Could Have Been Aubergines, No Thanks to the Treaty of Paris

Esquire magazine published an article entitled What If The Philippines Was A British Colony.  The write-up relays that between October 1762 and April 1764, the Philippines was actually part of the British empire.  Following George Washington’s attacks on French colonies, the French went to war against the Britishers.  Spain which rules the Philippines during that era, joined the same war so as to honor its alliance with the French.  Because of this, the Brits attacked and was able to capture Spanish-owned Manila in 1762.  However, British reign in the Philippines came to a peaceful end when the Treaty of Paris was signed in 1763. 

The Esquire article then presented a number of could-have-beens in case there was no Treaty of Paris and the British rule continued in my beloved Philippines.  Expecting it to be mind-blowing, the theories presented in the article were somewhat deflated, subdued and ordinarily predictable because the notions discussed were simply aligned and paralleled to what happened with other countries under the British rule like India and majority of Africa.

the closest thing to my being briton now is wearing a union jack shirt. haha!

Let me then dispatch my inane and doofus version of what could have been if the Philippines was part of the British colony.  Firstly, I could have had high teas instead of siestas.  Eggplants would no longer be eggplants but aubergines and shopping carts would no longer be shopping carts but trolleys.  And I’d be drinking more tea and eating more biscuits while saying “God save the Queen” during weekends!  I might be speaking like Harry Potter by now and would be rooting for John Whaite and Johannes Radebe to win Strictly Dancing this year on BBC.  We will never know, if Brits ruled the Philippines, one of the James Bonds could have been some dishy Pinoy bloke.

talong, the filipino name for aubergine

Hey! Why was I not consulted when that wonky Treaty of Paris was drafted and taken into effect? 

Sleeping Under The Stars

A couple of nights ago before going to sleep, I opt to step out of my balcony so as to decide whether to shut my windows close and turn on the AC or leave the balcony door and windows open since its tranquil and nippy.

And while gazing at the night sky I was thrilled to see multiple stars in the heavens.

too sad my camera couldn’t capture it

It dawned in me that it has been more than a year that I haven’t seen those stars hanging from the sky.  It was beautiful.  Seeing stars in the metro sky has been so rare.  It has gone so infrequent that metropolitan folks have started to link seeing night time stars as positive signs from the heavens that their longings will soon be granted.  No thanks to the smog and pollution of the concrete jungle.

I decided not to link seeing stars to the multiple wishes that I have.  I simply smiled and enjoyed the site.  And while stepping inside, I opted to keep the balcony door and windows open.  When I closed my eyes, I realized that sleeping under the stars is a perfect way to end the night.

Envious of Joanna Lumley

It’s not the monarch neither the Spice Girls.  It’s not Elton John neither J. R. R. Tolkien.  Though I admire the wit of Stephen Hawking and at awe with Margaret Thatcher, it’s not them.  The British human being who I envy the most when it comes to world travel is the effervescent Joanna Lumley.

Joanna thru her series of British TV travel shows feature amazing spots on the planet and showcase interesting cultures around the world!  What is so enviable about this travel diva is that she got to go around and got a bunch of travel-savvy production team who will do the chronicling for her!

 

I was at awe with Joanna’s enchanting Trans-Siberian adventures.  I enjoyed her splendid exploits of the inestimable Japan from north to south.  And how I wish I will be granted with the gift of travel for I was truly envious with her Silk Road adventures!

I have read somewhere that travel envy can happen to anyone.  It is caused by emotional discontent, frustration, feeling left out, the tendency for endless comparison and even social media.  In my case, it would be a mix of all of these combined with being stuck for a year due to this crazy pandemic.

I too read that one way to cope with travel envy is to turn such envy into inspiration, that is by planning the next adventure.  But it looks like planning for an out of the country escapade now seem unrealistic.

I would rather practice gratefulness and reminisce about my past trips.  Good thing I have this blog because reading through some of my travel posts decreases the intensity of my feeling jealous.

this is one spectacular spot joanna lumley has yet to step on! haha! https://neillangit.wordpress.com/2018/02/18/batad-rice-terraces-no-words-to-describe/

And while I was busy basking on these feelings of envy towards the British travel muse, I paused for a while not knowing how to end this invaluable writing.  I turned to my Facebook for a break and this very fitting photo struck me.

