Dreaming dreams..

Every single night before I go to bed, I look at the picture on facebook which I labeled meiner liebe. As of writing, I know that my dream is the only place I'll able to see him again.  Hm.. I don't think it is a crime to still dream dreams. Even better, as my friends on facebook often say and I  quote, libre ang mangarap ( it is free to dream), so I just keep on dreaming.   Besides, being still fully human, it makes me feel good to have found him. I feel like I am alive!

Even if he is not French-speaking and I am not probably going back to France even if I've seen  in my book called France that I've just seen a tiny southern part of the country, he has been like my inspiration in learning  French.  

It amused me that as the following  expressions came one after another in my French lessons one morning, and I repeat after the tutor each phrase, I said to myself "Ah, this is him."

Il a une belle voix ; Il est beau; Il est drole; Il est gentil;Il est grand;Il est mignon; Il est patient; Il est serieux; Il est sophistique; 

Needless to say the  above phrases came back easily to my mind.  So instead of doing what my father taught me since I was a kid this time of counting sheeps one by one to fall asleep, I am uttering these expressions one after another:  Il a une belle voix (He has a beautiful voice); Il est beau (He is handsome);Il est drole (He is humorous;); Il est gentil (He is kind); Il est grand (He is tall); Il le mignon (He is good-looking); Il les patient (He is patient); Il est serieux (He is serious); and Il est sophistique (He is sophisticated). 

Well, I am not exactly thinking I am doing or saying a magic spell for him to appear in my dream, so needless to say except on two occasions in a span of eight months, he never visited me in my dream.

The funny thing was my philanderer ex-significant other has been visiting in my dreams.  Weird!  and every time, I wake up, I always tell God "I don't like to see him even in my dream!" I wish there was a legislation where I could apply for a "Apprehended Dream Order", so I do not have to see him in my dream.

Last night I dreamed again...instead of seeing him who is  Il a une belle voix ; Il est beau; Il est drole; Il est gentil;Il est grand;Il est mignon; Il est patient; Il est serieux; Il est sophistique; I dreamed instead of a young man who is Il est maigre (He's skinny) and Il est lent (He's slow).  The horrible thing which woke me up was I agreed to have a date with him to eat pork. 

  

Just for the heck of blogging...

This is the island dividing my kitchen & dining area. It's been devoid of clutter for many weeks now. Hallelujah Praise the Lord! I have resolved to think of it as my lab bench, which on my working days as a science researcher, was all technically clear and clean-- devoid of spillage nor breakage or any kind of mess. I didn't just impress myself by this discipline, but also my supervisor when she came unannounced one day to do some stuff herself in the lab. She also commented it was unbelievable I worked so quietly! Why? because she didn't even heard when I put glassware on the bench! It was like absolutely soundless! Hmm.  possibly due to my excellent muscular coordination then?

As I am realising my energy levels going low, I am making assessments plus action plans of how I could conserve them.


There is really a big challenge before me of realising my goal to be minimalist at this stage of my life as  realistically I could pass away soon. I thought I better give myself a chance to live much better--not only health wise, but also home and garden wise. My brother Nimrod said the brain probably could think much better if the house is not cluttered.

Where do I begin? Ah, I thought I should really begin somewhere--and I began with the island pictured above. After I cook and eat, I cleared the area right away. Now, this spot in my house is like the hub of my googling, facebooking, you tubing and most importantly blogging while I sip my hot coffee in between during breakfast which is always like an enjoyable time for me, particularly, if I don't have to work early.  I like to chew my food well, enjoy my coffee sip by sip.  Also, because I am basically a morning person, I think my brain activity is at its highest during this time of the day.

Yeah, I thought it is just a matter of discipline. For example, I have books everywhere--in the lounge, in the bedroom, near every chair or table in the extension of my house. Why? because I tend to multi-task and this include browsing books and also jotting down notes while I am cleaning the floor, dusting stuff around the house, for example, which incidentally become boring to do continuously. So I stop sometimes, read or write in between.  Sometimes,  I pace the house as I  browse some light reading magazines which I keep because I like looking at the pictures for example, of beautiful houses and gardens and also different places in the world.  Ah, that's why I could not just donate my outdated books or back issues of magazines?  I practically could hang on to these, really, because I extended my small cottage house--basically to house my books (this was the Council's approval for the extension.  Although, one impetus really was (and I know this sound ridiculous!!!) so my tall Christmas tree would have enough room and also because I like to keep it up all-year-round! Anyhow, the long-year plan for  house extension came to reality when my mother had a heart failure in 2009 and needed to be rehabilitated.  I thought having an extension would give her  a good area to keep up with her walking requirements for rehabilitation.

