon that I was on the way. Mon got there first, though, and she said that she would be at the food court so she could start work on something. I eventually got there after a few minutes and then found Mon sitting by herself and on her tablet. I was surprised that she just sat at a random restaurant's seat because she didn't order anything. I found it funny and then we talked like usual. It's also coincidental that I passed by the cafe we were supposed to go to, so I got my name noted down for a reservation and then we walked around to explore. Mon kept pulling on my arm like usual and we went to Fully Booked to check out a few things. A cute wallet that looks like a PlayStation 3 controller catches my eye but I hold off on buying it as I get a phone call. It was the restaurant and they told me that a table was free for us, so we went downstairs so we could sit at our table. We get seated at a small circular table which seemed a bit too busy for comfort. We both ordered a few things, Mon gets that drink that she wants and I try out that interesting drink I saw. We also order some food, but we get our drinks first and we bring out our respective devices and do our things for a while as we wait for the food to be served. We take a few pictures before the food finally arrives and then we eat, while Mon talks about her experiences with work and what she's been doing lately, which was nice to hear. We talk until we decide to get our desserts and then Mon tells me more about her experiences and we actually take a while to finish our dessert, even though we both liked this matcha-mochi-mango-thing. I pay for our food and then we went inside Mitsukoshi Mall itself to just see the other stores inside. Mon and I visit Fully Booked and I bought a book about learning Spanish, while Mon just checks out the other books and manga inside. I also talked to someone for a bit during this time and I explained how I don't have feelings for Mon anymore, and how I didn't even have a crush on her, both of which were her false assumptions about me. After buying the books, Mon and I take a pic of us together and it was pretty cute. We went to Daiso and I bought this funny pouch that had a cat's face on it. After that, Mon and I walked to Uptown because we just wanted a proper place where we can just focus on our stuff. We tried visiting the Starbucks there, but it was full. It was also strange that we passed by an ongoing mass, but we went inside the mall and then hung out at the Muji there because they had proper seats, and we eventually found a nice spot there which had comfortable seats. Mon focused on her stuff while I finished off some of Friday's journal entries. We also settled on watching a movie, which would be Midnight Girls (2026), and I bought us tickets for it. We focused on our respective tasks for a while, and a I took a few photos of Mon, too. After that was done, we eventually went to see the movie, which had quite a bit of people watching, too. The movie was pretty nice, we found it funny and it's also funny how it opened up with a song I completely knew, which Mon definitely cringed at because I was singing it. The movie was pretty emotional, so that was nice. It got pretty late by the time the movie finished. Mon suggested that we go “Lawson-hunting” like we did before, and we bought a few things at Lawson. I wanted to try out their chicken skin, which was just okay. Mon and I walk for a while more, and Mon says that she misses walks like these because we just talk about random shit, but also serious topics, during our whole walk. I also feel the same way because I miss just walking and talking with a friend. Mon shares some story of her coworker which I just listen to, and we eventually arrive at my 3rd place, which was Starbucks on 32nd Street. We find a seat that's surprisingly the same place we stayed at in our first hangout. We stay there for a bit more as the next day comes along.

Song of the day: Just The Way You Are by Milky

Afternoon visit to Festival Mall

Sat, 16 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Festival Mall, Alabang

Saturday started with me and Jaze finally arriving in Taguig after our very long trip from Cavite. The ride back form Cavite was actually the easy part as there was little to no traffic. We decided to go to Assi Fresh Plaza and we got drinks at 7-Eleven first. We orderd our usual Mountain Dew Gulp drinks and then went to Assi Fresh Plaza to check out the place, and also since it had air conditioning. The aircon there wasn't actually cold today, and we really needed a place to just chill out and stuff. We decided to go to the 2nd floor at 7-Eleven, but when we got there, it was closed. So we just decided to drink our drinks outside like usual. I came up with the idea that I should charge my stuff and so I asked if we could go to the Starbucks down the street. Jaze agreed and we brought our stuff from there. When we got there, though, it was closed and then I asked if we could go to the one on 32nd Street instead, since I knew that would be open at this time, and so we went there. When we got there, they thankfully had motorcycle parking, but it was totally full inside. Jaze couldn't find a seat for the 2nd floor, and we decided to hang out at the community table instead. And then I still tried to find a seat at the 2nd floor, thankfully one opened up as I got there and we were able to get seated. One was near an outlet, too, so I used that opportunity to charge my stuff. We stayed for a bit for my items to charge, and funny enough I actually had the slow cable hooked up to the power bank the whole time. It's just a funny blunder and I was able to correct it enough for me to be able to charge a bit faster by the end. We then decided to end the day there and Jaze dropped me off after I got Jaze some gas. For the day, I only had my hangout with Naomi and Jane planned out. I didn't do much from the time between that so I just went to Festival Mall after spending some time in the house. I eventually got to Festival Mall and I eventually met Naomi and her girlfriend Jane. We walked around for a while, then I suggested that we go to Starbucks so I could get a drink. I treated them both to some Starbucks and I listened to them talk about the things they've been up to lately and it was nice to also share some stories of my trip to Korea. After that, I had the idea that we should do some end-of-year thing like book a hotel room and go clubbing in Poblacion since I'm familiar with the area, or go to EK. I let Naomi think about it and then we walked around for a bit. Naomi showed the Samgyupsalamat restaurant and we even went to this wide open area with a fake river or something, which surprisingly had some fish. I was surprised because the water didn't look clear enough to have fish, so that caught me off guard. I saw a weird fish in the water and I was thinking whether or not it's dead, and Jane also started at it for a bit before we realized that it's actually dead. It kinda spooked me but it was just interesting to see some fish here. We walked around a bit more and it was getting really hot because I wore the “cold outfit” I had back in Korea. I had a jacket on, and it sucked because I wasn't able to wear the intended shirt for this because it had some bird shit in it. We walked for a bit more, then decided to try the rollercoaster since the line wasn't that long. I was able to bring my iPhone Air with me along the ride because I had a strap for it, and it was a fun, but short ride. I'm glad it went for 2 loops because the track wasn't that long. I didn't expect much, but it was thrilling as far as small rollercoasters went. It made me miss my T Express ride back in Everland Korea, though. We walked for a bit more after that, then we decided where to eat and then Jane grabbed some take-out from a restaurant that her sister used to work at. We initially decided on *samgyeopsal* but Naomi said that it was out of budget, so we settled on Burger King, then we changed out idea after finally settling on that Thai restaurant that Jane got food from. I mostly just listened to Naomi talk about her and Jane's experience, and other things that they've been up to. We walked for a bit more, but we didn't really do much else aside from walk to the pickup/drop-off point in the east wing of the mall. Naomi and Jane booked a ride for themselves, and that's where I started getting a ton of hiccups, for no reason. I think it's because the Thai food was too spicy and that I didn't get that much water earlier. Naomi and Jane had a bit of confusion regarding the pickup point, and so did I because I had several drivers cancel on me before having one that did. By this time, we had all gotten rides home and then that's where we parted ways for the night. For the late evening, nothing much happened as I got home. It did rain, which was nice, but I mostly just enjoyed my time by scrolling on IG Reels and talking to a few friends. Nathan gave me some Miku candy thing because he went to this event, and it was pretty nice of him to do so. I asked him to hang out next week Saturday and he agreed, but not now because it was raining like hell. I made my sister try one out but she wasn't a fan of it because she dislikes the flavor. I stayed up and kept on browsing until the next day rolled in.

Song of the day: Pretty Please by Heart2Hearts

Night outing with Jaze and Foz

Fri, 15 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Cavite

Friday started out with me actually staying awake for almost the whole night. I was just honestly so bored and I didn't have much to do, but I mostly just did random stuff and killed time. I also talked to someone for a bit, but it was mostly about random topics that didn't mean anything. After that, I was able to sleep and time in for work. I mostly just finished off the week's tasks since it was a Friday and time just passed. Come the afternoon, the power went out and I got notified that it would take until the evening for the power to get restored. I was surprised that we finally got hit with the rotating blackout thing. I just informed my teammates that I'll be making up some time later. I called up Jaze and told him that we should leave soon, and then my sister got ready as well since she wanted to get out of the house. I got ready, had some cereal, and then waited for Jaze to arrive. Jaze eventually arrives at my house and we both head off to Venice Grand Canal as a kind of stopover before we fully head out to Cavite to meet Foz. Jaze noticed that the power had gone out and that they were using the diesel generators, and he asked if the power was out and the guard confirmed it. We were just at the food court and Jaze had wanted to eat at SNR anyway, but I suggested that we got to Starbucks first to get a few drinks before eating, since the trip there would take a while anyway. We got a few drinks and talked amongst each other for a while, and I got to charge my devices before leaving since I felt like I would need to charge anyway. We took a while there because Foz didn't want us to go so early anyway. After a while, we finish our drinks and go to SNR at the food court. We stood in line, which took quite a while, and I talk to Jaze about some nutrition stuff that he might know about. We eventually get our orders in and find a table that's next to this Japanese couple. Jaze recommended that I get the beef hotdog, which I did, and it was honestly pretty good. We ate for a while there and Jaze packs his food up because he couldn't finish his pasta. Then we head to Cavite which would take quite a while. The drive there was pretty okay, even though I was just on a motorcycle. We passed by this sign that said “Love the Philippines” or something, which was at NAIA, and it totally brought back my memory of leaving for South Korea. It actually broke my heart because I remembered that flight so clearly and it just made me miss the day I left for my vacation in Korea. The trip went on for longer but we eventually reach Dunkin' which was someplace in Cavite. It was actually the first time I've been to Cavite, or at least this part of it. Jaze parks for a bit but Foz recommends that we go to where his car is currently parked. We then drive for a bit more to see where Foz is and we stay inside his car for a bit to cool off because it was cold inside. Foz borrowed my iPhone Air to check it out and I look around his car's dashboard while I was sitting in the passenger's seat. Foz shows Jaze the many features of his car and the things he's done to it, as well as outfitting it with a new exhaust which was pretty loud. After a while of Foz showing off his car, we went to the nearby food stalls which were similar to the ones Jaze and I have been to around McKinley Hill. We stroll through and check out the booths before we settled on getting shakes, and I got some fried food because why not. The signal was pretty dead here, which was kind of difficult for me because I relied on it to pay for my food. But eventually thing's were okay and we ate for a bit while talking about random stuff. We drove off to the restaurant because Foz had already ordered for us. Jaze took the motorcycle and essentially tailed us, while I sat in the passenger's seat and took many videos as Foz sped and drove pretty crazily. The trip took a while, and we passed by a KKK memorial, which was pretty interesting because Cavite wasn't mentioned much and didn't seem like a big historical landmark, but it was interesting to see a memorial here nonetheless. We eventually arrive at Al-Bayt because Foz is good friends with the cook here. Foz just talks to the cook and owner while Jaze teases me about something he saw, that I was already looking at. The place we wanted to stay at was affected by a power outage, so we went off somewhere else. On the way there, Foz tells me how he's gotten close to the store there and it was a cool story to hear. We eventually settled on a McDonald's nearby and Foz orders a coke float or something while we eat some of the food we ordered. The food we got was really nice, I liked the different flavors and how it was really flavorful. It's been a while since I had middle-eastern food, so that was nice. We enjoyed our food but we couldn't finish it all. We took a few pictures, but we eventually went on our separate ways because it was getting dark. One thing Jaze and I noticed as we were heading back was how short everything was, and Foz never really got to share his story, which was the reason why we headed to Cavite in the first place. We still drove back and decided to stop at Assi Fresh Plaza so we can just chill down and stuff.

Journal entry for Thursday, May 14th, 2026

Thu, 14 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Thursday was more fun than yesterday. I got a good amount of sleep today, which was 7 hours. My morning started slow, though, and I was mostly just doing work for most of the day. I ordered Mang Inasal with my sister, which was nice, and then I talked to Mon for a bit for an idea she has to work together soon. I just listened and agreed because it seems cool. I talked to other friends and someone too, but that was only to just listen to them talk about their day. For the evening, I was pretty bored after work. I didn't know what to do but I wanted to watch a fun movie. I thought about going out again but I just couldn't decide if any of the movies now showing were any good. So I just decided to watch Project Hail Mary (2026) which piqued my interest but I couldn't watch as I was in Korea at the time. I watched Project Hail Mary and Foz asked me how I watched it, but continued to watch the whole film. I absolutely loved it and it even made me a bit teary-eyed at times. It reminded me a bit about Interstellar and I've been interested in watching space movies again, so this was pretty cool. I pretty much ended my day after that.

Song of the day: Man in the Mirror by Michael Jackson

Meh?

Wed, 13 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Today was pretty straightforward. I wasn't able to sleep much because I was having acid attacks and burping while sleeping. I slept for only 2 hours or so, funny enough. I was just working from home and my sister made breakfast, even though I didn't feel like eating yet. She also needed her room cooled because she locked her windows because it was so noisy outside, which led to my room being pretty hot and not properly cooled the whole day, but it was fine. I just had work in the morning. For the afternoon, I didn't do much aside from focus on my job. I eventually finished all my tasks and timed out for work, and then I watched the new episode of The Boys. It was pretty “meh” and I didn't know what to feel from it. Also, I asked Jaze if we were still down to go out tonight but he had other stuff so I just decided to watch a movie alone. I watched In The Grey (2026) at Venice Grand Canal and I really just wanted a reason to take my new iPhone Air out for a try and the movie was okay. I expected some kind of Now You See Me-type stuff or Ocean's Eleven, but nothing too spectacular. What's funny and creepy about it was that it was just me in the movie theater alone **AGAIN**. This totally reminds me of my time when I watched Tron: Ares last year. It was creepy! I was the only person watching the film in the entire movie theater, which was funny but also sad. It kind of reminded me of that IG Reel where a guy was alone the whole day and didn't talk to anyone. I did like some scenes and then had to go out with some people, which made me feel less alone. I had Army Navy and then went home, I mostly just talked to someone and asked them about their Davao trip and how disastrous their day had been going before sleeping. Today was still nice because I got to talk with a few friends, like Kai, Naomi, someone, Frits, and even Jaze for a bit. I also just remembered that I had upcoming plans for the weekend with Naomi and Kai, too, which was funny because I totally forgot since it wasn't on my calendar.

Song of the day: You'll Be In My Heart by NIKI

An iPhone Air So Soon?

Tue, 12 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special

Tuesday was definitely one of the weirdest Tuesdays I've ever had. I slept early last night, mostly because I was really tired, and I woke up really early, which is a first. I talked to my sister for a while to check out her phone and then she made breakfast for us. I just spent some parts of my morning at home and I just chilled for a good while until I decided it was time to leave. I was surprised to arrive in the office so early, and I got there just in time as my coworkers were just arriving. I did my usual round of morning stuff and then we got coffee that was just a long walk full of joking around and stuff. I got some new drink named Madagascar, or something, and we decided to have lunch since we were already nearby. We had lunch since it was cheap and pretty filling there. One of our coworkers wanted chicken and we saw that they had a bucket full of them, so we ordered those and split the bill amongst the 3 of us. The chicken flavors were nice, I think we like garlic parmesan the most. The others had separate dishes while we were eating. By the time we were back, we were really full so I was pretty glad we got to walk around for a bit. For the afternoon, it was pretty boring as I just focused on clearing a lot of stuff for work and focusing on things. I also helped out my teammates, especially the ones I were with earlier. But the afternoon passed and we just had *merienda* at the end of it. I wanted to buy more food, since I didn't plan on having dinner, but one of my coworkers said that they'll be having dinner, so I decided to tag along with them. We decided to have dinner at Taiwan Chicken and we walked there. We took the route that I knew, which didn't go through any places that had air conditioning, and I decided to walk upstairs rather than take the escalators, which my coworkers made fun of me for because I was already sweating bullets lol. I kept reiterating to them that I didn't sweat as much as I did when I was in Korea, and they just shot that down, which was funny. We eventually got to Taiwan Chicken and we ordered very similar meals, even though we didn't discuss about it with each other. We both got the sea salt milk tea and Taiwan pork *xiao long bao*, we even got a rice meal. The only thing different with my dish was that I got the chicken rice meal, and I ordered an extra Taiwan sausage. I didn't know that was a thing, either. We just listened to one of our coworkers talk about this Mobile Legends-based board game that the had made using AI and we tried to finish our food very slowly because we were already full, and we ordered **A LOT** of food. We finished what we could and we began our walk back to the office. Our day is actually about to end, we just passed by a lot of stalls, joked amongst each other (they mostly joked about me), and it was a pretty nice way to just chill. Then one of my coworkers teases me, all to just lead me into buying a new iPhone. I was initially hesitant, but after thinking about it, I was convinced and got a new iPhone Air with the help of my other coworker. I was surprised I agreed so easily, but I justified the purchase later on. I bought a new screen protector and case for it, which was nice, but getting this was so unexpected, it even shocked me. I tried to set it up for a bit in the office until I got a ride back home, and I eventually just decided to get a car ride home as it was pretty late and I was kinda tired. I told someone and my sister that I got a new iPhone Air and someone congratulated me and it was cool to tell them how I got the phone. We talked about other things after that and mostly focused on them staying in Davao, until they stopped responding and I was mostly focused on setting up my new iPhone. I continued setting it up until the following day and then I eventually slept. At the end of the day, I was having confused feelings because some parts of my life weren't working out well (things with my date had completely fallen apart), but I had some things going well like the year as a whole. I just decided to look at the good things regardless.

Song of the day: Rainbow Veins by Owl City

Journal entry for Monday, May 11th, 2026

Mon, 11 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Today was pretty normal and boring, honestly. Surprisingly, I got a lot of sleep last night, which was 10 hours long. I knew I went to bed early but I was still surprised nonetheless. I decided to work on-site today because I wanted to return my work monitor, and I didn't want to be liable for it anyways. I booked a car ride to the office but the driver took a weird route which kind of had them reversing for the first part, but thankfully it was smooth sailing from thereon out. Work was pretty boring, too. I was just there for my coworkers and they were. One unexpectedly showed up and one didn't show up, which was funny because we ended up looking for them the entire day and wondering if they went AWOL. I had lunch out with them, then we grabbed some coffee and I had some Dubai chocolate cupcake-thing, which was funny but also kind of delicious. I also tried that new thing at Marugame Udon, it was this bolognese thing and I absolutely hated it. It was so weird, even for me. It was actually the first time where I had a lot of leftovers there. For the afternoon, work just passed by. I focused on a few things. For some reason, I just felt angry and also sad because I'm not working for my wife and kids, I'm just working for myself and I want that part of my life to change. It was quelled a bit when I got to talk to Mon and that cooled me off for a while. My workday passed and I had Coco Ichibanya with my coworker before leaving for my house. I talked to my sister when I got home and I still felt that sting of being lonely into the late evening. I just felt so sad and angry that other people were doing fun stuff that I've never done—go on cute dates, have a romantic partner kiss them, that sort of shit. In the late evening, I came up with the most brilliant idea: 1 hour per day, collectively, to just think and brainstorm what can I do to achieve my dreams, and if possible, I'd act upon those ideas. I went to sleep satisfied with that plan.

Song of the day: NOT CUTE ANYMORE by ILLIT

Journal entry for Sunday, May 10th, 2026

Sun, 10 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

For Sunday, I didn't really have much to do but I just couldn't sleep properly. I just couldn't get some sleep, so I just stayed up throughout the whole morning. In the morning, I didn't really do much aside from wait for my package to arrive. I ordered groceries which was well-needed, and eventually my package arrived in the afternoon. I just assembled my new chair in the afternoon with the help of my sister. I was more than happy to try out the new chair for my room and it feels nice and stable, even though I'm a little bit wary of it because my last chair kept failing and tossing me to the ground. But it was stable enough, and I was able to watch a movie with it. In the evening, I finally got around to watching Music & Lyrics (2007) and it was so cute. I played some Apex after that, and eventually had a round with my sister and her boyfriend that just ended up horribly. My graphics card kept dying on me and it froze multiple times. I didn't want to bother with it anymore and just did other stuff on my MacBook before going to sleep early because I needed the rest.

Holy Ketchup

Sat, 09 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent

I just had the longest-ever recorded sleep I have ever had today. I knew I was sleep deprived for the entire week, but I didn't know that I would sleep # FOR 12 FULL HOURS! I legit didn't expect that, what the fuck. That was the craziest time I've been asleep ever. I did feel well-rested, for what it's worth. And I did my usual stuff of eating breakfast and starting my morning, even had time to post on IG about sleeping for 12 hours. And for the afternoon, everything was so quiet in my life. I barely got any notifications. I decided that today would be the day I catch up on my journal entries and, holy shit, did I catch up. I completed 2 months' worth of journal entries. It made me feel sad to go through some journal entries that were about Korea because I honestly miss Korea. I published all my journal entries online for the world to see, and of course I posted an IG Story about it. I'm actually glad I was able to get back on track despite being so delayed, which is a first. I talked to a few friends today like Kai, someone, Foz, but didn't have any full-on long conversations with anyone. I just chilled for the rest of the evening and updated my other stuff.

Song of the day: NOT CUTE ANYMORE by ILLIT

Holy Shit, Today Was Stressful

Fri, 08 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Samngupsalamat, Gilmore

I spent most of the morning still at Starbucks and still writing journal entries. Eventually, I decided that I had written enough at this time. Someone was still talking to me at this time and I decided to take a break from all the writing. I ate at the nearby Army Navy restaurant and tried their *naked burrito sisig* and a burger that I've always wanted to try. Both were pretty great, honestly, and I took my time to eat. I went back to Starbucks and ordered a pink drink so I could have something to drink as I continued to finish my remaining journal entries. I talked to someone and at around 3 a.m., the staff tells us that they're going to close soon. It was surprising because I thought they're open for 24 hours now, but I guess that's just for the drive-through. I went home and I get into this argument with someone again. It's crazy how many of these have happened throughout the entire week, I count at least 3. It was honestly pathetic at how my life turned out to be like this. I saw myself as pathetic, and I said that, but someone took it as an offense to them. Even though I actually saw myself as pathetic for having this shit happen to me, while my other friends are having fun with their romantic relationships, moving in together, and even becoming parents. It triggered that thing inside me where I want to change my life after seeing myself as pathetic, and I had to explain to someone that it was a good feeling because it makes me move and change my life. This feeling was literally what drove me to find jobs and led to many milestones in my life, and I have to explain that to someone. They eventually understood and we were truly okay after all that. They eventually had to go back to work and I tried to sleep. I had other shit to deal with in the morning and my sister had PC problems, and I didn't even get a wink of sleep because my sister kept waking me up. I was so cranky and angry at this point because I was extremely sleep-deprived for this week, and I didn't even get sleep today again. It truly infuriated me. I just tried to fix her PC even though I was super pissed off and I had to lend her my MacBook so she could install Zoom on it. She eventually switched back to her PC after I had fixed it and I told her that I'd be buying her a new HDD so she could throw out her 64% health HDD in the garbage, which was causing problems. Most of the day was a blur as I had work and I had to go to Gilmore to buy her that 2TB drive. I eventually got it at PCHub and the touts there ticked me off so much, but I'm glad I brought my AirPods with me. They also didn't have a card terminal that worked with debit cards after all these years, which kind of just added me to being more pissed off, so I had to withdraw at a store nearby and pass through several touts again. I eventually got the HDD quickly as it was just 1 part and I booked a ride home. Thankfully, the ride home was more chill and we went through C5, which was more peaceful. I was able to talk to some IMC friends during this time and I appreciated how blue and bright the sky looked. It definitely helped me calm down a lot. My sister had some work left and went to Makati afterward. For the afternoon, I had some free time to install her new HDD and rip out her old one. It was kind of annoying, but I got the job done and transferred her stuff in it, as well as set up some stuff. After timing out, my sister invited me to have dinner with her at Samgyupsalamat and it just occurred to me that I haven't eaten yet. I was extremely tired by now but I still pushed through with it. We just ate and then I grabbed some other stuff at the nearby FunHan Mart, and then I booked for a ride home. I didn't do anything else after arriving home, I just got my well-needed rest as this week was extremely stressful.

Song of the day: NOT CUTE ANYMORE by ILLIT

Journal entry for Thursday, May 7th, 2026

Thu, 07 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good
Significant Location: Starbucks 32nd Street

For Thursday, I just spent the day at home and I woke up pretty early since I felt I had gotten enough sleep. I talked to someone for a bit and then we left the call shortly after that. I had other stuff to do and paid for a few other things in the morning. I also saw that some of my payments for my credit cards had reflected, so that was nice. I didn't have much going on today aside from work which just passed by me. I got my new Anker powerbank in the evening just before timing out. Since I felt super productive and well-rested, I decided to go to Starbucks on 32nd Street to finally catch up on my journal entries. I booked a ride there and eventually got a seat. I was surprised that there were barely any people at this time, but eventually more and more people filled the place as the evening went on. I got to revisit some of my photos from Korea, talked to someone about my experience riding a taxi to Incheon, and we talked for a bit until they had other stuff to do. I just focused on completing as much journal entries as much as possible and my day continued from there.

Song of the day: Apple by Charli xcx

Journal entry for Wednesday, May 6th, 2026

Wed, 06 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

The *pares* that we ate that our friend recommended was…. okay? It wasn't stellar or anything, and it definitely wasn't a place we'd come back so. But at the very least we tried it. We went to our usual place at Assi Fresh Plaza afterward to drink and eat some snacks. It was funny because there was a DDS person sitting behind us and Jaze recognized that he was a DDS because he was blasting music for supporting Sara or some shit. We eventually decide to end our trip there and I got home fine. I have this long-ass, unwarranted argument with someone which kind of stressed me out even further, and I've had a loooonnggg day. But we eventually settle things and I tell them something nice, which was the actual truth anyway and not just some flattery. After that, I made up my mind on deciding for which credit cards I would close and I closed 3 credit card balances in the span of an hour. It was the most productive I've felt in a while and I can't wait to fully settling all my other cards moving forward. I slept as much as I could and then went to work like usual. I had lunch at some Japanese place with my coworkers and I talked to one about telecom plans and whatnot. I also had some Chagee by myself and then just worked for the rest of the day. I had *merienda* with some coworkers in the afternoon and then timed out after that, and I also took a car ride home because I had been so stressed for the week. My sleep had been so wrecked so the first thing I did after arriving home was get ready for bed and get some of that much-needed rest.

Song of the day: All Of The Lights by Kanye West

Journal entry for Tuesday, May 5th, 2026

Tue, 05 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: BGC High Street

Tuesday started with me and Kai still eating out at Pancake House and we eventually finish our food. She tells me of a few organic encounters that she has in her trip to Elyu and I just listen to her stories. We also took a few pics on the 3DS that she has. After that, Kai decieds that we should walk for a bit more and I accompany her for a bit. We walk through several places in BGC, pass through this road that looks a bit liminal at night, but we essentially just circle back to Burgos Circle. Kai decides to book a ride at this point and that's where she and I part ways. I book a ride home, too, but I also get this weird feeling that I still can't explain to this sad. I got really sad and worked up about changing my life and I think the ride home helped me feel better. I also opened up about this to someone but they literally didn't reply afterward so I never got help from them, not like I was expecting them to, though. For the morning, I had on-site work and it was pretty okay. I had coffee out with my coworkers and we tried this new place. The coffee there wasn't that good, though, but it wasn't that bad either to me. But for my other coworkers, it was pretty bad. I also bought a new charger and cable for myself, which was pretty cool. I also got the tempered glass on my iPhone 16 Pro Max replaced, and I was shocked at how yellow it had gotten. I broke the tempered glass for the first time in almost 2 years after I had mistakenly dropped it face-first while eating KFC with my coworkers. I had to get the screen replaced twice because the first installation was a dud and had this weird bubble on the screen. I just had work for the rest of the day after that. In the evening, I had dinner out with my coworkers and we ate at Kawa Ramen. I had a meeting later in the evening so we had to make it quick. It was kind of a hassle as my coworkers had other things to do, so we planned to have dinner somewhere else, but we decided to push through eating at Dela Rosa. We initially wanted to eat at Señor Pollo, but it was temporarily closed when we got there, so we just settled for Kawa Ramen since it was nearby. I mistakenly told them that the skin on the edamame was edible, but I was wrong and we tossed the skin in a proper, separate bowl. We went back to the office after eating in a car that I booked and paid for. I had my meeting and I surprisingly got off work super late at around 11:30 p.m., which surprised me. I still had to go out with Jaze after this so he eventually went to a place near my office and I timed out for the day and then met him. We drove to this *pares* food stall right by the road, somewhere near NAIA. It made me miss NAIA because I last went there for my trip to Korea. We took a while to find it, but we eventually found it just before midnight. My day continued from there.

Song of the day: MAMIHLAPINATAPAI by ILLIT

Lyrics that resonated with me:
I don't care, 더워도 hot 아메리카노
(Doo-roo, doo-doo)
I don't care, 여유지 hot 아메리카노
(Doo-roo, doo-doo)

Kai's Staying Over

Mon, 04 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special

My day started by still being outside with Kai getting her vape. Thankfully, this shop has it and she's surprised that it's way cheaper here in Taguig compared to QC. I use this to make fun of QC again, and a bunch of kids ask money from her, and she gives one of them money. After that, we had to make our way back to my house and we had to pass by some dogs, which was a scary and stressful experience. It was stressful enough that Kai had some of her hallucinations triggered, which was concerning. After that, we finished the movie we were watching earlier, The Whole Truth (2021), and it was really nice. Someone kept trying to message me during this time and they and I get into this weird altercation. We eventually finished the movie. Kai and I move to my bedroom and we decide to watch another horror movie. Someone eventually blows up on me and says that she's mad and annoyed, which was the weirdest shit because she isn't really my girlfriend and we're not even dating. I don't even have romantic feelings for them, so it was extremely off-putting. I was so ticked off from what she did and I eventually sent her a long-ass reply back and called her out. She didn't respond for the evening but I just enjoyed my night with Kai. We watched another horror movie, this time on YouTube. We watched Cult (2013) because we came across it often on IG Reels. It was nice, but it wasn't that scary and it actually got a bit funny at the end. All in all, I think we liked it due to how many jokes we were exchanging while watching. They also made me watch Eerie (2018) but we didn't finish that one. In the morning, I timed in for work but called in sick so I just timed out after. This time feels like a blur but I got breakfast for Kai and I, and we ate some *bulalo* since Kai wanted to eat some bone marrow. She played some Tomodachi Life gameplay from a YouTuber that she likes and we watched it while eating. After eating, we watched another horror movie on YouTube, which was Occult (2009). By this time, someone messaged me again and explained herself, and eventually apologized. I'm glad she did and I called her behavior out one last time as it was truly unacceptable from someone who was just my friend, and doesn't even want a relationship to begin with. Everything was all fine and I talk to them on and off as they were still on their Davao trip. Kai and I were still watching Occult and she orders some chocolate *xiao long bao*, which was pretty weird but I still ate some. The movie eventually ended after that and Kai says that she likes this one more than the other one, which was surprising. She tries to get me scared by forcing me to watch The Grudge (2004) and I was a bit terrified so I tried to hold her hand and stuff, but she kept asking me to face my fears. It was genuinely scary and I was terrified enough that my heart rate kept going up. But we eventually finish the movie and then we decide to play Tekken 7 for a bit. I didn't go easy on Kai and easily won against her in the first few rounds, and that's where I went easy on her. At this point, it was already the evening and I was honestly surprised that Kai had stayed over for a full day. I'm glad that she's hung out with me for so long, and I'm also more glad since I got my salary with my 14th month pay. After playing Tekken 7, we sang some karaoke with the Apple TV and we kept singing songs until she decides that she wants to go to BGC. She asks me if I could go to BGC High Street with her and I agree since I wanted to spend more time with her anyway. We eventually stopped singing and we got ready to leave. I booked us a car ride to BGC High Street and we drove there. After a while, we got to BGC and Kai decides on where we would eat at. She decides on Pancake House and we make our way there. We place our orders, which would seem to be the last order for the day, and we eventually got our food.

Song of the day: Terrified by Katherine McPhee, Jason Reeves

Kai Stays Over!

Sun, 03 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special

Sunday was supposed to be just like any other regular day. I kept talking to this weird person on Reddit because I was bored and they asked me to send voice messages and say that they have this tendency to like people just for their voice alone. It was kind of weird, and also unsettling, because this person didn't want a relationship in the first place. Personally, I didn't want to entertain these types of people and I focused on being more productive by completing my mood calendar entries. I continued to write and write about my mood calendar entries, and I finished a good bulk of them come the afternoon or so. Around 5 p.m., Kai messages me and asks if she could crash her. I was surprised but in a good way because I'm always down to have a friend hang out in my house. I immediately got to cleaning my stuff and she says that she started booking a ride here. I talked to her for a while and she told me about her new Nintendo 3DS that she got. She eventually got to my house and I saw her set up some characters in Tomodachi Life, like her cat and Rick from Rick and Morty. I asked her what food she wanted and I order some Chinese food for us, and it was a lot. I also watched her play a dress up fashion game on Roblox while we were killing time for the food to arrive. Kai also shows me some TikTok videos she made, which were funny and pretty cool of her. Eventually, the food arrives but it's missing some siomai because we only received one. Then Kai recommended we watch The Whole Truth (2021) on Netflix as we were eating and we wanted to introduce me to something scary. After a while, we then we left to get Kai's vape juice at some vape store nearby. It was kinda creepy since my neighborhood is known for having aggressive dogs, and even I'm scared of them. Kai was definitely twice as scared as I was. We had to essentially walk around some of the dogs and they were still scary. Our day continued from there.

Journal entry for Saturday, May 2nd, 2026

Sat, 02 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Below Average

Saturday just had me and Jaze playing Apex and Cholo eventually joined in, but we didn't win at all for the following games. I got some rest after that. The entirety of my Saturday wasn't filled with anything important, it was just me trying and trying to rank up inside Apex so I can play with my friends who are in gold. I was actually kind of ticked off because I've just been playing Apex and I saw that the guys were in the Discord call, but they didn't invite me to play with them or anything. I was pretty alone for the whole day which kind of soured my mood a bit. Some person also messaged me on Reddit and I was talking to someone on and off for a while, and that's how my day continued to the next.

Song of the day: Damn It Feels Good To Be A Gangsta by Geto Boys

Journal entry for Friday, May 1st, 2026

Fri, 01 May 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent

Today was really fun. I got to finally go on a large Discord call and stay up with my friends again. We were still playing Apex Legends and it kind of brought me back to how things were back in 2021. After Jaze tapped out, I played with Batao and his friend Bucs whom I haven't talked to in a while, and we won a game. We kept playing more games after that, and I even got someone some food because they were hungry and needed snacks. I still kept playing with Batao and Bucs and we even had some fun moments like when Bucs portaled me as Wraith to a fucking warzone. We eventually had 1 final game where Batao thought that we'd win this and we actually did win! We kept getting revived over and over, and I died at the end, but I'm glad we won that round and that was good enough for us to end it. I watched ILLIT's new music video It's Me before sleeping and then I slept. For the rest of the day, I woke up in the afternoon and just continued to grind in Apex. I ordered some food in the evening because I was starving and I got to play a few rounds of Apex with Jaze and then Cholo after he joined in, which was fun.

