Countdown to Honolulu

In three days we'll be off to Honolulu for the last hurrah of this very hot summer. Being in Honolulu will be a welcome change.

The last time we were there, we didn't bring the kids to Discovery Center. They loved that place so much as little kids, and number one on their "must do" list. Now they are 7 and 9, and even if they say they still want to  visit it, I think they won't enjoy it as much anymore.

This is an old photo--Volcano Express now has enclosed tunnels at the top connecting to this slide

What they are really looking forward to is the waterpark. So we'll definitely have to make that trek again on this trip. The nice thing about this whole-day excursion is that the waterpark closes at 4 pm. That gives the adults some time to do our stuff, which is to pass by Waikele Premium Outlets (exit 7) on the way back to Waikiki. We usually end up having dinner there too, making it a full day for the whole family.

There are not that many stores here, and it's very tiny compared Woodbury Commons on the east coast, and doesn't compare either to the Premium Outlets on the west coast. But at least it has a BCBG Max Azria.

 Free shuttle to take you to one part of Waikele to the other side 

Also on the last trip, the kids were old enough to understand what the Pacific war was all about so we brought them to see the Battleship Missouri and the USS Bowfin submarine in Pearl Harbor.

 Aboard the Battleship Missouri

I didn't think the girls would be so interested in "boy" stuff, so we took our time getting ready and went a bit late. They loved exploring the Bowfin and seeing how to crew lived. We stopped by quickly at the Bowfin museum and then went to the Missouri, which they enjoyed thoroughly too! This year, I'll make sure we take them in the  morning and spend more time there.

Hamming it up in the torpedo room of the USS Bowfin

 Engrossed in the USS Bowfin museum

Aside from the weather of course, there are tons of things  I'm looking forward to on this trip. High up there is Waiola Shave Ice--I'll treat the kids to this everyday! It tastes as good as Matsumoto's in the North Shore and the best part is it's 3 minutes from the house! Before friends told us about this hole-in-the-wall local favorite, we'd drive all the way to the North Shore just for superb shave ice. I'm sorry to say, but the he shave ice in all other parts of Waikiki, or any other place for that matter can't compare to this or  to Matsumoto's!

This isn't at Waiola--but it's a colorful picture of liquid sugar!

The kids always get "Rainbow" and I always get "coconut, pineapple and lilikoi". I should try the one with ice cream and mochi balls in the bottom, azuki beans and condensed milk. It's like having halo-halo and snow cone together. Oooh, but don't say "snow cone" to Hawaiians--it's "shave ice" here. I don't have a nice snap of the shave ice, so I will make sure I do a post just on this when I get there!

I'm also looking forward to doing a long lazy drive to the to the other side of the island--just  to have lunch at those shrimp trucks over there. Unfortunately, nothing in the Waikiki side comes close to this. I can't wait...

 Sauteed with lots of garlic!

I was prepared to write about all my other favorite Honolulu stuff, but now I'm very hungry and I'm suffering just looking at this picture in front of me. So bye for now while I have dinner. I should've been organizing my desk and paying bills, but I blogged instead. Oh well...

Tiptoe.. Through the Tulips

On the other side of the globe, where the weather is a bit cooler, gardens are a different story. Last year we were able to see the Keukenhof International Flower Exhibition in Holland in all its glory. I say "able to see" because Keukenhof is only open in the spring time--from late March to late May every year. The rest of the year, it is closed.

But what's with the clashing colors?

Keukenof is the largest spring garden in the world covering 32 hectares, with over 4 million tulip bulbs in 100 different varieties.

I loved seeing the tulips, but I didn't like that the tulip beds were planted randomly--meaning the colors were not matching. It would've been more attractive if there was some order to colors. For example, cool colors together and warm ones together, or maybe all pastels grouped together, and then all bright ones grouped together.  I would group them depending on hue, on tonal value, and then also on degree of saturation. It's just basic color theory.  But what am I saying?--these people are the experts, they probably have their own reasons.

We spent a whole afternoon here because there was lots for the girls to do. There was a playground with contraptions that were new to them.

Then there was a petting zoo with animals like furry ponies, furry chickens, goats, rabbits, a calf...

furry chickens!

And scattered around the park were different things to explore like a maze, a twig tunnel and a zip line.

There were also many areas for lazing around like these bales of hay doubling as lounging beds.

And there were also down cushions scattered on one part of the lawn, with people were napping on them.

Food was available from food carts--at least that's all we saw because we came late in the afternoon. The cafeterias were all closed by this time. But the grilled sausage from the cart was delicious!

Keukenhof was started by a group of Dutch growers who wanted to showcase the flowers of Amsterdam. It has now become the most famous tourist destination in the area--oh, and the website says it's the most photographed tourist site in the world. Hmm, I wonder how they concluded that?

