Terrible, terrible day

My first day to go back to work yesterday was a bit of a struggle. I had a difficult time leaving Kali at home with the yaya. And for all days, PISTON picked yesterday to stage their transport strike. I borrowed Tatay's car so I won't have a difficult time commuting. I arrived in the store 45 minutes early so I had my caffeine fix first before the big first day. Around noon it started to rain, heavily. Mind you, it's the middle of summer in this tropical country. The roads were difficult to traverse since there's almost zero visibility. From our store we could see cars crawling it's way down Commonwealth avenue, most of them have their headlights on. Then all of a sudden traffic jammed up and busses, jeepneys and cars were stuck in that 7 lane highway. It continued on for more than an hour. The second shift should arrive by 5pm, there's 3 of them and only Jose has arrived. Two of them sent message that they will be late because of the traffic in Fairview. My husband Lay will work the graveyard shift that starts at 7pm. He left the house at 5pm and after 2 hours he is still in North Fairview. Traffic was so bad, cars were not moving. And some of the idiotic drivers took the opposite lane, blocking all roads. Bevz who lives past SM Fairview walked in the middle of the rain from Fairview wet market up to Batasan. She then took a cab from there to get to our store. She arrived in the store at 7pm, she left her house at 2pm, imagine 5 hours to get to the store when in the normal day you get there in less than 2 hours. I felt so bad for her as I see her trying to dry her socks and rubber shoes. She even cried and had to be comforted by Liz. She already has colds and it would probably get worse. My husband Lay arrived in their store in Quezon Avenue past 9pm. More than 4 hours on the road. It wasn't just the rain or the transport strike. A bus sideswept a car somewhere in Fairview that worsened the already terrible situation. It had always been that way. Motorists never learn. It's already a cliche to say that in the Philippines defensive driving should be in mind whenever you are behind the wheel. I was supposed to go home by 8pm but since I don't want to suffer what they had to endure I had to wait and let the traffic subside. My sister waited for me and we decided to leave around 10pm. We took a different route and tried Don Antonio. Good thing my sister knows the road as I would have been lost altogether. We finally got home by 1130pm. I missed Kali so much she slept beside me in the bed. I can only pray to have better weather in the coming days. I don't want this terrible day to repeat again.

And I predict.....

David Cook will definitely win American Idol. No doubt since the beginning I knew that he is the only one who has the star quality worthy of the American Idol status. This season the judges seem to have lowered their standards. I mean, look at Kristy Lee Cook. She can sing, yes. But she seem to have been hiding under Carrie Underwoods' profile. No originality at all. And Jason Castro? I love reggae. I love Bob Marley. But his voice is one sided. He's definitely cute and charming but hey this is a singing competition, as Simon would say. As for the runner up, people would definitely vote for David Archuleta. It will be a David to David showdown. But for me I like Syesha better than Archuleta. But Syesha have been a favorite in the bottom three and bottom two. I doubt she'll make it to the final two. But we can never tell. Who knows? If ever I get this wrong, I am still right that Cook is already a star. He hasn't even finished AI and he already has a number 1 hit song! We'll see in two weeks.

My Favorite Soundtrack

I am not much of a Beatles fan until I met my husband Lay. He influenced me into listening to great music of all genre. He has excellent ears for good music. When we watched "I Am Sam" I immediately noticed that the soundtrack were Beatles music revived and reinvented. I like the original songs but the modern versions are also good. I got excited when I also heard the same songs in our official Starbucks playlist.