I have at one stage consider donating my Science magazines, however,  the inner core of my cerebral hemispheres is protesting and seem not to be very comfortable with this. I am happy I have kept these magazines with me as I realise now, these have served me as a references to research future trends on subjects I may find interesting.

As I am not called to work today except for telephone interpreting, I decided to lop the two-metre jacaranda that helped itself in one of my garden beds. After working for two and a half hours, the job was done and dusted. Thanks to the techniques I learned from my late father and my lost Brett. Most of all, I thank God for the energy He supplied to my biceps which, as I was sawing the branches to lengths that would go flawlessly in my green bin, should be one day like Michelle Obama's if I have to do this kind of task regularly. Well, the next agenda if I am not called to work is to lop one of the now bushy crepe myrtle trees in the front yard. Well, the remarkable thing that happened after doing this chore was my blood sugar went down that allowed me to have for morning tea a piece of traditional German cake (yay!!!), without feeling guilty at all!

I thought having lopped the two metre jacaranda tree should be enough work for the day, so here I am just sitting on the floral armchair behind the small step leading to my small kitchen, listening to some music ( a CD which I probably bought on sale for my late mother and which is called Golden Memories Remember When), the songs featured therein which incidentally I don't like except when Nat Cole's Answer Me Oh My Love came on.

As I listened to this music, I was inspired to blog, in between which, my gaze went past the sliding glass door to my courtyard and all the potted geranium plants giving just a bit of splash of colours. Ah, they truly need repotting and feeding. It was restful to my eyes settling on my green living fence with splashes of orange blooms now.

Once more I thank God for this house and garden He gave me. Never mind if it is stilled cluttered with books, clothes, bags and shoes plus all other stuff which belong to my mother and my divorced brother. It would be absurd to build another shed or room just to contain this clutter. Never mind even if I have turned my garden into a bush with all the hedge surrounding me all around. The main thing is I can relax, breathe in more oxygen and enjoy the peace and quiet of my house.

Selfie funtime Series 4---There's Something About a Black and White Dress

There's something in a black and white dress with big prints ...

 and a white hat ????

I must have eaten too much Black Forest Cakes (hahaha!)

I Am Called as a Christian to Minister..

My agenda was to walk from Blacktown railway station to the hospital. However just as I was getting off the train, I saw my adopted parents. That is, not having my own parents now to pray for since their death in 2010s, and having known both the old couple's  medical conditions  having been their interpreter for a number of their medical appointments, I have been praying for them.

 Inang M exclaimed, "So are you the one?" I said laughing a bit, Yes, Ï--I--I-- am the one ( saying this in a singsong which I believe made a Westerner who was listening to me talk at one time to someone asked which language I was speaking and eventually commented my native tongue was a beautiful language!)

The last few times the old couple had their medical appointments, I was not their interpreter, but my sister Daisy, instead, who told me seriously or maybe jokingly, that they now like her more than me (lol!).

After I said I would be their interpreter this time, Inang M immediately said that we---Tatang T, herself and I could all take the bus together to the hospital. I replied I was walking to the hospital and explained walking would lower my blood sugar level. I added too that we all must have missed, anyway,  the early bus to the hospital and since buses comes every hour it would be a long wait.

Inang M suggested then I could go by the taxi with them. I reiterated I really wanted to walk. Tatang T. reprimanded his wife and said, "She already told you she wanted to walk."

Thinking it might cost them heaps to take the taxi, ie recalling it cost me $36 to go from my house to Blacktown Hospital at one stage, I glanced at my watch and told them, they might be able to catch the bus if they were going to catch it from the railway station, instead of going all the way to the Bus Interchange at Westpoint. I also told them I would walk them to the particular bus stand.

When we got to bus stand 7, Inang M persuaded me even strongly to go with them in the bus. She said she was wondering if Regional Dialysis Centre is in the newly constructed building on the hospital grounds.

