The Linden Suites, Manila, The Philippines
Tuesday 2/18/14
A lovely last relaxed day in Manila before I head for home tomorrow. I got to do the "Manila mega-mall" thing. Prandy helped me with some final shopping, and took me out for a Filipino pork and chicken adobo lunch.
It's amazing what magic the simple combination of soy sauce, vinegar and garlic can do for pork and chicken. The meat is stewed for a couple hours in the sauce, which cooks down to a nice gravy, and served over rice. Prandy also ordered fresh green beans sautéed with slices of fresh coconut meat in a savory coconut milk sauce. It was so good I had three helpings.
The leche flan was the best I've had here, too. The classic leche flan is made with evaporated and condensed milk, egg yolks and sugar, and seved with a light caramel syrup, similar to a Mexican flan. I think this version had fresh cream in it, and just a touch of sesame flavor. I polished it off in short order and seriously considered getting a buco bandan dessert too, but my sanity returned just in time.
Prandy and Chiqui introduced me to buco bandan at lunch the day we visited the military cemetery. It's made with cubes of very young coconut meat that is still more a gel than a firm nut meat, shreds of fresh firm coconut meat, tapioca, cream and sugar, and served chilled. It's cool and refreshing with great textures.
I digress here for a mini-rant about automatic spell-checking and -correcting computers. Every time I type "buco bandan" the damn computer changes it to "buck bandana" and f have to go back and correct it two or three times before I can make the "buco bandan" stick. And "leche flan" turns into "lecher flan." It's irritating as hell but it's also a hoot to see what the computer does with words it doesn't recognize.
Anyway, when I had my first buco bandan I also had my first dish of a traditional marinated, skewered and grilled pork. (Pork is the main meat here, Prandy said, even more so than chicken. Fish is more common than chicken, too, and beef is not common at all.) The pork was wonderful, tender and bursting with juicy grilled flavor. Chiqui said the popular marinade recipe uses 7-Up or Sprite, of all things, along with vinegar, ketchup, garlic, maybe some Tabasco, and salt and pepper. I'll try making it at home.
Prandy got me a couple packages of Filipino coffee to make at home, too. They have wonderful coffee here. I didn't know the Philippines grew such good coffee. They brew the drink good and strong from fresh-roasted and fresh-ground beans. It really is the best coffee I've ever tasted.
The other wonderful taste of the day was a green mango shake, thanks to Prandy's daughter Chia, who wasn't able to join us today but told Prandy to tell me to try it. It was tangy and slushy-cold and just the perfect thing for a hot day.
I enjoyed meeting Chiqui and Prandy's kids earlier this week. They're really not "kids" anymore; their son Chino is in his early thirties and Chia is in her late twenties. They are a close family and I really enjoyed meeting and visiting with them all together over dinner.
Considering that I've pretty much eaten my way through south Asia for the last two and a half months, it's surprising that I've actually lost weight. The clothes I brought with me are loose, and some of them were too snug for comfort when I left California. I think with all the new environments, and with pushing my vision, hearing and all my adaptive skill to the limit and beyond, my body just needed more energy.
It's been a relaxing visit here in Manila, mainly because Prandy and Chiqui have made it so easy and enjoyable for me, and my hotel room is great. I think also, it's relaxing to be in a culture that is good at relaxing. The pace is slower. Even the rush-hour traffic jams are relaxed compared to the US and especially India. Meals are relaxed and events to enjoy with family and friends; They're numerous, too: most days there's breakfast, snack, lunch, snack, dinner, and maybe supper after dinner if you get the late-evening munchies.
After lunch Prandy took me up to the top level of the mall, where there are several salons offering massages, hair cuts and treatments, facials, manicures, pedicures, the like. A manicure and pedicure AND a 45-minute leg and foot massage only costs about $12 or $13 USD, and an hour-long massage is about $10. At that price I'd get a massage almost every day, and Prandy said that's exactly what they do in Manila. So I had a manicure, pedicure and leg and foot massage, and Prandy went to a salon a few doors down from mine for a back massage.
It was the perfect topper for my Manila mega-mall experience. I'm not much into shopping malls, but I could definitely make this kind of "malling" a habit.
So now I'm relaxed and ready for the trip home. I've been catching up on sleep here. In fact, I was shocked this morning when I woke up to find that I'd slept eleven hours straight through. It was good that I did because my eyes needed the shut-down time to recuperate from all the dry eye pain, and tomorrow will be a long grueling day.
From the time Prandy picks me up tomorrow to the time that I arrive in San Francisco, it will be more than twenty-four hours of traveling.
