Life Begins at 30

Finally,  I made it.  I crossed the line and I’m quite happy with how things panned out.  30 years on earth.   Who would have thought that I would make it this far? Looking back, I know for certain I had a good one,  I wouldn’t do it any other way.

Birthday Celebs!

I tripped. I stumbled. I fell. I stood up.

HP Manila Goes to Den Haag

I made friends. I lost some. But I knew, I won them over in the end.

My BFF!

I live. I love. I Travel. I Work. I Party. I Dance. with a PASSION.

The Boss, The Nanny and The Little Boy

Today. I mark the start of new beginnings. Rekindled passion for adventure. and an unwavering commitment to dance with life like nobody’s watching.

TMNS Team Pilipinas!

For over five years working in operations, I have completely forgotten the concept of a weekend.  It has always been long hours on weekdays and on call duties on weekends.  To a certain degree, I built my life around work out of habit.  Weekend, to people in the operations and service management profession, meant change requests, on call support work, project cutovers and server maintenance windows.  Yes, for quite sometime, this has been my life… Not that I didn’t like it. This was a choice I made for the love of my craft.

If there is one good thing about moving to the Netherlands, it is that I rediscovered the phenomenon called “Weekend”. In my interaction with Dutch people in general, I found only two topics of interest and one of them is about the weekend. To a lot of Dutch people (maybe not only Dutch, but Europeans in general), weekend is the highlight of their week. It is like a culmination of a week of hardwork and stress.  It is a time to be away from the pressures of the world, and simply enjoy a laid back time with the family.

For expats living in Holland, it doesn’t matter how one spends the weekend.  There is always something going on during the weekends, that it is impossible to let one go by without having done anything. Personally, my social calendar is never empty on weekends. I’m either whipping up something in the kitchen, doing some sporting activities, partying the night away without getting too wasted, raiding the racks at the fashion outlets, travelling some 800 kilometers and back for a breathe of fresh air, or simply chillin’ at the beach with a good book on a sunny day (which is very rare in this country!).

Even on a lazy weekend, I would start mine with a trip to the market on Saturday morning. This is one of the things I fondly enjoy but don’t get to do quite often, as I am almost always in another country during weekends.  But whenever I’m in Holland, I make it a point to visit the open market, which is 2 blocks away from my place. It is not only refreshing to have a set of new tulips by my window, but I find the whole experience of visiting the slagerij and bakkerij for fresh supplies, a therapy for homesickness.  Yes, it makes me feel at home here.

Being able to immerse in the Dutch culture in the little ways that I know, helps to ease the loneliness of living alone in this cold country.  It makes me feel like I am really part of this world now.  Don’t get me wrong, I do not wish to lose my identity as a Filipino/Chinese. I still hold true to the values my parents taught me growing up, but in order to grow and find my happiness here, I am also enthusiastic about really living the Dutch life – and that includes having a gezellig weekend every chance I get!

I woke up early today, very early in fact that I could have made it an hour early for work in Schiphol, had it not been for the pain I had in my stomach. I had spasms, the kind that could really make you crouch into a fetal position just to ease the pain. So I warmed up some soya milk and took painkillers.  The pain did not go away quickly, but the painkillers knocked me off completely. Even the espresso I took in the morning did not wake me up.

Four hours later, I woke up to an empty house.  For the first time in a very long time, I went to check gmanews.tv and inquirer for some news about the Philippines.  What I found was really very disturbing, enough to get me a bad migraine and pop another round of painkillers.  Call it funny, I felt my heart tighten so bad it hurts more than the spasms I was experiencing this morning.   I learned about the massive killings in the southern part of the Philippines, all for the filing for candidacy.  I was politically shaken and emotionally disturbed that a lot of people were killed for one man’s selfish ambitions.  Up to now, I keep shaking my head in disbelief over this massacre. As of the last news post, 57 innocent lives were brutally raped, killed and mutilated. All for what? For the filing of candidacy?

This led me to question the motive – Is this a failure of governance?an abuse of democracy? a misuse of power? or plainly a result of greed? When will we ever see a clean, honest and fair election?  When will we ever see the Philippines rise up to the challenge of a free nation?

I am aghast at how greedy people can become.  The extent they go for the sake of power is beyond humiliating for any Filipino — It is downright disgusting. Call me a cynic, but I never believed that people in power in the Philippines could handle democracy, or at least the majority of it.  Maybe in some ways, freedom has brought us somewhere. But in a lot of ways, it has also pushed us back way below the poverty line, making the economic turmoil in the Philippines as visible as it is today.

Photo courtesy of Mark Navales/AFP/Getty Images

Though this incomprehensible bloodbath is not a viable indicator of poverty, it is clearly a manifestation of the great divide, of people in power and the powerless, of the rich and the poor, of the masters and the slaves.  In the absence of a clean, honest democracy,  the autonomy in Mindanao has resulted to a hapless, pitiful form of Anarchy.

