Philippines Day 6: Family party

December 27, 2014 - family party in the garden

The new gazebo in the garden

One of the big events during our trip was our family party. We have a section of land near our family compound that's simply known as "the garden" or, sometimes more formally, as "Nanay's Garden", referring to my grandmother. A neighbor's house stands between our family compound and the garden so it's literally just a few steps away from our house. One section holds my uncle's furniture making shop, another section is a barbecue pit where they roast overflow lechons during peak season. The rest of the garden used to be a large piece of land that was basically where anything could grow, did. Today various tropical trees abound, including banana trees and apple mango hybrids.

Recently, my dad had it cleared and a cement gazebo structure was erected. Open air with a large, high, peaked roof and a cement floor, it’s an ideal place to host parties and other social gatherings. Which is what we did for our family party. It was part family, part family friends, part former high school kids from my dad’s old high school. He does a lot to support his old school, does fundraising for scholarships for the kids, to buy computer equipment, supplies and so on and he keeps in touch with many of the former students, including inviting some of them to the gathering.

Ready to hold the lechon

Flower centerpiece for each table

The party was scheduled to be a luncheon at noon so that morning, we (me, my sister, my nieces, my mom and dad and a few cousins and helpers from the compound) gathered to help set up. We had rented tables, chairs, seat covers and tablecloths from a local business; they dropped them off and we set them up. My mom had brought some Christmas-themed decorations and my nieces showed a flair for the artsy in setting them up. My sister commissioned our temporary maid to seek out flower centerpieces for each of the tables and she came up with great ones that provided a nice splash of color against each white tablecloth.

Another one of my cousins, Ate Susan (“Ate” – pronounced “ah-teh” - is a term of respect for an older sister or an older female cousin), who’s known as one of the good cooks in the family, did the heavy lifting of doing most of the cooking for the party. We were expecting around 70 people and in Filipino culture, that means you make enough food for at least 100. Remember, be generous with food and food will be generous with you. 

Balut (duck eggs)

Pancit Malabon

Another shot of the Pancit Malabon

My dad bought the biggest lechon available (it helps to have connections in the family business) and Ate Susan made Manok sa Pina (Chicken in Pineapple), lumpiang sariwa (the vegetable filling for fresh veggie lumpia, not to be confused with fried lumpia filled with pork), Beef Mercado (beef stew in a tomato-based sauce), Pancit Malabon (my favorite Filipino noodle dish) and another beef dish. Our family friend, Beckang, made batchoy. Uh, that would be classified as “deep Filipino food”, not quite for my Americanized taste buds even if I wasn’t such a picky eater. But everyone else loved it. We also had balut or duck eggs, something our hometown of Pateros is famous for. Desserts were leche flan, also courtesy of Ate Susan as that’s her specialty and a side business for her and her son (Swannie’s Jars) and Buko Pandan, a traditional Filipino dessert made of young coconut or "buko" and pandan leaves. Plus rice. Must always have rice at a Filipino luncheon.

Manok sa Pina (Chicken in Pineapple)

Batchoy

Vegetable filling normally for Vegetable Lumpia

Leche Flan

Buko Pandan

The family theme was red and white. Per my sister’s instructions for picture-taking purposes, the girls wore red and the males wore white. Or some semblance of it. When you have as many family members as we do, 80-90% compliance is pretty good. At our major family reunions, we always try to take group pictures. It’s something to document and cherish as the years go by, children grow up, other family members pass, and the rest of us just….grow older.

All in all, a fun day with the family. The gazebo proved to be a boon and a great way to christen the launch of a new branch of the family business – providing a location for others to hire for their parties and events.

Just a fraction of our family

Pure Gold (grocery store)

Pure Gold grocery store - visited December 26, 2014, Pasig, Philippines

The walkalator

For those of you who’ve never been to the Philippines, it might seem odd for me to blog about a grocery store but, as someone who likes all things food, I also like to get a picture of what all things food in other countries are like, even something as mundane as the grocery store. 

Perhaps your mental picture of the Philippines only includes roadside fruit stands and crude structures selling street food or small “sari-sari” stores that are like little condensed, limited 7-11s where you can buy rice, canned goods, and soap plus the odd pack of toothpaste and bananas.

