Summer is Back

I thought summer is already gone because for the past days its always raining. But i'm wrong, summer is back with a vengeance. The town is now again full of shoppers and the ice cream parlors were a hit. People are taking advantage of the summer sale and its also the start of the summer vacation for students.

I also shopped for some of my food needs at Thai Shop. On the way home, i encountered two hidden cameras in the bushes. It's good that i was warned by the passing motorists but i was surprised on the second one, so i brake hard and the eggs that i bought broke. So i ended up eating the broken eggs for dinner.

My Disaster Baking

Pan de sal is a favorite bread bun eaten in the Philippines usually for breakfast. I really love this bread and i miss it so much here in Germany. I really take time to research on how to bake pandesal. There are lots of receipes available but i only tried the simple one.

I don't have a break maker so i just use the mixer to mix all the ingredients. It turned out to be a disaster, unsuccessful, failure call it whatever. It's just nice in the picture but you cannot eat it because its hard. But i will keep on trying, there's no harm in trying it again for the 2nd, 3rd, 4th....and so on, i will never give up.

Noodle Box

Everytime i am in the town to shop, i always pass by a food store named nudel box. I'm really curious what's in there so i tried to taste their noodles. To my surprise, its only one kind of noodle and six different sauces.

The boxes to choose are small, medium and large. I tried only the small box and the carbonara sauce. The portion is just enough for me and it also taste good. Next time, i'm going to try other sauces. I'm really a noodle person, i eat it alternately with rice.

A Trip down Memory Lane

My daughter astrid send me this wedding picture of my eldest sister in the late 60's. I suddenly remembered my parents being together in a family affair. Though, we were born out of wedlock, my father is a responsible man. My eldest sister got married at the age of 18 and my mother really decided not to attend her wedding.

My mother was disappointed because she wanted my sister to finish first her studies. On the day of the wedding, my mother was still at home while the guests and the whole entourage were already in the church. Thanks to the convincing power of a relative, the wedding pushed through as planned.

A Sudden Storm

The other day, we were surprised that after a sunny morning, it became dark at midday. Then suddenly, heavy rains with small ice and strong winds hit our area. It lasted for about 20 minutes and after the sudden storm, many trees fell on the street and even on cars.

For a while there's no telephone connection and satellite TV, but it restored after some minutes. We were really surprised and its the first time that water enter our winter garden. Our garbage bin is also now full because of the collected leaves after the storm.

Our Lady of Manaoag

Last week, Our Lady of Manaoag also a title given to our blessed Virgin, visited my grandson's school, Mater Ecclesiae. She is the patroness of the sick, the helpless and the needy.

The statue of Our Lady of Manaoag purportedly has a long history of miraculous and pious events that are duplicated in the murals all over the church. This is done so that the events will never be forgotten. Devotees, coming from all over the globe, have various reasons for visiting the place among which are pleas for health restoration, good voyage, or better fate.

The statue of Our Lady of Manaoag is considered to be priceless because of the great identity it brings to the province of Pangasinan, but more interestingly because of its jeweled crown.

An Afternoon with Friends

Because of our on-going house construction, we're going to send more balikbayan boxes filled with house stuff. I run out of package tape so i decided to drive to the city to buy at least ten rolls.

While browsing around, i saw some friends and spend some time with them.

We have some kind of food trip, we started at mcdonalds, then to turkish restaurant and ended up at palazzo, an ice cream parlor in the heart of the city.

Mallorca Getaway

It's really a dream come true for my german brother here to have a summer spanish getaway. His newfound haven is located in mallorca,spain, just 3 hours away from Germany.

His property had a common swimming pool with sunny terraces and direct sea access. It
is also fully furnished.

The well-kept landscaped garden of this peaceful property will make you feel you have reached paradise.

The area gives an amazing views over the open seas and the coast

A Rainy Floh Markt

I really forgot that there is a scheduled flea market today, otherwise, i could have bring my pangga (my car) for my shopping. While waiting for my best friends in the city, i browsed around markplatz hoping that i can find something rare for our new house.

I was dissapointed because there are only few stalls there because of the bad weather. But i was able to find something for our kitchen, a small porcelain coffee set. And my camera capture the lady walking with her left hand reaching her behind.

The Overseas Workers

On our return flight back to Germany, i noticed the increasing number of overseas filipino workers leaving our country to try their luck to work in a foreign land. The exodus includes skilled workers taking unskilled work with only one thing in mind, to support the family back home.

With the present global crisis, remittances from OFW's influence the country's economic growth. They make a lot of sacrifice to provide for the needs of their families.

Car Wash Service

I always showered Pangga, the name of my car, with all my love and attention. That's why i am hands-on when it comes to cleaning her. I have to do it because car wash in germany is expensive for me.

Here in the Philippines, our car named Victoria has her shower every week. It's because the price is very affordable. There is a car wash service near our place and they charge 90 pesos, and they have a promo that on the 6th service, its free. But i found out that on the other street, it cost only 60 pesos, unbelievable right????

My Pandesal

Pandesal is the most popular bread in the Philippines. We always eat it in a number of ways combined with different sandwich spreads. How many times i did tried to bake this filipino bread but i'm always not successful. So i just buy from a pandesal vendor using his trike and going from house to house.

The problem is i always missed the pandesal vendor because he is driving too fast. So i end up borrowing toast from my better half or sometimes i just eat fried banana for breakfast. But the other day, i've learned that a bakery selling hot pandesal is just two blocks away from our rented house. So now, i don't need to wake up early and wait for the vendor to pass by our house.

Family Bonding

Yesterday, my eldest son Anthony and his family visited us at home. Even if i have many children, its hard to see them all. They're all busy with their respective jobs, studies and family. At the end of the day, its always me and dirk.

We're also busy with our house construction that's why i always make it a point to be with them as much as possible. Today we did bring them to our clubhouse pool and enjoyed swimming together with the high school friends of astrid.



Dirk played golf with steve today, and while he is having a relaxing massage, i treated my grandkids to a small shopping spree at SM.

My Simple Luxus

Aside from pampering ourselves with relaxing massage and some beauty treatments, i also use bottled mineral water when taking shower. Our water here in the subdivision is not that clean and i often get some skin rashes. I remember that before almost everybody drink tap water but now bottled mineral water is very much in. By the way, to beat the heat here, i'm taking advantage of eating halo halo which for sure i'm going to miss when we return next week to Germany.

The Mexican Restaurant

Since we arrived here two weeks ago, i haven't tried cooking rice or any dishes at home. We're out of the house most of the time so we just eat in the restaurant everyday.

Today, we have lunch at Poquito Mas, a mexican restaurant at Paseo. Their buffet was superb with more or less twenty dishes to choose from. Appetizers, soup and dessert are also available.




Though its a mexican restaurant, they also served fipinó dishes like dipped in cheese crispy kangkong, adobo, fried tilapia, sinangag etc.

Body Pampering

While waiting for the delivery of our terrace couch, we decided again to pamper ourselves. So we drive to SM santa rosa for a much needed relaxing massage. The massage girls are really competent and we feel like being rejuvinated.

We liked very much our customized king size couch for out terrace that come also with two single chairs, center table, two side table, cushions and telephone table. Our 60 square meters terrace is now complete with furnitures and dirty kitchen.