I have been here some days now, but only been at One Side 2 nights, and 1 night at Fusion.
First night at Fusion I met Marcus Chamat, Rodney Morris and some more WC-players watching a 15 000 P match against Mika Immonen and Radalfo Luat. Luat won in the end.
The other day I met the players from Holland at One Side, and a lot of players around the world had already arrived. I played one small set with Lolong, but lost 10 - 8.
The very next morning I tried my luck in Qualifier nr 9. I warmed up with a guy from Taiwan, and we played alternate break 10 racks. I had 1 Break and run, and 4 dry breaks, so I lost 9 - 1. The guy never missed, it was amazing to watch... He won a qualifier last year, but didn't get his name.
I met a player from Singapore in the qualifier. He got a dry break so I went up to 2 - 0. After that he didn't miss and I had 2 stupid mistakes, so lost 7 - 4. The guy from Singapore won also a qualifier last year.
At evening (Thursday) I went back to One Side, because the rumour was that Efren was coming in that night. The place was packed with locals = world players, and everyone wanted to play Efren. He played a short set with Johnny Fulcher, but then he wanted to quit. He had a match with Lee Van Corteza later that night, race to 31 in 10-ball, for 100 000 pesos, so he didn't want to play anyone, and declined all offers. Vincent Faquet offered him to play one pocket without handicap, but he even declined that offer to, and said he wanted to prepare for the match later at night.
Then he saw me, and he smiled and said hello. I was happy he remembered me from our 4 days with one pocket in Feb, so I said hello back, and then asked him to play one pocket, and he put up a big smile and said ten six! We agreed on 10 - 5, and then started to play.
Pretty cool, a lots of people watching, including all those Efren didn't want to play. Guess they were in shock why he suddenly changed his mind and wanted to play. I don't know either, but I was just happy I got another chance to play the best player in the world!
I lost 50 dollar, and 3 - 1 in the match. One game lasted for atleast 30 minutes, with lots of safeties.
Later that night, Jonni Fulcher wanted to get in stroke, so he challenged this young Filipino nicknamed Buddy, one of Bugsy's players. Buddy asked me about Jonni's speed, and I didn't tell him he was ranked top 5 in Europe at the moment, cause I didn't want him to get nervous. So I told him that if he played good he would beat him, and that I would sponsor him with 5 000, and we split 70/30.
Jonni didn't understand what happened to him. At 8 - 2 Buddy made his first mistake. In the end Buddy won 11 - 5, with only 1 mistake.
Later that night I bet 10 000 against Dennis Orcullo on the match Efren - Lee Van, and since Efren won I got 10 000, so in the end Efren made money for me
Today I went to a local cockfight, and I won 8 times my money
Great show, fun entertainment, but I do prefer pool
It's great to be here in the Philippines. Everyone knows who Bata Reyes is, it's just amazing. On the plane from Amsterdam I was sitting next to two Filipinos, and when they found out I played pool they said about 10 names of poolplayers in the Philippines without hesitation. And these two didn't play the game, they said they was only watching it on tv and reading newspapers.