If so, then welcome to Pure Gold grocery store. The one we went to was housed in a large, two-story building with a covered parking garage on the first floor and a “lobby” where you enter past the security guard (who gives a cursory glance through your purse like they do at Disneyland) and take the “walkalator” up to the second floor which is the main floor of the grocery store. A walkalator is just like an escalator but without the steps or a people mover such as the ones at an airport except it slants upwards instead of being horizontal. Perfect for anyone in a wheelchair.

Pure Gold is more than a grocery store. It’s probably more like a variety store such as a Woolworth’s in its American heyday. It’s a combination food court, separate pharmacy counter, has a Red Ribbon Bakery stand, and besides groceries, sells appliances and housewares.  

I poked around the different aisles, interested in seeing the wares on offer. As is typical in the Philippines, there are a lot of familiar American products available: Spam, Cheetos, Oreos, Betty Crocker cake mixes, Hershey candy bars and so on. As is also typical, the American-born products are more expensive while the local brands are cheaper. I did some quick comparison pricing and a can of Spam was in the $3-$4 range, not unlike full price in the States, depending on where you buy it and definitely more expensive than when I buy it on sale in bulk at Costco. But that’s actually not a fair comparison because many Filipino jobs don’t pay as much as even the US minimum wage. What a $10 an hour worker would earn at In N Out might be what a worker in the Philippines would make in a day. If they’re lucky. So for them to buy a can of Spam could conceivably eat up a day’s wages. 1 can. Fortunately there are cheaper food options for people in the Philippines but that might give you an idea of why a can of Spam might be considered a luxury or a treat in some families. Everything’s relative. And speaking of Spam, I was actually fascinated to discover it came in different flavors. I’m not a big Spam eater myself but even I was intrigued by Spam Tocino. I love tocino, a marinated Filipino pork dish. I didn’t buy it then but afterwards, I asked my mom to bring back a can so I could try it.

I also had a moment of nostalgia when I saw the end cap display of Milo. Milo is the local chocolate powder drink mix. My grandmother used to have a cup of Milo every day and my earliest memories were of her drinking it. She loved Milo.

Checking out is similar to any American grocery store. The main difference is they still have baggers who bag your purchases. Freezer items are rung up and placed together in the same bag and box so they can remain chilled together for longer until you can get them into the freezer at home, very important in a tropical country. All purchases are boxed in cardboard boxes, similar to Costco who re-uses the shipping boxes their foodstuffs came in, and tied with strong “straw” twine. When you leave the grocery store, you show your receipt to the guard on your way out, also a la Costco albeit there isn’t a Costco in the country.

It was a fun experience to shop in the local grocery store and actually something I try to do no matter which country I visit. You can always find local foodstuffs to try that you can’t get at home. My nieces got the spicy shrimp chips and I bought Nagaraya cracker peanuts, a favorite from childhood. I’m sure both are available in Asian grocery stores in the US (and probably the Spam Tocino too) but there’s something more special about buying it truly local.

Philippines Day 5 - cemetery visit then Aura Mall

December 26, 2014 - Day 5: A Funeral and a Mall

The most somber note of our trip to the Philippines was the funeral of a childhood friend. She died of cancer a few days before we arrived and lay in state for a week as her 3 kids wanted to “spend one last Christmas" with her. Her funeral was the day after Christmas. Funerals are very expensive and in the Philippines, everyone chips in and gives the family money to help with the funeral expenses. Some also bring flowers but almost everyone gives money. It’s community giving and grieving even if you didn’t know the deceased that well but know someone in his or her family.

The flowers we bought for my grandmother's grave (left)

The funeral was at the same place as where some of my relatives are buried, notably my grandmother who I miss to this day. She was such a forceful presence in our lives and her influences lives on. My sister and I bought some flowers to put at her grave. You might notice the second name on her gravestone and that’s actually one of my cousins, one of her grandchildren. It’s common for two names to be on a gravestone and two burials to be at the same site. Burial plots are very expensive and land is limited so often two people occupy the same plot. When the first person dies, they dig the grave deeper to place the first coffin in. When the second person dies, the ground is dug up again and the second coffin is placed atop the right one and covered.

