Our Holiday Schedule

Dec. 22 - Xtian takes Qatar Airways flight at 11:15 PM to Manila, Philippines. The trip is about 9 hours long! Dec. 23 - Xtian arrives in the Philippines at 1:30 PM (Philippine time: +5 hours from Doha). Mavis and Xiane would be waiting at the airport along with Xtian's sister and her daughter, Yiyi. Take a 2 hour trip north of Manila to Angeles City (Google Maps). Dec. 24 - Do some cooking and prepare the whole day for the gathering in the evening. Xtian's relatives and friends would be spending Christmas Eve in the his parents house. Dec. 25 - Wake up early for the trip to Manila to spend Christmas with Xtian's grandfather in Manila. Buy lechon (roasted pig) along the highway. Take part in a mini-program for the kids in the family compound. Later in the afternoon, check-in at Astoria Plaza Suites. Do some shopping in the evening. Dec. 26 - Do post-Christmas shopping and take Xiane to one of the Kiddie Parks inside a mall. Drive back to Angeles(2 hour drive). Dec. 29 - Take a 5 hour trip to the mountainous City of Baguio. Strawberries here we come!!! January 1 - New Year in Baguio! Jan. 3 - Take the 5 hour trip to go back to Angeles City.

It's almost D-Day

One more sleepless night and that's it for me. I'm going home. I'm going home to celebrate Christmas in the Philippines! After 2 years of not having a "real" Christmas in Saudi, we decided that this year would be different. We would be spending the holidays in the Philippines with our families (Christmas with my side of the family and New Year with Mavis' side of the family). So yes, I admit I'm excited. Plus, after 3 months being alone in Qatar, I get to see my wife and my daughter! I wonder how Xiane would react when she sees me. I'm not sure how we could update this blog while on vacation. Might go in a haitus for a while but hopefully, we could give you bits and pieces of our vacation. We'd all be back on the 20th of January so at least expect something after a day or two after that. In the meantime, I might publish our Year-end letter here before I go on vacation. I just finished it today and would be reviewed by Mavis tomorrow before we officially send it out. Since 2002, we've been writing a letter to our families and friends at end the year just to let them know how our year went and to update them with our lives. So let's see if Mavis approves the publication of our Year-End Letter. Still, D-Day is near!

The Kong and I

It was never my intention to watch King Kong until yesterday when I saw that it was showing in Grand Cinema Center and tried to see what critics had to say about the film. This is Peter Jackson's dream movie. Even before he finished the Lord of the Rings (LOTR), he had openly stated that he wanted to do a remake of King Kong. And so he did. What kept me from really wanting to see the movie is that I knew the outcome of the movie and the ending is something that I'm not too sure I'd want to see. But with the glowing reviews, I knew I had to see it. I took the 10:45 showing hoping that not a lot would wake up early on a weekend to see a movie about an ape. The seating arrangement in Cinema 6 was quite awkward as you had the middle area as an entrance. Either you choose to be on the left or on the right, missing on the really good seats on the middle. I'm sure whoever designed this cinema isn't a cineaste. I chose to be on the left side, about 4 (non-available) seats away from the real middle, as my dominant eye is my left (not too sure if it was that but I feel more comfortable sitting on the left side if given the choice between the right or left). After 3 hours watching the movie, I could say that Peter Jackson owned KingKong, or should I say, Andy Serkis owned KingKong. Serkis is the same guy Jackson asked to act out Gollum for LOTR. Both his characterization (through motion capture and facial expressions) of Kong was superb. Credit also goes to those who digitized Kong himself. The movie starts up flat in the beginning as it was more of long characterizations. The actual fun begins right after the first hour; engaging the audience with special effects and over-the-top sequences. I liked it and would recommend for anybody to watch it. But remind you though, it's not really for the kids. It's not comparable to LOTR or Harry Potter. Also, here are some tips that you may want to know to help you enjoy the film. 1. Make sure that when you watch the movie, know that this is fiction and try not to be one of those National Geographic guys dissecting the movie for its factual values. 2. Don't ask how Naiomi Watts survived being "Kong-handled". I'm sure a real person would have had broken her neck and most, if not all, of her bones broken the way Kong was holding her. 3. Don't ask how the men could've survived running with/under the stampeding brontausaurs with only 4 men lost throughout the whole 10+ minute sequence. 4. Don't ask how they got Kong onto the ship and where they placed him. Just know that they were able to take him to New York in one way or another (chop him to pieces to be able to carry him, fit him in the ship and reassemble him in New York). Again, this is a movie about King Kong. He never did exist nor is Skull Island real. So don't talk about the evolution, geology, biology and physics. Just enjoy the movie. p.s. I can't wait for Jackson's next project: HALO.