Having heard this and thinking they might not find their way to the Centre, just like  that Sri-Lankan couple whom I came across during one of my assignments and who told me they had been walking around in circles in the hospital grounds and still couldn't find their way, I told her finally I would go with them in the bus.

I could still recall how tired and exasperated the elderly Sri Lankan couple then looking for the Diabetic Education Centre in spite of having asked for directions from several people. Thinking I might not give or say to them the right directions, I walked the old people to the Centre for which they could not stop thanking me. I  could not stop thanking God, too-- I was of help to this old people---thinking in retrospect it would surely break my heart if the same thing happen to my own parents.

I took my adopted parents to the Regional Dialysis Centre and sat them in the waiting room. I told them I would come back after an hour as that was my booking assignment.

I walked to the Main Entrance of the hospital deliberating in my head whether I was going to do pastoral visits as I still had an hour before my work.

First things first, though, having had breakfast five hours ago and knowing I was due to have my morning tea before my blood sugar level drops, I walked to the Staff Dining Area . As I was savouring my bland home made pan bread to which I spread Nutella, anyway, I was asking God if I should do pastoral visits. My other agenda then, after taking that walk to the hospital, was to go to the library, not to read medical books but to read the book Germany I brought with me and was due to be renewed.

It was not in my agenda to do pastoral visits today so I did not pray for this last night. As a broken record I am oftentimes, I kept on asking God about this as I was having morning tea.

Having done pastoral visits in the past before I became busy with interpreting assignments in other places, I equipped myself with the conviction and confidence coming from God ---and most particularly with prayers. In my experience, it is not that easy to pick, walk and talk with patients who obviously are not well and maybe undergoing tremendous trauma, stress and sickness in their physical or mental states. Well, I told to myself I was like 98.99% well (ie not coughing much anymore), so I could definitely visit patients. Also, so I would not be challenged or struggle so much, I could go through the list of the patients in the hospital and just visit patients from my own religion. As I always make it a habit to make use of my time wisely, profitably and hopefully pleasing to God, I said a little prayer and told myself finally,  I would do pastoral visits.

I came across in the list of Seventh Day Adventists patients a name of a patient who is a member of the SDA church my Mum and I are members. I eased myself and said "Ah, there you go, you won't have to struggle much. After all, this old woman is not only someone you know but someone you always talked to, joked with and prayed with ( and sometimes even sat with) heaps of times. Well, I have had some challenging visits where the relatives of the patients were kind of calculating and sort of examining, if not scrutinising me. And this really made me feel uncomfortable, somewhat scared that sometimes I felt like ....hmmm...I wanted to just say goodbye if not evaporate in the air, even if I had not gone far, supposed to be, in ministering to them. These were the times I really did not care much who were in the lists and just visited patients at random, thinking to myself it does not really matter whether they are Baptists, Methodists, Catholics, Muslims or atheists.

When I got to the Ward B45 and went to the bed of my dear old church mate, I saw that there were some Health Care Providers (HCP) attending to her. So I visited other patients in the ward. I spoke briefly to two patients who were not so responsive-- because one does not speak English much and the second one was so emotional that she would not want to talk as of yet. So I walked along the corridor of the ward eyeing as the Spirit led, which patient I was going to visit. I finally spotted a man whom I'd placed to be in his early 70s. After I got his consent for the visit, I learned he was from Poland. We had a pretty good twelve minute-chat until a HCP came, which was a signal of course that I had to go.

I went back to visit my dear old church mate. As she was in an infection control area, I put on a pair of gloves, a gown and a mask. I was most eager to see her because since I came back to church after my mother passed away, I have not really seen her except for her name as listed among the members who need prayers. Just as I was ready to go in, a group of HCP headed by apparently by a Consultant, was approaching to go in her room. Oops! Not again!

So I took off all my infection control attire and threw them all in the bin and proceeded to my favourite Ward B35 to do more visits. My favourite receptionist from whom I always asked permission for pastoral visits was not around. Hmm.., maybe she was also on holidays. So I jsut spoke to anyone who was at the reception area.

