Goodbye summer, hello fire trees!

As much as I love summer, I love it more when it draws to a close. Besides the end to the scorching temperature in this side of the equator, it also means fire tree season!

Fire trees (or flame trees, Delonix regia) is a flowering tree that grows in many tropical parts of the world, like the Philippines. Truth be told, I only began to notice it and its bright red-orange blooms when I was in college, where the university I attended and the other university I would pass by in my commute from Manila to Quezon City, both had these trees in relative abundance. By the time school would start in June, they would already be proudly displaying their cheery color amidst a blanket of green.

The same month though is also the start of the rainy season, and those bright blooms find themselves scattered on the ground not for long. But for a few weeks, we get to see them put a delightful display. And it never fails to make me smile.

Once, I wondered out loud why people didn’t plant more of them in the city, line streets with them. Just imagine how pretty it would be! A friend who grew up in a farm then told me that they are notorious for harboring higad (those itchy, hairy caterpillars) and fire ants. She had an unpleasant experience with them and obviously didn’t share my enthusiasm for fire trees. I guess any visions of hanami-like (cherry blossom viewing) activities were out of the question.

But potential higad-infestation notwithstanding, I still try to go out of my way to look at fire trees. Years ago in UP Diliman, I once chanced upon A. Roces Street when its fire trees were almost all abloom. It was late in the afternoon, the street was almost empty, and there were these trees just putting a sort of  bright, happy punctuation to an ordinary day.

I took a stroll down there again last Sunday. The fire trees had not yet all bloomed (or maybe they had and I missed them) but I still saw some of the flowers clinging to their branches.

Bikers along A. Roces Street and under a fire tree

Keep blooming, you can do it! Imagine when more of them are bright red orange

Heading out, along University Ave

Bye, fire tree, until next year

Foodstock—music, vegetarian eats and organic farmers

Last night, the husband and I went to 10A Alabama in Quezon City for Foodstock, a fundraising event from the good people of Good Food Community. There was musical performance from , a (mostly) vegetarian spread, lovely homemade ginger beer, and a great reason to spend P250 (around 20 USD) as all proceeds were going straight to helping out the small organic farmers cooperative in Capas, Tarlac, for their greenhouse and irrigation needs in the next few months.

I first learned about Good Food Community from my sister who gets her bayong (basket) of organic veggies from the small farmers that the group supports within their Community-shared Agriculture program. Basically, you pledge to buy local vegetables for the week (for several weeks) from the farmers, who in turn are assured of a stable demand for an entire season. (Learn more about it here.) The group also regularly visits the farms, and shareholders (like my sister) get to meet the farmers who grow these veggies and sometimes help with the harvesting.

10A Alabama, which houses Resurrection Furniture and Found Objects Gallery, became the venue for Good Food Community’s Foodstock (Getting distracted by the pendant lamp, hee)

Meet Char, one of the folks behind Good Food Community. One of the coolest persons I’ve ever met (She also makes good ginger beer!)

Last night, the farmers were there. They along with GFC volunteers cooked a wide spread of vegetarian dishes–from a vegetable and tofu curry to tortang talong, a kind of sticky rice cake (somebody was not taking notes) and caramelized onion spread with crostinis, and bowls and plates of other vegetable dishes that were as varied as the music.

Hey look! History and architecture right around the corner

Whenever I travel and find myself gazing at some intriguing structure of some other city, watching also fellow travelers flocking to it, I find myself wondering: which places and structures back home merit the same admiration or at the very least, curiosity?

Manila or even the Philippines is usually not on the shortlist when it comes to eye-popping architecture. No, we don’t have pyramids, grand castles, and towering structures to take your breath away. (We have lots of beaches though, check this, this or this.) In the capital, most of the beautiful colonial buildings were destroyed during the World War II when the Americans dropped them bombs to finish off the Japanese.

When I worked for a teen fashion mag years ago, I sat next to one of the editors of the shelter and architecture magazines of the publishing company. Sitting next to her didn’t make me imbibe special architecture and design knowledge, but I did think of her when I posed that question to myself a couple of months back: Where in Metro Manila can you see historically significant Philippine architecture?

Aside from the historic churches and the old walled city of Intramuros built during the Spanish times that are typical tourist fare for Manila sightseeing, there are other areas with structures that are worth a look for the history they carry. Within a university campus, a residential neighborhood and even a cemetery, here are the places where Real Living magazine editor in chief Rachelle Medina recommends if you’re on the lookout for some historic pieces of architecture.

