The Love Affair is Over

October 25, 2007Noelle De Guzman

After nearly two years of consciously choosing to spend both time and money with them, I am bidding farewell to The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf. Never mind that I once professed undying love for their Extreme Ice Blended Vanilla No Sugar Added drink, or that they’ve recently introduced a Splenda-sweetened poppyseed loaf slice to their menu (something irresistible to someone like me who avoids sugar). Conspicuous consumption issues aside, the reason I stuck with the Coffee Bean for such a long time is because their service was top-notch, and they really made you feel comfortable in their cafes. The loyalty program they set up with the use of pink cards (which enabled you to claim a free drink after buying 12 drinks) and later on Swirl Cards (which stores prepaid credit and rebates per P100 worth of purchases) kept me coming back.

Coinciding with their recent expansion (they’ve opened branches all over the metro, including Trinoma, SM North EDSA The Block, and Bonifacio High Street) came a deterioration in their value for money. No Sugar Added powders never came at extra cost before; now, asking for NSA powder instead of regular powder adds an additional P10 to the total cost of a drink — which is already pricey enough, with very few drinks priced below P100.

I might have tolerated the price increase if it weren’t for the drop in the quality of service as well. My sister found it increasingly difficult to make use of the prepaid credit she had paid for on her Swirl Card, but the last straw for her was the staff at CBTL Eastwood switching her card (loaded with P500, plus stored points from her previous purchases) with someone else’s card (loaded with nothing). She only found this out when she wanted to use her credit at CBTL Ortigas Park. And the crew even treated her like she was lying to them that it was not her card. She asked them to fix this problem three whole months ago, and it still hasn’t been resolved.

As for me, the turning point was at CBTL Promenade. I had already computed that my drink would have 10 pesos on top of the listed price on the board because I had asked for NSA powder in my Regular Extreme Ice Blended Mocha. So I just handed my 500 pesos to them and waited for my change. As they punched my order in, I realized that they were charging me an additional 10 pesos on top of my computed price. I said, “I ordered a REGULAR,” remembering that the barista had even repeated my order back at me. “It’s not a LARGE?” the barista asked, confused, closing the register and printing my receipt.

The manager had to come and fix what had been punched in, then asked me, “You don’t want to make it a LARGE?” I stood my ground. But it wasn’t over yet. When they finally handed me the correct receipt, I still hadn’t received the proper change for my P500 and it took another few minutes to get my money.

With issues like this, I can’t help feeling like I’m being robbed at point-blank range every time I step into a Coffee Bean these days. Gimme a Starbucks any time. Sure they might be the McDonald’s of overpriced coffee shops, but even McDonald’s has superb quality control.

UPDATE 11/09/2007: I received a nice comment on my Livejournal post concerning this issue from Paulo Perez of CBTL Promenade. Here it is:

Hi Noelle! Good day to you. Just want to apologize in CBTL Promenade’s behalf about the incident. Rest assured steps have been taken to avoid this incident from happening again. Thank you for your feedback. We really appreciate it. Hope you can visit us again at the Promenade. Please feel free to send me your contact number at [email address redacted] so we can contact you and personally assist you in your next visit here.

All the best,

Paulo

Tags: Bad Service, Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf

BOMB!

October 19, 2007Noelle De Guzman

“Did Ayala Malls and SM Corp have a major disagreement, and that’s why they closed their bridgeway?” I asked myself in disbelief as I confronted the wall of steel blocking my way through the glass doors to Glorietta. I had just enjoyed a quick (and late) lunch at McDonald’s in SM Makati and was supposed to wend my way through Glorietta and Greenbelt before crossing Ayala Avenue on my way to the Living Asia office. I shrugged my shoulders and took an escalator down, hoping to enter Glorietta at the ground level.

As I started to exit SM, I noticed a whole lot of people just standing in front of Glorietta’s entrance. The mall’s interiors were dimly lit and the establishments inside looked closed. My stomach churned as I started to catch whispers of explosions and bombs.

Because the establishments on the perimeter of Glorietta were open, I stepped inside a Mercury Drug and asked the guard why the mall was closed. “May sumabog sa loob (Something exploded inside [the mall]),” he explained. “May patay (Someone died).”

“Kailan nangyari? (When did it happen?)” I asked, feeling my lunch start to rise into my throat.

“Mga 1:30 (At 1:30),” he informed me.

I walked toward Glorietta Park where several small groups of people had gathered into their own small circles gazing up at the mall’s facade. I took out my cellphone and found my parents and sister had gone nuts texting and calling me asking me to avoid Glorietta because a bomb had gone off there. And boy, did I know it. Between taking their calls and sending text messages back, I took some photos and video of the organized chaos in front of Glorietta and noted the helicopter making repeated runs in the airspace overhead.

