Dining Out at THE ARMANI HOTEL

I had a dinner last night at Ristorante in Armani Hotel Dubai..a new temple of fine dining.
The moment I saw the sheer elegance  of the place, I felt like I was going to an Armani  Fashion Show ...on front row.
 

stylemonger with fashionista/boutiqueowner/designer-RAHIL HESAN

Tall, well-built and handsome security guards with taut bodies that work out to a regimental rhythm, importing some ethos of sexiness..SESSO!!!! almost a dozen  in tight fit black  Armani shirt paired with equally tight Armani jeans came rushing to our car  helping us out. The feeling is just haute, the feeling is SIMPLY DIVA-ine!... screaming  just so...!!!

 

RAHIL HESAN

My third time  at  the Armani Hotel , I was still mesmerized.
 Wearing a classic  Zara white shirt  with Zara black outer t- shirt and  black Zara jeans, I felt  like a brand ambassador!!!..thanks to my style breaker:Dolce & Gabbana high cut boots and my own made uber- sized zebra  necktie..I dazzled.

While we waited for awhile at the lobby, I couldn't stop appreciating those Armani's kind of interiors: neutral tones, subdued lights, and minimalist luxe furnishings. The staff don Armani suits and dresses as hotel uniforms, and  oh lala..the guests just scream fab too, with their HERMES  bags...almost a dozen, another runway show??????
 Standing tall, Armani  hotel  become the new  'fashion playground' in Dubai, aside from being cosmopolitan and chic. You'll see super-cool people with trendy outfits here all the year round, not just during Fashion Weeks!

wine cellar

  
Completely different from the others, Ristorante is more of a 'cuisine de charme' than a restaurant.
 

the most expensive wine: 15,000.00 us dollars/bottle!

FOOD: THE NEW GUILT

please....don't seduce me....i'm on diet!!!!

  
  Against  palm strips  and  flushing bulbs  that decorate the romantic old noble street,  stands the new  found food haven for the copycats, fashion designers, photographers, poets and stylists.

Getting  popular, the NOODLE BOWL has generated a picky-cheeky following amongst those seeking food with or without all the fanfare. The menus are inspired by South East Asian culinary indulgence, evoking echoes of imperial China, of Bangkok's sinous River delicacies and the Kampongs of Javanese kitchens in Jakarta...almost a religious experience.

  

 

i am a vegie....heller!!!!!!!!!!

 

Endless fashion loads,  screaming clients ....a fashion designer's life  can be very demanding! Although I love the profession I am in,  but after hectic  day's pressure, we need to rejuvenate and escape even for a little while and indulge in delicious food and conversation.

noodles in spring........nominated for its authencity, imagine you coud speak the language after the sumptuous meal!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

  Thought that  Chinese cuisine was noodles and spice and rice and all that’s nice? think again.

 A stir fried duck and chicken  marinated and simmered over a slow fire for ages, it truly melts. The quintessentially chinese and thai gourmet will surely beguile the tastebuds of the connoisseurs. Here, the simplistic ambiance underplayed the gorgeous creations yet miraculously, divinely prepared for the fashion's tete- a-tete , unwinding tensions and rebinding friendship and relaxation.

Top up the meal with a coffee of your choice…or ignore your calorie conscious conscience and indulge in sinful desserts. A fresh sliced banana  with ice cream, a platter of exotic fruits provides for a wonderful finale to the meal. Believe me, it's worth it!
....I FELT GUILTY ALREADY!!!!!!

size XXL on the BEACH? why NOT.......

 

It’s so summer, and lots of fashion faux pas happens when you are planning to spend your weekend at your favorite beach resort. Well, here are some ways to be a beach diva and how how to dress for the occassion, remember, even the beach is a catwalk, honey….!

 

  To look like a celebrity hog, travel heavy, only the- can’t- afford travel light. You need to pack all your awesome things in your very best luggages – with customized name tags, preferably in acid colours. Bring Hermes in different sizes and colors, Louis Vuitton won’t mind. Subtle is for wannabe’s and starlets baby….

