October 20, 2006 is where we first met. I was invited by Janette Toral to the DigitalFilipino Club monthly meetup at the Makati Sports Club to talk about "Selling products and services online". Here's the actual e-mail invite:
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At 07:10 PM 9/29/2006, Janette Toral wrote:
Hi Jay. Our theme for the DigitalFilipino.com Club meeting this October is "Selling products and services online"
In this regard, I'd like to invite you to share your experience to fellow club members on how best to prepare and take advantage of the holiday season for those planning to sell products and services online.
Hopefully, this can also serve as a great avenue as well in meeting potential partners and clients for you. Details of the event are as follows:
Location: Makati Sports Club Club Caf (near the poolside area)
Date and Time: October 20th, 2006 3:00pm 6:00pm
If this is ok with you, kindly prepare a 15 minutes presentation in this regard. Your support will be very much appreciated.
Thank you!
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Incidentally, this was also the first time that Aileen would attend a Digitalfilipino event after all these years of being a member. We were introduced to each other but wasn't able to talk much during the event.
Janette mentioned in her e-mail "Hopefully, this can also serve as a great avenue as well in meeting potential partners and clients for you. Details of the event are as follows:" Janette was right. I didn't realize I would meet my potential partner here.
Our next encounter was during an Adwords consultation in Pancake House which two of us attended. I couldn't say I was attracted to her immediately, but I found it easy to get along with Aileen.
We got to chat and exchange e-mails online. Our choices of topics slowly expanded from business to personal. It was a delight to exchange stories and funny moments which we did regularly.
In December 2006, we attended the Digitalfilipino Christmas Party which coincided with the Yehey Anniversary at SIlvercity in Fontera Verde. We sat beside each other. There was an exchange gift by raffle session and surprisingly, the name she drew out of the fishbowl was mine. It's at this event where we also had our picture together.
In January 2007, we attended the next Digitalfilipino event which was held at the Microsoft Offices at 6750. After the event, we were supposed to have dinner at TGIF with Janette and other members of Digitalfilipino. For some reason, while walking towards Glorieta, everybody with us suddenly had to leave, leaving both of us alone. We ended up enjoying each other's company over dinner at Wendy's.
In late January 2007, Aileen blogged about a Valentine's day contest she and her friend Honey made. The person who didn't find a date for Valentines lost. On February 14, we bumped into each other at the E-Services Philippine event in Shangrila EDSA. We were both hungry then and decided to transfer to Shangrila EDSA Mall to have lunch. We dined at Max's Chicken and for dessert, she ordered their Valentines dessert shaped as a heart. I also invited her later that day to the Josh Groban media event with Christian Bautista performing at the Shangrila EDSA Mall. This was our first music event together. She pubicly declared defeat for not having a valentines date but technically, I was with her for lunch and the rest of the day on Valentine's day and so it seemed she did wind up with a date, even if we didn't plan it.
More stories to come...