As I walked down Ayala Avenue and crossed toward the Makati Stock Exchange, I was walking with a group of people that included a young couple and their daughter. The father was carrying the little girl and the couple tried their best to be calm around her. Then, as we reached the Stock Exchange, the father passed their daughter into the mother’s arms as he walked inside a bank. The little girl asked the mother something, to which she replied, “E diba may sumabog sa Glorietta? Hindi ba katabi natin yun? (Didn’t something explode in Glorietta? Weren’t we standing next to it?)” I took a closer look at them. They were carrying hardly anything, and the daughter was sock-footed and holding her sole shoe in her hand.

I had arrived at SM some time around 2:20pm. An MMDA truck and the ever-vigilant media (represented by ABS-CBN News) already were parked out front. The SOCO police van arrived just as I was walking away from the scene, continuing on my way. They — and I — had only missed the explosion by an hour.

I’d been delayed in my trip to Makati because of a traffic jam at Ortigas when I dropped my sister off at her meeting in Megamall, unaware that a 3-day sale had commenced today. Then, I had chosen to park in Shangri-La Mall and took the MRT from Shaw Station to Ayala Station, which connected into SM Makati. I had been so overcome by hunger that I chose to eat first before continuing into Glorietta. So I couldn’t help feeling like I’d been saved by the skin of my teeth from peril, however remote it now felt. Thank God!

UPDATE 4pm: It was a bomb, according to the police.

~~I’ll have photos and video up when I get home. I’m posting this from a computer workstation at the Fitness First in Makati.~~

UPDATE 7pm: Photos are now up. And MLQ3 has referenced this post, as well as my friend Joanne’s Multiply blog post.

Tags: Glorietta Bombing

Turning into a Girly Girl

October 18, 2007Noelle De Guzman

When I was younger, my mom let my sister and me play with her stuff: clothes, shoes, and even the make-up in her dresser drawer. But even though I played with her heels and learned in my own fashion to apply make-up, I still ended up barefaced every day and wearing flip-flops and flats. Life was simple.

That is, until recently, and I’m pretty worried — for my pocketbook, that is. I’ve done more shopping in the past two months than I have in the past half-year. And it’s not just any shopping (you can, after all, shop for food). It’s shopping for clothes, shoes, and make-up.

Clothes: The less I spend on food, the more I spend on clothes. I remember five years ago when I would come home depressed from a mall trip because nothing fit me (except shoes). Now I come home with shopping bags full of clothing, but depressed because there’s nothing in my wallet. Ü

Shoes: Okay, I admit I’ve always been a shoe addict, but I always buy for practical reasons, like replacing a year-old pair of trainers, getting higher heels for a “modeling” gig, and buying boots as part of a costume.

Make-Up: Yup. The day before yesterday, I went out and bought myself some liquid foundation. The weekend before that, I asked my mom to buy me a sponge for my powder compact, a blush brush and some blush powder. The weekend before that, I did my own stage make-up for the BodyCombat event — twice, with two different looks. And for the past two days, I’ve had make-up done. With glitter, people!

Now if loving to shop for shoes, clothes, and make-up are hallmarks of being a girly girl, then I might just be turning into one. At some point, it could turn into a chore getting all gussied up with the junk I buy, but right now it’s a lot of fun.

(Thanks to Ade for accompanying me while I bought my boots. I hope I didn’t turn you into a “Gay Best Friend, Only Straight.” Ü)

Tags: Shopping

Noelle, Queen of Oops!

October 10, 2007Noelle De Guzman

I didn’t want to write about this before it had come to its conclusion, superstitiously thinking that I might jinx myself. Well, there’s no chance of that happening now.

After three weeks, I am now out of the running to be the next RX 93.1 Radio Idol. I recorded my audition reel on September 25. It was aired on October 2, and the next day someone from RX texted me telling me I had gone through to the next round.

Of course I was excited, but had no idea what to expect. Considering I only started listening regularly to the radio a few months ago, I hadn’t really paid attention to the whole flow of the Radio Idol contest. Basically, people who want to become DJs for the radio station try to avoid getting knocked out in the earlier rounds by competing in batches through a series of challenges. This week was the second round and I faced off against three other people: Ellen, Randy, and Luis.

So last night I sat in a booth with the other three “DJ wannabes” and Rico and Danielle, the Radio Idol hosts. After we all introduced ourselves over the air, we each had to pull a topic out of a box labeled “J.Lo’s” (weird, I know) and talk for 30 seconds about the random topic.