Song of the day: It's Me by ILLIT

Journal entry for Thursday, April 30th, 2026

Thu, 30 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent

The last day of April was pretty fun, I was still out with Jaze and we eventually got to Assi Fresh Plaza after that whole Frankies thing. I felt so full because I ate 3 full meals today and I could feel them all in my stomach. But I wanted 1 last sweet thing before I went home so we just grabbed some Korean ice cream at Assi Fresh Plaza. I made a joke about seeing some girls and holding this ice cream in my hand which made Jaze laugh. But after that, we decided to head home. On the way back, Jaze took off his helmet and I kept telling him to put it on because I was worried that we might get into an accident or get stopped at a checkpoint. Jaze kept telling me that there aren't any checkpoints here until, literally a few seconds after that, there was a police checkpoint. It was very coincidental because we've never seen a checkpoint here before and we got stopped for a bit, but then let off. Jaze had finally learned his lesson of always wearing his helmet while driving, which is funny. After I got home, I just chilled, talked to someone for a bit, and eventually slept. I had work but that passed by quickly and was nothing noteworthy. It was eventually evening and I got into this huge Discord call with my old IMC friends in our old IMC server. It was loud but it was funny and kind of nostalgic at the same time, and we were playing Apex once again. I played with Batao and Jaze for a good amount of it and that call continued to the next day.

Song of the day: Dilaw by Maki

Journal entry for Wednesday, April 29th, 2026

Wed, 29 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good
Significant Location: Frankie's New York Buffalo Wings, BGC

I felt a bit restless today so I just coded some features from my main Angular theme to my blog's theme. I pushed some fixes, stayed up a bit more after that, and talked to someone a bit. She thought about what would happen if they haven't met me or something else, and I personally didn't care because I don't believe in those “what if” scenarios, or if thing's had turned out differently. I'm a staunch non-believer in those “alternate histories” because I don't know how life would turn out if things had changed, and I'm already fine with how things have turned out. I also remember that saying about giving up all hope for a better past. I told them that all that matters to me is the life I've lived. I stayed up for a bit more after that and went to sleep after. I had work and then wrapped up early as I had finished the bulk of my work and all my stuff for today. I got into a call with someone and they played Road to Empress I and we were surprised that it kind of left on a cliffhanger, but it was nice because the story, the production quality, was pretty good. They left for dinner and I watched the new episode of The Boys. I got into a Discord call with Jaze and Loy and we finally played Apex Legends like old times. We eventually were the champion for one game and kept playing, but we didn't win again. After that, I just chilled as I waited for Jaze to pick me up since we had to go out and eat today. I decided on Frankies because Jaze mentioned it and we went to their restaurant in BGC, which was near Starbucks 32nd Street. We didn't have the ones we want available, so we tried this combination that had spicy yangnyeom and it was so spicy that I nearly passed out from how spicy and hot it was. I had their burger earlier, so I was already pretty full anyway. Our trip for the night continued after that.

Song of the day: One Less Lonely Girl by Justin Bieber

Journal entry for Tuesday, April 28th, 2026

Tue, 28 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Average

Nothing much happened today as I just had work, and I got into a call with someone where they streamed some videos. In the evening, I got Anne some food because I heard that they had a long day. I had some alone time after that so I just played some Overwatch and stayed up for a good while.

Song of the day: Love Me Not by Ravyn Lenae

Journal entry for Monday, April 27th, 2026

Mon, 27 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Average

For Monday, I didn't really do much at the start aside from talking with someone and showing them my Screen Time. I tried out Asphalt 8 and they added me there, but I couldn't play a multiplayer game with them so we just gave up and then they slept. For me, I couldn't sleep at all and stayed up super, super early just browsing Reels and stuff. In the afternoon, I was able to talk to Mon, which was nice, and I got to tell them about something important that I've never shared with anyone, so that made me feel seen. It's nice to have things for a change and have me share stuff with them. In the evening, nothing much happened aside from me settling the bills and stuff.

Song of the day: Love Me Not by Ravyn Lenae

Journal entry for Sunday, April 26th, 2026

Sun, 26 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Sunday continued with me still out with my trip yesterday with Jaze. We just arrived at Assi Fresh Plaza and decided to just eat and talk there since it was kind of hot outside. Nothing much happened and I just went to sleep after that. For today, I didn't really do much and I actually expected to go out on a date with Anne, but they never acknowledged it nor followed up with me. So I just played Overwatch for the rest of the day and I thought about which European country I wanted to move to. After careful consideration, I chose Spain and I even cleaned up a bit of my resume. I was hyperfixated on doing something productive for today because I felt a bit cheesed that nothing was happening in my life here in the Philippines. I also talked to Mon, which was nice. But I just did other stuff for the rest of the evening.

Song of the day: All Time Low by Jon Bellion

Journal entry for Saturday, April 25th, 2026

Sat, 25 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Samgyupsalamat, BGC

For Saturday, I stayed up and accompanied someone since it's been a while since I've stayed up and stuff. I got to finally try the new/reintroduced burger streak supreme from Jollibee since it was available in Grab. I also got some chicken skin, and treated someone to food as well so we could eat. We watched a few documentaries from Fern on YouTube and I wanted to introduce them to that channel since we wanted something food-friendly to watch while eating. After that, I kept sharing my screen and we kept watching some scary/spooky stuff up until the morning. Thankfully, I didn't stay up too late and end the call at 10 a.m. like usual, and we got off at around 8 a.m. or so and that's when I got my rest. In the afternoon, I woke up and got ready with my sister since we wanted to eat at Samgyupsalamat. We ordered small amounts of food at the start and my sister suggested that we take 1 min to cook the beef properly, since we all had stomach issues after our last visit. But we eventually got too bored/tired since the food was cooked so slowly. I mostly just talked to my sister about the stuff that's happening in our home and how our cousins were becoming parents and having babies, especially while unprepared. We then went to FunHan Mart after eating since I wanted some dessert, but I was so full by this time. We walked around for a bit, stopped by Fully Booked, then we tried out the Magnum Creations even in BGC High Street. It was nice, for what it's worth, and then we went home. The driver played some progressive talk show, which was pretty funny and kind of a breath of fresh air because we're so used to drivers being anti-progressive, anti-intellectual stuff, so this was a very nice change. In the late evening, I actually had to go out and eat again with Jaze. We stopped by our usual *pares* house in Retiro and we ate there, and that made me so full. My night continued on as we finished eating but we were still outside.

Song of the day: Smack That (feat. Eminem) by Akon

Journal entry for Friday, April 24th, 2026

Fri, 24 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

For Friday, I initially stayed up for a while and ordered food. I got myself Jollibee and ate with someone. We watched a few things and they also showed me some stuff they missed like the Kellog's Honey Crunch cereal. We saw a few websites selling it, but in the end, we couldn't get it since they were all mostly out of stock. In the afternoon, I had some work and I ordered Army Navy since I felt like I deserved it after such a long week and it motivated me enough to push through my work and finish my tasks for the week. After working, I timed out and I got to play RV There Yet? with someone and Luan again. We mostly tried to get up from the cave and it was such a hard, irritating time since we kept falling and dying. And I could feel like not all of us were fully engaged, so we just quit playing that for the day. Someone and I still played and we had a few rounds of Overcooked 2. We tried the DLC Night of the Hangry Horde and we finished a few stages there. It was kind of irritating at times, but I mostly enjoyed it and it seems someone kind of did, too. I had one more late-night meeting but that was eventually over and I got to chill in the late evening.

Journal entry for Thursday, April 23rd, 2026

Thu, 23 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

For Thursday, I spent the majority of the early morning just setting up my MacBook again. I stayed up for a while and watched someone play their cat cafe game and I saw some memories on my Apple TV of my trip to Korea, which made me miss it. Work came and passed by eventually, and I timed out. After work, I played some Overcooked 2 with someone and it's been a while since we last played. I decided on that game since it was one of the few multiplayer games we had that could run on macOS, and I wanted to try gaming on the Mac again. After that, we got into a game with Luan and we played RV There Yet? Playing RV There Yet was one of the most exhausting and mentally-tiring games we've played. We traveled through an entire cave system and it was so dark and hard to navigate inside. There was one part where me and Luan died to a large fall and I had to orchestrate how to get us revived and stuff. It strained my brain so much because the RV was super close to breaking down, and we had another lava stage at the end, and it was not over. By the lava stage, we were so close to entirely giving up but I didn't want to restart from the start of the dark cave part, so I persevered to get the RV off the lava, and they eventually helped me get the RV across by winching at correct locations. We were all extremely drained by the end but I'm glad we made it, and I'm glad because I was running on so little sleep today, too. I stayed up until the next day.

Song of the day: Tindahan Ni Aling Nena by Eraserheads

Got Mac Back!

Wed, 22 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: BGC

Today continued with me still in a Discord call with someone and I was streaming with my iPhone, and it was funny because we were gripped by the Manila Bus Hostage Crisis that happened in 2010. After that, I stayed up for a bit and watched IG Reels before going to sleep. For the day, nothing much happened aside from me working and also eating some Wendy's for lunch. In the afternoon after work, I got into a call with someone and they showed me the tarot cards that they bought. After that, I streamed something and then we eventually played RV There Yet? with Luan. We crossed over this large river section and built this elevator going up so we could go through a large ramp. It was so precarious and the RV almost fell apart at times, but thankfully we were able to cross it. We crossed a few canyons until I eventually got an email saying that my MacBook had been successfully replaced. I immediately decided on leaving to get to Beyond the Box in BGC to get my MacBook and, after we reached a checkpoint, we stopped playing and I had to go do my thing for the evening. I booked a ride to the service center and I'm glad that my screen had been successfully. I was also shocked because they said that they replaced the entire front part, which was good. Because I remember I dinged the top a bit and the Apple logo had some scratches. So to get an exactly new lid, and with the hinge now tight as hell, I was more than happy to get my MacBook back! The best part was that I didn't pay a single thing for the repair, as it was covered by warranty. I was so happy and relieved, but also shocked because I received it back so quickly. I expected a week or something, but this literally took less than a week to get fixed. I was still more than happy to get it back and I went to my usual spot at Starbucks 32nd Street to set it up. I felt a bit scared since it wasn't fully set up in my Find My yet, but I eventually got it initially set up. I went home after a while since I had to download so much stuff. When I got back, I streamed From while someone and I watched it. The night continued on after that.

Song of the day: Don't Matter by Akon

Journal entry for Tuesday, April 21st, 2026

Tue, 21 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Tuesday had me doing something unusual as I had just gotten Anne a delivery. We got into a video call and it was nice to get them something. I also got an interesting message from someone because they apologized, which surprised me. But after that and my video call with Anne ended, I got some sleep. For the day, nothing much happened. I timed in for work and Meryll also messaged me to get the make-up I was. supposed to get her. But I was mortified to see that the only thing left in my luggage was the make-up powder that I was supposed to give to Mon. Meaning that I mixed up Meryll and Mon's stuff. I reviewed the pictures and I got Meryll something, but I mistakenly sent it to Mon. I felt like such an idiot and I wanted to make it up to Meryll but I'm glad she was cool with it. But damn, it put a damp on my mood because Meryll and I aren't on perfect terms and I just felt like an idiot. Today had been really stressful so far so I decided to get myself some good food to chill out. I also got into a call with someone and they streamed some gameplay of Red Dead Redemption 2. I also watched on my phone when I was tired because I still didn't have my Mac yet. We played R.E.P.O. in the evening, and I bought RV There Yet for Luan and gave someone some money so it wasn't that heavy on their wallet. We had so much fun learning the game's mechanics and traversing through the early stages. In the late evening, someone and I got into a call where they streamed stuff and even showed me this new music video from Sabrina Carpenter, and the call continued to the next day.

Journal entry for Monday, April 20th, 2026

Mon, 20 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Monday morning was my last planned day in the office for April! I got to the office and had coffee at harlan + holden with my coworkers. After that, since we were already in Greenbelt, we had lunch at Pound Flatterie. I tried their roast beef and ordered a burger patty because they were really good. After that, we went back to the office. I got an email saying that it could take my Macbook 30-45 days to repair, but I'm glad that they proceeded with ordering the replacement for my display. After that, I had a pretty normal day in the office. After my shift, I got to eat dinner with a coworker and I tried hard to persuade him since it was both our last days in the office for April. We ate at Kodawari in Makati and we walked there. I tried their salted and spicy mushrooms, which was nice. I also had their spicy beef and rice, and it was honestly so spicy. We also noticed the opposite table look at my gacha bag, which was pretty cool. After that, we ordered some pastries from Wildflour Café + Bakery and I booked a ride home after that. I gave my sister some pastries and take-out I had and attended a meeting in the late evening. I also talked to Anne and I got them some stuff from Starbucks since I felt like treating them and my night continued after that.

Song of the day: Everywhere by Michelle Branch

Bye bye MacBook

Sun, 19 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good
Significant Location: BGC

Sunday started out pretty unusually because I was in a game of Apex Legends and playing with Batao. He and I haven't talked in years, literal years, so it was weird to get into a call with him all of the sudden. I also got weirded out by playing Apex Legends again. We played with his friend named Em/M and we won a few rounds, which was nice. I also got to ask him how he's doing and stuff. After winning our last round, we got off the call after that and we ended on a win. In the morning, I just chilled with my sister and we got McDonald's for lunch. I showed her the actual first episode of Beast Games and I introduced her to season 2 of the Beast Games. After that, I eventually decided on getting my MacBook screen in for warranty, since the warranty was expiring soon. I got to Beyond the Box in BGC and showed the technician the dead pixels on my MacBook screen. They said that they'll take it in for repairs and I posted an IG Story about it. I walked around more, talked to Naomi since she messaged me about my laptop, and she shared her upcoming plans with her girlfriend Jane. I walked around a bit more and took photos of the cats around, but eventually decided on going home. I didn't do much when I got back home, I played a bit of Overwatch but eventually got some rest when I got too tired and just browsed IG for the rest of the evening.

Song of the day: Man I Need by Olivia Dean

Journal entry for Saturday, April 18th, 2026

Sat, 18 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Saturday didn't have much going on, I chatted with someone on and off until I slept and I ordered some *bulalo* with my sister, and I also settled some credit card bills. I downloaded Apex Legends as well, which didn't take too long since I have 1 Gbps Internet now, so that's nice. But my night continued as I got to play Apex after that.

Journal entry for Friday, April 17th, 2026

Fri, 17 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good
Significant Location: SM BF Parañaque

It was finally the end of the week and it had been a grueling continuous 5 days in the office. But I'm glad I got to go to the office and complete my 5 days as I had planned. We got lunch at Landmark and I think too much food because I had fried chicken, squid, and even siomai. The squid felt kind of off, to be honest, so I didn't finish it. After that, I went back to the office with my coworkers and I just worked. In the afternoon, I took a break in the breakroom and just chilled for a bit. I suddenly felt so sick after that. I wanted to barf and I was feeling anxious and dizzy all of the sudden. I booked a ride home and decided to work at home for the rest of the day. I got a ride home and got there pretty quick. While on the way home, I saw Howl's Moving Castle was playing, and I wanted to watch a movie in the evening so that I could feel better, so I decided on that since I could at least watch with someone. Thankfully, they were free and I eventually finished my work and timed out for the day. I got a ride to SM BF Parañaque and we watched the movie. At first, there was the issue that the subtitles didn't show, but it was thankfully fixed quickly. And the seat I was in was broken, so that made it uncomfortable to sit in, but it was fine since I just put up with it. And then a fire alarm blared for no reason and it went on for a while, but was finally okay. But after all that was said and done, I think someone enjoyed the film since she finally got to watch it on the big screen. I was able to re-appreciate the story since it had been literal years since we last watched Howl's Moving Castle, way back in January 2022 when we were still getting to know each other. After they paid for parking, I booked a ride home, kept talking to someone via chat for a bit, and my night continued on.

Journal entry for Thursday, April 16th, 2026

Thu, 16 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

For Thursday, it was a usual day at work for me. I woke up feeling a bit sick and I was kind of late to the office. Not by a lot, but enough so that my teammates had lunch without me, so I just had lunch by myself. I went to Greenbelt and ate at Ramen Nagi, and I finally got to try out their oyster ramen, which was their limited edition ramen for the month. It was very filling and I could taste the oyster/seafood flavor in it, which was nice. I also dried out the stuff in my bag and left most stuff on the desk so it could all dry properly. I went back to the office after that, and in the afternoon I got to go out with my coworkers to get coffee. It was very unusual for us to get coffee in the afternoon, but I wasn't complaining. In the afternoon, near the end of our shift, we went to The Marketplace to buy some ice cream. I got a crunch bar and I had my own ice cream tub while a coworker got his. I also tried a Feastables bar for the first time, and it was a rice crispy version, which was nice. My coworkers had the idea of having dinner around Poblacion and one guy suggested that we try out Tetsuo since they wanted to try their chicken there. We took our coworker's car there since he was just staying nearby. After timing out, we walked there and got our seats. We tried their flavored fried chicken with soba noodles, ginger with scallion chicken with noodles, and their beef + lettuce. Personally, the beef was the best one because it reminded me of *samgyeopsal* beef, which I love. I also loved the flavored fried chicken, which was our favorite since we ordered an entire platter of it after finishing the small portion that we had. Unfortunately, we liked the ginger with scallion chicken the least, even though that's what our coworker was looking at when he suggested. We finished all the food and a coworker and I walked it back to the office since we left our bags there. I had around 15,000 steps for today, so that felt nice, and I went home afterwards.

Journal entry for Wednesday, April 15th, 2026

Wed, 15 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent

For Wednesday, today was just a pretty chill day. I got coffee with a coworker and he suggested we go to Harlan + Holden in Greenbelt and we had lunch at the Pound Flatterie since it was nearby and we had already ate there before. We went back to the office after that. I also had a company executive give me a compliment for my cute gashapon bag, so that was nice. In the afternoon, I went out with a coworker for some *merienda* and we went to SM Makati. I wanted to try and find a Nestle Crunch bar because I haven't eaten one in a while. I finally found one and I was glad because I thought that they had gone extinct or something. I also bought a Ricoa chocolate that my coworker recommended because he liked it before. After we went back to the office, I talked to Patrice and I gave her the Starbucks Korea-themed tumbler I had bought for her. It was nice and I got to finally talk to her face to face, since I had known her since last year and it's our first time talking. My coworker teased me about it but it was fine. I eventually timed out after that and then booked a ride home. In my hurry, I wasn't able to close my tumbler properly and some water spilled in my bag. I just chilled after getting home.

Song of the day: Hold My Hand (with Akon) by Michael Jackson, Akon

Journal entry for Tuesday, April 14th, 2026

Tue, 14 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Tuesday started with me still in a call with someone and they turned on their cam to show me some gasha collectibles that they had. After that, I got some rest since I had on-site work for the day. I got to work and I got there pretty early, considering how late I stayed in the office yesterday. I also decided on bringing my gashapon bag for work and using it as my main work bag, since it looked cute and I wanted some whimsy in my life. I got some coffee from Nanyang and then I ate out with my coworkers. We actually switched it up today and ate at SM Makati for today. I tried the steak there and… it was okay. It was kind of chewy but also really tough. I wasn't the biggest fan of it, honestly, but it was fine considering the price. I also bought that Cinnamoroll bundle on Discord since I had some free time during lunch. We went back to the office after that. In the afternoon, I made sure to finish the bulk of my tasks early and I was pretty productive. I had a lot of free time and instead of getting *merienda*, we played Avalon in the office pantry for a while. Things got heated real quick with me and the newhire, but it was all in good fun as that's how the game was supposed to be played. I had a few wins, especially at the start, but I kind of had more losses than wins. It was fine and we ended our day after that. I got home and watched someone play that cat cafe game for a while before going just chilling by myself for the night.

Song of the day: RUDE! by Hearts2Hearts

Journal entry for Monday, April 13th, 2026

Mon, 13 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Today I'm feeling okay which was weird since I should be ecstatic since my date yesterday went well. But I don't know, it just feels wKeroro stuff that they got from the gacha in for work and we got coffee at Harlan + Holden at Greenbelt, and I think we had lunch there or idk. After that, my coworkers and I accompanied one of our coworkers to get a new iPhone 17 Pro because they had their phone stolen last week. And it was cool to help them set it up and track down the current location of their phone. After that, I just finished some work and continued my tasks. I had some free time in the afternoon and I played that new board game that my coworker brought last week, Toy Battle. I won a few rounds, but it was still my coworker still mostly winning. After that, we got dinner at Masajiro Burger and it was… okay. My coworker didn't like it and I felt so full, but I couldn't finish my food in a bad way. I did enjoy the pocket spicy chicken, which was nice. I also tried that new hojicha milk tea from Chagee, which tasted great. After that, I just chilled in the office because it was already late and I had a meeting tonight, so I just stayed in the office. I watched someone play that cute cat cafe game to fill the time, and I worked a bit. Then I came to learn that the meeting had been rescheduled, so I stayed for more than 2 hours in the office for nothing. I just booked a ride home and I got into a call with someone. They showed me some Sergeant Keroro stuff that they got from the gacha machine and our call continued from there.

What A Day! WTF! My First Date!

Sun, 12 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: Molito, Alabang

Today was so crazy because it seems that I was so packed today. But it still started with Kai still being in my room and we kept playing Tekken 7 on my PC until the morning. We tried out so many new characters, and it was kind of the most fun I've had in a while. I didn't want to cheese too much, but I somehow kept losing a lot against Kai, which was fun. We kept playing and we even stayed up until 6 a.m., and that's where Kai decided to get some sleep. To be honest, it was pretty weird and new for me to have a friend sleep over in my room. I think this was the actual first time someone had stayed the night in my room, and I'm surprised that Kai and I are that close, because I didn't even have my other best friends stay the night at my house. But it was cool, and kind of funny since Kai wanted a blanket and I couldn't find it. All I could find was this massive Teletubbies onesie and Kai wore it without questions and it looked so funny on her, too. After sleeping for a while, I was woken up to what felt like a pillow hitting my face. It turns out that Kai had hit me with a pillow, which was funny because she tried to deny it at first. She made me watch Sinners (2025) and I ordered food for us since we hadn't eaten yet. After that, Kai eventually had to leave since she had other plans for the rest of the day. After she left, it took a while for it to sink in because I actually had a friend come over and stay the night at my house, and we just played games, ate, and just chilled. Friendships like these are pretty rare in my life, so that was nice. In the afternoon, I talked to Mon. Initially I thought that we'd go out today but somehow that fell through and I just ended up shipping her the make-up I got her from Korea to her house. After that, I moved on to the main thing I had going on today: which was my first-ever date. Thankfully, I had already called Ikinari Steak in Alabang and made a reservation, so that's settled. All Anne had to do was show up. I booked a ride there and I was initially worried I'd be late, but I actually arrived on time, which was pretty neat. I eventually saw Anne and gave her some of the make-up that I had gotten her, and she seemed to appreciate the gesture, so that was cool. We ordered steak and they got a good one, while I think I over-ordered because I got so much steak. It was nice to eat, though, and I listened to Anne talk about her plans and upcoming travel to Thailand and such. After we ate and I paid the bill, we walked around. Initially, I decided on a McCafe nearby but we ended up at Molito and Anne recommended an ice cream place we could eat at named Karito. We ordered a few things and Anne recommended that I taste some flavors, and we made our orders. We sat on some chairs by a table nearby and Anne mostly talked about her life so far, like her upcoming derma work or how her and her friends have this credit card roulette thing. It was also nice to hear how tech-savvy she is, even down to knowing how her current phone's S Pen was different from the newer versions, which honestly surprised me because I thought nerds like me only knew that. But after all that was said and done, we had to call it a day. I ordered some juice at Coco and Anne went on her way. I was still surprised at how the date went, because this wasn't different at all from the many times I've met women online and got to know them. Still, I consider this my first actual date because both of us agreed on it, and I didn't hear any of my past meetups/hangouts get called a date, so this actually was my first-ever date in my entire life. I can say that it went well, so that's a nice little bow to end the day on.

Song of the day: Who's Holding Donna Now? by Rhythm Of The Night

Kai Comes over After a Long Time!

Sat, 11 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special

Saturday started with me still chatting with someone for a while. I stayed up for a while but eventually went to sleep. When I woke Hori RAP Pro N Hayabusahad a few messages from Kai and she asked if I was home. She eventually decided on coming to my house which surprised me because she hasn't been here in a while (almost 2 years) I immediately had to clean up my room as much as I could. It's a good thing that I didn't have any other plans for today. Kai commuted to Venice Grand Canal Mall and I booked her an Angkas ride to my home. We eventually met up and it was interesting to meet her again since it has been more than a year since we last hung out. It seems that Milktea missed her because he kept rubbing himself all over her and he was so friendly to Kai. I ordered a few things for us, which was BOK Korean Fried Chicken, and some Mountain Dew as well as some alcoholic drinks for myself. I also made rice but I added so much water, that it became mushy and kind of like *lugaw* due to how watery and sticky it was. It literally took hours to cook, and we just settled for somewhat-wet rice because it had already been hours and the food had gone cold by the time we decided to eat. Kai helped out by suggesting techniques for the rice to become more dry, but it was still sorta wet by the time we ate. Kai also drank a lot of Mountain Dew, which surprised me. But we also sang some songs on my Apple TV and I showed her how to use my phone as a microphone and we sang some songs, which was funny. After that, we just ate and watched some short horror films on YouTube. We eventually finished eating and we chilled at my room so we could play some Tekken 7. I had prepared the DualSense controller for her and I used my Hori RAP Pro N Hayabusa fight/arcade stick.

Journal entry for Friday, April 10th, 2026

Fri, 10 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Friday started with Jaze and I still hanging out at the *pares* restaurant in Pasig that he recommended. We ate there and the *pares* was okay, but it wasn't good as the ones we had at Retiro Street. And it was also pretty loud, like the speaker was above us and it was blasting Bruno Mars songs. We found it difficult to talk and Jaze was talking about this BYD issue he has with his family. After that, we just decided to chill at our usual place at Assi Fresh Plaza. We got a few snacks and the usual cat there went up to Jaze, so that was funny. We talked more and then ultimately called it a night since I had to work on-site in the morning and it was already 2 a.m. For the morning, I just commuted to work and I just had lunch by myself at Marugame. I went back to work after that and finished my tasks for the week. In the afternoon, I had some free time so my coworker introduced us to this new board game he brought called Toy Battle. I didn't get the mechanics at first, but I eventually got the hang of it after playing a few rounds. We played as 4 and we had a winner's bracket and a loser's bracket. In the end, I got 2nd place, which the board game owner being the one in 1st place, which was funny because one other coworker kept accusing him of being a cheater. I went home after that and talked to someone for a while, and the conversation got pretty emotional. Needless to say, my night continued on after that.

Journal entry for Thursday, April 9th, 2026

Thu, 09 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Thursday was a holiday and it was pretty shitty since our house didn't have water. I wondered why because I had just paid the water bill a few days ago. I eventually found out that it was due to a pipe bursting, and it took a while for my other relatives to fix it. It was actually nice to have running water again, all things considered. After that whole debacle, I just cleaned up my resume a bit to feel productive, but I essentially just spent the day watching season 2 of Beast Games. It was pretty entertaining, but it wasn't as spectacular or as interesting as season 1, kind of like what Squid Games felt like to me. I ended up watching it for the entire day and I posted some pictures I had of my Seoul travels to my Instagram, so that was nice. I had planned to meet Jaze in the late evening, so I was just biding time and chilling until it was time for us to go out and eat.

Journal entry for Wednesday, April 8th, 2026

Wed, 08 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Wednesday was my actual first time in the office after my trip from Korea and it was just crazy to be back in the office once again. I got to use that Starbucks tumbler I got from Korea, so at least I had a little thing from my magical trip there with me. I got coffee with a coworker and they told me a thing that's been bugging them and their team. I also ordered some mango drink that I tried to fit in my Starbucks tumbler, but decided against it. After that, I had lunch with my coworkers at Landmark and I talked a bit about my trip to Korea, but that was mostly it. In the afternoon, I went out to grab some juice and put it in my tumbler. It was nice to try some new drinks, but the fact that it came from Korea made me miss Korea a bit more, and even made me a bit sad. But it was fine, I just continued my usual round of tasks. I eventually went home but that was mostly it.

Song of the day: Who Can It Be now? by Men At Work

Journal entry for Tuesday, April 7th, 2026

Tue, 07 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Tuesday was pretty chill, I got a good amount of sleep and got my work started early. During my break time, someone played this new game called Road to Empress and I watched them play it for a while. I eventually finished up with work and just chilled for the rest of the evening. In the late evening, I hung out with Jaze and we ate at McKinley Hill. We had some Army Navy since we couldn't find anything else, and the night continued from there.

Journal entry for Monday, April 6th, 2026

Mon, 06 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Monday started with me still continuing to write on my journal for my Korea trip and I was talking to Mon on the side. In the morning, I timed in for work and I had someone chat me for a bit about trying some weight loss stuff like Ozempic. It not only seemed strange but also wildly expensive since I didn't have the money for it. I continued with my work and then timed out. In the evening, I just chilled. Then I got a barrage of new messages from people, which was funny but also cool since I'm meeting new people again. I also played R.E.P.O. with someone and Luan again and it was pretty fun. We got to watch that new Backrooms trailer and I got to chill for the rest of the evening. I talked to a few people for the evening but I honestly doubt any of these will last, funny enough. It kind of seems like I'm wasting my time, but I got to meet some new people, at least.

Song of the day: Who Can It Be now? by Men At Work

Journal entry for Sunday, April 5th, 2026

Sun, 05 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good
Significant Location: BGC

Sunday started out pretty chill as I was just in Discord and someone and I were watching a few stuff on Discord like Chilling Scares and Edvasian. We watched Edvasian by the time we got food, and I got to try out some new menu items from McDonald's, as well as the breakfast menu that Chowking was selling. After that, someone streamed this new game called Road to Empress I, and they played it for a while. After that, we eventually had to drop from the call to get some sleep. It was Easter Sunday today so we wanted to go out. My sister and I went to Samgyupsalamat first and her boyfriend tagged along with us. We ate there for a while until we were so full. After that, we walked around and ended up at SM Aura to attend mass there for a while. I made prayers for some people, and Anne actually told me that she prayed for me, so that was sweet. But after that, we booked a ride home and I just chilled for the rest of the evening.

Finally Met LK Again!

Sat, 04 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: SM Aura, BGC

For Saturday, I got bored so I just decided to post on Instagram and I also updated my IG Highlights to match the current theme of my profile now. After that, I got **A LOT** of sleep. I actually had 0 hours of just sleep. After I woke up, I ate outside and my sister had made salmon for lunch, and after that I got into a call with someone. They played that cute cat cafe game again, which was cute, and eventually I had to leave since I planned to meet up with LK today. We planned to meet at SM Aura and we met outside at the Starbucks there. I honestly couldn't recognize her, but I'm surprised that she recognized me. Afterwards, we talked about some stuff like and I ordered food that LK recommended. I also asked what she's doing now as a doctor and how her life has been. Then I gave her the Incheon tumbler I had and her make-up that I just gave away for free. Also, while I was out with LK, someone dumped a bunch of messages, so that was a little disturbing. But I mostly just focused on having fun and talking to LK since it literally has been more than a decade since we last met. I also caught her up on some classmates of mine who have died, to which she was shocked to hear. But it was honestly nice to get to talk to her in person and catch up, and also hear what she's doing now. I'm honestly surprised that LK's hair is still super long, and it's still funny that her reason for having long hair is just because she wants it to be long. I also took selfies with LK and then we looked at some make-up products before she eventually had to meet up with her family and say goodbye. It was genuinely nice to catch up with LK since we had been friends for years, and known each other for more than that. It was a super fun experience. For the afternoon, something disturbing went on in my friend group from IMC. Someone had gone missing and disappeared, and it was out of their own volition. It made us worry but I ultimately left it up to their 2 closest friends in the group to talk with their family, since I didn't know them much at all and I didn't want to push myself in a situation where I didn't feel like I belonged to. I posted my IG Story of meeting up with LK and I got into a call with someone and Luan and we played Peak for a while. After playing Peak, my call with someone continued to the next day as we kept watching YouTube videos.

Song of the day: Thinking out Loud by Ed Sheeran

Journal entry for Friday, April 3rd, 2026

Fri, 03 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Friday started with me talking to Mon about some serious stuff, it was mostly chill but I also just listened to her rant about stuff. I didn't do much for the rest of the day since it was a holiday, but I ordered some groceries for my sister and I. It was a bunch of groceries, and it was actually the first time I had groceries get split into 2 deliveries, which was kind of shocking. After that, I just chilled and spent the last few hours of the day to post on Instagram and stuff.

Song of the day: DtMF by Bad Bunny

A Return to Normalcy

Thu, 02 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good
Significant Location: BGC

Thursday was a holiday so I decided to spend today by myself and I went out to BGC. It was kind of my first time seeing the sky in BGC once again, and I initially stayed at Starbucks 32nd Street. I wanted to catch up on so many mood calendar entries, but I just couldn't feel comfortable enough. And those dead pixels were still bugging me, so I just updated the packages that my websites were using, but that was mostly it. After that, I walked to Samgyupsalamat since I had actually never had *samgyeopsal* in Korea, and this was the first time in a while I'm actually going to have it. So it was nice and a bit nostalgic for me. I went home after than and just chilled for the evening. In an attempt to do something productive, I organized some journal entries of my trip to Korea so I could start on them some other day.

Song of the day: City Is Ours by Big Time Rush

Buffet with IMC Friends!

Wed, 01 Apr 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Buffet 101, Pasay, Philippines

Wednesday was initially supposed to be just a usual, run-of-the-mill day because I didn't have anything planned for today, and that's how most of the day went. For the morning, I just timed in for work as usual and then I just worked to finish my tasks ahead of the upcoming long weekend. I then got a message from Loy asking me if I'm down to go out today and I agreed since my shift was ending anyway. After timing out for work, Loy picked me up at my house and he drove to Pasay so we could eat at Buffet 101 at MOA Seaside with Foz. We eventually got there and Foz trolled us a bit, but we eventually walked there. We talked a bit, caught up, and they asked how my trip to Korea was and I showed them a few pictures. After that, it was our time to go inside and we just ate, talked about some past events, and other stuff. There were some funny things that went on in the Buffet 101 venue itself, and it was kind of weird how there were a lot of birthday celebrants today. It was kind of funny because we kept eating and eating for the entire evening. I think I sampled all of the food and dishes that were available, and we were one of the last tables to wrap up. All in all, I enjoyed our trip tonight and we walked for a bit before Loy had to drop me back home. I just chilled after that but eventually slept after a while.

Midnight BGC Trip with Someone!

