2016 Review: Ogane Korean Restaurant

Ogane is a Korean restaurant located along Tomas Morato in Quezon City. We got there via taxi, and it was pretty easy to spot.

As with any legit Korean restaurant, you’ll first be served with banchan/side dishes. Sadly you can only have it refilled once but given how some Korean restaurants don’t even offer banchan, this is already a good deal.

Personally I liked the quail eggs the most, then the baby potatoes, then the kimchi.

Almost immediately the Mulmandu/Steamed Dumplings (PhP250) arrived next, then the Bulgogi Kimbap (PhP180). There was practically no waiting time, service was pretty quick, and the chairs were pretty good, too.

No idea what meat they put in the Mulmandu but it was mushy, but it’s the right kind of mushy. It was great. Out of the three we ordered this was definitely the best one.

Bulgogi Kimbap was also good, but not that great. Taste was pretty standard.

Shortly after, the Budae Jjigae/Spicy Sausage Stew (PhP750) arrived. This being our main course, and therefore the most expensive of the three was a letdown. Budae Jjigae is supposed to have at least one type of sausage with spam. But sadly the sausage they chose to pair up with spam… was hotdog. Yes you read that right, hotdog. Apparently this is the Philippine national sausage

Ramyeon was included for the Budae Jjigae

Good thing is that the spam taste did get through the soup, so if you’re a fan of spam (or Ma Ling?) you’d definitely like Ogane’s Budae Jjigae. The soup wasn’t spicy at all, btw. Good news for you less tolerant to spicy dishes.

There were a few pork slices, and some corn too

Even if I was disappointed with their Budae Jjigae (why hotdog of all things?), I still would definitely come back to Ogane. Their banchan was great, their Mulmandu was bomb, Bulgogi Kimbap was good. We spent a total of PhP1,180 and there were only two of us but for sure a total of four to five people would’ve been full with what we ordered.

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2016 Experience with Smiley Pizza

We found this humble joint along JP Rizal Ave. Makati City, and boy did we enjoy eating there!

First of all, the food was amazing! I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves (granted, my phone camera is not doing them justice).

Cheese Quesadillas – PhP122

Smiley Pizza Cheese Quesadillas with a healthy serving of ensalada, cream cheese, and jalapeños.

Cheese Burger – PhP225.50

Simple yet delicious Cheese Burger from Smiley Pizza. Served with thickly cut french fries, and ketchup.  Other than the obvious, the Burger did have some pickles in it. I’m pretty sure you could tell the nice waitress to have it removed from your order if you wanted to. More on her later!

Pork Burrito – PhP205 

You could choose from three types of meat for Smiley Pizza’s Burrito namely beef, pork, and chicken.

No beans for you bean-haters out there!

 

Other than the food, what we enjoyed at Smiley Pizza was the customer service we received from their waitress. There was a moment when my partner was scouting the area from some hot sauce, and when the waitress noticed this she approaches us and goes, “What is it, sir?” GIVE THIS WOMAN A RAISE! This woman right here is the epitome of exceptional customer service. Granted, the place wasn’t that jam packed, but you could say the same with other restaurants yet have none of their servers give their customers that much attention. Employee of the year 2016!

Overall, five out of five. Ten out of ten, 200 out of 100! Food was epic, you won’t feel like you were ripped of, you get more than what you paid for, they have top class customer service. Smiley Pizza definitely exceeded expectations, and is a gem of a restaurant in this fucking country.

You’ll find this humble joint along JP Rizal Ave, before you get to Makati City Hall. Here’s a map for easier navigation:

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helloPay Promo

Until today only!

Spend PhP2,000 to save PhP400! Registering for an account is super easy! See my review of their service here.

helloPay 2015 Review

I was first exposed to helloPay through Lazada, and let me tell you– TL;DR: I was very, very happy with their service.

Now, I am one of those people who refuse to get a credit card (and a debit card for that matter) out of fear of being swallowed by my loss of self control, resulting to my most probable, continuously growing debt. If you are like me then helloPay is for you!

I went to Lazada for a really urgent purchase, and sadly the product that I saw will be coming from abroad. Given I have no credit nor debit card, I was curious when I saw Pay with helloPay or something like that, written along the description page of the product. And I was all, “Well sign me up!”

To be honest, I did google them first, where I found out that helloPay is situated in Singapore. I also found relevant linkedin result from my search, and those were good enough for me!

Signing up went real quick. Here’s a screenshot from their website.

Quite a few number of fields to fill up, right? I KNOW! I thought of that too, and got confused, and suspicious b,y it, but those are really all you need to sign up for helloPay. Your country, and phone number for them to send you a text, your email address for them to send you an email whenever appropriate– I’ll get to that in a second.

After signing up you’ll instantaenously get an email, AND a text from helloPay giving you options on how to activate your account (the text only gives out the activation code).

