A Pretty serious New Year’s Eve.
Love that we have a sensitive new year’s eve tonight… multi-culturally & quite seriously a welcome to all the health downturns of the year now, — while having a good hefty sangria-filled lunch on the side of poolside writing. (Also, red wine is good for you.)
Pondering what i could write about squeezing every memory of the past year, in 2023. I felt it may be a good exercise (swimming & walking on exercise machines) to find how The Earthshot Prize might have been the proper year-ender-of-all, after all.
2023: We start with a list, & we end with a list.
1/ Shows. Filling the seats of late night matinees of new year’s eve for year-enders. i just watched a Nutcracker ballet (i th8k that was my first one), which was of the ballet corps of CCP — the Cultural Centre of the Philippines. Had a blast with all the christmas pas de deux’s, arabesques & on pointes, which were on the side of galerie that showcased all the painters commissioned for the december galas.
Notables (or my clear art piece favourites) in sculpture, mixed media and paintings on canvas, were distinctly: 1/ the “ballerinas series” watercolour on archival paper, by artist Gerardo Jimenez, 2/the metallic pink sculpture of a ballet shoe, (in fiberglas, resin, in metallic urethane paint) by JP Duray, 3/ giant ballerina painting in golden frame by Orley Ipon, & 4/ Impressionist Oil on Canvas Piruoette by Sandra Fabie-Gfeller.
2/ Presents-shopping, in the new malls (& both arrays of dizzyingly eclectic shoppes, as well as ) that cropped up in 2023. I like mostly the food shoppes @Rockwell: new ones like Submarine Centre, (where i had the orange chocolate shake (divine), the dark belgian chocolate & the orange fizz. I also was able to get pastrami at Podium with deli x chele as well as their Rockwell branch — where the ube cake was not something i would get again, dry and not as fresh. A very good discovery was the sugarbee cakes — with their Dulce de leche chocolate cake bestseller (with caramel topping as well as in between layers of moist chocolate cake).
3/ Property. Getting showroom freebies, when looking for flats, and having a “tour de four-condos” : Rockwell QC called Arton, Rockwell Makati called Proscenium, & Alveo condos by Ayala Land in QC, which i think was a good “Agham Rd.” address — & lastly, the showroom of 52 in Santolan Ave. launching in late 2024/25, a failed look-see in the South at Carmel Ray.
4/ Banks. There are new solutions in the new year, notably the new refurbished BPI app (where you can apply for both local and USD dispensed bank accounts, just online - or from mobile), and the debit card re-designs. Neobanks, and bank wallets — are also really cool, and quite something to note — on the grab app (asia), g-cash (globe, telco), & the BDO wallet.
5/ Travel. Finally, there is the year-end retreat after a year of planning and saving, to either do a home leave (always a good thing), or a vacay or what we did — a proper staycay in home country. This year, traveling via Philippine Airlines (PAL), is not something i do internationally, but locally so we get to navigate Terminal 1 - & all its enabled lounges for all flight delays with amenities in all Terminals.
Quite a short list, but i think it sets my tone for quite a good viable number of articles for this year to feature, but i think as each year progresses, there is a possibility that becomes a pacesetter, and we get mostly set into the turn of phrase that might get more eyes peeled for this page right here.
Without further ado, i won’t keep you from your sit-down dinners, drinks and firecrackers to welcome the year of the Dragon (technically still in February), but officially rounding up another year in years, as we get older but wiser.
Happy New Year everyone!
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/Last2023
