2013

2013, you were a joy.  I don’t know exactly why, but you felt good.  

You led me to several places, places I’ve never been to before.   I saw houseboats on beautiful canals, thousand year old temples, valleys and hills from the top of a mountain, the outline of islets from a cable car.  In all these places, I saw magic but only because I allowed myself to see it. 

You showed me that indeed, nothing worth getting and achieving comes easy.  And that if you push yourself outside your comfort zone, and you push your boundaries even just inch by inch, you will be rewarded with things you didn’t even imagine getting.  Then you reminded me that when you work hard, do not look so much on the reward or the outcome.  It will take care of itself. But you should take care of your heart, make sure it still is in the right place.  When it comes down to it, everything is about the heart.  Keep your values and motives in check.

2013, I feel privileged for having seen kindness and compassion up close - all those people wanting, even begging to give and be of help. There is always an opportunity to help and to be kind.  Start where you are with what you have.  I wish to see kindness and compassion become a movement in this country.  That would be the most powerful movement we will see. 2014, will you let that happen?

Thank you 2013 for the tiny victories. They are aplenty: good grades from the kids, graduations, Ezra doing his thing in the toilet, completed projects at home and at work, food trips and travels.  There were also major ones: our good health, my mother’s memory still working, budget on the green, a chance to build a new house again, solid friendships, a new church whose pastors disciple our family with their teaching and preaching.  I am thankful even more for our faith, the one thing that holds everything together for us and our true treasure.

You were awesome 2013, but it’s time you go. 

Hello, 2014! Be nicer to everyone.

Cambodia

I'm glad I went to Siem Reap. I don't think anyone ever regretted touring Siem Reap. The place is packed with history and ancient engineering marvels, and if you don't care for those, there's Tonle Sap for nature lovers (although it doesn't come close to our very own Puerto Princesa).

The place feels like a provincial city in the Philippines except that:

• It has a much much chicer airport (When you step into the airport from the plane, it feels like you're entering your hotel already. You can say it's cozy and resorty because it's not a massive structure. Also, I like that it's small, just single storey. No long treks required typical of any international airport. I hope the airports in our country can be as efficient and clean as Siem Reap's.)

• .. and really really old temples.  (Angkot Wat is of course the crowd drawer.  I didn't know though that Angkor is some sort of a district and within/around it are SO many temples, some of which are built as early as 900 AD.  I wonder what our ancestors have been up to around that time.  Making intricate gold bracelets, perhaps, or boats.  It's hard to imagine how Cambodia ended up being a poor country given its rich and glorious past. Well, there was Pol Pot, but he happened in the 1970s, at a time when Cambodia had been a poor country for years already.  And even then (although the comparison is quite a stretch), Germany also had a Hitler, but it still is a great country.  I will probably write about my fascination with Germany someday.)

• Everywhere in Siem Reap, dollar is accepted for payment and prices are quoted in dollars. (I don't really know if this is symptomatic of the country's political and economic instability or simply a reflection of the fact that the city is filled to the brim with dollar-carrying tourists, which leads me to bullet #4)

• Siem Reap has infinitely more tourists. (They have all types of tourists: French, Americans, Brits, Spaniards, all sorts of Asians, Latin Americans, backpackers, high-end travelers, families, couples, teens, retired.  It's very different from the profile of our share of tourists.  You know what I mean right? No? Google what former US Ambassador Harry Thomas said about 40% of our male tourists.)

• There's no mall in Siem Reap. (There's a place called National Musuem Mall which is annexed to (whatelse) the museum. It looks like it used to be a functioning mall (a posh one by Siem Reap standards) with stores and kiosks but now it's empty with the stalls slapped with "for rent" signs.  I guess the mall was built primarily for tourist but it didn't fly because tourist don't go to Cambodia to buy stuff.   In Manila, a mall or a structure of a mall going totally abandoned seems unthinkable.  Because if this was in Manila, the place would in no time be filled with dibidi and cellphone vendors ala Makati Cinema Square or Harrison Plaza.)

I'll stop here and tell you to go and see Siem Reap for yourself.  It's not quite Thailand but it has its all its own charm.  Enjoy!

Climate change ready houses of Tonle Sap

Taking it all in

Angkor Wat Library

Restaurant row

Happy travelers!

