My current stay in the island of Mindanao, Philippines is proving to be quite a challenge because of regularly scheduled (!) power outages or brownouts (as Filipinos refer to them). For instance, in the town where my uncle was laid to rest, brownouts are scheduled every other night for three very long, hot, dark hours every time.
On one particular night which had a scheduled brownout, I brought a pre-lit kerosene lamp with me into the bathroom when I went in to take a shower. My foresight saved me from screaming my head off when I was suddenly plunged into pitch-black darkness when the electricity was cut off.
I was told that El Niño is to blame for the brownouts: the dry weather and lessened rainfall have lowered the water level in Lake Lanao. Given that 70% of the electricity used by the people of Mindanao is generated by the hydroelectric plant in Lake Lanao, lower water levels in the lake means less output of electricity for the people of Mindanao to get by on. I hope and pray that the rains come very soon so that the power situation in Mindanao can return to normal.
On a more wistful note, the kerosene lamp brought me back to a certain time in my childhood when we lived in a small town where we did not have the luxury of electricity. We relied on kerosene lamps with metal bases, cotton wicks and rounded glass covers (and the occasional candle) to provide us light at night.
Maybe we did have electricity. Maybe what I recall are the nights when we had brownouts. In any case, I still remember the black smoke that emanated from the hole the top of the glass that covered the small fire, the soot that accumulated on the curve of the glass, the unmistakably strong odour of kerosene, and the small knob that I could turn to control the intensity of the fire — or turn off the fire altogether — by lowering or raising the wick.
Thanks to that kerosene lamp, for that one very hot, dark but special night, I was a little girl once again, treading softly on the creaking wooden floor, gingerly holding on to the fragile lamp.
Tags: about me
White lilies (image from www.irishviews.com)
I am in the Philippines right now, typing away this piece on a small laptop in the house where my mother and her siblings used to live as children.
The house is swarming with activity. A group of women are busy preparing tonight’s dinner. Another group of women are going around refilling small baskets with packets of biscuits and sweets, collecting used cups and replacing them with new ones. A group of men are sitting on plastic chairs under a canvas canopy emblazoned with the name of a governatorial candidate. Children are running around the house, oblivious of the real reason for this impromptu gathering of relatives — the white casket in the middle of the living room that holds the remains of my mother’s only brother.
The burial will be done tomorrow, right after a Mass which will be officiated by the Bishop himself. (My uncle and his family are Catholics, as most Filipinos are.) To be honest, I do not know what to expect, as this is the first Catholic burial that I’m going to witness.
Things have been moving at a surreal pace. Many a tear has been shed. But happy memories have been recounted and retold, as well.
It’s heartwarming to be surrounded by family, never mind if this is the first time I’ve ever seen them in my entire life. I love hearing stories about my mother’s growing up years from people who used to go to school with her, cousins who used to get involved in some mischief with her and her siblings, people who used to be their neighbours, teachers, childhood friends.
But it’s also sad that we have to be gathered in this house under such sombre circumstances. It’s sad that it had to take a death to have the whole extended family together.
May we never take for granted the people in our lives, for death can take us anytime.
From God we came and to Him we shall all return.
Tags: Philippines
Most of my travels are for business purposes, hence I’ve always considered myself as an ‘incidental tourist’, i.e. I get to do incidental sightseeing en route to a meeting or on the way back to my hotel.
Sometimes I get lucky and I get a few hours free in between my last meeting and my return flight. I use up these precious hours to wander around the city or, at least, the immediate neighbourhood where I’m in.
Once in a while I hit the jackpot and get to spend an extra day when it so happens that my airline of choice only flies certain days in a week. [Note: 'Airline of choice' translates to: 'the airline that offers the cheapest fare for the schedule that I need'.]
Sometimes, my itinerary gets so hectic that I don’t get to do any incidental sightseeing at all. But I always, always, always try to sneak in a few minutes to visit the local market or, at the very least, the local corner shop or supermarket. These places always have a lot of fascinating things to see. Many of the items sold are reflective of the local culture and the prices of goods give a good indication of what items are produced in that country.
In Indonesia, for instance, I was shocked to find a box of tea bags (30 bags per box) retailing at a mere USD0.30 (Rp 3,460). In Geneva, I was delighted to find a bottle of dried oregano that only cost €1, which is only about a fifth of what I pay for in Malaysia. In New Zealand, sheep’s skin rugs are a great bargain (but a pain to maintain, I found out many, many months later). In Thailand, I found that footwear and plasticware are incredibly cheap but of good quality and design.