Bring all your personal private armies- 3 personal assistants, 5 stylists: for your breakfast attire, brunch, lunch, snacks dinner and after dinner, and surprise rendezvous, who knows. Hire 5 musclemen to be your security guards cum lotion men when you love to show off your fake tan, fake curves and fake ass. Complete? Nah….hire some town criers cum twitter trannies to tweet every second of your movements. Get the loudest: Never Balderammasutra, KrishepaputamusLTD and the rest of fakes in twitter.

 

Wear wide brimmed hats with unique head-turner accessories like an Eiffel Tower on your head, but feel sophistication like Audrey Hepburn’s, to go with your over-sized Jackie-O shades.
Bring lots of bathing suits to display your freshly renovated tummy, pouting lips, and eye bags disappearance.To look summerish, show off the gumamela patterns with frills from your buying spree in Bangkok.

 At a beach resort, everyone turns up for the lavish breakfast spread to clock in the calories for the day – and be seen, so tag along your personal therapist, your dermatologist, personal nurse and your botoxologist. It is a fashion parade of no small significance….again, sureness. Sunflower-yellow minis, floral midis and bright striped maxis, soft pantsuits held on with beaten metal jewellery…pull out the stops and wear all the might.

 

You will be competing with haughty starlets who look fabulous, dress beautifully and shimmer with an, ‘I’ve-had-sex-on-the-beach’ (the drink, what were you thinking?) glow. They wear couture ukay-ukay for dinner. It’s your moral responsibility to show them you know how it’s done. Bring your DIORS and Balenciagas for grabbing attentions baby!

 Wear heels on the beach….BUT ON THE TOP OF YOUR HIRED PULPIT-to have this GODDESS effect.
 Don’t answer your BBM’s on your Blackberry, hire one dozen call center guys to do it for you……….!!!!!!!!!!!!

A Street Cat Named....DESIRE

Living alone gives me the kind of freedom, space and time I longed for…it’s impractical but convenient. I am single and it’s my choice. I had failed relationships in the past….all ending up in heartaches, a dismal facet of my miserable love life.I survived to a degree of almost self denial…then I said to myself,’NEVER AGAIN”.Putting my feet firmly on the ground, I made monastic vows to escape apathy and concentrate fully to I, ME, MYSELF mantra.

…..so I live alone, abroad.

It is liberating, I have access to the bathroom anytime. I’m doing household chores at my own pace,the ultimate privacy with no one bothering and snooping my unguarded moments….its my” declaration of independence”.

Like anybody else I have my own depressions, feeling lonely and knowing that nobody is there to comfort me. I sought solace to my friends…my emotional blankets, components to my comfort zones,I can’t imagine life without them.Routine it may seems but we never bother to alter our lifestyle, it’s just absolutely complacent.

Lots of them are living alone too…”same feather flocks together” as they say,we hang and chill out spending most of the night dining,chatting or just passing off the time until we bid goodbyes.

One time when I was returning home, there was this cat crying profusely,maybe he strayed and was hungry or afraid in the dark.He was filthy and weak.Leaving the hapless creature in the alley induced guilt feeling, yet I never bothered to appease him.His meows annoyed me, I couldn’t sleep and covering my ears with pillows proved to be a futile exercise,so I went downstair and picked the small cat home.I gave some milk and covered him with warm cloth,feeling comfortable and fed, he stopped pestering the night.I went to bed and slept.

Having extra responsibility like tending a cat was new to my system.I hated the idea of having me obliged to fed,nursed,bathed and groomed a stranger in my” private idaho”.

I compromised and allowed myself to give it a try.. a new challenge to my lethargic existence.Later, the task was routine and I was little relieved.