A book review

The Recorded History of a Girl by Celine Lopez

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


I wrote this review on Good Reads upon the request of the Author whom I tagged in Instagram where I gave her book some love.

i kinda rooted for this book even before it came out and before having even read it.  been an avid follower of the author's column for years, so i feel like i know her, her struggles and fears and joy and basically the things that make her an interesting human being. She's a generous writer like that, sharing these intimate things about herself knowing probably that it makes her an open target to people who judge and love to hate.

but it is what makes her relatable as a writer. she gives a voice to my own fears, insecurities and vulnerabilities, even when we don't share a common backstory and social status.

she was for a long time a sad girl, but she has bounced back big time.  i know this of course only from what she writes and tells interviewers. By bounced back i mean less about her new film and book but more about her newfound life perspective and self love. she has embraced happiness, and i feel like this tiny victory is mine as well. i like her more this way.

so even before i read the book i have already decided that i love it.

i got the book the moment it was up on amazon. i wouldn't have minded paying for it, but it came free (told you she's generous)

what can i say? i missed R already right after i clicked 5 stars on my kindle. I enjoyed reading R's letters. Even shed a few bittersweet tears over some of them, particularly those to her kids. I love the adult that she has become, the wisdom and insights she shared.

she had an authentic voice. she sounded natural, and not pretentious at all. there were no cringe parts. really. i savored her every sentence. 

R felt so real, and that's the thing that makes this book a clear winner.





View all my reviews

Amsterdam

I don't have to tell you that Amsterdam is just downright pretty. Quaint, chic, green, design forward, enviable bike culture. Too damn cool, in other words.

No smugness, stores with storekeepers out of sight, super friendly storekeepers, taking photos welcomed everywhere (except in the Anne Frank House, a gem of a museum.),  people on bike stopping to pose for photo, no police asking for train tickets, coke with your name on it, street names with multiple and side-by-side vowels, cheap but good convenient store food, tourists everywhere, boathouse of my dreams, no spectacular local cuisine (no local cuisine is more like it), old churches turned into event venues, cobblestones, very tall people, i now know why they call it Dutch treat, 200 yr old windmills, handcrafted wooden shoes akin to present day engagement rings, too many souvenir shops, paying .50ureo for extra pack of ketchup at a Mcdonald's, cannabis everything, picture perfect houses all around, good beers.

I definitely enjoyed Amsterdam, but I would have enjoyed it infinitely more if Marvin saw it with me. I'm such a dependent like that.

The Last Weekend of May

I don’t know what it is with mountains but the weekend our family climbed one, it was magical. I was completely swept over with deep gratitude:
for togetherness, for family, for an able body, for stamina, for being able to afford tiny luxuries such as an unplanned overnight stay in a hotel when the soul has been begging for nothing else but some nice hot bath, soft bed and warm blankets

I woke up unexplainably happy that weekend and saw how God’s grace has put me where I needed to be throughout my 35 years.

I saw, too, how the imperfect and less than ideal can end up beautiful and heartwarming:
rain on the descent from the summit that made everything trickier;  rain still when we got down to the campsite where we had planned to pitch tent for the night; the hotel (or inn, looking rather shabby from the outside) that we had to settle for because our first three choices were all fully booked

That weekend I realized all over again that I can never outthink and out-imagine God, especially on the best way to warm my heart. He just knows it way better than I can ever try.

What can I say.  The soul yearns for epiphanies and when it does catch some, there's magic (and yes, a bit of mush, too).

Genuinely curious, our youngest hiker Zion asked after hurdling the first peak what the whole point of climbing a mountain was.  Why break yourself like that? The answer comes the moment you reach the summit: the breathtaking view; the sense of accomplishment; a fresh perspective of life; a heightened sense of freedom (or is it empowerment) from realizing that there are things that you do not because you need to (like the things you do Monday through Friday) but because you want to and you can. And yes, you really can.

In the summit, you're filled with all these positive emotions, until you see the dark clouds looking heavy and you imagine the descent you'll soon be making and you start worrying about the kids.

After just a few minutes of raining, it already got super muddy. And here is where we all really had fun, the kind that you don't get from theme parks.  Walking with 5 inches of mud under your shoes feels like walking on the moon in an astronaut's suit. I don't think we'd have more fun if there were no mudslides and buttfalls. Zion asked if that was how real adventure looked like.  Well, of course, son!

Bulalo + videoke all to ourselves = best way to cool down from a muddy climb. Marvin got to hone his Pusong Bato rendition. Charming guy.

If we stayed in the better known Tagaytay hotels, we wouldn't have gotten this spacious and cozy room for half the price. And you get to listen to the rhythm of the falling rain on the vine-covered patio. 

Our morning-after view from the hotel. Couldn't be more perfect.

Sans Ez because we didn't think he was ready for the climb ;)

Confessions of a Facebook Addict

Hi. My name is 7.11 and I am (afraid I'm about to become) a Facebook addict.

