The view from our window

It has been my handsome's habit to look outside the window every night. He likes the view of the ocean plus the tiny boats the fishermen lit as they go fishing. They all look like fireflies from a distance. I love it when his eyes sparkle every time he sees something in the water. We are blessed to be living near the ocean. Our house is situated up a hill where the water is over looking. You can actually see the coastal area of Marinduque. We have been hoping to go there soon with our pastor's family since they are from there. It will only take one boat ride they said. The trip should be planned soon! :)
Anyway, there was a night when he thought he saw a big ship sailing. He called me and said,"look, it's a big ship with many windows!" I was surprised to see the ship thinking there's no trip late in the evenings. And again it appeared the following night. He really got puzzled by it. We couldn't explain where the ship was going because every time we see it it seemed to be not moving. I started to wonder if it was a haunted ship, lol. Eventually, he found out that it wasn't a boat nor ferry. It was a reflection of a building with galvanized wall and the light from it illuminated. He was relieved somehow but still wished it would have been a ship. Haha! Poor hathome! (grin)
My point here only is that my handsome is really cute like a kid when he's fascinated with simple things. It makes me blush every time I think I am married to him. :) Ah, love.

Check out this song he shared on my wall on Facebook.

Fun time!

We were invited to a very special birthday party yesterday. I say it's special because it was Audriana Summer's birthday! The first baby of the circle, (the licerio, Enano and McGuffin) haha! We shared the feeling of being blessed for having this baby. We got all excited when we first learned that Joy missed her monthly visitor. We were like kids anticipating for a new member of the family. We went through all the stages with the mother, my gosh! haha! It was all worth it, I say. Audri almost went out when she was still 5 months old and we saw how she moved inside her mom's tummy. We even planned on how to carry Joy from work to the hospital. We were like a team, so coordinated! And then, the labor day came. I can't imagine Joy sending text messages informing us that she's reached the 5cm (whatever that is) warning. lol! She was like, I am still okay and not in pain at all. We waited and even stayed late until we got a confirmation that Audri has already arrived. :) It was a bliss! I'm pretty sure they felt much happiness than we did.
Joy and Jericho even formulated a game called "guess the name of the baby contest." Their friends and relatives had a blast guessing it. I can't believe it's been a year and seeing Audri yesterday running and making faces was just a confirmation on how God has been taking care of this wonderful kid. :)
Here are some pictures from the party:

The sunshine and the star of the party, Audri! :)

The Super family! Cuties! 

Children in costumes and having fun in the game

Joy made this and placed one on every chair.. i got a feathered one! ;) 

the uncles! Uncle Pewee on the right side won the drawing contest. 

Audri had a photo booth that surely was a hit!

At our table, being goofy. hehehe.. :)

I am not them

One thing I know in life is to not compare people with what they have and who they are. However, being married to a foreigner puts you in an inevitable situation. There have been countless encounters wherein I was always mistreated because some people think I am an imbecile who only have an American dream.Nothing more, nothing less. Well, I know I don't have to assert myself to anybody about what I do and what I have  it's just that at times I really needed to bite their heads off for them to actually respond to me in a way that they don't discriminate.
I have nothing against women who are having a great time in life because they're married to foreigners. That's their destiny. That's what they want and this is the life I want. Besides, they also have worked hard to attain that life. Although I can't blame other people who think, we, Filipino women only marry foreigners as a passport to a better life because a lot have done it. Therefore the snarling at judgmental and shallow minded people is inevitable.
Anyway, I promised myself to be more forgiving and understanding although if they would be needing a piece of my mind, I would gladly educate them, that some women marry foreigners because of LOVE not of MONEY!
All I wish now is that these people will stop accusing me of holding back money for my relatives and friends. They think I married a money tree.They are even surprised that I have two jobs, I am happy and I am content.

Oh well, like I said, I am not them.... I AM ME! Dish that! 

Two wonderful years!

This is a very late entry, I know. I have no excuse why I haven't been updating my blog. Anyway, last October 11 marked the two years of our marriage and it is going stronger because of God's untiring guidance and love. I believe the vows and covenants we made in front of Him are sealing this marriage just enough to conquer any challenges in life.
We didn't celebrate it with a fantabulous event because we are not in the position to be extravagant these days knowing the expenses of our upcoming trip. One thing we only promised to ourselves was to get a new pair of wedding rings. The ones we had  left dents on our ring fingers.
Here's a pic of the new ones.

I can say, with these rings we will grow old together... :)

Filipino words that " my handsome" knows....

Our home is multi lingual. It is just so because I married an American, I am in a neighborhood of "tagalog" people, I am visayan and I teach English to Koreans which somehow allows me to learn a little of their language to be able to expound lessons more. I feel like I am a walking device ready to be switched on to any channels of language you want me to use,anytime. It's fun but it's causing me to slack in teaching "my handsome" our national language. I know, it's my bad. He has been in our country for almost two years now yet his Filipino vocabularies are still limited although he understands conversations already through gestures but still, he has to learn it to follow through, profoundly.

Anyhow, he managed to pick out some words that he keeps on hearing over and over. He would approach me and ask, what does this word mean? Is it a good word? Does it mean like this? These are the usual queries he has. I, on the other hand am amazed on how he is coping up. Like yesterday, we visited a friend who manages a net cafe and he saw the sign that said, "bawal ang pornograpiya." Knowing that our friend is a Christian, he asked me immediately after we left the meaning of the word "bawal". Now, he knows its meaning.