Tue, 31 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Starbucks 32nd Street

March 31 was one of the strangest days I've ever had because I started it while I was inside someone's car after she had picked me up from NAIA. I was also kind of shell shocked at seeing Philippine roads after visiting Korea. We just went to BGC and we actually got a bit lost there, for some reason, and it was funny because we kept going in circles for a while. We eventually ended up at the parking lot nearby Starbucks 32nd Street and I had to unpack some luggage because someone's gifts were inside them. We went inside Starbucks and I got us a few drinks, and had to get another drink for someone's mom. We talked for a while, and I was glad to see that she was listening to me talk about my experience in Korea, and I also showed her some photos of the trip. We wanted to try the new Harry Potter drink, but it was unavailable. After that, I got to give someone the stuff that I had bought her, and I also gave her my only-ever pack of Busan caramel. I also tried it with her, and it was pretty nice. Flavor isn't my big thing, but someone says that she likes it. After that, someone drove me home and they also went back to their home safe. It was so surreal being home after a long trip from Korea. I finally laid back at my usual bed and I got some proper rest after such a long trip away from home. I woke up and eventually talked with my sister and gave her that Piplup bag that she immediately loved. After that, I paid some bills and organized a few stuff. I also put up some Busan fridge magnets, which were cute. In the evening, I got to sit down on my PC and play Peak with someone and Luan once again. We tried out that new game mode and we passed by the tropics and mesa biome today, but we eventually ended our run without reaching the peak as we all died in the mesa. Afterwards, we played a bit of Phasmophobia and played a couple of rounds before we had to go to sleep.

Goodbye, Seoul! Goodbye, Korea!

Mon, 30 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: Incheon International Airport, Incheon, South Korea

This is honestly one of the most bittersweet Mondays I would ever have. I'm patially more sad because I'll leave South Korea today. For most of the early morning, I was packing my luggage and getting everything properly fit in. It was such a tiring struggle to pack everything, especially some of the makeup (even though it wasn't a lot). I was actually surprised that I was able to fit it all by the end. After that, I initially planned to get some take-out, but decided to have it in the morning instead. When morning came, I had a few things to do like buy food for myself, call Mom and show her Seoul before I left, and then get ready to leave. Since I had a free tall drink voucher from yesterday, I went out and walked to a nearby Starbucks to claim it. I also got to use the new Seoul tumbler I had. I checked out some food delivery apps to see if I could use my WowPass in them, since that had around 31,000 KRW still in it, but I couldn't. So I just decided to take the bus to that Burger King I've eaten in before. The bus trip was quite quick and I thought to myself that I'll miss easy bus rides like these. I eventually got off at my stop and then took a few photos of the street and sky. It was just really surreal because this was my final day in Seoul, and in South Korea. It sunk in that I would spend my morning in Seoul and end it in Manila. I posted an IG Story of it, and took photos of some of the street signs because I was actually in Gangnam-gu, the place where the Gangnam Style song was about. I eventually got to the Burger King and, while I wanted to eat there and not at the hotel, it seemed like it was lunchtime for the Koreans here as there weren't any seats available. So I just ordered for take-out. I bought 2 burgers and some chicken because it'll be unlikely for me to eat again after this, and this might be my last meal in Korea, funny enough. I took a few pictures of the street signs in Gangnam and I posted an IG Story of how absolutely insane it is to start my morning in Korea and end the day in the Philippines. Only then did it start to sink in that I'm leaving Korea soon. After I got on the bus, this really weird thing happened. Some lady came in and tripped, and she hit her forehead on some part of the wall. It was crazy and, while the bus driver helped her, she seemed to say she was fine. It was just honestly surprising to see. I eventually got back to my hotel and ate my food, then I went out to buy some snacks for someone and I got some watermelon and blueberry Pocky snacks for myself. I had a FaceTime call with my Mom and I showed her what Korea looked like and I eventually went back to my hotel room to clean up and pack my entire stuff. I headed for Incheon Airport and booked a taxi ride going there. I brought both of my luggage and essentially just enjoyed the car ride to the airport. It took a while since there was some traffic, and it was almost a 2-hour car ride to the airport. On the way, I passed by some blooming cherry blossoms, but I could only stare from within the car, which was kind of sad. I posted some IG Stories, especially a Gangnam Style one which I found funny. On the way to the airport, the driver put the pedal to the metal and he was essentially speeding like a madman I saw his speedometer reach above 150+ kmph, and I have a photo of him going 147 kmph. It was easily the scariest ride I've ever been on, funny enough. But I'm glad I got to the airport in one piece and made my way to the correct gate to drop off my luggage. I legit thought about throwing away some clothes because I just had to fit it under 25kg. I dropped off the big luggage first, which was surprisingly at 18kg and I organized and threw out some stuff on the smaller luggage so that it would be at 7kg. I seriously considered throwing away some clothes at that point, but I didn't. It was also weird how Incheon was touted as this big, busy airport when it seemed pretty dead and quiet when I visited it both times, and this was on a Monday. I finished the Pocky I was eating, got my stuff scanned, and the Incheon Smart Pass came in handy a couple of times. After screening, I was near the departures area and it started to sink in more that I was leaving Korea. I actually got to my gate right on time and I took a photo of the plane. I even cried a bit because it sunk in that I was going back to my life in the Philippines. By 6:30 p.m., I boarded the plane and I was one of the first to board because I had my Incheon Smart Pass registered, so that's cool. I got to use the restroom a couple of times and put my stuff on the overhead seat. By 7:10 p.m. or so, the airplane was taxiing and we eventually took off. It still amazes me how planes move so fast that they fly. I just chilled and slept for most of the trip back to the Philippines. I played my Antok FM playlist and slept for some parts. We eventually made our way back to the Philippines and it was interesting to see the path that the plane took in order to land at NAIA. We eventually touched down and I took some pictures of the Manila skyline and posted it on IG as we landed. I got a couple of messages from friends asking if I was back, and I told someone that they should start driving to NAIA because I had just landed. I filled up that eTravel thing. It was also super shocking how hot it was, even at night. It's an extremely stark contrast to how cold my hotel room in Korea was versus the temps I'm feeling now within the airport. I got my baggage and felt sad that it was the last remnant of my Korea trip. I eventually met up with someone and I brought my luggage to her car. I seriously cannot stress how **HOT** it was, it was SWELTERING and I was sweating like hell. After we got in someone's car, we decided on where to go and I decided on Starbucks on 32nd Street in BGC because I know we could chill there. Someone was hesitant at first, since she dislikes going to BGC, but she eventually agreed and we drove there. My night continued from that car ride to BGC.

Song of the day: 360 by Charli xcx

Last Full Day in Seoul (and in Korea)

Sun, 29 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: Myeongdong, Seoul, South Korea

I didn't really have anything concrete planned today in my itinerary. Today was more of an “explore and have fun” day. I decided to visit that Kiki's Delivery Service-themed cafe, Koriko Cafe, and I took the bus going there. Afterwards, I walked to Koriko Cafe and ordered their meat pie, as well as 2 coffee drinks. The food was nice and I ordered some Ghibli-themed stuff for someone. It was kinda expensive, and it shocked me how my expenses have been because I maxed out my credit card. I reloaded some money to my card and paid for some stuff. After that, I wanted to go to another stop I was curious about but I just couldn't push through as I couldn't figure out how to book a reservation there. Naver required some Korean ID and I just couldn't figure out how to book as a foreigner/tourist, so I just decided to forgo it. Still, I decided to go there and I took the bus again. I saw some girl wear the exact same Cinnamoroll jacket that I had and my eyes lit up so much. As I was trying to figure out how to book a reservation, some elderly guy kept looking at me, even though I was just sitting at some bench. I think they were looking at me funny because they were racist or something, and I think that was my only racist encounter so far on this trip. So I got kinda spooked and started walking. I didn't push through with trying to get a reservation and tried to chill at a Gong Cha nearby. Apparently, I had wandered onto Hongdae Shopping Street without even knowing it. I took some photos of some cherry blossoms that were blooming, and then I decided to visit Mang Taho around Hyewa. I took a taxi going there and the taxi driver was a lot more patient than the one in Busan, which surprised me. We got off at a weird stop because I think it was trying to drop us off at the Catholic church inside. I just got off and I went to some stalls that we passed by. To my surprise, they were selling Filipino food, and that there were Filipinos there. It was actually an entire community of Filipinos, which was surprising as hell. I just had some Filipino food there, even though I actually kind of dislike the idea of Filipino food because I'm dreading to go back to the Philippines tomorrow. I am literally going back to the Philippines, I don't know why I ate at a Filipino food stall. The elderly lady there was impressive because she spoke Korean and Tagalog, to my surprise. I also talked to another elderly lady who said that she misses the Philippines and I was taken aback so much. It was almost offensive to me. But it was fine, I order some food and *turon* and then went to a Starbucks nearby. After a while, I got tired of wandering around Hyewa and I took some photos of some cherry blossoms that bloomed before I took the subway to Myeongdong again. I went to Cats' Playground since I was interested in visiting a cat cafe, and it's been a while anyway since I last saw a cat. I saw so many cute cats there and took photos of the various cats. I missed Milktea a bit, but I just enjoyed my time here checking out the cats and the place itself. I saw several big cats, too, which were well-fed and had this bib that said “No Food,” which was funny. Afterwards, I just walked around Myeongdong, I had some more lamb skewers and I ate another chicken skewer. I came across some Filipinos there, funny enough, and this couple approached me while I was eating a lamb skewer. A lady asked me if I was Malaysian and I told her I was a Filipino, which was interesting because she immediately clocked me as a fellow South East Asian. It was a funny exchange, and I eventually went my way after that. I tried the baby octopus skewer after that and that's where my food adventure ended for the day. I went to a nearby Starbucks to finally order those tumblers, an Incheon one and a Seoul one for myself. I also booked a window seat in the Jeju Air app and I collected my mobile boarding pass, too. I drank some drink there but eventually left. For my last night, I visited Cheonggyecheon once again. I was a bit anxious since I didn't want to have an accident and suddenly sprain myself, since I **HAD** to catch that flight out tomorrow, so I was a bit more careful. I walked downstream, I passed by some parts and eventually had the courage to walk on stones that led across the stream. Afterwards, I booked a taxi ride back to my hotel room and just prepared for my flight out tomorrow. I signed up for Incheon's Smart Pass and fully prepared my luggage by packing in everything for my flight.

Song of the day: DtMF by Bad Bunny

Lyrics that resonated with me:
Debí tirar más fotos de cuando te tuve
Debí darte más beso' y abrazo' las vece' que pude
Ey, ojalá que los mío' nunca se muden
Y si hoy me emborracho, pues que me ayuden
Debí tirar más foto' de cuando te tuve
Debí darte más beso' y abrazo' las veces que pude
Ojalá que los mío' nunca se muden
Y si hoy me emborracho, pues que me ayuden

Cherry Blossoms in Busan!

Sat, 28 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: Haeundae Beach, Busan, South Korea

I started my morning by having some complimentary breakfast downstairs. I actually loved how there was complimentary breakfast here and I had some delicious food. I ate a lot of soy eggs and sausages, as well as some rice, orange juice, and yoghurt. I gathered my stuff and eventually checked out of the hotel, then booked a taxi ride to Busan Station where I'll do this whole bullshit of hiding my stuff in separate lockers again. I did the same thing as I did before which was hide my stuff separately, and I also got a smaller luggage to store my additional stuff. The lady selling it at the subway market gave me a good deal on it, she was super nice to discount it for me and I paid in cash. After storing my stuff, I was free to explore Busan for the day, which was just hunting for cherry blossom trees that were blooming, and visiting the Haeundae beach. I got some rest at the Starbucks near Busan Station and then booked a taxi ride to Haeundae Beach. I saw some cherry blossoms that were blooming, but the taxi ride going there was kind of weird because the driver seemed a bit impatient and annoyed at the traffic. It was weird but I essentially just brushed it off. I eventually got to Haeundae Beach and it was so bright out, but it makes sense since I got there at noon. I played “Umbrella Beach” by Owl City and took a lot of photos. Weirdly enough, I didn't see anyone swimming, even though the water was crystal clear. Afterwards, I walked to some apartment complexes that had cherry blossoms blooming, and I took a few photos. It was really interesting to see cherry blossoms blooming up close. They looked whiter than I expected, but it was nice. I eventually came across a whole road lined with cherry blossoms and there were so many people just taking pictures there. I spent a good amount of my day just taking pictures here and enjoying the scenery because it was so beautiful. I took so many pictures, but eventually I took enough and then decided where to go next at around 2 p.m. I still had my train to Seoul scheduled for night. I ate at the Baskin Robbins nearby and I actually liked their ice cream. Then I booked another taxi ride to Busan Station and the driver seemed more impatient and annoyed at the traffic, weirdly enough. I got both of my luggages and then decided last-minute to cancel my other ticket reservation later in the evening to book a train ride for 4:55 p.m. in the afternoon, since I had so much dead time and I wanted to make the most use of my time, and head back to Seoul. I took the KTX train to Seoul and I actually sat on the wrong side of the seat, which was nearest to the window. I didn't notice my blunder until 1 stop out, and that's where I moved to my proper seat. Thankfully, it wasn't much of an issue and the rightful owner of the seat next to me eventually sat there and I just chilled for the rest of the ride back to Seoul and played some music. Once I got back to Seoul, I booked a taxi ride to the hotel and I was scolded a bit again, in Korean, as the taxi driver was already at the pickup stand and I was looking at the wrong way. But it was fine, I eventually got to my hotel and got checked in. The room was more spacious than the one in Toyoko Inn, but it wasn't as big nor as glamorous as my first hotel. I also purchased a weight increase for my luggage as I don't think my stuff would all just be under 20 kilograms. After placing my stuff, I went to have some dinner at a Burger King. According to KakaoMaps, the walk would just be 18 minutes or so. But that walk **WAS HELL** as I had to walk up and down several hills. It was entirely exhausting, but it felt nice to have such a safe walk, without any scary, rabid stay dogs and with the cool weather. I eventually got to Burger King and ordered their Tough Pepper Cube Steak Burger as well as some popcorn shrimp, which they didn't have at the Burger King back in the Philippines. It crossed my mind how funny my outfit was, which was essentially a loose-fitting black polo shirt I used to wear at work. It was 9°C out in Seoul and I'm not freezing nor shivering. I absolutely loved the weather. I took the bus to my hotel room instead of walking back, and I essentially just watched some YouTube videos while eating the cheesecake I got from Busan yesterday. I got some well-needed rest after that.

Song of the day: Umbrella Beach by Owl City

Busan Day 1! A Train to Busan!

Fri, 27 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: Haeundae Blue Line, Busan, South Korea

Today was finally the day of my trip to Busan! I woke up and my mood got way better compared to last night because someone eventually apologized. And I spent most of the morning just packing my stuff and preparing my luggage, which was already getting too full. I spent like an hour and a half just preparing my luggage and clothes, as well as throwing out my unused stuff. I had so much to stuff in one luggage, but I eventually got it done. I took a bath and eventually booked a taxi ride going to Seoul Station KTX. I had to say goodbye to one of, if not the best, hotel room I've ever stayed at (even compared to some 5-star hotel rooms I've stayed at in the Philippines). I also left the hotel which was kind of my home for these past few days. Eventually, the taxi had picked me up and the traffic was kind of congested and I kind of got worried because I just had to go to the correct KTX platform and navigate it, all in under one hour. I eventually got there at around 7:40 a.m. and my train was bound to leave at 7:58 a.m. so it was kind of a nail-biter. I took the elevator going up and then navigated to the platform to where my train was. It was on track 7 and it surprisingly took me only a short time to get from the main train platform to track 7 itself, and I was carrying my luggage, too. # I got to my scheduled train just in the nick of time! I left my luggage at the storage area and went to my seat. I got my MacBook out and I just listened to some music for a bit. I tried to connect to the Wi-Fi inside the train, but it wasn't that reliable, so I just connected to the hotspot that I had. I was seated across some ladies who spoke Chinese and next to some Korean man. I watched Train to Busan (2016) for a bit and I even wondered if I was on the correct train because it made several stops. But I got reassured that it was the right train and that the stops were normal. I eventually passed out as I was listening to my Antok FM playlist. When I woke up, we were close to arriving at Busan, which was kind of the expected time anyway. I got up as the people were leaving the train and that was surprisingly straightfoward. After arriving in Busan, I had a bit of a dilemma: my hotel booking wasn't until 3 p.m. or so, and I arrived in Busan at 10 a.m. in the morning, so I had a lot of free time to kill. I tried to find some lockers, but the ones were full and some guy even scolded me a bit, but it was just some random dude and not a train station employee. I had to rent 2 lockers: one at Busan Station itself and one at the nearby subway. The one at Busan Station had my large-ass bag and MacBook, and I made my way to the subway nearby so I could store my luggage. After that, I just chilled, ate at a convenience store nearby, ate some snacks and bread at the Paris Baguette, and eventually had some *mandu* and fried, cheesy chicken at the food court. The cheesy chicken kind of reminded me of the ones I used to eat at Maisen in the Glorietta food court, so that was interesting. I couldn't finish all of the mandu, though. After that, I just walked around to pass the time and eventually got my stuff from the lockers at around 2 p.m. or so. I had to carry my heavy-ass luggage and bag down to the subway to ride the train to Jungang Station, where my hotel was at. I got confused a bit, and even a lady scolded me and showed me that there was an elevator because I looked like a tired jackass for carrying my luggage down the stairs. I eventually got to Jungang Station, and a guy even helped me out by carrying my luggage over the turnstile, and another guy helped out by carrying my luggage up the stairs. He was with this woman and they were both students. We didn't talk much after that and I headed to my hotel on foot. I got checked in to the hotel and I asked if they had extra rooms for 1 more night, and they said that they were fully booked out, so I'd have this “limbo” issue tomorrow because I had to store my stuff in lockers again. When I got into the hotel room, it was tiny compared to the one I've been staying at. It felt kind of like a shock since it was extremely small, and there was barely any space. The bathroom was small as hell, too, and it kind of made me miss my hotel room back in Seoul. But I didn't have much time as I had to leave immediately so I could catch my scheduled Busan tour. I just dumped my stuff and then booked a taxi to Busan Station. I actually made it in time and I was pretty early, I ordered some matcha for myself. I met up with our tour guide, David, and there were some elderly ladies to which David spoke Japanese to, which shocked me because this dude was trilingual. I eventually met up with the others and we boarded the tour bus and met up with the others. The bus ride to pick up the other passengers took a while since the traffic was bad and that it was a Friday, but I got to see my first sighting of some cherry blossoms. I took a photo and just stared out as we headed to pick up the other tour attendees. After picking up the other people, we eventually went to our first stop which was the Haeundae Sky Capsule. We were dropped off at the Blue Line Park, took a group photo, and David gave us free time to explore and walk around for 5 minutes or so as he got to claim the tickets at Mipo Station. I got some souvenirs and some Busan caramel, which seemed interesting. I got paired up with an elderly and sweet British lady named Sarah, who was on this solo Korea trip as well. I mostly just asked her about her life back in the UK, her family and kids, and I guess she was kind of surprised that I was extremely fluent in English. We eventually rode the Sky Capsule and I took a few pictures. Sarah was nice enough to take a few pictures of me and I also took photos of her in exchange. I got to have some good views of the sunset, even though it wasn't that visible because of the air quality and that it was a bit cloudy. I got to wave and exchange glances at the other people in the capsules that passed by, which was funny. But the “ride” eventually ended once we got to the other station and I talked to some of the other people there who were solo travelers, too. One was even a Filipino-American who came from the US. I talked to him as we headed to our next stop, which was Cheongsapo Daritdol Skywalk, and it was this cool rainbow bridge that looped back from a cliffside. I asked our tour guide, David, to take some photos of me and cooked with those photos. I got some pretty cool shots, which were so nice. Then we made our way back to a nearby seaside restaurant. I talked to some of the other solo travelers, too, including one teacher who was from the US and another one from the UK. We ate at the seafood restaurant and we actually got to order a lot of food since we were a group. We all shared how nice it was to actually order some grilled food and have sides because we were all solo travelers, and it is notoriously hard to order good food as a solo diner in Korea. We had seafood which was a mix of some clams, this “new-to-us” sea creature which was just an abalone, and some shrimp. It was nice to eat out and talk to fellow solo travelers, and it was actually the first time I've felt less alone in Korea. What we ordered was so interesting, some people from another table took videos of the food we got, which was funny. After that, we went to The Bay 101 where we took more photos, had David explain to us some expensive apartments in Busan, and I got some cheesecake there. Us solo travelers also took a few photos together since we were all acquainted at this point. Then we went to Millac The Market and David explained some history about it, which had some funny entrance doors. I ordered some bread there, but it wasn't some stuffed bread that I wanted. Us solo travelers also tried to go to the photo booth nearby, which was PONYFILM, and it actually ate the money that we put in there, funny enough. We tried fiddling with the machine and in the end we ended up using pics that Sarah took on her iPhone 15's front camera, which was funny. Afterwards, we took kind of a long trip to a place that overlooked Busan at night. We didn't do much there aside from just stand around and look at the view, but afterwards we were all worrying about how to get to our respective places since it was getting late and around 10:40 p.m. already. We exchanged Instagram handles and I took the tour bus back to Busan Station. I took the subway back to my hotel room and eventually got some well-needed sleep after such a long and eventful day.

Song of the day: Am I Wrong by Nico & Vinz

Aquafield Goyang Spa Day!

Thu, 26 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: Aquafield Goyang, Goyang, South Korea

Today was my 7th day in Korea and my last full day of staying at this hotel. I started the day by ordering a ticket and deciding which Aquafield I wanted to go to since I had 3 options: Hanam, Goyang, and Anseong. I essentially just chose the one in Goyang since it seemed the closest and most-reviewed. I also booked a KTX ticket from Busan to Seoul, and took a screenshot of my booking at Toyoko Inn Busan. After that, I slept and I got a really good night's rest according to my Apple Watch, which was a full 8 hours and 12 minutes. I barely woke up since I was so knocked out. I took things slow today and didn't really rush things, but I had to commute from the hotel to Gyeonggi-do. It was a bit confusing but I essentially took the bus to the train station at Guro Digital Complex, and then took the train from there. I eventually got off near the Dorimcheon Stream and took a few photos while I was walking to Aquafield Goyang. I saw that it was inside another Starfield mall, which kind of shocked me at how large this mall company was. I eventually went inside and the mall was super huge. I kind of got lost a bit again, but I eventually found where it was. I was able to claim my ticket that I booked through Klook, and I got changed. I was still kind of weirded out by the naked dudes at first, and I was even a bit conscious, but it was fine and I got the hang of it. I tried out a few of their spa pools, and I even got a body and foot scrub from an old guy, which was funny and definitely an interesting experience. It was funny because I initially got scolded for wandering around because I didn't know where the area was, but I eventually got queued up for the massage just fine. They also asked where I was from. But after that, I tried out the other features of the spa like the sauna room. I eventually got out of the spa and into the “common area” which had everyone else. For the afternoon, I ate at the food court and I kind of ordered a lot again. I had some *bibimbap* as well as some fried *mandu* and then some beef cuts, which were all really delicious. The beef cuts were my favorite of the bunch. Needless to say, it filled me up and I just lounged and chilled for the rest of my time there. I went to the room with beds and watched some Korean TV and lied back until the evening. For the evening, I tried out the other rooms, ate at the food court again, and this time I tried out some chicken bits and fries, as well some *yukgaejang*. I tried out the massage chair for a bit more, but eventually decided on leaving as it was getting really late. The bill for my trip was an astounding 133,500 Korean Won which was around 5,500 Pesos. It kind of shocked me, but I essentially spent a day pampering myself, so it was all worth it to me. I took a car ride back to the hotel because I didn't want to stress myself out further and I guess the taxi driver got confused because they passed by me, and then they had to make a turn and I had to cross the street just to get to them. But after that, it was smooth sailing back to my hotel room. I got another hot bath in my room's large bathtub and I essentially just enjoyed the rest of the night at this hotel room. In the late evening, I had a bit of an argument with someone over how they'd pick me up from NAIA, so that ticked me off a bit and that ruined my night a bit since I slept while not resolving anything.

Song of the day: Pookie by FIFTY FIFTY

Suwon Starfield Library and Cinnamoroll Sweets Cafe!

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: Suwon Starfield Library, Cinnamoroll Sweets Cafe, Myeongdong

It was already the 6th day of my trip to Korea and I planned to visit the Starfield Library in Suwon. I checked the route that's headed there and eventually took the bus going to Seoksu Station, which would then take me to Hwaseo Station which the Suwon Starfield Library was near. I rode the bus there and at first it was funny because I'm just wearing my usual shirt, while I pass by so many people who are in full winter outfits. But I continue my commute, look up some stuff regarding my passport and employment status, and I just stand on the train until I got off at Hwaseo Station. I eventually arrived at Hwaseo Station and entered the mall. And at first, it looked just like your ordinary mall. I actually didn't know how a massive library would fit in here, but it eventually made sense when I came to find out that this mall was 7 or more floors. It even looked a bit like SM Aura. I went to Starbucks to get some coffee and I tried out their own thing on the “Dubai chocolate” by ordering their *pistaschio-chocolate-bread-thing* and some latte coffee. It was nice, but I made my stop short and then went upstairs to where the library was. I eventually got to the floor above the library and I couldn't believe it. The library was so huge. It was pretty big and stacked enough that the shelves for the books were large as hell. It was reminiscent of Murph's bedroom from the movie Interstellar (2014). It was pretty cool and I got my selfie stick out to take a few photos. Eventually, I had asked a few people to take photos of me. I even came across a Filipino couple and I talked to them in Tagalog, and I asked them to take a picture of me. I also had some American dude take photos of me and he was kind enough to take some more photos of me and he was shocked that I was fluent in English, he seemed a bit flabbergasted, which was funny. But I just took a few pictures and enjoyed the scenery. I didn't stay for long, though, as I headed out after spending an hour in the mall. I took the train and headed to Mapo-gu, which was a stone's throw away from Myeongdong. I went there because the Cinnamoroll Sweets Cafe was there. I initially had trouble finding it, but eventually found it which was inside of a mall. The place was smaller than what I expected, and there were so few people there. I honestly thought it would be packed. The place was nice but it looked like a small, temporary place rather than a permanent fixture, for some reason. I expected it to be grander, but oh well. I liked the various Cinnamoroll-themed stuff they had. I got myself a “photocard” which was essentially a plastic ID with my picture, and it looked pretty cool. I also printed out an ID that I'd give to someone since they were just 3,000 Korean Won. I printed mine but I wanted more variations, so I printed out more. The only problem was that I kinda fucked up with the orientation and placement of my picture for the 2 other ones, which came out borked. I also had 1 borked copy of someone's ID, but I was eventually able to print out a good one. For my snack there, I tried out a small banana cake-thing of Cinnamoroll and a blue drink which had Cinnamoroll's face on some ice cream. Both looked super cute and they were pretty okay. I thought that I could order some blue Cinnamoroll curry, but apparently that's only in the Cinnamoroll cafe in Japan. After I ate, I took a few pics and bought a lot of stuff at the Cinnamoroll gift shop nearby. I bought some stuff for myself, including an ID case, a big-ass laptop bag, and I also bought some Cinnamoroll stuff for someone. After that, I went to the mall downstairs to buy a Cinnamoroll wallet and this super-cute T-Money Cinnamoroll keychain. It looked like a cute keychain, but it was a functional one in that it was able to store some T-Money credits, which was pretty cool. I also went to the convenience store to try the banana milk latte for myself, and it was good. I had some trouble throwing away stuff again but I was able to dispose and clean up after myself. I then took the subway again to Myeongdong since it was already nearby. I got some stuff for Anne, then I got someone's stuff, as well as a few remaining stuff that my coworker asked of me since I was already at Olive Young. I also bought LK's stuff at another Olive Young store in Myeongdong. I walked around a bit more and I got that free Olive Young pouch, which I had planned to give to Anne, and that was it. For the rest of the day, I just chilled at Myeongdong. I tried out some street food there, which was some tempura, and I sought refuge at the nearby Starbucks there because I had to charge my iPhone for a bit. After that, I ate some more street food which was this delicious lamb skewer and I ate some spicy baby octopus skewer which was pretty delicious and spicy. Afterwards, I took the subway going back to the hotel and finally arrived back at the hotel after a long day. Dipping myself in that large hot tub was honestly just what I needed, and I also closed all of my fitness rings on my Apple Watch for today. I just chilled for the rest of the day until the next day rolled around.

Song of the day: Sky High by Elektronomia

A Trip to Everland!

Tue, 24 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: Everland, Yongin, South Korea

Day 5 in Seoul meant that today would be my trip to Everland! I had just bought tickets for today and I woke up a bit early, too, at 8 a.m. I got into a Discord call with someone and I turned on my video to show them what I was up to as I was getting ready to leave. I packed all my essentials and checked my bus route, then I rode the bus. I actually got off the wrong bus station and told someone this. All in all, they were making jokes and comments as I was commuting, but I didn't try to talk much/at all while on the public transportation. They eventually slept as I just got on the train to Seoul and I commuted on my own after that. So I got off the train and then walked to the bus stop that took me to Everland. I actually missed the bus because I was on a bench at a bus stop outside of the road, when the bus I meant to catch was in the bus stop *in the middle* of the road. So I just chilled at a nearby Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf, and I got some muffin and coffee. I went back to the bus stop as my bus' time of arrival was nearing, so I cleaned up my tray and went back to the bus stop. I got on the correct bus, which was a different one compared to the ones I was used to, but I got a comfortable window seat. I actually took some photos and then slept for a good bit, but I awoke just in time as the bus was arriving at Everland. After that, I left the bus and saw a sign that pointed to Everland **AND** Caribbean Bay. Wait, what? Caribbean Bay? From the CABI Song that Girls' Generation and 2PM sang? *THAT* Caribbean Bay? I was legitimately surprised because I visited another Girls' Generation landmark and I immediately sent this to someone. After asking around, I was able to enter Everland and I was surprised at how small it initially seemed. I walked around trying to look for T-Express, but I somehow couldn't find it. It was confusing because it was such a big rollercoaster, but I couldn't find it. So I just stored my stuff at a nearby locker. I rode Thunder Falls as my first ride and it was so scary! It was also exhilarating and I got so wet from the drop because I sat in the back seat. The couple in front of me saw how disheveled I looked, but I didn't care and I just laughed. It was genuinely so fun! I went and decided to try to find T-Express, and that's when the scale of this place really hit me. This place was HUGE. I've only had Enchanted Kingdom as my biggest theme park, but it was nothing in comparison to Everland. I kept walking and walking, and eventually found T-Express! I tried to see where the line started and I just waited in line. Thankfully, it wasn't that long, but it was surprising how there was still a long line despite it being a random Tuesday. It was then my turn to ride T-Express and I didn't want to sacrifice anything so I put in my wallet and phone at the locker nearby. Then the ride started. T-Express is, by far, the scariest ride I've ever been on. I felt like I was going to be ejected from my seat and my head decapitated. I thought I would end up on one of those YouTube documentaries where someone died while on the ride. It was honestly the scariest ride I've ever been on, like it genuinely freaked me out the first time. But it was the most fun I've had ever on a ride, honestly. I wanted to go again, but I wanted to eat first. So I just ate at the nearby Alpine Restaurant. I sat there and ate alone, and just thought about how crazy this all was. I was thousands of miles away from home, far away from anyone I can call myself close to. It was just so crazy how lonesome and how far I am. But it was cool, and I enjoyed my meal which was just some chicken and kimchi rice. I walked around a bit more and I tried the hotdogs being served, which tasted nice. I also found another group of Filipino tourists and I took photos of them, and they took photos of me in return. Afterwards, I rode their own take of a swinging ship ride, the Flying Rescue, and it was fun but it didn't last long, nor was it that scary, which was kind of a letdown. I walked and explored more of the park while I was talking to this girl I met on CMB. I sent her my itinerary but, funnily enough, it was cropped. But I showed her how I was completing most of the stuff on my itinerary and following it so much, which also shocked me. After this, my phone's battery was getting low so I charged and walked around for a bit. I also talked to a few friends and browsed Reddit for a while. I rode 1 more ride after this, which was Double Rock Spin, which was one of the scariest rides I've ever been on because I genuinely felt like I was going to fall or something. Thankfully, I didn't, and I talked more to that girls I matched on CMB and we connected on Instagram. I decided to have some light snacks after this and also decided on going home since it was getting late. Before leaving, I stopped by a gift shop and decided to get my sister this cute Piplup bag that was reminiscent of the cute bags that the people in Lotte World had yesterday. I also found out the place that sold that Cinnamoroll thing and it was a popcorn stand, weirdly enough. I was confused how they would store popcorn it in, but it was cool how I got a cute Cinnamoroll keychain as well. I rode the bus and went back to my hotel. It surprised me how quick the trip took and I was back at my hotel room at around 8:30 p.m. or so. I didn't do much else for the rest of the evening aside from talking to that girl from CMB and browsing IG Reels. I also ate out of that Cinnamoroll popcorn bucket, funny enough. I stayed up until the following day.

Song of the day: STYLE by Hearts2Hearts

The Lotte World Turnaround!

Mon, 23 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: Lotte World, Seoul, South Korea

Today started with me arriving home late from my trip yesterday. I had plans to go to Lotte World today, but I just couldn't sleep. It was like something was bothering me. In the morning, my mood was still shot from my early morning “adventure” and I woke up late, too. I decided to just take a car ride to Lotte World because I would arrive there very late in the day if I took public transportation. I got off at the wrong place and even wandered around a good bit before reaching the tickets at Lotte World Adventure. But eventually I was able to claim my ticket and go inside! And there I was, at Lotte World in Seoul. I actually got to the Lotte World ice skating rink where Girls' Generation performed Oh! in the 2010s. That live performance also shaped me going here, to be honest. I tried to ride some ride in the adventure area, but the lady said something about my clothes, so I didn't push through. I decided to try the Flume Ride instead. I was kind of surprised because there were a lot of people here and the line took a while, even though it was on a regular Monday morning. I also noticed some of the cast members look pretty and do this dance while they greeted passengers who had just finished the ride, which was pretty cute. I got into a log ride with a couple sitting in front of me, but it was fine. I got wet on the ride! But it was so fun! Honestly, just realizing that I'm at a theme park instantly turned my mood. I needed a mood shift after yesterday, so I'm glad I got to go to Lotte World. I also looked around and saw so many couples in uniforms, which was cute. I tried their viking ride, which was The Conquistador, and then I walked to the outdoor area, which was Magic Island. I took some photos of the outside and just kept walking around. I got in line for Gyro Drop and it was surprising how fast they came down, because they blew my hat away! I was able to ride it quick because the line was short and it was fun and also scary at the same time. After that, I got some food and I got a basic hotdog, some potato chips, and chicken nugget balls which cost me around 1,000 Pesos, which was super expensive, if I'm being honest. I tried the Gyro Swing next, which was also scary, but super short. After that, I walked back to the indoor area to take a few more photos. I then got in line for the French Revolution ride and it made me wait quite a while, too. And there were some people who came in front of me who were clearly in groups, even though the line was meant for solo riders. Still, I got in the ride and, while it was short, it was super fun and scary. Too bad I'll only get to experience it once due to how long the line was. I took a few more photos after that, ate some dinner there, and I wanted to try the hot air balloon ride, Aeronauts Balloon Ride, but it was closed by the time I got there. I just walked around for a bit, and I wanted to take a video of the French Revolution ride as it went in the loop, but 2 girls were dancing Twice's What is Love on the bridge, so I couldn't go there. I also didn't try out Atlantis because it was closed this day for inspection. I just walked around a bit and turned on my Strava workout. I didn't really have anything else to do at that point, and I didn't want to spend any more money, so I literally just went home. I know I still purchased a ticket that came with access to the Lotte Aquarium, but it was already getting late at this time as it was already around 7:40 p.m. and I had to take public transportation. So I just went down to the subway that led back to Seoul. I passed by Bongcheon and I thought about getting off at this stop in search of the Bongcheon-dong ghost, but I didn't really push through it because I was tired. Plus, I wanted to recoup some strength for tomorrow's Everland trip, so I just went back to my hotel and chilled. All in all, Lotte World was fun and I'm glad that I got this trip because it was the turnaround that I needed to lift my mood.

