A couple of random New York pieces from my travels:
From TGI Fridays Menu. Take a look at that calorie count! It makes me a big fan of the NY State law on listing calories on menus. Entrees went from about 900 calories to over 2000. Talk about TGI Fry Days. Think again about what you order. Wow!
Not so much graffiti on the Upper West Side but I did snag this cool one on the Highline thanks to Carla
Joggers and walkers on Central Park’s Running Track
Our first three weeks in Washington had been a lot about crossing “to dos” from our list of responsibilities. Most days involved taking care of something essential in order to keep the wheels of our transit turning, if only for an hour, and also there was a great deal of shopping to accumulate the vast amount of supplies we needed for the next two years in Nepal. However, between obligations and purchasing, we walked – alot – exploring blocks and blocks of DC’s many shaded, wide pavements. I really missed that kind of freedom to walk and explore in Manila.
Once we got to New York City our most of our shopping was done, the packers had come and gone, and Latham had departed, so it was just the two of us and the streets of New York to explore.
I had lived ten years previously in New Jersey and yet rarely took the hour train ride into New York, staying overnight only once in all those years. Now I was looking forward to getting to know the city better and our new two-week home on the Upper West Side, close to Central Park, was a great area to start.
Central Park is big and there is so much to see and do. It really is the heart of the city and there’s always something going on. We visited frequently and yet I feel I only saw a few corners of it.
After all these years, I had never explored Central Park and was really surprised at how many buildings, monuments, bridges, ponds and attractions there were. It was crowded some times more than others, of course, but never so crowded that I wanted to leave.
Sunday morning was a continuous stream of cyclists, skateboarders, rollerbladers…if it had wheels, it was part of the morning Central Park exercise parade
Strolling around in the Park. Always something unexpected would pop up…
Central Park Pond
We particularly liked this gnarly old tree!
This squirrel was actually posing for pictures. Lots of other wildlife too…birds, turtles, frogs…
I couldn’t help imagining what it would be like to live in New York City without this oasis of green. It would certainly be a very different city. I’m so glad I finally got to know it.
Cooking with Carla. Whatever were we fixin’ ?…..I can’t even remember…but we had fun!
After almost three years overseas, returning to DC felt like closing the loop on our Manila experience. I have visited on and off over the years or to see Robert when he was in training but not more than a couple of weeks at a time. Our last stay was the longest and I l learnt to find my way around the city and the metro a little.
The Washington DC Metro is clean, safe and efficient but a little like a science fiction movie too. Someone turn on the lights!
So when Carla came to visit at the beginning of our stay I was able to act as tour guide — at least a little. I happily planned three loosey goosey days of activities starting with the sales. After almost three years in Manila I needed new stuff – I couldn’t buy clothes to fit there — and Carla very kindly helped me tackle Ann Taylor to stock up. Its so hard clothes shopping only every couple of years or so for a different place that you’ve never visited. If you’re too hesitant then you end up wishing you’d bought more…too gungho and the credit card takes a hammering and you end up with stuff you don’t need. What to buy…what to buy?
What about this one?
The next day we spent some time at the American History museum checking out 1950’s transportation, Julia Childs and the history of American food…all one floor I might add. That place is big! Then did one of our walks through downtown DC, past the White House and all the way back to Dupont Circle where we were staying. We both like seeing cities on foot!
Day three was at the wonderful Washington zoo. Latham had his new camera and took loads of pictures testing out his new equipment. We went early on a rainy day and avoided the summer crowds. Free admission makes it so easy to go for a short casual trip and go back more times.
This sign was just made for tourist pics!
Having an early evening dinner on the deck. When the sun went down, we also got a floor show. Ugly Naked Guy … as we dubbed him… would parade around bare-arsed naked in front of the window next to our table. He did this every night, displaying everything except his face. We did wonder….?!