Jobs in the Gulf

A lot of people have been emailing me to help them find a job in the gulf. I am not a contractor nor employed in an employment agency so I really can't help you with that. However, let me tell you this. I got my first job in Saudi Arabia through the Internet. I found a post in jobisland.com in which an employer wanted someone with experience in graphics and web design to work as a consultant for another company. That was in 1999. I got my second job in the gulf in 2002 by searching the web and looking for company websites where my work would fit in. I was able to find an advertising agency in the gulf and directly sent the General Manager my resume. Their website didn't even post an opening but I still sent the GM mine. I got a call from them about 2 weeks later and on the interview, he asked me where I got his email address and I told him that I got it off the net. Plus points maybe? I applied for the job in Bahrain last year (November) as I was on vacation in the Philippines. A friend, Rico, found an opening on the internet for a company in Bahrain (Orbit). I went to their website, found the opening on the career section and sent them my resume. The day after I got back in Saudi, I got a call from their HR department asking me if I can go to Bahrain for an interview. Now, in my current job in Qatar, I sent my resume September or October last year. I googled the web for Oil and Gas companies and sent my resume to some of them. 6 months later, having moved from Saudi to Bahrain, I got an email from the company asking me if I was still interested in the position I applied for 6 months ago. And now I'm here. All the jobs I had for the past 6 years were brought about by using the Internet. I haven't sent a hardcopy of my resume since 1999 to apply for a job. And the thing is, I must have sent a hundred to 200 emails to potential employers in the span of 6 years. I did get more offers than the actual number of jobs that I held. I declined going to China, Hongkong, Egypt and Cyprus. I also missed joining a gaming company in the Carribean because of a wrong email address. So for people asking me to help them get jobs, be resourceful. If you were able get to our blog and emailed me to help you find a job, I'm sure you could email potential employers just the same. To help you out looking for jobs in the gulf, you could go to the following sites.

http://www.worldwideworker.com/

http://www.bayt.com/

http://www.gulfjobsites.com/

http://www.qp.com.qa/qp.nsf/jobs?openview

http://jobs.escapeartist.com/Openings/Middle_East/

http://www.jobsindubai.com/ You could also do a google search for the industry that you want to be employed in. For example, do a search in google for "hospitals + Saudi" (without quotes). Go to the specific hospital website, look for an opening and send them your resume. Heck, even if you don't see an opening, send them your resume. You'll loose nothing by pressing that send button. So, unless you are my relative, please do not ask me to help you out with finding a job.I do hope I've enlightened you and hope that my tips help you on your job search. Goodluck on your jobhunting! p.s. IF you're not a relative, please don't pretend to be my relative either.

