SFC – Page 2 – tinamats.com

All These Things (4): January-February edition

February 20, 2015February 20, 2015 Tina Leave a comment

Here I thought I’d have time to blog more come 2015, but look, it’s already February. Scratch that – February is almostÂ over, and I just sat down to finallyÂ blog.Â I promise, I really wanted to write last January, but I went through another round of transition then, so I had other things I needed to focus on.

But don’t worry, it’s good transition. And by that, I mean I don’t feel as lost now as I did at first. :)

So what has happened to me so far in 2015?

Pope Francis’ visit to the Philippines – I will write another blog entry about this, but this is definitely one of the experiences I will never ever forget. What a way to kickstart 2015.
Work, and lots of itÂ – This isn’t new, but there was a lot of work only because I filed my resignation last December, so most of this is transition stuff. This means…
I have a new job. :)Â This wasn’t in any of my plans at all. I had other plans, really, especially since this opportunity came to me last year but I ignored it the first time. Then when I asked for it, someone else got it, so I figured it wasn’t for me. Lo and behold, I got a message by December if I wanted to go for it again. So I did, and I got the job. I’ve been in the role for one month and it’s been fun so far. The tasks and responsibilities are quite daunting, but I’m also having fun and I actually like this stretch. (So much that I actually went to work yesterday – a holiday – willingly, how about that.) Lots more to come for this, and I’m quite excited for those things. :)
SFC International Conference in Palawan.Â My fourth SFC ICON, my second time in Palawan, andÂ thanks to the generosity of some CFCs in Palawan, we got to visit El Nido on a budget (like, really awesome budget). What an amazing, amazing experience, and I really, really hope that I get to write about this soon.

There are many things that I need to write about (part two of the Bangkok-Siem Reap trip, for one), and I’m really going to try harder to do that soon. I mean, I have a lot of time outside of work now. I think I’m just sort of adjusting from all this free time now. Ever had that dilemma? You know, having almost no free time to suddenly havingÂ so much free time that you don’t know what to doÂ with it now? Yeah, that thing. But let’s not waste time, right?

Here’s one thing I know, after the first 51 days of 2015: it’s been a blast, so far. :)

14 (Joyful) Things About 2014

December 31, 2014December 31, 2014 Tina Leave a comment

Sometime around end of November, I tried to recall what had happened to my 2014 when I was hit with a realization:Â whoa, a lot of things happened this year.Â No kidding.

I think the thing about 2014 for me, is how a huge chunk of the year seemed to go by in a blur. The obvious culprit for this feeling this is work, as it really ate a lot of my time, but I think other than that, there were really so many things that happened this year that it was almost overwhelming.

When 2014 started, I tried to make it a habit of tweeting at least three joyful things that happened to me in that day, using my 2014 hashtag, #takedelight. I think I lasted doing that daily up until April, where I stopped, and then started somewhere else again, and then stopped again. It was an attempt to remember and be grateful everyday, which was a fun and hard exercise. I wished I had kept at it, but even if I didn’t get to do it everyday for the year, thinking about it reminds me of what my 2014 was supposed to be: a year of delight.

And this is why I like year-end recaps, because it gives me a chance to go through the year one more time. I suppose writing this would have been easier if I had managed to keep at the daily #takedelight things, but even if things weren’t documented, it didn’t mean it didn’t happen. To me, anyway.

This 2014 recap is a lot less…I don’t know, emotional (or heartbroken, really), than 2013, but like I said, there’s a lot in 2014 that happened that I didn’t really expect. And in the spirit of that daily project I never got to finish, I’m calling this 2014 recap 14 Joyful Things About 2014. :)

I think the biggest and most important joyful thing that happened to me this year is doing the 33-Day Consecration to Jesus through Mary retreat.
I heard about this through a friend last year, but because I wasn’t really a Marian devotee back then, I didn’t think about it much. Then came January and my friend encouraged us all to do it. I ordered the book, thinking it would take a month to arrive, but it arrived in 2 weeks, just in time to start the retreat on the next suggested date. This led to my first consecration date on March 25, which was a pretty significant date before but because of this consecration, is now significant in a different way. Then I did it again with our community, and I finished on December 8, which, again was another significant date for me in 2013. I don’t think these are coincidences, really, but a way of Mama Mary telling me that she’s got me, and she has me under her care, so I need not be afraid. My friend said that to prepare for miracles when we do this consecration, and you know what? She’s right. :) Ave Maria.
Travel, as always. I think there was one time early this year when I realized that I seemed to be going places almost every month. That kind of stopped around May, but there were still a lot of places I went to, near and far, this year. There’s Cagayan de Oro in February (that I never got to blog about!), then Calaguas in March for my birthday, a part of Quezon that I haven’t been to in April, and then Pangasinan in September. On the international front, I went to Japan in May, and Thailand and Cambodia (will blog about Siem Reap soon!) in October. I almost went to Sagada this December but we scrapped it because of some changes that was happening in our lives, but that just meant I’ll probably go there next year. Here’s to more places in 2015!
I released my first book. Wohoo. As my thesismate told me last night: you are now an AUTHOR. Sometimes, it still feels a bit surreal. :) I’ve always been so scared to send the things I write for editing, and releasing them out into the wild because they’re my babies, you know? But I realized that there’s really nothing to be afraid of, and it’s actually fun. And this is a fulfillment of all those dreams since I was a kid. :) I realized that this thing is something that I wouldn’t mind doing for my entire life, on top of speaking about books, and just doing wordy stuff.Â Because man, I really love words. Read More

ã‚ã‚ŠãŒã¨ã†æ—¥æœ¬!

June 28, 2014June 28, 2014 Tina 1 Comment

When I was a kid, I fell in love with the Sailormoon series. I loved it so much that everyone in school associated it with me, and I even cried several times when I missed it, or when I watched a particular episode where they all died and such. It was my first introduction to anime, and I thought that because I loved Sailormoon, I would probably like other anime, too. Eventually, I watched some, and then because I was such an otaku (or so I thought), I found this how to speak Japanese booklet at home and started trying to learn it, because I thought it was cool and all that.

Then I just lost interest, and never really looked back. (Except when I catch some Sailormoon episodes that they air here every now and then.)

Here’s the thing: I never had Japan in my bucket list. I have friends who love everything Japan and Japanese – from music to food to TV shows and all that, and every time they talk about it, I just nod politely and listen. It’s not that I didn’t want to go – I just didn’t have it in my list of places I wanted to go to. I wasn’t as fascinated with Japan as I was with New York City, or Europe.

Then late last year, a friend called me and asked if I wanted to go to Osaka because there was a seat sale and they were about to book a flight. Being a Yes-girl to a lot of travel stuff like that (which is how I got to go to Jakarta last year in the first place), I said yes, and then ta-da! I had a ticket to Japan!

I had no idea what to expect. I didn’t do much research until a few weeks before the trip when we were working out our itinerary. We had five days there – less, because we arrive in the evening on our first day – and there was just so much that everyone in our group of 9 wanted to do. In the end, after we got our visas, we decided to go crazy over it: Osaka – Tokyo – Kyoto. All in five days.

Let me tell you: it was ambitious and achievable, but prepare for aching feet, long rides, and very quick stops. Because friends, three cities in five days = crazy. Even more so, Japan in five days = NOT. ENOUGH.

Time to let the pictures speak for themselves! (Photo dump!)

Tag: SFC

All These Things (4): January-February edition

14 (Joyful) Things About 2014

ã‚ã‚ŠãŒã¨ã†æ—¥æœ¬!

å¤§é˜ª