His playfulness gave me headaches.Cushions,beddings and table clothes were his favorite accessories to his playground.I taught him to use the litter box but for him everywhere is his toilet.He was naughtyand stubborn. Body language was our means of communication,like he’s rubbing my legs when I came home, displaying his affection and trying to catch my attention.

My cat became my new roommate..he was just another guy in my life,hanging around and comforting me during my rough days.He was my pal, our natural closeness bound us together…two singular soul sharing life….he was my commitment.

I named him” Gypsy”, for his affinity to the streets,his nature of being a wanderer.

There were times when I’m bored and isolated… emptiness filled my soul,but my body hormones permeated fire deep in me..burning me slowly… I felt the malice.

Inspite of his sufferings from wounds and bruises afflicted to him during his street rendezvous,Gypsy ventured often and disappeared for couple of days.I resented the action but allowed him freedom…a cat will always be a cat.

I kept myself busy and spent more time with my friends to avoid the emptiness and longing I felt especially when alone in my bed. I realized later that Gypsy was also waiting for me everynight..maybe I did not pay much attention to him.

When we were together, we spent calming each other’s nerve by patting, hugging and playing around.We enjoyed the night by viewing the busy streets below our balcony…and I thought Gypsy was trying to give me some hints about life..its pain, joy and struggle.

Shall I endure the bruises he got looking for love??….

Is it really worth to love and get dumped than never to love at all??…including footing the bills…allowances,and services like his “personal geisha” and waiter…?

Will I just gracefully continue my cat realationship and abstain from another human being…sharing my life and my bed.

Gypsy and me…or Me and Gypsy

Two souls…two different worlds…one desire.

EROS GOZE: SEPARATES FROM THE WANNABES & MUSHROOM PHOTOGRAPHERS

 Eros Goze's  edge is what distinguishes his  works, the dark side, the side of things that we tend not to focus on. Fashion is sensuality, it  sells clothes, but  "an  Eros"-  is a sensual that is much more palpable and realistic.


  Fashion and Art collectively collaborates  to create a distinct characteristic between "art" and fashion photography or lack thereof, that seems there's no thin line and boundary .

 

With his boyish  charm, chubby build, and unremarkable clothing -jeans and T-shirts, usually,  Eros Goze  blends into his surroundings. In fact, armed with a black bag, his camera is   unconspicuously hidden somewhere. If I hadn’t already knew  him, I wouldn’t have been able to pick him out of the crowd, maybe Goze's desire and passion is only to shoot people, models and other things he love.
 


 But the narrative sensibility of his photography suggests an Eros Goze's above and beyond  artistry...raw, unharness and dark.

 
  There’s a guilelessness to Goze's  works  that suggests recurring visuals—unfiltered, sometimes erotic emerging from his subconscious, and it sort of doesn’t matter whether he wants to, or is even able to, or to articulate deeper meanings.



 Art isn’t better than fashion photography. With fashion photography and art, people have the same kind of hype about their works. But to say that it all means nothing doesn’t mean you have to take their work less seriously....DO LEARN FROM THIS GUY

Follow him: hit Eros Goze on Google

photo credits: EROS GOZE

Si Lagring ug ang Beauty Contest

It was a frantic lazy afternoon without electricity, making me so uncomfortable, so I decided to move the bamboo bed to the backyard’s mango shade. I brought a made in Korea battery operated fan. The noise made me irritated from the plastic propeller.

Lagring….Lagring!!!!!!!!!

“Pagdala ragud ug paypay day kay perting iganga!” I said.

“Unsa nga pay- pay sir? Katong gikan sa Dubai? Gikan sa Pagadian, Ozamiz o katong from Bohol”she giggled.

Wow, misamot kaigang sa mga words na walang sense from Lagring.

“Kato nalang from Dubai’ I shouted, I imagined myself making pay-pay from one white peacock feathered fan I bought from the yearly Global Village event and sprayed with the latest Miss Dior perfume from Dubai Duty Free.

“Unsay color Sir? Penk? Green? Reed? O kani ganing daghang balhibo sa manok?” she retorted.