I'm glued to my phone's 4-inch retina display and it’s not making me (and the hubby) happy. It’s freaky, if you come to think of it: me checking FB by the hour (sometimes by the half-an-hour), poking, lingering, scrolling down, refreshing, refreshing, refreshing.

What's freakier still is, I'm not even enjoying it as there's practically nothing about Facebook that feels exciting anymore. The feed is boringly predictable; everyone pretty much sticks to his posting themes and patterns. And yet. I would check my Facebook feed with the clockwork routine of a prison sentinel, making sure that no status update has gone past the radar.

The menacing habit of regularly checking on Facebook has grown into some sort of a weird psycho-physiological reflex:

traffic slowing down, check Facebook; food/friend/my turn taking 1-minute long, check Facebook; stuck in a paragraph I can’t quite get right, check Facebook; zoning out in a humdrum meeting, check Facebook; book getting nauseous or boring, check Facebook; webpage taking 30-second long to upload, check Facebook. Any lull is practically an invitation to check Facebook.

All this is making me want to puke at myself.

It also makes me want to puke at some people on Facebook.

It’s really not their fault, this nausea I get when I scroll down my news feed. It's me and my occasional hyper-sensitivity to (what feels to me as) tasteless status updates, the (downright or humble-) bragging, pontificating, intellectualizing, or complaining.

I really shouldn't have a problem or a care with other people's updates especially if I’m not even the object/subject, but somehow I get affected. And I catch myself every so often treading the path of the judgmental and the scrooge. The scrooge is when I simply just refuse (in my head only of course) to indulge some people with their need to be admired and seen in a particular way. I mean, how hard can that be? It's a natural human need and I for one crave these, too. It's all funny, if you really think about it. And yet.

To me, this only means one thing: I've lost my so-called sense of humor. You see that a lot in cranky, unhappy, sanctimonious old people (old being a matter of state of mind).

At 35, there are only a few other things that scare me more. And the longer I linger on Facebook, the harder I get taunted by this scary realization: I'm losing that underrated life survival skill.

People say Facebook isn’t real life. I don't totally agree. If you are on it, Facebook is a real sphere in your life the same way that your job is. Facebook takes up space and energy in your real world. There is no distinction in terms of real-ness between the experiences and roller coaster emotions you get from Facebook and the ones you get from 'physical' social interactions.

For addicts, Facebook can easily become a negative space and energy in our lives. Facebook puts us in the middle of fifty conversations at any given time. That can really fuck up the psyche.

And unless you're not just an addict but a masochist as well, then by all means stay on Facebook and enjoy the feast. But if you care for your sense of equilibrium, calm and youth, my suggestion is we run away, even for just a short time while we try to regain our sense of humor back.

Not Really A Food Review

A not-a-proper-food-critic’s thoughts on Wildflour Café + Bakery*:

•    WCB is obviously aiming for that LA breakfast eatery feel, and to
some extent it succeeded.  The interiors hit the mark {very pretty and
not in any way intimidating}, but the overall vibe doesn’t quite make
it. The hallmarks of bakery and café were missing: the inviting coffee
aroma and the delicious smell of freshly baked bread wafting softly
through the air.





•    The food is unabashedly decadent, with no remorse for the jammed up

cholesterol and calories.  We ordered poached eggs on toast with

mushrooms and croque madame. They looked really tempting, and tasted
good, though you have to understand that in my book, any eggy and

hammy dish is good and satisfying. But of course coming to this place

{where the prices of the brunch items hover at P350-450}, I expected
to be more than satisfied {because I can always do satisfied at home}.
I wanted to be totally blown away.




•    It didn’t happen. There was no bomb. It felt as if our food heavily
relied on the butter to deliver the yum.  In my humble opinion, our food should have
been served with fresh baby greens on the side, to neutralize the
richness of the butter and cheese. Along this line, I think there is a
dearth of resto in the city offering a variety of decent fresh, leafy
salads. I could definitely be wrong; my exploits have been far from
exhaustive.

•    I’m a coffee person but for the sake of novelty and my love for
anything hazelnut flavored, I tried the nutella choco drink.  It’s
very likeable, but you have to drink it while it’s warm and delicate.
The problem is, you tend to savor it quite slowly {coz there’s only
so much sweetness you can take, just like with people}.  And just
before you have finished half, the drink has become room-temp already.
Perhaps these kinds of drinks should be served on some quirky drink
warmers and stuff?  Or can using a warmer make the drink look like a
fondue sauce, or is that weird?



•    The coffee was good and reasonably priced. In my book, that’s a winner.



