Gravitate towards like

Last weekend, I joined my friend Sitti and the other Sittizens to visit this orphanage in Parañaque.  

When Sitti observed that we ended up with babies "like" us, it made me wonder how true that was and whether we do gravitate towards people like us...

photo edited to protect the baby's identity

In my almost 8 years of working in a school, I've always been working with highschool students.  The only interaction I've had with younger children is whenever they visit my co-counselors or when I encounter them when I roam the school grounds... People know how ambivalent I am when it comes to children and perhaps kids know it too because they steer clear of me as well haha Just kidding! I don't bite! I just don't do baby talk and would not initiate the cooing when faced with a baby or a toddler...  I would rather just observe and stay in the background...

Which may have led me to this baby girl in the orphanage... She was literally just observing and keeping quiet amidst the visitors in her little nursery... The rest of the group was welcomed by toothy grins and little arms together with a "carry me plea"... while she just observed and stayed put in her crib... 

While my other friends "picked" their baby, I ended up at her crib and trying to get a response... Wow! It was a test of patience I tell you... She was really just looking at me or just smiling... I was waiting for her to tell me her name! haha impossible of course because she was still too young to talk... 

Good thing my patience paid off... and when she finally "warmed up" I didn't expect her to start running around inside her crib and I mean literally! You know this sudden bust of adrenaline when you just need to run and expend this energy you have! Gah! Imagine the Tasmanian devil running around in a crib - that's what she did until she got tired of it and got distracted with the toys I was handing her...And she finally wound down and seated herself... Whoops! Define adrenaline rush...

Looking back at the time I spent with that little girl makes me wonder if whether you do gravitate with people who are more like you... As the old adage, birds of the same feather...and in the next breath, opposites attract too! So go figure! haha

One thing I'm sure of, I enjoyed the time I spent in that orphanage - it was a first for me in the sense that I really interacted with the babies - very unlikely of me because I would rather just observe and stay quiet...

Maybe it just takes a certain little soul to magnetize you... No wonder babies are the center of attention... you can't help but gravitate towards their innocence and effervescence.

Latest food find: Rice Pots in Parañaque

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"Food find: Rice Pots"

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Making friends should really be a pastime

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"Making friends doesn't have an age requirement nor an expiry date"

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I found my 1st singlet

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"Look what I found: My very 1st singlet! Levi's Funrun 2009 @bitsbeyb @wandergirlxo "

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Ensure to Endure Run @ BGC

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"Ensure to Endure run with Misty and her Team Timezone "
(taken at Bonifacio Global City)

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Yellow lane road down under

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"Yellow Lane (Adelaide, Australia, May 2012) #potd #travel"

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How do I stay fit?

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"Will be taking a break from boxing for the meantime..."
(taken at Ringside Boxing Club)

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The Fault in our Stars by John Green

Nope! This is not a book review... Shedding a few tears which is a sure sign that I loved a book - which I did after reading this one - is enough to let you know that this book is another good one by John Green...

I'm just going to list down some quotes that I bookmarked in my Kindle.  These lines/quotes might be a little SPOILERISH so consider yourself warned! haha

"I fear oblivion," he said without a moment's pause. 

 "I fear it like the proverbial blind man who's afraid of the dark." 

*****

"Sometimes people don't understand the promises they're making when they make them," I said

Isaac shot me a look.  "Right of course.  But you keep the promise anyway.  

That's what love is.  Love is keeping the promise anyway."

*****

"That's the thing about pain," Augustus said... 

"It demands to be felt."

*****

"The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars/But in ourselves" 

Easy enough to say when you're a Roman nobleman (or Shakespeare!) 

but there is no shortage of fault to be found amid our stars.

*****

"The dead are visible only in the terrible lidless eye of memory.  

The living, thank heaven, retain the ability to surprise and to disappoint"

*****

"You realize that trying to keep your distance from me 

will not lessen my affection for you."

*****

"Do you know, what Dom Perignon said after inventing champagne?...

He called out to his fellow monks, 

'Come quickly: I am tasting the stars'"

"Of course," said our waiter.  

"We have bottled all the stars this evening, my young friends."

*****

"People always get used to beauty, though."

"I haven't gotten used to you just yet."

(BOOM! hahaha -not part of the quote!)

*****

"Oh, I wouldn't mind, Hazel Grace.  

It would be a privilege to have my heart broken by you."

*****

"You are a side effect," Van Houten continued, 

"of an evolutionary process that cares little for individual lives.  