This one was a bit odd as my grandmother was joined by my cousin who died 5 years after she did. I had expected her to be placed where my paternal grandfather, her husband, was but we couldn’t find his gravestone when we visited. In investigating this later, we learned that when my grandfather died many years ago, this particular cemetery, Garden of Memories, hadn't opened yet and so my grandfather is buried in the old town cemetery. Now we're aiming to have the tombstone re-done to place my grandparents' names together and for my cousin to get his own.

Christmas display inside Aura Mall

After the funeral and after we had paid our respects to the family, we went to the mall with my cousin Abby. It was our first foray into souvenir shopping and Abby took us to Aura Mall and Kultura, a store that specialized in Philippine-made products. You know how big I am about buying local. When I’m in the US, it’s made in the USA. When I’m in the Philippines, it’s made in the Philippines. As with anywhere else, there are plenty of goods made from other Third World countries with cheap labor but as I told Abby, I can buy made in China back in the States and I wanted goods made in the Philippines. Hence our visit to Kultura (or “culture” in the English translation). Kultura ran the gamut from jewelry to Christmas ornaments to placemats, wallets, handbags, t-shirts and kitchy souvenirs. Yes, I paid more than if I bought elsewhere but they were all locally made and that was worth it to me.

Aura is like any other mall in the States with some stores unique to the Philippines like Shoe Mart (the equivalent of Macy’s, Target and a little Kohls thrown in, despite the name, they sell far more than shoes) and other stores just as in the US like Forever 21, Abercrombie and Uniqlo. My nieces, both big Forever 21 shoppers, checked out the one at Aura and discovered the prices were actually better back home, even with the peso to dollar conversion rate. Go figure. We also found "Bay Max" from Big Hero 6. No idea who he is but my nieces knew. Good enough.

Filipino food at the Aura Mall food court

Filipino humor

Tapsilog: Tapa (beef) and itlog (egg) over fried rice

Also like any other mall, there was a food court and we stopped to have "merienda" or an afternoon snack. Merienda in the Philippines isn't a snack like a pretzel or a frozen yogurt. It's more like a meal. The food court held an assortment of various cuisines, mostly Asian. There was dim sum, Filipino food, Japanese food and some more Western cuisines.

Also, similar to back home, I found a cupcake shop. I know, I must have a magnet on me somewhere. This one was called A Royal Touch and like many cupcakeries, sold individual cupcakes that were decorated and had fancy flavors. The only odd thing is they only sold the cupcakes in packs of 3 or 6. I needed 3 so I didn’t question it that closely. I bought each of Abby’s 2 sons a cupcake based on their flavor preferences (vanilla for the younger one and caramel for the older one) plus chocolate for me to share with my nieces. The decorations were quite cute, especially the snowman with the penguin eyes on mine. The cupcake itself was just okay though. The chocolate flavor of the cupcake could’ve been more pronounced; it wasn’t dry but it wasn’t as moist as I would’ve liked. The frosting was quite good though, rich and creamy. Since I normally don’t like a lot of frosting, you know when I say it’s good, it’s good. The prices for the cupcakes ranged from 80 to 95 pesos, depending on the flavor and decoration, I suppose. So it’s somewhat on par with the $3-$4 range in the States; by Philippine standards, it’s more pricey than other baked goods so it would definitely be considered a luxury. Remember that Puto Bungbong was only 35 pesos and that was for a greater quantity than a single cupcake.

Puto Bungbong

Puto Bungbong - recipe from Filipino Foods Recipes

There are many varieties of "puto" or steamed rice cake. I've already touched on the Puto Binan of my mom's hometown, I've posted a recipe for puto on my blog and today's post is about Puto Bungbong. Many Filipinos associate Christmas time with Puto Bungbong (or Bumbong), similar to how fruitcake and eggnog make an appearance in an American Christmas.

On our first day in the Philippines, as we walked the streets of my original hometown with my cousin Abby, we saw Puto Bungbong being made by a street vendor.

She had a steamer and an inverted funnel to her left and to her right was a basin full of purple dough nestled in purple flour. At the top of the funnel was a cylinder into which she would place a portion of dough, insert it over the top of the funnel and within seconds, pound out the purple cylinder shape of Puto Bungbong. Supposedly it got its name by the sound the cylinder,  typically a bamboo tube, makes when the puto is pounded out of the tube "bunggg! bonggg!" like a tap-tap. Or so they say.

