Escapades

Yesterday, we went to Bocaue to buy fireworks. It’s like this… my BIL and nephew always go there secretly before new year’s day. They don’t tell anyone and they usually leave early in the morning. Well, this time I told my nephew to wake me up if they’re going and to tell his dad to let me tag along. I wanted to go because I want to take pictures. They did let me tag along but I wasn’t able to take pictures because we left late afternoon and it was already getting dark and there were too many people and the stores weren’t as I imagined it, it wasn’t inviting and the pile of fireworks didn’t look pretty. So, yeah no pictures. And I didn’t get off the car either, I just stayed there with my sister and the kids. Besides, they went from one store to another and they crossed the street a lot! I’m scared to cross a street when there’s no traffic light or overpass… and I’m telling you, crossing streets here in the Philippines can be a real challenge. Anyways, the stores didn’t look inviting and the place was crowded with people and cars.

The place did remind me of a lot of memories though, too much I guess. When I was in college, a couple of my peers were from Bocaue and we went there A LOT. The place hadn’t changed much except for the new flyover and we didn’t go as far as my friends’ places so I couldn’t tell how much it changed. They’re not there anymore anyways for they both migrated to the US.

Fireworks are more like a tradition here in the Philippines. We adapted it from the Chinese culture where the sound of the firecrackers is thought to scare away evil spirits. My BIL didn’t buy too much noisy firecrackers. He did buy a light of sparklers though. He bought about P5000 (about $100) worth of fireworks and we already tested a couple. Mind you, I haven’t touched a single one for a looooooooooooooong time now (I can’t even remember when the last time was) and I don’t think I will this coming new year, I’ll just be a spectator and enjoy the sight. One of the sparklers was really pretty… you have to throw it on the ground after lighting it and it spins, creating a beautiful moving circle of light. I’ll be taking pictures of each on new year’s day and maybe some videos IF I already have my new phone by that time.

My nephew and I decided to help prepare a couple of dishes for Christmas. We’ve decided on Blueberry Cheesecake (yeah, we love cheesecake) and Char Kway Teow (fried flat noodles). We searched the net for recipes that looks good and easy to follow and we did our not-so-serious cooking the other day. We didn’t garnish both dishes anymore because we just want see if it tastes good, so the noodles had no shrimp and the cheesecake had no blueberries. Haha!

About the noodles, we weren’t able to find any peanut oil in the 2 supermarkets that we went to, so, if by Christmas we still don’t have it, I’ll just probably use peanut butter. When we were eating the noodles, I tried to put a little peanut butter on mine and it tasted better. Weird huh?And we also used egg noodles instead of fresh rice noodles. Again it was not available. And we didn’t put chili paste yet. It’s really no good! Nah! Just kidding. It still tasted good even the lack of everything. Haha!

About the cheesecake, we finally found what’s missing from the previous cheesecakes that we made. Yay! You want to know what it was? None other than… sour cream! It really made a lot of difference.

Anyway, I will not be posting the recipes yet because it still needs a little fine tuning. Here’s just a little teaser, a photo of the kulang-kulang na noodles:

Don’t you just love it when you’re waiting for a perfect opportunity to knock on your door and it would? I do! Well, I do hope it really did knock and not just passed by my door! Haha!

Last week, an online friend asked who’s interested to apply as part-time tour coordinator and I was like OMG! This is just perfect for me! Imagine being paid to travel! And I don’t really care about the pay, it’s like an icing to the icing, kwim?

So, I sent my resume, I didn’t even care if what’s written there didn’t have anything to do with traveling. And I received an email telling me that they’ll schedule the interview this week. I was stoked! But I still haven’t heard from them again, yet, but I’m still hoping it’ll push through.

I’ve waited so long for an opportunity like this. You see, I’m hibernating from my friends and I have no way to go on trips, except to go alone. And I’m still preparing myself for that. Haha!

I really hope this will push through and I promise to keep all my other promises and start being a good girl! As in, really good!

I received this email from Uncle about some interesting and unique architectures around the world. And I thought I would feature some of them here in my blog and would be on the lookout for some others.

Here is the first one, it’s called The Crooked House and it located in Sopot, Poland.

Below is the description from the contractor of the building:

“The building is situated in Sopot, at Bohaterów Monte Cassino Street. It is the compact settlement and it is an extension of the already existing shopping and service center which main entrance is at Haffnera 6 Street. Through booth building leads walking duration connecting service center between Haffnera and Monte Cassino Street.

The building with its character refers to fabulous drawings of Jan Marcin Szancer and Per Dahlberg. Exterior elevation suits to very popular Monciak’s promenade style. The building with its floors refers to cornices and floors of neighbouring buildings. Colorful stained glass entrances, stone elevation decors and windows framed with sandstone make impression. There is also unusual roof covered with sheet metal with enamel roof tiles coloured with green shades, see blue and Parishian blue, which in the whole makes illusion of dragon scales.

The building was projected as three-storey object with service attic. Communication between three storey assure the lift and allowed staircase freely available. Passage from ground-floor to storey is available thanks to perfectly demonstrated range stairs. Passage from first-floor to second floor leads through reinforced stairs and from second floor to mezzanine through steel stairs which are covered whole by wood.”

Source: http://maps.pomocnik.com/