ZEN Bitchin'

In past dinners at the house, V and I had been including pesto in the menu. Sometimes we serve it with pasta, sometimes we spread it on sliced baguette as a base for bruschetta, or sometimes as dressing in salads. Said pesto has always been received warmly by my friends. Some even ask for some to-go pesto after the dinner. I’m happy to comply with these requests. One friend pointed out that people would be willing to pay for this pesto.

Really, I wondered, and put the thought in the back of my mind. One day a couple of weeks ago, feeling bogged down by my ennui, I called V and told him let’s make some pesto and try to sell it.

V, W, and I went to the market and bought local basil, garlic, and glass jars. We then went to the grocery to get olive oil, parmesan cheese, pine nuts and another type of basil (more purplish in color than the local) that we use in combination with the local basil. I also inspected the bottle sizes and prices of the bottled pesto in the supermarket. The bulk of the work was picking the leaves from the stems; I had stained on my fingers and nails afterwards. The next steps were fairly simple.

The first production yielded 8 bottles of pesto, with some to spare. I portioned the excess into small packets and distributed these among people we know for tasting. We sold the lot in 4 days. Motivated by the ’success’ of the first venture, we made a second batch last week. V and I bought a food weighing scale to standardize the recipe (for consistency). The second batch yielded 8 300 gram-bottles of pesto. We sell these for $6.50 a bottle. This is cheaper than the bottled Barilla Pesto in the supermarket, which is being sold at $4.60 per 180 gram-bottle.

pesto-ng-ina-mo!

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Turning Japanese – Sprung Monkey

On Sunday I woke up at around 9AM. The flat was silent, as Danika has left for work. After a breakfast of Milo and peanut butter sandwich, I went out. It was looking to be another sunny day, as opposed to the almost daily dose of rain in Kuala Lumpur. And since I was able to do a lot the previous day, my schedule for my second day in Singapore was pretty flexible. I only had 2 appointments, a lunch with J and an evening concert with Danika. In between, I thought I could do some shopping–actual or window, that is.

So I headed to Paragon. The first shop I went to was Muji, the Japanese ‘non-brand’ shop. I love all things Japanese. I am all for the aesthetics of Japanese design, whether it is architecture, interior, landscape, and fashion. I first heard of Muji from fellow blogger fuchsiaboy, who fears that he’s turning me into another brand-whore (no worries, there, D–I’ve been one even before we met–hahaha!). On the flight from Phnom Penh to KL, Muji was featured in the inflight magazine. Serendipity? Why not!

The shop was all that I imagined it to be, if not more. I was almost salivating from the stuff that they had. The clothes weren’t for me, though, because they don’t make it big as, say, Marks & Spencer. But the other stuff were so cool, I wanted to buy them all. Alas, I had to content myself with purchasing a few items; I was watching the weight of my luggage, the rest of which I left in KL. To show my appreciation to fuchsiaboy, I got him a couple of small items that he can use in his design work.

J

As we waited for our food (burger for him, baked fish for me), we found ourselves talking like old friends. In spite of our 11-year difference, I felt we had many things to talk about because (a) he is mature for his age, or (b) I am immature for my age. Kidding! Both of us are male nurses (Focker alert) who do volunteer AIDS work. Enough said, eh?

After a nice meal and chat, J and I went to Kinokuniya where he introduced me to ‘Fables’, a graphic novel series that puts a new twist on fairy tale characters. Then he had to go to meet his family for their regular Sunday family meets. I had an hour and a half to spare so I went back to shopping. I found a nice throw-everything-but-the-kitchen-sink bag on sale at Takashimaya, plus a shirt and chinos at Marks & Spencer.

I returned to Danika’s flat at around 5PM, because we were to have dinner first before the concert of the Japan Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra at the Esplanade. By 5.30PM we were off, dressed in our theatre-going outfits. Actually I was hopelessly underdressed: I just wore a checkered shirt and jeans. We had dinner at 7,107 Flavours, a posh-looking Filipino restaurant. I love their logo. And their Kinilaw na Tanigue was wonderful too; it reminded me of the kinilaw I used to enjoy in Mindanao.

