| connecting |

The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf

Some of the alumni during the weekly meeting. Ate Jing is absent because she is in Bacolod trying to catch chickens (chicken bacolod bala haw!). Ram and Alex are also somewhere due to some errands.

Next month, March, a number of the alumni are getting older(party! party! party!). Here’s the list:

Jean -5

Alex -7

Grace-15

Fems, Ttarts-21

Ram- 26

Esther’s news report for Jan 2007

Dear Friends,

I forget if I told everyone that my boss isn’t sure she can renew my
contract as her paralegal come April. It’s a tricky situation because our
major client (and source of income, I might add) is being hounded by legal
issues and it will affect her practice if they decide to resign from the
company. Suffice to say, it will affect me too. I am still hopeful because
we might be able to work through it. I have given it and entrusted my
needs to the Lord, and at the same time I’m looking around for other jobs.

I feel like it’s not time to leave Saipan yet. I have a lot of unfinished
business, and I’d really want to deepen my friendships with the people
here. I have hit the 2 year mark and instead of wanting to leave, I still
want to stay. I have a youth group that my friend from church, Nicole,
and I oversee too.

Financially, if I stay I’ll be able to save enough for Canada, if and when
my job application pushes through. My parents are in Ottawa, and they,
together with my youngest sister have put in their application for
permanent residency.

We’re moving to a new office!!! It’s a place BESIDE my boss’s house,
close to where I work right now. It’s a bungalow with 2 rooms annexed to it
that will serve as the offices. In the bungalow proper, 2 of the bedrooms
will be mine, plus a toilet and bath, and the 3rd will be used for
supplies and storage. I’ll have privacy though because we’re installing a
door in the hallway to
separate my quarters from the rest of the house.

The living room will be converted into a foyer/reception and the part I
love most is the BIG kitchen.  There’s a sliding door that leads to the
back garden and my boss is going to put a patio/deck there for BBQs.  I
feel like it’s my own house. Hehehehe….

I can FINALLY invite you over for a meal! And cook! And entertain!

I’ll be far from the beach now, but this time I’ll be seeing it from atop
the hill.  There’s a hilly road that winds behind the new place and it
will be good course for running and fitness. My officemate, Norman
Camacho  is a surfer and he’s looking forward to running there too.

I love the quiet of the place. My current apartment compound is full of
roosters for cockfighting and many cars in the parking lot.  I’ve started
moving some of my stuff to the new place and made arrangements to
terminate my rent, that way I don’t spend money anymore. In the meantime,
I’ll be staying with a friend, Sarah Helbert, during this transition.
I’m looking for an extra bed (with mattress) so if you know anyone who’s
willing to loan me one that they’re not using, I would be really grateful.

Please pray that the Lord will grant that I still stay at my current job
and that I still stay on island, at least for another year.

My parents are doing well, and my dad just completed his annual church
report. He says it’s tiresome to do but you gotta do it! My mom’s back
muscle has healed and she barely has pain anymore. I ORDERED her not to
lift heavy things anymore. They recently sent us pictures with big
snowdrifts behind them.

My recently married sister,  Erna, is giving birth on March 20, but I hope
it’s March 21 coz that’s my birthday. I was hoping she could give birth
here so the child could be a US citizen, but it’s too close to her
birthdate already and she shouldn’t be traveling alone. Her husband
Benjie, just recently celebrated his birthday, and we are so glad for him,
and his love for Erna.

Trina is busy doing her thesis and is stressed about this, but I’m glad
she’s on this last leg of her marathon. It was tough for her to quit
school for a semester when she was hospitalized for a viral disease that
if it wasn’t diagnosed right away, would have paralyzed her lower limbs.
She’s enrolled in a dance class that is going a long way in helping her
regain her strength. Her current instructor is the adviser of the
streetdance club where she was a member of (she’s inactive now because of
the thesis).

I appreciate your thoughts prayers for me and my family. I am keeping you
in mine.

Missing you all,

Esther

suggestions?

hey all – if you have suggestions for discussion/bible study topics for our weekly meetings, please post them in the comments section of this entry 🙂 i’ll be facilitating the meetings for now, but we’ll do a ’round robin’ soon (or a ’round roovin?’ as in roovin does all the facilitating?! hehe.)

on a more personal note, it’s only the second day of the week and i’m already feeling spent. i should eat healthier. bought apples on my way home the other night. i might try mangoes tonight. hope you are all in good health.

for weeks now, this verse has been ringing in my head:

teach me to number my days aright so i may gain a heart of wisdom. (ps 90.12)

we’ll see you this friday? (roovin will pose the venue here as soon as it is final. so keep checking in.  (No get-together this week. See comments below and 2/14 sidebar update.)

aleks

okay, here’s the intro

this was long in the coming. too long. after two failed attempts over at blogspot (passwords now banished to oblivion), we proudly present… *cue really grand musical intro* the UP Diliman Navigators Alumni Blog! (applause here would be great, but we’ll settle for that oh-sucks, nostalgic smile…)

yes, girls and boys, those of you in your late 20s or early 30s, who now only have fading memories… of days spent at the nav tambayan (where the world’s best sisig is just a sniff away); of soul-satisfying times in bible study or times running away from BS? hehe; of laughter generated by our warped sense humor (who else on this planet thinks the word ‘meni’ is funny?); of tears shed for joy (tres!) and sorrow (singko!); of MNM’s (truly chocolatey!) and TNT’s (explosively insightful!)… this space is for you.

and also for you who might not remember any of the things above because (circle all applicable)…

(a) the cruel corporate world has stressed you out to the point of amnesia;
(b) you weren’t with the UP diliman navs in the 90s (er, 1890s then?);
(c) you came to the nav meetings solely for the food, all else is a blur now
(d) you were a navie elsewhere — say, aruba?
(e) okay, you’re just blog-hopping, or ‘omniscient’ google brought you here

seriously now. we’d like to think that the UP dil navs was/is more, exponentially more, than just a subculture, or just a clique of university students wanting to have fun and free food while learning more about Christ on the side.

this space is for anyone who has had contact with the UP diliman navigators and would like to keep connected despite the pulls and pushes of life after UP 🙂

soon we’ll be posting some guidelines for, well, posting. so get ready with your stories and we hope you can plug in to the nav connection soon.

now, isn’t this way cooler than our logbook? and, for the record, i’m the very first to log! hah.

aleks
(aleks78[at]gmail[dot]com)