Song of the day: Pink Pony Club by Chappell Roan

Lyrics that resonated with me:
"God, what have you done?
You're a pink pony girl, and you dance at the club," oh mama
I'm just having fun
On the stage in my heels, it's where I belong, down at the
Pink Pony Club, I'm gonna keep on dancing at the
Pink Pony Club, I'm gonna keep on dancing down in
West Hollywood, I'm gonna keep on dancing at the
Pink Pony Club, Pink Pony Club

Board games at some cafe

Sun, 22 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: Cafe in Changsin-dong, Seoul, South Korea

For today, I didn't have much planned. I actually planned it as a rest day/free day, and I planned to just spend it at a park. But I thought that it would be way cooler if I could mingle and play board games as well. I did have 1 item on my list first: which was to get my Korail pass card. I went to Seoul Station in the morning and I took the bus and then train to get there. I was surprised to see that the Namane card booth wasn't working, so I walked around. I was shocked to see some homeless people out here in Seoul station, and I went downstairs to some tunnel which had more homeless people and people sleeping in cardboard houses, which was kind of a shock to me. I eventually got to this hotel that had a Namane card booth and I was able to print my Korail Pass+, which wasn't needed but I liked that I have a card to commemorate my trip. I took a few pics but then went straight to that cafe along Cheonggyecheon or something. I was hungry so I stopped by and initially planned to have a quick bite to eat. I ordered 3 pieces of chicken at this store and I had gizzard too. It was definitely too much for just 1 person and I saw 2 dudes at another table point and look at me, and then said “aigoo” which was super funny to me. I ordered the chicken for take-out and wrapped it in a bag myself. I was in a hurry because I wanted to play board games anyway. I then went to the cafe and got my ticket and a drink. I went downstairs to find some people playing board games and a table was nice enough to invite me to play with them. We played Da Vinci Code at first and it was this weird board game where you had to guess the numbers. I didn't initially get it at first, but the guy was super nice and friendly in telling the mechanics. I played at a table with 3 people: Chloe, who was a Korean nurse, and the couple who were also Korean and the guy was studying law. It was fun to play with them and, after that, we were joined by another guy named Solomon, who was some kind of engineer at Incheon Airport. I played board games with them and then we moved to the next game, which was Codenames. I feel like I've played this game before, but I don't have a clear memory of it. Then, as we were playing, it hit me that we already played this in Dice before. I was partnered up with the guy studying law and Solomon was teamed up with the girls. We often kept winning because I was able to guess the words that the guy was trying to link. The girls failed a few times, especially by getting the card that made them immediately lose the game, which was funny because it happened multiple times. We were joined by another woman, who was by herself. Then Chloe had to leave and another guy from Greece named Nick joined in. We played this other game next, which was Spyfall, and it was kind of a headscratcher to play because we kind of didn't get the mechanics at first. But we soon got the gist as we were playing. It was fun because we were all multilingual, but we tried to deduce who was the spy in our playthroughs. I never got the spy card, though, which was sad. Then we played Flip 7! I actually got my drink at this time because I had to ask it, but it somehow wasn't served to me, so that was cool. We kept playing, but I often got greedy with getting cards up until the point where I get a duplicate and end my turn. I think the lawyer guy won in the end, so that's cool. He was so lucky, too. Sadly, the couple had to leave after this game, but Nick, a new joiner named Sara(?), and the solo Korean lady still kept playing. We played The Island next and it was such a long game, but it was a fun one. One other Korean dude came to our table, but didn't play, and he said that it's his favorite game. It was a long game, but we eventually finished it and Sara tapped out at this point. So it was just us 3 at this point: the Korean lady, Nick, and I. For our next game, Nick picked Camel Up which was this camel betting game, which was fun but also hard to play. I didn't fully get how we were playing, and even until now I don't get it. But Camel Up was fun because it was a chill game we could play. For our last game, another Korean lady named Olivia joined in on our table to play Cascadia/Harmonies. Cascadia was actually the name of the board game in French, and the board game was in French because it was just donated by someone else to the cafe. We didn't get it at first, it was kind of confusing for me, but Nick got it quickly and Olivia had been playing it for a while, so she already understood it. I just played along and I saw how much fun the others were having and I was struggling at this game. It was fine, but our round took so long to play out. We were actually the last group to leave the cafe, and Nick took a while to tally our scores. The cafe owner was even looking at us haha. But it's fine, us 3 (Nick, Olivia, and I) as well as the guy who liked The Island from earlier tagged along with us for dinner. Too bad the other lady didn't join us, unfortunately, and no one got her contact, too. We continued for dinner and we went to a place that Olivia recommended. Nothing much happened, it was mostly Olivia asking Nick about Amsterdam and stuff, and a bunch of other things. We ate some food at a restaurant that Olivia recommended, so that was nice. I exchanged details with them but after that we parted ways. I took the bus going home and I even passed by Cheonggyecheon so I took more pictures of it. I passed by down this creepy alleyway, and the bus back home took a while since it had 44 stops or something. I eventually arrived back to my hotel room at around 1:40 a.m., which led to the next day. Overall, today was kind of a mixed bag. This was totally an unplanned part of the trip and I kind of regretted it a bit because I never really got to connect with someone here, even though I tried my best at this social event.

Namsan Seoul Tower Day!

Sat, 21 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: Namsan Seoul Tower, Seoul, South Korea

Today started with me still on my Cheonggyecheon midnight trip. I walked a few scary-looking places just to get there. They seemed scary not because I saw them as unsafe, but scary because I was unfamiliar with where I was going, and urban places without people seemed liminal. But I eventually got to Cheonggyecheon and took a few photos of it, and a few selfies of myself, too. I didn't stay for long because the Bluetooth shutter wasn't working. I just decided to go home after that, but I found some difficulty in finding a bus taking me back to my hotel. I was honestly confused and didn't know where to go because the buses servicing my stop didn't have a route going to my hotel. There was also this thing with BTS' comeback somehow diverting buses, which inconvenienced me because I was waiting at some bus stops for a bus that never came. Still, it was fine, and I just kept walking and walking until I got to a specific bus stop nearby. The N51 Night Bus I rode was freaking packed! We were packed in like sardines and I could only assume this was the case because a lot of people had their bus routes changed. I couldn't even tap my T-Money card at the terminal, but there was a guy kind enough to tap in my card and one of another passenger. That bus ride was hell and I actually forgot to leave at the specified bus stop because it was too crowded. I just decided to get off at the next bus stop and I was able to tap my card out and get out of there. Even the lady next to me was sort of crushed by the door due to how crowded it was. So I just left and decided to book a car ride back to my hotel because I'm out of options. Honestly, I kind of regretted going out this late at night lol. I booked a cab ride and I did my usual thing of saying the cab driver's name just to confirm. And at first, she didn't get why, and she kept talking to me in Korean which I totally didn't get huhu. She was a nice, elderly lady and I was able to tell her a bit in Korean that I don't speak Korean at all and that I was a foreigner. She drove like crazy but it was such a fun ride back to the hotel. I'm just glad I got back after all that and I was able to make it safe. I just chilled and got some rest after that. For the morning, I had this strange dream that I'll oversleep, but thankfully I didn't and I woke up at around noon. I got a ticket for the Namsan Seoul Tower since that was planned in today's itinerary. I wore something comfortable and stopped by at a nearby coffee shop because I also wanted to check that off my itinerary. I asked in Korean and I didn't understand what they said. But I was able to ask how I'll clean up after I finished my order, and the lady said that she'll do it herself, so that was nice. I took the bus to claim my Klook ticket because it was for the cable car and for the tower itself. I took the bus there and I dropped by somewhere near Myeongdong. I got my ticket and used a nearby elevator to go up to the cable car building. The cable car building was kind of a long wait, but it was fine. I just didn't expect that I'd be riding a cable car full of people. I thought it was in smaller groups, or something. We were packed and standing, like a bunch of sardines or something. But I enjoyed it for what it was and drank a Pocari Sweat from the vending machine at the top. I took a few photos of the tower and I overheard a few Filipinos and I assumed they wanted a group pic of them together, so I offered and asked the lady in Tagalog if I could take a pic of them. They seemed shocked, but glad, and I took a few photos of them. They also took a few photos of me, since I needed a few pics of myself anyway. So that was a nice exchange. I walked around to a nearby restaurant and had late lunch there because I hadn't eaten all day. I also rolled on this fortune paper thing and I think I got a good one. I took a few pictures and then decided that it was time to go up to the tower itself. I got a real ticket for the tower heading up and took a few photos. I also bought a few souvenirs, as well as some for myself, as a gift to bring back. I also got this N Seoul Tower card as a kind of souvenir for myself, because I couldn't pass up the opportunity to get it and say that I have something tangible from this place. I got to meet another Filipino, this time a traveler coming in from Japan. She says that she isn't staying long in Korea, and she generally asked if I could take pictures of her. Thankfully, she was also kind enough to take pictures of me in return, so that was nice. I went to the lower floor and we bumped into each other again, and we took pictures at this nice window view as the sun was setting, so that was cool. For the rest of the evening, I just chilled at the base of the tower. I thought to myself for a bit, took a few photos, and oversaw Seoul's city skyline. It was still surreal and I just couldn't believe I was here in Seoul, South Korea all by myself. After a while, I went to a Starbucks nearby and got a drink. I was thinking if this was the day I got that mug and tumbler from Starbucks, but decided on another day instead. I just enjoyed my coffee which was actually served in this *trenta* size. I also had food at the same restaurant and saw a few Filipinos there, so that was cool. I walked around for a bit in Strava and then decided to go down once I felt like I had explored all of the places here. I waited in line and thought that I didn't have to wait in line, I assumed the line was for the tickets (which I already had), so I left my place only to find that I was wrong. So I waited in line again, and I think a few Filipinos were behind me, so I pretended to call a friend and speak in Tagalog, and the couple behind me were definitely looking at me. When we got to the cable car, that's when they asked me and they introduced themselves to me. They were 2 sets of couples and the girl from the Korean couple actually studied in the Philippines for a while, kind of what like what we had in our school. I talk to them for a bit, but eventually part ways with them and I kind of regret that I didn't get their number of Facebook accounts, and stuff. I took a few photos of myself at this landmark and then took the bus home. I just wanted to get home early today so I can just chill in my hotel room. I eventually arrived back and bought a few stuff at some convenience stores nearby like some toothbrushes and this banana milk.I also got my accommodation set for Busan, thankfully. After that, I went to sleep.

My First Day in Another Country!

Fri, 20 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: Seoul, South Korea

My morning started off with me still flying to South Korea so I just watched the movie that Mon recommended to me, which was Everyone Knows Every Juan. It was quite a strange, surreal, but fun movie to watch while up in the air, and it was pretty cool to watch. After I finished watching, I went back to sleeping and listening to my Antok FM playlist. After a few hours, we eventually arrived in South Korean airspace and even flew over Jeju Island. It showed on my maps and I could not believe that I was headed alone to some foreign country. We eventually got to Incheon and landed there. I was so shocked but at the same time, I couldn't believe it. We got to Incheon Airport safe and I was in a place no one in my family had ever been in. I was just walking around and taking it all in. Then I passed by this giant LCD screen that had some designs and stuff on it, and I saw some characters from Cookie Run Kingdom. It was so surreal to see Gingerbrave and the others, it felt like I was dreaming. I also couldn't believe how nice the airport looked, but also how empty everything looked. It kinda looked liminal because there were almost no people around here except our flight, and this is supposed to be a busy international airport, but it's 4 a.m. and it's devoid of people. I got through immigrations just fine and the line wasn't actually that long, since it's just people from another flight and ours, and I got through immigrations quickly. I got my bag, too, and I was off to get that SIM card that I bought. I walked around, only to find that the store I'm supposed to claim it in is on the other side of the airport terminal. So I made my way there and it didn't work on my Samsung Galaxy SCR01, so I had to use Ailysh's phone. It would then be my main networking device for the trip and I hid the SIM card and my SCR01 in my bag. I was thinking whether or not I should book a taxi to Seoul or just use the subway to get there. It was almost 5 a.m. anyway, and I decided I didn't want the wait and hassle so I just booked a taxi ride. I had a discount coupon because there was a BTS promotion, so that was nice. I also loaded some money to my T-Money card that came with my SIM card and booked a taxi. It quickly arrived and I had to exit through Gate 14 and I was immediately shocked by how cold it was. The temperature difference didn't strike me at first because I was inside the airport, but when I exited, I got spooked by how cold it actually was. Then there I was, on a taxi ride to my hotel in Seoul. The taxi was really fast, and I checked the weather app and it showed that it was 3°C in Incheon, which was super cold. I still enjoyed the taxi ride to the hotel and I had to translate/look up a common phrase to signal to the taxi driver that it's already paid. When I arrived at the hotel, I said that to the driver as he helped me drop off my luggage, and I was instantly shocked at how he understood me. I was shocked, but also glad I could do that. After that, I got checked in and I got my room number, which was pretty high up. I got in my hotel room, which would be my “home” for the next 7 days in Seoul, and I was shocked at how nice it was, and also how nice the bathroom was. There was this huge bathtub that could easily fit 2-3 people, and I was shocked at how nice this bathroom was despite the hotel's price. It easily beat all of the hotels I've stayed at in the Philippines, including the 5-star ones. After I had settled in, I wanted to walk and enjoy the Seoul morning air, so I took a walk even though I just had my basic polo shirt on, and I walked to a nearby McDonald's since I was kinda hungry. My walk felt so nice, and it was only 2°C, but I loved the temperature on my skin. I've never had dry cold on my skin before and it feels so nice. I walked past a few places, took a bunch of photos, and I just couldn't believe that I was out and alone on a foreign country. It still hasn't sunk into me yet. But then I got to the McDonald's and ate there for a bit. I used the ordering kiosk and paid using my GCash card, which worked well, so I had breakfast and I sample their coffee and talked to some friends like Nate. I also called my sister to show how cold it was, and after that I headed back to my hotel to change, clean up, and get ready. I wanted to go to Cheonggyecheon even though it wasn't planned, and I wanted to take the bus there. I tried KakaoMaps for the first time and I was a bit nervous to use the bus, but I found the directions easy. I also used the time to just chill and play songs, and also look out the window. I eventually got off near Seoul Station and walked there. I saw a few BTS promotions since it's their comeback, but I eventually got to Cheonggyecheon! I honestly couldn't believe that I was at Cheonggyecheon. I had only dreamed of visiting this place, and it feels so strange to actually be here in person. I took a lot of photos, but it sucks that I forgot to bring the selfie stick with me. So I kept walking downstream and I saw a few ducks, and some people were feeding the ducks. I sat down for a bit, took a few photos, talked to Mon and my sister, and even crossed over a few rocks that led to the other side. For a while, I just explored and walked around for a while. I also wanted to get a WowPass so I was look around for a terminal for that. I also went underground to withdraw cash, but I still continued my search for a WowPass terminal. This was also the time I rode the subway for the first time! I kind of got lost and ultimately went back to somewhere near Myeongdong. I wanted to eat since it was already lunchtime anyway, so I walked and walked. I ultimately passed by a WowPass terminal, but I couldn't claim a card because I didn't have my passport with me, so I was just in search of food. I tried navigating through KakaoMaps and trying to check out some recommendations there, and some were closed, so I went to this one other charcoal grill place. Unfortunately, since I was eating alone, I couldn't order their meat on a grill, and was just stuck with some grilled fish and their steamed egg soufflé, which was more gelatinous than anything. It wasn't my ideal meal. I got to eat and also take a few photos, as well as charge my phone. But after that, since I was already near Myeongdong, I decided to just shop and buy the stuff since I didn't want to be bothered with shopping on the next few days. I bought some stuff at Olive Young and chatted with a few of my friends while there so I could get their exact stuff, and then I checked out. They were offering a tax refund on the spot, but I didn't have my passport on me, so I couldn't get the tax refund and just paid for the whole thing. After that, I went to the K-Pop merch store upstairs to see if they have the ILLIT album, and they didn't, so that kind of disappointed me. I then went to the HBAF store across the street and I was so surprised that they had so many flavors in stock! Most of these flavors were ones I haven't even seen before, so I was really amazed. I only bought a few and then chilled at a nearby Starbucks to recoup some energy because I've been walking around all day. I also tried that new drink that they had. It was nice, but I was surprised that it was fully soda. After that, I just went to a nearby bus station that has a route that's near to my hotel. The entire ride home, I was just looking out at the window. I even slept and passed out because I was so tired, and I was shocked to see that no one stole from me or anything. I eventually arrived at my stop and I tried to find a universal adapter at a nearby ACE Hardware store, but they didn't have it. So I went to this Lotte store to ask for an adapter, and they did give me one. I also asked for an adapter in Korean and I was glad that the lady got it. At first, I was kind of disappointed, because the lady gave me a multi-plug charger, but when I got back to the hotel, I was glad because I got the right thing, which was an adapter. By this time, the sun was setting, so I just stayed for a bit to charge my stuff. Then I went to a nearby hotel which had a WowPass terminal and I got my WowPass card. I even loaded it with 50,000 KRW. It was already nighttime so I just decided to have dinner. I initially wanted to eat at this restaurant which served pork cutlet, but I decided for KFC instead since I wanted to show Jaze how the KFC was in Korea. I got there and I was surprised that they had butter rice, which kind of surprised me. I also tried out Dr. Pepper for the first time and it was great, honestly. I just ate while talking to Jaze and Cheska for a bit, then I asked if I could get my food for take-out and I said it in Korean, which made me glad because I could phonetically sound out sentences and they could understand it. I walked back to my hotel room again and contemplated for a bit if I should go out again, even though it was getting close to midnight. But I still went ahead with it. I brought my selfie stick, too. I wanted to visit Cheonggyecheon again and so I left and got on a bus going there. I also checked my finances and I was surprised to have spent 10K Pesos in one day. I honestly couldn't believe I spent so much money in one day, and I wondered how I'll survive for the next few days of my trip. But it was fine, I played Some Nights by fun. while on the bus ride to Seoul Station. Although, the bus didn't actually go there. The driver asked where this person was getting off, and they thankfully said Seoul station. I kind of figured out from the context that they're not stopping there because there was an alert saying that buses won't go to Seoul Station because of BTS' comeback. So I got off at a completely different stop and decided to walk there instead. My night continued from there.

Song of the day: Seoul by Girls' Generation & Super Junior

My First Flight Alone!

Thu, 19 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: NAIA Terminal 3

# Thursday was finally the big day! I have literally waited MONTHS for this day to come, and today would be the day I packed and left for Seoul, South Korea! I couldn't be more excited, but also anxious at the same time. I started this morning just on a call with someone and I just ordered take-out. Nothing noteworthy happened and I didn't stay up for long because I had to sleep and get some rest eventually. In the morning and afternoon, I made sure to have everything prepared and packed. I had a little bit of help from my sister in packing my luggage. We made sure everything was prepared and I even had her clean an old jacket-thing that I bought years ago. I had my entire outfit settled: the new polo shirt that Mom got me recently. While I was packing my stuff, I read online that liquids should be stored in some quarter Ziploc bag. I didn't have it on me, so I had to spend an additional 1,000 Pesos buying other stuff from a faraway SNR and it was kind of a time pressure since I had to leave now. But I eventually get the bag, wrap some essentials in there like my perfume, and then Mom sends me the money that I lent to her back in January. I also get some messages from someone about cats. I use the remaining time I had to just pay some credit cards and settle bills because I didn't want to be bothered while I'm on vacation. After all was said and done, I booked an InDrive ride to NAIA Terminal 3 and had a little talk with my uncle before leaving for the airport. While on the way, I realized that I didn't bring my noise-cancelling headphones with me, which was a shame, but whatever. I was already on the way to the airport. When I got there, there was a line for Jeju Air and the people manning the booths weren't there yet, so I waited for a bit and played with the selfie stick. I also took a few photos of Bing Bong since I brought them out. Eventually the staff lined up and gave a loud Korean greeting, which had me shocked because I've never experienced that before. But that was so cool. After I checked in my bag and items, I also had to pay some travel tax which deducted some of my money, but it was fine. I then went back to grab my boarding pass and it looked so cool. I then headed off to immigrations and the line took a while, but I was eventually able to reach the counter. I couldn't hear the IO at all, but I got the gist that I needed to sign up for an eTravel thing in the eGov app, so I just filled that out and went back in line as a show of respect. I eventually got to the counter with another IO and they checked my stuff, I also showed them my company which I thankfully had on me, and I was stamped and good to go. After that, I had to get myself and my bag scanned. After all that, I was breathing a sigh of relief because all I had to do was just wait for the plane. It felt super nice clearing the major airport hurdles and now all I had to do was just wait for the plane. I took a pictures of the departures board and went back to an old blog post because I genuinely could not believe I was going to South Korea. I posted a few pictures to IG before leaving and left someone a few photos of me going to the plane before taking off. Honestly, I was super glad to get a window seat. I honestly could not believe my luck, because I got a window seat. I went to the bathroom a couple of times and the flight was delayed a bit due to air traffic, but I'm glad we got to take-off safely and leave on time. It's always such a shock to me to see an airplane takeoff because this thing goes fast. Fast enough to leave the ground. And that's where I spent the last few hours of my day: off the ground headed for some other country.

Song of the day: MONTAGEM - PR FUNK by S3BZS

Journal entry for Wednesday, March 18th, 2026

Wed, 18 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Wednesday was one of the most boring days I've ever had and this day was essentially a filler episode in my life because I just wanted to skip this day. I did nothing but look forward to my South Korea trip tomorrow and I just did my usual round of preparation, like filling up my e-Arrival Card in Korea, and ordering some food while being on call with someone. I couldn't sleep much because of my excitement but I was also anxious because I might suffer an injury or something, and because I had to go to the office today. So I wanted to be extra careful and “protect my energy” so to speak. I got to the office, had my usual round of lunch with my coworkers, and we got some of those viral Dubai chewy cookies, and I also sent someone money so they could try those. My office also had this interesting “free banana day” and I got a free banana, for some reason. I also got some money to exchange at Rolan's money exchange business, so that was cool. I got some Korean Won and it was cool to see their currency and to actually touch it. After that, a coworker got me a cute charm from Japan and I eventually went home after timing out of work. For the evening, I played some It Takes Two with someone and we finished quite a few levels. We also watched some horror gameplay, and my sister eventually got me that selfie stick. And in the late evening, I got my ticket to Korea prepared, and I essentially stayed up late while talking to someone.

Song of the day: STYLE by Hearts2Hearts

Journal entry for Tuesday, March 17th, 2026

Tue, 17 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Tuesday started with me still chilling in the call with someone and I was talking to Mon about some deep stuff, but that was mostly it. I actually stayed up with someone and stayed on call with them up until 7 a.m. or so. We just talked, watched some K-Pop music videos, and eventually I guess I rested and timed in for work shortly after. In my break, they played more of Shutter Story, I was organizing my playlist for my South Korea trip, and they played Needy Streamer Overload. But I eventually timed out and just chilled for the rest of the evening.

Song of the day: Terminal by Rupert Holmes

Journal entry for Monday, March 16th, 2026

Mon, 16 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Monday was when shit got real. **THIS IS FINALLY THE WEEK I GO TO SOUTH KOREA** and I was so fucking hyped as shit. I stayed up for the morning, planning my trip and how everything is supposed to go, like my trip to Busan and what time I'd rake the KTX train to Busan, paying for the ticket, and paying for the Busan tour as well in the evening. I had the perfect plan for my day trip in Busan. I got my KORAIL Pass and I even bought the KORAIL PASS+ which is a physical card I can claim, I bought it since it was only around 300 Pesos and pretty cheap. After planning some more, I essentially just went to sleep. For the morning, nothing much happened as I just had work. I planned a bit more for my upcoming trip, and I talked to Mon for a bit, but I just went back to work after that. After my shift ended, I got into a call with Luan and someone, and Luan played Fatal Frame for us. I ordered dinner for my sister and I, and I just chilled and watch someone play Red Dead Redemption 2. They finally played that new game they recommended named Shutter Story but it wasn't that long as only the demo had been out. After that, I stayed up and was still in a call with someone up until the next day.

Song of the day: Hey Baby (Drop It To The Floor) (feat. T-Pain) by Pitbull

Midnight visit to Tuscany, McKIenley Hill

Sun, 15 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Jaze and I eventually arrived at Assi Fresh Plaza and we actually ate inside the store for the first time. Jaze cooked up the noodles that we bought and I ordered the spicy ones, AND IT WAS **TOO HOT** for me. I actually felt like passing out because it was too spicy for me. I just couldn't handle it and I just didn't finish my food, but Jaze seemed to enjoy his food so that was good for him. After that, we ended our trip outside and I was back at home. I talked to Mon for a bit, and with someone as well, but that was mostly it. For Sunday, I didn't actually do much other than play CyberPunk: 2077 on my MacBook, which was a total first for me because I never actually thought about gaming on my MacBook Pro, but it was fun and I got myself hooked on the story a bit. I talked to Kai for a bit, too, but I essentially just chilled for the evening and stayed up until the following day.

Journal entry for Saturday, March 14th, 2026

Sat, 14 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Seoul next week. I got some sleep after that and I woke up at around the afternoon after getting a full 8 hours of sleep, which was nice. I checked my matches on CMB and I saw that I matched with someone named Maria. We talked for a bit, but it wasn't much. After that, I mostly just talked to Mon and browsed some IG Reels. I had so much free time today that I was actually free to get into a call with Mon and I played some knockoff Tetris game while we were talking. We talked for a bit, but eventually had to end the call. I just chilled and passed the time as Jaze and I planned to eat out in the evening. And in the late evening, Jaze eventually picked me up and we ate at Tokyo Tokyo. We tried their ramen and it was total ass, it tasted weird and it was kind of disgusting. Of course, we couldn't talk shit about their food there, but it was just horrible. We didn't finish our food and we just left for Assi Fresh Plaza to eat proper noodles.

Song of the day: STYLE by Hearts2Hearts

Journal entry for Friday, March 13th, 2026

Fri, 13 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

For Friday, I was getting more and more excited since my trip to Korea would finally be next week, and as fun as this week was, I just wanted it to be over. I started the morning a bit stressed because someone and I talked about some future stuff, but it was eventually resolved and I was able to go to sleep. I went to the office today as usual and I had my usual thing of going out with my coworkers and having lunch with them. After a while, I had to go home as the day was pretty much done and I could just finish my other tasks at home. After work, I signed up for CMB Date, even though it was the most expensive dating app subscription I've ever had. I got curious since Mon kept talking about it and I wanted to try it out. I sent a few flowers, messages, and other stuff hoping one sticks, and funnily enough I saw Mon there, too. I talked to Mon for a while and eventually had a meeting in the late evening around midnight for some work, and that's how I ended my day.

Song of the day: All Of The Lights by Kanye West

Thursday's Makati Night Trip

Thu, 12 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Today was my usual day in the office and I started it by going to the office and working on-site. I had lunch out with my coworkers, but I also got some matcha by myself. I tried to look for some travel groups or meetup places in Korea for my upcoming trip because I didn't want to be lonely. For my breaktime, I got into a call with someone as I was chilling in the pantry. I talked to Mon for a while, too, but I mostly was on call with someone and watched them play Red Dead Redemption 2. I got to open up to Mon about a scar that I still had, so that was nice. I continued to focus on my tasks for the day and, after timing out, we decided to have lunch out. We wanted to eat out at this restaurant in Poblacion, but it was full and waiting would take. along time, so we had some *samosas* at the Samosa Street food card. It was so funny because apparently the seller and one of my coworkers went to the same college, so that was interesting. The *samosa* was actually good, too, it was really delicious. We couldn't decide on which restaurant to have dinner at, though, but we eventually settled on La Pita. I tried out the lamb meat since it was the most exotic one on the menu, and it tasted nice. It was so filling, though, and it took me a while to finish my food since I was just eating it all alone while my coworkers shared their food amongst each other. After that, we wanted to walk around for a bit and we decided to have some drinks at Black Kettle that's nearby. I got a drink and their pastry, which was funny because I still had yesterday's cookie in my bag. After that, we all went our separate ways and I went home because I still had more on-site work for tomorrow.

Song of the day: Club Can't Handle Me (feat. David Guetta) by Flo Rida

Work and Ramen Out

Wed, 11 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

For Wednesday, it started with me fixing the Spotify integration because apparently I needed to have a paid account so I could use their API, which sucked since I don't use Spotify anymore, but whatever. I also got some messages from Mon inviting me to go out once I got back from Korea, which seemed cool. Once I woke up, I went to the office and I eventually had lunch out at the food court. I had a coworker ask me if I could pasabuy her something from Korea, and I agreed. I also still kept talking to Mon throughout the day and then I prank messaged her, which backfired. But we were cool after that and then I had dinner out with my coworkers. I saw a large group of cats just chilling out and we were going to Manmaru which was around Makati Central Square. On the way there, I kind of did a goof because some coworker pointed to some rooftop bar and I asked how could we get up there, and then they teased me by going up via the elevator as they thought I would scale the building. That was funny and we 3 just kept walking afterward. I just got some ramen but my coworker was a bit adventurous and wanted to try the *natto*. I think it was the server that recommended he try the *natto* sushi, but my coworker wanted to try just the *natto* by itself. They tried it and immediately disliked it. I also hinted that they were supposed to smell/taste like that because they're fermented. It was just funny seeing their reaction, and my coworker also took some pictures of them. After eating, we got some drinks and I got an additional matcha cookie which we got at the restaurant Edoya across the street. We walked it back to the office and then I went home since it was getting late and I also planned to work on-site tomorrow.

Journal entry for Tuesday, March 10th, 2026

Tue, 10 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Tuesday still had me out with Jaze and we were still finishing our food from KFC and 7-Eleven, and Jaze kind of vowed to never order again at the KFC in McKinley because their fries tasted horrible according to him. It was also kind of weird for me because we loved that branch's fries back in the pandemic, I guess their quality just went down. But I mostly just ate the hot shots that I bought. After that, we went home and stopped by Petron to get some gas. When I got back, I still had time to get into a call with someone and I logged in my Steam account on their PC so they could play my games, and they played Needy Streamer Overload for a while. We chilled on call for a while until I had to leave since I still had work in the morning. For the rest of the day, I just had my usual round of tasks and there wasn't anything noteworthy going on. I talked to Mon, then I got into a call with someone where they streamed some stuff and showed me the Amazon Kindle that I got them a few years ago. I talked to them a bit and then tried to fix something on my website.

Song of the day: Regent's Park by Bruno Major

That's the Catch!

Mon, 09 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Bad

Today initially moved like any other, with me still overthinking about yesterday and how shitty my life has become over the past few years. I was still talking to someone about it via chat and I explained to them via text and I notiAssithat they eventually slept. I didn't want to stay up anymore by overthinking it, so I just read “Goodbye, Eri” and left Mon a message and slept. In the morning, I woke up to a few messages from someone and they were worried about me because it seemed like I was spiraling to them. It was super nice to see that they were worried about me. They offered to listen to me rant while they play video games and it was really touching hearing that coming from them. It helped me feel a lot better because I've just been so beaten up by life recently. I talked to them and we got into a call where they streamed Red Dead Redemption 2 while I mostly watched and we talked for a bit. I timed in for work and started on my usual round of daily tasks. Over the course of the day, and in my free time, Luan streamed his own gameplay of Resident Evil 7. He streamed it while I was doing work in the background, too. It was around this time where Mon messaged me and told me about what she did throughout the day. I also got groceries delivered and my sister and I had Jollibee for take-out. For some reason, I just felt absolutely hurt and a bit betrayed, to be honest. I had held off on the idea that I might like them, even though I extremely enjoyed us hanging out. I always felt like they were “too perfect” and there had to be some sort of “catch” or red flag, and it was absolutely soul-crushing to have learned all of that today. Thankfully, I was at my house and I was with friends, so I felt a little shielded from the blow. In the afternoon to evening, I wrapped up with work. I eventually had the space to open this up to someone, and I was only able to tell them a bit since they didn't offer much to console me. I got back into a call with someone and Luan, and I treated someone to *tokwa* because they haven't eaten all day, and they also insisted I eat even though I wasn't planning to. I just ordered McDonald's and I ordered additional drinks and this vodka + Sprite drink because I just felt like getting drunk a little, even though I haven't had alcohol in a long time. With honestly how shitty this and the past day was, I could use a drink. I mostly just watched Luan stream Resident Evil 7 while I was eating and drinking. I was also trying to process my feelings in the background and move on. Eventually Jaze says that he's almost going to leave so that we can hang out and I eventually left the stream to hang out with Jaze. I told Jaze everything and of how hurt I felt. I'm glad that he was just down to listen and to lend an ear. We wanted to go to Popeyes but they were closed for a bit. So we went to some food tents in McKinley West as I ordered a few things. I ordered *isaw* since I was craving for it, but they didn't cook it well so I kind of felt like I wasted my money. I told Jaze of what happened and all the things I discovered today, and he suggested that I just move on. I told him that's exactly what I was planning to do and I'm glad I was able to stop myself from having feelings this early on. We tried the KFC nearby and ordered some stuff from there, then we stopped by our usual Assi Fresh Plaza we just bought stuff and talked as the night went on.