Photo shows flowers offered by journalism students during a rally condemning the Maguindanao massacre at the foot of the Chino Roces Bridge in Manila yesterday - JonJon Vicencio

This is very shameful news, indeed.  The brazenness and brutality of this action is beyond reprieve.  We can only say sorry and offer prayers to the victims of this tragedy, but to the families left behind by the bodies lying in these mass graves – the onset of fear, the excruciating pain of loss and grief, and the anger over this senseless killings will haunt them every single day of their lives.

So, what happens next? What happens to these families with shattered hopes and dreams  Perhaps, the government will drive down the hunting to grant them justice they deserve.  Perhaps, they will get something back from the government in order to repair their lives.  But, to people who experienced this loss, does justice really stop there? Or are we prepared to see more violence? I refuse to think the unthinkable, but perhaps my next question is – are we ready to face the wrath of vengeance?

While I do not promote it, a study on human dynamics and political rivalry reveals a very strong trend of vengeance in the face of tragedy.  It is simply inevitable.

So, where does this leave us? Tell me.  I would like to know.

Exactly 10 months and 19 days ago,  I came to the Netherlands with my luggages in tow, curious as to the kind of life I will have in Holland.  Today, I look back and realize that in more ways than one, I have become accustomed or maybe partially imbibed what they call The Dutch Life… let me count the ways.

• I have a PINK Dutch Drivers License. And I love it!
• The yellow traffic light – I consider that to mean “Drive Faster!”
• I use triangles in the road to tell me if I must pass first.
• I have developed a liking for Frikandel (but only before I learned what kind of meat actually went in there.)
• I am eating more potatoes than rice.
• I am addicted to Griesmeel. (Thank you, Rina!)
  
• I actually own a horrible pair of Dutch boots,  a flashback of what being fashionable meant during the 80’s. (I’m sorry Giuliana, i know you hate seeing me wear them, but the boots are really comfy!)
• I am in love with fresh mint tea.
• My palate has become accustomed to less salty, less spicy dishes. (At least now I can say, I can find refuge in Surinamese food, as though it were real Chinese food!)
  
• I look forward to waking up early in the morning on Satudays to go to the open market
• I have become experimental with my “cheese”.
  
• I wear tights and skirt sometimes.  Go Madonna!
  
• I can pronounce Scheveningen properly (sometimes!!!).
• I actually keep a strippenkaart in my wallet for emergency purposes.
• I am getting used to having a separate toilet and bathroom.
• I know my geography a little bit. I can tell you the capital of each of the 12 provinces… doesn’t that sound so geeky?
• I eat tosti met ham and kaas for lunch, sometimes!
• I actually love Dutch music – Think Tiesto, Kane, Armin van Buren, PVD, Chuckie, Ilse de Lange to name a fiew.

Griesmeel, my current obsession

I can go on and on about this whole Dutch life experience  and how much of me is still  left as unDutchable (like not owning a bike!).  At the end of the day,  what really matters is that I still keep the same values and I am still the same person, only with more love to give. To all the Filipinos shivering in the cold Dutch weather, here’s my favorite Dutch band to give you some goede lovin’ – Kane – No Surrender

I wore my thinking cap again today and it made me feel good. Really good. After what seemed like the longest and darkest week of my life, for the first time, I smiled again. Not for any reason  in particular, but because deep inside of me, I felt better. My sore throat is gone, I didn’t feel tired, my head was clear, my heart is free… Today, I was at my best and it felt awesome!

What changed overnight? You might ask. I was deeply moved, if not touched by God’s grace. Not only through friends who have been offering me support all this time (yes, they are my angels, I don’t know what I’d do without them!), but also through the words of Bo Sanchez, my brother’s favorite writer. In his blog, he wrote about The Only Thing That Can Heal Your Emotional Wounds and I’d like to quote something that really struck my core. He wrote:

But when a person forgives, he’s like opening a window in a smelly room because one person stepped on poop. Fresh air comes in. If bitterness wounds everyone, forgiveness heals everyone too.

It is a very simple statement that holds a lot of truth in it. I had the chance to mull this over last night and I realized that indeed, I should not allow other people to control my feelings. Simply put, I can get angry but never let that anger kill me or my relationship with everyone else around me.

So this morning, I woke up with a renewed commitment to forgive myself, to love and to share that love with others. This is the start of my healing. Yes, I do not deny the fact that I am still emotionally wounded, but it gets better in time. I am certain of that.

True enough, when you release your pain, when you share your sorrows with people who care about you, the burden becomes lighter.  So light even, that you barely know it’s there. As I start cleaning my emotional wounds, I pray that God will also touch your hearts and heal your own wounds.

I always thought the dark, wet and dreary weather in the Netherlands will not have any effect on me emotionally. Or at least, I knew I needed to fight the psychological battering that comes with being alone in a cold country where everything seems to be lost in translation. Until recently, I thought that waking up to a Dutched reality only meant longer summer days in the beach, enjoying Surinamese cuisine as the closest excuse to honest-to-goodness real Chinese food, or getting fashionable with tights, boots and skirt like the late 80’s, early 90’s material girl icon popularized by one of my favorite artists – Madonna.