My co-competitors were nice; we all kind of bonded in the hour before our show was due to start and we spent the time talking about random stuff, like Spongebob Squarepants. Just before the show started, I had told my companions that OPM was my weakest suit in music. Unfortunately, that was the genre I pulled out of the box. “Rivermaya”, the piece of paper read.

All I knew, every witty remark I had in my brain — it felt like someone had taken my head, unscrewed the top off it, and emptied its contents into a wastebasket. I felt like Patrick Star when asked if he wanted fries with his Krabby Patty (i.e., “DUUUUUUUH” was the only thing sounding in my head).

So, in short, I embarrassed myself on national radio before the ears of thousands of listeners. Right then I already knew I’d have the “Not Worthy” stinger played after my name at show’s end.

But guess what? I’m more broken up about sounding like a fool than about losing the contest. I didn’t want it as much as the two “Worthy” contestants Ellen and Randy did. But Luis has been trying for nine years to get into RX, and this is his second time on Radio Idol.

It’s probably not my time, nor God’s will for me to go into radio this way. As Gelli texted me after the show, there are other opportunities, other openings. While there’s the Wildcard entry that may still be open to me in Radio Idol, I’m not really counting on it. Like I told Randy last night, I’m just interested in seeing where I fit in, where I can excel. I learn that through both being accepted and being rejected.

Tag: Embarrassing Situation, Radio

The Main Event

October 8, 2007Noelle De Guzman

Fitness First had a big show last night called The Main Event. Each club had handpicked 12 people to represent them in this event, where the teams faced off against each other in displays of synchronization, technique, energy, and team unity as they participated in BodyCombat, a martial arts-based non-contact cardio workout.

Fitness First: The Main Event

The extent of my participation in this was limited to the BodyJam production number and the cooldown, but even those were eventful in themselves.

I’m still trying to collect all the photos I can of the event because I have a lot of stories to tell. This is the first time I’ve ever been in anything this big as part of the production team, not as a participant. Interesting tidbit though: this event was held exactly one year to the day I competed in the Nike Rockstar Bollywood final. Ü

Tags: BodyCombat, Fitness First Philippines, Les Mills

Domain-atrix

October 1, 2007Noelle De Guzman

Well, after more than a whole year procrastinating, I’ve gotten myself a personal domain. My friend JR, who so graciously hosted me on Scrufus.net, has set up a redirect so that the old subdomain (noelle.scrufus.net) and its pages will redirect to the new domain (noelledeguzman.com). But please do update your links if you can.

I am finally master of ~~the universe~~ my domain! Ü

Boogie Tonight!

September 26, 2007Noelle De Guzman

I’ve been getting a lot of search engine hits for “Body Jam 42”, which is the latest release to be launched across Fitness First gyms in the Philippines. While I’ve been doing parts of this release during my demos, it’s always been just a couple of tracks or a short block (and on the instructor’s side). I finally got to attend a full class when Fitness First Ortigas launched on Monday evening. I arrived early that night to get a place in the front row, and I came to party!

Warmup
Boogie 2Nite (Seamus Haji Big Love Edit) – Booty Luv: This track does a great job of bringing in that party atmosphere so crucial to any Jam class, since it is the “ultimate dance party workout.” Super simple combos too, so anyone can get it.

Isolations
Tambourine (Clean Version) – Eve: The hip-hop feel to the track helps make isolating core muscle groups fun instead of a chore. Excellent choice of song as well because it makes me wanna dance!

“Cha-Cha-Cha” Latin
Don’t You Worry ‘Bout A Thing – John Legend / Let’s Get Loud – Jennifer Lopez: A little challenge in the latin track’s rhythms makes this one enjoyable. Sexy too!

Contemporary Rock
Do It Again – Mega NuRave Styles and DJ ‘Little’ Rippa / One And Only – Timbaland ft. Fall Out Boy
Funky new feel, chest pops, and a huge cardio blast — this track had me rocking. The stomp at the beginning seems to drag on for too long though.

Recovery
Umbrella (Clean Version) – Rihanna ft. Jay-Z
Nice way for the heart rate to come down slowly. Obviously this is one very popular song, but this mix of choreography and music makes this my favorite Body Jam recovery track so far.

Jam de Podium
Sexual Healing (Freemasons Mix) – Alibi vs. Rockefeller / Get Down (Original Club Version) – Groove Armada / Get Up (Before The Night Is Over Tribalectric Mix) – Global Deejays ft. Technotronic / Rain Down Love (Phunkk Mobb Remix) – Freemasons ft. Siedah Garrett
I love that this track doesn’t have too much traveling from side to side going on, so even in a crowded dance studio everyone gets a chance to break out. The Bounce move is so much fun and the playfulness in this cardio block’s choreography really elevates the mood and hypes everyone up. I don’t like how this block ends, though. I’d rather have a big finish because the energy is just through the roof.