And so it begins...AbobeMedia

Adobe has officially acquired Macromedia on Dec. 3, 2005. The whole deal was valued at about US$3.4 billion, all of which were stock-made transactions. Adobe would still be Adobe but Macromedia would be no more at the start of 2006. I first heard of Macromedia in 1995 when I was beginning my foray into the IT world. I never touched a PC before 1995 I think. My professor in animation would have Macromedia Director, Authorware, Freehand and Fontographer installed in his machine. I never did touch them as I didn't even have an idea how to create a Microsoft Word document then, how much more with those applications. Fast-forward to 1998: The internet internet boom was just starting in the Philippines and people were starting to be interested with webpage development. I got to know that there was a software called Dreamweaver that could easily create webpages for me and my clients. Then you had something called Flash that can create animated banners for you instead of using GIF animations. Surprisingly enough, both Flash and Dreamweaver were owned by Macromedia. Circa 2000 - 2005 Instead of trying to compete with Adobe in terms of graphics, publishing and video, Macromedia knew they hit a jackpot with the techonlogy they developed and cultured. Flash became an industry standard. Designers and Developers were using it everywhere; to create presentations, banners, interactive applications and webpages. Dreamweaver has been rated to be the top WYSIWYG HTML editor around and has helped developers carry their work more efficiently. Everybody in the business of Web Development and Multimedia knows Macromedia. The Future The announcement that came on the 2nd half of the year came as a surprise for me. Adobe Systems, a software company that provides graphics artists and video developers tools to do their thing, is acquiring Macromedia. It's a no-brainer that Adobe did try to enter the world that Macromedia was reigning on even before they acquired it, trying to see if the giant that it is, could dislodge Macromedia in its grip of the web development market. Adobe produced products like GoLive (HTML editor) and LiveMotion (Flash content development) which both failed miserably in the market. Then the annoucement. Why did Macromedia sell out? The question asked by those using Macromedia software is plain and simple. We know that no one can ever beat Photoshop, After Effects, Acrobat and Illustrator. But since they have acquired Macromedia, how are they going to handle the development of the products by Macromedia? Some say that it might be for the better since the products would now be intertwined with each other, making an almost seamless jump from one program to another when editing, importing or exporting. They'd get to settle their differences in their palette tools and interface schemes (in 2000, a lawsuit had Adobe claiming that Macromedia was infringing with the way they had "tabbed palettes" in their products - Adobe won the case). Never again would you be using an Adobe product to manipulate photos and then importing them to seperate Macromedia product. Now, it's a "roundtrip" development process. Build, develop, create any media using several products by one company, Adobe. Would it really be for the betterment of Macromedia products? It might not be.. well, for at least sometime, until Adobe has fully integrated their code and system to these Macromedia products. It might be that the first year would be a bout integrating their products to the products of Macromedia. Would that mean that Macromedia products would remain stagnant in development except for the integration? Adobe never did understand fully well the needs for web designers and developers. Hopefully, they won't bully the guys from Macromedia when it comes to decisions for the future of Flash and Dreamweaver. How would Adobe handle the development of Dreamweaver vis-a-vis their own GoLive product? In any case, no one can really say. Here's to hoping the the next iterations of these products would actually benefit the people using them and not just satisfy the Giants' need to have a share of the web. Would we be seeing AdobeMedia in the future? I don't think so.

At Home and at The Garden

Kutch, Sandro and Joel, of PinoyTechQatar, came to the apartment today to supposedly help me out in arranging the furniture as I asked for help at the start of the week. I also asked them to bring a drill so we could move the hanging lamp. They arrived at about 3:30 but instead of doing what were supposed to do, we ended up doing nothing. They just copied some MP3's and movies from the Xbox, watched satellite and ate. I ordered Pizza from Pizza Inn (current favorite: Chicken Fajita) and baked pasta to match. Since we were all, in one way or the other, "techies", we spent time discussing softwares, servers, emails and IT stuff. By the time we finished, we were all full and ready to burst. They left at about 5:45 PM but we plan to meet again next week to buy stuff we need to take home to the Philippines. Kutch and found out that we were taking the same flight on the 22nd a couple of weeks back. I shouldn't have eaten that much since I was also due to meet with a colleague at 7:30 for a small gathering to celebrate his employment with our company. He was hired as a contractor at first but eventually was taken in by the company, which was a reason to celebrate! We met at The Garden - The Great Indian Restaurant