In a night market in Phuket in 2007, DH and I stumbled upon this unexpected treat whose name escapes me already:-
This is belimbing asam (or kamias, as we say in the Philippines), toasted coconut and peanuts, pickled ginger, fresh onions, and tamarind paste all rolled up in a piece of daun kaduk (wild pepper leaf) and eaten as is. I’m not exactly a fan of raw leafy stuff but this combination just totally blew me away. You should try this if you happen to find this in Thailand. (P.S. Sorry about the awful photo quality. This was back in the days when I used a point-and-shoot with the flash on! *Wince*)
In Geneva in 2008, Lola and I chanced upon a fresh produce market very early one morning in a square within walking distance from our hotel, where we saw the biggest artichokes (the green things in the far right) that I’ve ever seen in my entire life.
Okay, okay, they were the only artichokes I’ve ever seen in my entire life heh ;) And those large things that Lola is holding? They’re leeks. (I mistook them for large spring onions a.k.a. scallions.)
Last year, I was amused to find this supermarket in Amsterdam which was actually selling a Dutch line of kroepoek (keropok, i.e. fish crackers) and instant mixes for bahmi goreng (bakmi goreng, i.e. fried noodles) and nasi goreng (fried rice):-
In a supermarket in Capetown also last year, I found something that delighted my children — speckled eggs!
They’re an ingenious confectionery made up of a jelly centre, a chocolate middle, and a candy shell. Scrumptious! (I miss them so! *sniff*)
In a small supermarket in the outskirts of Jakarta, I caught sight of Indonesian-style mortars and pestles.
Note that the mortars are flat, almost plate-like, very different from the bowl-shaped mortars that I’m more familiar with in Malaysia and the Philippines. [NB: These implements are used for grinding herbs and spices instead of whizzing them in a blender or food processor. The taste's just not the same, folks in Asia would swear.]
And to my delight, I discovered that I need not go all the way to the Netherlands to indulge in some hagelslag — they’re available in Indonesian supermarkets afterall!
I’ve seen bread sold by weight in Switzerland, antiperspirant/deodorant sold in single-use sachets in the Philippines, eggs sold by weight in Indonesia. I’ve chanced upon homemade pickled onions in a small roadside shop along the Great Ocean Road in Melbourne, fresh almonds heaped on bins in a supermarket in Oman, chestnuts peddled after sundown from human-pulled carts in the streets of Shanghai. Given very limited time in a foreign country, I’d gladly pick the local market over a huge, ultramodern shopping mall anytime!
Books in Bahasa Melayu (or BM, for short)
Knowing how my children need to improve their Malay, I’ve been taking small steps lately to help them build up their vocabulary.
Like this morning, for instance. I turned on the radio, picking out a talk show in Malay. Then I highlighted certain words to them.
“Banduan,” I said. “Do you know what that means?”
Blank stares.
“It means ‘prisoner’,” I explained. “Banduan is different from panduan. Banduan is ‘prisoner’, panduan means ‘guide’.”
Silence. (DH is overseas, so I was the one driving. With me driving, I couldn’t see their faces to figure out what the silence meant.)
Then I heard the voice on the radio mention the word bekas.
I nudged RoundBoy,”Do you know bekas?”
He nodded. But I knew that the bekas that he knows (bekas = container) is different from the bekas that the radio announcer was talking about.
“I don’t mean bekas, as in bekas where you can put in your food or drink,” I clarified.
I then explained that if you take a noun and placed bekas in front of it, the meaning of bekas becomes ‘ex’, as in bekas pelajar = ex-student.
The opposite of bekas, I continued, is bakal which, when placed in front of a noun, means ‘future’, e.g. bakal suami = ‘future husband’.
And so concluded our Malay language lesson for this morning. They may be small steps but as an old Malay saying goes, “Sikit-sikit, lama-lama, jadi bukit.” (Literally: ‘Little by little, over time, becomes a mountain’. You get the drift.)
Talk about irony — the Filipina mother teaching her Malaysian children Bahasa Melayu!
Tags: Bahasa Malaysia, Languages, Malay
Someone once told me that the most beautiful places on earth are sites where the sea and the mountains meet the sky. One prime example of such site is Table Bay Harbour, Capetown where the sea meets Table Mountain and the blue, blue sky.
I’ll let the photographs speak for themselves. (Click on each photo to see a larger version in a new window.)
That speck you see on the clouds up there is a seagull; it’s not some piece of dirt on my lens ;)
I love the quaint little buildings and colourful boats and ships that dot the harbour. I think they give an added element of interest to the photographs.
And in case you haven’t noticed, Table Mountain in all three photos is, more or less, in the same spot, i.e. Victoria & Alfred Waterfront. All I did was walk a few paces between each photo. Those few steps allowed me to capture a postcard-perfect photo each and every time.
If these photos don’t succeed in making you want, crave, desire, long for, and get hell-bent on going to Cape Town, I don’t know what else will. Except perhaps some photos from the top of Table Mountain next time ;)
All photos straight out of the camera, totally untouched save for re-sizing and the addition of my site’s URL.
Tags: Cape Town, South Africa
