Nunciature Inaguration : Pope Benedict XVI

popeinaguration

I knew I will have a full day today starting from the IDC conference early morning today till a PSIA forum right after but my dad showed me last weekend the invitation from the Papal Nuncio for a 10am mass at the Cathedral followed by lunch and an evening's cocktails in honor of the new Pope.

Tough decisions. I told him I can accompany him in the evening but morning might be difficult. He agreed because he said he might get someone to accompany him during the morning activities.

Well it seems it was difficult for him to wake up early and I think it was really hard for him to go alone (guilty feeling). So off I left the conference before the last speaker finished so I can be with dad. He always required we leave 1.5 hour before the stated time to make allowance for traffic.

The guests were mostly from the diplomatic community unlike in other gatherings. I unexpectedly met a very gracious lady that evening. She sat beside dad near the piano. Dad called me to say that the lady had been asking for water from the waiter but none arrived. I tried looking for a waiter but it seems all were busy somewhere else so off I went to get the glass of water myself.

Little did I know that she was Austria's charge d'affaires! I made a good friend that night :) I told her of our past travels and visit to Austria and like me she too was passionate in travelling. She had been assigned to Taiwan in the past and the assignment she loved best was on the tourism portion.

She also was amazed that there was a diplomatic residence outside Forbes Park! I was surprised with the remark but she said all residences of Ambassadors are in Forbes (since the embassy bought them ages ago) and only two are in Rockwell so it seems its the first time she attended one in Manila :)

She asked if I intended to pursue what my dad did and I said of course! I just needed to set up some trad businesses and when thats working I will want to start the travel biz once again.

As during the IDC lunch earlier, I noticed the foreigners don 't usually eat unlike the pinoys :) She just took water!

Photo above was prior to the toast led by Papal Nuncio Antonio Franco and beside is a huge banner of the new Pope displayed at the patio where sumptuous ice cream from Amici was served.

idc 

PICS Planning at Oakwood

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The other weekend the new board of the Philippine Internet Commerce Society spent its precious 'rest' time to plan for the year's activities. Oakwood as suggested by Winthrop was a great choice!

I was able to attend a seminar at oakwood when it newly opened but never got the chance to see and stay in its serviced apartment till this time. We got a two room place and it was complete with washing machine, dryer, dvd and vcd player plus broadband which was a requirement.

Unfortunately, we were not really able to make use of all the luxurious amenities for presentations, discussions, including hooking up with Bobby who was in the US took us till past 4am therefore all we can do then was just sleep :(

We were forced to wake up early despite the fatigue for we didnt want to miss the sumptuous buffet breakfast. If we were not able to use all the other hotel comforts at least we were sure we didnt forsake the meal :)

Not in photo is Mike who had to escape a few hours for a date (!) and Bobby who was in San Francisco.

The Blog Mania

Early last week I got an invitation to join yahoo 360, a community of sorts which includes blogging. A few days later I received another blog invite this time from Friendster! Friendster has partnered with type pad. I was excited to use its other features esp the links and, gosh I forgot the term but its something you drag on the browser so next time you want to post a link to a story you dont need to open your friendster blog to post. Unfortunately it has so many bugs that its a feat just trying out some of the other features. I guess Google is still tops for having the first mover advantage as well as using Picassa and hello for the photo hosting. I think Yahoo bought Flickr but I prefer picassa :)