click on Map to view full size - map by Maporama

The Garden has 3 floors in which the 1st floor served an all vegetarian menu. I'm not too sure what they serve on the the 2nd floor. The 3rd floor was called Royal Garden and served buffet. Since I was with 4 colleagues who were from India and know what good Indian food tastes like, I had them taste the food first. The reasoning is, I wouldn't have any idea what authentic Indian food tastes so I can't say that it's bad or good without a standard, right? The food got their seal of approval so I chomped away. The Hamour was good and so was the Chicken Tikka. The other viands were also tasty though I didn't get to memorize what they were called. The choices in the buffet were nice although we would have wanted more mutton viands. The place was classy, clean and neat. You also get good service and their starter drink was fantastic (better served chilled). You have to reserve if you plan to have a group eat on the Friday as a table might be difficult to get and the place is a bit cramped. It was packed with people and those who finished eating were easily replaced in a minute or two. It gets 4 out of 5 for me. The only thing not good about it was the space. So if you're in an adventure to try out Indian food, I recommend The Garden. Anyway, we got to talking about languages, dialects and accents, food, meat, being vegetarian, and work stuff. We had a great time! We parted ways at about 10:30 and planned to get together after Eid (January) to try out the vegetarian restaurant. P.S. Yeah, I know, I've eaten a lot today.

My HD Died on Me

Qatar - My 2 year-old Laptop Hard Disk (HD) died on me the other day. I tried to resuscitate it by running a defragmenter, doing a scan disk, formatting it and reinstalling Windows. Everything failed. The tried checking the physical blocks of the drive again and found Bad Sectors. Bad...really bad. I wasn't able to fix it so the only solution was to buy myself another laptop HD to replace the one I have and hope that I could still recover my files on the 2nd partition of the old laptop. So off I went to Sofitel trying to see what they have. I was looking for a 80 Gb, 5200 RPM (Revolution Per Minute - the higher, the faster, the better) drive... an update to my dead 60GB 4200RPM HD. I got to this store which was telling me they have one which was 7200 RPM! Almost too good to be true. And it was. They showed it to me and said that the drives before showed it clearly on their tags that they spun 7200 RPM. But right now, they don't show it as this are coming from a new batch of delivery. So I asked them if they're sure and was told "Yup, we're sure but we can not guarantee". That also meant I can't return it if I find out on the net that it is not running at the speed they were telling. But what the heck. I needed a drive so I bought it, took it home and installed it. I was not that dissapointed when i did find out that it's running at 4200 RPM. At least I got the laptop working again. As for my data files, I was able to recover so little but I'm still not giving up. I'm hoping I can still recover my "My Documents" folder. Arghhhhh.... Technology has its ups and downs. By the way, the HD that I got was a Toshiba 80 Gb for 420 but got an extra external USB case for 50QR only. I saw a 100GB selling for 630. Look around, prices are different for each store.

Quotes to ponder (part 1)

Xiane is our talkative 2 1/2 year old daughter who calls Cinderella "Abby Abby", is scared of ants, has a set of Faces (Happy Face, Sad Face , Surpised Face, Angry Face), loves Belle of Beauty and the Beast, and is a swimming junkie. While watching Cyndi Lauper sing with Elmo on DVD... Grammy: That's Cyndi Lauper (thinking that Xiane would say "ah just like Aunt Cindy")! Xiane: she sing too much While watching Oscar the Grouch on DVD Mavis: Don't be Grumpy coz you'll be like Oscar. Try to always smile. Will you show me your Happy Face? Xiane: (Emoting, making a Sad Face then shoving her head on her arm) I don't happy, I'm sad (acting). After spilling water from a basin in the kitchen... Mavis: What did you do? Why did you spill it? Xiane: I'm sorry mommy. I walked too much. Just a little bit ok? After watching a lady clean fresh fish on the market... Xiane: Poor fish, the lady cut it up. Wanting to touch the fish... Xiane: The fish won't bite, she's a good girl! (referring to the fish)