The house and location really made our stay and it was great having Carla come and enjoy it with us. We especially enjoyed basil-laced gin and tonics on the deck and watching the darkening evening sky….despite Ugly Naked Guy….a dip or two in the hot tub. Next stop….New York City!
Its sort of overwhelming returning to the States after almost 3 years. I expected the vast choices and the higher prices. I expected to be shocked at how much everything cost, and I was. It was like blow to the gut paying $4.50/lb for something that I used to pay 99 c/lb three years ago. Between the recession, normal inflation, center city prices and my newly acquired (but skewed) Filipino sense of cost, shopping stateside seems filled with crazy store owners making up prices to see how high they could push me me before I said no! A short shopping trip around the wonderful Dupont Circle farmers market cost $60 for the week’s vegetables for two people. That’s about half my totally weekly shopping allowance in NJ three years ago. For carrots, peaches and lettuce, really?! But then again I took them home and stored them well in the fridge and they stayed fresh and beautiful all week. Dewy fresh, beautiful and tasty. Goodness knows how much money I wasted in Manila on “cheap” fruits and vegetables that started to rot within 24 hours no matter how carefully I stored them. I often threw away more than half of the produce that I bought because we didn’t use it immediately. A real crime anywhere, but especially in a developing country where people don’t have enough to eat.
Restaurant portion sizes are huge here and so is the tab. But again…if the cheapest lunch item on the menu is $15 and it fills you up or you can share it between two… and the quality is there… that’s pretty good value. In Manila we often order a “family size” pizza just for Latham or ordered him two dinners. At that rate the prices were the same as DC but for lower quality. It often wasn’t truly “cheaper” to eat out in the Philippines. What was a real deal were the drinks. Local beer was $2 a glass in a fancy restaurant. Here we’re paying $6-9 for a bottle in a neighborhood place. Then there’s that weird flip on the meaning of local. In Manila local meant cheap. Here in the states it means artisan and expensive. Managing my financial expectations is taking some resolve and the occasional deep breathing exercise.
I’ve found that value for money changes meaning for me all the time. Cheap and value for money are not the same thing, but sometime its cheap that gets you what you want and other times it’s something expensive (that lasts) that you really need. Here on home leave pivoting back and forth, on the road, on the run, shopping is not for the faint of heart!
…you see signs like this.
Really, I can have ice cold wine in 7 minutes? Welcome back to the land of innovation and new ideas. You’ve gotta give that to the States. And I was just getting to a state of reluctant acceptance that the red wine is always chilled in Manila.
I know. I probably the only person you know that hasn’t seen one of these things. But, then that’s the point. I’ve been away.
Time to add the closing bracket on our experience of Fort Bonifacio. From our initial First Glimpses of the City much has changed since the first few months of stepping precariously across empty wasteland plots. However, in recent months the view of our kitchen window has changed little compared to other areas of the Fort. Documenting further progress involving going up to the roof on the 55th floor of our skyscraper. I put this off until the last day. The vertigo feeling is both scary and exhilarating, but mostly scary. Especially alone. But eventually… up I went.
Here is the view from our roof over the window-blocking new building:
It reveals more vacant grass patches, but not so many anymore. Every patch is really just the footprint of buildings to come.
Yes, that’s SM Aura in the background. Although the shopping center and cinemas are open, you can see the continuing construction on the tower as the offices are not completed yet. Here’s a close up of Aura, in striking contrast to the older, poorer district immediately behind it:
Lastly, the last patch of green grass – that WAS planted lawn not wasteland – that used to be our easy access into the center of Fort Bonifacio by foot – is now well on its way to becoming a car park. And that is sad. For me that was the nail in the coffin of my disenchantment in living here. Between the growing traffic, blocked sidewalks, noise, dust and pedestrian hostility, I have reached my proverbial shit limit on the construction story that I have tried to embrace whilst I lived amongst it. Perhaps its just human nature that when we know we need to make a separation from something the protective walls come down and we allow the negative in to help push us away. Or maybe I’m just sick of people trying to run me over!
