Travel the Continents Tag

I got this tag from Desperate Blogger. Thanks a lot,my blogging pal! The idea is to know the location of our buddy bloggers.

Rules :

1. Start Copy from "Begin Copy" until "End Copy".
2. Put your blog's name and url write in which continent you live, add the country you live in. Example : My Imaginary Travels (Netherlands)
3. Leave your url post in here and I'll add you to the Master List.
4. Please help spread this tag by tagging your friends as much as you can.
5. Don't play unfair! If you have more than 1 blog, you can participate all your blogs for this tag. BUT you will have to post this tag to all your blogs as well. So, please. Don't cheat!
6. Please come back again to copy the update of the master list, often. This process will help new participants to get the same gains as the first participants.
7. Don't forget to use the banner at your post, you can save as or you can just copy the code in here.
Master List :

A. Asia : 1. Moms... Check Nyo (Philippines) 2. Hailey's Beats and Bits (Philippines) 3. allinkorea (Korea) 4. kimchiland (Korea) 5. korean food (Korea) 6. idealpinkrose (Korea) 7. Manna from Heaven (Philippines) 8. and Life Goes On for... (Philippines)9. A Great Pleasure

B. Australia : 1. your turn

C. Afrika : 1. your turn

D. North Amerika : 1. your turn

E. South Amerika : 1. your turn

F. Europe : 1. My Imaginary Travels (Netherlands) 2. Juliana's Site (Netherlands) 3. Picturing of Life (Netherlands) 4. Portia (UK)5. your turn

G.Antarctica : 1. your turn

~ End Copy ~

Can the following blogger friends travel with me?

1. Prily
2. Lynn-Chic
3. Tricia

Sharing the Love

Got this tag from cousin Lynn. Thanks a lot.

This award is extra special because Crystal created it in honor of the donor who saved her son's life. Her son Noah had to have a heart transplant when he was just over a month old. This award is supposed to help raise awareness of the importance of organ donation.

“The rules of this award are: SHARE THE LOVE!!! Share this award with all those blogs out there that you love. All the people who make you smile. All those that make you laugh. All those that make your day. All those that leave uplifting comments on your blog. **All I ask, is that you include a link to this post with the award and ask your recipient to do the same**

As you may have recently seen on my side bar, I have finally created a custom blog award!! I have wanted to do this for a long time but never came up with something that “fit”. I didn’t want just anything. It had to be something that meant something to me. And what could mean more than Sharing the Love by giving you pieces of my heart?? So I created this award in Honor Of The Donor That Saved Noah’s Life. I share this award with those of you whose love and friendship have enriched my life and made my world a better place.

I hope by passing this award around the blogging world we can all help raise awareness of the need for Organ Donation.”

I am sharing this tag to all my blogging pals. Let us keep the love around.

Titillating Tulips

I took photos of these flowers on my daily walks here in a foreign country. They are breathtaking... They are multi-colored --- pink, yellow,lavender, orange, white. They made my day...They are called tulips.

Although tulips are connected with Holland ( dubbed as "Land of the Tulips") they can actually be found anywhere especially on mountainous areas with the dormancy of cool temperature. Hence, it will always be found in temperate regions. Since i am in the European country, tulips abound everywhere. I love tulips.

Here are some of the photos that i took. I hope i can go to Holland one day and so i can take photos of millions of well-manicured tulips. For the meantime, i am quite content with these ones...



Here is the origin of its name....

Although tulips are associated with Holland, both the flower and its name originated in the Ottoman Empire. The tulip is actually not a Dutch flower as many people tend to believe. The tulip, or "Lale" as it is called in Turkey, is a flower indigenous to Iran, Afghanistan, Turkey and other parts of Central Asia. A Dutch ambassador in Turkey in the 16th century, who was also a great floral enthusiast, Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq, got their very names because of their Persian origins. Tulips were brought to Europe in the 16th century; the word tulip, which earlier in English appeared in such forms as tulipa or tulipant, entered the language by way of French tulipe and its obsolete form tulipan or by way of Modern Latin tulīpa, from Ottoman Turkish tülbend, "muslin, gauze." (The English word turban, first recorded in English in the 16th century, can also be traced to Ottoman Turkish tülbend.) The Turkish word for gauze, with which turbans can be wrapped, seems to have been used for the flower because a fully opened tulip was thought to resemble a turban.

Onassis Diamond is Sold for 3.6M Pounds

DIAMONDS ARE SUPPOSED TO BE FOREVER...