“So I’ve opened my helloPay account. What are the next steps to take?” The next step is what helloPay refers to as, “Top Up”.

From these options, I chose Dragonpay – online banking since I have already registered Dragonpay as one of “my” merchants in my bank account. After filling up the required fields, then clicking on the Top Up Now, I immediately received another email, and text from helloPay containing the instructions, including the Reference number of my transaction (I got an email from Dragonpay too).

Other people might find this spamy but I like it! I like being notified whenever I make an important decision, especially concerning money.

I then accessed the link sent to me, to finish topping up my helloPay account. Don’t forget Dragonpay adds PhP5 to every transaction, so you need to add that amount to your original top up amount.

And then, when I finished– Guess what! helloPay sent another text, and email to me!

This brings me to conclude that helloPay gives you more attention than your friends in facebook messenger!

I then used my topped up helloPay account to buy something off of– wait for it… Lazada~

Now, from my experience, the Payment Method Pay with helloPay only appeared when I used the web app, not when I used the mobile app. So beware if you’re planning on using a voucher along with paying with helloPay.

I then received another text, and email from the helloPay team saying that my payment to Lazada has been completed even before Lazada was able to send me their confirmation (which is understandable, of course, Lazada has so much more to deal with than helloPay).

The Verdict
helloPay is easy to use, straight-forward, and convenient. The only downside I could think of is you can’t use their service if you haven’t got an internet connection.

That is it for this review! If this review helped you in anyway, do give it a Like, or share amongst your friends who are thinking of using this service or not. Do Follow for more content like this, and thanks for hanging out!

Till next time!

Review: Advocate for Cats

Now that Advocate for Dogs has been reviewed– You knew it was coming: review for Advocate for Cats.

The biggest problem any pet owner has imo is: flea infestation (after budgeting for their pet’s food, space, vet fees :v). It hurts so bad seeing your pet scratch continuously, leaving bald spots overtime. Let’s see if Advocate can lessen their scratching or remove it altogether with just one application.

The Packaging
We bought Advocate for Large Cats weighing 4kg~8kg.

You will be greeted by two cats who look like they do weight 4~8kgs.

Looks just like Advocate for Dogs, only it is significantly lighter

1.7ml difference from Advocate for Dogs (Medium)

It comes with stickers you could stamp on to your cat's health card.

Ease of Application
The cap is equipped with an instrument that could stab the vial open, which is cool. Before, you’d have to search for a pin in order to do that (technology!).

According to resources I have gathered, you’d have to apply Advocate in the middle of your cat’s shoulders. That’s so they won’t be able to lick the spot regardless of how much they reach out to.

In addition, I found out that it’s a good idea to apply it on your pet in the evening before bedtime to leave it overnight. Cause it would take hours for it to fully dry out… Why don’t they include that in the box, tho?… or did they?

In all actuality, ease of application depends on your cat. And it doesn’t help that it has a strong, almost Mighty Bond-like smell. My cats just kept on looking back as I was trying to apply it on them.

The Price
Caption: this little thing costs PhP450.

The Verdict
There was no bald spot where we applied Advocate to our cat, which was one of the side effects you’d find on the internet (even during second application!). Now I think it’s safe to assume results would be different from cat to cat, but we have two cats and both didn’t experience baldness of any sort.

Before, our cats would scratch for 30 seconds non-stop. A week after application of Advocate, I noticed a significant difference! Scratch time has reduced to just 3~5 seconds. At PhP450, Advocate for Cats is definitely a sweet investment.

Now, the scratching – the fleas – are still there– and it is pretty unrealistic to expect the scratching to be completely gone in just one application. However, with continuous application, I’m confident Advocate would get rid of them all!

Review: Advocate for Dogs

This is turning out to be a blog on dog products, yes?

As our journey for taking better care of our pets continue, then so will this type of reviews!

This time, it’s Advocate for Dogs.

Remember the ticks we mentioned back in our review for Petgard? Well, this time when we removed ticks from our dog, their souls were already sucked away from their bodies! We only needed to comb her fur then the ticks naturally gave way. Good job Advocate!

Advocate for Dogs by Bayer

We already did research on medicines for our dog’s possible mange which turned up a lot of Frontline-related results. So it was the first time we heard of Advocate when the vet said that’s what they were gonna use. They said they’d charge us PhP900 in total for consultation + the product! Nope. Nuh-uh. So we figured why not just do it on our own? Searched for Advocate in olx, contacted the merchant. Paid. Boom. Done! DIY FTW!

The Price
Got this for PhP510 with shipping fee! That’s near 50% cheaper than what the vet offers, with consultation!

The Verdict
Full of wins with this one! No regrets! Will definitely buy again for maintenance.

Next up: Advocate for Cats!