Grace, Eye MD

It was a rainy and chilly day yesterday, and I suddenly had the inspiration to cook tinola. I bought chicken and sayote sa Shopwise and cooked it for dinner. Mama and Papa were short of flabbergasted na “marunong pala” ako mag-cook (Papa thought all I knew how to cook was ginisang monggo and sopas because I kept cooking those whenever Mama left for lunch/dinner). Duh, you don’t need to be a nuclear physicist to know how to cook naman, no. Just observing Mama preparing our food all these years is enough to learn how to cook (though I won’t venture into cooking her uber sarap lenggua in cream of mushroom sauce and callos, kasi toxic mag-boil and clean ng ox tongue and tripe). Suffice to say, they had second servings of my super sarap tinola. Mama was gleefully saying na she doesn’t need to cook na pala! Ha! I won’t let her off the hook that easily!

The SMS that absolutely made my day was from Yen, a plastic surgeon who was my roommate in Singapore. She has a beautiful and smart two year old daughter named Nina. She sent this message: “Nakakaloka-I have kwento, Nina cut her bangs today! Her yaya just called panicking! Last night kasi Nina was showing me that magaling na siya humawak ng scissors. Gosh! I never did this as a kid! I wonder what she was thinking! She collected pa all her hair and showed it to her yaya. Nakakaloka siya! Tuwang-tuwa pa siya sa ginawa niya!” Hahahaaaaa! That was enough to brighten up my rainy day! Can’t wait to see Nina’s self-styled hair!!! Attached is her picture when we had dinner at Condoms and Cabbages in Bangkok last April. She was scaring her Tito Sam with Sammy the Snake (obviously named after him)!

Sam’s text one Saturday morning as he was attending rounds in a hospital in Hong Kong: “Honey save me, the speaker says no one knows the extend of the surgery!”.
Hahahaha!!!

Sam just sent me an SMS “ Just had a Mc Donald’s dinner because it’s cheap-Big Mac Meal upsize is HK$25 lang. Hehehe now so full…” Ha! I sent him a scathing message: “Ha! So who succumbed to the I Miss Mc Donald’s Syndrome?!?”

You see, by the time he joined me in Singapore for his 6 month fellowship, I had been there for 8 months, and I was really sick of their food na (Mama couldn’t believe that I actually DIDN’T like the food—I’m the family’s certified mega-takaw Food Monster). We’d hear Mass in the Cathedral every Sunday, and he’d ask me after where I wanted to eat lunch, and I’d say, “Mc Donald’s”. He was pretty quiet about it for the first few weeks, since the closest Mc Donald’s was at the Funan IT Mall; and we’d stay for a couple of hours afterwards, just browsing through the stores. Pero after a few weeks, he was complaining, “I don’t believe it, we’re in Singapore, and you want to eat sa Mc Donald’s?!?!”

E kasi naman, I was eating Singaporean food Monday to Friday, and white chicken rice (I think I swore this off on my 8th month), laksa (noodles in thick curry with squid cake, cockles and cuttlefish), noodles (I didn’t realize till I got there that I hate noodles pala), prata were coming out of my nose na. It wasn’t also because the food was lousy—my boss is the biggest foodie there is, and he brings us only to the best places! I guess I was just desperately homesick for more familiar food. Mga once every two weeks, he would bring us to a western restaurant, and I’d get my fill of milkshake/fries/pastries/panini/pasta, etc. Kaya naman Mc Donald’s was a real treat for me na! And it wasn’t cheap at all—a meal was at least S$5.55 (Php166.50). I’d get my fries, ketchup and grease fix that made me really happy! My most memorable breakfasts were with Yen, when we’d go to Mc Donald’s after Sunday morning mass (wala pa si Sam that time), and we’d gorge on pancakes, sausages, hash browns and coffee!!!Haaaaay, the best things in life costs S$5.55!!! Di bale nang mahal—it somehow energized me and got me ready for my manic Monday!

So now it’s Sam’s turn to look for Mc Donald’s. Told him baka ma-Instik na siya sa kakakain ng dimsum -“Ha?!? Dimsum nanaman!?!?”. Hahaha!!!

Peew arrived for a short vacation, and we had breakfast with her. She looks quite good, as always, but we were teasing her na parang lumaki ang cheeks niya. Thrown the same comment, I would have been bothered for a grand total of 5 seconds and promptly forget about it (translation: I don’t’ care about my weight), I would be more bothered about a comment about my skin. Whereas, she was so upset and threatened that she wouldn’t eat na (she’s a 5 foot, 98 pounder packed with muscles from running and working out). Helloooooo!!! Shows that even among siblings, life priorities differ!!! Hahahaha!!!

She also had a small (mga 3 inches in length) tattoo done about two months ago in Bangkok,which spells out “Malaya” in nice script (design with the help of kunsintidor Takwe) sa palmar aspect of her right forearm. She was trying to hide it from my folks and had a good job of doing it, but Mama noticed in the car. We were all flabbergasted when she said, “Ano yan? Permanent ba yan? Talaga? Maganda, kasi Malaya ka na!” NO SCOLDING AT ALL, WHATSOEVER!!! We were all laughing in the car, kasi we thought papagalitan siya. But then oo nga pala, Takwe has a full, freaking tattoo sleeve on his right arm (14 sessions so far) of a koi and cherries, so a small script on Peew’s forearm was no big deal. So I’m the only un-inked sibling (I’m the most boring Dizon, I think). Papa was saying I’d surprise them one day and get a nose ring (naaaah—-I’m too sipunin—I’d just infect it right away!). Takwe was saying that Peewee initially wanted the word “Payapa”, but he said that if the one who saw it was dyslexic, it would read “Papaya”, so they scrapped that idea. Hahaha!