But not if you are Athina Onassis, who three days ago sold a flawless,icy, pear-shaped 38-carat diamond that belonged to her heiress mother Christina for 3,650,000 pounds at auction or 317,550,000 billion pesos! The pear-shaped, colourless Christina Onassis Diamond, which is the centerpiece of a pendant necklace, was bought for twice its estimated value by an anonymous phone bidder (i wonder who that was??? what a hell of a billionaire!!!). Athina wore the glittering item during a 1980 party in Versailles but the stunning pear-shaped 38-carat rock which the daughter of Greek billionaire Aristotle Onassis wore that night is to go under the hammer.

Athina, 23, sold 44 of her mother's jewels for 6.8 million pounds, nearly three times the 2.5 million estimate. Christina Onassis was born in 1950 to Aristotle Onassis and his first wife, Athena. She lived a life of luxury between exclusive Swiss mountain resorts, country clubs and the yachts her billionaire father favored —including a converted Canadian corvette he named Christina after his daughter.It was on this yacht that Onassis reportedly kept a jade-colored Buddha by Peter Carl Faberge, renowned for creating ornamental eggs for Russia's imperial family. The figurine's hands and head moved on springs and pivots, and would have serenely rocked as the ship sailed the Mediterranean. The Faberge Buddha ornament from Aristotle's yacht also sold at 1,273,250 pounds.

Christina died from a heart attack in 1987 aged just 37 after a history of drug abuse, weight problems and four failed marriages. Her daughter, who is Aristotle's sole descendant, sold the collection in a jewellery sale at Christie's in London because it was said to be too-old fashioned for her. She is young and she just doesn't wear them anymore. She wants to feel comfortable in what she wears. That era was gone.

The items were among a total of 230 lots by designer such as Cartier and Van Cleef and Arpels. Christie's said Christina's gems were the highlight of the day's auction, which made a total of 15 million pounds - a British record for a jewellery sale. Christina Onassis was thrown into the spotlight when her father died in 1975, leaving her to lead the family's shipping and real estate empire. Reports of an inheritance dispute with her famous stepmother — Aristotle's second wife, Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis — kept Christina in the news, along with her own short-lived marriages to a Los Angeles real estate broker, another Greek shipping heir, a Soviet civil servant and French businessman Thierry Roussel. The latter is the father of her only child, Athina.

Oprah Is Rocking It Up Again!

She is again the cream of the crop... So, do you think Obama will win because of the influential Oprah??? Anyway, on another matter here is a breaking news...

NEW YORK - Talk show host Oprah Winfrey is the world's most powerful celebrity for the second straight year and for the fifth time ever, according to the 2008 Forbes Celebrity 100 Power List released on Wednesday.

The annual list also included two couples among its top 10. Actress Angelina Jolie came in at No. 3 and her partner Brad Pitt nabbed No. 10, while music mogul newlyweds, Beyonce Knowles and Jay-Z were fourth and seventh.

Golfer Tiger Woods remained No. 2 and soccer player David Beckham was No. 5, while actor Johnny Depp took sixth. Music group The Police nabbed No. 8 after reuniting for a successful world tour and British author J.K. Rowling was No. 9 after the release of the seventh and final Harry Potter book.

"It's not surprising that Oprah Winfrey and Tiger Woods remain at the top this year -- they're certainly some of the biggest earners," said Matthew Miller of Forbes magazine.

The rankings give the most weight to earnings over the past year but also factors in such things as Internet presence, press clippings, magazine covers and mentions on TV and radio.

During the past year Winfrey made $275 million, Woods, $115 million, Knowles $80 million, Beckham $50 million, Depp $72 million, Jay-Z $82 million, and The Police $115 million.

While Jolie's earnings of $14 million and Pitt's salary of $20 million pale in comparison, the popularity of the couple, who have four children and twins on the way, and their constant presence in magazines saw their power soar.

"Had (Jolie) made a couple of millions dollars more she probably would have been close to topping the list because the number of magazine covers that she was on, the number of stories she was mentioned in, far surpassed anyone else on the list," Miller said.

And it was Beckham's move to Los Angeles with former Spice Girl wife Victoria and their three sons in a blaze of publicity that helped propel him into the top 10 for the first time.

In contrast, Rowling earned $300 million in the past 12 months, more than Winfrey, but is a reluctant celebrity.

The 2008 top 100 is made up of 20 film actors, 20 athletes, 10 musicians, 10 talk show hosts, 10 TV actors, five "tween" stars, five directors/producers, five celebrity personalities, four authors, four hip-hop impresarios, four chefs and three models.

The "tween" category, a marketing term that usually refers to an audience ages 9 to 12, is new, Forbes said, with "Hannah Montana" star Miley Cyrus making her debut in the top 100 at No. 35 "following a sold-out concert tour, a hit 3-D movie, and a controversial photo shoot that had the press buzzing."