Woo hoo!! I'm going home!
Tuesday 2/18/14
A lovely last relaxed day in Manila before I head for home tomorrow. I got to do the "Manila mega-mall" thing. Prandy helped me with some final shopping, and took me out for a Filipino pork and chicken adobo lunch.
It's amazing what magic the simple combination of soy sauce, vinegar and garlic can do for pork and chicken. The meat is stewed for a couple hours in the sauce, which cooks down to a nice gravy, and served over rice. Prandy also ordered fresh green beans sautéed with slices of fresh coconut meat in a savory coconut milk sauce. It was so good I had three helpings.
The leche flan was the best I've had here, too. The classic leche flan is made with evaporated and condensed milk, egg yolks and sugar, and seved with a light caramel syrup, similar to a Mexican flan. I think this version had fresh cream in it, and just a touch of sesame flavor. I polished it off in short order and seriously considered getting a buco bandan dessert too, but my sanity returned just in time.
Prandy and Chiqui introduced me to buco bandan at lunch the day we visited the military cemetery. It's made with cubes of very young coconut meat that is still more a gel than a firm nut meat, shreds of fresh firm coconut meat, tapioca, cream and sugar, and served chilled. It's cool and refreshing with great textures.
I digress here for a mini-rant about automatic spell-checking and -correcting computers. Every time I type "buco bandan" the damn computer changes it to "buck bandana" and f have to go back and correct it two or three times before I can make the "buco bandan" stick. And "leche flan" turns into "lecher flan." It's irritating as hell but it's also a hoot to see what the computer does with words it doesn't recognize.
Anyway, when I had my first buco bandan I also had my first dish of a traditional marinated, skewered and grilled pork. (Pork is the main meat here, Prandy said, even more so than chicken. Fish is more common than chicken, too, and beef is not common at all.) The pork was wonderful, tender and bursting with juicy grilled flavor. Chiqui said the popular marinade recipe uses 7-Up or Sprite, of all things, along with vinegar, ketchup, garlic, maybe some Tabasco, and salt and pepper. I'll try making it at home.
Prandy got me a couple packages of Filipino coffee to make at home, too. They have wonderful coffee here. I didn't know the Philippines grew such good coffee. They brew the drink good and strong from fresh-roasted and fresh-ground beans. It really is the best coffee I've ever tasted.
The other wonderful taste of the day was a green mango shake, thanks to Prandy's daughter Chia, who wasn't able to join us today but told Prandy to tell me to try it. It was tangy and slushy-cold and just the perfect thing for a hot day.
I enjoyed meeting Chiqui and Prandy's kids earlier this week. They're really not "kids" anymore; their son Chino is in his early thirties and Chia is in her late twenties. They are a close family and I really enjoyed meeting and visiting with them all together over dinner.
Considering that I've pretty much eaten my way through south Asia for the last two and a half months, it's surprising that I've actually lost weight. The clothes I brought with me are loose, and some of them were too snug for comfort when I left California. I think with all the new environments, and with pushing my vision, hearing and all my adaptive skill to the limit and beyond, my body just needed more energy.
It's been a relaxing visit here in Manila, mainly because Prandy and Chiqui have made it so easy and enjoyable for me, and my hotel room is great. I think also, it's relaxing to be in a culture that is good at relaxing. The pace is slower. Even the rush-hour traffic jams are relaxed compared to the US and especially India. Meals are relaxed and events to enjoy with family and friends; They're numerous, too: most days there's breakfast, snack, lunch, snack, dinner, and maybe supper after dinner if you get the late-evening munchies.
After lunch Prandy took me up to the top level of the mall, where there are several salons offering massages, hair cuts and treatments, facials, manicures, pedicures, the like. A manicure and pedicure AND a 45-minute leg and foot massage only costs about $12 or $13 USD, and an hour-long massage is about $10. At that price I'd get a massage almost every day, and Prandy said that's exactly what they do in Manila. So I had a manicure, pedicure and leg and foot massage, and Prandy went to a salon a few doors down from mine for a back massage.
It was the perfect topper for my Manila mega-mall experience. I'm not much into shopping malls, but I could definitely make this kind of "malling" a habit.
So now I'm relaxed and ready for the trip home. I've been catching up on sleep here. In fact, I was shocked this morning when I woke up to find that I'd slept eleven hours straight through. It was good that I did because my eyes needed the shut-down time to recuperate from all the dry eye pain, and tomorrow will be a long grueling day.
From the time Prandy picks me up tomorrow to the time that I arrive in San Francisco, it will be more than twenty-four hours of traveling.
Woo hoo!! I'm going home!
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