Fun Things!

This weekend was Ben’s birthday, so Tim, Ben, me, and a few of Ben’s Filipino friends went to Bacolod Saturday and Sunday. Here’s the funnest thing. I bought SIXTEEN movies for $4. They are so cool, they come in from China, and they are 8-in-1 DVDs for $2 (100 pesos). So I bought two. Here’s the movies I got: Back to the Future 1-3, Freaky Friday, Chicago, American Dreamz, Pret A Porter, Millions, High School Musical, and some other ones. Actually I really only got 15 movies cause American Dreamz is on both discs. They aren’t top quality, like real DVDs, but they do have menus and were not shot in a movie theater, and come in real packaging. They are probably illegally imported from China, but they are awesome. So are the movie descriptions. Here’s the description, verbatim, for Back to the Future: “Dawn with a time machine back to the strange Boshibulang 1955, after a series of thrilling experiences, the two finally returned to 1985. However, the calm Not long after, strange and sudden Dr. entered the dawn of life, as he once again time to travel to the future and found some strange things might jeopardize the dawn of the next child, in order to ensure the future of Matignon family, and he and Dr. strange time again onto the shuttle machines to 2015.” Wow, sounds compelling, no?
A little thing but it’s fun, and fun things make me happy: I went to buy more minutes for my cell phone, and they had a bunch of phone covers for sale. I asked if they had any for my phone, which is kind of an older, cheap-o model. The lady looked apologetic, and said, ‘all we have is Dora the explorer.’ Perfect!! I love Dora! So now I have a super fun phone cover.
So that was awesome. Saturday night we went out, and first we got Pizza, which is great just in itself, cause I love pizza, and it’s not exactly available everywhere here. We got the giant party pizza, it is 30 inches across!! We couldn’t finish it. Not even close. After that we went to videoke, which is actually way more entertaining than karaoke is in the states, I think. I even did a rousing rendition of “I want to break free” by Queen, and we were all jumping up and dancing around, cause everyone secretly just wants to break free. I also got a perfect 100 score on ‘Pinoy Ako’. Everyone was impressed, because that is a Tagalog song. That was fun. I also played a round of pool with one of the Filipinos, and almost beat him. Really. I only had one ball left, and he had three, but then he got them all in and the 8 ball. But I was close.
Another fun thing is that I’ve started buying stuff for my house, with my host mother’s help. I bought a bucket and dipper (very essential), and a rice pot (also very essential.) I was going to buy the smallest rice pot, but my host mom said, what if Tim comes over to eat, you should buy the next biggest one. Tim can put away the rice. I got some pillows, and an electric water heater. The furniture could be a bit of a issue, but I do have a bed, so that’s the most important thing. Also fun is that they tiled my bathroom, before it was just a nasty concrete floor! Seriously, having a tiled bathroom floor is just so incredibly awesome, I can’t begin to tell you.
One more fun thing is this fruit called rambutan. I don’t think they are available in the states, but here they grow on trees all over the place. They are funny looking fruit, and taste sweet. We got a bunch for free cause they are in season now. I like them. They are funny looking but nice tasting.