Blackbird by Sarah McLachlan

Two of Us by Michael Penn and Aimee Mann

I'm Looking Through You by The Wallflowers

Across the Universe by Rufus Wainwright

Strawberry Fields Forever by Ben Harper

You've Got to Hide Your Love Away by Eddie Vedder

Mother Nature's Son by Sheryl Crow

Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds by The Black Crowes

Golden Slumber by Ben Folds

Nowhere Man by Paul Westerberg

Let It Be by Nick Cave

Don't Let Me Down by The Stereophonics

We Can Work it Out by Heather Nova

I'm Only Sleeping by The Vines

Help by Howie Day

Revolution by Grandaddy

Julia by Chocolate Genius

Bayani Fernando

Metro Manila is polluted, dirty and unattractive as it is but do we really need the face of Bayani Fernando plastered along the major highways every 500 meters? I hate driving in Commonwealth Avenue what with the useless pink fences, reckless drivers that the traffic enforcers does not apprehend, deadly U-turn slots that doesn't help the flow of traffic at all, sidewalk vendors that come and go and pedestrians who risk their lives and the motorists lives with their deadly decisions to run and play patintero with buses, jeepneys, tricycles, motorcycles, cars, you name it! And he wanted to run for vice president? Come on?! Can somebody explain to me how could his useless slogans help discipline the Filipino people. How the pink fences provide aesthetic and appeal to the city? I mean, It is so third world. Add to that the pink urinals along the highways that leave stench and tolerates the male population to relieve their full bladder at just about anywhere. Is that what you call Metro Gwapo? I am sure he has a lot of supporters specially from Marikina whom he managed to govern properly as some might say. But Marikina is Marikina. Metro Manila is a different story. The Republic of the Phillipines will become one hell of a playground if we let BF govern us. As a taxpayer I know I have all the right to express my opinion. The cost of contructing each one of BF's projects is worth millions when in fact it could cost less. He has become a billionaire out of this projects I suppose. I am not saying that people should not vote for him, I for one will not. But his early campaign will just prove that he wants the power of a higher position. And I fear that.

Bad Experience # 2

As a manager I need to conduct a meeting of my partners every 45 days. Most often than not we would hold our meeting in our company's main office in Makati. But when there are times that there's no available conference room we would hold our meeting in a different place. Post-Christmas season there were a lot of reservations in our main office that is why we need to find another place that would fit at least 15 people, is quiet and affordable. Since our site is in north quezon city we decided to make a reservation at Elyong's Grill and Restaurant located in Commonwealth Avenue, North Fairview. A day before our meeting I personally visited the site to check their function rooms and inquire about the price. The receptionist showed me the videoke lounges that could sit at least 15 people and is priced at P2500 consumable of food and beverages. The package is good for 3 hours and in excess of an hour you have to add P300. I had to make an immediate decision as we don't have much time anymore so I proceeded to give half the amount as deposit. The day of our meeting would also be the birthday celebration of three of our partners, Dennis, Josh and Bevz. They brought a cake which the staff of Elyong's charged for P100 corkage.

Aside from the videoke lounges, Elyong's also have bamboo huts which are scattered all over the vast area. Some of the bamboo huts are small that can sit 6 to 8 people but there are also bigger huts that can accomodate 20-25 people, most of the bigger huts are elevated which also provided a nice view of the posh subdivisions nearby and at night offers the view of the city and its dazzling lights. You might be wondering why I am still giving a description of this place and not go directly to my rants, well, I guess it's just fair to let the people visualize the good things and try to weigh in the end if they still would want to try it out. Now the bad things. Upon getting there we did not ordered food yet since we need to conduct our meeting first and having food in front of you would surely distract people. After about 2 hours we ordered the food and drinks, they arrived in time to feed our hungry stomach. Probably in the minds of the staff after serving the food we don't have much need for them so they kept on ignoring our requests. We requested for water and after 20 minutes of waiting we followed it up. Still no water. They are not even concerned that we might choke and die at that moment, ok so that's a bit overreacting. But my god! Its just water! We are not even ordering perrier or swiss water, just plain nawasa water. I went out of the room to check if there are a lot of customers. Around 10 of the huts were occupied and 4 of the lounges. So there are a bit of a crowd that Sunday night. I don't freakin' care. They are in the customer service business and I am sure that they know that Sundays are family day and they should expect a lot of customers. They should be the one to make adjustments to staffing. After about 40 minutes our water arrived. We also ordered 2 buckets of San Mig Light that we also followed up about 3 times or more. Since we have a cake that we need to eat we also requested for forks and plates. Those requests were also ignored. All in all we waited for the stuff we requested more than an hour to arrive. You might be thinking more than an hour is too much and why didn't we get mad or complained. We are too engrossed in our conversations and catching up of each others' lives that we didn't notice the time, we are also enjoying singing to our hearts and laughing over each ones funny antics. We are not even in a hurry to leave the place. But that doesn't mean that we don't deserve the kind of service we expect. We arrived there around 5 pm and around 11 pm we decided to pack up and leave so we asked for the bill. Which is another story. Another long wait. I am really itching to talk to a higher up to complain but I am about 6 months pregnant that time and I don't need stress to add up to my already tired mind and body. I just went to the cashier area to ask for the bill since I cannot wait anymore for the servers and I badly want to go home already. That's how bad it was. Even getting the bill would cause you precious time. For me no amount of extraordinarily good food can compensate for good service. And take note, their food is just ordinary.

Bad Experience #1

When Flavours of China opened in SM Fairview last year my husband and I wanted to know if they are as good as the other chinese restaurants we have tried in the past. We tried their Yang Chow fried rice and two other dishes. I think their menu is a bit overpriced considering that the taste is not so good. The service was bad. I am a very patient and considerate customer. But when the staff can't recover from a bad service experience I really make it a point not to go back to their place. Well, it just so happened that our food had a strand of dishwashing sponge. The green scouring part of the sponge. How it ended up there was something that wasn't explained to us by the staff. They offered to change the food, something I would be grateful for if they had apologized first. We asked for the bill, now that's another story. It took a long time for them to give us the bill and the change. And when we were roaming the mall to buy stuff I checked the receipt again only to find out that they overcharged us by almost P200. A dish we did not even ordered. I did not want to go back so I just asked my husband to get the money from them. One complaint in a day is already bad. But two complains from one customer is a disaster. I think the management should reorient their staff and their managers on how to properly handle dismayed customers.