Groove Down
Beautiful Liar – Beyonce ft. Shakira
Sensual, sexy feel to this track and I love it! One of the best groove downs in my opinion, still incorporating dance while helping you stretch out those worked muscles.

I can’t wait to do this release again at the classes I attend. It provides a great contrast to the latest Body Balance release, number 38, which is all about stillness and focus. I helped launch BB38 in Fitness First branches in Manila and North EDSA, and will be launching at ABS-CBN, Fort, and Eastwood over the next few days. It’s a tremendous rush for me to break out and dance after all that controlled movement in my Body Balance classes. Ü

For more information about these group exercise programs, check out LesMills.com and Fitness First Clubs PH. For track listings, visit TotallyLesMills.com.

Tags: Body Jam, Fitness First Philippines, Les Mills

Saying Goodbye to Stage Fright

September 18, 2007Noelle De Guzman

Last Sunday I was at TriNoma Mall doing a demonstration of group exercise programs from Fitness First. I shadowed the warm-up to BodyJam 42, presented the standing strength of BodyBalance 38, and shadowed the Oldskool block from BodyJam 41. We were performing in front of the membership recruitment booth on the ground floor, and it wouldn’t have been anything out of the ordinary if our impromptu audience hadn’t started whipping out their camera phones, still cameras, and videocams (!!!) and started visually recording what we were doing.

I found myself feeding off the attention and actually loving it. It’s a huge contrast from last year. I think I’ve really grown in that aspect. Here’s the evidence.

June, after starting to attend dance classes: If there’s one thing I don’t want to do in a dance class, it’s to draw attention to myself. When that happens, thoughts start coming into my head, like “Am I trying too hard? Do I look like I’m from the Pretty Fly (for a White Guy) video?”

July, thinking that I was destined for a life behind-the-scenes: I’m just going to come out and say this: I have terrible stage fright. There’s just something about the way all those eyeballs are focused on me when I’m up on stage that turns me into a deer in headlights — frozen still as a statue as the 10-wheeler of shame bears down on me.

August, after attending BodyJam classes for three months: I was really surprised and flattered when she gave me this piece of advice (this is not a direct quote). “Everyone was watching you… You only looked up whenever I called your name. You know the last time, when I said you were dancing in your own little world… You have to look up! The audience can’t see you project.”

September, after auditioning for the Nike Rockstar Bollywood competition: After the cool-down, one of the judges announced the three members who would represent Ortigas. The first number she called was mine! I felt like I’d won Miss Universe (and I probably had the same mock-surprise facial expression, haha).

October, after competing at the Nike Rockstar event: And then we went out on stage. To my surprise we did better than I expected, and I was glad we didn’t prove to be embarrassments to our branch. After all, we were chosen as the team because we were supposedly the best they had to offer.

February, after auditioning for BodyBalance instructor training: Admittedly I’m a gym rat but I’m more of the sweat-my-way-to-fitness kind, which is why I was totally surprised when Mother Fhe (so called because she’s the “mother hen” of most group exercise instructors at Fitness First Philippines) told me to audition for BodyBalance.

March, after participating in another Nike Rockstar competition: It was a nice way to spend a few days living a different routine from home-work-home. I’ll end this entry with a video of our performance of which I’m very, very proud.

March, after BodyBalance instructor training: I’m sitting here typing this smiling inside with a wonderful feeling of accomplishment. You might ask why, since it’s so early in the morning. Well, for the first time, I team-taught a BodyBalance class this morning at Fitness First ABS-CBN… I really do enjoy this and I hope I excel at this new endeavor. I may be an instructor of a group exercise program that’s supposed to leave you calm and centered, but I am definitely buzzed about it!

July, after my first trip with Living Asia Channel: I’d never been on a working trip before, so everything was new to me: being on cam not for a family video but for a real show, traveling insane distances in bumpy circumstances just to get a shot of a required location, sleeping in a different place every night and at some point not having a shower to come home to… But it was so much fun!

The Noelle of last year would never have thought she’d be doing what I’m doing now: being in front of people, hosting or presenting or performing or anything of that sort. Sure, she may have dreamed of being in front of cameras but she wouldn’t have thought she’d have the guts to do anything there aside from quivering and shaking and making a fool of herself.

