i know i did. and fortunately so. i find that memories of a happy childhood serve more purpose than just to bring a smile to your face when you remember them. they help define who you become as a grownup. a couple of friends and i were talking about our childhood memories over roti and sodas this weekend, and i couldn't help but notice that most of my childhood friends are still very good friends up to now . somehow, apart from the many conversations (silly ones, i might add), the bond forged over being caked in dirt and sweat together has endured the test of time.
i grew up in the village that we live in up to now. it looks very different though. unlike our time when the streets would be filled with little children playing on the streets in the afternoon till early evening, the roads now are much more quiet. children spend their afternoons watching tv and playing video games, walking around the mall, more than anything i guess. thinking about that made me sad for them, for missing out on the secret adventures that our village had for young minds, just waiting to be discovered. i wish they had the same childhood that we did.
i grew up living on the same street as many of my cousins. i come from a big family (on my mother's side at least), and having 11 aunts and uncles, most of them in the same village, meant having a lot of cousins over for summer.
now, even the weather is different. it's been raining every day since i arrived from australia. but i digress.
my favorite days consisted of mornings at swimming class then art class with my cousins, afternoons spent on the streets, playing patintero and chinese garter. i remember days spent at jacqui's house. i would be there early and we would play win, lose, or draw or that flag memory game thing. i liked it there because we could have coke any time we wanted hahaha. early afternoons, we would be given the kababayan bread with our coke, and when it stopped being too hot, we would play chinese garters with the girls on our street, and after, patintero or kickball (our version of softball but kicking around a soccerball) with the other kids on the street.
other days, we would bike around the village or playing hide and seek. we even had picnics and jogging sessions and camping days. i remember one night when there was a massive blackout and my mom and some friends of mine laid out a mat in front of our house and we just sat talking under the stars.
other afternoons would be spent being "bantay" in my tita's store, which was one of the more popular sari-sari stores inside the village then. it was good for people watching and seeing crushes (hahaha on the brain, even at 8), getting free food and soda, and whiling away hours when we really had nothing to do.
when we wanted to make money, we would make "pastillas" (from a mixture of powdered milk and condensed milk, rolled into balls and then coated with sugar) and force our parents to buy our creations. no one thought to wash their hands of course, so we ate even what our parents bought.
i even loved the summers i spent in the province. days when i would go to my tita's office and get paid P5 per day to write poems about the people in the office. we would eat pancit at asiong's on f.tanedo or have cheese pineapple sandwiches that the nurse made. we would take baths with the hose outside the house and hide from my lola because i was the most sickly malnourished child ever. we would "shop" at my grandma's store (where i would buy everything from patis to katol) and bring them home in a plastic bag. but the summer i spent at my cousin's house in tarlac was one of the most memorable. it was where i met the first guy who really liked me (age 9).
we would nap in the afternoons (a conspiracy between all grownups at that time) and walk to the panaderia to buy pandesal and the palengke type sweet corn snacks. at night he would go to my cousin's house to sit with me in the lanai. good times. hahaha.
i wonder what kids spend their time on these days. i can only hope that their childhoods are half as fun as ours were.
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Thursday, May 01, 2008
Sydney Stories - Day 3: Communing with Nature at the Blue Mountains
Day 3 of our trip brings us to the Blue Mountains - also a short trip from the Sydney City Center. Our day is made more interesting by our tour guide Manash: an Israeli immigrant who arrived in Australia only 6 months ago. His inability to speak straight English is compensated not only by his immense knowledge about Australian flora, fauna, and culture but by his desire for us to learn about it as well. He was constantly hollering at us (you could hear a deep voice yelling "Manash group here! over the din of noisy tourists) when he saw interesting plants and structures.
Our first stop was at the Neppean river where we had tea and biscuits (formerly a colony of England, they are big on teatime here as well). The park around it made for a very pleasant stroll.
HHWWPSSP (holding hands while walking pa-sway-sway pa) baduy!
For our second stop, we explore a bit into the forest where we have our first kangaroo sighting. The kangaroos are a bit stand-offish hahahaha - they turn their backs to us while we scramble to take photos.
We go into a village where we are shown an Aboriginal engraving of a kangaroo that is nearly 200 years old - Manash says it was the Aboriginal way of indicating that there were kangaroos that could be hunted in the region nearby.