“Excuses Lagrimas, dili na sya from chicken!!! Hello, ako mopalit ug fan from himungaan???? Yay, peacock na Lagrimas!.I got irritated.

And she did bring the fan and shouted on the concrete stairs “ MISS CHINA…..!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Ayay, Miss China sa imong kigol…she waved the fan in the air and strutted down in the garden below. I was thinking…haaaay, where did I go wrong with Lagrimas. I realized maybe watching cheap TV serials made her crazy? Or maybe by watching low grade beauty contest inspired her…..you know, from the barrios.

“Dia Sir, pero ako nalay paypay nimo bi, wala naman koy trabaho Sir” she made some carinyo to me.

Wow ha….

While I felt the pastilang pagkalimi bya sa hoyohoy dala sa mahalong paypay nga pi perpyuman ug Miss Dior……..

“Sir, naa unta koy ihaangyo nimo, kanang hing text akong inahan sa kanunay gitabang nga papaulion kuno ko sunod ugma Sir….. kay paapilon ko sa kapitan namo  sa beauty contest sa among barangay Purok Manggiloy-on, she requested in soft voice.

Unsa?????? Lagrimas?...sure ka?...pagsure oi…eh tinuod ka? Ahaahahahaha!! I mean I was caught between mybad and my so discriminating  reactions.

I looked and surveyed Lagrimas…after all these whitening lotions she used everyday, she is fairer so far and maybe pretty as if…..kung wala nay lain!

Lagring stands 5’4, well.... pag naka high heels ug 7 inches e di 6’1 na ang kagwang. Na smooth napod iyang legs, adah..... daghan bitaw ug Hazel Bishop ingod- ngod sa iyang bagtak. Bantog ra sige lang syag suot sa iyang pekpek shorts……

Hala sige Lagrimas apil anang inyong binuang, basta uli dayon inig human sa contest ha? I approved and consented.

“Kanang Sir ingon man to si Ma’am Bebe Enriquez nga naa daw IKO attire”..kana bang mugna gani gikan sa kinaiyahan?

“Unsa? Basin ug ECO attire….ecological attire from nature”

“Mao na Ser…..!tenk yo jud daan Ser.”

Unya asa na nato na paliton?....pila ka bulig nga saging kinahanglan nimo sa imong Yellow Banana attire? Ahahahaha!!! I imagined Lagring in full Banana…say, she will be Miss Banana Republic!!! Arghhhhh…any how kan-on nalang later ang saging noh?

“Nah…dili ko ganahan ana Ser, bugal-bugal, maulaw ta ana….mokorana raba si Kapitan Otik! Kato nalang akong nakit-an sa imong trunks gikan sa Dubai…kato bang abaca nga gown?.....”

Wow….ambisyosang Lagring.

Ang gusto pajud isuot ang akong couture nga gown made in abaca with Swarovski crystals!!!!

Para bang mag-ambisyon gani ka….iambisyon jud ang taas, wala bitaw bayad!

Maka daug kaha si Lagring?....unsay iyang iparang sa Miss Talent Portion?...unsay iyang gamiton nga country?...unya naa kahay swimsuit portion? Unya duna diay na syay swimsuit…..naa kahay mapalit nga two piece bikini sa ukay-ukay????

…abangan!!!!!!!!!!!

Being a typical PROBINSYANO

I was born and raised in Zamboanga del Sur, but for the last half of my life I have lived in Dubai. Since compulsion formed no part of my decision to work here, I am at ease in this lively cosmopolitan city. I speak few of the languages-as it is somewhat a melting spot of many nations; have a wide swathe of friends and sufficient resources to partake of Duba's many attractions.


I feel at home here, and yet it is not my home in quite the same way as Philippines. My connection to Zamboanga is visceral. It is the Eden of my childhood. It is the setting of my earliest memories and perhaps my most profound experiences. It is my home by birth. It is where my ancestors are buried, where my parents live and died. Dubai is my home by adoption. It is where my style sanctum flourished my being.