•    Will I come back to this place again? Sure. But it’s not going to be
something like can’t-wait-for-the day-I’ll-be-able-to-come-back. And
it’s definitely not a spur of the moment breakfast place, like
McDonald’s is to us {it’s my happy breakfast place}.  No, places like
this are sort of a pilgrimage.  But not the sort of pilgrimage that I would
make like if I were to go back to that unassuming joint in Barangay
Uno in Laoag where I had my first taste of the glorious papaitan at 5
am from an all-nighter. Oh how that humble dish left an
imprint on my soul!

•    Still, thank you, WCB. You are awesome for trying.




*Post brought to you by Carol, who asked for my food review.

the thoughts swimming in my head lately

I want to tell you about these things:

Our Christmas 2012/New Year’s 2013
It has been deliberately low-key, and I liked it.  A big part of the low-keyness was for convenience:

The Christmas Tree – instead of our old, bulky, dust-gathering tree, our tree was a real tree, er shrub.  My principled self’s reason for using it is I wanted to bring in a new, more meaningful Christmas symbol that is the Jesse Tree. My practical self’s is it didn’t take up valuable space in our tiny unit.

Gifts – I convinced my colleagues to do away with our gift giving (which was starting to feel obligatory) and have instead a ‘shared experience’. We toyed with doing the rounds at the homes for the aged, but we lacked the energy. So we settled for the easiest to pull off: an eat-all-you-can fest.  For their kids, the idea was to give experiential gifts, so I gave tickets to a museum.  Gift buying was generally a breeze.

13 round fruits – totally abandoned the round fruits, with the permission of my mother who is the family’s NY tradition keeper.  My principled self invoked Roman 8:28 (“And we know that all things work together for the good of those who love Him.” ). My practical self just didn’t want the hassle of collecting the lucky 13 fruits which, according to my mother’s handbook should include a twin-head pineapple for improved luck.  And do I have to tell you how the prices of fruits go wild leading to new year’s?

The media noche – we didn’t bother finding out what are supposed to be the lucky aoohdfnd not-lucky food; we just prepared what was easy to prepare and what we actually wanted to eat.   I didn’t feel harried and there were no obscene quantities of leftovers.

Some people might say that not making the effort to make the holidays a wee bit more special is so un-mother.  We’re supposed to make Christmas extra special for kids.  I hope my kids don’t feel that, and if they do, I hope they forgive me.  But more important, I hope my kids don’t feel like they have to wait for Christmas to feel our family’s togetherness and love.  I hope they don’t need Christmas for the feel good moments because, well, if so, isn’t that tragic?

Matthew 6:33
This is what I said would be my verse for 2013, seeking God above all else.
I used to make long list of New Year resolutions, but most of these resolutions don’t cross over to the list of accomplishments.  So the list feels stale, with all the recycling it went through. I said maybe I need to change approaching things. Maybe it’s time I recognize there’s more to will and motivation when it comes to changing yourself, or anything for that matter.

God’s grace.

And then this verse just presented itself during a conversation with colleagues.  It spoke to me, and I’m claiming it.

But what does it mean to seek God, I’m not even sure.  I want to operationalize God-seeking in my life, not only during Sundays when I’m psyched up for depth and soul connecting.  How do you seek God in the context of the day-to-day and the mundane, because this is where my challenge lies?

I want my life to be a manifestation of my God-seeking.  I want my family life, my relationships, my work, my credit card bills, my driving, to be an expression of my deep yearning for God. (note to self: for starters, how about resisting that urge to honk hoping it will make the other driver feel guilty about cutting you?)

By God’s grace.

The Man in the Arena
"It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.

The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again,

because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause;
who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly . . ."

This is from Teddy Roosevelt’s speech “Citizenship in a Republic”.  It’s a long one, but if you care for speeches that don’t BS, that take a clear stand about certain beliefs, avoid platitudes and ambiguities, then this is a good read.

Sometimes I’d like to daydream about the things I would be doing if money was no object.  What would be my arena?

I think I used to be passionate about certain things at work, but somehow along the way I started feeling jaded.  And that’s something I promised myself I wouldn’t to turn out to be.   I like to think about myself as having that fire, the drive to do and produce something meaningful at work.  I don’t know about you but work plays a big role in my self-definition.  

I pray for passion for things that matter, for spunk and stamina, for kindness and understanding for people who don’t seem to get it, for forgiveness for myself for unmet expectations, forthe wisdom to know meaningful passion from vanity, for useful skills.   And when I have indeed done the things I dreamed of doing, I pray for the grace to proclaim, I did it only by God’s Grace.

These are the things that swam in my head reading the speech.  Be careful indeed what you read.