Who I'd Like To Meet

This is a true story about my quest to meet Manny Pacquiao.  For those of you who don't know who Manny Pacquiao is...he is the most popular guy in the philippines and is boxing's Pound 4 Pound Best fighter in the world. In June 2001, was the first time I've seen Manny fight when he became the IBF SuperBantamweight champion.  Ever Since then...I've watch all his fights. He is now the WBC Lightweight Champion and has a upcoming fight on December 6, 2008 against Oscar DeLaHoya titled "The Dream Match". In November 2006, after I was jumping up and down doing cartwheels and backflips and screaming like a girl when Manny defeated Eric Morales...I made a decision that I wanted to meet Manny. So I put his picture on my vision board and titled it "Who I'd Like To Meet". I wrote on my journal "Meet Manny Pacquiao" as one of the top 25 things I want to accomplish. For 2 years, when I was working at Nordstrom @ The Grove in Los Angeles, I was looking for him. I always knew that he lives across the street from where I work. There was a couple of times when he would visit Nordstrom and I missed him because I was off or I was at my lunch break.  My co-workers would always tease me when I come back to work telling me that they saw Manny Pacquiao. One of them even took a picture with him and sent it to me. They know I'm a big fan so they like to tease me. The stock guys go to work early in the morning so they would see Manny running or shadow boxing at the park across the street. Even my girlfriend at the time sees Manny running when she drives to school early in the morning. They tease me about it all the time and I get mad about it. I told them and myself that I'm gonna meet him one day. I remember whenever the store have a meeting in the morning, I would get there earlier and wait at the park hoping I would get a chance to meet Manny. But it never happened. 

But one day...I was working and had a customer name Robert. I asked him "Are you filipino?" He said yeah. He asked me the same question and I said, "Yeah, I'm a Manny Pacquiao fan." The rest became history. He happened to know another filipino boxer name Vernie Torres who's been boxing with Manny since he was 10 years old. On June 30, 2008...Vernie came to the store one day with Manny's uncle, Noel...and invited me to the house to meet Manny. It was the coolest thing ever. I went to Sports Chalet and bought a pair of boxing gloves...got my camera and I was ready to go. Here's the first picture I took with Manny Pacquiao. You bet I enlarged it and showed it to my co-workers who's been teasing me about seeing him.