Pinoy ala Pobre

“Ma, kung puputi ako, yayaman ba ako,” (Mom, If I turn white, will I be rich?“) was an inquiry my eldest brother made as a kid. This was when the American soldiers would roam Cebu streets with their transistor radios and chocolates, and Cebuanos would go, “Hi, Joe!” . I often wondered what my brother's real intentions were. Would he want to be fair colored like the Americans or did he want to be rich? Or is being white a prelude to being rich?…

For me, being rich is a state of mind. And being poor is not the absence of wealth, but the absence of meaning. I often tell my children that the best investment is relationship, and if you put your time, effort and resources into having real, true friends, you will reap more than you can ever imagine.

Being rich is what many aspire in the material world. Commercialism abounds so much that sometimes we even measure success by having the means. Because many filipinos cannot fulfill their dreams in their own country, they opt to leave. A prominent school in Bacolod, has half of its population in the nursing department, while the other half is a combined mixture of business, the arts and the sciences. That just goes to show you how desperate filipinos are for a better life and their only recourse is out!


Some look for the American dream which is: German car, Italian Wardrobe and Swiss bank Account. or , the Chinese dream which is : an American house, a Japanese wife and Chinese food...but what is the Filipino dream? I asked a lot of my friends about this, and many replied - to get out of the country which is really a sad plight. But I guess it's a host of many things. The best answer came from an old 'boyfriend' who composed this song and which the apo sang...I heard this for the first time today and just loved it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQ2ynVPactM

okay, so do you know who my 'boyfriend' was???? he was a cutie then...hahahah! (but this was in high school, silly!! so no need for explanation on both sides..)...so much for that..

Last week I spent my birthday with brunch at a Brazilian resto in Union Square. I ordered the breakfast menu complete with beans, kale veggies, cassava carbs and a glass of caiperinha. At 2 in the afternoon they were serving me cocktails with the meal! The drink was so yummy, that I had to try making it myself when I got home.

Caiperanha is a poor man's drink in Brazil, like tuba is for the Cebuanos. Cachaca is the alcoholic beverage from sugar cane and is different from rhum, which is a byproduct of molasses. To make the drink, simply cut up lime, mix it with sugar and mash it with a pestle. Put in crushed iced, and add the cachaca. Mix and enjoy. You can even brush the rims of the glass with colored sugar. (i placed brown sugar in mine) Drink moderately because it has the same effect as the agave (tequila)

Imagine, they even have my age printed on the bottle...Talking of coincidences..


A la pobre in spanish means 'of the poor'. And many recipes are called ala pobre because they are either missing some ingredients, or it is the dish which the lower level of the economic chain often eat. But for me, it is a matter of semantics. Anchovies to italians, bulad for us. Same thing. We may not have Brazilian coffee, but we have kopi luwak (the most expensive in the world). Or tequila to the mexicans, lambanog for us. Same thing.

For me, we are all the same-equal, whichever way you look at it. Even when it comes to taste. Everyone has taste, but not everyone has exposure or experience. For as long as we do what we like and are happy, money will just follow us. (that is another law of attraction!) So,..what then defines the rich from the poor...this is what i got:

" Rich people pursue their dreams, read a lot, are curious and they are still kids...Yet a poor person will always try to look damn smart, spend too much on shitty things, and will always hate rich people."

Well said, but as for me, how would I know, I'm just middle class!!!!!

And talking about the pobresitong pinoys, why is it that the filipino culture has the crab mentality....so for today's dish, I have made 2 kinds of crab recipe...relleno and salad. The salad has the costly ingredients like apples, cucumber, green pepper and the caesar salad dressing. The relleno has the leftover veggies I had in the fridge, potatoes, carrots, okra, raisins and seasonings.


Whether one is a rich man's side meal and the other a poor man's main, they still both are yummy either way...Enjoy!

Are you sure it's my birthday?

Birthdays are such a fun event when you're young. Not so much for gifts, but for the fun that it brings when celebrating with friends. When I was younger, my birthday gifts were so limited to mostly clothes, dolls and hair accessories. And my birthday parties consisted of cake, ice cream, spaghetti with sweet hotdog sauce and pork barbecue on a stick. Although they were fun and memorable, I just couldn't wait to be thirteen when I was officially declared a 'teenager'.