Incidentally, the word kangaroo means "I don't know" or "I don't understand you" in the Aboriginal language. There was a bit of confusion between the British linguists and the Aborigines were exchanging terms. He would point to the kangaroo asking "What's that?" and the native would say "Kangaroo" to indicate that he didn't know. I should try that in school sometime: "Miss Lee, what do you mean by Negotiable Instrument?" Me: "Kangaroo". hihihihihihihi.
our tour guide Manash
For our next stop we visit the King's Tableland - a lookout point in the Blue Mountain area that acts sort of like a book of our earth's geological history. In fact, the entirety of the Blue Mountains are not really mountains but plateaus showing a cross section of the earth's plates piled one on top of the other. Like rings inside a tree trunk, you could literally see how old our earth is by counting the lines running along the edges of the plateaus. What's amazing is, for some people this lookout is literally in their backyard. It is about a 3 minute walk from the residential area and residents can actually stop here to sit and think whenever they need quiet time.
Imagine having this view from your backyard everyday
Manash talks to us about the earth's history
Next, we visit Wentworth falls (we travel down some 500 steps to a good lookout point - so not worth it! I'm not fit!!!). After 2 puffs of asthma medication before and after the trek back up to the bus, here is the best photo that I was able to take. Hay.
During the trek up Manash managed to squeeze in botany lessons which i tuned out - i was panting too much me thinks.
but look at this cool grass tree! literally a tree of grass hehehe
For lunch, we went to this picturesque village called Leura - a charming small-town village in Katoomba. Also known as the garden village, its residents pride themselves on a variety of gardens (I wish I had photos but the bus was moving too fast) and quaint small shops.
cute dogs in Leura
rows and rows of small shops
We then went to Scenic World for a closer view of the gorge (this is similar to America's Grand Canyons) aboard a cable car, and then after on the Scenic Railway (the world's steepest rail ride - It was almost vertical!) Couldn't take photos as I was clutching for dear life.
views from the cable car
the scenic rail as it arrives
the famous 3 sisters (named so after an Aboriginal story where a father turns his 3 daughters into rocks to protect them from a witch doctor)
my mom was hilarious - she kept asking us when we would meet the 3 sisters because she wanted to talk to them. she had no idea they were rock formations hehehehe.
On our way back, we pass by the Sydney Olympic park, constructed to host the 2000 Sydney Olympics
and then we took a ferry ride to Circular Quay where we had the greatest views. I allowed myself to freeze outside to be able to take these pretty pictures.
our ferry
views from the front - Titanic moment, anyone?
on a side note, I made friends with this Chilean/French dude. I wish I had a photo, as he was somewhat cute. But I think he looked a bit like this guy:
hihihi. interesting.
Our first stop was at the Neppean river where we had tea and biscuits (formerly a colony of England, they are big on teatime here as well). The park around it made for a very pleasant stroll.
HHWWPSSP (holding hands while walking pa-sway-sway pa) baduy!
For our second stop, we explore a bit into the forest where we have our first kangaroo sighting. The kangaroos are a bit stand-offish hahahaha - they turn their backs to us while we scramble to take photos.
We go into a village where we are shown an Aboriginal engraving of a kangaroo that is nearly 200 years old - Manash says it was the Aboriginal way of indicating that there were kangaroos that could be hunted in the region nearby.
Incidentally, the word kangaroo means "I don't know" or "I don't understand you" in the Aboriginal language. There was a bit of confusion between the British linguists and the Aborigines were exchanging terms. He would point to the kangaroo asking "What's that?" and the native would say "Kangaroo" to indicate that he didn't know. I should try that in school sometime: "Miss Lee, what do you mean by Negotiable Instrument?" Me: "Kangaroo". hihihihihihihi.
our tour guide Manash
For our next stop we visit the King's Tableland - a lookout point in the Blue Mountain area that acts sort of like a book of our earth's geological history. In fact, the entirety of the Blue Mountains are not really mountains but plateaus showing a cross section of the earth's plates piled one on top of the other. Like rings inside a tree trunk, you could literally see how old our earth is by counting the lines running along the edges of the plateaus. What's amazing is, for some people this lookout is literally in their backyard. It is about a 3 minute walk from the residential area and residents can actually stop here to sit and think whenever they need quiet time.
Imagine having this view from your backyard everyday
Manash talks to us about the earth's history
Next, we visit Wentworth falls (we travel down some 500 steps to a good lookout point - so not worth it! I'm not fit!!!). After 2 puffs of asthma medication before and after the trek back up to the bus, here is the best photo that I was able to take. Hay.