The hot, fresh Puto Bumbong is wrapped in banana leaves and sold along with grated fresh coconut and brown sugar. This vendor was selling several pieces for 35 pesos or the equivalent of $.67 USD.

Genuine/traditional Puto Bumbong is made with a special kind of glutinous rice that has a distinct purple color, as evidenced by the final product. That's not food coloring that makes that beautiful purple color, at least not in authentic Puto Bungbong.

I don't know if that purple rice flour is available in the States so I've included a recipe below that calls for the food coloring as it uses a more readily available rice that can be found in Asian grocery stores. Please note that I haven't tried this recipe myself as I'm actually not a big consumer of puto bungbong. I don't mind the chewy texture and the flavor is okay but I prefer other types of puto. You can also view youtube videos of how to make puto bumbong.

Nevertheless, I'm including this as part of my travelogue as it's very traditional Filipino Christmas time fare. And I like the color. My parents bought some for my nieces to try and they enjoyed it. They have a much more adventurous palate than I do and the (fortunate) ability to enjoy a wide variety of foods.

1 kg Malagkit/galapong (glutinous) rice, mixed with 125 grams ordinary rice
1/5 tsp. Lilac or violet food coloring
Pandan leaves
Salt
1 pc shredded mature coconut
Butter
Banana leaves
Water
Sugar

1. Soak pre-ground malagkit/galapong or glutinous rice and ordinary rice mixture in salted water with lilac/violet food coloring for 1-4 hours. Let dry overnight by putting inside a flour sack.
2. Put something heavy on top to squeeze out water. Mixture is ready for cooking the following morning.
3. Or to manually grind rice mix – Slowly grind using a stone grinder or manual grinder. Do not put too much water in while grinding. It will delay drying of milled ingredients. Too much water on the other hand will cause the mixture to be sticky. Put milled ingredients onto cotton cloth and tie corners of the cloth. Let drip. When the mixture is almost dried, press by using a heavy object to remove excess water. Let stand overnight.
4. Place pandan leaves in water to be steamed. Heat steamer (lansungan) with enough water.
5. Put a small amount of rice mixture inside bamboo tubes (bumbong) about 3/4 full. Steam for a few minutes. Serve warm with coconut and sugar.

Philippines Day 4: Christmas

Day 4: December 25, 2014 - Maligayang Pasko (Merry Christmas)

Christmas Eve with my cousins

If I was back in the States for Christmas, we would likely have had some extended family over for a big Christmas lunch or dinner, we’d have a tree, gifts, Christmas decorations and I’d bake a lot. In the Philippines, Christmas is a bit different. Many people had artificial trees but since we were there for a short while and we don’t live there year round, we didn’t have one nor did we decorate the house. Nor did we have a big present opening. We had given out most of our “presents” when we had arrived and unpacked our suitcases. Those presents being canned goods, dry packaged foods, clothes, some shoes, school supplies for the kids, make up for my female relatives, sponges, toothbrushes, toothpaste and other necessities. In a Third World country, you focus mostly on needs rather than wants although it’s always nice to toss in a few indulgences like makeup and nail polish.

My paternal grandmother: 1910 - 2004

It’s a Filipino tradition that kids go “na-ma-masko” meaning they go to adult relatives and friends to pay their respects and wish them a Merry Christmas and in return, they get money. Think of it like trick or treating but at Christmas instead of Halloween and you get money instead of candy. When I was growing up, only the kids did it but I’ve noticed in recent years that more and more adults have been doing it as well. Typically, they’re poorer and while most have jobs or make a living in some fashion, they still benefit a lot from the extra money given out at Christmas by those who can afford to do so. This might seem like a weird custom by Western standards but it’s a time-honored one in the Philippines and, similar to the giveaway done by Final Touch, is a way of “sharing blessings”. If you’re fortunate enough to be the one giving money away on Christmas, you’re considered very blessed. The amounts given out vary, depending on the person’s age (children get less than adults) and their relation or relationship to you (godchildren get more than non-godchildren, the local street sweeper and garbage pickup guy may get a little less than the guy you occasionally or regularly call on to drive you places), a poorer relative gets more than a less-poor relative, a close relation may get more than a more distant relation. It’s a judgment call every time.

