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Ahhhh!  This thing is finally up and working again!  It was down for like 2 days!  Hmm.  Now I need a little time to recover my thoughts.  Oh my god.  I think my pictures, which were some of my best yet, got deleted somehow.  Man.  That's pretty upsetting.

They were pictures of bead street, pictures of the neighboring areas which gave a better context of what things look like, pictures to prove that my addiction to scratchers makes me worldly, evidence of the first good food I made for myself here, and others.  Damn it.  Perhaps some savvy computer whiz can help a brotha out and get them things back to me.  I am utterly confused by the programs that say they can recover this sort of thing.  None of them have been recognizing the camera when I have it plugged in, though most of them brag that they can recover files even directly from a digital camera.  Boooo.

Enough of that.  Let me try to convey some idea about the last couple days.  My meeting with another hospital got cancelled.

But, that meant yesterday was the perfect outing to a magical world in Cebu referred to as 'bead street.'  This is the place where a bunch of people, generally who wholesale pieces of jewelry to various companies and designers, sell stuff.  It is a series of about 16 cramped stalls filled with beads and jewelry:

They sell finished items for super cheap, some of which I bought.  But, that is not what my game is all about.  I got so many strands of beads for makin' shit.  They have piles and piles of loose beads in bags on the floor, stacked to about 3ft high.  There are a bunch of strings hanging out the walls.  It's amazing.

I do have a picture of my bead booty (but the awesome picture of one of the stalls I bought some wonderful things from is MIA):

And you haggle because Jo Jo is with you and can get a better deal.  And, all this feeds well into sensations of white guilt.  All that stuff above cost me less than $7.50.  Those two necklaces on the left were far too expensive at 60 pesos a piece, so Jo Jo talked her down to 30 ea.  That is $0.70.  I cannot wait to go back again.  (Pssst.  Veronica, if you are reading this, I picked out the coral strands to the right, that bracelet on the bottom and some turquoise strands on the left for you, if you like them.  No big deal if you do not, I can always use them.)  If someone has their eye on something else, lemme me know.  Like I said, I have every intention of going back.  Julienne, I foresee a Cebu bead crafting day in our future.

Then, I met Jo Jo's husband when we all went out for some AMAZING Thai/Vietnamese fare at Lemongrass, a restaurant in the majestic Ayala mall.

I ate this

And this (but longer; they are shrimp quenelles on a sugar cane skewer.  mmmmmmm)

Some of the most amazing green curry with chicken I have had ever, and then squid pieces deep fried in a sweet potato and chili batter with some awesome sauce.  I also had 2 of these:

Afterwards, I took them  to go get gelato.  The place features 6 mango flavors.

I had the passion fruit mango gelato.  Wonderful.

Today, war is back on with these ants though.  Beezer gave me a tip about vinegar and ants hating it, but I ain't got none.  Neither does the pharmacy down the street (360 Pharmacy).  Let me down.

They also do not have the tape I was hoping to find, since I discovered a large population of the ants living in the overflow drain in the bathroom sink.  I blew on a little ant that was crawling on the edge of it so he would go away, and they flooded out.  I was debating taking video but saved you from having to watch it.  Now, I have a very real question to pose: what the f*%# is this?

I understand you would have preferred to have been spared the image, but I LIVE WITH WHATEVER THIS IS!  IN MY KITCHEN!!  And, I didn't find it until today.  Hahahah.  Gross.  I know everyone was really thinking: wow!  Look at the macro setting on that camera!

It's time I showed you pictures of where I live, so you can also get impressed about the wide angle lens too

Pretty view of Ol' Cebu

Facing out to the street from the end of the driveway of Pete's

Justice isn't done in this image to show the 45 degree incline up that drive.  It seems vertical in 90 degree weather.  (There has got to be some clever right angle joke in there somewhere.)  

Walking down that path each day makes me really happy.  I am not exactly sure why; maybe that is the first time each day that I am really, truly in Asia/Philippines/Cebu.  It's a good feeling.  Outside of my apartment for the last few hours, someone was playing some Bowie and then some Smiths.  I wanna find out where it was coming from!  It would be so awesome to meet people my age to hang out with.  But, I am also in the company of some wonderful people.  In case you haven't noticed a theme yet, Jo Jo is a wonderful, wonderful hostess and has been taking me around a whole lot.  She is having me over for dinner at her house tomorrow!  So, I made her some jewelry today.  I hope she likes it!

That concludes our session today.