Song of the day: Man I Need by Olivia Dean

Journal entry for Sunday, March 8th, 2026

Sun, 08 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Bad

I decided that I'm unsure about my feelings for Mon because it all seems “too good to be true.” I've been here before, and there's always a “catch” to these. So I'm holding out and keeping my feelings at a distance rather than just blatantly saying/admitting it after a hangout that went so well. For today, I had a hangout planned with Max and Meryll. I talked to Mon for a bit throughout the day and up until I had left. I booked a ride to Ayala Malls Circuit because that's where I thought we'd go. But I found out that it was just *near* it, and that it actually wasn't there. It was actually somewhere else. So I spent 15 minutes walking to The 210 Weekend Club and I eventually got there and saw Max and Meryll talking to each other. I ordered some stuff and then made friendship bracelets, and I could only give one to Max because of time constraints. We then planned to go to Ayala Triangle and I booked us a Grab ride to there because it didn't cost much anyway. I told them a bit of how I sold a Google Pixel 9 for only 1K Pesos and I heard some stories from Max. After we arrived, we walked around to find a suitable place to sit on and we just talked for a bit. It was this time when a topic was opened up that absolutely shocked me. At that moment, I was kind of left speechless but also kind of sad. I did apologize and mostly listened, and I didn't really defend myself much. When I was asked if I had any issues, I said I had none, which was true anyway. But part of me felt a little pained because this was kind of the last friend group I have. Like they were the only group of people I felt like I could tell stuff to, and especially since we've lasted since our days at Dice. It sucks to hear that even this friend group will die out on me, and I kind of cried at the thought of it when I was looking at a palm tree. We walked to Glorietta and talked, and I tried my best to feel and be engaged even though I was ruminating in my thoughts. When we arrived and went to the bathroom, I had some time to myself to just cry because I've had so many friendships collapse over the years, and I could just tell that this one is also done for. But I didn't let them know and I just said that my eyes were irritated, which is why it was watery. We went up to the Top of the Glo and just talked, chilled there, but I was mostly just disassociating and passively listening. We eventually ate at Saladstop for dinner and my mood had shifted, but I was still just listening to them and I listened to Max share her relationship experiences. We went home after that and I just ruminated in my thoughts for a while.

Song of the day: Wake Me up When September Ends by Green Day

A Surprise Mon!

Sat, 07 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: BGC

Saturday was initially pretty boring, I was just staying up because I didn't know if Mon would message me, or if someone will, but I just spent it alone. I just had this random need to message Mon good night and I hope she got home safe, and it was that time where she was just waking up, so that was a weird coincidence. We talked for a while before I got to get my well-deserved rest because the past few days have been extremely tiring. So I woke up and I didn't really have any plans to do. Someone's package from IKEA arrived and the driver called me, and that was a hassle to get delivered, but that was it. I talked to them for a bit on Telegram and then wished them a happy birthday. I just woke up and talked to my sister and other family members who were just chilling outside. Then I talk to Mon for a bit, she says that she's thinking of buying some stuff and seeing a movie, The Loved One (2026). We get to talking and I eventually convince her to go out, and she asks me if I'm doing anything today and I say I'm free, too. Before this, I was literally just browsing and leveling up on Steam, so I had nothing better to do anyway and I'd love to spend it with Mon. She eventually decides on hanging out with me today and we both got ready to meet at BGC Uptown. Since I didn't take long, I had some spare time to set up and sing karaoke with my cousins and sister in the living room before leaving for BGC Uptown. Mon got a ride, too, and I asked her to take care. I got to BGC Uptown just fine, and I was the first one to get there, which wasn't a surprise. I talked to William and Mariah for a bit, and I congratulated them on getting back together, so that was cool. I got a cream puff from the Tokyo Milk Cheese Factory while I was waiting for Mon. She eventually arrives and gives me this big hug which was cute because it kind of feels like a long while since we last saw each other, and it kind of has been. We walk and talk for a bit, and I notice that some of the icons on her phone were themed, which looked cool. We tried to find Ramen Ibuki and I joked around because she didn't know the area. But she eventually suggests I open Google Maps and, sure enough, I find it and we walk down this street. I asked her if she goes to bars and clubs because we just passed by what used to be XYLO or something. I was surprised to hear her answer, but eventually we got to Ramen Ibuki and get seated. While we were eating, she mostly tells me about her work stories, like how many kids her coworkers have, and then I asked her what was the craziest thing she saw this week. I was just shocked to hear the answer, but it was cool to know. I also asked her how her day went yesterday and she also told me of the crazy thing she saw at IKEA, and I joked that I'd barge in there. We then wondered what was this log of charcoal inside the water, but Mon was too shy to ask and so I asked the server and asked as if it was on her behalf. But we eventually got our food and Mon mostly tells me her work stories and another crazy thing she did involving coffee and the Chagee tumbler I gave her sometime ago. After a while, we finish up and I pay for the bill. Mon approaches me and proposes to me the idea of walking all the way to SM Aura. I wholeheartedly agree and I think it's cute that she asked. We then walk all the way from Uptown to SM Aura, and I talk to her about history of playing Mobile Legends and playing League of Legends with her past friends. She told me about her group of friends that used to play with her before, and how that's turned out. Then she tells me of the place where she had her wallet stolen, and I tease her for this. We keep walking and I do notice that she has a light blush going on, which I ask her about, and she does tell me that she's does have some on by using a blended lip tint, which I was just shocked to hear because I've never heard of that way before. Then she tells me of her other relationship in college when I asked her about it, and then she unpacks a lot of stuff regarding her ex and how she found out about all this. It was some of the craziest stuff I've heard and it sucks to hear that Mon went through this. By this time, we were already at SM Aura and Mon pulled on me to drag me into the H&M store. We look around and she looks at some clothes, I also look to pick a fit because I'm going to Korea and it's going to be 0-10 degrees Celsius there, and I don't have any outfit that can handle that sort of cold temperature. Mon and I look around, she sees a few hoodies with some famous bands and their tour dates. Then she finds a jacket that has this weird texture, like it's some sort of sponge. Mon ties her hair during this and I just realized that her hairstyle had changed and it wasn't tied up anymore. After this, we keep looking for more clothes. She suggests this one jacket that looked nice, but wasn't available in the size I wanted, and no other branch nearby had it either, so we gave up on it. Mon pulled my arm again so we can get out, and she pulled my arm several times after that because she wants to show me around. It was kind of cute how she would pull and yank on my arm, it reminded me of how my old girl best friend and I used to be. We eventually stopped by Bershka and this was where I bought a jacket and pants, and I tried them out and paid at the counter. Mon and I walk for a bit to SM department store and we hang around there for a bit until we get to the 5th floor. We checked out Datablitz first and she checks out a few Switch games, and I was surprised to hear that she's actually interested in getting a Steam Deck, which was honestly pretty cool of her. We then walked to the nearby Gashapon store and we looked around and joked a lot while checking out what to get. I told her to pick whatever she wants and I'll pay for it and then we pass by some really funny stuff. I settled on getting a Minecraft one and a Sanrio one, hoping to get Cinnamoroll. We pass by this gashapon machine that had this “mojojojo” product on it, and it was pretty funny because it had these plushies and one of them was named “You never know” and we just laughed at how absurd its name was. Mon settles on her favorite character from Chainsaw Man and then I got us tokens. I first tried the Minecraft one, then the Sanrio one, and I actually got Cinnamoroll. Which is weird, but also cool I got him. Mon then tries the Chainsaw Man gashapon and she got her favorite character, too! By now, it's super eerie because the odds of us getting the characters we wanted were super low. Idk how that made sense, but okay. We rolled for mojojo and Mon wanted to get “You never know” and unfortunately we didn't get him. We both thought we got a character, Matcha, that Mon just said, but thankfully it was a character named “Loulou,” so that was cute. We stopped by to get a few things before heading to the cinemas. I settled on Gong Cha since she made me pick, and then we grabbed some snacks. I just got nuggets while Mon initially wanted Ruffles, but that was unavailable so she chose some other bag of chips. We got our complimentary popcorn and drinks inside and she asks me how I made the seat recline and such. Then we joked around and talked before the movie started. We watched The Loved One (2026) and we both thought it was pretty good. I could find myself resonating with Ellie the most, even though the protagonist Eric is literally a senior developer/engineer like me, and that he uses Python at work like I do. After the film, we split for a while to go to the bathroom and Mon surprises me by hugging me from behind. It absolutely scares the shit out of me and I scream, and a few people turn to look at us. It was so funny. I eventually tell Mon I get easily scared when approached from behind, to the point where my coworkers make fun and try to scare me for it. We stopped by Fully Booked and Mon recommended me Strange Houses, and I remarked that I've had a friend read Strange Pictures and it wasn't that scary. We then go downstairs, then to Watsons, and finally end up at the department store so that Mon can buy some toothbrushes. While walking, she tells me the story of her former long-time friend since elementary and about how they grew apart. After this, I had a stomachache and went to the bathroom for a while and then reunited with Mon as we went downstairs to get some bread. Our last stop was llaollao for the day but then Mon suggests that there's one a BGC High Street and that we should go there instead. I agree and we walk there while Mon tells me of how her last relationship went. It was some of the craziest lore drops I've ever heard and it was honestly sad and scary that she went through that. It was so horrible to hear and left me totally speechless because I can't imagine myself in that situation. That's where I draw the line, too, in a relationship. The line at llaollao was long so we essentially tried to go to Venchi Philippines in BHS Central Square because that often where my family and I go, but BHS Central Square was closed by this time. I just tried to see what store still served ice cream and harlan + holden had ice cream, so we went there instead and we just chilled at a bench nearby where we talked about life and our own dating prospects recently. After a deep conversation, it was eventually time for Mon to leave so she booked a ride home and she gave a hug before saying goodbye again. I thought about wanting to wait for a bit or walk around to just process my emotions for today, but I already had done enough and I booked a ride home instead. When I got home, I talked to a few friends and I just processed my feelings from it all. I wondered on what to think about because I hadn't come to a decision yet, and I eventually settled on a decision on the following day, early in the morning.

Song of the day: Demons by Imagine Dragons

Journal entry for Friday, March 6th, 2026

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Friday still had me out with Jaze as we were eating the KFC we bought at Assi Fresh Plaza. We didn't think it was that great and Jaze swears that other KFC branches were better. I agreed but also asked him to let me know. We wrap it up for that day and I eventually got home. For today, I had another day in the office and there were a lot of us there. We all had lunch out because one of our coworkers celebrated their 10th year in the company. We ate at Manam and it was pretty good. It was also someone's birthday soon so I got them a cake from Caramia Cakes & Gelato, and I got them their favorite cake. I had Chagee by myself and went back to Greenbelt because I felt stressed. I kept talking to Mon throughout the day but it was mostly just me listening to their problems and issues. In the afternoon, we had some free time and we played some card games that my coworker brought. They had this game called Dixit and we played it before the others left and timed out. It was pretty interesting and we had fun. I also got someone that IKEA shelf that I had promised them for their birthday.

Song of the day: Demons by Imagine Dragons

Journal entry for Thursday, March 5th, 2026

Thu, 05 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

I got some of the shortest amounts of sleep I ever had. I tried to writAssid finish my blog post because I was feeling super down, but I couldn't find a way to write the conclusion for it, so I just wrote some journal entries for the past few days and then slept. In the morning, I woke up and I got a few messages from Mon about a new band she found. She updated the playlist she shared to me and I messaged her as soon as I woke up. We had a little back and forth and she asked me if I was okay because I was gone yesterday. I was so swamped with work and other stuff and I got to explain to her, and thankfully she understood what happened and all that. It's still nice to hear that she got concerned, even if it was only for a bit. We got to talking until I prepared to leave for work. I eventually got a ride and then commuted to the office while listening to the new songs she had put in to the playlist she shared. It was super strange that these are mostly/all love songs, though. By the time I got to the office, I had set up my stuff and worked on my primary tasks for today. I messaged Mon in the small breaks I got between tasks and I mostly asked them how their mood was, how they were doing with regards to work, and also about the Chagee tumbler I got for her since I didn't ask about it yesterday. I honestly noticed it a bit that we shared the same humor because she made a joke I would make, and we noticed more and more similarities as we kept talking throughout the day. I was also busy with some tasks and I noticed a few things that I was messaging to my coworkers about. Until one of my other coworkers pokes me a bit in the back which scares me and I could hear them, as well as a few others in our vicinity, look at us and laugh or look intrigued. I think I startled them a bit too much. But everyone had a good laugh at my expense so it was all good. I had lunch out with some of them and I got to order some Korean cheesy noodles, which were okay but still seemed a bit expensive. They mostly just joked around and teased me throughout lunch, too, but it was cool. I went back to the office with the others after that. I still had some downtime so I talked to Mon about some games she was interested in playing and I was surprised that she was familiar with a few PC games I had like BioShock and especially Life Is Strange. She also showed me her keyboard and it was funny because her keyboard was all dark and clean looking, she even put in the effort of 3D printing stuff on her keyboard, and I teased her by calling her a nerd. I showed her my keyboard and she laughed because of how opposite we were and I was rocking this Cinnamoroll keyboard. We talked for a bit more and then I focused back on my work as my break ended. In the afternoon, I was mostly focused on completing some tasks and helping out answer some tickets. I had finished a bulk of what was needed to be done and so I took a break by going to this cafe that Mon recommended since I was down to try another one of her recommendations. I tried that drink and I showed Mon some pictures of me preparing the coffee and then gave her my thoughts on it. She also told me of her plans for tomorrow as I was just chilling. It was interesting because this was the time where I showed my drawing tablet to Mon and she told me that we both had the same brand **and model** as our first-ever drawing tablet. She also talked about how she spilt coffee on hers, which I just found funny and such a Mon thing to do. We kept talking and she eventually told me about how she was interested in watching Beyond the Spider-Verse which was showing next year. I was surprised just by hearing that she was interested in it, too, and so she drafted a makeshift contract where we both sign it and that we'll watch the last Spider-Verse movie together. After signing it, I got back to work and focused until I timed out. For the evening, my coworkers and I planned to go out and have dinner again. We walked all the way from the office to Koobideh Kebabs. I was mostly engrossed on my phone during this time because I was talking to Mon and this was the part where things got eerie due to how many similarities but opposites we shared. For starters, our main friend group is composed of 3 people. The opposite between us is that, for my friend group the Baguettes, we're composed of 2 girls and 1 guy. For her, her group has 2 guys and she's the only girl. It's also weird that, for my group, 2 members have left the company we started our friend group in, leaving only 1 member still in the company. For Mon's group, 2 members stayed in the company and 1 had left, which is the direct inverse of our group. The only weird similarity is that Mon and I are both the only single people in our friend group. It was extremely puzzling to me and also a bit crazy, in my opinion, because I couldn't believe how similar yet opposite our worlds are. I also found out that Mon likes Vocaloid and Laufey, which was pretty cute. We eventually got to Koobideh Kebabs and by this time Mon was showing me some Vocaloid stuff as well as this other Japanese singer before she slept for the night. I was talking to someone during this time as well but they also seemed busy so I just focused on talking with my coworkers and joking with them. I got questioned and put on the hot seat but I honestly didn't care as I was able to answer some of their questions and reveal a bit of backstory of how much of a simp I used to be, even getting a crate of Pepsi Blue for a girl I liked back then. I walked back to the office after this and I got someone's Starbucks gift card. I didn't have much going on so I asked Jaze if he was free to hang out today and he agreed to meet up later. I didn't have much to do so I just had work and then went home after that. I just passed time and waited until Jaze was free to hang out.

Song of the day: Pink Pony Club by Chappell Roan

Journal entry for Wednesday, March 4th, 2026

Wed, 04 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Poblacion

Wednesday was finally the start of us having 3 days of on-site work. Today was finally the day. I don't know what to feel about this, but I sure do know that I felt tired. Because the day started with me and Jaze still outside as we were just talking at 7-Eleven. Jaze and I eventually left and I arrived home just fine to catch up on some journal entries because I didn't want to sleep with a full stomach. I eventually got my rest and started my morning. For the morning, nothing much happened as my sister was out, so all I could do was just ready myself for work. I got there just fine although the rider I was with seemed a little hotheaded and had a case of road rage. This kind of made me just wish I could save up for my own car soon. Once I got to work, I was a little confused because we had new seating assignments, and I was a little disappointed that I was seated a bit far away from my usual coworkers. But it was fine, I just focused on work and cleaning up some tasks in the morning. I was glad I got invited out to still have lunch with my usual coworkers, even though they teased me as usual and said that I shouldn't come with them, and that I was the baby of the group. They even had a new coworker and I pinched them because they kept teasing me, but it was all fine and we kept laughing on the way to get our lunch. My lunch was just my usual and I stood up while eating because I somehow didn't feel like sitting down. While on the way, I also told my coworkers that I had met someone new and that I sold them my Google Pixel 9 for 1K Pesos, which they kept teasing me throughout the day for. After lunch, 1 other coworker and I got coffee and I told him that I would pay him later. I got back to my desk and continued working on tasks until the afternoon. My coworkers invited me for a quick *merienda* break and we got food at SM Makati. I just got Paotsin and then this “big” *bola-bola siopao* while there, and I kept asking where we'll go for dinner later because my coworkers and I planned to walk for a bit and have dinner together in the evening. We went to Chagee afterward since one coworker wanted to try this specific drink, and I was surprised because him and I would be trying the same drink. I only wanted to try the “Glutinous Green Milk Tea” one because Mon said that her friend recommended it. It was really nice! I took a photo of my drink and I wanted to tell Mon about it, but it's the afternoon and Mon hasn't messaged me all day, so I figured that she was just busy or something. I went back to the office to finish my usual round of tasks until I timed out for the evening. For the evening, I was mostly waiting for my coworkers to finish up with their work. We had planned to visit Hà Nội Phố in Poblacion and one of our coworkers was kind enough to drive us there. I had time to kill so I joined Luan and someone's voice call and watched Luan continue through more of BioShock Infinite's story until I had to leave. We eventually drove there and even joked to play some songs on our coworker's car stereo. One coworker finally played fitterkarma's "Pag-ibig ay Kanibalismo II" and it was a pretty good, okay enough song. We eventually got to Hà Nội Phố after a while. I wanted to try something different so I got their *Phở* while my other coworkers got the other beef dishes and *Bún Chả*. I added more chili and spices to my *Phở* and it got so spicy. I had, like, 3 or 4 refills of water by the time we finished our meal. I'm glad to hear that my coworkers liked their dish. One of our coworkers eventually revealed that they watched a movie with their ex and how that affected them, and I mostly just listened to their story. I also said that I get their stance because I've been in a similar spot romantically (minus having the ex part as I've been single my whole life). We paid the bill and decided to walk to Mixue which would be deep into Poblacion, but we were all down for a walk. We just talked and made jokes, I even thought some dude was a statue until they moved, which was so funny and embarrassing. It felt comfortable to walk because I was wearing my rubber shoes and this oversized polo shirt which felt really comfy. After a while, we eventually got to Mixue, but we were surprised to find out that it was closed. We walked to Beselu Cafe instead to at least get some gelato. We just ordered, talked for a bit, and then we parted ways after that as one coworker and I still had to go back to the office and walk it back to there. It was a long walk, and my leg had somehow cramped up during the walk back. It hurt but we eventually reached the office just fine. Thankfully, I was easily able to book a ride home and then got back home safe. The whole ride home I was wishing for God to give me a sign that everything's going to turn out fine. I wished for a flashy, obvious sign and I guess I did see it in the form of an airplane flashing its lights far out and some light sources being a little bright. My day was fun but it was kind of lonely at the end because I didn't get that much time to talk with Mon.

Song of the day: Get Busy by Sean Paul

Journal entry for Tuesday, March 3rd, 2026

Tue, 03 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

I woke up early today, for some wild reason. I got some rest again and eventually woke up in the morning. I just chilled for a while, I replied and talked to Mon for a while before preparing to leave since I would get them that Chagee tumbler and so I could drop off some stuff. After a while, I was able to pay for Mon's drink, and mine, and I even ordered a 3rd drink for no reason. I wasn't all that shocked about the bill, though, since it was only 1,500 and I just shipped the tumbler and 2 drinks to Mon for her to enjoy. I booked a ride home after all that was done. Thankfully, Mon liked my jasmine milk tea suggestion! She said that it tastes more tea than milk, which she liked. And she was kind enough to give the extra drink to one of her coworkers. She said that the tumbler looked so cute and she thanked me because it made her day. I felt appreciated a lot, and we talked in and out throughout the morning and afternoon. I mostly just had worked and focused on my tasks for the day and replied to some emails. Once my work was done, I moved into a call with Luan and someone where we watched Luan go through more parts of BioShock Infinite. I also noticed that someone wasn't paying attention much and I heard a large Telegram notification which I had called them out for, but eventually they seemed to focus more on the game afterward. We just continued to watch the gameplay and point out some stuff in the story. Meanwhile, I was just chatting with Mon and I asked about what happened in her day. Then she showed me some of her artwork and even a journal entry from December last year. They talked about how transient some relationships are and that people come and go, and it seemed super eerie because the theme was kind of like an expiration date for food. **And I literally wrote a blog post about the same topic, down to the same expiration date analogy!** It was super freaky, but also kind of cute, but also strange that we had such a similar thought occur within months of each other. I asked Mon for some recommendations on skincare stuff, like a moisturizer and sunblock for me to try out. For the rest of the evening, I just chilled at home and waited for Jaze so we could hang out again for the night. We went to our usual spot, which were the food tents in McKinley Hill. We talked about the global situation while on the way there and we eventually got there just fine. I ordered some *isaw* and Jaze took a stick of *isaw* from me since I had a lot. He suggested we go to Army Navy because I keep suggesting it, but I already had my fix last weekend so we ate at his next suggestion: Pizza Hut. We rode there and I got us a pair of pizzas for 1,100 Pesos or so. These were originally meant for take-out, but we just ate them in the restaurant just fine. I fixed his resume by looking at templates, and ultimately giving him mine so I could easily port over some details from his old resume into his new one. They didn't serve any water so we went to our actual, usual hangout spot there which was Assi Fresh Plaza. We first went to 7-Eleven to buy our usual drinks and water, plus some biscuits. Then we got to Assi Fresh Plaza. I ordered my usual Korean ice cream and I just updated Jaze's resume from the template I use. I was able to port over a lot of stuff and list down some technical skills for him. Then he closed up his laptop and we just went to 7-Eleven to just talk about random stuff like schoolmates and how rich they are. I also checked up on how much a Porsche is and I didn't know that it was 1.8 million Pesos, and I just had a bit of anxiety in me because I just want my life to get better enough to the point that I buy a Porsche one day. After that we called it a day and drove back to my house, and Jaze actually took the wrong way because he was spacing out. But eventually I got home safe and enjoyed my day.

Song of the day: OMG by NewJeans

Journal entry for Monday, March 2nd, 2026

Mon, 02 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Monday was actually pretty chill and mostly just an okay day. I stayed up long enough to actually still see Mon online and we were both surprised, to a degree. But after that, I went to sleep. I started work in the morning and just completed through my usual tasks. For some parts of the day, I talked to someone and asked about their recent trip to Baguio. They also asked me to ask for delivery since they got fresh strawberries from Baguio and I should ship it quick before it spoils. I got the stuff shipped and eventually work ended. I got into a call with someone and Luan while he streamed BioShock Infinite for us to watch. I was talking to Mon during this time about random stuff while Luan was continuing to play BioShock. Someone eventually got tired and that was the time where we ended our call. Around this time, I was just talking to someone and we just talked about random stuff like how their Baguio trip went and stuff. They eventually went to sleep just fine. After that, nothing much happened in my day and I rested for a while at 9 p.m.

Solo Mio!

Sun, 01 Mar 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good
Significant Location: Glorietta, Greenbelt

Today was the day I finally decided to watch Solo Mio (2026) on the big screen. My day started with me **FINALLY** publishing my remaining mood calendar entries for February. I got out of Starbucks 32nd Street at around 1 a.m. and I felt so hungry. Fortunately, there was an Army Navy restaurant nearby, along with some other 24/7 restaurants. I decided to get my usual order: a naked *sisig burrito* and it was really good. It totally hit the spot and was the best way I treated myself after completing such a slogfest that happened yesterday. I booked a car ride home since it wasn't that expensive anyway, and personally, I just wanted to relax. I arrive home okay and I chill for a bit since I just ate and didn't want my acid reflux to hit that bad, and I eventually slept just fine. In the morning, I woke up for a bit and talked to Mon and someone for a while. I mostly talked to Mon and she did such a cute thing of preparing to me a playlist full of chill love songs, and I told her that I'll be listening to it later today and she'd add some more songs later. I was feeling so tired so I slept for a while as I charged my devices. When I woke up, I believe I had overslept because I was only planning to sleep until noon, but now it's around 1:20 p.m. and I woke up to several messages from Mon and someone. I talked to Mon and messaged her back and forth throughout the afternoon and also checked in with her for a bit. We mostly talked about how she's used Photoshop in the past and she showed me some pics, which were funny. I packed up and booked a ride to Glorietta then went to Greenbelt to watch Solo Mio at 6 p.m. Since I haven't had any food since breakfast, I decided that I would eat at Sumo Niku and it was such a weird feeling eating there alone because I'm always with another friend when I'm eating there. I actually didn't have much time left and I was contemplating on whether or not I should rush my food to go see the 6 p.m. showing in Greenbelt, or just miss it and book for another ticket at 8 p.m. in Glorietta. I decided against rushing things and I actually got to have more time to talk to Mon about things, and she also got to know more about my journal and stuff. She told me that I should write more about happy days or how X specific day stood out from the rest, which was pretty nice. I don't think I've ever had a friend give me that perspective, so that was super cute and sweet of her. We kept talking and I eventually left Sumo Niku to go buy a ticket. While I was buying a ticket, the cashier gave out a seat to me, and then burped really loud and even cursed, which was funny. We both laughed it off and I told her that she should drink more water. But that interaction was funny. I got my ticket and ate at Auntie Anne's, and then grabbed a cooke from MO' Cookies near the cinemas. Going to the Glorietta food court on a non-workday felt so weird and strange. This place *is* familiar to me, but not anymore since my brain associates it with working. It's crazy. I was able to keep talking to Mon and she showed me a few things that she planned to do tomorrow and I got in the cinema and it was extremely empty. Mon got some sleep at this time and she told me to enjoy the movie. The movie was honestly really nice! It was so fun, it's been a total while since I've had fun and laughed at jokes in the movie. For a while, I felt immersed and the seat I was in was actually pretty good. I thought I'd be alone, but thankfully other people came in, even though there weren't a lot of them. I really enjoyed the movie and it's the best one I've seen so far in 2026. For the ride home, it was kind of scary. I got locked out of Glorietta, for the first time ever. I had to walk over from another exit all the way back to the pickup point and then the driver kept talking to me on the way home about the weirdest topics. He sounded drunk, but didn't seem that much drunk to me. It was totally weird but, all in all, I got home safe and I enjoyed me day out.

Song of the day: Dying Inside to Hold You by Timmy Thomas

Lyrics that resonated with me:
And I was dying inside to hold you
I couldn't believe what I felt for you
Dying inside, I was dying inside
But I couldn't bring myself to touch you

Finishing February's Entries!

Sat, 28 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Starbucks 32nd Street

Today was the last day of February and I had such a massive backlog of journal entries to complete so I decided to complete them all today. I stayed up just chilling and trying to get my mental health okay until 2 a.m. and decided that I should get a full 8 hours of rest today so that I would feel way better in the morning. Surprisingly, I got my rest and I felt way better in the morning. I got exactly 8 hours and 1 minute of sleep, which was great to hear since I planned on waking up at 10:30 a.m., but I somehow woke up at that time by myself. I ordered some take-out which would be me and my sister's breakfast. Someone messaged me in and out throughout the day because she was still in Baguio. For most of the day, I talked to Mon about so many things. I even went to the place that she suggested since she asked if I could check out a pair of jeans for her. I booked a ride to BGC after finishing breakfast with my sister. I walked all the way to Burgos Park from the Mind Museum to check out some jeans for Mon. I also bought jeans for myself, too. Unfortunately, I couldn't find jeans for Mon so I just continued to walk to my third place, Starbucks on 32nd Street. I got there around 3 p.m. and got a seat at this big table. I started writing some journal entries there and then finally a seat on the long sofa opened up. That's where I sat for most of the day and that's where I continued to write my remaining journal entries. I wrote 20+ journal entries throughout the entire day. I talked to Mon throughout the day, asked her what she was doing and even joked to her for a while, too. We talked about so many things and the conversation was generally about light topics. Mon also shared with me some pics that she took when we last went out and she eventually shared with me the picture we took together. Mon eventually had to go to sleep and I wished her a good night after that. I continued to focus on completing my remaining journal entries and someone checked in and out of our chat for some parts of the evening, but I was mainly focused on completing my journal entries. After all that, I finally completed all my journal entries for February before midnight. It was such an effort to complete all my journal entries but I am so glad that I did it and was able to catalog February because this month was such a rollercoaster.

Song of the day: M@GICAL CURE! LOVE SHOT! (feat. Hatsune Miku) by SAWTOWNE

Lyrics that resonated with me:
If my pain can be a cure for peace, I don't mind
I can play as a nurse healing you everyday
So what if I might shed a tear, get some bruises?
A wipe is all I need to clean a cherry blush away, ha!

Fighting through the night, but I'm wide awake
It can all be so hard for me to get through the day
Your smile is enough to heal all my aches
Wrapped in a cute Band-Aid

I can take the pain, fight all day, fill up the syringe
With love heal up the world and go again

...

On my own without anyone to know
How my job's not all rainbows
But then I think about your smile (your words are so lyrical)

I'm a magically bright invincible girl!
If you need me to heal, go on and call out my name
When you find yourself going down a spiral
I'll bonk away what puts you down, a pink hammer melee! Yeah!

Journal entry for Friday, February 27th, 2026

Fri, 27 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: The Original Pares Mami House Retiro

The day started with continuing where yesterday had left off. Jaze and I were still at The Original Pares Mami House Retiro and we tried some of the *pares*. He said that he missed the taste and was glad that it still tasted the same. I tried some of their *siomai* and it was a bit hard, and Jaze said that it was like that because it was still raw/undercooked. I found the sauce the *siomai* was dipped in too spicy, for some reason, but I was eventually able to finish my food and we then went to the next stop, which was Assi Fresh Plaza in McKinley Hill again. We drive through EDSA and even drove adjacent through Balete Drive, and I joked to Jaze that we should go there, but he told me that it wasn't actually the real Balete Drive, which I found weird because I really know that it was this one. We kept driving and he even showed me the hospital that he thinks LK might work at and I took a photo of it and asked LK if she works there. We eventually arrived in Assi Fresh Plaza and bought some drinks like Mountain Dew from 7-Eleven as usual. We still mostly talked about life and I opened up to him about how I haven't talked to Mon in a day and he gave me some solid advice. I already knew what to do, but talking to him just reaffirmed what I already had in my head. Honestly, it was just really nice to vent to a friend in person and tell them about the difficulties I was facing, as opposed to doing it in front of a screen. I talked to someone for a bit by then and told them that I was out with Jaze. We eventually decided to leave at around 2 a.m. and I arrived home okay. The morning continued as usual but things were more quiet and peaceful in my life. Mon eventually messaged back and we talk for quite a bit, so I was glad for that. Then they recommended me a shirt and I bought it on Shopee. I focused on work for a while and finished the major tasks I had for today. After work, I had some free time and I played a bit of Genshin Impact with Mon. We called for a bit as she was doing something and they mostly helped me collect some stuff so I could level up my characters to level 90. For the evening, I mostly talked to Mon and she opened up to me about a lot of things that were going on in her life. We didn't talk all night but it was nice to get to talking with her again. Someone also messaged me after a while and told me of her experience in Baguio.

Song of the day: The Sky High - Instrumental by Elektronomia

Journal entry for Thursday, February 26th, 2026

Thu, 26 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

For Thursday, I stayed up since I was working from home for today until Friday! I helped her migrate a domain and a website to that new domain, and I was able to help her without relying on some external tool. I felt glad to have helped her like that, and I eventually got some rest after a while. In the morning, I timed in for work and completed my usual set of tasks for the day. I had some free time around lunchtime and I got into a call with Luan and someone where he played some BioShock Infinite gameplay. He played for quite a while, and even played some Mirror's Edge for the break. He eventually finished Mirror's Edge because he was close to finishing it as well. After that, I got back to work and was focused on completing this major task for today. After completing all my work, I had some time to chill and got into a call with someone. I took a comprehensive attachment style quiz after someone said that she was feeling frustrated that she kept taking quizzes that had their results paywalled. I'm surprised but also not surprised to have scored “secure” in my attachment style quiz again, so it was nice to get some affirmation. I watched someone play Needy Streamer Overload for a while but she eventually dropped it since she got a bad ending where the girl left her. She played a bit of Euro Truck Simulator 2 after that and had trouble with the controls at first, but then she got the hang of it and continued playing. She said that it felt peaceful after getting used to the controls and that she was only driving. I watched someone continue playing Euro Truck Simulator 2 in the evening and then Luan eventually invited us to watch him BioShock Infinite again. Luan played for a bit but then we eventually left the call to do other stuff. Mon was surprisingly gone the whole day and so I wondered whether or not I should leave her a message. I flipped a coin and decided that if it landed on heads, I would leave Mon a message. It actually did land on heads so I left her a message. In the late evening, Jaze and I planned to go to one of our old places, which was The Original Pares Mami House Retiro. Jaze hadn't been here in years and the last time we got here was in 2022, the day I visited the house of the girl I loved in 2022. Things went to shit after that night and I'm actually surprised that Jaze remembers that trip with Batao. We eventually arrived after quite a long trip and my night continued from there.

Hello everybody, my name is

Wed, 25 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: S Maison

Wednesday actually started with me and Jaze still outside. By this time, we were just kicking back and talking about a few things that happened in high school, over the pandemic, and mostly his relationship with his girlfriend. I also told him more about Mon and how I gave her my unused phone and stuff, and he just listened to me talk about her for a bit. I bought some *dynamite* and ate it while we were walking to the restaurant, which was Buffalo Ave, where we just had chicken wings. After that, we went to our usual place: Assi Fresh Plaza and I got some Korean ice cream and then some food from the nearby 7-Eleven. We talked for a bit more about life stuff before we both decided that it was time to head to our respective houses. For the morning, I talked to someone about Euro Truck Simulator 2 because she seemed interested in it. I commuted to work after that and eventually got to the office. When I got there, I noticed that they had some booth about bread open so I thought I could buy some bread and try the one that Mon likes. Unfortunately, they only had the one that I liked, which was the one with raisins. I continued through my normal day of work and I also realized that today was the day that Markiplier's movie would be premiering in theaters in the Philippines. I booked a ticket since I was going to watch it by myself and I decided to watch it after work. In the afternoon, I had some time and so I took a break to walk to the chapel in Greenbelt. I really needed a break because I felt so mentally exhausted, and I talked to my mom for a bit, too. I just sat there for a while and admired the view. When I got back, I asked Mon for some song recommendations and talked to her on and off for a bit. A coworker and I went out for some *merienda* and we went to Glorietta where we found a stall that sold the elusive Dubai chewy cookie that we've been looking for. We bought it and it was nice, my coworker was surprised that I was able to finish mine quickly and I pointed out that he took a while to eat his. It was expensive, but we liked it, so that was nice. For the evening, I didn't have much to do and had some time to talk and chat with Mon. Mon called me, which was a surprise, and she told me of what she was doing. Mon also told me of the few things that she would buy there and then eventually went back to focus on the thing she had going on for the night. After that, I timed out from work and went directly to S Maison to watch Iron Lung (2026). I eventually got into a call with someone and Luan since he was streaming some BioShock Infinite gameplay and I still had time left before the movie started, but we eventually ended the call as someone had to get some sleep. I watched Iron Lung and it was pretty okay. I was left confused at around the start because I didn't know what was going on, and I couldn't hear it properly either. But eventually I was able to get the gist as the story was going on. I also got a message from LK telling me to check out this thing because it reminded her of me, which was sweet because she still thinks of stuff to enlighten me after all this time. After the movie ended, I booked a car ride home because I was super exhausted. I got to check out that thing LK sent and let her know my thoughts on it. I eventually arrived home safe, even though I was a bit tired because this day had me do so many things.

