I have awesome friends

I just realized I haven't written about the previous weekend, which I spent with my awesome college friends or, as we like to call ourselves, the LF elders. LF stands for Lingua Franca, our org. We were supposed to go on a sort of retreat dubbed Oplan Ayos Buhay 2013 but we could never agree on a schedule, so we settled for dinner instead.

We met last Saturday at Kanin Club in Technohub and had a sumptuous dinner of sinigang sinangag, crispy dinuguan, adobong kangkong, and vegetarian curry. I don't really like dinuguan BUT OH MY GOD THAT CRISPY DINUGUAN WAS AMAZING. No wonder David was like, "Tangina, ang sarap!" Sinigang sinangag was awesome too. It was basically fried rice made to taste like sinigang. So it was dry sinigang? Haha. I didn't get to try the vegetarian curry but it looked and smelled good. The adobong kangkong was good, too. I love kangkong! We also had this salad with green mango and celery and peanuts in it. Not really a fan of celery so it tasted weird to me.

I take terrible photos of food. That's the sinigang sinangag.

Star of the night

After dinner, we went to Mercato and some of my friends bought ice cream. Seventy bucks for a small cup of ice cream was too expensive for me so I decided not to get any. But it was good. Rock salt caramel, I think the flavor was? Reminds me of this Blue Bunny frozen yogurt that had caramel and praline in it. Mmm. After going around Mercato checking out the food stalls, we hung out on the steps of one of the buildings there (techportal, I think it's called? Not sure) and did some catching up. I was asked about my breakup (Kamusta ka na? Anong nangyari sa inyo?) twice, first by Tine, then by my thesis partner Issa. I was like, Inyo? Wala nang inyo! Hahaha. I kept spouting bitter sounding remarks the entire night and we all had a good laugh, so it's cool. We conversed, we joked, we sang, we danced this crazy-stupid dance. We wanted to go to karaoke but we didn't know any nearby karaoke place, so we just sang right then and there. At some point we started acting as if we were drunk, but we weren't even drinking! I guess we were getting drunk on one another's company. It was that awesome.

Hanging out with friends like that makes me feel like I'm in college again. I miss college. I miss UP. I'm very fortunate for having been a student of the university. The experience is priceless and I was able to meet amazing people I couldn't have met elsewhere. I'm lucky! :)

The best thing about the elders? THEY ARE AWESOME. They're intelligent, smart, brilliant, talented... NO, I AM NOT EXAGGERATING. They really are. It still amazes me how I get to be part of such a wonderful group of people. It's humbling, really. When they start talking about serious stuff, I almost always just shut up and listen and watch them in awe. LOL~ That I am friends with such people makes me feel I am awesome too. Hahaha!

We went to Baler last year in the summer and we're planning to go elsewhere this year, but we haven't decided on our next destination yet. I'm hoping to go on a camping trip, maybe to a place like Anawangin where we can have both mountain and sea. I love that place. God, I could stay there forever.

I love my friends. And I will always be grateful for them. These are people I can see myself being close friends with until we're old and wrinkly and gray.

Found this photo on a Facebook page I liked and saved it. A reminder to invest in relationships only with people who deserve the effort and who reciprocate. My LF friends always remind me of what I'm capable of. Sometimes I feel as if they believe in me more than I do. We all need such people in our lives. :)