Yesterday morning, I cooked sopas for my team. Yes, the good, old sopas — macaroni pasta, soup, milk, chicken stock, chicken strips, carrot strips, cabbage, pepper, salt, onion, and garlic, plus a chicken cube flavoring. I boiled four (4) chicken breasts the night before and set them aside, thinking of preparing a creamy, chicken macaroni…
Category: Life and Inspiration
Ordinary Things, Extraordinary Stories (2)
When I went to Morocco in 2023 for a two-week scholarship program, I only carried one cabin-size and one medium-size luggage bags, plus two shoulder bags. Those were enough to carry my clothes, shoes, computer, and pasalubong for the program organizers and my fellow diplomat-trainees. As the days progressed, and we visited several areas, and…
Stories of People and Places
In 2025, I attended the the film festival “Know your North” in the National Museum of Anthropology. I watched film director Gab Malvar‘s documentary about the life and art of Amparo Balansi Mabanag, a GAMABA awardee. I am not writing an analysis of the documentary however (I don’t feel qualified yet to do that), except…
Perspective
Many years ago, an FX driver, whose vehicle I had the fortune or misfortune of riding to Morayta was very zealous about his religion. For about an hour, he kept saying it’s the truest religion and citing information, both theologically and historically. What made that instance interesting was the driver was not originally Filipino, but…
Tweet-tweet
It’s 6am on a Saturday. I wake up several minutes before the alarm I set. I can hear the birds outside, happily heralding the new day. I breathe a prayer, thanking God for the weekend, for this free day, and for feeling well and comfortable. I pray for my family, my friends, my work colleagues,…
The Palate Remembers
I had wanted to write this piece April, when the Filipino Food Month is celebrated. But due to the busy schedule, I only went as far as writing the title. So now, while I have time, and while I just finished an evening meeting and my mind is still very active and sleep is still…
Rivulet
It’s a mid afternoon on a Sunday. Rain’s falling. I close my eyes and I hear this ensemble of sounds all at once — the intermittent wind, the rustling of leaves, the pitter-patter on the roof, the plink on the wet pavement. It feels peaceful. I smile, full of gratitude for the weekend. I had…
To be a woman
It was Saturday night. I could hear inaudible conversations, some distant music, distant roar of car engines. The weekend vibe was in the air — light, carefree, unhurried. I had a free day and was not thinking of deadlines, at least not until Monday. But I was slumped on a gray rug in my restroom,…
Aphantasia
I was today years old when I learned that some people cannot see or access their mind’s eye, through a TED Talk by Alex Rosenthal, “Can you picture things in your mind? I can’t.” Oh my! I assumed that visualizing things was a natural ability that all people have. Imagining the rocket-ship that crash lands…