Song of the day: Yuukei Yesterday by Jin

Journal entry for Tuesday, February 24th, 2026

Tue, 24 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

For Tuesday, I spent it working from home and I was in a call with someone again where they played some Silent Hill 2. I had some work and I just focused on it for today as nothing much was going on. I also talked to Mon a bit and she told me about some of her past and the current state of her self-esteem since she gets a lot of compliments from people. I eventually finished up with work and my shift ended. I got into a call with someone and Luan and we tried out Super Battle Golf for the first time. We only played on the tutorial course and didn't proceed with the game because someone and Luan had to eat. After a while, we got back in a call and Luan was playing Ultrakill and told us about some of the game's lore, which someone seemed really interested in. We talked about sharing my Steam library for Luan to play games in and I got him to play games on my account. We decided that he would play BioShock Infinite because someone was interested in the story for that, too, and Luan streamed it for us. I also gave him money for 1 month of Discord nitro so he could stream in high quality and we could watch his playthrough. After a while, someone eventually slept and we all disconnected from the call. I met up with Jaze in the late evening because we planned to go out and eat somewhere in Venice.

Song of the day: DtMF by Bad Bunny

Journal entry for Monday, February 23rd, 2026

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Monday was pretty chill. I mostly just worked from home. Since I had nothing to do, I watched someone continue their playthrough of Silent Hill 2. They continued playing all throughout my lunch break, too. After my break, I talked to Mon and she told me her commute experiences to and from work. It was nice to hear of Mon's stories and I got to know more about her when I asked for her interests and stuff. I also joked to her about the chocolate bread that she bought from yesterday. Also, someone told me the full plot of the movie Wuthering Heights, and that she's reading the book because the ending wasn't that satisfying. After that, nothing much happened in the afternoon and evening.

Song of the day: Masanay Ka Muna by Silent Sanctuary

Meeting Mon!

Sun, 22 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: BGC

I was still in at the company vacation by the time the day started. I was just in the room, charging my phone, the Samsung pocket Wi-Fi, my Apple Watch, and AirPods since they were all out from yesterday's events. Since I had nothing else to do, I gave watching a chance and watched 1 of the 2 movies that someone recommended to me: My Girl (1991). It actually didn't seem familiar at first, but I had the slightest feeling that I've watched this somehow. And I continued through watching the movie because I didn't want to watch The Substance (2024) over a fear that some sexually explicit scene might show and my roommates might walk in on. So I watched My Girl and it was genuinely cute, it had a bit of romance in it and, somehow, I already remembered the plot by the time they went to the beehive. I remembered watching this sometime around high school when I used to watch a lot of movies. I eventually finished the movie, gave someone my thoughts on it, and eventually slept. When I woke up, 1 of my 2 roommates had already left because their dog needed medicine. I woke up late and I was kind of dismayed that my roommate didn't wake me up for breakfast. I went outside to get breakfast and I just barely made it. There were only 4-5 other coworkers there who were just finished with their breakfast. We were supposed to get our breakfast with claim stubs, and, even though I was late, the dudes serving breakfast were pretty chill with letting me just eat without a stub and I just showed down on some food. The head of our department came in and they just sat down to have a nice chat with us and I just got introduced to him. It was just a nice small discussion about pickleball, how life was in their home country, and stuff like that. After that, we all went outside to enjoy the remaining time we had. I walked around, laid on the bed for a while, and also basked in the sun for a bit. I just reflected on this outing as a while and thought how nice it was since it was yet another company outing in this new chapter in my life, where I'm not stressed out nor anxious. It was really nice and I got all cleaned up. We took a few photos before we all started leaving and stuff. I figured to just hop on to someone else's ride—whoever was leaving first and was headed closest to my house. I was able to get transferred out and we headed out after a while. I slept while on the way there, and I had just come to find out that we were supposed to meet up with another ride that was headed to the same eatery. We eventually reached Bhabez Gotong Batangas and Inihaw na Liempo and we ate there. I kind of ordered a lot, but I enjoyed the food. I saw another coworker order their *chicken inasal* and the piece they got was, like, super huge compared to the ones I usually get at Mang Inasal. We ate, chilled long enough to meet and catch up with the rest, and they were even planning on going to some church but we just had to get back to Metro Manila. We were back on the road after eating and I told my sister to prep my outfit for later and I got some more rest as we were heading back. We eventually arrived the office, and I thanked our coworker as we were leaving his car, and I booked a ride home. It was kind of a race against time as I had to get home and then out to SM Aura to meet up with Mon. I did give her updates on where I was, and she suggested that we meet tomorrow, but I wanted to push through with meeting today even if I'm kind of physically tired (honestly) from the company outing. I think I got enough strength from sleeping in and out, and after preparing for a bit, I immediately booked a ride to SM Aura. I got there first and changed the screen protector on the Google Pixel. I had to have it replaced with some liquid cutout, and it was over quickly. Mon had already arrived and she eventually meets me outside the Huawei store. I was so nervous but Mon met me with a hug, which was cute because it's been a while since I met up with a friend that offered a hug. We eventually talk and walk around. She tells me this story of how she got a little late because her motor driver was feeling sad, he was playing this old love song (that even my *lola* used to listen to) and retold his story about how he had a childhood lover from Laguna and he moved to Manila for a better life for them, only for him to find out that she had been cheating on him with his cousin when he visited the girl. It was pretty heartbreaking and I found it funny that Mon called him dumb even though he was the victim, but I could sympathize with him since I kind of went through something like that where the girl was talking and entertaining other men. It was nice to hear Mon open up and talk because I was feeling so stiff. I felt really tense because I'm usually trying to gauge the other person's energy, and we eventually walked upstairs while Mon and I were talking, and we went to have dinner at Lady Luck per Mon's suggestion. She wanted to try the matcha, but they were out of it, so we tried the hojicha instead and we basically just kept talking. It was nice that she sat near me and not across the table, so that was nice. We talked about a few things and that eventually helped me ease up with her, she joked about kidnapping the child from the family that sat across us and even told me a story of how she wanted to “cosplay” in BGC, and I joked to her about how she should complete the look by bringing envelopes and stuff. We just kept joking and talking since I was warming up to her and Mon's jokes were really funny. She remarked to me about how a table near us ordered the pizza that didn't seem that good to her, and I dared her to tell that to the table that ordered. After that, we eventually get our order and we kept talking, and the waiters actually gave her the wrong drink. I got the real hojicha one and she got something completely different. But the waiters eventually correct it and then tell us that they got the order by mistake, which was okay with us. Mon finished her food first and the waiter asked to get her food and I joked to her that she was just playing with her leftovers, and at this point I was comfortable enough with her already where I can tease her and have jokes with her. We talked for a bit more until we decided to get the bill since we've finished and then I paid for the bill. We walked out and Mon asks me what kind of extrovert I am because she has a friend who often calls her, is clingy, and stuff, and she also has another extrovert friend who is fine being alone but has quite a few friends and stuff, and I say I'm the latter because I don't need to be always talking to people and that extroversion comes from socializing and talking to people itself, not just being with people. She gets it and we eventually keep walking, I joke to her that we should let couples go first because they seem more important and she laughs about it. We decide on just finding the other Lawsons in BGC and we walk past Market! Market! while I tell her about what 67 is, and stuff like that. She also makes a joke at a street crossing that I should take a photo of her getting into an accident and that she'll send it to her team leader. We pass by Serendra where she makes a few jokes and then she says that we might get cancelled for our conversations which I just laugh at. We eventually reached High Street and I tease her a bit about her height and how she's short, and I also make a joke and say that I'm not like the other guys, to which she just laughs. We keep walking and eventually turn left because she wants us to go down this place that leads to Terra 28th where she tells me her romantic preferences and I just get a bit shocked to learn that and then she lists off a few things that she's seen some disturbing stuff about. And I tell her that I can understand one of them and then she teases me about it. We keep walking and then go through past Terra 28th and she ties her shoes. I scout around and say that there's a Lawson nearby and then I tease her that she wasn't looking, but she does say that she can't actually see and we just go to it. We go inside and Mon tries to check out a few things while I try to buy the matcha that she's been recommending to me. It wasn't available there, and I was also shocked to learn that she wasn't even going to have it, so we checked out some other Lawson instead. We kept on walking and talking about the most random of things and she makes a joke about dying and then she said that she'll just lie on the ground right now. We cross the street and pass by a coffee shop that she doesn't recommend much, and we eventually reached Lawson #2! It thankfully had the matcha drink that she suggested and I ordered a large one. She looked around and bought bread, and I made a joke that I was going to rob her at gunpoint, but then she kept browsing and checking out other stuff while I tried to drink and taste the matcha drink that she recommended. It was really nice, it reminded me of the milky matcha I used to make back in 2022 and a bit in 2025, so it was nice. We eventually go outside and then talk about life, and I tell her that it's been a while since I walked and paced around BGC. I only usually walk around a lot when I'm thinking about life stuff and she asks me what was the last thing I thought that hard about. I just told her that it's about not being sure on where to go about in life and she says she agrees that it's pretty heavy. We walk down 3rd Ave as she's telling me about the things that she bought, which were just some bread, and I ask what flavors they were and she tells me that one was this chocolate one. I tell her that it's not my thing and chocolate is overrated, and I remark that the best type of bread is the one with raisins, to which she disagrees with. Mon then tell me this story of how she got invited at a friend's house one day for their schoolwork and that they made this pizza with raisins as the topping. We both found it strange, but I could understand it in a way since raisins had this tangy flavor and I guess she eventually got it after thinking of it that way. But I still made fun of it because they were seriously smoking something when they came up with the idea of that. We pass by BGC Portal and I tell her about how people just moon there, and I told her what mooning is, and then she also tells me that some people put their IG handles there to look for a foreigner. We pass through BGC Central Square and then she gets to talking about an incident that she had and I just listened through it. We kept walking up 32nd Street to sit down at my third place, Starbucks on 32nd Street, and then I tell her that I come here all the time, and that it was her first time here. I order some drink with lemon and I think she orders a pink drink. This was kind of the perfect time where I asked her how she thinks my name is pronounced, and it was funny because she says that she was dyslexic and I eventually gave her the correct pronunciation. We sit upstairs since the table that we picked was then taken and so we found a seat that had 2 chairs sat together. We saw a guy livestreaming and I joked about how one of us should find their handle and throw a comment or something. I also joked that we should pass by and make a face, and I eventually get enough courage to do it and I made a face while I was on the way to the bathroom. But it was locked and the girl just looked at me weird as she was waiting for the bathroom to open, so I made my way back and made another face before I sat next to Mon. She seemed so shy because she looked at the whole thing but she found it funny. For a while, we were just talking with each other while she's telling me her work stories and things about her coworkers. She told me one about how they “pranked” their Japanese coworker, then she told me about an Indian guy that she works with. Then she told me about the actual company that she works for and only then did it snap in my head that she was working for that specific company. I listened to a few more of Mon's stories as we continued to sit there. After that, we walked outside for a while. Mon showed me a spot where she found an ID lace at, but it wasn't here. And then we walked all the way to BGC High Street again. I asked her about her work, and the type of stuff she deals with on a day-to-day basis. I asked her about another work thing and I listened to her talk about it for a while. We eventually ended back up to Fully Booked in BGC High Street where I gave her the Google Pixel and I even joked about how she'll get a new phone now and she won't have to set low power mode for this one. She tells me that she's had her current phone near the start of the pandemic and I'm just surprised that it's holding up well. Mon eventually books an Angkas ride home and I joke to the rider that he should be careful of her. After that, Mon give's me a goodbye hug which was cute and I stood by for a bit before going to continue my walk afterward. For a while, I walked around BGC to process all of just what happened and what the past few days were. This was ultimately crazy and I couldn't believe so much good things have happened, so part of me feels scared that something bad will inevitably happen soon. I thought more about Mon and decided on her, before ultimately just thinking that I'll just keep messaging her and see where it goes. She was also talking to me while this going on and she sounded so concerned. Afterward, I booked a ride home and ended my day.

Song of the day: Focus by Heart2Hearts

Lyrics that resonated with me:
I cannot focus on anything but you, baby
I cannot focus on anything but you
초점 뒤의 흐릿한 반투명한 my view, baby
I cannot focus on anything, on anyone, but you

Advanced Summer Outing!

Sat, 21 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Outside Metro Manila

Today would be the day that we'd have a summer outing! It was super strange that our summer outing was in February, but whatever, it was fine. I mostly accompanied someone for some part of the day through text and we messaged back and forth on Discord for a while since I was preparing my bag. But after that, I prepared my things and eventually commuted to the office where I'd be picked up. Since I had nothing to do, I went to One Ayala mall nearby got this waffle cone from The Matcha Tokyo. I actually got there super early and they haven't opened up, so I talked to Mon for a bit. I got to learn that Mon did like K-Pop at one point and was primarily interested in NewJeans, so that was cool to know. I was bored and waiting for my other coworker to come and pick us up so I just prepared a playlist of songs that Mon recommended. We eventually were picked up by our coworker and we were on the way to the resort. While we were on the way to the resort, I talked to Mon via chat and she tells me a few things like some more music recommendations and our music tastes. It was fun to talk to her and I was surprised that she even knew this artist, and that's where I knew that we were really on the same wavelength. I got to know more about her and she shared some of her pets while we were traveling down the SLEX. It was funny to just have Mon to talk to and I also listened to a few songs while on the way there. We also stopped by a Chowking and ordered food for a while before we continued to hit the road. I passed in and out while we were on the way there and I played that playlist I had of 2000s dude songs. After a while, we eventually got to the resort just fine. I eventually met up with some of my coworkers and I got assigned to a room with 2 others. I got to know some coworkers and I cleaned up. I put on my usual cologne and I got complimented by another guy because they wondered what that nice smell was, and that the scent made them remember high school. It was flattering since I don't get compliments often. Our games for the afternoon started and I was still talking to Mon while this was all going on. I had come to learn that she was looking to replace her phone and she told me she was interested in getting a Samsung or Xiaomi, or even a ROG phone. Then she told me that she was specifically interested in getting a Google Pixel 9. My jaw absolutely dropped because that's the phone I have! I have that exact phone that was just sitting in my drawer. I immediately offered to just give it to her for free since she needed a new phone anyway and I just had that phone sitting in my drawer, rarely being used. I'm glad she agreed to meet up tomorrow so I could give her that phone, so I looked forward to meeting her the following day. After that, she left for a while to do other things and I focused on the games and the atmosphere. It was nice to have another peaceful company outing, honestly. After the terrible past outings I've had, I'm surprised that I just barely knew anyone here and I'm happy to make new acquaintances. I just chilled for some parts of the afternoon. I took a quick swim in the sea because I wanted to just chill, but I didn't stay long since the water was a bit dirty, and I even saw a filled diaper float around. After I backed away into the shore, I saw a black jellyfish just swimming around and I was glad I got back because I didn't want to get stung and miss tomorrow's meetup with Mon. For the rest of the evening, I mostly just had fun. I talked to Mon and we exchanged numbers and some details, and I asked them how their haircut went. I then just chilled with my coworkers and even sang some songs. I had fun singing karaoke with my coworkers and some of them even joined me in singing some old OPM songs. In the later parts of the evening, we had some dancers perform a fire dance for us and we just watched in awe. We then had dinner after that and I watched a coworker act crazily drunk. It was funny. I barely drank liquor the whole night and only indulged in the wine. I mostly indulged on the snacks and other *pulutan* available. Once my phone and hotspot's battery was dying, I went back to the room to just chill there for the rest of the evening and watch some movies that someone recommended to me.

Song of the day: STYLE by Heart2Hearts

Journal entry for Friday, February 20th, 2026

Fri, 20 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

For Friday, I didn't feel as peachy as I did like the start of yesterday. I felt super off for some reason and I used this day to just take a break because I was feeling sick. I did a few things at work and lined up a few things, so it was nice to have some stuff done. In the afternoon, Mon messaged me and we talked for quite a bit. We talked for a while about life and where we hang out, which was BGC. I somehow also revealed to her my true identity but it was because I got to know her name, too. I messaged her my MBTI and I got to find out hers as well. We kept talking for a bit. After a while, I got back to Mon and left a message for her but I eventually realized that she was asleep and after that, I just went to get some rest for a bit.

Song of the day: Leave Before You Love Me (with Jonas Brothers) by Mashmello

Stark Constrast

Thu, 19 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

The morning and evening segments of my day were pretty different from each other. I spent most of my early morning alone, playing catch-up in Genshin Impact because I just wanted to grind and be the same level as Mon. I finished through 1 segment of the story inside Fontaine after sorting out that controller issue with my PC. I finally finished that segment and did some completion tasks to hopefully bring up my XP, but then I realized that I had to grind more parts so that I could level up higher. Not gonna lie, it dissuaded me a bit because I had to grind through quite a bit, but it's fine. I just got sleep afterwards. In the morning, for some reason, I weirdly woke up early. I woke up at 7 a.m., even though I slept at 2 a.m., and I didn't have that much sleep anyway. This was honestly weird, but I started my day talking to Mon for a bit and then I replied to someone's messages about them wanting to plan a wedding for someone. They asked me if I have any prospects, a question they don't usually asks, and it was such a timely question because I had just posted on IG and told a few friends yesterday. I told her pretty much everything I know and they seemed pretty excited and happy for me, which was surprising but also kind of made me happy. I just spent a part of the morning telling them all about the person I just recently met and I felt so giddy and happy about it. But after that, I had to get ready and eventually left for work. The commute was fairly nice, it was super sunny out and I kept playing songs from Speak Now and, I don't know, the world felt a bit more lively. It's nice to have hope and be hopeful for something. I commuted to work and actually got to work early, too. I was surprised at that. I had coffee out with Jimmy and we just got coffee from Starbucks, and then got back in the office afterward. For most of the morning, I was just in the office doing my thing. We had lunch out early where I eventually hinted and told my coworkers that I met someone charming recently, but they didn't believe it and thought it was a lie, which they joked to me about. At work, nothing much happened aside from having lunch with my coworkers and them teasing me like usual. I had some free time in the afternoon during my lunchtime and I watched someone play Red Dead Redemption 2 for a while. They also messaged me from their alt account, which was weird and I opened up a bit with them about something. But after that, nothing much happened and I mostly focused on work until the late evening. I didn't have anyone to talk to in the evening and somehow my mood felt so down by then. I booked a ride home after that and got some rest.

Song of the day: blue by yung kai

Journal entry for Wednesday, February 18th, 2026

Wed, 18 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

I spent most of my morning just playing Genshin because I wanted to catch up to Mon's level, but I eventually slept after a while since I had on-site work the following day. When I woke up, I got ready for work and commuted there. Work was mostly chill and I didn't really do anything noteworthy. I talked to Mon again and they sent a voice message so I heard their voice for the first time. I also shared something about myself like some blog post since I found that we had the same thoughts about being single and stuff. In the afternoon, I had some free time so I took a break and played Genshin with Mon while I was in the office pantry. It was only a short break and they mostly helped me defeat Childe and collect a few stones so that I could level up my characters. In the evening, I went home and I updated that playlist I have about falling in love because I might start to have feelings if this keeps up. I shared it to my IG Story and I had a few friends congratulate me because I might actually start to like someone new after years. So that was nice. I mostly worked on increasing my level in Genshin and finishing some parts of the story so I can play on the same world level as Mon.

Song of the day: Secrets by OneRepublic

Lyrics that resonated with me:
I'm gonna give all my secrets away

Journal entry for Tuesday, February 17th, 2026

Tue, 17 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent

Tuesday was Chinese New Year, and it was a holiday. So for Tuesday, I started it while on a call with someone and we were just chilling and watching some Hearts2Hearts performances. And we ordered food since we had nothing much to do. I was staying up and accompanying someone anyway since I could sleep all day or do nothing. They showed me some grapes they were eating, which looked nice because they seemed like big grapes. I eventually got full from eating Army Navy and saved some for later, and we were just watching some YouTube videos to fill the time. I slept for a bit and in the afternoon, I was in a call with someone and they streamed some of their Jurassic Park gameplay. For some time, I was watching someone stream. I also had that person from Reddit talk to me today and we kept the conversation going. It was fun to continue to keep talking to them and we talked about a lot of other topics throughout the afternoon. I also joined in on a call with Luan and he played The Mortuary Assistant because I bought him the game. It got a little scary for someone and we eventually had to stop and leave the call because someone had to sleep. Eventually, someone messaged me after a while because they couldn't sleep over how disturbing The Mortuary Assistant was. So we got into a call and they streamed some more gameplay. I was still talking to that person from Reddit and they told me that their nickname was Mon. They gave me their username on Discord so we could talk there instead and they eventually had to sleep since they had work tomorrow. After a while, I eventually left the call with someone and had some free time. For the rest of the evening, I was just setting up and redownloading Genshin. For the rest of the evening, I was just setting up and redownloading Genshin. I also kept circling back to what Mon said, and because she said that she appreciated me. It was the cutest thing I heard in a while because I thought I was taking up so much of her free time, and I was just glad to hear that she said she appreciated me.

Song of the day: The Story Of Us by Taylor Swift

Journal entry for Monday, February 16th, 2026

Mon, 16 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Today was just a boring Monday and I originally had nothing planned. But in the morning, I decided to reach out to someone on Reddit and I was super surprised that they messaged me back. I started to get to know them throughout the day and actually shared a bit about myself and got to know them as well. It was weird since they graduated IT and were into designing. It was actually super fun talking to them and I think we vibed well because we're on the same wavelength. We joked about a few things and they were easy to open up to and they opened up easily, too. In the evening, I was just finished with work and got into a call with someone and Luan. Luan streamed some fanmade FNaF game but then eventually played FNaF: Pizzeria Simulator. In the evening, I talked to Kai a bit and she mostly gave me a rundown of the horrible stuff they experienced last year. Needless to say, it was too much for me and I just felt bad that they experienced that. I continued to stay up after that.

Song of the day: DtMF by Bad Bunny

Journal entry for Sunday, February 15th, 2026

Sun, 15 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good
Significant Location: BGC

Sunday didn't have much going on for me aside from having this spur-of-the-moment feel to go to BGC. I asked my sister and we decided to eat at Samgyupsalamat at BGC Forum. We both got ready and booked a ride there. We are some *samgyupsal* and then found some Korean ice cream at the nearby Funhan Mart. We checked out this small art expo across the street and looked at a few art stalls, but that was mostly it. At this point, I decided on watching a movie and eventually picked Send Help (2026). It was nice, I kind of enjoyed the movie even though it was a bit gore-y at times. I booked a ride home afterward. In the evening, I watched a few IG Reels that had a song from Bad Bunny and I started liking it. I stayed up just browsing the Internet after that.

Song of the day: DtMF by Bad Bunny

Lyrics that resonated with me:
Debí tirar más fotos de cuando te tuve
Debí darte más besos y abrazos las veces que pude
Ey, ojalá que los míos nunca se muden
Y si hoy me emborracho, pues, que me ayuden

Debí tirar más fotos de cuando te tuve
Debí darte más besos y abrazos las veces que pude
Ojalá que los míos nunca se muden
Y si hoy me emborracho, pues, que me ayuden

Journal entry for Saturday, February 14th, 2026

Sat, 14 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Valentine's Day started out fun. I was still in a call with someone and mostly just watched them work and play some Red Dead Redemption 2 on the side. And that mostly made up my morning. We also watched more music videos and live performances of Hearts2Hearts, along with some live performances from SNSD. After that, we tried Wordle and I got the word which was “Bloom,” funny enough. We tried a bit of poker after that. I was happy after it all, so that's nice. I didn't do much throughout the day. I just installed Cyberpunk 2077 on my MacBook Pro to basically just try it out and see if I could game on it. It turns out that I could and I had fun continuing through some parts of the story. I went to sleep after that as I didn't have much going on anyway.

Song of the day: Focus by Heart2Hearts

Dangwa Visit!

Fri, 13 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Dangwa Flower Market

Today was Friday the 13th and it was pretty close to Valentine's, too. I accompanied Jaze to Dangwa and he bought some flowers for his girlfriend. He picked orange ones that were white at the center, and I think it looked pretty cute. I could only feel envy and a bit of jealousy because I wished that I had a girlfriend to buy flowers for. We were supposed to go to Assi Fresh Plaza afterward and I made a joke on our way back because I shouted to him in a joking way that we only went to Dangwa so he could get flowers. I was trying to make the rider and passenger next to us laugh and I was glad that I was able to make them laugh anyway, so that was nice. We eventually arrived at Assi Fresh Plaza and we mostly talked about random stuff. I also ordered coffee for someone during this time. I arrived home just fine and I got some rest since I would be working from home today. In the morning, I timed in and I did a bit of work as well as a few things needed for today's tasks. I had some free time and watched someone play Red Dead Redemption 2 in the morning. Angel also messaged me today asking if I could be added as a reference and I gave her my details and such. They also killed a legendary animal which was the large bison, and after that they tried for the White Arabian horse, but were unsuccessful. In the afternoon, I focused on fixing a major issue at work and eventually got that resolved. After timing out and in my free time, we got into a call where Luan streamed his playthrough of Five Nights at Freddy's: Pizzeria Simulator. After timing out, I had a deep conversation with someone and I wondered where the person for them could be, and they say that it's someone they already know. And I just continued to accompany them as it was a Friday.

Song of the day: Banana Man by Chonny Jash

Journal entry for Thursday, February 12th, 2026

Thu, 12 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent

Thursday was pretty weird but I was supposed to work in the office today. It was a pretty chill day at work, though, with my coworkers teasing me to one of our coworkers and that I should get them a bouquet from a nearby bouquet vending machine. It was mostly all fun and games. In the evening, I wrapped up with work but stayed in the office for a while to unwind as I waited for Jaze as we were supposed to head to Dangwa tonight. I got into a call with someone and we played a game where we said a work and we would list down any words that could be made from the initial word that we gave. It was a good way to test our vocabulary and, needless to say, someone was way better at this game than I am. They consistently won, which was nice. After that, they had to sleep and I just waited for Jaze to arrive and pick me up. Eventually, Jaze arrived at around 11 p.m. and we went to Dangwa sometime around midnight and my night continued from there.

Song of the day: Easy On Me by Adele

Vietnamese Food!

Wed, 11 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Poblacion

For Wednesday, I felt okay and ready enough to go back to the office. I booked a ride there and it was a pretty straightforward ride. I had lunch out with my coworkers and focused on work. I had some time in the afternoon to watch someone play Red Dead Redemption 2 and they streamed it for a bit during my breaktime. In the evening, I was bored and I asked my coworker if he was down to have dinner outside. He recommended that we try this Vietnamese food place near Poblacion, Makati. We walked all the way from the office to that place and it was a hell of a walk, but I was able to handle it. It's just that my feet were killing me because my shoes were in bad shape. We eventually did arrive in Hanoi Pho and I got to try out their *Bun Cha* that they recommended. We also tried their Vietnamese spring rolls and the *Bun Cha* soup I got was extremely spicy. I think the waiter mixed ours up and my coworker eventually told me that he was supposed to get the spicy soup, and not me. So that made sense. It was still nice to try out some Vietnamese food. I decided on whether or not I should walk with him to the place he'll stay at or if we'll go our separate ways. I didn't want to spend time alone in the restaurant and I was down for a long walk, so I decided to push through it, even though I was carrying my work laptop and bag. It was a tiring and long walk, and I even reached 170+ bpm on my heart rate! It was extremely exhausting and painful because my shoes were killing me. I made the decision to give up on these work shoes after tonight. We eventually arrived at a place somewhere along EDSA and he just accompanied me until I booked a ride home. My coworker actually didn't believe me when I said that I'm comfortable with walking very, very long distances, but after I showed him my Strava and some of the walks I've been on, he believed me. I'm glad I got to get some good exercise today and walked 4 kilometers in total for my outdoor walks. All in all, today was pretty great.

Song of the day: Miracle by Paramore

Journal entry for Tuesday, February 10th, 2026

Tue, 10 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Average

For today, I commuted to the office but didn't feel right and so I timed out for work and then went home to get some rest. Nothing much happened in the evening and I mostly just rested as I still planned to go to the office tomorrow.

Song of the day: Bubble Gum by NewJeans

Journal entry for Monday, February 9th, 2026

Mon, 09 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Monday was pretty chill, I worked from home today and I was able to watch some gameplay of Luan playing Five Nights at Freddy's: Sister Location. He failed a few times but it was fun seeing him play for a bit. After that, someone and I got into a call and we watched a few videos from FunkyFrogBait and watched them playing Silent Hill 2 again. Worked pass by and nothing much happened. In the evening, I was bored and so I configured my Apple TV to make the Apple Music Sing function work. It was nice to actually get it to run and have that AUX cable properly configured. I sung for a bit and then slept after that.

Song of the day: Neverita by Bad Bunny

Journal entry for Sunday, February 8th, 2026

Sun, 08 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Average

For Sunday, nothing much happened aside from me finalizing which hotel I'll stay at and it took me a while to reach this decision, but I'm glad I have a hotel I've decided on. For the rest of the day, nothing much happened and I just ordered Jollibee for dinner and spent the most of it at home.

Song of the day: Opalite by Taylor Swift

Journal entry for Saturday, February 7th, 2026

Sat, 07 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Today started out with me accompanying someone for their night shift and we mostly just talked about random stuff and we both ordered pizza from Pizza Hut because we were bored and a bit hungry. We watched a few videos from YouTube while eating, so that was nice, we even watched a video about the horrors of SpongeBob. Then we tried to watch this anime that someone found called The Promised Neverland. At first, we tried to watch it through Scener, the platform that we used to watch Seohyun's Love & Leashes before. But it didn't work well and we ran into technical difficulties. So I just resorted to streaming it and someone also showed me the things she got from me like the R.E.P.O. baby and the aespa keychain lightstick which looked pretty cute because it was working. After that, they showed their screen to show me a video they're editing and they made fun of their boss in the process. But for most of the morning, we watched The Promised Neverland until the 7th episode. We left the call eventually after that. I also slept after that. In the afternoon, I woke up to a message from someone saying that she appreciates me and that she shops to be the same type of support for me. It was cute to receive a message like that, especially from someone. I also gave that old router back to my ISP along with the entertainment box that I barely used. The afternoon passed and in the evening I just finalized on the hotel I'll stay at for my upcoming trip to Korea next month.

Journal entry for Friday, February 6th, 2026

Fri, 06 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

For Friday, I was just chilling at home and working. Nothing much mostly happened during my shift aside from work. Once my shift was done, Luan, someone, and I got into a call as we watched Luan complete Five Nights at Freddy's 4. It was quick but also nice that he was able to stream the ending. After that, he moved on to streaming FNaF: Sister Location and he played a few days of it until he had to give up because it was getting difficult. After that, we just watched a few FNaF VHS tapes on YouTube and we eventually left that call and I just rested for the day.

Song of the day: Pretty Please by Heart2Hearts

Journal entry for Thursday, February 5th, 2026

Thu, 05 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Salcedo Village

Today was the day we planned to get cookies from The Kind Cookie and I woke up alright today. I immediately booked a ride to the office just so I can catch up with them. I eventually arrived in the office and it seems that they just waited for me because they immediately noticed that I just arrived. I set my stuff for a bit and then went with them downstairs. We were all set to leave but one coworker had just come in so we had to wait for them to go down so that they would come with us. One coworker used this to peel off from us and just get coffee at a nearby coffee store because they really wanted their morning coffee already. I also tried in persuading them, but they eventually left. But eventually our other coworker arrives after unpacking their stuff and they join us in our excursion to Salcedo Village. It was actually a nice walk there. We planned to get coffee at Toby's Estate first, then visit The Kind Cookie and so we did. We walked all the way to Toby's Estate while walking, talking, making jokes to each other. It was such a nice day out, too. I mostly just enjoyed the walk there and, while it was tiring, we eventually got to Toby's Estate. I bought a “vanilla nitro sweet cream cold brew, ” or something, and it was pretty good. We hung out for a few minutes inside the coffee shop before we went to the nearby Kind Cookie store again to get that Dubai chewy cookie. But when we got there, it was already sold us. The cashier just told us that it was just sold out a few minutes before we had arrived, so that really sucks. But it was fine, we ordered other cookies instead. I ate my cookie while we were on the way back to the office and I was able to finish and toss my coffee out, too. We got back just fine, even though we took a while. But I just got back to my desk and continued on my tasks. I had lunch out with the other coworkers while the others just had lunch separately. I didn't actually eat much, I just mostly talked to them. After that, we got back to work and they teased me because the other team had already left for lunch, separately, and that I was tearing their team apart, but it was just a joke and I found it funny, too. After that, I mostly focused on work. For the rest of the day, nothing much happened and I just did my work, and then went home afterward. Nothing significant happened in the evening so I just passed the time.

