Pepito is my sister's puppy, a Maltese-Shih Tzu mix. He is a bundle of energy, love, drool, and tiny doggie teeth and there's nothing I like to do than bury my face in his warm fuzzy tummy. His first few days with us were marked by frantic visits to the vet (the first at 2 in the morning) since he had digestive problems and we thought it was Parvo. Now, he's all over the house, biting ankles and darting from one corner to another like a black, furry floor mop. And for some reason, he likes to do his business in my brother's room. Go figure.
Nikki, a fried of mine had her birthday at Island Leisure Boutique Hotel and Spa sometime in September. I have heard of the hotel and have read about it on Facebook but never really knew what the inside looked, so I was pretty curious about going. The hotel is charming, cute and homey, which is no surprise since it used to be a house before it was gutted and transformed into what it is now. There are small nooks with fountains and benches for you to choose from. I found the decor interesting, probably a mix of different Asian themes. The upstairs rooms still smelled of pain and woodwork, but they already had a fully functioning spa and Jacuzzi. I also loved the lighting-- subdued and soft, which was not surprising since it doubles as a spa after all.
I like the boutique concept-- the items used to decorate the hotel is for sale, and you can see how much by flipping over the price tags attached to each one. I don't know if Dumaguete has other boutique hotels like this. This is a pretty nice concept and it would be nice to see other hotels like this pop up in the city.
The food left a lot to be desired, however. I wouldn't go into the details since I forgot what we ordered. One of the friends ordered beef, which came hard and rubbery. She practically wrestled the beef into submission since she was hungry and needed to go back to work after dinner. My mashed potatoes came cold and bland, very much unlike other preparations of the same dish that I have tried in restaurants in the city. The only thing in the menu we liked was the calamares. The exterior was crunchy and crisp, while the squid meat was soft.
Perhaps it was just our luck that we went there when the place was still very new, and the staff didn't have the system down yet, so there were problems with the service as well. ( For one, they brought the silverware per dish, which required a lot of going back and forth, pretty tiring to watch even if you didn't do the actual going back and forth yourself.)
We did have fun taking pictures though. I kind of want to go back again, to sample the spa this time. Perhaps we can make a date out of it. Hopefully by then we'll see improvements in the food and service as well.
I never thought I would be able to shoot on a rainy, but I did. After a few days of Facebook messaging and a little bit of preparation we, Rena, Kat, and I got together to do a little shoot. We settled for the SU campus, hoping to find a location that would suit us. There were cute little picturesque nooks all over the campus, and luckily enough we found one, just across the street from the home of classmates who lived inside the campus as well, and who were kind enough to let us in when the rain finally decided to pour down.
Yep, the rain came, and not just your typical dainty little shower. It was the kind of rain that drenched you down to your underthings if you stood under it for five seconds. Kat and I, not wanting to waste more time and weirdly optimistic that the rain will let up in a few minutes, braved the downpour in our umbrellas and scoured the location, and we got a bit muddy in the process. But it was fun. The good thing about the rain is that it leaves things in a deeper hue when it leaves, so everything was extra colorful, dreamy, and and the sun decided to shine through right away, which was always a good thing.
I initially wanted to do a dark, somber theme, but the light was beautiful and so I decided that I wanted to capture that in the photos. There is something inviting about things after the rain. Everything is softer, clearer, and colors are more vibrant. There is something fresh and pure about the leaves, even the raindrops that sit on the barbed wire fence. And the way the sun peeks through, especially after rain in the afternoon, is just magical.
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ABOUT ME
Fur mama, bargain hunter, and horror-movie buff. I write for businesses and real people. I also love taking photos of lived, honest and authentic moments. Especially when dogs are involved.