In Memory of Nanay

One of the saddest period of my life was when Nanay Belen died, our maternal grandmother. There wasn't a day for two years after she died that I never thought of her. Until now I miss her everytime I would eat kare-kare, she makes the best kare-kare and she cooks not well but excellently. Whenever there would be family gatherings her dishes would always be complimented, and guests would often bring home food, and still there would be enough leftover for us to eat for two days. We would often wonder, bakit hindi nauubos yung pagkain? And Nanay would say that dinasalan daw nya. After she died, our nanay Vicky took over the cooking with the help of my aunts, and oftentimes we would run out of dishes to serve. Guess she wasn't able to ask her mother the secret. Aside from her wonderful cooking, Nanay Belen was always on her feet, roving places. She would bring us, my sisters and I, to familiar places and sometimes places we haven't been to. She would tell us we would go to a relative of hers who live somewhere in Bagbag, or sometimes go to Tondo where we used to live, or in Bulacan where her older sister resides. Places near and far, by jeep, bus and even train. My first train ride was not on the LRT but the very old dilapidated train bound for Bicol. We didn't go to Bicol though. We rode that train to go to San Pedro Laguna to visit my father's brother for an affair I cannot remember anymore. The train ride was bumpy and the scenery started with shanties and ended up with greenery.
When we were little we experienced nanay belen's infamous spanking. We heard of that story from my nanay vicky. Nanay Vicky would tell us stories of how she suffered from Nanay Belen's heavy hand. She would end up badly bruised because apparently somebody would tell Nanay Belen that they saw her with my Tatay. Nanay Belen doesn't want Nanay Vicky to have a boyfriend that time I guess. The most painful experience I had with her was when she hit me with a walis tambo in the butt. I cried non stop. I can't remember the reason why she did that but I made sure it won't happen again. It was a learning experience that until now I did not regret because it molded me to be somebody who fear my elder and follow rules.
Nanay Belen died on the month of July. As she would often tell us it would rain on her burial because her earwax is always wet. We would laugh on that fact and tell her that it's just an old saying. But on the day of her burial, it did not just rain but there's a storm and everyone who walked to her grave site were soaking wet. I smiled at the coincidence while tears were pouring from my eyes. She was right indeed.
People would always say that we should show our family how much we love them because we don't know what would happen next. About a month before she died, I didn't know what took over me, but I hugged her while we were seating on the sofa. I would not normally do that. I placed my head on her chest and hugged her. I can still remember how she smelled. Of spices and aromatics, because she just cooked for my parents' wedding anniversary. The last celebration she would share her cooking expertise and the delicious food I still crave for until now.

It's only been three weeks!@*#!

I nurse my baby as much as I can for the two months that I am on maternity leave. Breastfeeding brings a lot of benefits to the baby as well as to the mother. It has been established that breastfeeding lowers the risk of breast cancer. That is why I tried very hard to breatsfeed since the disease is already in the family (my grandmother died of breast cancer). Medical studies have shown that breast cancer or any cancer for that matter skips a generation. I certainly don't want to suffer from it. Breastfeeding also help you get back to your pre-pregnancy weight. That is so true! I didn't have a hard time getting back to my pre-pregnancy body. But as much as I would want to give 100% breastmilk to my baby I just can't. There are times that my milk is not enough for my baby so I use fomula substitute, Enfalac A+. And my baby sure does gulp milk very fast! She feeds an average of 8 times a day, 3 ounces per feed. Formula accounts for only about 30%. Three weeks ago I bought a big can (950g) of Enfalac A+ in Mercury Drug. It was priced at P803.25. We went to Shopwise to buy groceries and to my surprise the milk was cheaper there! It was only around P795. But many people have said that it's more cheaper in SM. Ok, next time, now I know. The other day we went to SM to buy milk since my baby's milk is depleting already. My god, It's P835! And the promo refiller told us that the price have been going up every 3 days or so. Imagine, that's P40 increase in 3 weeks! I will soon go back to work and I worry about my breastmilk. If I don't nurse my baby often or if I don't express/pump milk it will just stop. And my work usually last for 10-12 hours. We don't have a private space at work that I could use to express milk. I guess I will just have to create a routine, like wake up very early to pump milk and store it in the fridge. Sacrifices are needed in tough times such as these.



