The rambling recipes & travels of a home baker

I’m back in Asia!  The messy, muggy, humid zaniness of a large city in Asia.  It’s a far jump from Seattle, but I managed to make it to Manila via Seoul on Asiana Airlines.  Asiana is a Korean airline and it was an 11 hour flight on a Boeing 777 (LOVE IT!) where I was lucky enough to have no one next to me!  Movies: Wall-E and Mamma Mia – plus others I wasn’t interested in – The Mummy version 3? and Ghost Town.  The food was decent (because I had the Korean dish, Bibimbap) and the service was great.  The flight attendants were all a frighteningly perfect size 2 as well.  We crossed the international date line on New Year’s so somehow most of New Year’s Eve was zapped away from my life….I may have slept through it!

Seoul’s new airport, Incheon, is like a high class mall – Chanel, Gucci, Prada, plus everything is new and shiny.  Not a bad place to hang out, but alas, my good friend, Susan, kindly sent me Twilight (yes, the teeny bopper gothic romance – like this generations Buffy the Vampire Slayer – only not as hip) to read and I am now totally sucked into it (it pretty much goes with my terrible pop music tastes) 

So I’ve only spent one day in Manila and it was basically adjusting to the time zone difference which I think is currently 15 hours ahead of Seattle.

My good friend, Michelle, and her sister Merisse, came to pick me up late at night at Ninoy Aquino International Airport which felt a bit more what I expect Asia to be like – muggy, lots of honking, people smoking.  But somehow when I am on vacation, my patience is greater and when I’m in Asia, things that would bother me in Seattle, don’t phase me at all.  I should try to have this zen attitude at home.

So Michelle’s family lives south of Manila this morning, she woke with her dad to take a bike ride around her neighborhood (Michelle is training with her pop to ride the Seattle to Vancouver BC bike ride).  I snoozed away after staying up late to read more Twilight.  When they returned, Michelle’s 93 year old grandma had taken a tumble in the shower so Michelle’s Dad took her to the hospital.  The rest of us, Michelle, her sisters, Merisse, Merielle and her mother all had breakfast which included longsilong (pork/garlic sausage)….and the tastiest mango I’ve had in ages.

The rest of the morning was spent trying to figure out how to reserve a seat on a bus up to Banaue (northern Luzon) for next week.

We then headed to the mall for Michelle to get some of her visa paperwork sorted and out and to get ironically a facial and to look for a cell phone for me (since it was agreed that I should not head up to Banaue without some method of transportation).  So, off we went.  The facial was ridiculously cheap – $5 (or 250 Philippine Peso).   While in the mall (there are so many in Manila) I observed many tragic english translations, worst of which might have been Mushy Balls – a stand that sold fish balls, potato balls, other odd things in a ball form.  I’ll leave it at that.

The next day we headed out early for a flight to Basco, Batanes.  Read more in the next post!