Car Pooling...Help ease the traffic in Doha

Qatar - The following has been originally posted at http://www.qatarliving.com Good news to everyone, I and some of my friends are in the process of developing a network for ride share.The idea is very simple, if you don't own a car or if you own a car but don't want to use it or sick of driving and you need someone to drive you to and from any place in the city of Doha all you have to do is just contact us, subscribe (IT IS TOTALLY FREEEEEEE) and we will hook you up with someone who will be your ride-share partner. Also if you are a car owner and you drive alone and you wish to do something good for this community, you wish to help other people and also help yourself by decreasing the load on the crowded city of Doha, just contact us,subscribe and we will hook you up with someone who will be your ride-share partner. For further info please send your full "real" name, contact number, the area you live in (not necessarily the exact address,for safety purposes) and your ride-share plan, for ex what time you go to work?? where is your work?? what time do you get off work?? If you have any special needs that you need special arrangements?? Please send all these info to dentical75@yahoo.com and we will contact you as soon as the project is complete. Please help us beat the traffic jam by reducing the number of moving cars on the roads, send this message to your friends, encourage them to contact us, and advertise for the idea, it's great and it worked in many places all around the world.If you have any ideas or suggestions you are most welcomed to contact us on dentical75@yahoo.com Best regards, Dentist

MAP: Sofitel & Computer Shops in Doha

Here's a map to the Sofitel Building to help you guys out if you want to buy PC peripherals in Doha. Click on the image to see the full size. Map provided by: Maporama

The Hype that is Xbox 360

I've always been fascinated with gaming. I've had an Atari console when it came out, playing Pac Man and Space Invaders. Aside from the several Game and Watch screens that I had, I also had several Nintendo Family Computers in which Mario and Luigi were made famous. Then Sony came out with Playstation which brought in the Final Fantasy Series and Metal Gear. But that was then and now what I have is the Big Black Console called Xbox. I love my Xbox. It's been 2 years since I got mine from the Philippines (though the unit was bought and brought from Hongkong) and had a 120 GB harddrive installed to it. Not only do I use the console for gaming but also for playing all media files that we want to watch on the big TV; JPG, AVI, MPG, MP3, RMVB, WMV, MOV, DAT for VCDs, and even our DVDs. You can even transfer the files from your PC/Laptop directly to the Xbox through ethernet connection. The only thing missing is for it to be a PVR (Personal Video Recorder) so we can copy TV show from our satellite feed directly to the Xbox harddisk. We've brought it to most of the hotels we've stayed in just for Xiane to be able to watch her cartoons and keep her happy. It's one of the first thing that I set up when moving to a new place (we've moved 6 times this year including our long hotel stays). So far, paying roughly US$380 for the console with 120GB has been worth it. Microsoft has just launched its new Xbox, named Xbox 360 for whatever reason. A Core version (Console, Composite AV plus wired controller) would set you back for 299 while the Premium System (Console, wireless controller, headset, ethernet cable, Component HD cable, and 20GB hard drive) would cost you US$399. That is if you can find one. He he he. People who were lucky enough to get one had sold theirs thru ebay, earning almost twice the amount of what they paid for. That's what hype makes people do, spend an unbelievable amount of money for that item or service. I have a friend who is not really a gamer but was fed the hype. He now is too excited to get an Xbox 360 just because he knows a lot of other people buying it. Amazon and other online retailers have them on their sites but most likely, your orders would arrive January or even February of 2006! But people are still ordering and other have been trying to track down those elusive boxes. Others have even resorted to stealing! I'm not sure why MS would hype the launch of their next gen console only to have limited numbers available to those who want it. A marketing ploy to salivate those who want it? Or, looking it at the other way, it might mean that they released so little for people to serve as product testers for the 360. A lot of owners have been complaining about errors, hangs, disc reading errors and disc scratching. MS says it's just 3% of 360 owners but I'm not too sure. Personally, I would not buy one just yet. I don't want to be a guinea pig for MS. I'd probably buy one after a year or two after 3-4 stable firmware versions have come out. Besides, my old yet trusty Xbox hasn't given me a problem in 2 years of use and abuse. Plus I can almost do anything the Xbox 360 can do (except play those not-so next gen games and output to HD) and more. I'm not in for the hype...which is good, so I can start saving for the High Definition TV that I'm going to buy once I decide to buy my 360! He he he he...

