Almost one month has passed since the eventful conclusion of the 1st Asian University Championships held at Makati City, Philippines. Well, I guess those of us who went for the trip had been frantically trying to catch up with school work that we missed over the 5 days we were away from school (hmmm, or is it just because exams are nearing, lol) so much so that we haven’t had the chance to enter our experience here! So here I am…

The experience has been one of enrichment, fun, excitement and certainly of exposure for all of us, be it to our foreign counterpart’s culture, to the competitiveness of the game and definitely to our own team members! Hmmm, did anyone know that both Raymond and Phyllis are both excellent Pianists? Ooh, the sound of music resounding through the lobby without fail every morning. And Jorwe actually enjoys playing those Arcade Kiddy ball games? Or that all of us are just plain foto-wh*res… O well, enlightenment…

The first day we touched down, we were warmly greeted by the Captain of the Ateneo University Bowling Team Captain, TJ Yusun who also happens to be our friendliest and responsible tour guide cum driver. Hmmm, not to forget other interesting characters from the university such as Xiao Ku Ku as affectionately addressed by Cam, and certainly, Ian (the one who longs for Clar’s protection when he comes over to Singapore).

Arhz, when will I ever get down to the proper issue at hand! Lolz, as I was saying, after we arrived at the Manila Airport, we next proceeded on to Best Western Astor Hotel, a small hotel a while away from our bowling venue. Well, apparently its much better than the one in shah alam, as we heard from the seniors. Next up was the practice throw session at Powerbowl (the bowling alley) at Powerplant Mall, Rockwell. It must have been the most tiring practice session, considering the fact that we shifted lane by lane, over 24 lanes, for 5 min interval throws at each time and for what purpose, still remains largely unknown. Well, having thrown the first shot, we realized the lanes at Powerbowl is of great deviance from the ones we have in Singapore. The ball goes long, yet the reaction and comeback (prol due to the extremely clean back-ends) is immensely strong, in a sense, opening up quite a big area of play. Technical stuff’s so boring, arhz, more bout the shopping mall for now. Woo..

The shopping mall is very much similar to Taka or Paragon? Hahz similar in terms of their prices, but one thing for sure, Filipinos sure love the sound of the piano. They practically have Grand pianos at every other corner and prominent location. Ah wth, and food there is so much cheaper. Imagine a plate of spaghetti costing just S$1? Tt’s Jollibee for you, little wonder y Mac’s isn’t gaining ground there. All in all, we visited Italian, Jap restaurants, Corny Dogs, Victoria’s Shop etc etc… and every meal cost us an average of only S$10-15, and mind you, each meal left us all full n gorged.

Anyway anyway, some more on the bowling aspect of the trip… Having experienced the lane conditions during the practice session and with advice from Uncle Adam, everyone of us went prepared the next day for the first event of the competition. Performance was not bad but I shall not go into the details as its gonna take quite long to describe. However, throughout the whole span of the competition, the amount of knowledge and experience gained certainly amounted to a whole big load… For example, what to do if ur seemingly perfect shot starts leaving the corner pins? (hmm, it cld be that the ball is reacting too strongly on the backend, and hence a sharper entry thus failure to carry the pins) Or sometimes ur seemingly perfect shot, one that even bystanders or Uncle Adam would look with disbelief, starts leaving the same pin OVER n OVER again… its juz sway-ness… All of us can attest to it, Cam, Jasc esp.. hahaz… To sum it up, the bowling competition has indeed benefited all of us who went, having learnt so much and getting to know new friends from the other uniz.

Hmmm, some memorable events…

1) Glorietta
Left to while away 4 hours in a shopping centre, what can 4 guys do? Arhz well, they do the most unexpected things like go bowling in the arcade (some super strong guy happened to ram the small ball right into the display board of the game and it dropped down, right Raymond?), challenging the basketball machine (and hell, do we suck at it) and of coz we gotta mention our dearest Jorwe’s favourite game; Feed the Clown. And all of these to exchange for 4 cutest n prettiest hair-bands for our 4 beloved female team-mates… Oh, and pls ask ‘Man’ his experience at the massage parlour, Rest n Relax… hoho…

2) Best Astor Western (10th March)
Last Nite! Hahahaz and the wildest nite we had! Wooo… all from a bottle of Vodka Citron and the game called ‘Ring of Fire’. Within half an hour, 7 of ur was high, and 1 KO-ed. Hahaz, lets not mention whu’s that but yea… Aniwae, we din stop at one bottle, we walked over to 7-11 the next hr and got ourselves another bottle of Bacardi… hahaz I shall leave the rest as sweet memories and for ur imagination…

On an ending note, (this has taken far too much time) this trip has been a great and fantastic break away from the monotony of school and certainly provided the best experience for our parting seniors as well as us the unknowing freshies. Lets not get emo here, but its indeed sad to have to sae good bye to our seniors whu have brought so much fun, laughter, joy and certainly, they whu have brought NTU bowling team to where we are todae. Arghz, lets save this fer another time…

Signing off,
Whoosh…

NTUBowlingTeam at 8:26 PM :: |

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Tuesday, February 13, 2007