philippines part 2: people and places

For part 2 of my Philippines trip, I'd like to introduce you to most of the members of my family and more pictures of my home and our life there.

Flowers right outside our front door. My grandmother and aunts have quite the green thumb, a skill I did not inherit.

My uncle Arnol trimming some sugarcane. When I was a kid, I loved grabbing a piece and eating it raw - the juices are sweet like candy!

My aunt Edith, preparing some squash blossoms for dinner. Aside from being such a cheery shade of yellow, they're delicious.

Other foods I indulge in when I'm home: Jollibee two-piece Chickenjoy complete with rice and gravy, simple home cooked breakfasts of egg and rice, sweet rice cakes called bibingka, and fresh-from-the-shell coconut.

...and more food. My aunt Lyn demonstrating how to drink soda from a bag (the best way to drink soda!), my favorite street food of pickled green mangoes + shrimp paste (also eaten out of a bag), and freshly made chicharron (fried pork rinds).

The view coming down from our old house.

The house my grandfather built and in which my dad and his eleven (!) siblings were raised. We moved to our current house when construction had proceeded enough along to be habitable and to spare my grandmother the burden of getting up and down our little mountain in her later years.

My grandmother, Rosita. She is without a doubt the single most influential person in my life. She's my hero. Isn't she beautiful?

Clockwise form the upper left: my female second cousins - Nicole, Justine, Azen, and Lea; my cousin Marissa; my aunt Aida; my uncles Amor and Carlito; Marissa's son, Kenneth; my cousin Rose. Phew. I tried to get everyone but I couldn't find any good shots of my uncle Ely, my aunt Arma, my cousins Elar, Madelyn, and Arcely, or my aunt Nitha. Still, I'm batting over .300 consider how large our family is.

This little lamb lost its mother, so my aunt had to feed it using a baby bottle.

Some wild turkeys (I took this shot as close as I dared...they're kind of mean!).

And last but not least...basi, Ilocano moonshine. wink wink.

want more Philippines? part 1: on the way home

philippines part 1: on the way home

I can't believe it's taken me over two years to go through and catalog my pictures from my last trip home in 2011, but better late than never, right? 

Some pictures on the way home:

I had a 4-hour layover in Japan that turned into a 6-hour layover. Our airline gave us a voucher for 1000 yen (about $10) to buy some dinner at McDonald's as a form of apology. Mickey D's is insanely amazing overseas. In the Philippines, you can have fried chicken with rice or spaghetti in addition to the regular fare of hamburgers and fries. In Japan, they had the burgers, too, but I opted for the Shaka Shaka Chicken. It's a chicken patty that comes in a paper sachet with a packet of powdered cheese. On the back of the paper sachet are instructions (middle picture) to pour the cheese over the chicken patty, roll up the opening of the bag, and shake so the chicken is covered in cheese. The shaking sounds like "shaka shaka". Maybe it was because I had already traveled 14 hours by plane by this point, but I found the packaging super cute and amusing, and while my description might have sounded gross, trust me, it was delicious.

Six hours after my shaka shaka experience, I landed in Manila, slept a few hours at my uncle's apartment, and promptly boarded a bus heading north to my province of Ilocos Norte. 10 hours later, I opened my eyes to see the capitol in Laoag through the bus window.

A half hour later and I could finally see the ocean. The moment I can smell the sea water is the moment I really feel as though I've come home.

And another half hour after finally seeing the ocean, I enter Bangui and see the main bridge running through town.

A sign at the foot of the bridge instructs me to turn left for the windmills and travel the last kilometer home.

After thousands of miles and some 35 hours later, the tricycle comes to a rolling stop and brings me home. I don't feel tired at all. 

 

For the first time in four years, my eyes can see this. How can I be tired?

this weekend

James and I are planning to go to the Philippines this April. My hometown of Bangui, Ilocos Norte is so beautiful (the picture is of the beach about a 10-minute walk away from our house). I haven't been back home in over two years, and this time, I'll be going with James. I'm so excited for my family to meet him. Here's to his passport coming soon so we can buy tickets!

This weekend, I'm going to be thinking about home, and all the things I love about it:

mangoes

soda in a bag

Jollibee

barbecue (and street food in general)

Here's to good memories, old and new.

Have a great weekend!

images via 1 2 3 4 5

memories

potchi 'kendi'

I left the Philippines when I was 6, and I've gone back every 3-4 years in the almost 18 years since. There's something about eating this candy that brings me back to a time when I didn't know America existed and couldn't have imagined how my life would change the moment my plane landed in Los Angeles that June day. It's funny, really, since I don't remember eating this candy when I was still a local. I ate White Rabbit candies back then, because my uncle would slip them to me all the time, so much so that I had a huge cavity on my center right front tooth by the time I was 4. But they've stopped making White Rabbit candies soft and chewy (they're now rock hard, like Werther's hard caramel instead of the soft version), and I've moved on to potchi. I think in my effort to try to recapture my childhood beyond just vague images or dreams that rarely come, I was drawn to the individual sachet packaging of this candy, because it's exactly like the rows and rows of individual candy pieces you can buy at any corner store all over the Philippines for a peso or two. I like to think that I did go to those sari-saris often when I was younger with friends whose names and faces I can't recall.

 I eat this candy as much for nostalgia as taste, with the overwhelming sweetness balancing out the wistfulness for a time I barely remember and the homesickness for a place I haven't called home since.

 cavity, documented

my uncle, Arnold, of the White Rabbit/cavity infamy and me, circa 1992