University of the Philippines, Diliman, Quezon City

Aside from being one of the country’s top universities (not to mention a favorite Sunday running spot), Rachelle says that UP Diliman has the best example of post-war Philippine architecture all in one area. And they’re all made by some of the country’s national artists: Cesar Concio, Juan Nakpil, Juan Arellano, Leandro Locsin, among others.

The Church of the Holy Sacrifice is recognized as a National Historical Landmark

The Church of the Holy Sacrifice is likely the only church in the country created and designed by five national artists–Locsin for architecture, the River of Light floor design by Arturo Luz, the crucifix by Napoleon Abueva, and the Stations of the Cross by Vicente Manansala and Ang Kiukok. It stands out compared to other popular Catholic churches in the country (with their towers and columns) because of its circular shape, its concrete dome (a first back in the mid 1950s), and the location of the altar in the center.

Going back to Boracay

It’s crowded. There are so many people in the small island that there’s even moderate vehicular traffic along the small main road behind the beachfront properties, which would have been unthinkable decades ago. And should that make you shake your head in disbelief, you can get some comfort from a cheeseburger in McDonald’s or a latte in Starbucks. Okay, time to pick up your jaw from the sand, Boracay-visitors-from-long-ago. Oh, let’s not forget the lumot (algae) that stain the clear waters particularly in the summer months when the tourists come in droves. With so many people jostling for a piece of this paradise, it’s easy to tell yourself, I won’t ever go back. I shouldn’t have gone back.

How can you not go back to this? Early morning when the crowds are still nowhere to be seen on White Beach.

But then I find myself standing in the water, digging my feet into the white, soft sand below, and (my back to the shore and the lumot) staring at the stretch of different shades of blue before me–from the sea to the sky. And in spite of everything I fall in love with this small island all over again and wonder what took me so long to go back.

Eating in Hong Kong: language barrier, chain restos, and Tim Ho Wan

When you’re traveling and you encounter a menu where you can’t understand single thing, do you a) make an attempt to communicate with the server with only four words you know of the local language , b) point at something in the menu and hope you don’t order something heinous, or c) try your luck in another restaurant with English translations in the menu? I’ve done all three: a) if I am feeling adventurous and , b) if I’m feeling extremely adventurous and c) when exhaustion dictates the need for something familiar and the the only adventure I want to have that day is figuring out the train route.

Golden roasted goodness in one of the windows of a restaurant in TST in Hong Kong

In the trip to Hong Kong, a place where good food is abundant, I found myself making all three decisions. In the mornings, when P and I are eager to start our day and before we meet with our friends, we wake up early and explore the nearby streets on our own from where we were staying.

From Andy Warhol’s pop art to Sheung Wan’s street corners

Whenever my husband and I travel, while I make sense of train or bus routes from the airport to where we’re staying, I can always count on him to appear beside me with a handful of useful maps and brochures gathered from the information counters. Outside the Hong Kong International Airport, while we waited for the bus (see other ways to get to and from HKIA below)  he began showing me his latest stash–one of which was a brochure to an Andy Warhol exhibit at the Hong Kong Museum of Art.

Time for some Warhol. Outside the Hong Kong Museum of Art

We were traveling with another couple and made the mental note to find the time to see it. And on our third day in Hong Kong, before we met up with friends, we spent our Friday morning ooh-ing, ahh-ing, and gazing at Warhol’s works. Later on, I was ooh-ing and ahh-ing over the street corners of Sheung Wan.

Turning touristy in Hong Kong

I should have bought a shirt. You know, the one with the “I <heart> HK.” I should have gone years ago but Hong Kong’s reputation for being a shopping mecca discouraged me. (I’m not really big on shopping. I’ll spend hours inside a mall because I’m looking for something in particular not because I’m just hoping to find something that catches my eye. So, I always thought, what else was I going to do in Hong Kong?)

The Hong Kong skyline from the Tsim Sha Tsui Promenade. I couldn’t get enough of this view.

Turns out–hello, ignorant tourist– that there are a lot of other things to do in Hong Kong besides shopping: gawking at the lights show in Victoria Harbour, going up the Peak to gawk at the Hong Kong skyline some more, walking along the Avenue of the Stars, taking the Star Ferry, going to Disneyland, eating dimsum, pork buns and egg tarts, going to a night market, going to a neighborhood flea market, going to a temple, taking the Star Ferry all over again, and just going around the narrow neon-lit streets. Mostly touristy things I know, but I still enjoyed every minute of it.