Best Oscars Ever

I don't normally like watching awards ceremonies. They usually bore me. Last night was different. It was probably the best Oscars ever! I love that they had Ellen DeGeneres host it again. She was just unbelievably brilliant. She's truly awesome, and no one--no one, can host the Academy Awards better than she can.

The nominated movies seem to be really good. I'm excited to watch them. I know I should have watched them already, but I'm not too big a fan of movie theaters so I've waited for them to come out on home video. I'm so psyched that I have a ton of good movies to watch in the coming weeks!

The speeches last night were also phenomenal. Jared Leto (Best Supporting Actor for Dallas Buyers Club) and the newcomer Lupita Nyong'o (Best Supporting Actress for 12 Years A Slave) especially, gave incredibly inspiring speeches. It was Hollywood on a different level.

Star power and fashion last night were also awesome. Cate Blanchett was astonishing, as usual. Lupita Nyong'o, again, as with all previous awards ceremonies this season, wowed with amazing class and sophistication. And even though I didn't like what my favorite Julia Roberts wore, I still love her. My bet for best dressed would have to be Jennifer Lawrence in her red Dior Haute Couture gown.

But there were two things that really made my night last night: Ellen ordering pizza for the celebrities (poor pizza delivery guy, he had no clue!), and this selfie--

Ellen wanted everyone to retweet it to try to break retweet records. All the traffic broke Twitter for a few minutes instead. Awesome, just awesome.

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Fated to Love You

I thought I'd never ever get hooked on Taiwanese dramas. I was wrong.

I was following Fated to Love You on GMA 7, a local network. However, I got impatient and decided to watch the entire series online over the weekend. And by God, I loved it!

Fated to Love You is a romantic comedy that tells the story of a "sticky note girl" who accidentally has a one-night stand with a somewhat spoiled heir who is deeply in-love with his beautiful girlfriend. The girl gets pregnant, and the two are forced to get married and live together. The story starts out simply, but ends up deep and meaningful, with so many twists and turns. It's both funny and touching on so many levels. I cannot count the number of times it made me laugh and cry!

If you want to know what I'm babbling about, you can catch Fated to Love You every night on GMA 7 (if you are in the Philippines) or you can watch it online (dubbed in Mandarin with English subs). This is the highest rated Taiwanese series to date, and it won Best Drama in the 2008 Golden Bell Awards so try to watch it. You will enjoy it!

sticky note girl - a pushover; a girl who is "used then discarded", like the sticky note or Post-It
Golden Bell Awards - Taiwan's most prestigious radio and television broadcasting awards

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The Power of YouTube

It looks like I've been hiding under a rock for the past few months, and pardon me for that, but I only found out about Arnel Pineda today. I was watching Eat Bulaga (Philippine lunchtime tv show) with my mom when they asked who the lead singer was of the band who sang "Open Arms" on one of their segments. When the answer turned out to be Arnel, I was shocked. I knew Journey originally sang Open Arms, but who was this Arnel person? Was there a new band who covered this song? My mom mentioned him a few days earlier telling me that he was an internationally known singer and that he won 1 million pesos on Deal or No Deal (Philippine version). But aside from that, I didn't know anything else. So I Wikied (searched Wikipedia, that is) him, and I was pleasantly surprised by what I found out.

Arnel is the new lead vocalist of the band Journey! That is amazing indeed, but what's interesting is how he was discovered--through YouTube. The band's guitarist, Neal Schon, found videos of Arnel and his band, The Zoo, covering old Journey songs and said, "he's the one". Arnel sounds remarkably like Steve Perry, and I think he's really, really talented, so I hope Journey will rise again. With Arnel as their frontman, that is very much possible. They have a new album out, Revelation, which topped at #1 on the Billboard charts and has already hit Platinum. Classic Rock magazine nominated this album for Album of the Year, and you can show your support to Arnel and the band by voting here.

Arnel's quick rise to fame because of YouTube reminds me of another Filipino, Charice Pempengco, the "international teen singing sensation" who was also discovered on the same site by Ellen DeGeneres, and later Oprah, who introduced her to David Foster. In the year that she's been discovered, Charice has been singing with the likes of Celine Dion, Michael Buble, Josh Groban, Alicia Keys, and Andrea Bocelli.

Truly talented and hardworking people deserve breaks, and I think it's wonderful that YouTube makes that possible. If not for that, these people would never have had this opportunity to make it really big because of their nationality and location. Another thing Arnel and Charice share is a sad past. Because of poverty, they had to strive hard in order to survive (read more on their Wikipedia profiles). I can imagine what this new life must be for them. What a wonderful blessing; truly amazing!

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