Hoping to see the world soon!

The UK Variant & Being Back to the Dark Ages

just a thought

I read somewhere in the world “wild” web that calling the now-named novel coronavirus as the Wuhan Virus or the China Virus is unfair, uncivilized and xenophobic.  Lots of articles and write-ups raised that this naming of the new virus from its place of origin is inhumane and no longer acceptable since year 2015 by the World Health Organization.  Articles explained that such should be named differently because the world is no longer in its Dark Ages and that the old practice has caused violent anger and physical danger towards the citizens or ethnicities where the disease originated.

But I got sets of disturbing questions now.  If WHO has new sets of best practices in naming viruses and diseases, how come the now-mutated and highly contagious variant of novel coronavirus is commonly called The UK Variant, the place on earth where it was first detected?  And why are the British people not reacting the way Chinese folks reacted when novel coronavirus was named after their country?

I don’t have a relative living in UK now but I know lots of people there, from Boris to Elizabeth to cute little George, Charlotte and Louis.  Why is my godmother who is British whom I last met when I was 3 years old is not hurt, not offended and not even reacting?

Answers to these troubling questions I guess is because British folks nowadays have gone too docile to react and have been too busy trying to improve their sad and alarming Covid19 status.  Or maybe, we are back in the Dark Ages.

Get well UK!

Feeling Low? Read This!

a friend captured this early this morning in his home province…

If you are a non-Filipino and you hate your life and at a lowest low, think again.  Let me just inform you that while I am writing this, my country (the Philippines) is experiencing the deadliest, the strongest and most devastating tropical storm of the year on the planet.  Power outages, spotty internet, dreadful storm surges by the seaside, terrible flashfloods, daunting evacuations of families and horrible destruction of buildings, crops and produce are all ongoing.   And this is in the midst of the deadly pandemic!

So, if you are feeling sad, miserable and dispirited, think again! You just don’t know how blessed and fortunate you are at the moment.

Got to go.  Need to evacuate to my mom’s house and arm myself with the mighty umbrella!  Stay resilient Philippines! I pray for everyone’s safety and that this deadly storm will pass soonest!

A Monthly Halloween-Like Scare

It’s Halloween tonight!  Aside from joyous celebration, it is also the period for those who adore creepy Halloween movies and dive right in to frightening books about ghosts, vampires and lost spirits.   Others are inspired to visit spooky ghost towns while the rest will get chills from hearing friend’s and family’s scary tales and encounters.

I, on the other hand, do not have to get inspired by the season to get a taste of the spooky and scary circumstances.  I actually receive a monthly Halloween-like fright!  And that is by simply tearing the envelopes sent to me and finding out the amount of my monthly utility dues! 

I can bear the sudden presence of scary spirits. I can endure the hair-raising screams of the naughty ghosts.  I can withstand the spookiness of nasty looking ghouls but nothing beats my being so damn scared when I receive all these freaking monthly bills! Hahaha!

happy halloween!

Happy Halloween everyone!

Dance When Bored Angels Ignore Us

It’s the last quarter and when I realized that I haven’t gone out of the country this year, I got sad.  When I counted that it has been close to eight months that I have been limiting my movement outdoors, I got sad.  I actually got sad when I realized I got sad.

Gazing into the affirmative, bouts of sadness may be good for us.  Can you just imagine happiness if there is no sadness?  Life then would be so dull, nauseating and mind-numbing.  Angels in heaven must have been so bored with happiness they prefer descending down to earth in search of sadness and turn the same into glee, delight and gladness.

Life is not about wishing storms to pass. It is about learning how to dance in the rain.

I am not saying that I would love to bask on sadness.  I had so much of it already.  But sadness as unwelcome and unwanted as it may seem is a life ingredient.  And if bored angels up above ignore us, what is good about us being humans is that we cope.  We have the capacity to manage, the ability to handle and the aptitude to deal.

Sadness is like a life’s unwanted storm.  It can be intense, horrible and devastating.  But life is not about wishing storms to pass.  It is about learning how to dance in the rain.  Therefore, we simply just have to dance if bored angels ignore us.

