A Pinay in Europe

 Makati

Since arriving in Manila, I have had a ball, in bed!  It’s only today that I have started recovering, thanks to the anti-allergy and Vitamin C tablets prescribed by the doctor!  It was the usual case of allergy against pollution and dust which is very common among balikbayans (homecoming overseas Filipinos) who come from clean-air environment such as the Americas and Europe. Hence, I advise everyone to start taking Vitamin C long before you fly home.   It enhances the body’s immune system and essential for defending it against pollution. (I told you, this thread covers all topics under the sun including Health and Medicine!)

Now for the real ball!  H is joining me in January and  I’ve been busy organising our itinerary for trips to Cebu, Bohol and Dumaguete.  We are both excited and looking forward to some snorkeling and eco-touring. We’ve been to Coron, Palawan before and the beauty of the islands and the people are forever etched in his memory!  I can’t wait for January and take note, he will bring our brand new Canon EOS40D of 10 megapixels, hurray! Move aside Nikon Coolpix 5700 (5mp)!  Finally our dream to upgrade our 5-year old hybrid camera has been realized!  The continuous shooting mode of the 40D would be perfect for the dolphin-watching in Bohol!

H adores the Philippines but not Manila.  He cannot stand the traffic, pollution and the crowd.  I chose Bohol, Cebu and Dumaguete because they are within short ferry rides to each other, and Dumaguete reminds me so much of Penang, Malaysia, a garden city by the sea.

Another reason why my homecoming is a ball. we had our grand reunion with my high school class/batchmates of X years ago!  If I was not homebound the past few days due to allergy, my face would have been a permanent feature in our high school website where photos of the daily gatherings are posted!  Add to that the invites of my ex-officemates and other friends to their Christmas parties.  The spirit is willing but the body can only take so much

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It’s that time of the year again when I have to take my annual leave to spend the holiday season with my family.   Hopefully, amidst those most-eagerly awaited filipino delectables and the noise and excitement of being surrounded by family, i can still gather my thoughts and write some observations about the Philippines (as i did last year!)

and for my last post this year, from Europe, here are pics of Leicester:

clockwise from top right:
- the white paint next to the natural brick colour on this building tells of two separate terrace houses. terrace housing originated in England in the the late 17th century. here, a row of identical or mirror-image houses share side walls.
- the restaurant, Marquis Wellington, founded in 1907
- bay windows, typically English, are often associated with Victorian architecture. the main purpose is to let in more light into the building.
- what a mansion!

despite the absence of a cross, you can always tell a building if it was a church or not, . this one is now a day centre. the stained glass feature is perfect for waking up the artistic passions of the little tots!

I guess, december 1 in the UK is the start of every christmassy activity which is geared towards everyone digging deep into his/her pockets. here seen infront of the town hall are carollers singing for some charitable organisation

the cemetery grounds of the abandoned Gothic church next to us is now the refuge of squirrels. everytime we walk past, we see them scurrying around looking for food! this one is about a foot long and he actually stopped to pose for the camera!

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Nice is a beautiful city…it’s the second most visited city in France, after Paris.

When you visit, try going in July/August.  I know they are madly crowded months but it’s exactly the crowd you will enjoy watching - from the backpackers to the filthy rich, from the slobs (the tourists usually) to the most fashionable!  Also check the colorful markets and the many concerts and operas.

Take the train journey.  It’s the most awesome way to see the coastal landscape, the mountains and the medieval villages.

you can climb the hill on the left to see one of the most beautiful panoramas in the world

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We’ve been to Limoné today! This italian skiing resort never ceases to pump our excitement level, not only the snow but even the food!  Even the simplest grilled aubergine, canneloni and lamb stew taste so perfect in the mouth! And the women are so fashionable.  Everything in Italy is so good!

Mariadams: Italy! oh my goodness!! I just love this country!  what are we doing in Leicester?
Hubby: to earn money so we can pay all these trips!
 

sipping coffee al fresco amidst the snow…i just love that!   

it was 7degC but the sun was really shining!                                  snow all over the place

fashionable mummy and fashionable baby..                             two fashionable babies..
 

the ski map of limone and limonetto                                            a paticceria….

scouting for a place to eat…                                                               that’s the holly tree in the foreground

an iceberg in limoné!                                                                         winter plants for sale!…
 

respect nature…

this is what greeted us at the Italian side of the kilometer long French-Italian tunnel/border.
what we cannot fathom is…at the french side, it was all green, and not a single drop of snow!

thank goodness, it’s sunday today! the owner of this car didn’t have to drive to work !!

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We were in Provence but did not stay long because  it was pouring with rain all day long so we decided to drive to the Alpes Maritimes which is surprisingly dry but still cold.  We go to Limoné (Italy) tomorrow for our Sunday out and will look for that solid hot chocolat!

Here are photos of our provençal lunch today:

 dorade grillé (grilled dorade) courgette quiche, potatoes, tomato sauce with thyme and rosemary
 

my favorite dessert: nougat glacé (nougat ice cream)

my noisette (small coffee with nut-size of milk)

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Sunday pm, 18 November

What was supposed to be a 2-hour journey turned out to be a complicated, nerve-wracking four hours on the road.

Complication no. 1 - we got lost.
Yes, we missed the turning.  That’s what happens when a wife and a husband of opposing minds discuss business behind the wheel,  add the ever confusing road signage system of Britain and you are in for a merry go round in roundabouts.