Early on, when we were still living in Marikina he would always wake up at the call of the guy selling "taho" (it's a soya drink). He learned the word even before tasting it. Street vendors were his first teachers especially the guy who was selling fruits. His line was always, PinyaKWAN, Papaya Saging!(pineapple, papaya, watermelon and banana) Sometimes it's PinyaKWAN, Papaya, Dalandan, Mangga!(Pineapple, watermelon, papaya, orange and mango) Imagine how startled he was on his first encounter with this guy but later on he was fascinated with him already and learned what fruits he was yelling. There was also the buko (young coconut) guy who was very nice to him!  Although, there's one street vendor/teacher that we both had a hard time figuring out what she was yelling about. In our own interpretation it was like, Inapa;eeey! We were both clueless and I had to run outside to check what this lady was selling. I figured out that she was selling TINAPA AT DAING(smoked and jerked fish). The lady shortened and stretched the words in an odd way that I couldn't figure out myself. It was a fun time for us, though. :)

Somehow I also am doing little efforts in helping him learn the language. There was a time when I told him a funny story about a certain word that has two meanings. The word is "baba". I shared the joke about an American who was in an elevator in the Philippines. The elevator stopped on a certain floor and a Filipino outside asked a fellow Filipino this way, bababa ba? And the Filipino inside answered, "bababa". The American guy witnessing it asked, did you guys just talk? It's weird but they talked, indeed! This word "baba" in the story means, going down. Another meaning of it is, your chin. I like it when we have fun learning our language. He always remembers it. Ha ha!

He still has a long way to go, I know. But he will get there, eventually. He blames himself for not learning the language fast although I keep on telling him too that it's better he learns it slowly than learning it fast and not embracing the culture totally. Besides, he has forever to learn. LOL!

When asked if he's handsome. He answered, Hindi! Who said he's not learning?!  (not that he isn't) geez! lol!

That wraps it up! Haha!

I know, my redeemer lives...

Are you the type of person who forgives easily? Knowing Christ who forgives all levels of mistake I set it to myself that there's nothing that a person can do towards me that I cannot forgive. I kind of reflect on things that I've done as well that have hurt others and if I have done anything to apologize. I realized that as we grow older inevitable things happen and we, Christians get caught in the middle of just moving on and forgetting the things done unto us without the situations being talked over. No settlements. No amendments. We shake them off thinking that they do not matter as long as we go on with Christ. He will provide peace and love continuously ,no matter what. I believe in God and His power to contain and control situations beyond our human competence. No question about that.

As a person, your character and traits come naturally on how your parents or your environment have influenced you. You are privileged if you grew up with your parents and was brought up in an upscale environment. In my case I can say I had a good childhood until I was 8 years old. That was when my mother was still living and things were easily provided for us. As young as I was I knew life will never be the same again after she passed away. My relationship with the Lord was springing out.  I was praying harder and trusting Him more in all the things I did. I am not saying I had a perfect relationship with Him but He knew me more than any of the people surrounding me. He knew my bouts, hurts, apprehensions, dreams as young as I was. I cried to Him often about life on how juvenile I was mostly about who I was to ran to when I needed an adult to supervise me, to encourage me, to tell me that life is a challenge. Nobody was there. Although God used a few people to reach out to me and have left good impressions but still I felt I was alone only with the Lord. Most ministers I talked to said God is the best companion. You can never go wrong. I am glad I listened to them.

After all these experiences, I just noticed one thing about people who grew up privileged in life. They have the ability to intimidate you by  easily telling you that you are this and you are that. There were times I tried living up with their expectations. I tried because they said it's the right thing to do. Although I have no problems with peer pressures. Heck, I don't care how people live and what they have because I know my limitations and capabilities. It's just that these people are so called Christians. I remember a line from a movie that says, without suffering there would be no compassion." These people have no idea how I struggled in life for them to just tell me what they want for me to have and to do. I doubt if they've even experienced sleeping and walking on streets without any meals for three days! If they've worked like a labor guy at piers! As a Christian it is important you have a good relationship with Christ but you shouldn't forget that a reflection on how good your relationship with the Lord is on how you deal with others just like HE did when HE was on earth dwelling with the people.

I was surprised on how these people condemn and eradicate you from what you thought was a brotherly and sisterly environment. Tough love is not eradicating people or humiliating them. It's dealing with them step by step in a constructive manner to make sure you'd end up still having a harmonious relationship as you continue to serve God together. Nevertheless, I also realized that the Lord has His ways on how to work on this kind of situation... HE allows stuff to happen so that HE will be glorified more. Humility is the keyword. When we humble ourselves before God, He is glorified. When we practice humility in the midst of people treating us like a trash, HE is glorified. Humility is not from us it's the power of God that is enabling us. Self control abides with it. God is always to be glorified. It's the joy of knowing that Jesus really died for me and that He has always been there no matter what.

In the end, God just wants us to be strong, fit and ready when He comes. I am in a situation wherein I am being broken and ready to be molded again into His likeness. He still has a lot of things to mend in me. I am willing and I am ready for I know, MY REDEEMER LIVES.

Check out a version of this song that my father in-law shared to us: