Starstruck

After moving in yesterday to my new home in Singapore, the family I am staying with decided to take me out for dinner to welcome me to the family. I finally had the plate of fried rice I was craving for ever since I arrived here, and it was everything I had ever hoped and dreamed for. hehe. After dinner, I hopped on a bus to go watch the inaugural event of the Betfair Asian Poker Tour over at the Mandarin Hotel. I was meeting up with a guy who organized a friendly cash game in Singapore and wanted to see the kind of competition I would potentially be up against. There were alot of Europeans and Americans playing in the tourney, not a lot of locals however. There were lots of SnGs going on, ranging from $100 to $500, which paid out only to top 2 places. The main event of the evening was a $440 super satellite tourney that gave out seats to the $5000 main event beginning on tuesday. It was quite a massive turnout, almost 200 players showed up for the super satellite, and about a hundred more for the SnGs. Too bad I was not able to pre-register online and could not participate in any of the events. It was pretty tight in all the tables in the early going and eliminations were quite sparce. But in typical NLHE fashion, bad beat stories abound. I saw KK cracked by AQ when it runner-runner straight, OUCH.

But the highlight of my evening was when I was looking around and saw a familiar face on one of the tables and recognized him almost immediately, it was John Phan! I immediately borrowed a pen from the floor staff and asked for his autograph. He was really nice about it and seemed a little bit embarrased that I did. LOL. It wasnt a good night for him though as he ran into Aces twice and exited out in the middle stages of the super satellites.

Also, I just realized what I had earlier feared last night. I was watching an SnG and turned around quite suddenly and accidentally bumped and think stepped on the toe of a woman who shrieked abit as I said sorry. I just confirmed the girl I physically harmed was, in fact, Liz Lieu. Im a friggin clutz!

On the way out of the tourney area, I got a call from Silly Cow (thats his name on the forum, dont ask me why) and he told me how he was card-dead almost the entire tournament and finally had to push with Ace-rag and lost. He then introduced me to a friend of his who hit a straight flush against 2 other players and raked in a huge pot. He also mentioned that Tony G was still playing inside and I decided to watch him play a bit as well. Tony G was very quiet and sedated in playing and was holding an average stack. On his table, I saw another reason to always stay alert in NLHE tourneys: Guy in early position raises to 7000 when blinds were 200-400 with 50 antes. Everyone folds to SB who does not notice the raise and just thinks its just between him and BB. SB moves all-in, BB folds and initial raiser calls. SB is surprised and asks raiser if he can still back-out. Dealer says no deal! Tony G says to SB to relax and see if raiser would still fold. Raiser says call and turns over AK. SB embarrasingly turns over J5. Tony G says, "not bad, 60-40, you're still in". Ace on the turn and its all over. Everyone comments how unfortunate that was. Tony G also says that he shouldnt be embarrased, the raiser still had to win the hand. That was just plain stupid if you ask me.

TD later tells everyone to move out of tourney area and that was my cue to exit. Got a bus and arrived home shortly. Its been a while since I watched a live event and I felt the poker rush once again. Cant wait to play a live game soon. Once I get my TV, Cable, Internet and new laptop, should be playing online and downloading more poker vids. Cant wait to watch Gus Hansen, Mel Judah and John Phan again in action on the main event this wednesday.

Till then, Peace out!

See ya....

Once again, my apologies for not updating the blog as often as I did before. Its been a really hectic past couple of weeks and alot of things have changed for me. If you dont already know, I recently got a job in Singapore and have been working here since Tuesday (November 7th) and could not be happier. People close to me know of my dreams of working in Singapore and have finally reached it. Until now, I still find myself staring into the horizon and telling myself, "I cant believe I actually work here.... in motherf*ckin Singapore! Woohoo!" Hehe. Not everyone is happy that I shifted though. My girlfriend wasnt too excited about me moving, for obvious reasons of course, but I know she will support me no matter what. I am so lucky to have found someone so understanding and caring and loving as her. Everyone, please give her a round of applause. How many girlfriends, or wives, for that matter would be this understanding? I would be hard-pressed to find anyone remotely like her. Love you hun! Mwaaaah! I'm coming back for you, promise! c",)

On to more pressing matters. As you may or may not know, the poker scene in Singapore is virtually non-existent. There are no legal cardrooms or casinos here that will cater to my obsession, and that makes me sad. hehe. Fortunately, I have seen a couple of sites and have been in contact with a couple of locals who tell me of a friendly cash game every weekend that I can maybe join sometime when I build a big enough bankroll (Apparently, they play $2/$5 NLHE with a maximum buy-in of $500!). A blessing of some sorts is the timing of my arrival here. The Asian Poker Tour is kicking off here in Singapore starting this coming Sunday, with the main event, a $5000 buy-in tourney, starting on Wednesday. A host of top-pros will be in attendance, including Gus Hansen, Phil Laak, Mel Judah, Martin de Kniff, Liz Lieu, John Phan, Tony G (I think), and a host of many others. I heard that Gavin Smith and a couple of other name pros were also supposed to join, but a major tournament in Foxwoods coincided with this event. I will be there to maybe play the smaller buy-in tourneys and steal a kiss from Papa GUS! 11Finger already asked me to give a kiss to Papa GUS from his end, anybody else want me to blow a kiss as well, just pop me a comment. Hehe

As for now, I will probably just stick with PokerStars until I find a regular live game or when the casino here finally opens. Hehe. If and when I get my credit card, I plan to shift to Full Tilt Poker as to the suggestion and high praises that GameFrog, Nutsboy and ManilaGrind have given it. I have played substantially better and more consistent. Keeping out of my mind all the bad beats and making sure I still make all the right decisions, because as Nutsboy put it, "the math will always stand-up"

I have met alot of people because of poker in the Philippines. Id like to thank all of them for keeping me company on all those late nights, sharing bad beat stories, winning decisions, donk plays and suck-outs, damn, I love me some suck-outs! Hehe. It is quite sad for me to be leaving all you guys, you have been a huge part of my life and its hard to adjust to normal, responsible adult living. I will try my best though. So thanks again to Bryan (WPT champ, booyah!), Maverick (for the chip tricks and how he hates people who limp-in with rockets, lol), ManilaGrind and Nutsboy (thanks for the online tips), GameFrog (thanks for all live tips), JPT (for the harrington on holdem books and showing me around all the poker venues), Cardinal (for being a great tourney organizer), NickG (for being the face of PH poker and letting it grow), 11Finger (for the online tourneys and pokerroom top-ups), to my live game buddies: Brian, Ryan, Mark, Randy, Patrick, Romeo and all the rest. Thanks for introducing me to poker and helping my game. But mostly, thanks for me being good friends. Hopefully, when I come to visit PH, you will all still welcome me in. *sniff* *sniff* :)

On a side note, I recently acquired the entire WSOP 2006 main event videos and will upload them to YouTube as soon as I get internet access where I live, so watch out for my poker videos section to be updated soon. I also have Phil Gordons little green book in audio format with Phil himself reading it, so I will try to upload that on YouTube as well.

Thanks again to all you guys! Peace out and let the cards fly (or some shit like that, hehe).

P.S.

Could not resist this suck-out story that started my rush to winning an online tourney recently:

I go all-in for my last couple of chips with AQ off.

One caller, pocket 7s.

Flop is K-K-7

Turn is K

River is K

I have the better quads! Hehe.