Song of the day: Gimme Hope Jo'Anna by Eddy Grant

A Super-Fun After-Work Adventure

Wed, 04 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Salcedo Village

Wednesday was pretty eventful. I woke up feeling really late and from a horrible dream But then my morning got started, albeit at a later time. I also talked to Han and someone in the morning, and spent a good amount of time talking to Han and telling him about my stay in Korea and that we should get together soon. I still tried my best to prepare early enough and I eventually got on a ride to the office. I thought I forgot something, but thankfully I had it in my pocket this whole time. For the rest of the day, I was mostly swamped with work and trying to get a few things done. I had several calls and mostly was focused on getting them done. I did have my coworkers here with me so we were able to buy lunch out and we even stopped by to get some coffee before we came back. But since then, it was just work and getting a script working which would be my main deliverable today. After work, my coworkers and I had this idea to try the new, viral Dubai Chewy Cookie and there was one in Salcedo village. We then walked there and we initially planned to go to a Vietnamese restaurant but then chose Mendokoro instead because someone else suggested it, and we just played along. We walked for a long time there and my coworker estimated that it would only take 20 minutes. We wanted to take our coworker's car, but since they said that it would only take 20 minutes, we just walked to it instead. Our entire walk spanned 30 minutes instead! They mostly teased me to one of our coworkers but I lowkey found it annoying since I wasn't interested in them anyway. But I had fun walking, laughing, and joking with them on the way to Mendokoro, it was really, really fun. It was kind of the highlight of my night: just walking together at night, having fun with coworkers after work. It's something I have never had and I last had it during my KVH days. We stopped by Wildflour Café + Bakery and bought a few things, but I didn't eat mine as I didn't want to get full. After that, we eventually arrived at Mendokoro. I just found out that the *super chashu* was just a larger pork meat version of the *shoyu* ramen they serve, so I initially opted for that. But then the server suggested to my other coworker to get this spicy dish instead, which I chose for myself since I wanted something different. Our other coworker was confused why I put down Ian as my name for the reservation, but eventually it was fine and we talked about a few things, mainly where they were staying for the night and such. After we got seated, we just ate and I sat in the middle of them. I mostly talked to them about their work and such, but then we eventually realized that it was already 8:30 p.m. and we didn't stop by The Kind Cookie Cafe. We searched for the place and it was closed, but we still tried to visit. It was just super close, literally just around the corner from where we were eating. But it was closed and we didn't really want to bother by trying to ask the staff if they could cook 1 more batch of cookies beyond closing time. It was super funny that we had forgotten our reason for going to Salcedo village in the first place. It was also funny when I realized on our walk back to our friend's car that we should've taken their offer to drive here in the first place. It would've saved us time from walking to and from the carpark in the end. But we just walked and talked about the cars that they bought. Our coworker was nice to drive us around to our drop-off. I just asked to be dropped off where my other coworker was going to be dropped off, because I didn't want to impose. And as we were arriving, I booked a ride home for myself, albeit it being a bit expensive. Still, I got on the ride and got home without problems. It was still super late so I just relaxed for the rest of the evening as I was so overloaded from all the things that happened today.

Song of the day: American Pie by Don McLean

Journal entry for Tuesday, February 3rd, 2026

Tue, 03 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

For Tuesday, nothing much happened aside from me going to work and spending most of the day alone. In the evening, I did get into a Discord call with someone and Luan. For the rest of the evening, nothing much happened aside from me planning my itenirary for my Korea trip next month. I had a few ideas of what to do and where to go, and I believe I set out an idea to travel to Busan for a day or two, but nothing's been finalized. I was just mostly looking at the massive prices for the hotel and wondering just how I would cover that. Still, I prepared for however much I can and then went to bed.

Song of the day: Sa'yo - Orchestra Version by Silent Sanctuary

Lyrics that resonated with me:
Kung tunay nga ang pag ibig mo
Kaya mo bang isigaw
Iparating sa mundo

Tumingin sa aking mata
Magtapat ng nadarama
Di gustong ika'y mawala
Dahil handa akong ibigin ka
Kung maging tayo
Sa'yo lang ang puso ko

I got tickets!!!

Mon, 02 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent

I had a really, really weird dream today about finding some secret stash of money or something. It was so strange because I had this feeling that I just had so much money stuffed somewhere that could pay all of my credit card debt, but damn, it didn't really turn out to be real. In the morning, I didn't really have much to do aside from time in. Someone and I were able to get into a call and show each other stuff. They mostly got the mystery box of books that they got. It was cool to see some of the ones she got, even though I had a feeling that she wouldn't read some of them. It was also nice to see someone buy a scary Japanese book, which looks interesting because it had pictures. But they mostly streamed for a while and then tried to sleep. In the afternoon, Yza replied back to me with my ticket information and this was where it finally sunk in me that my Korea trip was all set! I finally had my ticket! After worrying about it for so long, I finally had a ticket and I'm just glad that I could finally rest easy. The day essentially just continued. With me working and trying to eat the sandwich that my sister made for my breakfast, as it was now the afternoon and I've yet to finish the damn sandwich yet lol. Eventually, someone wakes up and then we call for a bit as she tries to install Silent Hill 2 on her PC. We watch a few videos to pass the time, which were just some fun videos about past events. After that, she installs the game and then plays for a bit. She encounters a few issues like her game crashing, and she ultimately gives up after the 2nd or 3rd time her PC crashes. For the rest of the day, I just time out of work and just chill. I get really excited to plan out my future trip to Korea and I actually start building out my playlist on Apple Music. It's so nice to revisit some Girls' Generation songs and re-make my old playlist from 2012 about travelling to Korea. I just browsed the Internet on my Mac for the rest of my remaining time for the day.

Song of the day: Seoul by Super Junior & Girls' Generation

Journal entry for Sunday, February 1st, 2026

Sun, 01 Feb 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: BGC

For Sunday, I actually didn't do much and I got some rest in the morning. But someone messaged me in the morning and then they replied to me a bit. After that, I watched them play some AC: Odyssey, but that was mostly it for a while. They eventually left to get some rest and I went on my day like normal. After a while, Loy calls me and asks if I'm down to hang out and I immediately say yes. I got ready and he got his car here and we went off to BGC for the day. It's been a while since we hung out, but we mostly catch up in the car. He tells me the stuff he's been doing and, surprisingly, also asks what's up and opens a space for me to talk, too. Which was super nice because I haven't expressed myself to a person in a while and I just told him about recent events in my life. Real events, too, to which he listens and it was nice because I got to be the one explaining and sharing my story. We eventually got to BGC and just keep talking, and then he talks to me about the benefits of having a dedicated girlfriend at this life stage, and such. I mostly agree and we walk upstairs to Datablitz to check out some stuff, and I also planned to buy a USB cable for someone. We didn't find any, but we talked while browsing Datablitz and then we went to the Gashapon store nearby. We got a few things, I initially got an aespa lightstick keychain for someone. Then Loy got his own things, but shortly after that I saw an Apex Legends capsule container and we both got that for the memories. It was nice, I got Octane and it kind of brought back some memories of me playing Apex with them in 2021. After that, we stopped by Fully Booked and Loy was interested in this one specific book, so he had that on his mind for a while. We then passed by Card Central Cafe where I showed to Loy that it was a recently-opened place. We saw a guy in line with a really cute girlfriend and we just can't help but notice at how eccentric he was, and yet he has a girlfriend that looks so pretty. I just order for myself and it was this peanut butter coffee, which was admittedly pretty nice to drink, but it baffled me and Loy at how long it took to serve. It was just coffee. But then Loy asked me about what I do these days, and he even went further to ask about the nature of the company I work for and the team. He seemed really into knowing me and genuinely interested, so I was able to open up and it felt nice to just open up to a friend. After that, we kept walking to Starbucks since that was our ultimate destination, and after a while of walking, we eventually got there. I got drinks for us and we just sat outside, talking about life and more on Loy's trips, experiences. After a while, some guy and his kid sit next to us which then just makes us go to our next stop, which was CoCo Ichibanya on Forbestown road. I told him about the places we could eat at, and he picked Japanese omurice and curry instead. We got seated and just talked more about random things, this time about Steam games and the other games we used to play, also handheld gaming devices we used to have. But after that, we then started wrapping up our little trip for the day. We stopped by Market! Market! because I wanted to get a SIM card for someone and he passed by a few stores in SM Aura before we ultimately paid for the parking ticket and then went on back home. I got dropped off and did a few things to chill for the night.

Journal entry for Saturday, January 31st, 2026

Sat, 31 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Saturday finally started and I felt like I could finally breathe. Friday was so stressful and now I just had time to relax and catch up on my rest. Today started with me being in a call with someone and we were watching a few K-Pop music videos. After that, we watched a proshot of Heathers, the musical. We watched the entire thing and it was actually nice to just watch, follow along with the story, and comment on it with someone watching, too. It was mostly someone noticing the differences and them pointing out to them. They were so surprised by the differences, too, but we had a laugh about them and just finished the show. For the rest of the time, I just accompanied them and watched some of their Assassin's Creed: Odyssey gameplay in the morning. They eventually completed the story and it was fun seeing them complete the whole story! I was glad they got a good ending, too. After that, I mostly spent my Saturday afternoon and evening just chilling. I needed to relax anyway and I didn't really do much aside from catch up on some sleep. In the evening, my dad called me for a project, and I was wholly on board with it. In the evening, I also got into a call with someone and Luan. First, we watched Luan play some Five Nights at Freddy's 4. After that, we played Left 4 Dead 2! It was seriously fun to play even though it was a bit frustrating at first because my graphics card kept crashing. I didn't want to try out gaming on the Mac yet, so I just continued through troubleshooting settings on my Linux PC. Eventually, it was stable enough to play on and it was so nice gaming on the new 2K monitor and at 180 FPS, which was a total contrast to the same 1080p TV I've been using for 10+ years. All in all, it was fun and I got some more well-deserved sleep afterward.

Song of the day: Piano In The Dark by Brenda Russell

Stressed as hell, but alive

Fri, 30 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Friday was so damn busy, it was insane. The day started out with just me, chilling and just re-reading the blog post I had written for any grammatical mistakes. I also talked to Kai for a bit and she says that she read it and we started talking for a bit. I tell her that I really doubt I'll get married but also told her of a pact I have, but I doubt that pact will follow through anyway. Then she tells me that we both have a pact, too. I had a pact with Kai? What the fuck? Apparently, it was just to try and be with each other when they turn 25 and if we don't have a partner yet. It made me laugh a bit because I thought it was some big ticket thing like get married lol. I told her that it wasn't that serious anyway but, to her, it seemed serious enough. I doubt these 2 pacts I made will follow through anyway as I'm still believing that I'll die alone, love-less haha. Fuck it. We have a light conversation until they taper off. I also chat with someone in the background and eventually get tired at around 3 a.m., so I get my rest. The morning was pretty chill, and someone messaged but I didn't get a reply back. For the rest of the day, it was just me stressing about my tasks and the amount of things I have to finish in less than 7 hours. I barely had lunch since breakfast was good enough for me. I had very late lunch and finished just half of my stuff before having lunch. A lot of things piled up in the afternoon, too. Friday was so eager on stressing me out. I had to order food and groceries for me and my sister, and that coincided with a stressful bank transfer and a countdown to order groceries because of Grab's free delivery thing. I was super stressed and my mind was so overloaded with things. My main priority was work and, thankfully, the groceries arriving fine and okay, and eating my late lunch helped. But I was super stressed because there was another issue that popped up which just piled on top of so much stuff I had to do. This whole endeavor stretched until the late evening, until 8:30 p.m. where I had overtimed for free because I was so stressed and busy, that I had to catch up on so many tasks. My head was honestly spinning at the end. I was glad I had NO OTHER OBLIGATIONS after that. No one to answer to, no one to feel indebted to. It felt to nice to just relax and decompress after all that. My anxiety was so high after doing all that work, that it took me a while to fully calm down and get my stress levels down. I'm just glad that, at the end of the day, I was able to accomplish all that I could on my list. And I actually did follow through my promise to my sister of ordering groceries on Friday. So that was nice.

Song of the day: Neverita by Bad Bunny

Lyrics that resonated with me:
Yo 'toy puesto pa' ti y tú te me quita'
Diablo, qué piquete la chamaquita
El corazón lo puso en la neverita
Dice que este verano se queda solita
Yo 'toy puesto pa' ti y tú te me quita'
Diablo, qué piquete la chamaquita
El corazón lo puso en la neverita
Dice que este verano se queda solita

Pero nunca sola, sola
Amores vienen y van, como las ola'
El DM explotao', to's le escriben "hola"
Una fila 'e cabrone' y yo quiero la cola, yeah, yeah, yeah

Journal entry for Thursday, January 29th, 2026

Thu, 29 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Today was finally the last day I would work on-site for the month. This day wasn't supposed to happen as I had originally planned to work on-site last week, but whatever. My friends seemed to even want me to work from home today, but I just got to complete this day and get it over with. Thankfully, commute was fine and perfectly normal. For the rest of the day, it was actually quite fun in the office. I spent it with coworkers. I saw a coworker that I haven't seen since December of last year, and he and I were immediately joking like usual. It was actually super fun. I had lunch with them and I got Pepper Lunch for the hell of it. It was hard carrying the tray back to the table, too! But I was able to have lunch with them, laugh, share jokes and stories, whatnot. We grabbed some drinks at CHAGEE and I got that new peace milk tea drink that they had. It was 169 Pesos or something, so it was worth it. My coworker also gave me the thermal bag for the 2 drinks we ordered, so that was cool. We went back in the office and I continued to work on my tasks for a long while. In the afternoon, I had a short break to grab some Starbucks with another coworker. He told me about his past trips to Japan and he seemed interested to go to Korea, and I told him some of the basics of getting a visa. After that, he said that I'll visit Korea at the time when the cherry blossoms will bloom. I was completed shocked! *Oo nga noh*. I will see cherry blossoms for the first time ever in my life. Holy shit. I didn't even plan on seeing the cherry blossoms, but apparently now I will. Holy crap! What followed was that I was even more excited for my trip because I wanted to see the cherry blossoms so bad as it's also a new experience for me. We then went back to the office and I continued on my work. I had a small *merienda* session with one coworker and we immediately went back to the office, and I went home early for the day because I had a meeting and I planned to work my remaining hours at home. I eventually got home while the sun was still out, so that was nice. I just relaxed but eventually did some work and attended my meeting per usual. After that, things were pretty chill. Someone eventually woke up and we started messaging on Discord after a while. Also I found enough time to think to myself and sit with my thoughts about the future and the way I've been feeling these past few months. I was able to finally write that blog post I've been thinking of since Tuesday.

Song of the day: Way Less Sad by AJR

I finally got my Korean visa!!

Wed, 28 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special

Today started out pretty weird, to be honest. I had a dream about my Korean visa. It was just a piece of paper in black and white appearing to me in a dream and, wow, I couldn't believe it that it was a premonition of some sort. The rest of the morning and day was actually relatively routine and chill, thankfully. My heart couldn't take any more rollercoasters after yesterday. But for today, I had my usual stuff: commuting to work, working on-site, and doing a round of morning tasks. Before lunch, I checked out the website for issuing Korean visas and I was so surprised to see that the text had **changed**. It went from **심사 중**/in review to **허가**/approved. I was sat on my chair and I wanted to jump and shout on the spot but I was able to calm myself down enough. I immediately told my family and then someone about it, and I just had to get steak afterwards. It was such a rush of happy emotions and I was glad that all the hard work of gathering paperwork, walking to several places just to get X document prepared and Y document sorted out. And the wait for the visa, the staying in line, was now totally worth it. Well, it was already worth it just by doing it, but it's nice to see some positive payoff. So I initially tried to find a restaurant to eat at and eventually settled on a restaurant that had steak and I just had my usual lunch out, but this was the second day I'm just spending it alone. But after eating, I eventually went back to work, had a meeting, and had a few things wrapped up before finding enough time for an afternoon break. So hopefully my flight situation is fixed, and I found it reasonable enough for my ticket to be around 13,000-ish for a round-trip flight to Korea. I just continued on with my day and eventually wrapped up work late. I had some lunch and I eventually tried that Japanese restaurant that everyone kept ordering food from, and it was great! I also ordered some take-out for my sister because she wanted to eat *hakaw*. I then went home afterward and mainly just chilled. I was able to find enough time to catch up with the news and what's going on in the world, enough to form my own opinions on it.

Song of the day: YOUNG LUV by STAYC

Lyrics that resonated with me:
My love's so young, I'm young, 달콤한 나이
너만 바라볼 순 없어, na-na-na-na
Cold, I'm cold, 깜깜한 밤
아름답긴 해도 따뜻하진 않아

Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh-ooh-ooh
겉으로만 나 멀쩡한 거 일지도
Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh-ooh-ooh
쨌든, baby, I'm sorry for my young love

An Emotional Rollercoaster

Tue, 27 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Holy shit Tuesday started with my commute to work being one fucking bad omen. I woke up on time but it was raining and I had to bring in the laundry that was left out to dry all by myself. I didn't have breakfast or what and my stomach was hurting so bad, but I still pushed through my morning. I talked to someone a bit while I was booking a ride and I was able to publish my journal entry and some code changes to my site, so that made my morning a little productive. Booking a ride took so long, almost an hour of just waiting and hoping to get a ride. Someone also asked if I had died, which was kind of a bad omen as I almost could have died. But eventually I got 2 rides, one for Angkas and in Joyride. Somehow, I forgot to cancel the Joyride one because I was actually waiting for the Angkas one. The Joyride driver arrived first, somehow, and I had to cancel the Angkas ride which I deeply regretted. The Joyride commute was **TOTAL FUCKING HELL**. The driver took so many wrong turns, ignored GPS directions, and we even almost crashed 2 times. He was also doing this strange and weird thing of spreading his legs and driving so slowly. Even one motorcyclist on the SLEX was looking at us and I was so terrified for my life because we could crash or have a fatal road accident at any minute. We drove through and we got a few vehicles honking at us because he was leaving so much space between us and the next car. He was totally out of it and only snapped out of it when I tried to guide him to an alternate route that I believed is much safer and walkable. In the end, I had to ask him to drop me off early and I even had to make an excuse about how the drop-off point was hard to drop off passengers or some shit. But in reality, I was so shaken and scared for my life. I just wanted to walk and process things while on the way to work. Work was pretty much quiet, thankfully, and I even helped out a teammate and solved a problem on my own. It was a pretty big highlight of my day, honestly. For lunch, I wanted to get some *omurice* because I saw it yesterday while watching Frieren so I decided to walk to CoCo Ichibanya in Glorietta for my lunch. After that, since I still had this “any menu item free”-thing from Starbucks Rewards, I just claimed it and got a white chocolate mocha that was a venti as a pick-me-up. I also just chilled for a while and finished my drink during lunchtime. Work in the afternoon was pretty okay but a bit frustrating since I couldn't complete what I was working on, but it was functional enough to a degree. This kind of continued the chain of **[GOOD THING]** happening and then **[BAD THING]** happening throughout my day. But eventually, I was finished with work as my work day had ended. By that point, I'm not sure why, but the stresses of the day kind of just piled up on me. Thankfully, I had this “birthday freebie” thing from Timezone wherein I got 500 Pesos worth of Powerload because it was my birthday recently. I was excited to play at Timezone to just cool off BUT I had forgotten my Wangan Midnight card! I checked my wallet and it wasn't there! Either I left it at home or I totally lost it, which just made me want to fall to my knees. I didn't give up, though, and I just claimed the free 500 Pesos Powerload and played a few games. I even played 1 round of bowling because I was so frustrated and I'm glad I did because I got 2 strikes in 1 bowling game, so that was super cool. I also just relaxed at the nearby massage chair. While resting, I saw a girl that looked like someone, which was pretty neat, but also intrigued me. While I was wrapping up, I saw that Return to Silent Hill (2026) was showing in theaters and I still had time to catch a showing! I immediately got my tickets at the ticket counter so I could go inside of the movie theater. I got seated and I enjoyed watching the movie for a bit, even ordering an extra side dish of bread with a cheese dip that somehow cost me 250 Pesos, but it was fine. All was going well until there was a couple that sat next to me, which was shocking because, while I was picking out the seats at the counter, I had absolutely no one in my entire row. Here comes this dude and his girlfriend which somehow just made me envious as usual. The dude also coughs throughout the entire film! He coughed every 5 minutes or so, it was honestly downright annoying. This dude with his stature, and his rudeness can get a girlfriend to watch Silent Hill on a random Tuesday night. I saw him caress her hands, too. And here I am, single with fucking no one to watch this shit with. Fuck me, fucking hell. This day was honestly too much and I was already so over it. The film wasn't that great either, but I appreciated some parts that tied into the video game. It kind of just made me want to play the game, or watch someone play the game while I streamed it. I was just done by the end of the day. Emotionally done. I wanted to cry so bad because I had such a rough day, but I couldn't find myself to. It was a total chain of **[GOOD THING]** happening and then **[BAD THING]** happening: - Got 10 hours of sleep - Almost got killed on my morning commute - Complete an important task at the start of the day - Fail to complete my main task for the day - Got 500 Pesos worth of Powerload - Forgot to bring my Banapassport so I couldn't play the arcade game I wanted - Got to watch a movie - The guy next to me kept coughing and I got jealous he had someone to watch with The only saving graces of this day was that my commute home wasn't that memorable and I got a ride fairly-quickly. Plus my sister cooked food for me when I got home, so that was really nice of her. I also had enough time left in the day to decompress and process my thoughts. Ultimately, I didn't know where to put my mood for today. It was such a rollercoaster, but since I weigh BOTH the good things and bad things that happened now, I just feel like I'll put it as a good day regardless. Today was pretty freakin' weird, though. And the whole time, I kept thinking of how I ended up on this timeline. But that's a blog post for future me to write about.

Song of the day: Stars by fun.

Journal entry for Monday, January 26th, 2026

Mon, 26 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Yesterday was pretty peaceful, actually. I got some much-needed rest at the start of the day and at the end of the day. I mostly just timed in for work and did my tasks, pretty much like a usual Monday. In my downtime, I mostly used it to catch up on other things like finally watch Frieren because someone has been egging me to watch it. I finally made back my promise of watching it, thankfully. I also had a short call with Luan where he played some Hytale and Banjo-Kazooie but then left because they had dinner. Luan invited us to watch him stream in the late evening but no one was down, unfortunately. I was kind of tired from work as well to make any social interaction and I just had dinner and watched a few more episodes of Frieren before ultimately feeling so tired come 8 p.m. I guess I still haven't paid my sleep debt so I called it an early night and I went to sleep.

Song of the day: Pretty Please by Heart2Hearts

Hanging out as 4!

Sun, 25 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good
Significant Location: SM City BF Paranaque

Sunday had yet another trip going on! This time we'd be 4 people in SM City BF Paranaque, it would be Naomi and her girlfriend Jane, along with Renne and I. I took a while to book a ride and I thought about something on the way there. I eventually arrived at SM BF and I heard that Naomi and the rest had already met up. Naomi teased me a bit and I eventually saw the 3 of them behind me. Naomi was being her cool, chill self, Renne was super shy and didn't even look at me, and Jane was close by Naomi's side. I joked about how Renne was so shy and that she shouldn't be, and the eventually was fine enough and got the courage to talk to me and stuff. I asked them if they're down for Starbucks and they all agreed, and I got their orders. Renne had a cheesecake and java chip, Naomi got the usual strawberry acai drink that I got her before, Jane had this chocolate chip thing, and I got a venti juice drink. All in all, it totaled to 1,000 Pesos but the cashier didn't allow me to use my Apple Wallet to pay for our drinks and said that I should use the app. Which just made me furl my brow a little because I had literally used the same card for thousands of Pesos worth of purchases with no issue. It ticked me off but whatever, I just paid for it all and got seated with the rest of them. We mostly talked about a few things going on in their lives and we took a few pictures. I don't know why, but I made it my duty to make sure that no one felt like they were left out and I asked everyone equally how they were doing, and stuff like that. It felt strange to be the extreme grown-up in this situation, which I kinda was, but it was fun too since I got to play the role of an extrovert again. We eventually finished our drinks and walked around for a bit. After that, we decided on eating at Sumo Niku instead. They told me that it wasn't like their usual *samgyupsal* place before because this was expensive and they could only afford the 200-Pesos ones, but I told them that it was fine and I was paying the bill. We cooked a lot of beef and some pork, but it was mostly beef strips. I somehow made a mistake and ordered a lot of the wagyu cubes that they had, which wasn't everyone's liking, I guess they mostly preferred the beef strips. We mostly talked, shared stories, and I mostly cooked alongside Naomi. I made sure to give everyone a piece of the cooked meat equally and make sure everyone got their orders in. I eventually had to help Naomi finish her food by the end because she wasn't looking great and it seemed like she was full, so I offered to take some of her food. I even ordered some extra *gochujang* because I really like that sauce. I eventually finished my food and then paid for the bill, which was 2,700 Pesos for all 4 of us. I was pretty much fine with it, but I was just initially surprised as my wallet took a beating these past few days, haha. But it's fine, I think I have enough money to go to Korea anyway if I budget properly AND get my visa approved in the first place. We just walked around more after that. We stopped by National Book Store and I asked if Naomi wanted a book for her birthday. She said that she wanted this FNaF book but couldn't find it anywhere so I just took a note of it. Renne said that she wanted to read this book but said that it was expensive, but I secretly took a plastic-wrapped copy of it and eventually bought it. I gave it to her and asked about the book as we were all walking and then gave her the book. It's nice to give them a gift as they gave me a painting that they made, plus I got myself the 3rd book of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid anyway. We walked a bit more but eventually had to part ways. I booked a ride home and eventually got some well-deserved “me time” which I used to catch up on so much stuff. I decided if I would go to my usual hangout, Starbucks on 32nd Street in BGC and if I should bring my MacBook Pro to work there, but decided against it and that I would just catch up on my 21 journal entries at home instead. I spent the majority of the evening just catching up on my journal entries and publishing them at the end. It even extended to the next day, but I'm glad I just locked in and finished all of it in one night.

Song of the day: Billyeoon Goyangi (Do the Dance) by ILLIT

Lyrics that resonated with me:
J'aime danser avec toi

Binondo Food Crawl with the Baguettes

Sat, 24 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Binondo & Poblacion

After yesterday's funny ordeal, I got into a call with my friends and they were just streaming their gameplay of AC: Odyssey. They had fought off the minotaur and eventually got into Atlantis. I also told them that I was surprised to learn recently that Batao owned a restaurant franchise, but they seemed entirely uninterested and even told me that they didn't care. It just rubbed me the wrong way and I decided on just meeting new people to befriend. For whatever reason, they asked me to tell them a story, which made me feel better because it at least showed that they give a shit about what I have to say. I told them about what happened to me and Jaze moments earlier and they seemed pretty interested in hearing it, so that was nice. Our call continued and we just discussed random topics. But at some point, it got emotional and very deep. I told them about my ideology on it: > things that aren't meant to happen, won't happen; consequently, things that are meant to happen, will happen no matter what. There is no such thing as “missing the right person” in my belief, as missing out on the “right” person just means that they're not the real, right person for you. They argued that it was boring and that it means that I believe that everything is predetermined, which I wholly believe that it is. If it isn't meant to work out, no matter what, it would never happen. I saw this first-hand in many of my romantic pursuits, I tried so hard and putting in effort for the girls I liked, and yet I never ended up with any of them. And to this day, I have been single and never found the one for me because the ones that did like me aren't the people for me, and the ones I liked, aren't for me. After this whole thing, they seemed to be in a cheery mood after that and our night continued. I also got them food again, this time it was *tocilog* from Sinangag Express. I didn't get myself food and instead just ate some candies. They played some AC: Odyssey in their free time and I got so sleepy in the morning. I was trying my best to watch through their gameplay and stay up, and they even asked me if I wanted to sleep, which was super thoughtful and sweet of them, but then I told them of my plans to stay up as I was going to leave for my Binondo food crawl with the Baguettes after this. We eventually reach 7 a.m. and I got my sister to prepare some coffee for me and then I left for Binondo. I was super late to get to the meetup as the planned time was 8 a.m., and I eventually arrived at 9:40 a.m. I had extremely miscalculated things and the trip took longer than expected, even though traffic wasn't that bad. I still saw them, it's just that they all had a catching up and breakfast already. We eventually met up and grabbed some *hopia*, and I got a dice one with *munggo* and cashew, which was nice, even though *hopia* isn't really my thing. Walked around after that and we wanted to try this restaurant, but it was full so we walked around some more. We tried some *tanghulu* and it had this weird, wax-like flavor to it, which was interesting but also weird. I took a picture of the Binondo signage and even got some sugarcane drink. I told them that it tasted like *palay*, which it kind of was, as it was just raw sugarcane extract. Meryll, funny enough, laughed at me for it but eventually believed in me as she didn't like the taste much. I took a picture of us as I was the 5th wheel in this. I was in between 2 couples: Max with her boyfriend, and Meryll with her boyfriend. We eventually moved to try out Estero Fastfood and I saw a few cats that were chilling, which was cute. We ate some fried frog legs, which was super weird, but I got used to the taste. A cat came up under our table and it seemed that one of its eyes had gone blind. This broke my heart so much and I was on the verge of crying because I feel so sorry for them and that I didn't give them that much food. I thought on ordering some more food to feed the cat but the menu was so damn expensive, there wasn't a single item worth less than 100 Pesos that I couldn't give to this poor, starving cat. I had to give it some leftovers which I still feel guilty about because I wanted to give this poor cat some food. I was super close to crying but thankfully the cat ate some of the food and we left the table. That cat stuck to my mind and I thought about visiting it some other time to properly give it food. After that, we walked around a bit more, eventually ending up at Café Mezzanine. We waited for a bit to get a table and we eventually got a table for us 5. We talked for a while amongst ourselves while waiting for our food and we planned to go to El Nido, Palawan, in the future once Ben returns to the Philippines again. We had our food and we had a bit of confusion amongst us because we got a lot of food. Thankfully, the bill wasn't that much and I didn't pay much for the amount and quality of food served, which was totally worth because the food was so delicious. We also talked about going to Poblacion later because Ben talked about this bar that had this “midget boxing” thing going on. We were all curious so we agreed to meet later at Poblacion. After paying for the bill and dividing it equally, we parted ways and I went home. The trip home was so long, but it was peaceful once we got near our place. Binondo and Manila in general were super crowded, messy, and just filled with people. Our place seemed so calm and peaceful, there was greenery everywhere. And it made me feel like home. I eventually arrived home safe and gave some of the take-out to my sister, which she liked because she was a fan of the custard bun now. I used the hours to get whatever sleep I can. In the evening, I got prepared to go to Poblacion in the evening. I only got around 5 hours of sleep or so, and I didn't continue with that hotel booking since I didn't want to spend money so soon and I also had a hangout tomorrow. I eventually got there and I was a few minutes late and just missed Max and Meryll. I eventually got to meet them by going inside the bar where the midget boxing thing was going on. Apparently, they had already watched 1 round of it, and I had just missed it. But we stuck around for 1 more round. I kept my AirPods in and turned on this “Loudness Reduction” thing so that my eardrums wouldn't burst as the music in there was so loud. It also reeked of cigarette smell, which I haven't smelled in a long time and even made me gag a bit because I don't smoke at all. We eventually watch the show, eat some *calamares* and potato chips, which took a while because they were apparently cooked at Filling Station, but we enjoyed it and had a bit of laughs at how silly all this was. It was fun regardless and I enjoyed it as I got to spend time with my friends. I joked to Ben how we were exactly 5 people as this seat wouldn't fit 6 people. They told me that I should really get a girlfriend soon so that we're 6 people but I dismissed them as I have been single my whole life. We continue to watch the show and eventually leave once everyone was okay enough. We then went to The Spirits Library and I showed them the way because they were taking the wrong route. I showed them and they wondered how I was already familiar with the place, I told them that I did go here with my former coworkers last year and they teased me a bit, but it was fine. We got inside but stood as the bar's seats were already full. I got a drink, although I don't know what it was. I just got a “cheap” drink of hard liquor worth 250 Pesos, even though I kind of regret getting it as I'm not a drinker at all. It was hard to finish, too, as it burned my throat. Meryll and her boyfriend eventually left first and I accompanied Max and her boyfriend for a bit more through the evening. I eventually got home as Max and her bf were leaving too and I passed by them one more time before ultimately saying goodbye to them. I got home safe and I eventually got some well-deserved rest.

Song of the day: I My MeaN (feat. Kagamine Rin & Kagamine Len) by Hachioji P

Night Ride with Jaze Again!

Fri, 23 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: McKinley Hill

For Friday, I continued it by staying on call with my friends as we watched Single's Inferno. It was pretty nice and some of the women were pretty cool this season. We already had picked our favorites and one of them looked so much like Karina, and as I pointed that out, my friends also said that they had the same thought! It was honestly crazy. She eventually revealed that one of her titles was “Karina of the track” and that was so crazy but also understandable. We loved the first episode but didn't continue watching the second episode as my friends had work and I had helped them out a bit with the website. I also got them food and we ate during the night, but shortly after that I got some rest. For the morning, my Mom, sister, and I had breakfast as it was my Mom's last day in the Philippines for this vacation break. She would go back to Saudi Arabia today and we just enjoyed the meal, talked, took a few pics, had a few emotional hugs before we saw her leave in a Grab ride I booked for her. My sister started crying afterward and I consoled her, but she was eventually okay and I got started on my work. Friday's work had me pulling in a lot of effort just to get this task completed. I put in a lot of effort into completing what was on my plate and I'm glad I was able to complete a bulk of it and be so helpful to my teammate, which was nice. In the evening, I had some spare time and I asked Jaze if he was free today. I had to go home at around 12 midnight because I had a call with my friends, but Jaze eventually agreed and I was glad we got to hang out again! He eventually arrived to our house and we headed off to Venice Grand Canal Mall. We just talked and I caught him up on a few things I was into last year, even showing some pics of what I did last year. We couldn't decide on where to get dinner, but I told him that I've never tried Tom Yang before, he recommended it and we got food there instead. He mostly caught me up on what was happening in his life and how the recent wedding of our friend was, and he showed me a few pictures that were interesting. It was really fun talking to him and hanging out again and I also learned that Tom Yang was actually like a buffet. It reminded me of my time in those 5-star hotels and some hotel stays that had breakfast buffets. We had a hotpot and some meats, and it was really good. I enjoyed some grilled salmon and some grilled beef, and I even had to order more beef that I had to finish by myself because Jaze was so full. He also told me that one of our friends, Batao, owned Chicken Joo. Not just a franchise of it, but the actual brand itself and that was honestly pretty impressive because I haven't heard from him in so long, and he was part of my core group of friends back in 2021. Regardless, it was super fun catching up with Jaze as this was the first time in a while we got to catch up and tell each other of what happened since our last falling out. After eating, we went to Mercury Drug nearby because his girlfriend had an issue with their dog, but that was settled and we went to Assi Fresh Plaza for at Tuscany old times' sake. I ordered a few sweets and some Korean ice cream. I tried some new Samanco flavors and I can say I loved them, especially this custard one. I flipped through some of the Japanese magazine that was on the desk and we were also surprised to see this place have a dining area inside it. It wasn't like this during the pandemic and I can see that they took some cues from FunHanMart because they have a place to cook noodles. I just ate some ice cream while Jaze was standling and walking around, burping because he ate too much. It was kind of funny but I also felt concerned. We eventually headed home and, as we were on the way back, we drove over this pothole and I noticed something fall from the motorcycle and it lit up sparks on the road. I was worried that it was my pocket Wi-Fi or wallet so I asked Jaze to pull over. He tried to get it while I watched over his motorcycle. Weirdly, I noticed that all my items were safe and they were in my pocket the whole time, so I was wondering what fell off the motorcycle. Jaze eventually returned and it was his motorcycle's license plate! He told me how funny it was that he thought that my wallet was now a metal wallet, but he also got shocked to find out that it was his license plate all along. I laughed so hard at the situation but we eventually got back and he dropped me off fine. After that, I got into a call with my friends that extended until the next day.