7,107 Flavours logo

The Esplanade

After dinner, we crossed over to the Esplanade Theatre to watch the concert. The Singaporean pianist, who was in the first half of the show, was adequate–I’d seen better Filipino pianists, to be blunt. But he was quite good. The music in the first half wasn’t that impressive for me. But the orchestra and the conductor were really good. I liked the music after the intermission better. By 10PM Danika and I were back home. I packed my bags for my bus trip to KL the next morning. I slept at around midnight.

I was up at 6AM, and left Danika’s house at 7AM to head to the bus station, located at the Harbour Front Centre, which was about 20 minutes away from Danika’s flat. Danika was getting ready to go to work when I left.

Because it was a day trip, the bus went on a 10-minute break at a rest stop. Nice, clean rest stop. With at least 2 mobile stores selling refreshments and snacks. By 1PM I was back in KL. I took a taxi to Prince Hotel, where my luggage was, before I went to Number 8 Guesthouse. But the darn cabbie was asking me a flat rate of RM15 for the trip. Malaysian cabbies are nasty, especially when compared to their Singaporean counterparts.

The Rest-stop

I was at Number 8 by 2PM. I stayed here last in 2006 and I was impressed. I guess it was unrealistic for me to expect it would remain the way it was. It has deteriorated so much that I regretted my decision to stay here. I should’ve just stayed at Prince Hotel. After a good massage, I went out to meet Abdul at Pavilion. Our appointment was at 6PM so I had more time to stroll. We walked further to KLCC, where we had dinner at Madame Kwan’s, which purportedly served an excellent Nasi Lemak. Abdul wasn’t impressed, though. I, however, liked my Nasi Bojari. For dessert we went back to Pavilion, which was closer to where we were checked in. We had dessert at MOF, a Japanese sweet shop, where we unknowingly got an overdose of red bean paste. It was nice, nonetheless.

I was very happy to see Abdul. I missed seeing him when I was in Singapore last year and this year. Good thing he went to KL. The next rainy morning I was off to the airport at 8AM. However, when I got there, I wasn’t able to check in right away because of a glitch in the airport’s computer system. They couldn’t print boarding passes and the ground crew were finding it very hard to write on the passes long-hand. The consequence of technology.

When it was time for me to check in, the glitch was repaired. At the gate, a phallanx of black-clad bodyguards sent the Khmer who were waiting to board in a kind of flurry. They were bowing to a short, stately old man whose eyes disappeared when he smiled. I didn’t think about him anymore until we landed in Phnom Penh. We stopped far from a tube but the plane doors were opened. Through the window I saw that a red carpet was unfurled and down went the old man, followed by his entourage, welcomed by many people below, along with a military escort.

In exchange for the inconvenience of descending a plane under the noon-time heat, I got to do that on a red carpet. Too bad I didn’t take a photo in time. By 1.30PM I was back in the quiet of my home. Tired. But relaxed, recharged, and rejuvenated (not to mention nearly broke–hahaha!) from this trip.

If Love Is Blind – Tiffany

I went to India a couple of weeks ago to join a training for trainers on sexuality and development issues. We were billeted in a condominium-type hotel that consisted of 2-bedroom flats, so between 2-4 people shared one flat, which had its own living and dining rooms and kitchen. We had no use for the kitchen, though, other than to make tea or drink water because all our meals were served at the hotel restaurant.

My flat-mate was an Indian guy who worked for a huge volunteer organization. He works with the disabled (or to be PC: differently-abled). He is also blind. When I first realized this, I thought, ‘Oh, my God, I have to help him around and I’m going to hell if I don’t!’ Well, the bit about hell is probably an exaggeration–as I am wont to do sometimes–but you get my drift, right?

In a nutshell, I didn’t know how to act around him. My first instinct (or reflex or whatever) was to at least try to help him in every bit but another part of me told me not to so as not to offend him. He seemed mostly self-reliant and independent, anyway. I tried my best to act naturally around him, which for me meant that I let him be. This, however, made me a bit uncomfortable. It’s not that the other people in the training were more attentive to him; it was a kind of guilt, akin to survivor’s guilt–now that I’ve thought about it longer.

