Yay!

More pictures from Cebu, taken by Greg and Derek the canadian guys we met at the hotel. See them here!

Here's some of my faves:

Spelling "help" on the city tour

A girl dancing while her blind grandad played guitarDancing at the Christmas party

John and Mel dancing

Day 5 and 6

Christmas Day! Woohoo! We had another lie-in after staying up quite late with the other guests at the Christmas party, and opened our presents before we got up. As soon as we saw it was sunny we slopped suncream on, grabbed our books and rushed downstairs to sit by the pool and catch some rays. Even though we were only out there for about 30 mins before it rained I still managed to burn. I am still peeling from it, but I now have a nice tan too. For lunch we had a nice pizza and mango shakes. I love the shakes soo much, they're so yummy!

I think after lunch we either went back out to sit by the pool or we went back to bed for a nap. I really don't remember. But I know that at about 3pm we went for some spa treatments using the vouchers Jo and Greg had won. Because Greg had already had a facial and massage he let me have his voucher, which was really great of him. We decided to have a facial, foot scrub and massage. It lasted over 3 hours and it was wonderful...The facial especially was very relaxing. I didn't enjoy the foot scrub so much. They filed away all the hard skin, and it was really uncomfortable when they were doing the tickly spots. I can't explain it, but I endured it rather than enjoyed it. The massage was good too, except I got really bad back ache from lying on my front for so long. We went back smelling very fragrant and feeling very relaxed.

In the evening we watched a ton of movies. It took us 2 and a half hours to get through the whole of Elf on Cartoon Network because there were adverts EVERY 5 MINUTES. Seriously. It was so frustrating! And they kept missing bits out. We managed to watch 2 films at the same time because of those damn adverts. I did really enjoy what I saw of both the films though.

Day 6 was our last day. We changed our flights so we left 2 days early because...well...there wasn't anything we could afford to do except sit by the pool or beach. I would have loved to have completed the scuba diving course but that was over £100 I think. I couldn't afford it anyhow. So we spent the morning sunbathing since it was gloriously sunny and left around 3:30pm. Our flight wasn't until 9:30pm but the airline told us we had to pay the changing fee four hours before the flight. But when I got there I was told I could pay at check-in so we turned up hours early for nothing. Argh! Our flight was delayed again, but we were back in Hong Kong in no time. From the minute we arrived to when we got back to our flat was under an hour. So quick! I was so glad we didn't have to queue at immigration- we just swiped our ID cards and had our thumbprints checked. If this is what they plan to do in Britain with our ID cards then I say go for it! It was SO easy.

On the 7th day we rested.

Holiday: Day 4

Day 4 was Christmas Eve. We didn't do much. I think we had a long lie-in and watched movies on TV. In the afternoon we decided to see the beach with the canadians, so we asked the manager to drop us off. He said he'd be taking us to a nice beach. We were told that the Cebu Beach Club beach wasn't great but there was another one which was much nicer. Guess which one he took us to...Yup the Cebu Beach Club. And when we saw the beach we weren't happy. We walked down and half of it was covered in algae, and there were boats moored. This wasn't the white sand, clear sea beach we'd seen in the pictures. And there was no sun to be seen. We would have gone straight back if the manager hadn't driven off. Derek explored a bit to see if there was a nicer beach we could walk too, and luckily there was a better one not far away. It was still small, and there was a watersports centre close by but it was better than the algae covered beach. So we "sun" bathed and read until the manager came to pick us back up.

In the evening the resort held a Christmas Party for us. Considering the resort was at "full capacity" there weren't many people there. We were seated with the canadians (because we couldn't get enough of each other haha), then there was a British guy and his Australian fiance, a Japanese couple, John, a Korean family and then the owner of the resort (Larry) and his family. Oh and because it's an ESL school some of the students came too. They served us clam chowder, turkey and stuffing, ham in a pineapple sauce, salad, break, fruit cake and homemade icecream. It was a really nice dinner. Then we played some games. The first game was a version of "Islands" and we had to dance around a folded newspaper and try to squeeze on with our partners when the music stopped. Jo and Greg won and got a certificate for a free spa treatment.

The next game was the 5 Apples Challenge- eat 5 apples in 3 mins. 2 of the students tried that game but I don't think either managed it. Then they did the same game but with 5 beers so Derek and a girl had a go. Apparently it was really bad beer and both of them struggled, so all the other guys gave them some help. Derek spent the next half an hour in the toilets throwing up haha. We were given live entertainment after- some German guy with his guitar and keyboard played songs and we all danced and chatted. It was a really good night all in all.

Holiday: Days 1 and 2

So we left on Thursday evening and eventually landed in Cebu at 5am. 2 hours late. Our airport pick-up was nowhere to be seen but the staff at the airport were really helpful and let us use the phone. By the time we got picked up it was 6:30 and we were very tired and groggy. We collapsed into bed straight away and didn't re-emerge until the evening when we decided to eat and check out the bar.

The next day we thought about going to the beach but when we got to reception there were a group of people doing the island hopping and scuba diving so we decided to join them. Scuba diving was so much fun! We went with 2 Swiss guys. One was an expert so he went off with a buddy, whilst the other guy and us did the intro course. It is so weird using the oxygen thing- I had to keep reminding myself that I could breathe. We learnt how to clear our masks, and clear the breathing-thing of water. We went for a swim around the coral and it was so amazing! There were all these different types of fish, and bright purple starfish and black spiky anemones...Just amazing! We had some lunch on the boat and then we went further out to see and got to dive a little deeper. At this dive spot there were much bigger fish...some of them were huuuuge and we fed them with bread. It was a bit scary doing that- didn't want my fingers to get bitten off too. When we went deeper the pressure change really hurt my ears and I thought I might have to stop but luckily it passed after a while. I can't really describe how awesome it was to be underwater breathing and interacting with the wildlife.

I'm back!

I hope you all had a very merry Christmas and Santa brought you everything you wished for! I spent my Christmas day sitting by the pool, eating pizza and watching films. I've got a ton of stuff to write and it would be a ridiculously long post so I'm going to break it down into days, and eventually get everything posted. All the pictures from the holiday, the last day of school and the teacher's Christmas meal are up on flickr now so go have a look!

Merry Christmas!

I've just found out (via Jo) that we will be getting paid an extra $500 a month to cover travel expenses, and that we've just been backpaid for September, October and November so I should have $1500 in the bank now! Which means I could use that money to pay the dentist...Or I could just use it to have fun with in Cebu haha.

It's Christmas party day so all the kids are looking adorable in their party outfits and santa hats, and are all very excited! Ms Wong's K3 class just came into the office and they all chanted "Merry Christmas Ms Jenny!" and then all shook my hand haha. So, so sweet! And I said it back to them in cantonese :p "sing dan fai lop!"

I probably won't be on a computer for over a week now so I hope you all have a very happy Christmas and a great new year!