Song of the day: 5 Years Time - Sun Sun Sun by Noah And The Whale

Journal entry for Thursday, January 22nd, 2026

Thu, 22 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

For Thursday, I spent the start of it in a call with my friends as they wanted me to watch Lake Mungo (2008) to see how I would react. I pretty much enjoyed it and it took me a while to settle in, but I was eventually into it after a few minutes of watching. It seemed like a pretty long movie and it dragged on for a bit, before unveiling the twists in the story which made me hooked into the story. Eventually, we got to the part where the ghost of her dead self appeared to Alice and it absolutely shocked me when it kind of “jumpscared” the audience. I definitely did not expect a jumpscare because this was framed as a “mockumentary” but, wow, that caught me off guard. I eventually finished the movie and I talked about it with my friends before I got some rest. I watched a few more YouTube videos before getting some sleep because the movie scared me a great deal. In the morning, I actually planned to go to the office today, but my friends told me something. I eventually relented because I felt sorry for them and I wanted them to be okay. I just accompanied them through the day and I got them food from Yabu because they've been wanting it for a while, too. They seemed pretty cheery after that and I eventually got to work as they had to rest. The rest of my workday was pretty uneventful and I timed out just fine. In the evening, I got into a call with Luan and eventually my friends joined in for FNaF 2. It was time for us to watch Luan's next gameplay and I got some chips from a nearby *sari-sari* store while watching some of Luan's gameplay. It was actually impressive to me that he played FNaF 2 well and I was on the edge of my seat the whole time because I wasn't sure if he was going to fail or not. But it was really impressive that he got through THE ENTIRE GAME without getting a single jumpscare. He didn't fail once. I had failed FNaF 2 so many times in my recent playthrough but seeing Luan play the game was honestly cool. After that, he played FNaF 3 and he wasn't as great as the last installment because he failed to track Springtrap a few times. I told them that this was my favorite game in the series, too, because I remember playing it a lot around college and it had the least scary jumpscares, but that's what also made it cool. Regardless, Luan eventually called it a day and I then got into a call with my friends and watch them play AC: Odyssey instead. They defeated a cyclops, which was cool. Our call continued to the next day because we also watched season 5 of Single's Inferno.

Song of the day: Cherish (My Love) by ILLIT

Journal entry for Wednesday, January 21st, 2026

Wed, 21 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

For today, I had on-site work and I spent some time spending it in a call with my friends as they faced off against Medusa in AC: Odyssey. I got some rest after they failed at the first fight and it was nice of them to be considerate of my tiredness. After that, I got rest and then got ready in the morning to spend my day in the office. Work was pretty uneventful, but most of it was pretty fun because I finally had my coworkers accompany me and I had lunch out with them. I also sent Luan enough money for FNaF: Sister Location because it was his birthday and he initially said that he didn't have enough money for it. It was really fun to socialize, joke around, laugh, and I even had *merienda* with some of them before I went home. In the evening, I talked to my friends and Luan, and Luan decides to stream Five Nights at Freddy's for us. I got to watch and he actually was skillful at this game. He only got jumpscared and failed a few times, but it was still super fun and he eventually got to complete the game. We planned to stream again for tomorrow and then I hopped on into a call with my friends and they streamed more AC: Odyssey for some of the night as our call went on to the next day.

Song of the day: 5 Years Time - Sun Sun Sun by Noah And The Whale

Journal entry for Tuesday, January 20th, 2026

Tue, 20 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good
Significant Location: Makati

For Tuesday, I tried to sleep early because I would be working on-site today, but I couldn't sleep properly. I just talked to Renne for a bit and then messaged my friends, too, and it was funny because they were so shocked that I replied to their message quickly. They asked why I was awake but they eventually went back to work and I got my rest. In the morning, I just played that song from Noah & The Whale as I needed a mood booster. I then got ready and booked a ride to work. Work today was pretty chill and it was just me in the office. I mostly just fixed this major thing, which was a huge accomplishment to me, even though it was something small. I'm glad I was able to fix it without the help of AI, too, because I feel like I've been using it as a crutch lately and it's stifling my native ability to troubleshoot and debug code. And I'm glad I got to prove myself again. For lunch, I had it at Marugame Udon and I took a picture of Waffle as I passed by them. I just chilled in the office and waited for my sister and Mom to arrive from their IKEA trip. They watched Wicked: For Good and it seems my Mom liked it. We had lunch at Tim Ho Wan and my sister really liked some *hakaw* and that fried custard dumpling that I recommended. After that, we had a bit of an issue getting to the Grab ride because my Mom wanted to take a few pictures. But we eventually got home just fine. In the evening, I got into a call with my friends as they played AC: Odyssey and I also called Renne for a bit, too. After all that, I got some rest as I had to work on-site again tomorrow.

Song of the day: Banana Man by Chonny Jash

New Monitor Day!

Mon, 19 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special

I finally got my new monitor today and that was honestly the main highlight of the day. I spent the start of it arguing and being stressed out at this Grab delivery to that new person I met and the driver was such an asshole. I tried my absolute best to plead with them and they were so thirsty for money, even returning to that person's address and haggling them a tip for the trouble, which is honestly pretty rude. It was such a logistical nightmare that it got me so stressed. But I'm just glad to have it done and I had a short call with that person, Renne, that wrapped up. I finally got my sleep after that. I had work once I woke up and I decided to work from home today because I had that gift from myself arriving. It eventually arrived in the afternoon during my lunch break and I spent the entirety of my lunch break just setting it up and troubleshooting my Linux install, and then making it work at 1440p at 180hz. It was really fun because I was rocking out to this variant of a song I like, it was “Banana Man” but a parody of it by Chonny Jash, which was pretty cool to listen to. I eventually got it all set up and it was worth troubleshooting broken DisplayPort connections on my GPU and setting up my Apple TV with it. I eventually retired the Sony TV that my Mom brought for me more than 10 years ago and she told the story of how it was bought with her first credit card in Saudi Arabia. After that, I continued my work and eventually timed out in the evening. I got to watch my friends play Assassin's Creed: Odyssey on Linux at 1440p and it was so breathtaking to just experience things through this new monitor. In the evening as well, I was able to log into my old GCash account and I got in! The account's suspension was finally lifted and, what's better, was that I was able to save 20K and eventually my salary came in! Holy shit, I couldn't believe it when I saw 100K in my bank account again. Holy fucking crap, having my money at 100K again feels nice and I should really have this amount often. It was kind of disheartening to give Mom 15K so soon (even though she promised to return the amount in February), which knocked that down to just 40K or so at the end of the day after paying so much bills and other stuff. It dampened my day a bit, but whatever, I still counted the good more than the bad and I eventually got into a call again with my friends in the evening.

Song of the day: Banana Man by Chonny Jash

Lyrics that resonated with me:
He says
"look you, you're too uptight you know
You could laugh and kick it back and go
(weeee) but without a rhythm or a rhyme
You do not banana all the time
Fly away from city on the run
Try to make a little fun"

So I say "what's this, fucking 1959?
With the painted face and googly eyes?
And the accent of the Caribbean?
And the imitation simian?
Weren't you born and raised in Michigan?
This banana's gotta stop"

Forget all your morals and go with the flow
Forget about the bad
The good is all you know
And forget about the voice
That's lying deep inside
The one that's screaming and screeching
Proclaiming wrong and right

Tagaytay Trip!

Sun, 18 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: Tagaytay

Our family had an adventure planned for Sunday and it had me waking up pretty early. I couldn't sleep much from last night as my body was still trying to adjust itself from my night shift. But it was honestly fine and I felt okay enough to still tag along. We'd be going to Tagaytay today and my sister's boyfriend would be driving. They woke me up and I got into the car. We quickly drove to Tagaytay, we took the expressway there and our first stop was Picnic Grove. We didn't do much there, actually, aside from just taking pictures and taking in the view. I did try some strawberry *taho* for the fun for it and it was okay, it wasn't something pretty new. But we just walked around more, took a few pics, and I guess the fun part was my sister spotting a poster my friends hung up of a Roblox character, which was funny. We then got back in the car and drove to the next spot which was Starbucks Reserve Hiraya. When we got there, they had this line and it stretched out pretty well. It actually took us a while, too. We waited for more than an hour. In the meantime, Luan offered to stream some Portal 2 but it was this mod called Portal Reloaded which had a time portal and this time travel mechanic, which was pretty cool. Since I had nothing else to do but wait in line, I was down for watching and I guided him in some sections. When we got inside the venue, my cell signal fully cut out and I was forcibly removed from the call due to bad signal. We got our seats allocated and I still stand in line to get our orders. I had a list of what to get them and I also picked out a tumbler for myself as an extra gift, but then I thought about how white this one looked and how it wasn't slim enough for my backpack, so I just put it back. My mom also asked me to put a few pastries, and it was a lot of pastries. I had to pay for everything upfront and it all totaled to 2,600 Pesos, which seemed excessive, especially since we had just planned to get coffee here and our main event was eating *bulalo*. I still pay for the bill and head back to our table and even my sister gets shocked at the bill. This leads to my mom having a tantrum and storming out of the place which just surprises me and I roll my eyes at this because this is exactly how I deal with some of my problems. But I do the adult thing and chase after her and convince her to come back. It was seriously a weird thing to play the adult in this interaction, but whatever. I just try to not put too much thought into it otherwise my brain might melt down or something. I eventually escort her back and convince her to sit between me and my sister. We just ate and I notice her tear up and cry a bit, but I thought that the best decision to make her was to let her process her feelings on her own and not ask why she feels like crying or something. Eventually, things become okay enough, and I continue eating my raspberry tartlet which was too sour for me to finish. After waiting for a while, we went out and I withdrew some money to have some spare cash. We went back to the car and headed to Mushroomburger. Mushroomburger was a pretty quick stopover compared to the others. We mostly tried their mushroom fries and I actually ordered a lot of their mushroom fries (around 3 buckets at least). My sister's boyfriend tries them out and he thankfully likes it because he says he hasn't had this before, only the burger. Mom also tries it and she likes it, and my sister likes the burger she ordered a lot, along with the fries and even the mushroom *siomai* I ordered for myself but gave my sister some of. After that, we went to our last destination for the day: Mahogany Beef Market & Bulalohan. We parked easily and we went upstairs to a *bulalohan* that my sister said was good. We got seated and then ate some *bulalo* which was pretty great. The beef here was pretty soft and I was so used to having so many hard beef chunks in *bulalo* so this was a nice surprise. I also ordered some *chicharon bulaklak* on the side and that was also pretty good, so I felt kinda full by the end because we had already eaten so much from our past stops. It was nice, all in all, and mom and I ordered some take-out for my sister's boyfriend's family and then I carried all of my mom's stuff so she could feel better while walking around. I just walked around with her, we bought some *lanzones* to take home and went back to the car so we could all go home. During the trip, they took a weird route that wasn't on the expressway, and we spent an hour or so just driving through Cavite. During that time, my phone's battery was dangerously low but I still kept playing music because I was bored. We drove through more road and even passed by Nuvali Park in Laguna, which seemed cool. We eventually got to CAVITEX and, from there, went to SLEX. It seems that my sister's phone had died and so had her boyfriend's phone, because they were using my sister's Samsung tablet as a GPS. My iPhone was hovering around 6-10% battery at this moment and I was getting worried, but we passed by Alabang quickly and we were already in NCR. Somehow, in their infinite wisdom and sheer geniusness, they decided to exit SLEX at C5, NOT at SM Bicutan. This was honestly a stupid as fuck move. Not only did they pay for **MORE MONEY AT THE TOLL GATE**, but we ALSO GOT STUCK IN TRAFFIC FOR MORE THAN AN HOUR. The car also had issues climbing up hills and there was this Catholic festival-thing going on that blocked several roads. This was such a fucking facepalm because they could have just exited SLEX in Bicutan but they made this bonehead move that cost us so much time and gas. They seriously wasted so much time, money, and gas. I was already kind of livid and tired at this point because I had been wanting to go to the bathroom in so long. It was also traffic around our way home so we had to take this shortcut that I thankfully knew, otherwise we would have spent an hour or so more. Fucking hell, the drive back home was absolute bullshit and we didn't have powerbanks at all so we were kind of screwed, honestly. We eventually got home and I was just tired and done from the trip, I swear. Today was planned to be a quick trip to Tagaytay but so much drama and stupidity happened in a day that I'm honestly just glad to have been home. I was really emotionally drained and I just chilled by myself for the rest of the day and enjoyed the rest of the weekend. I got into a call with Luan and I was just guiding him through some Portal Reloaded stages. While helping him, Naomi's girlfriend Jane introduced me to her friend that wanted to get to know me. I agreed and talked to them while helping Luan with his gameplay. Also in the evening, we also had more of the *bulalo* from Tagaytay for dinner, which was pretty nice.

Song of the day: Helena Beat by Foster The People

Journal entry for Saturday, January 17th, 2026

Sat, 17 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: BGC

Today was a pretty cool and fun day and it was the last day of me doing night shift for the week. I just spent it while on call with my friends and I eventually timed out after my shift. My friends streamed some of their Cookie Run: Kingdom gameplay and then we also watched some cave diving videos, which were cool. Our call continued until our usual 10 a.m. and that's when we left the call. I got some sleep and in the afternoon we planned to go out tonight. I also finally ate some *liempo* and we had some food at our house.. I woke up and got ready to leave first as I had an issue activating my SIM card. But after visiting my cell provider again, I was able to make it work! It was such a cool thing to see my first SMS text from that number get sent! I also got a text back from my sister, which was shocking. After that, I tried to get the GCash account suspension lifted because I had it suspended until further use. I took a few pictures for identification and that was it. It seems the issue was that the number was somehow blocked, too. But I'm glad it's working now! I then went to Starbucks Shangri-La The Fort - 3rd Avenue and I actually passed by Nikka and her boyfriend, which was a total shocker. I didn't want to seem nosy and intrude upon them so I tried taking a pic and standing in front of them to see if she will notice, but she didn't. I just went inside and got my order and then messaged Nikka through Instagram. I told her that my family and I were chilling here and that I passed by her and her boyfriend, which was funny. We didn't meet up or anything and our chat ultimately ended. Eventually, my Mom and sister arrived and met up with them. We planned to get a massage at Breeze Oriental Spa and, like before, we just tried to walk in. But I was already facepalming since we didn't get a reservation and they still tried to book a massage, and I already knew how it was going to turn out. We got in and immediately got rejected as they told us that they were booked for the evening. Part of me feels disappointed because I already told them that this place was super busy and we wouldn't get in without a reservation. We ultimately just decided to have some ice cream and we walked to Central Square Mall. We got some gelato at our usual place Venchi Cioccolato e Gelato before and we chilled at Muji upstairs as we grabbed some drinks. I was fiddling with my SIM card on how to get it to turn into an eSIM but I ultimately gave up. We went downstairs as we planned to go home afterward but my Mom stopped by Shake Shack to get some fries. Our ride eventually arrived and we went home to finish some of the food that we had cooked in the morning.

Journal entry for Friday, January 16th, 2026

Fri, 16 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: BGC

For today, nothing much went on aside from me and my friends still being in a call from yesterday. I eventually finished my night shift and my friends played The Sad Story of Emmeline Burns again. I also looked around and randomly thought of that SIM number I had before. I found the SIM bed for it and I figured I should get access to it again. I decided that it was worth the hassle because I finally found the SIM bed and that the GCash inside had around 2,000 Pesos worth inside. I decided on going there after my call with my friends. They eventually finished The Sad Story of Emmeline Burns and they tried to stream AC: Odyssey for a bit while I tried to replace my SIM card. I went to this law office to get an affidavit of loss and got it notarized. I then went to my cell provider and gave out the document, a few ID photos, and I eventually got it back! Well, I got a replacement SIM that had my number, but it was cool enough. I was told to wait a day or so for it to be fully activated so I just waited. After that, I went back home to get some proper rest as I was done with my trip for the day. In the evening, I finished the rest of The Backrooms videos with my friends and Luan and I got into a call with my friends as they played some AC: Odyssey. Our call continued up until the next day.

Song of the day: Regent's Park by Bruno Major

Journal entry for Thursday, January 15th, 2026

Thu, 15 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

The day started with me still working through my night shift and being in a call with my friends. They showed me a funny video that their friends were doing that was this “1 hour of a day in my life” thing and they did this fake-out with this fake cigarette stick that actually blew bubbles instead of smoke. After that, we just continue our call and I got off work. They just play more AC: Odyssey until we both left the call at around our usual 10 am or so. Nothing much happens in the afternoon but in the evening my friends, Luan, and I got into a call and we watch the first video to a new series we'll watch: The Backrooms by Kane Pixels. We watched the first few videos which was kind of intriguing. I also got that gift for myself: a new monitor from Samsung! I've always wanted a high refresh rate monitor and I've had so much money pass through my hands and yet I have used the same Sony TV as my monitor for more than a decade now. I found a deal that made the monitor pretty cheap and I didn't think twice about ordering it since it was a well-deserved gift to myself. I eventually got it ordered while we were still watching The Backrooms and then we finish up what we can as Luan had to sleep and the next video in the series was 45-minutes long or so. I had some work and my friends and I got into a call, they played AC: Odyssey for a while and our call continued until the next day.

Journal entry for Wednesday, January 14th, 2026

Wed, 14 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

For Wednesday, I started it by continuing my night shift and eventually wrapping up with it. My friends and I were still on the same call and we watched a few videos from ILLIT, which I liked since my friends and I finally got to watch it. I also gave them some money for food, so it was nice that we ate together. In the morning, I told them about this cool thing about ChatGPT's Deep Research feature. I told them that it can help them find some really obscure thing that's hard to Google. I told them that while they were playing AC: Odyssey and they told me to try and look for this visual novel game they played before. It kind of had this cute ghost story and I eventually found it! I told them if that was the game and they were so happy I found it! It was The Sad Story of Emmeline Burns and my friends streamed it for me while we were on call. It was nice to see them play it and they seemed to like the story. They read most of it in their British accent, so that was cool to hear. After that, we just had our usual shenanigans, they showed me their Nommi again and played a bit more of AC: Odyssey before we went off the call for the day. In the evening, I woke up and saw a few notifications on my Apple Watch that summarized a few emails I got. I thought that Taylor Swift was going to have a concert in the Philippines but it was just a mis-summarization of some Google Alerts and I showed that to my friends. Eventually, we got into a call with Luan and we watched this found-footage film called The Borderlands (2013) which was pretty scary. It really got me at some parts, so that was nice. After that, I got into a call with my friends and I played some Cookie Run: Kingdom while I just passed the time waiting for my night shift work. I finally got Shadow Milk Cookie from this Dominion of the Beasts event and I was able to promote them because I had bought some soulstones. After that, our call continued to the next day.

Song of the day: Perfect Night by LE SSERAFIM

Journal entry for Tuesday, January 13th, 2026

Tue, 13 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

For Tuesday, I just worked the night shift and I was still in a call with my friends. They showed me that cute Nommi doll they got, which admittedly was pretty cute. My shift continued and I just worked on my usual set of tasks. After my shift, I mostly just watched my friends play AC: Odyssey and some Prehistoric Kingdom. But after that, we both left the call to get some sleep. In the evening, nothing much happened and I just watched my friends play AC: Odyssey and my night shift started after. Nothing much went on for the day.

Song of the day: Sunday Morning by ILLIT

A Productive Monday

Mon, 12 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Korea Visa Application Center in Manila

For Monday, I was tasked to work the night shift for this week and I made the most out of my day by applying for that Korean visa in the morning. I got there quite early, I think. I planned to get there by 10 a.m. or so, just as the place was just opening. But I spent breakfast at home which took sometime, and I got confused with the directions, went to SM Aura first and then finally at Brittany Hotel, and eventually got myself at the front desk at around 11:40 a.m. or so. I had messed up the paper sizes, but the lady at the front desk was kind enough to show me the right way and I eventually fell back in line and got a number. I found a seat nearby and waited until my number was called, which took hours. I didn't mind the wait and it actually gave me some time to focus on the music I was listening to, and to look at lyrics on Apple Music the whole time. After my number was called, I submitted my documents and hoped to get an answer soon. I actually went home after that because I was feeling pretty tired. But then my sister called me and said that they were at SM Aura, too. I had to decide to go back to SM Aura and I also brought my sister's Samsung tablet with me. When I booked an *Angkas* ride, I got the same driver! I had the same driver going home from SM Aura and then BACK to SM Aura. The situation was so funny to me because we just went in a loop, with the driver eventually ending up at the same place. The whole situation was just super funny to me. Eventually I met up with my Mom and sister. We decided to eat at Samgyupsalamat but we had to hurry up because they had to catch a movie and I had a meeting in the evening and I didn't want to be late for that. We just ate for a while, and even the staff commented how we were quick with our stay. My Mom and sister eventually left first while I paid the bill, but eventually they came back as they didn't want to leave me behind, which was sweet of them. We walked back to SM Aura and they eventually watched the movie while I thankfully found a quick ride back home. I was starting to worry a bit because my phone's battery was depleting and I had it on full brightness while listening to music earlier, but it was all good and I got home in time for my meeting. My meeting eventually started and I had some free time before my shift. My friends, Luan, and I eventually watched some Ted the Caver story on YouTube. It was pretty okay, but nothing that gripped me into the story. After that, my friends and I got into a call.

Song of the day: Sunday Morning by ILLIT

Another Walk to Remember

Sun, 11 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Special
Significant Location: BGC

Sunday was completely tiring! My mom and sister wanted to exercise and that exercise meant going to BGC. My mom and I decided to walk there, while my sister and her boyfriend will bike there. My sister went out first to meet with her boyfriend since they were both cyclists and Mom and I were going to walk there on foot. We walked to BGC on foot, entirely on foot. We didn't even take a tricycle or anything, we just walked. It was 18,500+ steps and ~13 kilometers of walking! My feet were absolutely **killed** by the time we got there. It was extremely tiring and I struggled at some parts, but fuck, was that totally worth it. I am glad that I just kept silently going and pushing through the extreme pain because I was able to prove to myself that I really am strong and resilient through hardship, which was a pretty good achievement for myself. Our walk ended at Terra 28th as we usually did, and my sister and her boyfriend eventually met up with us. We had breakfast at Tiong Bahru Bakery nearby and just talked about plans for next week's weekend. We planned to just drive to Tagaytay and my sister's boyfriend would be the one driving us there. After eating breakfast, we all went home and I just chilled at home until the evening. For the evening, we left for our usual mass at Greenbelt church. We had some Peri-Peri Charcoal Chicken afterwards and I got a free plate of food so that was pretty nice. We then went home afterward.eep playing Assassin's Creed: Odyssey. That call went on until the next day since I had nothing to do anyway.

Song of the day: Billyeoon Goyangi (Do the Dance) by ILLIT

Helping Out Exavier!

Sat, 10 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

For Saturday, I continued it by accompanying my friends throughout the night. They spent some time working and we watched a few YouTube videos here and there. We also ordered food for tonight and I got some Wendy's chicken fingers while we watched some video on YouTube about women flying to Korea for their boyfriends, which was intriguing. I accompanied them until the morning and we eventually left the call and I got some rest. In the afternoon, I went to Exavier's house so we can do some dev work and I could coach/teach him on a few things. I taught him how to code React a bit, but we mostly set up his website and I showed him how to buy a domain. We also talked about work and about our former colleagues, which was funny to think about. I also saw his newborn that I was the uncle to, and he was cute. I also saw his parenting style and how his kid responded to him, which was such a cool insight because I figured I'd have a kid by now. It just made me think about my own situation as well because I've been single since birth, but whatever. After setting up Exavier's site, I tried to print a few things for this Korean visa I'll be applying for. We had a few printer issues, especially on macOS and since I only had a MacBook Pro. Exavier had to try cleaning the printer head using the printer tools on Windows. He eventually made it work and I had to walk back to my house. For the rest of the evening, nothing much happened aside from me having dinner at home and sleeping.

Finally Watching Together???

Fri, 09 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

For most of the day, work just passed by and I just spent it just focusing on my tasks. That's how my first work week ended: uneventfully. Which I'm not sure if that's a good or bad thing. In the evening I got into a call with my friends and Luan and we finally played Peak again today! It was super fun playing Peak with them again and, on our first run, we got up until the kiln where we had some trouble getting up, and eventually we all died and couldn't make it. But it was fine and we got some new outfits along the way. My friend saw our new outfits and we all did another run as I guided them on how to get it. We tried jumping up and down on the mushrooms several times but they weren't getting the achievement, for whatever reason. We all eventually stopped playing and only then did my friends realize that they had gotten the achievement. I just figured that they had Steam notifications fully turned off, that's why the achievement didn't pop up for them. We eventually all left the game but somehow got together in a Discord call to watch a movie. We watched Noroi: The Curse (2005) and I've watched it several times at this point, at least 3. But I still watched it with them and my friends didn't seem to pay attention at first, but I guess they eventually did and liked the movie. After watching, my friends and I got into a call and I just accompanied them the whole night like usual.

Journal entry for Thursday, January 8th, 2026

Thu, 08 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

I decided to spend my workday at home because I wanted to rest and yesterday's trip got me a bit tired. I spent the first few hours on call with my friends and we watched a few YouTube videos, I helped them out with their work website, and we watched some K-Pop music videos from UNIS and NewJeans. For most of the day, nothing much happened, and I spent my evening with my friends while we got on call and they streamed AC: Odyssey. Nothing much else happened and we eventually left the call for the next day.

Song of the day: STYLE by Heart2Hearts

Journal entry for Wednesday, January 7th, 2026

Wed, 07 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

For Wednesday, it was another day at work and this time I had more of my coworkers come to the office today, which was nice. I had lunch with them and in the afternoon we grabbed some *merienda* in the form of some pastries. It was funny because my coworker and I couldn't pronounce some of the pastries. I still bought an *eclair* regardless, which was nice because I bought one that had strawberries. In the evening, my mom and sister planned to meet me around Greenbelt where we would meet up and have dinner together. I met up with them after work and we decided to have dinner at Buffalo's Wings 'n Things at Glorietta. The chicken we tried was really delicious, and we got a family platter that had a few things. Mom liked it as well, so that was nice. My sister and I mostly had some of the flavors we ordered and we had the rest for take-out. While eating, my sister went to Landmark because she had to buy cheap wired earphones for us because we wanted to play Maimai DX again at Timezone. We went to Timezone to play for a while and it was really such a great experience with wired earphones on. It totally helped us focus more on the Vocaloid songs and I don't know if it was the earphones or just us gaining skill for this game, but we got better at it. It was mostly my sister having a significant gain in her score because she had an **S+** rating, and she was the first of us to get a rating, so that was pretty cool. Mom also got us a pretzel from Auntie Anne's which I just ate as we went home. For the evening, I mostly just relaxed. I had some time and got into a call with my friends and they showed me their Hacipupu, which looked cute. They also played some AC: Odyssey, which I streamed and we stayed on call for quite a while before sleeping.

Song of the day: Leave Before You Love Me by Marshmello & Jonas Brothers

To Apple Music!

Tue, 06 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent

Today was the day I decided to just fully migrate everything from Spotify to Apple Music. I'll miss Spotify so much because it had “Scrobbling” support built-in. I'd have to download scrobblers for macOS, my iPhone, and my Google Pixel, but whatever, I decided that it was worth the hassle. Aside from that, it was another day in the office for me so I decided to commute to the office like usual. I just worked on tasks like usual and only 1 other coworker came in today, so it was just me and him spending lunch together, which was pretty chill. I also had *merienda* but it was by myself and I tried out some coffee and beef *kaldereta* since they had it and I've never been here before, so I decided to give it a try. My usual workday followed and I just went home after clocking out for the day. In the evening, I decided to just cancel my Spotify subscription and move over some playlists from Spotify to Apple Music. I mostly just updated the playlist covers, selected new images for them, and just did some general housekeeping. I also got in a call with my friends and they just played Assassin's Creed: Odyssey in the evening. We eventually left the call around midnight or so because I still had on-site work the next day.

Song of the day: Leave Before You Love Me by Marshmello & Jonas Brothers

Journal entry for Monday, January 5th, 2026

Mon, 05 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good

Monday was finally the start of my work week and I decided to kick off the first workday of the year by going to the office. I didn't plan on it for last year, I just made the decision to spend my first day like this. I got ready and booked a ride to the office, and the ride there was a little difficult, but I eventually got there fine. For most of the day, I was just alone and working on my own tasks while the hours passed. For lunch, I also had it alone and I had a few thoughts about this year, and how last year was. After that, I just went home like usual. I spent time with my friends in the evening and we got into a stream that lasted to the next day but I didn't stay long.

Song of the day: Stop by Spice Girls

Lyrics that resonated with me:
Stop right now, thank you very much
I need somebody with a human touch
Hey you, always on the run
Gotta slow it down, baby, gotta have some fun

Journal entry for Sunday, January 4th, 2026

Sun, 04 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Good
Significant Location: Makati

Sunday I kind of felt anxious at a lot of things. I think I was a bit anxious that today was the last day of my 2-week vacation and it felt really long at times, but also felt really short and, like, I didn't spend it much with friends. I tried to make the most of out it by browsing IG Reels all night and I even watched a movie called No Other Choice (2025) which was pretty long. After that, I had breakfast with my family for a bit and even got into a bit of an argument on some online forum, but it was all fine after breakfast. I slept for half of the afternoon and we just prepared to leave for mass at Greenbelt Church for the rest of the afternoon. We then got ready and booked a ride to Greenbelt Church where we had ChaTraMue before attending mass. After that, we had Ramen Nagi which was nearby, and we walked around for a bit more after that. We then went to Timezone in Glorietta where my sister and I played the Maimai DX Twin arcade game again. I saw this skilled guy with an equally-skilled girlfriend(?) accompanying him and they just played together. My sister and I played and we had some difficulty, but we had fun. I kept looking at the guy and how happy he seems with his girlfriend. It made me super sad that I don't have someone like that in my life. It made me more sad when I realized that I don't even have my own person to do fun stuff with, which sucks. I thought for a second if someone was that person, but as I've pondered many times, the answer is no because they can't even do the basic things. Which means either that person for me is out there somewhere, or that they don't exist at all. It kind of put me in a downcast mood for the rest of the evening because it triggered my anxiety for a bit. I need to do something with my life. I need to learn and pick up a technology, upskill, change something, pick up a hobby, and finally meet proper people IRL who aren't selfish and wholly about themselves. Funny enough, I enjoyed my day despite having my anxiety and sadness triggered. I got to spend the day with family and I was actually alone and able to squeeze what I want out of my day. I talked to someone for a bit but then they disappeared after I told them that I would eat this pretzel from Auntie Anne's that my mom gave me. I finished the pretzel and we went home shortly afterward. We reminisced about the time we spent at Dusit Thani over Christmas, which kind of makes me feel nostalgic about it, too. We eventually got home and I just rested and browsed IG Reels until I slept for my work the next day.

Song of the day: STYLE by Heart2Hearts

Journal entry for Saturday, January 3rd, 2026

Sat, 03 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Above Average

Saturday started with me still accompanying someone from last night. We hard ordered food and I think I overate considering the amount of take-out I got. I just convinced myself that I'll eat less food later in the day to sort of balance this thing. I just watched some commentary videos with someone as the night went on and they did some work but also kept playing Assassin's Creed. Around the morning or so, they took a nap for their work break and I also used that time to nap since nothing was going on. They eventually woke up around 7 a.m. but I kept sleeping. I woke up for a bit but then just went back to sleeping because I was really tired. For the rest of the day, nothing much happened as I was just at home and relaxing. I just browsed IG for most of the day and spent it alone. Someone messaged me for a bit, which was a surprise on a weekend, but they eventually just went away and I was just alone for most of the evening.

Song of the day: All Time Low by Jon Bellion

Journal entry for Friday, January 2nd, 2026

Fri, 02 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Average

For January 2, nothing much really happened and I just spent it at home. In the evening, someone messaged me and they explained their situation. Shortly after, we got into a call and I mostly just watched them keep playing Assassin's Creed: Odyssey. That call went on until the next day since I had nothing to do anyway.

New Year's Day

Thu, 01 Jan 2026 12:00:00 GMT

Mood: Excellent
Significant Location: Samgyupsalamat BGC

New Year's day 2026 was pretty fun, my family and I were in this big crowd that's just shoulder-to-shoulder with people. We got our phones out and my paranoia was somehow high for today because I thought a stampede would occur or some crazy thing would happen. But no, thankfully, we just celebrated the coming of the next year and watched some fireworks for a bit. After that, we kept walking to Burgos Circle so we could find a ride. We managed to find some seats and I walked around to find a nearby bathroom, but when I returned, we still didn't have a ride booked yet. We walked to Starbucks on 8 Forbestown Road so we could chill there, but it was closed. So we decided to just wait there on the empty chairs until we booked a ride. Thankfully, we got one and we were on our way home. We arrive home just fine and I just did a few programming tasks because I had to update my site for 2026. I added in a few things, wrote my journal entry for December 31st, and deployed my code online. I cleaned up before I got into a call with my friends. I mostly watched them play Assassin's Creed: Odyssey for a bit and they played for a good hour or so. After that, they just rested and we watched a few scary YouTube videos until morning. I noticed them sleeping so I disconnected us from the call and they immediately woke up after. They essentially tried to convince me to stay up with them for their entire night shift since this would be the last time I'd stay up with them for their night shift for a while because they have an upcoming trip and we won't get to talk for a while. I just gave in and continued to accompany them. We watched some videos about this horror channel named Product and they continued to fall asleep while the video was playing. They woke up for a bit due to work but they ultimately kept on sleeping again. Around 9:40 a.m. or so, it was already morning and I was so tired by this time. We eventually had to call it off since they were going to time out for work and sleep anyway, and I got my sleep by then as well. Nothing much happened and I woke up in the late afternoon. My family and I planned to eat at Samgyupsalamat because we weren't able to eat there yesterday. We all got ready and, thankfully, there wasn't a super-long line to get in. When we arrived, we waited for a bit for our table to get prepared and we eventually got seated. We ate a lot of food for this sitting, mostly cabbage and kimchi. We had a lot of servings of beef and some pork that my Mom wanted to try since she hasn't had it in a while. We enjoyed the food and we were so full by the end, but we had fun and our cravings were satisfied for tonight. Since we ate a lot, we decided to walk around BGC for a bit more, mostly walking to Fully Booked where my sister bought a new book about the Wicked franchise. We then walked to Starbucks on 32nd Street so we could get drinks and I could complete my 18 stickers. I ordered 4 drinks and, while waiting in line, the guy asked me where I got my Cinnamoroll AirPods case. I just told them that I got it online and they thanked me. I made my order and got my free mug for completing my Starbucks 2026 Collection required stickers. We drank our drinks and had trouble booking a ride, and then we eventually got a ride home and got some rest. I updated my site's code for a bit before going to sleep.

Song of the day: I Wanna Be The One by fun.