— witsandnuts

Archive
2010 Yearly archive

football guy
(Passed by along this corner in Marina Mall before getting our cinema tickets for the must-see Tangled screening. One of the football guys gamely posed; they are selling tickets for the 2010 FIFA World Cup.)

Qatar will be hosting the 2022 World Cup.

In time with the UAE National Day, the Emiratis were rejoicing with the other Arab countries. Qatar will be the first Middle Eastern (and the smallest) country to host this event. Here’s an interesting bid presentation done by the first lady of Qatar, Sheikha Mozah Bint Nasser:

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Singapore 1
Singapore 7

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uae flag 2 december 1971
(The flag of the UAE was raised for the first time on 2nd December, 1971, at Union House in Dubai.)

Amidst the series of deliverables we worked on, we had an interesting day in the office because we pre-celebrated the UAE’s 39th birthday. The work arena has been filled with decorations which gave me a slice of the Christmas feel because of the abundance of green and red colors (inspired by the flag; white and black being the remaining colors). Traditional arabic dishes were served, too. Our organization is highly comprised of several nationalities, hence, you can imagine a mini-United Nations Day celebration when few of the expatriates even wore their traditional dresses (in response to the email from the management).  I am one of those who came with their normal corporate suits. But upon seeing those who responded, although the possibility is remote, something quirked me to bring with me a terno or the baro at saya I used in my folk dance class in college (if they would still impossibly fit, har har) from the Philippines. Few colleagues asked me about the Filipinos’ traditional dress. I found delight in explaining about it as I imagined the elegance of our terno and barong tagalog, which piqued their interests.

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2010 exchange gift
(Few days ago I sent the package to my exchange gift partner. I had to posterize this photo just to still keep the mystery. I hope she gets it before reading this post. I hope she will like everything in there, including the stuff which she never asked for especially the three Christmas playlists in the flash disk.)

I was thrilled when I learned that she-who-must-not-be-named is my exchange gift partner for our online kris kringle. (There is no way that she looks like Lord Voldermort; I am certain about that even though I have no idea at all what she actually is, except that I know the size of her feet, shoulder, even her brain and heart, i.e. she is smart and caring.) I thought that it would be easy to tick off the items from her wish list. But unfortunately, some items do not exist in my region and/or not possible at the moment. This got me thinking about my own wish list, which I thought would be workable.

Gift-giving is exciting for so many reasons . Personally, it is special because the entire process allows us to share a part of ourselves. From the time we thought about the person, to scouting the gift, to finding the alternate, and all that. At the end of the day, we are giving this person the gift of time. Whether we are working on a wish list or not, the process of picking the pieces of the puzzle is a wonderful experience. Since we are looking at things from different perspectives, we might think that an alternate piece or angle would be better. Truth be told, in this life, we will always receive something which we do least expect. Something which we never ever thought we would wish for. In this case, from someone at the other side of the globe whom we probably never had shared coffee talks yet, face to face.

At the end of the day, the old cliche will always be true, it is the thought that counts. This goes for my other exchange gift partner who might have had so much trouble in finding my Starwars chopsticks and other stuff. The gift of time is more than enough.

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Another set of captures aside from those previously featured in travelogues about Malaysia.

Malaysia 3
Malaysia 2
Malaysia 1

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