Giving out candy bars to the pihit boys

Another Filipino tradition at Christmas is lechon. Lechon is whole roast pig and is my family’s main business for some of my relatives. My grandmother started the business when she was young and she built it into local fame that lives on today even though she passed away more than 10 years ago. Thanks to her hard work and entrepreneurial nature in running the lechon business, she raised, fed, clothed and educated 9 children even though she was widowed young, and having been orphaned at age 8, she only had a second grade education. Yes, she was amazing and a smart businesswoman even without a formal education. My cousins have kept up the business and during non-holiday season, they do about 35-40 lechons a week. On Christmas Day alone, they did 102. They also did more than their weekly average every day in the week leading up to Christmas and New Years. Just as in retail, they do more than 85-90% of their annual business over the holidays. People order it for large family gatherings, office parties, weddings, holiday lunches and dinners, baptisms and christening, reunions and other special occasions.

Some people might find it strange or off-putting to see a whole pig roasting over a pit but if you’re a meat-eater, it’s no different than buying a pristinely-wrapped package of pork chops at the supermarket. Actually, I would argue the pigs used for lechon are likely more humanely treated than those that end up as mass-produced pork products. In the Philippines, there aren’t massive pig farms run by giant corporations. Instead, there are small “piggeries” supplying pigs for lechon and every pig counts for poor farmers. If a pig is sickly or dies en route, my cousins won’t accept it or pay for it so they send it back, always bad news to a farmer relying on the sale of the pig for income. It’s in their best financial, if not humane, interests to treat the pigs well. When I make loans on Kiva, I like to extend loans to pig farmers, knowing they’re who supply pigs for lechon.

If you’re a vegetarian or vegan, I can understand not liking the whole scenario, regardless. But still, I can’t use my Western standards to judge. In a poor Third World country, most of its residents don’t have the luxury to forego eating meat or animal products when they’re eating for survival as to what’s cheapest and available to them.

Selling lechon by the kilo

In the Philippines, lechon is a cultural tradition and marks celebrations and special occasions. It’s a luxury food for most people as a whole lechon can be quite expensive. The price depends on the size of the lechon ordered. My relatives also offer lechon by the kilo for those who can’t afford a whole pig and they sell by the kilo on Sundays and special occasions. Any lechon that doesn’t sell is then made into “paksiw” or lechon stewed in a sauce. Nothing ever gets wasted as they cannot afford the luxury of waste.

Bags of rice to give away

As part of our own Christmas giveaway, my dad gave out bags of rice and some money to the "pihit boys" who staff the family lechon business. They're mostly grown men rather than boys but some of them have been with our family a long time, and a few were even raised by my grandmother back when they were little more than boys, orphaned or very, very poor and taken in by her, helping in the business to earn their keep. Some she even sent to school in the hopes that they would aspire to being more than a pihit boy. "Pihit" refers to the act of turning the roasting pig over the coals until they were cooked, usually for at least 2-3 hours, depending on the size of the pig. Pihit boys do more than that, as you need them to kill the pig, clean it inside and out, stuff it with banana leaves, spear it with the pole, keep the coal fire going, roast it, take it off the fire when it was done, wrap in banana leaves and cardboard, deliver it and chop it up for serving.  They have families to feed and for those with kids, we also gave them candy and crayons.

All in all, a different Christmas than how I usually spend the holiday but in many ways, much closer to the real meaning of Christmas as it was more focused on giving to others less fortunate and being conscious of my own blessings.

Philippines Day 3: A "Giveaway" Filipino-Style and Brazilian blowout on Christmas Eve

Day 3: December 24, 2014 - Final Touch Salon Giveaway and Brazilian blowout on Christmas Eve

Weeks before I arrived in the Philippines, I had arranged with one of my cousins to make an appointment to get my hair straightened. One of the awesome aspects of going to the Philippines is a lot of personal care services are so much cheaper than in the States. So of course I had to take advantage of it.

The giveaway bags full of groceries

My uncle's assistant, Lhita, made the appointment for me at a hair salon just a couple of blocks away from our house. My appointment was for 9 am when the shop opened so, being used to punctuality, Lhita, my sister and my niece who were going to get their hair cut, and I arrived a few minutes before 9. My stylist hadn't arrived yet and a call placed to him assured us he was "on his way". On his way translated into being almost an hour late. That is one aspect of Filipino habits I don't embrace. Tardiness has become one of my pet peeves as it shows such a lack of respect for one's time while the tardy person goes on their own schedule. But if there's anything I've learned in all my travels is that it's often best to leave your home-country preferences at home and to "go with the flow" on certain things. Punctuality being one of them when dealing with a more laidback culture.