I accommodate claims of both places in my heart by describing myself as an expat, at liberty to come and go as and when I like. It is this flexibility, this freedom that underpins my happiness here.

Almost every year, in the early July, I make up an excuse to head home to my ancestral village in Zamboanga. It isn’t as if there is an anniversary or birthday to celebrate. In fact, if I had to ascribe a reason, I would say it is a matter of roots.


Although many expats love to return home, the power wielded by Gulf money, the flourishing life, Pinoys lured away the temptation to go back home. But, the acid test for the born-and-bred-in-the Philippines-but-living-elsewhere-now, coming home is more on sentimental reasons, kiss and goodbye!.

Mountains of coconuts and bananas, hills of paddy, yards of morning glory flowers, rows of glinting buffaloos herding in the gleaming sun... this is the lure of home.


I have always been fascinated by the romance of nature and faraway illusions of huge forest, trudging through meadows, before clogging parchments with dreams about drinking coffee-in-the-mist I canonised so long ago. It was this pastoral road trips and the idea of getting back to nature that thrills me. So, when I flew to Zamboanga last summer, I convinced myself that I have to leave Dubai's confines and get to my boondocks that held forth the promise of a creative
cornucopia.


I imagined my last holiday back home, arriving late on a long trip from the local domestic airport, engulfed in darkness, air thick with the chirping of crickets. Our headlights revealed a lonesome carabao and her fawn in the woodlands behind us. The roar of gushing wind was hypnotic, but I was too tired to go any further at that late hour and crawled into sleeping instead.

What sounded like the hellish roar at night turned out only to be the river by the crack of dawn. Hot coffee and a stick of C in hand, I sat on the wooden chair composing nonsense haikus and eventually ventured out towards the water. Teetering across mossy stones, I decided to plant myself on a rock and let fresh air and creativity swathe me.


As the sun rises I took some excellent trails only a few meters away from my Balinese- inspired house cum retreat. Realising rather quickly that I was all fairly out of shape, I took on the fallen branches as support, to get down on all fours to climb over rocks still moist with what I hoped was only morning dew. The path took me an exhausting 100 feet up that offered me an Edenic views of Yllana Bay and surrounding hilltops.

Gasping for air as I was near exhaustion, nature, I learned, despite my delusions, isn’t necessarily benevolent, but the rusticity had me feeling more at peace with myself and the world and did in fact give me a new lease on creativity.

i'm coming home.................!

PAGADIAN CITY: THE NEW "TEASER"

Slowly and steadily, the contemporary Pagadian City address is getting a suave  facelift, thanks to the towering ambition and sky-scraping vision of one man, passionate and inspiring, his canvas is changing the definition of progressive and comfortable living in Pagadian. He may be misunderstood, but his power-packed transformation of the city speaks Major.

Cities excite me perhaps way more than it does to other people. On holidays I roamed to lovely cities like Paris, London, Rome, Milan, Cannes, Monte Carlo and Amsterdam.

I thought I was going to be a traveler  and then my dream morphed into being simply a tourist who is hungry for exciting adventures. It’s the way I think, the way I look at the world.

Like most other fast-growing  cities, Pagadian is “growth obsessed”…the city is the new black, the attitude of the south, which is why the search for MISS PAGADIAN CITY  was doing so well. The brain child of  the City Mayor – Samuel Co, the event was so charming and the city was charmed too.

Pagadian  is undergoing a period of enormous change and unprecedented economic development. It may be a show off but the display of growth works to the city’s advantage, making the city potentially more solid. It is  capable of attracting potential investors and creative types operating at the highest levels, myself included.

The city is an offering that requires an in-depth understanding of the market, it also requires us to be ready for it. It will  take years for the right – and sophisticated  conditions to be created… yet the way I look at it….new Pagadian is the hip&chic in whole Mindanao .

photo credits: Bobot Funcion