25 Years in Australia

I wonder if MyGirl would bake us cupcakes when we reach 25 years in Australia.

(I know I have to improve the contrast in my photos but the kids wanted to eat the cupcakes already so I had to take the shot ASAP.)

Pub Visit

When I hear the term pub, I think of a dark, crowded place where drinks are served along with chips, nuts or other 'beer match' items. I imagine a stinky and smoky place filled with men. It would be located underground or at some dark alley. It would have a low ceiling and poor ventilation.

Don't ask me where I got this concept of a pub. All I know is that before today, I don't recall ever stepping into one .

Yes, I went to a pub today. I joined about a dozen officemates at lunchtime to celebrate someone's birthday. Agincourt Hotel could not be further from my concept of a pub. (The name of the establishment has the word 'hotel' in it. That in itself told me that I have got pubs all wrong.) Perhaps the true definition of a pub is a place where alcohol is served. I think all those San Miguel commercials back home made me equate beer houses to pubs.

The pub we went to was bright and spacious. It was clean and well-ventilated. It was located a couple of blocks from the office, not in some God-forsaken alley. The ceilings were high, nobody was smoking (I think it's illegal) and the place was filled with men and women alike. Best of all, they served lunch, not just drinks, and their food was great.

I had a rump steak with mashed potatoes and gravy. Others had porter house steak, steak sandwich, chicken schnitzel, roast chicken, Japanese salad, and the like. Some of them ordered beer or asuho. I just had a lemonade.

I arrived with three other members of our team so I was able to get an idea how the mechanics of such lunch outs would go. You order and pay at the counter before you sit down at your table. They will give you your ordered drink along with your change. Don't forget to bring the gadget with a number that they give you. Find a good table to occupy. It doesn't matter how near or far you are from the counter because the gadget will beep and light up when your food is ready. You bring your number to a window so you can claim your meal. Condiments, utensils and serviettes (napkins) are readily available nearby. Pick up what you need and you're good to go!

I thought their claim stub gadget was cool. The closest I've seen to that sort of restaurant gadget was the buzzer in UCC Cafe at the Paseo Center. Press the button and the waitress will visit your table. Of course here in Australia, since things are essentially self-service, you do the walking. Even if they did have staff going around collecting dirty dishes and wiping the tables clean, for everything else, it was each man for himself.

By and large it was a good first pub experience. Next time someone invites me to go to a pub, I won't hesitate to join them and I won't worry that I'll return smelling like Marlboro Country.

Love Affair

Love Affair is one of my all-time favourite movies. The title itself sends shivers down MacGyver's spine and the knowledge that I love that movie doesn't help one bit. He has tried to dampen my enthusiasm over the movie by pointing out to me that Warren Beatty has a reputation of having slept with over ten thousand women (12,775 to be more exact, give or take a couple, because who's counting?) And that is in spite the fact that he is married to the beautiful and talented Annette Bening in real life. Of course what Warren Beatty does in real life is irrelevant to the movie. So even if he slept with a hundred thousand women (good grief! ) I would still love the movie.

The appeal of the movie does not lie solely on the main characters' looks and popularity. It is a love story. And you know how much I love love stories, especially if they have happy endings. So how can you argue with that logic? (You can't. You just live with the fact that I love the movie.)

Love Affair is a remake of the Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr starrer An Affair to Remember. I think I watched An Affair to Remember a long time ago, way before Warren Beatty and Annette Bening played the roles of the couple that agreed to meet at the Empire State Building. I think I enjoyed that version. It was a good movie with a nice story. I liked it but I didn't love it.

So what makes Love Affair different? What makes it so special?

I must admit, aside from the fairytale story and the movie stars, it is the music.

Ennio Morricone is a genius. He adds a different dimension to the scenes of the movie. The music makes the movie more beautiful and more memorable.

Yes, yes, I am a romantic at heart.

LOVE AFFAIR: Movie Trailer - Watch more top selected videos about: Movie_Trailers, Love_Affair, Annette_Bening, Chloe_Webb, Katharine_Hepburn, Pierce_Brosnan, Warren_Beatty, Garry_Shandling, Glenn_Gordon_Caron

Sentimentale

MacGyver sent me this link. That was his gentle reminder that I should practice my flute. He said he'd play the keyboard part if I learned the part for the flute. (Please note the white hair on the pianist.)