Employees of Final Touch salon

Waiting actually worked out because it turns out that when we were there on Christmas Eve day, the salon, Final Touch, was doing a "giveaway". Giveaway doesn't have the American meaning of some kind of freebie of "buy one get one free" or sample sizes of a product promotion happening in a store. This giveaway was more akin to churches giving out bags of groceries to the needy except this was a local business doing the giving. My cousin Albert, who is a town councilor and often does charitable works for the poor, identified those in the area with the most need and each family was given a ticket. Final Touch Salon's owners (who turned out to be distant relations on my dad's side) spent their own personal money to buy rice, groceries and vitamins enough to fill 200 bags. Each family with a ticket could come to Final Touch on Christmas Eve and receive a bag of groceries. Final Touch's employees helped portion out all of the groceries into the bags the day before then they helped with passing out the bags on Christmas Eve when the salon opened.

The experience touched me on several different levels. For one, it was heartbreaking to see such need. People lined up long before the salon opened, clutching their tickets, despite the pouring rain at the time. Some brought extra family members in hopes of getting an extra bag and the salon owners had to politely but firmly explain it was only 1 ticket per family and 1 ticket per bag. Others had heard about the giveaway and shown up hopefully, young children in tow, and had to be regretfully turned away because they didn't have a ticket as the salon had to make sure they had enough bags for all of the tickets given out. Part of me almost felt despair at the overwhelming need, wondering how long a sack of groceries could sustain a large family. One day? Two? And that was for the lucky ones who were able to get a bag in the first place.

But as one of my aunts always tells me, "It may just be a drop in the bucket, but that's still better than an empty bucket." And that's something I always have to remember. Perfection is the enemy of progress. Just because you can't feed them all every day doesn't mean you shouldn't try to feed some for at least a day. Many of the people lined up had jobs but they still struggle to make ends meet and feed their families. A helping hand (or a full grocery bag) matters a lot in their struggles.

What struck me the most was the attitude of generosity. In the US, there's been a sentiment of considering many helping hand outreaches as "socialism" or villefying the poor as being "too lazy to work" and of "sponging off of the government". I've heard people talk about how hard they've worked for what they have and why shouldn't others do the same, how they themselves were never given any breaks so why should other people expect things to be just handed to them? In the Philippines, the sentiment is a little different. Because much of the country is so poor, there's more a sense of community and of helping each other during hard times. The salon's "giveaway" was regarded as not so much giving food but as giving "blessing". Meaning the owners and those fortunate to work there have much more than those lining up with their tickets and they were sharing those blessings with them. The sentiment has both cultural and religious roots, Biblical in giving to the poor and having it be returned unto you tenfold and cultural in that Filipinos don't believe in being stingy with food else food be stingy with you. Meaning you always should be generous with food and it's believed your generosity will manifest back to you as you will always have food in abundance.

It's an experience I won't forget anytime soon and I was actually glad Rey, my stylist, was late as the waiting time gave me a chance to watch Filipino generosity and sharing of blessings in action. And when Rey arrived, my hair straightening went underway. In the US, the procedure would be considered similar to a Brazilian blowout. In the Philippines, they call it "re-bonding". The process is similar - apply a cement solution to the hair, let set for a time, wash, blow dry and straighten every strand of hair with a flatiron (that part took the longest time as he was very meticulous about getting every strand), apply another solution and let it set, wash again, this time with a hot oil treatment, then a final blow dry. Result is my hair went from strongly wavy and freaking frizzy in tropical humidity to stick straight Asian hair I wasn't lucky enough to be born with but could at least buy for a time from the salon. Best part? At home, a Brazilian would cost me $250-$300 or more. In the Philippines - $50 plus tips for Rey and Jamie, the shampoo girl. Totally worth the trip.

Before and after pics of my Brazilian blowout

Despite the late start,  I was done in time to join my family to a trip to my aunt's house in Fort Bonifacio where she hosted us for Christmas Eve dinner. There were 14 of us but she made enough for 50 so it didn't look like we made much of a dent. It was a far cry from the scenes from that morning and forcibly reminded me just how blessed I am.