At 13, I wanted to be 15 right away so I could attend discos or 'mix' parties. I was popular then, and I got invited to many of the soirees, but not without a chaperone, which was either a yaya or a sibling. Turning 16 was cool, because I could then watch movies that had a 'for adults only' sign, which meant I was an adult. Moreover, I was able to get a student driver's license, even if I wasn't driving, much less have a car. At 18, I went on dates unchaperoned mainly because I was already dating Mike, and he was a familiar face in our household.

At 21, I got my license to drink in bars which really didn't matter because I was already drinking anyway. A few months later, I got married and had my first child, Wiggy...After that, I started counting all my children's birthdays as well, and got.....

The nice thing about marriage is, its a partnership where one remembers a birthday while the other one forgets. In my case, I already stopped having birthdays at 32...and Mike keeps remembering it for the past 18 years. If I'd have a debut, this is it. Am at the age, where there is so much selective memory. I often catch myself in these scenarios....

"Where the heck are my glasses?"
"It's on your head, mom!"
"Where's that sanamagan ballpen I was just using?"
"It's behind your ears, mom!"
"Okay, now where are those keys?????"
"It's on your hands, mom, you're holding it!!"

And with all these answers, I get embarrassed and the only thing that comes out is an "OH"!!

If that's not bad enough, how about meeting a friend at a mall, and you both shriek with glee. She remembers your name, but you can't hers. What do you do? Try to recall--pudgy nose, pimples like potholes, and a body to die for--then your brain goes--downloading....downloading..downloading....and..ERROR!..then you try to upload an image of betrayal, ..a sexy body, boys...aha!..Nadia!!!your classmate that stole your best friend's boyfriend...but that was years ago, and both of you start to reminisce ....

Ohhh! if only our brains had those microchips, that can store data and then retrieve it when needed. As a matter of fact, I am believing that I have such an implant. Every night when my hubby tries to touch my keys for his rations, I turn to him and say, "access denied, access denied". But then, he eventually gets the password correctly: a diamond ring, a new camera, dinner at an expensive resto...then it's "password approved". Or how about those request your children make.

"mom, can i have a car?"...and you say, "deleted"
"mom, can i go to so and so's place? "...and you say, "with attachments!"
"mom, can i have money?..and you say, "virus, warning, virus in your wallet"
"mom, are you okay?"...and you say, 'system failure'.....and the diagnosis--"menopause, menopause,...reboot!

To be asked what a person would be 20 years from now, is easier to answer for a person in his teens than that of a golden ager. The former would have outlined his goals and dreams, because of his youth. But the latter, whose physique has taken its toll, would reminisce on the things he should have done. Such were my thoughts a couple of days ago.

As I ponder and think about my life, I am thankful to God for allowing me the joy of living, the ability to stand up inspite of the many wrong decisions I made, and for giving me what I really needed: supportive family, loving friends and my health. That's just what really matters.
In time, the health will wean and the physique will give its way. Friends will soon be gone - as the saying goes, "my parents told me to respect the elders, but I've reach that age when there are very few of them."...and my family --well they will move on and have their own families.....

Coming to America was an eye opener for me in terms of the elderly. Here, families are too busy to care for their own, and that they are left to many Filipino caregivers. It is so sad, and I thank God that in our society, we do take care of our own elders , regardless...it is our culture, and Thank God I'm Filipino!!! But then again, my children are opting to move to different shores, and so am wondering again...and pray...will they still be living the Filipino culture?...That made me think..I should start being doubly nice to them because they will chose my nursing home...

But then again, I thought to myself, what if I lose my mind to the Big "A". That's the 'in' thing with the elderly isn't it? Tears just started rolling because then the 'what ifs' of not remembering friends, or recognizing my own children or even forgetting how to chew came creeping in. I started to feel depressed, but just as I was sliding into it, i snapped out of it realizing that negativity just won't help.

Life is what you make of it. And I have resolved in my coming years, that I will take each step as they come with a teaspoon of sugar, and not a grain of salt (kay it's ASIN), and not to sweat the small stuff. I will look at every adversity with a smile, and remind myself that it is temporary. I will keep a positive attitude and stay away from people with long faces (read the "Law of Attraction"--and long faces aren't attractive)...and even if I do become mentally lost , I pray that I will never loose that sense of humor......and so at this point ARe you sure, it's my birthday? or was it 9 months before, when my parents had sex? hmmmmm....

Itlog, Manoy , Orange!

If you are Cebuano, you would definitely know what "itlog, Manoy, Orange!" means. This phrase is so commonly heard from food vendors. When riding a bus to the province, there are necessary stopovers which will often have the food hawkers advertise their wares simultaneously shoving them into your faces.

