May

23

‘Missing List’

Filed Under Books, Food & Drinks, General, Society & Culture, The Philippines | 14 Comments


I miss…

1. My pamangkins — my five-year-old niece Yannah and my three-year-old nephew Ethan (they were here in Switzerland for an eight-day tour last April)
2. My family, friends, and my lovely dog (R.I.P.)
3. Chocolate-chip flavored pancakes of Pancake House
4. Metro Manila malls
5. Press conferences and media familiarization trips
6. Playing board games with my siblings
7. Driving
8. Bohol (my favorite Philippine destination)
9. Tropical climate
10. Living in a house
11. Laundromat services
12. My home church in Alabang
13. Bank passbooks
14. Siopao and siomai at Hen-Lin
15. Eating Max’s Restaurant’s fried chicken (remember that Max’s is “the house that fried chicken built”)
16. Family reunions in my aunt’s holiday home in Tagaytay
17. Traveling extensively around the Philippines as a tourism writer
18. Pinoy sales ladies or customer service staff who call me “Ma’am” non-stop
19. Singing with my sister using my videoke microphone
20. Interacting with like-minded people
21. Affordable dental rates
22. My old weight
23. Reading newspapers in English
24. The hustle and bustle of the press room
25. Powerbooks and Book Sale
26. CHF1.00 = PHP45.00 exchange rate
27. Watching English programs on HBO, Discovery, and StarTV
28. Conversing freely in Tagalog and English
29. My photo albums and compilation of published articles
30. Graduate school notes and term papers
31. Having a househelp
32. Halo halo, bibingka, and pork barbecue (Pinoy recipe)
33. Buying cakes at Goldilocks or Red Ribbon for pasalubongs
34. Jollibee’s Chicken Joy
35. KFC chicken combo meals (just love the gravy there!)
36. Chocolate crinkles (can’t find them here)
37. My mom’s sinigang, tinolang manok, and spaghetti
38. Going to the cinema every week
39. Floating on the Dead Sea
40. A nice foot massage
41. Pairs of pants not worth CHF80.00 (PHP3,375.00) each
42. Being 22
43. Having a working SLR camera (almost all my cameras, except for my Polaroid camera and Canon point-and-shoot analog camera, are now broken)
44. Eating pasta goodies at Sbarro
45. Climbing trees
46. Entrepreneur Philippines magazine
47. Meaningful soul friendships
48. Teaching English in the Ukraine
49. Worry-free shopping escapades
50. Not having to speak German

May

16

Amy Tan

Filed Under Blogs & Blogging, Books | Comments Off


It’s such a joy to discover that one of my favorite authors, Amy Tan, now has a blog!

The best-selling author of The Joy Like Club, The Kitchen God’s Wife, The Hundred Secret Senses, The Bonesetter’s Daughter, and The Opposite of Fate: A Book of Musings (an autobiography) blogs at the Red Room.

Her first blog entry was written on Jan. 1, 2008. Click here to read her blog post title “Virgin Blogger Moment.” (Photo taken from Red Room website)

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