During the trek up Manash managed to squeeze in botany lessons which i tuned out - i was panting too much me thinks.
but look at this cool grass tree! literally a tree of grass hehehe
For lunch, we went to this picturesque village called Leura - a charming small-town village in Katoomba. Also known as the garden village, its residents pride themselves on a variety of gardens (I wish I had photos but the bus was moving too fast) and quaint small shops.
cute dogs in Leura
rows and rows of small shops
We then went to Scenic World for a closer view of the gorge (this is similar to America's Grand Canyons) aboard a cable car, and then after on the Scenic Railway (the world's steepest rail ride - It was almost vertical!) Couldn't take photos as I was clutching for dear life.
views from the cable car
the scenic rail as it arrives
the famous 3 sisters (named so after an Aboriginal story where a father turns his 3 daughters into rocks to protect them from a witch doctor)
my mom was hilarious - she kept asking us when we would meet the 3 sisters because she wanted to talk to them. she had no idea they were rock formations hehehehe.
On our way back, we pass by the Sydney Olympic park, constructed to host the 2000 Sydney Olympics
and then we took a ferry ride to Circular Quay where we had the greatest views. I allowed myself to freeze outside to be able to take these pretty pictures.
our ferry
views from the front - Titanic moment, anyone?
on a side note, I made friends with this Chilean/French dude. I wish I had a photo, as he was somewhat cute. But I think he looked a bit like this guy:
hihihi. interesting.
Sydney Stories - Day 2: Wine Tasting at the Hunter Valley
For our second day in Sydney, we decided to go on a day tour of Hunter Valley, made famous by the many large-scale and boutique wineries in the area. The local area's slogan is "Mines, Wines, and Friendly People". It is roughly an hour and forty-five minutes away from the Sydney City Center.
Our first stop of the day was at Wollombi (most town names are taken from Aboriginal words) to sample Dr. Jurd's Jungle Juice and to enjoy lovely fresh-baked scones with Devonshire Cream and Jam together with coffee or tea.
lest you be fooled, Jungle Juice is not juice but port wine. Port wines are those created in the style of the Portuguese, and has since been shortened to port. It is typically sweet, and is usually served as a dessert wine.
I took a shot of Jungle Juice and made a bee-line towards the table with the scones, cream, and jam. It is a bit too strong for my taste, luckily. (I consider this a blessing as my preference for soda over alcohol anyday ensures that I will never become an alcoholic despite my seemingly easily-addicted propensities.)
for those more inclined to port, here are some of the things you can do to spice it up
Our next stop is the Lindemans vineyard, Australia's largest and most popular winery, where we sample around 6-8 different kinds of wine, all sold only in Australia (our sommelier tells us they keep the best kinds inside Australia - true! we tried very interesting and uncommon wines here). It is common for wineries such as these to also produce their own olive oil and balsamic vinegar mixes, and so we had cheese and crackers as well as a sampling of different olive oil varieties to go with our wines. We liked them so much we ended up buying 3 bottles: Sparkling Shiraz, Juliet (a moscato/dessert wine), and a sparkling white wine.
outside the Lindemans winery
inside the main tasting area
the truth from Lindeman himself
a lovely view from outside the winery, while i was trying to walk the alcohol off hehe
beautiful vineyards as far as the eye can see
Our next stop is at the Hunter Valley Wine School where we learn about the art of Wine Tasting. We are first taken outside to see the actual vineyards where we learn from our guide that Australia is just about the worst place to grow grapes - an interesting fact to discover since they have been growing grapes for wine for over a hundred years already! It is a testament to how sheer determination and the will to work it out can reap great benefits.
learning all about grape growing
Inside, we learn about how grapes are turned into wine by subjecting them to a series of processes (no, gone are the days where you just stomp on them and hope for the best hehehe) and then mix them with other varieties of grape to come up with interesting wines.
We are taught the subtleties of wine tasting and in my excitement to start tasting I almost drink from the first glass before everyone else does! my teacher calls me a dirty drunk. hehehe. if he wasnt such an old man i would have socked him. Not! he looks scary! but it was all in good fun.
our "class"
he called me a dirty drunk! (hahahahaha affected)
we are given a series of different wines which we are to smell, taste, and experience
the main wine-tasting area. see the spittoons? (spit buckets) - its not rude to spit the wine out - it is in fact expected - how are you going to stay sober while tasting all of them?
we have lunch at the San Marino restaurant right beside it, where we learn the art of wine pairing
I walked around the grounds to walk off the alcohol - everything is so pretty!