How do you say goodbye to a large staff of almost 100 who have worked together as a team for over two years? With a big, slap up barbeque and video karaoke party of course!
Carpenters, painters, drivers and technicians getting ready for the big feast
Corn and fried tofu on its way
Smoking us out with bbq chicken
More food appeared from all over …along with more hungry guys
Part of the great team that is FM Manila. We will miss you guys!
And no goodbye party is complete without a tribute video. With apologies to Psy!
Men at Work
Its surprising just how noisy 8 guys with tape guns can be. The clunking, scraping and stretching sounds rip across the room like fervent roadscrapers, manically shoveling paths through snow. A kind of Stockhausen-esque aleatoric composition with its own cacophonic melody. Concerto for Tape Dispenser in G minor. I could barely hear myself think above the din.
Drowning in stuff!
The more soft furnishings that disappeared, the more it echoed. It took two days to put everything we own “back in the box”…some of it literally and some of it figuratively… and a third day to get it out of the apartment and out of our lives. At least for a while.
As if enough wasn’t going on already, the window cleaning platform showed up. For the first time in two years they cleaned the windows properly. Great timing!
And then the boxes started to disappear
We are packed out and sort of back to square one with our home space, except now we aren’t expectantly looking around imagining how the space with develop around us, we are remembering our lives in that space and in all of the things we did in the Philippines.
Going…going….
GONE!
I never in my life thought of living in the Philippines. Its just not on most people’s maps or bucket lists (unless they’re Filipino of course). It has been both surprising, fascinating, frustrating, ugly and beautiful. Its hard to even remember my impressions and expectations when I first arrived, and yet when I glance back at my own blog from the first few days, I really feel the extent of 2.5 years here, everything we explored, loved and hated about living here. Despite the frustrations with traffic and food quality, it has been largely a very positive experience that I am so glad to have had the opportunity to experience. It my own small way I feel ownership for the land, people and language. Made in The Philippines will forever mean something more to me.
I doubt we will have the opportunity to return. We have so many competing places and relationships elsewhere and only limited time to visit, but who knows? Maybe one day? I know that even five years from now it will be a very different place.
This post participated in the Daily Prompt’s Weekly Photo Challenge: On The Move
I know this song and never made the connection! Bob Seger may be long gone from Kathmandu, but the music still hits a spot!
I am sure we’re not the first people to think of using a mirror and post-it notes to keep track of something, but I have to say that it was a really good study plan strategy. I noticed Latham liked to keep his homework on post-it notes sometimes, sticking them to the window when he had multiple assignments due. So for finals I bought a bunch of them in different colours, then we picked a colour-key (re-read, review, cram, exam) and put up a big calendar (pink post its) on the sliding mirror closet doors, covering the six weeks leading up to exams. Each week started on a Saturday because the weekend was the start of the lead in to the following week.
Then we added events, doctors appts and other key activities, included scheduled free time, and finally added the actual exams (red post its). This formed the basis of all the “set items.” Then Latham created a yellow post it for every subject area he had to cover for every subject. The goal then was to place all the subject study post its on to the calendar in a way that made sense based on the exam dates and all the other realities. The photo is the final result at the beginning of the six week period.
It was such a great system because it was simple. Every day he knew what he had to do and it broke up the overwhelming exams into daily bites. It was flexible. Things crop up and life messes with the schedule. The post-its could easily be moved around to accommodate changes. Plus it had the added bonus of being able to remove a subject once you had studied it, which has the same satisfaction as crossing something off a list. What was really key was that it showed the possibilities and limitations of the six week period in a very visual way, illustrating how it could be done, but also demonstrating that if you don’t study a particular unit as scheduled you needed to find a way to fit it in somewhere else instead.
Regardless of his results which we don’t have yet, it set up him up to succeed and hopefully the results will reflect that.
So what do you think? Should I pack some post-it notes in a fancy box with a DVD and sell it as an IB Study System for $49.99?!
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