My Superhero Action Figure

Majority of the present male human specie – young and old – grew up playing with superhero action figures.  Every one of these dudes can gleefully recall which among these animated crusaders was their favorite.  I am part of the unfortunate, luckless and deprived minority.  I never got the chance to play with a mini-Superman, Batman or the Green Lantern.

that’s me! hahaha! had a pretty twisted set of toys yet with awesome childhood

Instead, I can clearly recall that I and my siblings would play with canned goods and variety of grocery items of Nengkoy (my mother) from her pantry storage at the second floor of our house.  We enjoyed rolling cans of Hunts pork & beans on the floor with the aim of hitting unopened plastic bottles of Jergens body lotions and Gee Your Hair Smells Terrific shampoos.  We find excitement in stacking weighty tins of Spam luncheon meats. And we adored imagining fragrant boxes of Dove and Ivory bath soaps as mini cars. 

Miniature sports figures (not the Hulk, Captain America nor other superheroes) would be so infrequent to come by because we would have to wait for the next can of Milo or Ovaltine to finish because the free promotional mini-sports figures are buried somewhere within the cans of these powdered choco drinks.

Don’t get me wrong.  I actually had a balanced and awesome childhood.  But unfortunately, I could not contribute or share a fun childhood experience when asked which among the superheroes did I grew up having as an action figure. 

But now that I am old, people would seem to start contemplating whether they had a cool childhood as I did when I dare answer such question because my reply now would no longer be a boring “none”.  It is only lately that I figured out that I actually grew up having a superhero action figure! It’s the supreme crusader in bright red imperial regalia that would beat even the chief, topnotch and paramount superhero a human animator has created.  Nowadays – though I did not played with it, I actually prayed to it – my simple answer to this question is the little Santo Niño (translation: the image of The Child Jesus).

My very own Santo Niño in green imperial regalia was gifted to me by my mom more than 25 years ago when I decided to live on my own and be independent.

Skin Moisturizing Bread Spread

While looking into the product lines of Kiehl’s yesterday inside a mall, a stupid thought suddenly popped out of my mind.  A silly light bulb moment which I think would make me heaps of money if I am a dermatological chemist.

If I am a skincare chemical expert, I would develop those firming, lifting and anti-wrinkle gels into a bread spread.  I would create varieties of butter jams that would carry those line-reducing and dark spot-diminishing serums. My chemically concocted pates, tahinis and halvas would be dashed with ultralight daily UV defense systems for the skin.  I know that there are organic foods that is good for the skin, but my preposterous objective is to develop bread spreads that are really intended for epidermal upkeep. Hahaha!

Can you just imagine how much precious time is saved in the morning and at night by the humankind if these formulas are incorporated into our spreads instead?  It’s like having our breakfast or teatime while doing our skin care routine at the same time!

Overwhelmed with my ridiculous idea, I could not contain it.  I brazenly asked the attendant if they sell skin moisturizers in the form of spreads for the bread.  The attendant smirked and thought that me, her buyer, is a loony who was only there to try on the free testers.

my age defenders! my skin care haul.

smile!

How I wish this post is paid for by Kiehl’s because their efficacious products are not cheap!  Stay young looking everyone!

A Moment When Dark Spirits Hated Me

I have just been in a zoom meeting and encountered a circumstance where I have been slightly wronged.  Though I was not bestowed even a hint of apology, and since the concern at hand has been clarified, I simply let go of the issue and tolerantly charged it to experience.

This zoom meeting experience is nothing but bread crumbs if compared to a huge loaf of an intense situation others may have when it comes to the aspect of forgiveness. I read somewhere that forgiveness could be the most difficult thing many of us do in our lifetime.  It is hard because it is against all our earthly impulses.  I hope that there would not come a time when forgiving for me would be the hardest.

my face being a peace! hahaha!

But I guess on undemanding situations, forgiving is easier than being too proud, too bitter and too loaded with angst and resentment.  Being at peace is the benefit of being tolerant while good will is what you get from tossing away the negatives.  Evil spirits abhor the concept of forgiving and during that specific zoom meeting, those dark hostile forces hated me.