Among those dropping from the list are Tom Hanks, Jessica Alba, Hayden Panettiere, Adam Sandler and Scarlett Johansson, The Rolling Stones, Elton John and Jessica Simpson.

The full list can be seen at http://www.forbes.com/celebrities.

Madonna's Adoption Joy

After lots of painstaking criticisms, Madonna's adoption of two-year-old David Banda was finally approved by a Malawi judge. Malawi is a landlocked nation located in southeast Africa. The singer compared her experience of adoption to the pain of childbirth. I could imagine the bureaucratic process she had gone through! I, one day, if Godwillingly would like to adopt a child as well. But right now, just cannot do it for very practical reasons. It is expensive and very time-consuming.

Madonna has a good heart( and very good money) of taking care of David and is spearheading a campaign by her Raising Malawi charity to get help for the 900,000 orphans in the country, many of them HIV-positive. AIDS has destroyed many families in Malawi, which has a population of 13 million.

David's mother died when he was a month old. His father couldn't care for him alone and placed him in an orphanage. He did not object to Madonna adopting David. In fact, he is very, very pleased!

Right now, the star has been caring for the boy at home in London with film maker husband Guy Ritchie. Madonna and Ritchie already have a son and a daughter. They will raise David with their other children in Britain and in the US.

Madonna made a documentary I Am Because We Are which focuses on Malawian AIDS orphans.

Philippine Showbiz Couple to Join the Trend

I really thought everything was alright about Sunshine Cruz and Cesar Montano after saying to the media last January that everything had been patched up. There was then that much publicized rift between actress Sunshine Cruz and husband Cesar Montano allegedly because of a Brazilian beauty, apparently everything is all right between the celebrity couple. But recently it is not. The things had gone from bad to worse...

I like the two of them. They are one of my few favorites actually in the Philippine local showbiz couples. But just like many of the Hollywood couples(and also some local couples), they themselves will be joining the bandwagon --- and that is an Annulment case had been filed by Sunshine Cruz. What a sad case again ending a romantic marriage solemnized in a romantic twilight garden wedding on Sept. 14, 2000. They should have been celebrating 8 years together this coming September, but unfortunately, that would probably not happen. Just sad!

One of the causes? It’s been reported both in the tabs and in the Internet, that Sunshine and her sister-in-law have been hurling unsavory words and accusations at and against each other. It’s painful to learn that an old controversial clip from an unfinished (and therefore unshown) sexy movie has reportedly been uploaded in the Net to "destroy" Sunshine. Just really foul! It must have been a very bad marriage if some of the family members are always intervening the private marital affairs! And Cesar? Did he defend his wife? Oh well, celebrities...celebrities...what else is new?

Geneva Cruz, Sunshine's cousin had been divorced from her first marriage and now it will be Sunshine... I hope Donna Cruz , also another cousin( who is married to a doctor)will never follow their steps. And Sheryl Cruz? Did she divorced as well? Oh well, what else is new?

Rice and Life

I am out of the country and the other day i talked to my sister on the phone. My sister is 3 months pregnant. She told me, "how i wish i am not pregnant right now, the rice is 50 pesos per kilo already and it might reach 60 pesos per kilo this year". I answered to her, "you better be pregnant now than when the kilo of rice will be 100 pesos or more!".

The fact is : when is the right time to get pregnant? The right time is when you are there and when you think you can support a life. As for me, there is no right time to get pregnant.

The businessmen are so tricky brilliant. They had been hoarding and hoarding how many cavans of rice? They want to sell it for higher price. Of course, they want profit. What about the NFA (National Food Authority) Rice? I just think they are the lowest, lowest quality of rice. It is just a manifestation how infected our government is! Okay the price of NFA rice is 25 pesos per kilo and you should queue as early as 6 o'clock in the morning to be able to avail. I mean, what a deplorable state of our country. Do you think the price of rice will become less? Do you think the quality of NFA rice will be atleast closer to Jasmine rice? Or Basmati rice? or any other kind of rice? I always believe that price and quality goes hand in hand. What is free in this world?

As for the unborn child in the womb of my sister and for the other unborn children, what future await for them? The very sure thing is : they will eat rice. It doesn't matter if they will eat it with a sprinkle of salt or a little bit of oil, or a little soya sauce. Rice is always a staple food no matter what is the partner. And the price of rice? Always high. And life? It is priceless! Probably, we need to parctice eating maize now! Or just like what my neighbors are eating right now, rice porridge(" lugaw"), with lots and lots of water!