I wanted to do more for him, but I knew I could do enough. As the days wore on, however, as I got to know him better (as much as the few days allowed, anyway), I was able to cope with the (as it turned out) unfounded guilt that I was feeling. Realizing that we have a common friend in Bangladesh, we were able to chat about things that are not work-related. As I said, he was very reliant and independent. His computer even has a program that reads documents. However, if he needed help (like getting oriented to a room he enters for the first time), he was not above asking for it.

An exercise in the manual tackled disability and sexuality. It was an evocative exercise, a series of questions is asked and one has to put one’s self in the situation described by the questions, such as: imagining if you are blind, crippled, or mentally disabled, asking what one will do when one falls in love, etc.

One question asked, which was preferable, acquiring a disability later in life or having it since birth. I thought I preferred not to be disabled but if I were to choose, I’d rather have a congenital disability so I wouldn’t have to yearn for something I lost. I thought that acquiring a disability later in life is more traumatic psychologically, requiring more than physical adjustment. However, a colleague’s opposing opinion got me thinking as well. He said he’s prefer to acquire a disability later in life because he’d have been able to develop himself so that he’s better equipped to cope with this life-changing condition.

Imagine how difficult it must be for a disabled person to express her/ his sexuality. Most of the time, disabled people are not seen as sexual people. In the process of trying to help them achieve a good quality of life, the sexual aspect of this ‘quality life’ is often ignored. We are, for the most part, torn between accepting a disability and accepting the sexuality of a disabled person. And what of sexual variance? No doubt, disability adds a layer of complication to an already complicated life of a sexually variant person.

To drive the point deeper (ouch!), the clever organizers of the training saw it fit to show us a glimpse of a film that deals with the subject of sexuality and disability. The film is called ‘Sixth Happiness’ and based on the few precious minutes that we saw, it unflinchingly shows the sexuality of its protagonists. We immediately wanted to know where we can get the DVD and we were told that the DVD can be ordered here. I intend to do so in the near future.

Centerfold – J. Geils Band

More than a year ago I was able to live–albeit briefly, my dream of working in a magazine. I served as Editor of Square, a magazine for young people. I chronicled that marvelous experience here and here. After that, I spent last year doing what I usually did, in terms of work. Until early this year, when I got a call from a friend who recommended me to be involved in another magazine.

The magazine, called G21, was sort of a competitor of Square because it used to be about education and career, and targeting young people as well. But Square wasn’t just about education; it was about lifestyle, fashion, and other things that interested young people. In the last 6 months though, G21 has undergone a metamorphosis of some sort, turning into a magazine that is focused on older girls and young women. It’s a very interesting concept, full of exciting possibilities.

So I came in as a Creative Consultant (although my scope of work covers some editorial work as well) on a 20-hour a week basis. I’m basically in charge of how the magazine looks. I’m giving myself (I think the same goes for the company) a 3-month trial period for this. If I think the working relationship is working, I will consider a longer involvement. I hadn’t signed a written contract, and this might be best under the circumstances.

A couple of weeks ago, the first issue that I was involved with came out. Feedback was generally positive about the issue, but personally I think there is enough room for improvement. Unlike with Square, where I had complete editorial and creative control, G21 is completely a collaborative effort.

G21 March 2009 Issue
(first time to feature a couple in the cover)

Also, I was in India last week. The two previous posts were written in my spare time in the evening. Sadly on my 3rd night the Wi-Fi stopped working until the day I returned to Cambodia. When I had the chance I looked at Indian magazines and purchased some. I was amazed at how cheap the magazines were. They ranged from $1.50 to $2.00 only. So, as a homage to fuchsiaboy’s style of blogging, here are the magazines I got in India.

Harper’s Bazaar India
supposedly a collector’s item because it’s the maiden issue,
also, it has crystallized Swarovsky elements on the magazine name

Cosmopolitan India
Freida Pinto found fame thru ‘Slumdog Millionaire’,
she is in two magazines this month, the second being

Vogue India
Freida’s photoshoot here is way better than the Cosmo shoot,
shot by Regan Cameron

Vogue Fashion Supplement
66 pages of fashion stuff, probably because
India Fashion Week happens every March

Men’s Health India
Personally, I find Indian men hot
hence the purchase of this magazine.
I would’ve loved to get GQ as well but the store didn’t have it.

Men’s Health Magazine Style Supplement
This is on the flip side of the magazine and
I think the model is hotter than the cover guy.