A love-filled gathering of the animal kingdom
Don’t be fooled by these photos. The images that you see on this page have men and women of all ages and levels of fierceness. They all gathered one night to unleash their animal instincts — otherwise known as my birthday.
My home base, Encore, was transformed into an enchanted forest filled with vines and exotic foliage — think Avatar meets The Jungle Book. Ledges housed giant birdcages, tabletops had precious crystals pulsating with positive energy as guests received animal-themed photo prints upon entry to mark their arrival. For all this, a big TY to my Encore family Erik Cua, Kim Yao and Pam Sollilapsi!
All tribes were well represented, with glitz-biz royalty hobnobbing with the avant-gardians who hung with the cool kids. Inside the jungle, everybody had the “gift of garb.” Guests wore their skins — animal skins, that is (faux, mind you — just say no to animal cruelty anytime) — to make themselves counted in the kingdom. KC Concepcion wore zebra while Teresa Herrera wore tiger print all over. The “It” triumvirate of Georgina Wilson, Belle Daza and Solenn Heussaff chose to be birds of paradise, perfectly blending with the night’s theme. Tessa Prieto-Valdes, herself a different kind of animal, wore different specimens of wild animals all over her body — the huntress cometh! Divine Lee and Joey Mead wore Cavalli cheetah, while Stephanie Zubiri, Pia Guanio and Claudine Trillo all wore sexy leopard prints by Charina Sarte, all to match what I was wearing — a Rajo Laurel cheetah print tuxedo jacket with pom-pom epaulets. I certainly looked like the chieftain of the tribes! Ungga! Ungga! (Hmm… I wonder where Kuya Kim was.)
The moon was at its fullest that night — tribal beats were provided by DJ Ronian Poe and DJ Santi. The vibe was Hakuna Matata with Lucio Pua providing the whole corner with Skyy Vodka and shots! shots! shots! of Jose Cuervo Platino. Our in-house team of mixologists and tasters concocted special rainforest-inspired libations for the thirsty.
Truth be told, I was expecting The Killers to show up as surprise guests, thus my Brandon Flowers-inspired look — I wanted to sing Mr. Brightside that night. Since their Asian tour got postponed and I didn’t think it was a good idea for me to sing that night, I just devised another program to keep my guests entertained. “Tim’s Favorite Things,” yes, inspired by the great queen of the jungle — nope, not Queen Latifah, but Oprah! Giving away things has been an everyday thing for me for a while (check out my twitter page — twitter.com/iamtimyap <http://page—twitter.com/iamtimyap> — where I give away prizes daily!) so why not do something even more special on my birthday?!
It’s a jungle out there, and what you’ll need for survival, in my biased opinion, are these things — a Nokia N97 (the phone I’m currently using), Nokia 5230 (the phone I’m giving away to my Twitter followers), pampering at The Spa for the winner and seven of her friends, Ray-Ban shades, a Canon camera, a Nooka watch, tickets to Cats the Musical, Genderme and Diptyque scents, and Murad skincare, all from Rustan’s the Beauty Source, weekend stays at the Dusit, a Greenwich party for 17, bottles of Skyy and Jose Cuervo Platino, Tim Yap tees from Folded and Hung and many more — you get the drift. All to punctuate my 17th year. Yay!
The climax, for me, was when I gave out a check worth P100,000 in school supplies from Mongol Pencil, the result of an advocacy campaign I did for them last year. UN ambassador KC Concepcion accepted the check on behalf of the Virlanie Foundation. It really feels great to give. The second climax was when Thai Airways GM Nivat Chantarachoti joined me onstage to give out the ticket to any destination in Thailand via my favorite airline, Thai Airways. Carla Sibal was the lucky recipient of the raffle prize most desired by the revelers that night. The night progressed with more wishers streaming into the Amazon. You could hear the load roar — and all that happened in Encore.
On a personal note, I’ve been celebrating my birthday in a big way each year, and the question at the end of the day is, “How old are you?” That’s why I make sure that there is always overflowing booze so that question is skipped and forgotten. Seventeenth year of being 17? Sixteenth year being 16? Fifteen years... in the industry? Age, as we all well know in the animal kingdom, is just another number. I looked around the packed club filled with all the friends I have made in this jungle, and more (for me, it has always been about inclusivity — everyone is welcome). They were all having fun; they seemed happy. That was more than enough for me. Turning another year older and wiser isn’t so bad after all. Each year we should realize how blessed we are to be surrounded by so much love in our lives that we should celebrate every day!
Whatever age you are, just always make sure that it’s roarin’. Raaawwwwrrrr!!!