If you are from a climate that is hospitable to tulips, you can actually order tulips while you are here (or even online I think) and they will send the bulbs to you in the fall so that they can be ready for the next spring.  I understand they ship all over the world. Unfortunately for us, these  tulips will never survive here!

Wanted: Lush Garden

It's been unbearably hot this summer and the plants in my garden are complaining and withering away! In Laguna though, plants seem to thrive all year round.  Ponce Veridiano's hideaway in Laguna is the ultimate in LUSH. His Laguna house has a beautiful garden--or actually it would be more appropriate to say that his beautiful garden has a house in it! 

The sitting area of the 2-bedroom villa

At the we visited, he was in the middle of building the pool for the 2-bedroom villa he is going to rent by-the-day to vacationers. This is his first attempt at interior design and it was coming along really nice and tasteful--but what still really stood out was his landscape design. This guy is naturally talented!

Healthy and happy calatheas

Ponce is a self-taught landscape artist from Laguna. He is an electrical engineer by training and in another life, he worked for Meralco in a very junior post. It was during this time that he the Meralco Garden Club (!)  at the prodding of one of his office mates.  He won the second garden show he joined and got the attention of  a Chinese lady to asked him to create a pocket garden inside her condo. From there her friends saw it, and also hired him.

View from the master bedroom of the main house

Eventually he found himself rubbing elbows with chi-chi personalities in Manila, and he got his first "commercial" job when Tony Floirendo (the father, not Tony-boy) asked him to landscape the family-owned Pearl Farm Resort on Samal Island. He had quite a long stint there because the family took to him and treated him like family.  Not only did he design the gardens of the different members of the family there, he also styled parties and weddings. He is that creative.

the open living room of his house

Through working with the Floirendos, Ponce got to meet other prominent families. I think it was about this time that the Ayalas either heard about him or saw his work. He was then tasked to do the gardens of Greenbelt in Makati.

View from the den--don't step out though--those are all waterlilies covering a pond.

His style was strikingly different from whatever landscapers did in the past. He plays with a monochromatic palette of green and hardly uses any flowering plants. relying on the shapes of the leaves and massing for his design statement. The gardens he creates are ultimately simple but extraordinary, low-key but elegant.

At the entrance of Kawayan Cove

After Greenbelt, he did the landscaping of Kawayan Cove, an exclusive seaside community in Nasugbu, Batangas. His style fit the development perfectly since Kawayan is elegant in its simplicity. His restrained use of plants and colors contributes to the harmony of the place--nothing jarring to the senses here. In fact, as soon as you pass through the entrance, you are overtaken by a sense of calm.  Definitely very tasteful.

Back to his house in Laguna...aside from the main house and the 2-bedroom villa, he has this bahay kubo structure across the street, for hanging out. 

From here you can listen to the raging river below. Ponce said he used to swim in it as a child.

I like the contrast of the crystal chandelier in a structure that's in the middle of the boonies.

He continues to be in demand for residential projects in Forbes, Dasmarinas and Urdaneta Villages in Makati. Inspite of his talent, and being highly sought-after by "people-in-the-know",  he remains down-to-earth and humble. He doesn't even want his picture taken or published.

From the garden looking into the main house (this is still Ponce's house, not mine!)

Every now and then, I call Jess, his top landscaper, to take peek at my small Ponce-designed garden (good thing Ponce still has ongoing projects nearby so Jess can easily swing by). He said my gardener is basically just cleaning and tidying the garden instead of caring for the plants. Jess tried to teach him twice, how to prune certain plants, but it seems that the gardener didn't want to learn new things.

My (once) lush garden when it was newly planted. Grass was not put in yet.

I think I'll have to put in new plants after the summer and right before the rainy season (first they steam in the humid heat of the summer, hopefully they don't drown next). By that time, I hope I have a better gardener! I'm learning so many things about these plants that soon I will be able to do my garden by myself.

May is for Mango

The fruit, not the store. I think the season officially starts in April, and throughout the whole of May, markets are full of mangos in all states of ripeness, or over-ripeness!

A couple of years back we were invited to go mango-picking at a farm in Zambales. I was surprised to see such compact and low mango trees. I'm used to huge ones. The green mangoes were hanging low on the branches. I wondered about that when our host told us that his farm staff had already started harvesting the fruit, but he told them not to pick the low hanging ones because he was planning a mango-picking adventure with kids.

Our city kids were thrilled to be picking mangoes straight from the tree-- I was thrilled to be taking home all these mangoes for free! :)

We didn't know (then) that the sap from a newly-picked mango's stem is so acidic that it can actually blister your skin. Carmel had a small wound on her chin, and I had one on the back of my hand. Good thing it was only that because took over two weeks to heal.

The mangoes were wet because it was drizzling. Each mango has to be wiped dry otherwise the water spots will turn into black spots on the ripe yellow mango. The more experienced pickers came equipped with tube socks that they used like gloves to dry the mangoes.

Mangoes are picked when they're green. Then they take a few days to ripen. 

