Happy Birthday Our Awesome Planet!!

Happy New Year to all of you!!

Thanks to some of you who emailed me and expressed concerns on what happened to me over the holidays. I was recuperating from a very serious case of flu and sore throat; I was confined for 3 days in the hospital. The experience reminded me to take care of my health and strengthen my immune system.

January 1 is special to me. It marks the birthday of my blog: Our Awesome Planet; it is 2 years old already. At last, I finished the Index site of the Best of Our Awesome Planet. This would make it easy for readers to check out the best of my restaurant posts and for newbies to the site to navigate around the blog.

You can see the main index site at: www.ourawesomeplanet.com which contains the following:

The Best of Our Awesome Planet (2005-2006):

Top 50 Awesome Philippines’s Restaurants! – People often ask me, what’s my favorite restaurant? I always answer it depends on what type of food, the occasion, the budget, and what is the celebration is all about. This is my top 50 restaurants and use this list if you want to try out the Awesome Restaurants in the Philippines.

10 Awesome Desserts in the Philippines! – I also love desserts and if Lori is the Queen of Desserts, I dream to be the King of Desserts. But I know I won’t be as good as Lori when it comes to desserts, but this is my humble attempt. This contains the best desserts I loved over the last two years.

Amazing Chefs-for-hire — These guys are the best because of their unwavering passion for cooking for other people! Pat Choa, Joan Manalang and Popit De Leon — thanks for the memorable meals you cook for me, my friends and family. I hope to build a top 10 list of Amazing Chefs-for-hire; let me know if you know of any other passionate chef out there.

Awesome Mall of Asia — The Best places in Mall of Asia. Check this out if you want to find the hidden treasures inside Mall of Asia.

The Best of Walking Tours in the Philippines! — If you are looking for Awesome Tours, you should try all of these tours by Carlos Celdran, Ivan Mandy, and Tina Decal.

The Best of Quezon and Laguna — If you want to explore Viaje del Sol and other areas around Quezon and Laguna area, this is your one stop shop for the very best of my post on Viaje del Sol. Even Lonely Planet is not able to cover this rich information about these areas.

The Best of Serendra Restaurants! — My prediction was right that Serendra Restaurants would bring life to the Fort. During the holiday season, I avoided this place because you can’t even get a decent parking anymore. With the newly opened City Center, I love this place even more. I’ll continue to update this index as I explore more restaurants in this area.

7 Unique Spas in the Philippines! — The very best of spas and massage places in the Philippines. If you are like me who loves massages, you got to check all these unique spas in the Phlippines.

Unique Stores in Metro Manila — I should update this. I’m always fascinated with stores that are not located in the malls. This is the list of all the unique stores that you should check out.

Miscellaneous Favorite Posts:

My Very First Post: Life and Death in 2005 — It was funny looking at this first post.

Pagudpud.awe.ph : The Definitive Travel Guide to Pagudpud! — My first online travel guide. Watch out for the Tagaytay Guide soon.

Romi’s Everest and My One Big Dream. What’s your Everest? — The driving force behind Our Awesome Planet.

Project Management Professional (PMP) Roadmap! — I often get questions on how to become a PMP. This is the roadmap that you should take.

“Pinoy 2.0”: The next generation of Global Filipinos — This is the blueprint that I want to follow for developing my son, Aidan. We need to develop the next generation of Global Filipinos and we need to start with the right mindset and strategy.

First Philippines Google Earth Tour! — This is the first version and I plan to come up with my version 2.0 soon.

A Creative Adventure in the Writing Salon — My very first formal lesson in Creative Writing.

Thanks to all the readers of Our Awesome Planet!

My main goal this 2007 is to finally release my book Our Awesome Planet: Philippines. I’m planning to go back to some old time favorites and visit the other awesome places in the Philippines. Also, if you want to help out let me know. I’m doing this on my own and would start looking for publishers, editors, etc.. If you want to donate and support the effort financially, feel free to do so via the Make a Donation button. Thanks again!

I wish and pray that all of you would have an awesome 2007 ahead of you!