what’s up everybody. the contest is going to wrap up today. gosh, the past 3 days have been epic!!! 4-6′ and perfect perfect barrels barrels. yes, yes. the only bummer is the weather has been cloudy and raining. not good for photos but good for surf. i lost in my heat last night but i’m still happy. got to surf perfect cloud 9 three times for 25min with only a couple other guys out. i’m going to watch the final so give you the results tomorrow. see ya.
*as for my stomach, it feels much better but i’m still a little weak. about 8 other competitors got food poisoning too. i saw this australian guy throwing up before his heat and he had a hard time walking down the stairs for his heat. gosh, i know that feeling. it’s the worst feeling in the world. anyway, hope everybody gets better soon….

the other day, hayato and i were walking back to our place when these 2 kids came up to us. one of them said “give me money”. gosh, they must have been only 5 or 6 years old. hayato gave them some candy and they were off. then i saw one of the kids again and he asked me for my surfboard. gosh. i just don’t know what to say….

you want to make good use out of your empty coke bottles? fill it up with gas and sell it. that’s pretty dam smart…..

aloha, got up this morning and felt a lot better. my body still feels poisoned but i can actually walk today. my heat was one of the last heats before they stopped the contest due to low tide. low tide here is crazy shallow. no water at all. the waves are still barreling but if you eat it, you will hit for sure. it was round 2 four man heats. the heats were 25 minutes so plenty of time to get 2 scoring waves. i got a couple of barrels over the dry reef and luckily made them. got 1st and will head to round 3 this evening or tomorrow morning. as for the weather? it sucked. it was raining and cloudy all day. but that made for epic glassy conditions. oh, and last night was a trip. thunder, lightning, and heavy rain. and not to mention a couple of earthquakes. the lightning was coming down right outside our window. the thunder was rattling the windows too, and the earthquake was shaking my bed. after that, i couldn’t sleep. all i was thinking was “tsunami”. and if there was one, we would all find out by getting a big wave over us. we are staying right on the beach and there are no emergency systems here. it was kind of freaky but i got through the night was was happy to wake up this morning…..

we’ve been eating out every night. except for the time i got food poisoning, everything was really good. this night, we ate at this barbecue place about 10 minutes away. it was so good. here’s tokura-san and hayato drinking a cold one. well, not that cold….

we were all ready to board the plane in cebu when we forgot something. jacksan. it was 2:15 and our flight was leaving at 2:30. i ran out of the airport and looked for a duty free. found him, and came back in time. this island we’re at has none so that was big. we stuck a bottled water into the freezer to make ice, cut up 3 plastic water bottles, and had a jack kind of night….

this is kazuya, hayato, and uske eating breakfast at a place down the street called “101”. i ate there today and it was actually really good. i had a spaghetti with meat sauce. it was pretty good…..

this is the place where i got sick. looks good but i guess any kind of contaminated meat will look good after being cooked. sorry, but i could never eat there again. but hayato and tokura-san still go there for dinner…. yikes.

good evening. gosh, today was probably the longest day of my life. the longest suffering day. it all started last night when we went to eat out. ordered chicken curry, pork adobo, and fried pork. i think it was the fried pork but when i got home, my stomach started hurting. i ended up staying up all night curled up into a ball. yes, food poisoning in a third world country. it was the second time in my life, the first one on a boat in indonesia. let me tell you something, it sucks. i feel like i was dying today. pissing out of my ass, throwing up. and lucky me, my heat was the second one in the morning so i had to paddle out at 7am. body aches, cold sweat, and pretty much down but i had to go out. the waves were too perfect. i caught a couple and got second so i surf in round 2 tomorrow. the other guys in my heat were tripping out because i threw up 3 times during that heat. it was hell. came back to my room and slept, well, tried to sleep. i ate a mango and that came back out in 5 min. luckily tokura-san and hayato were nice enough to make me miso soup with rice. what a life saver. thanks guys. oh, and hayato got food poisoning too but not as bad as me. as for iron stomach tokura-san, he was fine as usual. it’s 8:30pm now and i feel a little better but my body has no power.
as for the waves, gosh, it was going off today!! super sick barrels. got some good surfers in this contest so it’s cool to watch. well, i was trying to watch from my bed. they ran the contest until dark. the last heat of the day was the best. epic…. tomorrow should be good too so i hope i feel better.
**oh, i was the 4th surfer to get food poisoning in the last day. i ended up seeing the aussie doctor at the contest and he gave me some good medicine. gosh, if you haven’t experienced food poisoning before, i hope you never have to. especially in another country. i learned something today, watch what you eat and be very careful. i can’t handle another day like this. it was total pure suffering….
**photos coming up later. the contest starts at 6am and i’m going to climb the mountain to get some lineup shots before it starts. i hope i have enough energy…. see ya….

this is sick. a baby bird with feathers and everything in an egg. a popular filipino dish. yuck….. i’m going to throw up again….