Our third stop was the Hunter Valley Cellar where they sample and sell a huge variety of local and imported wines exclusively. I liked this stop the most because we were able to sample nearly 15 different kinds of wines - all distinct and yummy! My favorites were the Pink Moscato (found only in Australia), the Botrytis (the noble rot - its actual a fermented form of fungus, but very yummy!), and the Chocolate Port - brandy infused with chocolate while in the barrel. We end up buying 3 more bottles of wine here. Big alcoholics we turned out to be huh?
the halls of Hunter Valley Cellars
our sommelier Stella
the cellars with barrels of aging wine
indeed life is dreary without it
upon our return to the city, we again have much difficulty looking for a place to eat at. We chance upon the Trinity bar along Crown street (a few blocks away from our hotel) and decide to stay there. I had the potato gnocchi with braised chicken and sweet potatoes.
if it looks greasy its because it is - but not bad for a neighborhood pub!
Our first stop of the day was at Wollombi (most town names are taken from Aboriginal words) to sample Dr. Jurd's Jungle Juice and to enjoy lovely fresh-baked scones with Devonshire Cream and Jam together with coffee or tea.
lest you be fooled, Jungle Juice is not juice but port wine. Port wines are those created in the style of the Portuguese, and has since been shortened to port. It is typically sweet, and is usually served as a dessert wine.
I took a shot of Jungle Juice and made a bee-line towards the table with the scones, cream, and jam. It is a bit too strong for my taste, luckily. (I consider this a blessing as my preference for soda over alcohol anyday ensures that I will never become an alcoholic despite my seemingly easily-addicted propensities.)
for those more inclined to port, here are some of the things you can do to spice it up
Our next stop is the Lindemans vineyard, Australia's largest and most popular winery, where we sample around 6-8 different kinds of wine, all sold only in Australia (our sommelier tells us they keep the best kinds inside Australia - true! we tried very interesting and uncommon wines here). It is common for wineries such as these to also produce their own olive oil and balsamic vinegar mixes, and so we had cheese and crackers as well as a sampling of different olive oil varieties to go with our wines. We liked them so much we ended up buying 3 bottles: Sparkling Shiraz, Juliet (a moscato/dessert wine), and a sparkling white wine.
outside the Lindemans winery
inside the main tasting area
the truth from Lindeman himself
a lovely view from outside the winery, while i was trying to walk the alcohol off hehe
beautiful vineyards as far as the eye can see
Our next stop is at the Hunter Valley Wine School where we learn about the art of Wine Tasting. We are first taken outside to see the actual vineyards where we learn from our guide that Australia is just about the worst place to grow grapes - an interesting fact to discover since they have been growing grapes for wine for over a hundred years already! It is a testament to how sheer determination and the will to work it out can reap great benefits.
learning all about grape growing
Inside, we learn about how grapes are turned into wine by subjecting them to a series of processes (no, gone are the days where you just stomp on them and hope for the best hehehe) and then mix them with other varieties of grape to come up with interesting wines.
We are taught the subtleties of wine tasting and in my excitement to start tasting I almost drink from the first glass before everyone else does! my teacher calls me a dirty drunk. hehehe. if he wasnt such an old man i would have socked him. Not! he looks scary! but it was all in good fun.
our "class"
he called me a dirty drunk! (hahahahaha affected)
we are given a series of different wines which we are to smell, taste, and experience
the main wine-tasting area. see the spittoons? (spit buckets) - its not rude to spit the wine out - it is in fact expected - how are you going to stay sober while tasting all of them?
we have lunch at the San Marino restaurant right beside it, where we learn the art of wine pairing
I walked around the grounds to walk off the alcohol - everything is so pretty!
Our third stop was the Hunter Valley Cellar where they sample and sell a huge variety of local and imported wines exclusively. I liked this stop the most because we were able to sample nearly 15 different kinds of wines - all distinct and yummy! My favorites were the Pink Moscato (found only in Australia), the Botrytis (the noble rot - its actual a fermented form of fungus, but very yummy!), and the Chocolate Port - brandy infused with chocolate while in the barrel. We end up buying 3 more bottles of wine here. Big alcoholics we turned out to be huh?
the halls of Hunter Valley Cellars
our sommelier Stella
the cellars with barrels of aging wine
indeed life is dreary without it
upon our return to the city, we again have much difficulty looking for a place to eat at. We chance upon the Trinity bar along Crown street (a few blocks away from our hotel) and decide to stay there. I had the potato gnocchi with braised chicken and sweet potatoes.
if it looks greasy its because it is - but not bad for a neighborhood pub!
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