... a worthwhile read for would-be moms...



http://babyparenting.about.com/cs/breastfeeding/f/bfbenefits.htm

I Didn't Know This Until Now

Our electric bill for March was around P3800, quite alarming since normally we average only around P2800. Then I remembered I am at home because of my maternity leave and I am one of the reasons why our consumption increased. I watch TV, use the computer and electric fan. We have an ACU but I don't want my baby to get used to it so I don't turn it on. I also use an electric steriliser and bottle warmer. We live with my parents so I felt a bit awkward. I just vowed to myself that I would give money for the electric bill once I get my maternity benefit. I usually watch National Geographic when there are no good shows to watch in the food network. On April 22, Earth Day, they featured something about electric consumption and there they mentioned that 75% of a household's total electric consumption comes from appliances that are on standby. Meaning, appliances that are not turned on but not unplugged either. Since then I make a conscious effort to really pull the plug when an item is not in use. I believe that each one should make a contribution to help our ailing planet, a small act like that could help in a big way.

The Singing Bee

Franchising shows proved to be successful for both rival networks GMA 7 and ABS CBN. What with American and European shows dominating primetime and daytime TV ratings. There's Pinoy Idol, Pinoy Big Brother, Pinoy Dream Academy and soon Survivor. But there's one franchised show that I eagerly await every night. Premiered last April 21, The Singing Bee, franchised from Zeal Entertainment which is hosted by Cesar Montano, proved to be the show to beat. What with its pilot episode garnering 23.9% leading the race in the primetime shows of ABS CBN. The show is really super fun to watch and the race to the top is very entertaining. Contestants have to pass 3 levels before playing the final game which is really very easy considering you will bag 1 million pesos no less. What you need to be equipped with when you become a contestant of this show is knowledge of song lyrics. Funny how sometimes songs featured are super easy (like leron leron sinta) and at times super difficult (like Akon's Don't Matter). Some people might think that the show is a duplicate of "K, The P1 million videoke challenge" hosted by Arnel Ignacio and Jaya in GMA 7. Both game shows dig singing/videoke but they have varying styles, with TSB employing more fun tactics. That show (K) might go down the drain anytime soon because it is really boring and they don't feature regular people, only celebrities (correct me if I'm wrong). That doesn't help much to poor people at all. I am really a Kapamilya to the core, hehehehe. No offense to those who love GMA 7.

My Favorite Iron Chef

Bobby Flay

Things heat up when southwestern specialist Bobby Flay steps into the kitchen.

http://www.bobbyflay.com/

From: New York City

Restaurants: Mesa Grill, Bolo, Mesa Grill (Las Vegas), Bar AmericainCuisine: Mesa Grill is American Southwest, Bolo is Spanish-inspired and Bar Americain is regional American

Interests: Travel, golf, food

Ideal secret ingredient: Any kind of shellfish

Culinary inspirations: Wolfgang Puck, Jonathan Waxman, Julia Child

Ideal judge: My mother

Culinary secret weapon: It’s a secret and giving it away could jeopardize my chances of winning another match.

Favorite restaurant: I have too many to just choose one.

Favorite food: Ice cream

Food you won’t go near: Fiddlehead ferns

Weirdest thing you've ever eaten: Fish testicles

Favorite food destination: Anywhere in the US: New England, the Deep South, and the Pacific Northwest. They all have amazing ingredients and chefs and I am always blown away by the recipes and the food.

Alternative dream job: Mayor of New York

Eversince my night turned to day (my baby is usually awake in the wee hours of the morning), food network and asian food channel had been my best friends. It is very difficult to keep your eyes open as sleep would really crawl into your skin every minute or so. I would always tune in to these channels and wait for my favorite shows to air. I would be watching reruns of Iron Chef America and Showdown with Bobby Flay and would be too engrossed time would usually pass by and morning has come already. I am really amazed by how passionate the chefs are most specially Bobby Flay, I like his style of cooking and I have always wanted to eat authentic southwestern cuisine.

Kali Santina

On March 6, 2008 at exactly 12:31am I gave birth to a baby girl whom we named Kali Santina. She's born premature, only at 35.5 weeks but what a miracle she is. She's born very healthy and doesn't need to be incubated. We even left the hospital a day after I gave birth. She's only 5 lbs and 6 ounces, very tiny and fragile. I don't exactly know how she came out of me since I was heavily sedated and they put me to sleep so I didn't get to hold her after the delivery. I only saw her first in the digital camera brought by his papa when I was already in the recovery room. I felt so sad at first since I didn't expect our first meeting to be like this. I felt I need to gather all my strength as I really want to see her and hold her. In the afternoon I mustered enough energy to stand and be wheeled to the nursery. There I saw her. It was the most wonderful feeling in the world. This child you waited a long time to see, finally is in your arms, ready to receive the love and care you so longingly bottled up inside.