Complication no. 2 - the traffic
It’s like Edsa traffic in a UK motorway, the obvious differences are: British drivers stick to their lanes and car windows are clearly transparent. Are Pinoys still using those almost opaquey film on their windows? In Britain, their car windows are just that: car windows. there are no impediments, such that, you can even peek at what they are watching on their tv/video screens. The British treat their cars as their second homes so they fit them with the latest gizmos such as video screens the quantity of which depends on the number of family members or maximum of four. This is so that little jamie and big sister annie at the backseat would remain quiet as mice, thus, creating peace for everybody. On the other hand, one tv shared by two hyperactive kids is formula for child wrestling, or synchronized yelling! Daddy and mummy in the front seats would also have one each but daddy would have an extra toy in the form of a GPS navigation system, although this is not always a reliable tool to take you from point A to point C at the shortest distance as there are reports of vehicles getting stuck in the middle of a cattle farm or even in a dumpsite because they relied so much on their GPS!

So after an hour or two of turtle speed driving, negotiating a short patch of expressway, we finally got out of the gridlock realizing that there was nothing at all, no accident, no vehicle stalling which might have caused this bottleneck. i told you, it’s like Manila traffic!

Complication no. 3 - from snowflakes to white horror
All the elements of a snowstorm where present that night: it was freezing cold, it was heavily windy and the car thermometer registered a reading of 0degC.

At first, we were enjoying the thin flakes of snow swirling around us, like thin and tiny bits of cotton falling from the sky. Hurray! the first snow of the year, how exciting!

But then, the flakes were merely settling down - they were not melting at all - they were slowly blanketing the grassy sides of the motorway into whiteness.  And as we drove, they got thicker and thicker! even the traffic signs were already heavily shielded with snow that we could no longer figure out where we were that moment! we were already guessing wildly whether to keep driving straight or turn right or left…then the snow were also starting to settle on the road surface of the expressway. that despite the constant movement of cars, they were not melting anymore!

Then chaos began. several cars were already stopping in the middle of the lanes!  But it was better to stop than skid on ice! to skid is more dangerous, even fatal! and we were still about an hour away from home!

I was praying hard on my seat.  Supposing the car suddenly stalled? are we going to spend the night out, in the car, in the middle of this snowstorm?  I’ve seen on tv cars getting stuck on heavy snow, with no help coming, and the passengers ended up with frostbites that a thumb or a foot had to be amputated….all these grim scenes were starting to play on my brain!

Then suddenly, the road became clearer!  The snow started to melt…hurray!

And we finally found our street!
Huh! the first snow of the year almost becoming a nightmare!

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A UFO in our neighbourhoodIt’s been 3 months since we moved into our flat in Queen Street but I can never get used to the sight of a UFO look-alike structure that seem to have crashed down in our neighbourhood of elegant but rundown Victorian buildings. I honestly believe that a considerable number of late 19th century buildings - most of them historical factories as ours used to be a textile mill - have been demolished to give way to this overpowering but out-of-place Leicester Theater and Performing Arts Centre which they claim would be the biggest cultural center in the UK outside of London…..Hurray! my teacher liked this opening paragraph to an Opinion page sampler that, out of the 5 students in her class, I was the only one she asked to bring this completed article next week for the whole class to review, edit and prepare for submitting to the editor of our local newspaper, the Leicester Mercury (tabloid). She reckons this would stir interest because it denotes movement (”crashed down“) and passion which editors are looking for ….

she told us this very important tip:
….so as to crack the Journalism world, we have to start at the bottom, i.e., getting our stories published (for free) even in local newspapers, and as soon as we have accumulated at least half a dozen of these published works, they then would form our portfolio when approaching the biggies…!!

here are photos of the UFO i am talking about:

 Our apartment building constructed in 1897

Conservation Area… are they kidding?

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A window display of one choc shop in Blvd St Germain de Pres

These barrels are made of chocolates! so big, aren’t they? I wonder what happens to them when they change the window display? Do they just dump them in the bin? Hmm, it would be a dream come true working on these shops! …. especially at Pierre Hermé!!!!! 

I also saw another shop displaying a rugby field, the players and everything - all in chocolate…..that was the time when the Rugby season was on!   My greatest regret to this day is: we missed the Salon du Chocolat by a day!   If i was there, that would have been my dream trip of a lifetime!!  Imagine the photographic opportunities plus the taste tests and the choc-making demos…!!!!

“Hand over the chocolate and nobody gets hurt!”

seen at a charity shop in Market Harborough, UK

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 Taken from our walk by the riverside yesterday

The river of soar (this riverside) is just few-minutes walk from our doorstep.. add few minutes more and you’ll get to see the amazing National Space Center!

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Did you know…..that the Beagle 2 Mars spacecraft was controlled from the NSC’s Landing Operations Control Centre. Trivia :
Beagle 2 was an unsuccessful British landing spacecraft that formed part of the European Space Agency’s 2003 Mars Express mission. It is not known for certain that the lander reached the Martian surface; all contact with it was lost upon its separation from the Mars Express six days before its scheduled entry into the atmosphere. It may have missed Mars altogether, skipped off the atmosphere and entered an orbit around the sun, or burned up during its descent. If it reached the surface, it may have hit too hard or just simply failed to contact Earth due to a minor fault….wikipedia

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