I have no idea where this boldness will take me, but I’m sure God has a great plan for my life which didn’t involve the timidity I used to suffer from. Right now, I’m just happy to say goodbye to my deer-in-headlights look. Ü

Tags: Performing, Overcoming Stage Fright

We Are One Tonight

September 11, 2007Noelle De Guzman

Isang linggong pinag-ipunan / Isang buwan mong inabangan / Ang feedback ng mga gitara / Mga paborito mong kanta / HALA BIRA! — “Sugod” by Sandwich

My sister and I waited more than a month for the Switchfoot in Manila concert, so last night we were hoping for a really great show.

What happened was an experience beyond my wildest concert dreams. I’ve never been front-and-center at anything before (well, I had front row seats to an M2M mall tour appearance once BUT THAT DOESN’T COUNT OKAY?!).

We had bought tickets to the mosh pit. We were at Cuneta Astrodome around 6:30pm and there was a long line for Lower Box B ticketholders already. We almost lined up there, but thankfully Marielle saw a friend in there who told us the mosh pit line was further ahead.

As we fell into line, I noticed this tall Korean-looking guy in front of us and I thought, “I’ve seen him somewhere before.” And then I realized it was Champ from the band Hale. (I didn’t take pictures. It would have seemed stalkerish.) Other local showbiz luminaries passed by, like Anne Curtis, who greeted the Hale vocalist as he stood in line and was later joined by the rest of his bandmates. Later in the evening at the mosh pit, Jericho Rosales and Heart Evangelista showed up and stood with all of us regular Juans as we waited for the concert to start.

Then some guy got onstage and told us what we were all gathered that night for. Apart from it being Switchfoot‘s first concert ever in the Philippines, 20% of the ticket proceeds would go to the International Justice Mission, a “human rights agency that rescues victims of violence, sexual exploitation, slavery, and oppression.” My heart swelled within me as I realized these guys had come halfway around the world to do a concert for such a cause. It’s just like them. Even though their songs aren’t overtly Christian and they don’t market themselves as a Christian band, nevertheless their lives show that they truly live the message in their songs. “We were meant to live for so much more.”

Salamin opened for Switchfoot. They played four songs, ending with “Euphoria” featuring Gabriel Valenciano and Daniel Gorospe on bongos. The guys were really on, really whipping the already-excited crowd into a higher frenzy.

Then the roadies came onstage and started soundchecking for Switchfoot.

What else can I say about the concert? I don’t even remember a lot of details, really. I started screaming my head off as soon as Switchfoot came out and started playing “Oh! Gravity”. It was pure delightful headbanging madness from beginning to end.

Jerome, the band’s keyboardist and guitarist, is a Filipino-American so at some point as a stunt, he got someone to bring out balut (boiled fertilized duck eggs) for his bandmates to try. It was a huge hit with the crowd, and truly established these guys as good sports.

They played a lot of favorites and the energy from the crowd was intense. It peaked during Switchfoot’s encore of “Only Hope” and “We Are One Tonight”. We mosh-pitters really rocked it out, especially a group of guys on my left who are in a band and have Switchfoot as their main influence. (From their conversation pre-concert I could tell they were massive fanatics.) In fact, the crowd was so hopped up on adrenaline that a guy and a girl from the mosh pit jumped up and started running around onstage, to the dismay of Switchfoot’s roadies. The guy got bodyslammed off the stage by one roadie, and two other roadies pulled the girl away kicking and screaming after the concert ended.

Because we’d bought our mosh pit tickets before August 6, my sister and I were entitled to a poster and a t-shirt for free, which we collected after the show. We didn’t know that the poster was an autographed one, so when I saw the actual Pentel pen marks on the canvas poster, I was in complete shock. It really ended the evening on a high note. Thanks, Switchfoot!

“We are one, tonight / and we’re singing it out / We are one, tonight / and we’re dreaming out loud / And the world is flawed / but these scars will heal / We are one, tonight! Tonight! Tonight!”

Tags: Concert, Manila, Switchfoot

Wedding Jitters

September 5, 2007Noelle De Guzman

No, I am not getting married. At least not yet, anyway. I have a wedding to attend on Saturday and I have just realized I haven’t bought the wedding present. But I’ve got an even more pressing issue.

I have nothing to wear!

The invitation (which I got only today) asks that we guests refrain from wearing black and denim. Dress code is formal. Serves me right for choosing the little black dress over a neutral-colored anything. On the whole I really don’t have a problem with the way I dress, except for formal occasions. Now I’ll have to rummage in my closet, but I have a sinking feeling I’ll need to buy something specifically for this occasion.

Any ideas? Cheap ones, preferably. I don’t want to overshadow the bride (LOL!), especially since I’m just the groom’s guest. Ü

Tags: Fashion, Weddings

true tales as told by Noelle

Author: Noelle De Guzman