Roundabouts

Roundabouts aka rotundas.

Back in the home country, traffic was always a challenge, if not a nightmare. Where three lanes were built, four lanes of vehicles could be found. There were such animals as rotundas however they were found in trickles and were generally of huge circumferences intersecting major roads. There would normally be a monument or a park inside the rotunda. We have the Welcome Rotunda and the Quezon Memorial Circle. It seemed that the presence of the rotunda was for the landmark rather than to aid the flow of traffic.

Here is Australia, one of the more common road features would be the roundabout or the rotary; in lay (Filipino) man's terms, a small rotunda. Roundabouts are found all over various intersections enabling traffic to flow orderly and smoothly without the need for stop lights. No, there are no statues or monuments within the rotunda, just a slightly raised circle to mark the area not intended for cars.

It is a very good idea, really. And as long as the drivers obey the traffic rules and regulations, there should be no problem.

Upon approaching a roundabout, the rule of thumb is that anyone inside the roundabout has first priority. Everybody travels in a clockwise manner and one should only enter the roundabout if there is no approaching vehicle from the right. (Remember that Australians drive on the left side of the road in right hand drive vehicles. So incoming traffic would normally come from the right.)

As long as everyone is aware of these rules and conventions , people give way to other vehicles and traffic flows smoothly. It is always clear which car has priority over the other.

Now it seems oh so simple in the roads of Australia but I honestly cannot imagine this working in Manila.

I think about the Quezon Memorial Circle where they have adopted the one-way flow of traffic. They removed the middle lanes and let everyone go in a counter-clockwise direction. If you happened to be coming out from Visayas Avenue and wanted to go to UP, you would have to go all the way around through North Avenue, Quezon Avenue, East Avenue, Kalayaan until you hit Philcoa. Perhaps the sheer size of the Circle and the volume of cars passing through Quezon Memorial are enough reasons for chaos to reign. It seems too far-fetched to compare the roundabouts here to the rotundas in the Philippines.

I can't recall if all the streets intersecting Quezon Memorial have stop lights to regulate the entry and exit of vehicles. I am sure there were lights at the major roads - Quezon Ave., East Ave., University Ave., Visayas Ave., but the minor roads seem to have been free for all. Here, even in biggish roundabouts, where they have plants in the middle, there are no stop lights and the roundabout rule applies. It is quite possible that you would wait a couple of minutes before your turn to enter the roundabout came but you can be certain that once you were in, you had priority.

I have come to love roundabouts. Roundabouts allow you to go wherever your want to go. You can go "straight", turn left, turn right, or as we have done several times because we had taken a wrong turn, you can go back where you came from.

They say that people often reach crossroads in their lives. I think I like roundabouts better. They are a tad friendlier and they give you the option to turn your life around. Of course, one has to remember to make a choice because staying in the roundabout will not get you anywhere.

Favoured Colour

I was hanging the clothes outside yesterday when I was struck by a simple question -- what is your favourite colour?

I had run a load of darks and so amidst the blacks and charcoal greys, I hung some dark blues and greens. Were any of these my favourite colour? I recall GI going through a black phase when ALL his t-shirts were black but I know for sure that black is NOT his favourite colour.

You might think that one's favourite colour would be reflected in the clothes they'd buy and choose to wear. I beg to disagree. Perhaps this would be true for the Paris Hiltons and Britney Spears of this world, for the Desperate Housewives or the Sex in the City ladies. However, for the regular office worker like me (with limited means and resources, and closet space), one has to mix and match. That beautiful blouse in red, orange or aqua will surely make heads turn. You would surely get a lot of compliments when you wear it the first time but mark my words, you would think twice before wearing it the second time. You would ask yourself when was the last time you wore that, who did you see at that time, and where did you go. But of course, there is little room for regret when it comes to buying clothes in your favourite colour, especially if wearing them gives you great joy. You will definitely find a reason or an occasion. In fact, even a simple urge would suffice. However, linking one's favourite colour to one's usual outfit is not a sure fire answer to the question at hand. When it comes too office attire, I think many people go for the classic black and white plus a sprinkling of grey. It works for me. It makes mornings a whole lot simpler and definitely less stressful. (Although I do have my share of brightly coloured clothes.)

What about clothes you wear on weekends? Would that reflect your favourite colour?