After picking three big baskets of mangoes and drying each one carefully, it was time for a picnic lunch and generally lazing around the whole afternoon. We then drove to Subic for the night.

When we got home, I divided two kaings and shared them with dad and mom, pa and ma, and siblings on both sides who were in town, and then I still had one whole kaing for us enjoy for the next two weeks and more.  We ate them in all stages of ripeness--green with bagoong, slightly yellow still with bagoong, then of course when they were  yellow and fully ripe. I froze the ones that had gotten too ripe--and used them to make mango shakes.

Philippine mangoes are the best in the world and I think is best eaten in it's purest state--just cut open and scooped up. Yum. Thanks Ed and Lina, for a this special back-to-nature experience for us and the kids--and of course for all those mangoes!

Our hosts

Jars in Silang

This is a new vendor along the road going to Nasugbu again. Beautiful jars all over the place! I stopped to inquire because the only other outlet I know is that along the Mandaluyong bridge.

These are the jars that are usually specified by landscape artists like Budji and Ponce. They're not cheap--the ones I asked about were 5-7k pesos and the big ones can go up to 25k. They are all imported from Vietnam! 

Well guess what, they are the SAME guys who are in Mandaluyong! The shop is called "8 Corners" or eight something, I forgot. Just like the furniture guys who are from all over Luzon, but who set up along the road to Nasugbu, these guys got smart and also set up here. I think they've figured that a lot of their customers are those who have beach homes along the Nasugbu coast!

They cleared a pineapple field and are renting the space for only 15k a month. They guy told me that they have more containers arriving and they will be able to finally unload them all--so expect even more jars!

They don't look like anything laid out this way--but one or two jars in a beautiful setting..

Bamboo Beach in Kawayan Cove. I barely got the jar in the photo--but it's on the right side

These jars are super heavy so they're not worried about it being stolen from the roadside. At least they're halfway to Nasugbu already, for those who are buying for their beach homes.

Makati and Taguig from the Sky

Don't you find the view from an airplane fascinating? If I sit by a window (which is almost never), I always pull out my camera and snap some aerial shots. It never looks interesting in the little camera screen, but once it's on iPhoto, it's captivating.

The top photo is of the Makati CBD and the residential villages of Forbes and Dasma. Here below, we've moved a bit farther and the buildings of Taguig are coming in stage right.

To the left of the Taguig buildings are two neat squares--that's the north and south fields of the Manila Polo Club. I can't figure out what the open space and the golf course on the foreground of the photo are. Hmm..I don't know my geography. Could that be Navy Club golf course?

Now we're flying over Taguig and the American Cemetery, the big round patch of green grass. It's a beautiful, green park and the white crosses are neatly lined up--I would hardly call it a cemetery--more like memorial.  You can see that Bonifacio Global City is still way underbuilt, and with all the available lots between the buildings it will soon be overbuilt!

The streets in Bonifacio Global City are also not that wide, so I'm not too hopeful about the traffic situation here. Good thing there is that American memorial, which I now realize is almost as big as Bonifacio Global City. A big park in the middle of all the future congestion.

We're now leaving Taguig. Goobye Manila..for now!

Mirror Mirror...

This is from the Vogue Interiors book

I'm looking for a mirror for my living room, and I want one which looks like this one above. It's gold, it's simple all around with a focal point on the top.  Infact, if I can get an old one with matching ghosts like the ones in the Paris flea market, I would love it. I'm still figuring out how to ship something like this back home, and I wonder if it is even worth it.

I almost fainted when I saw this shop. I just want one...okay, maybe two?

The ones in this shop were between 2k euro to 9k euro! Eegads. Those ghosts are expensive. How can these all be antiques--reproductions perhaps? I don't know too much about the shops in the Paris flea market and if these are real antiques or Egyptian reproductions. For all I know, they come from Pampanga? hehe.  These ones below were lower than 2k because they hadn't been restored.

I like the one in the middle

In Dalat Vietnam, they had French-looking mirrors all over the Sofitel Dalat Palace. I loved the overall ambience, but don't look too closely, because then it will scream "tacky".  It doesn't have that elegant gilt old-world look its supposed to have. There were a lot of impressionist reproductions hanging on the walls too--again, very well executed, but don't look too close.

Sofitel hallway mirror

Too gold and a bit too much with the too-curly console

The whole hotel has a French colonial theme--well, Dalat is supposed to be "Little Paris" as it was the French who discovered and developed the place in the early 1900's, the way the Americans built up Baguio for us.

In every corner and landing, there was a different mirror and console set up. This is a bit better.

I want something carved out of solid wood and gilded after. Vietnam has a lot of French influence so it's only natural for them to reproduce these things in the proper proportions. I'm sure the Pampanga woodworkers have these mirrors too, I just haven't had the time to check them out. Maybe when it's not too hot anymore, I'll make a trip there!

Love this look--the chandelier, the mirror on the left with non-matching console

.