The World Challenge

The World Challenge is all about global involvement, casting a net for ideas from individuals or groups deserving recognition. In the process we also hope to inspire would-be entrepreneurs. I'm proud to be a Filipino especially when hearing news like this. Out of 12 finalists from the Global Community, Filipino agricultural engineer Justino Arboleda went back home to the Philippines $20,000 richer but more than that, bringing pride and glory to the Philippines by winning the First World Challenge sponsored by BBC World television in London. There had beeen 456 entries from 90 countries. His entry was the use of Coconet, waste coconut husk material developed to prevent landslides and soil erosion. Ingenious. With the Philippines being the no. 1 exporter of coconuts, what other better way to use such product than to use it to help prevent environmental disasters around the world. And not only that, the good thing about his Enterprise is that it also provides income and livelihood to the community. They now produce 30,000 square meters of this Coconet for distribution around the world. They also produce doormats, stuffing for car seats and mattresses, and fertilizer (made from coconut dust). Wow. All that from a coconut tree and a Filipino. The Finals is being shown on the BBC in a special program on Dec. 3 and 4 and be featured by Newsweek magazine in its Dec. 3 issue. Just click on the link and pick your country and the date to show you the TV listing for that day. Or you can view the Video about Coconet here... You can also view a local article about him here.

Sa Doha nAPO Sila...The APO Hiking Society Live in Concert!

Qatar - The Apo Hiking Society (APO) will hold a concert in Doha Cinema on 15th to 17th of December with guest performers Kyla and Bituin Escalante. Ticket info Nayong Filipino Restaurant (Mesaieed) Damascus Saloon (Souq Al Asiery) Romel 5818474, Roger 5423695 Fathima 5436577 Angelito Rivera (Alkhor) 5428119 History The APO HIKING SOCIETY first gained recognition in 1973 when they gave a farewell concert at the plush Meralco Auditorium in Metro Manila. Just out of college, the group was the talk of the Ateneo University and adjoining campuses for their music and humor. It was only when two of its four members were about to retire from the field of amateur music, however, that the APO, then known as the Apolinario Mabini Hiking Society, finally had a city-wide audience. One of them was scheduled to leave for Turkey as an exchange student. The other had a position waiting for him in his father's advertising firm. Why a talented young man of 21 would want to go to Turkey, every young man in the early seventies would probably understand. But what the APO could not understand was their fourth member's decision to leave the irresponsibility of being unemployed to join the ranks of the corporate world. The trip to Turkey did not materialize and the APO, now a tentative trio, pushed on steadily towards fame and fortune. Looking back, the APO members Danny Javier, Boboy Garrovillo, and Jim Paredes do not regret never having been regular wage earners. Their farewell concert, which had SRO audiences for two stormy nights, not unexpectedly became a hit record the following year. In the three decades since that "farewell" concert, the APO has made 22 record albums; hosted several television shows including their own noontime Sunday show "Sa Linggo nAPO Sila"; and launched hugely successful major solo concerts and countless provincial, dinner, and corporate shows. They have performed in over 50 cities in the United States, in Canada, Singapore, Indonesia, Germany, Switzerland, Italy and Japan to bring Original Pilipino Music to Filipinos the world over. taken from: http://www.apohikingsociety.org/history.shtml