For those with confused conjugations, or have a muddled mind, it is presumed that a person's yard balls are a reddish yellow. (Probably from hours of tight sitting--you know how buses can be so crowded during the holidays).

So now why am I talking about eggs and orange. It's because Easter is a time for eggs..and lots and lots of it...First of all, what's with hiding them, and then letting little children look for it? Second, what's coloring the eggs got to do with it? And third, don't they know that eggs cost so much nowadays, don't they think of those poor chickens that have to push their embryos out so humans can have fun? What's with you people??! Oh yes, and do you really end up eating those eggs you find after it has been crushed and probably peed on by dogs.....Eating all those eggs you find will cause a GAS-tronishing catastrophe which equals that of eating the musical fruit....(pinch nose)...pheeew!

Okay, so before I get carried away, here's my Easter contribution for the day...




breakfast fare for my grandchildren....and the title of my article.
(check out the hair--groovy fried quail's egg)

Finally, there is this argument about which came first, the bird or the egg?
My take on this is that they came together when creation was made--they came
in between Adam's legs!!!!
Now my question is, was Adam Cuacasian or Asian!




unsa man dong! Itlog Manoy Orange?

Ataya oy! (a cebuano expression)

Ataya oy! is many a cebuano expression when translated literally would mean "livered up". But what does it really mean? Atay is Liver in the Visayan dialect, and so a person using the phrase might just have had a moment of exhilirating experience...or something.

As a young child, we never had any liver food, except liver spread on toast. Since we were not tagalogs, we had menudo sans the liver. But after I got married, my mother in law made the best liver and onions. After that I grew more adventurous.

I am anemic, so when I was pregnant, I had to eat liver as source of iron. Then I finally had liver in menudo...then when I had drinking friends, they had paklay...then of course, there was dinuguan which I ate only when everyone was eating it too..(but now I prefer to make my own, or my daughter in law's or issa's)..Then there is the grilled chicken livers or wrapped in bacon then baked or slow cooked.

Today, I passed by the deli, and bought a pound of chicken liver which I made into three appetizers/tapas. But before I show you my creations and their recipes let me tell you a short story about three brothers to go with my three tapas.

Here's the story:

There were three Cebuano brothers who were so close with each other. Even as they grew up, had jobs and got married, they needed to bond. So every Friday afternoon after work, they would meet at a bar and would have a few drinks before spending the weekend with their respective families.

The bartender and the locals would always expect them. However, things changed and two brothers were relocated to other cities. One brother was assigned in Manila while the other was signed in Mindanao. The three brothers, because of their commitment, promised to continue the habit of drinking every weekend as a reminder of their closeness and brotherhood.

Every weekend, the lone Cebuano brother would go to the bar, order three drinks and after consuming it, would then leave. Many months later, as he came into the bar, he ordered two drinks. The locals were surprised and thought something happened. Everyone at the bar approached the Cebuano and offered their condolences.

Local: Bai, sorry about your loss.

Bisaya: Ngano man bai? (WHY?)

Local: You ordered ony 2 drinks so we pressumed one of your brothers died.

Bisaya: Oh! No! Both my brothers are still alive and I'm still continuing our promise. I am drinking for both of them...Di naman ko mo-inom,Bai...Kay BORN AGAIN naman ko! (I'don't drink anymore because I'm born again) ...

Local 1: GI ATAY NIMO OY!!

Local 2: ATAY MAN KA OY!

Local 3: ATOTS PUD!

Okay, so here's my three chicken liver tapas


#1 Chicken Liver terrine
(cut up chicken livers sauted in butter with onions and garlic with seasonings plus madiera wine. Pureed and placed in a dish, then cooled to form) serve with crackers or in this picture..wheat thins.






#2 Chicken Liver in Skewers
(marinaded the chicken livers on ginger, garlic, soy sauce, seasonings and drops of red sherry wine. Wrapped in home made roasted pepper, skewered, then broiled)














#3 Sauted chicken livers
(sauted in olive oil, with garlic, onions until brown but still pinkish inside. Transferred to bowl then remaining onions deglazed with wine and poured over livers)




After the shoot, Mike and I ate my creations with the pairing of a drink...vodka, tomato juice, lots of ice and a celery garnish...which by the way, is excuse number 7 which my friend, issa and I placed in our book entitled: "1,000 ways to refrain from sex without saying NO!".....BLOODY MARY!





ATAYA OY!