Maybe I am exagerrating a bit, but clearly this fall has paved the way for a nosedive on my self-esteem and sense of self-worth. It feels like every single thing around me was falling apart, ripping right through my core as if to say “you’re coming down next”. It is crazy, scary and at the same time emotionally unnerving to see this all happen right under my nose. Indeed, only in moments when you hit rock bottom that you realize that God has blessed you with enough cushion before the fall.

“I believe in angels, the kind that heaven sends. I’m surrounded by angels, and I call them my best friends.”
~ Pamela Daranjo

In this day and age, angels don’t come with wings. At least, for my experience, they come clad in Berkeley sweat shirts, A&F pullovers, or even in the simplest pyjamas with heart prints. They don’t offer judgment, only words of wisdom, especially when you least expect it.

During this moment of bitter sadness, I have felt their presence in more ways than one – picking me up at my worst, cheering me up when I needed it, and sending me mp3s if only to make me smile… It sounds trivial, but when you lose what you thought mattered, even the simplest things become a reason to celebrate.

I dedicate this post to genuine friends, my angels, my shrink, my life – Thank you so much for giving me a reason to smile despite the dark clouds looming in my horizon, for making me find my way, even when my world is crumbling down upon me. Words are not enough to express my heartfelt gratitude for all the things you’ve done for me. You may not know it, and I don’t say this often – but you have touched my life with your honesty, sincerity, love and compassion.  I cannot thank you enough.

I am not exactly sure if Kaldereta is a Filipino original, but for sure it is a classic dish that is never missing in most Filipino feasts. It is a dish that uses tender cuts of beef as its main ingredient, stewed with carrots, potatoes, peas and tomato sauce. In some parts of the Philippines, it comes with goat meat (kambing) instead of beef. I find kaldereta to be one of the easiest dishes to cook. The secret is to make the meat really tender without breaking off. Here’s to share my version of the Spanish-inspired Filipino dish called Kaldereta (Beef Stew).

Beef Kaldereta

Beef Kaldereta

Ingredients:
1 kilo beef, cut into cubes
2 squares beef buillon
4 pieces medium sized potatos, cubed
2 medium-sized carrot, cubed
1/2 cup Spanish Olives
1 large red bell pepper
3 pcs bay leaves
3 cups water
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp butter
1 head medium-sized garlic, minced
1 head red onions, finely chopped
1 cup green peas (optional)
1/2 cup pineapple chunks (optional)
6 pcs hand crushed soda crackers (Skyflakes, Jacob’s)
1 cup red wine of 1 small bottle of beer or 1 cup cola
1 small can tomato paste
salt and pepper, to taste

Procedure:
Put olive oil in a pan and melt butter in it. Saute beef with garlic and onions, until the meat is golden brown. Season with salt and pepper. In a separate pot, mix water, red wine/beer, soy sauce, beef buillon, bay leaves, whole pepper. Add the sauteed beef and cook in slow fire for at least an hour or until beef is tender. If needed, add more water. Add carrots and potato to the pot and cook until tender. Take extra care that potatoes are not overcooked as it will affect the consistency of the sauce. Add peas, olives, red bell peppers, pineapple chunks. Stir in tomato paste and let it simmer for 2-3 minutes. Throw in the handcrushed soda crackers. Let it simmer for another 2 minutes.

If you fancy, you can also bake the meat for another 5 minutes and top it with grated cheese. I have done this a few times, but even without baking, kaldereta is something I will never pass up on.

Being an archipelago of 7,107 islands, it is no surprise that Filipinos coming from different regions have slightly different ways of preparing food. However diversified the cooking style maybe, it cannot be questioned that Filipinos all over the world have a common love for all things seasoned and marinated.

Among the variety of Filipino dishes, one that stands out as un-officially everyone’s favorite comfort food is Adobo. As opposed to its Spanish and Puerto Rican definition, adobo in the Philippines generally refers to a dish cooked using a preparation technique indigenous to the filipino cuisine.  This involves tenderizing meat with vinegar and cooking it under low fire with soy sauce, garlic, bay leaves and peppercorns in a pot. This is a cooking style that dates back to early ages when refrigeration was not yet an option. To most Filipino families who do not have access to a fridge, this is a way to preserve food from spoiling, as the vinegar helps to kill bacteria, thus extending the food’s shelf life.

Dried Pork Adobo with Rice

Silly though it sounds, there is no standard way of serving adobo – it could come as dry, spicy, soaked in soy sauce, crispy/fried, or in dry flakes… you name it! I have probably seen over a 100 ways of serving the dish, but one thing is for sure – you can never go wrong with an adobo!

Here’s to share the traditional “Dried Pork Adobo” recipe for some weekend indulgence.

Dried Pork Adobo

Ingredients:
500 grams Pork cubes, cut in 2in squares
1/2 cup Sukang Maasim (Vinegar)
1/4 cup Soy Sauce
6-10 pcs peppercorns
3 Bay Leaves
Salt and pepper to taste
4 cloves garlic, minced

Procedure:
1. Put together all ingredients in a pot and cook in low fire.
2. Let it simmer, while stirring occasionally.
3. Allow the meat to cook in its own fat, until the sauce drains out.
4. Increase the heat and stir the meat until it becaomes slightly dark brown but not burned.

Remove from heat and serve with steamed rice.

Enjoy!