Let me see. On weekends or mufti days, as they call casual days in schools here, I would gravitate towards one of my baby pink or powder grey t-shirt. (Oh my goodness, I suddenly had a vision of me as a teenager in my pink Smurf t-shirt and my grey stretch jeans!) I could wear t-shirts in either of those colors week in and week out without thinking twice. Although I probably did just that (wear pink or grey t-shirts week in and week out) when I was a stay-at-home mom, I don't think pink nor grey is my favourite coulour.

So what is my favourite colour?

The room I shared with LondonEye was yellow. I wonder if yellow was once my favourite colour. If ever it was, that would have been ages before Cory Aquino made yellow a political color.

No, I don't think yellow is or was my favourite colour.

Possibly at one point in time, I liked the colour orange but not to the extent of it being my favorite colour. If there is a relative of orange that I would favour more than others, it would be the colour of sunrise or sunset. I love looking at the skies at dawn and at twilight. I don't think I would ever tire of watching the sun and the skies at those times of the day. (Especially if I were watching it while lying on a sandy beach.)

I have an affinity to certain shades of green. I bought a batch of beautiful emerald green crystals from Divisoria and made myself a bracelet. I have a pair of emerald green earrings which I would wear if I were not wearing my diamond studs. I set the font colour of my Outlook message replies to green at the office and I have green ink in my calligraphy pen. (Special thanks to Sunshine for getting me that bottle of ink.) I think green was once my favourite colour but because green is not really a "girl colour," somewhere along the line I managed to convince myself that it was not appropriate for me to choose that as my favourite.

Again, I ask myself -- what IS your favourite colour?

Sometimes I wish I could give a quick answer like red or blue or pink but I know that wouldn't be an honest answer coming from me.

A political answer would be "I love them all equally," as if I were being asked which of my children I consider my favourite child. However, that wouldn't be the truth either.

I have decided that it is possible to exist and not have a favourite colour. It isn't a crime not to have one, is it?

In spite the indecision about MY favourite colour, I have found that the whole exercise in not in vain. I managed to gather the favourite colours of MacGyver and the kids. MacGyver likes dark green, GI likes purple, RD likes aqua, MyGirl likes pink and purple. It is good to have this information as part of stock knowledge. You never know when it will come in handy.

(Now that I know that, I can't say green anymore because that would be copying MacGyver's answer. Needless to say, I am quite ashamed to admit that I have been married to him for seventeen years without knowing that green was his favourite colour. My only consolation is that we could live to be married for over forty more years and he still wouldn't be able to tell anyone what my favourite colour is.)

If I were pressed to give an answer, I still wouldn't know what to say. I love wearing pink; it makes me happy. I love the colour green; it is close to my heart. I love red orange especially when it is painted across the sky. But most of all, I love the colours that are made when light passes through a crystal. (Does a rainbow prism count as a colour?)

This whole dissertation and yet still no favourite colour.

How about you? What is YOUR favourite colour?

I Will

Who knows how long I've loved you
You know I love you still
Will I wait a lonely lifetime
If you want me to, I will.

For if I ever saw you
I didn't catch your name
But it never really mattered
I will always feel the same.

Love you forever and forever
Love you with all my heart
Love you whenever we're together
Love you when we're apart.

And when at last I find you
Your song will fill the air
Sing it loud so I can hear you
Make it easy to be near you
For the things you do endear you to me
Oh, you know, I will
I will.

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to all the mothers out there.

This is one of my favorite pictures of our Lady -- Madonna of the Streets. I have a poster like this in my room at Cebu Avenue.

The Shack

A kidnapped daughter is presumed dead. Her father is overwhelmed with grief and anger. When a letter apparently from God invites him to the scene of the crime, Mack can't help but go and what he finds there changes him forever!

I got this book for my birthday. My first cousin sent it off from the UK. It is a wonderful book and I hope you get to read it. There is a website (www.theshackbook.com) where you can read more about it, but I strongly recommend that you go and get a copy for yourself.

Big thanks, R! I love the book.

Birthday Evening

For my birthday, we just stayed home. After dinner, MacGyver moved the two black chairs in the living room to make space then he spread out the sleeping bags on the floor. Then the children gave me a mini-concert. MyGirl and RD played a couple of pieces for me on the keyboard, after which, GI played the guitar. Then we brought out a bag of chips, turned off the lights and watched a movie.

It was a good day.