You are a failed experiment in mutation."

*****

"You know what I believe?  I remember in college I was taking this math class, 

this really great math class taught by this tiny old woman.  

She was talking about fast Fourier transforms 

and she stopped midsentence and said, 

'Sometimes it seems the universe wants to be noticed'"

*****

"How are the eyes?"

"Oh, excellent...  

I mean, they're not in my head is the only problem."

"Awesome, yeah...Not to one-up you or anything 

but my body is made out of cancer."

*****

"Ma'am, your daughter's car has just been deservedly egged by a blind man.  

Please close the door and go back inside or we'll be forced to call the police."

*****

"What's that?"

"That laundry basket?"

"No.  Next to it."

"I don't see anything next to it."

"It's my last shred of dignity.  It's very small."

*****

"some infinities are bigger than other infinities...

There are days, many of them, when I resent the size of my unbounded set.

I want more numbers than I'm likely to get..."

*****

"The pleasure of remembering had been taken from me, 

because there was no longer anyone to remember with. 

It felt like losing your co-rememberer meant losing the memory itself..."

*****

"You are going to live a good and long life filled 

with great and terrible moments that you cannot even imagine yet!"

*****

"There's a great quote in Gus' house, 

one that both he and I found very comforting: 

Without pain, we couldn't know joy"

*****

"But it was sure a privilege to love him, huh?

Gives you an idea how I feel about you."

*****

"The real heroes anyway aren't the people doing things; 

the real heroes are the people NOTICING things, paying attention."

*****

"You don't get to choose if you get hurt in this world, old man, 

but you do have some say in who hurts you."

(Gosh! I got teary-eyed a bit rereading a few of those favorite lines again!)

Things I learned from my free day Saturday

Lessons I've learned (or re-learned whichever the case may be) from my free day Saturday this weekend...

1. I'm not used to eating that much food...that fast! 
Goodness! I woke up early - after a late night Friday gimik night watching Wilson Philips @ MOA Arena  may I add - to make a quick phone call to the office and headed back to bed because IT IS A SATURDAY NO WORK DAY for me... then had to drag myself out of bed again around noon... 
Checked messages and tweets and spontaneously made arrangements with my new adventure buddy and while rushing through my lunch, was making final arrangements to head off to QC by 2pm?!... GAH! As in di ko ata nalasahan yun kinain ko! haha

2.  It is truly a memorable experience to find and meet new friends and acquaintances...
You never know where such encounters will take you... enough said

3.  There are still good taxi drivers
For the life of me, I've always been anxious whenever I ride a taxi...
Good thing that the taxi rides we took yesterday were uneventful so to speak and the cab drivers were nice too!

4.  My penchant for wearing anything La Sallle in The Ateneo had an exemption if my life depended on it! haha
Define Bonfire... yup! I was there!
and did I mention I was (unfortunately? whichever side you're on) wearing a La Salle shirt - my trip to Katipunan was a spur of the moment thing - really!
So since we were unable to make a side trip for me to buy a new shirt... I had to settle to wearing my jacket! In this heat?! You can just imagine, right?! 
And what luck... of course I'd see familiar faces in Ateneo... and of all people, I bumped into one of my current student haha

Me with Ymara - current SC president in school

5.  I CAN NOT stay up late a day before a scheduled run!
And here I was thinking whether or not I can do it one after the other! hahaha
When I arrived home this morning! I was hungry and downed a 2-pc chickenjoy - that is a sure sign that I'm really hungry! Stayed up for a couple of hours coz I was still on a high after the
impromptu adventures I had - one in Tomas Morato and the other in Katipunan!
And woke up with just a couple of hours of sleep to start my Sunday!
My body clock sucks bigtime! haha

Instagram: Playing with pic collages

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"Different moods... Same fixation...  #Starbucks"

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Park benches in Australia

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"During my trip to Australia, I had this crazy urge to have my picture taken on the nearest park bench "

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Know my favorite shirt style?

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"Now you know my favorite style in shirts..."

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Instagram: Tempura is an all-time fave Japanese food

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"Tempura Bento Box"
(taken at Red Kimono Alabang Town Center)

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The latest by Mitch Albom on my Kindle

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"Or do I read this one?... Decisions...decisions..."

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Instagram: The Casual Vacancy in my Kindle

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"Will I read this one first...?"

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Latest addition to my e-library

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"Excited to hook up my 2 latest ebooks in my kindle too!"

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