I sanitised my hands as usual and off I walked through the corridor of the ward hunting for another patient to visit. I saw a woman whom I would similarly placed to be in her early or mid 70s and whom I learned later was Polish. Ah, Ï said to myself it is Poland Day for me. That's great! Having just visited a Polish patient who was gentle and soft spoken, the nocturne in E flat Major in my head was suddenly now overshadowed by the introductory piano bangs of Polanaise in A Major. Why, because as soon as I walked in the ward, with her wide opened and staring eyes, she told me she was cold and asked me to get her boiling water. I asked a nurse that just passed by to give this patient more blankets to which the nurse responded promptly coming back with a blanket to wrap around this patient seated on the chair. The patient asked the nurse to give her boiling water to which she also responded promptly.

I got the consent from the patient for a chat and just as she was about to sip the boiling water I emphatically told her not yet---as I know, the water was truly boiling hot and told her to wait till it cooled down a bit.

Our talk revolved around her country and Chopin. She herself used to play the piano and she told me her son at the age of 7 won a piano competition. I said WoW. As we talked however, I was really getting anxious she might scald herself as she kept on pushing in and out her bedside table, and so I kept on putting away a bit further the cup of boiling water.

Even if I was not glancing at my watch I knew I would have to go soon to go back to the Regional Dialysis Centre to work. I was saved by her Physiotherapist and told the patient I would have to go. Having said this, she held out her two hands to me which I held with my two hands, too. She squeezed my hands hard and asked me, "You'll come back again?" I said ÿes

As I sanitized my hand before walking out of the ward my spirit sank. I knew in my heart of hearts, I was not 100% sure of being able to come back. I asked God for forgiveness and said a prayer for all the patients I visited today.

Food Glorious Christmas Foods!

This is the title of one song we loved to sing as children after having watched the movie Óliver.  My sister Daisy even has an album on facebook with the same title.  I thought I better write also my thoughts about food.  After all it is Christmas season when every family gather together on a table to share meals.  What sort of meals, anyway?

I remember as children, we somehow had beautiful foods during  Noche Buena (translated literally as Good Night from Spanish to English, but words we used to refer to our Christmas Eve Celebration).


What I enjoyed most then was halaya ube  as pictured here (the picture extracted from Foodipino as I don't have any image of it simply because we don't normally have this now on our Noche Buena table).  I think this is one of the most delicious Filo food and it is fabulous even as topping on ice cream.  When we all visited Lola, our paternal grandmother each Christmas Day, I , and I believed all my siblings as well, always looked forward then to having halaya because our Lola cooked it the best and beyond compare-- not discrediting of course my big sisters who laboured so hard in the kitchen to serve this each Christmas Eve Celebration.


Another food I miss now during our Noche Buena was the Christmas chocolate  which my mother bought from the market to make us all hot chocolate drink. This chocolate was special because it isn't the instant Cadbury or Milo or Sustagen chocolate drink. As mother cooked Christmas chocolate,  Nimrod, primarily as well as all of us, could not help but savour in our nostrils its sweet aroma that filled our entire house.  I showed here a picture of a cup of chocolate which I extracted also from the internet and which was labelled cacao.  Am not quite sure whether what my mother bought from the market was called cacao.  As a kid, my only concern  then was to eat and enjoy food glorious Christmas foods.

The third food I also missed even  to this day was the chicken salad prepared Filipino way as pictured on the right (also an extract from the internet).  Of all the images, I think this one resembled what my mother and later on my big sisters prepared then.  Of course there were also other goodies like the chestnuts my father usually brought home and the queso de bola or chicken sandwiches our big sisters made. My siblings and I truly could not stop eating.  We loved to the last bits all our Christmas foods!!!




As a finale,  my siblings and I usually had this fruit salad (pictured here from our 2014 Noche Buena).  This salad is not quite the same as the ordinary fruit salad here in Sydney because it is rich, supersweet and delicious just like the usual Filipino fruit salad. Thanks to my sister Cyn who should be an expert in cooking and preparing Filipino foods, after graduating from the university with a food and nutrition degree.

My siblings and I grew up with the foods pictured above as highlights of our Christmas Eve Celebration year after year, not to mention the other foods  such as   ham,  which my father usually got as a gift from work, the chicken adobo cooked by our mother, should we want to eat rice instead of or in addition to bread,  and the hot chicken macaroni soup which our mother also cooked for us.  As December had always been a cooler month in our native country, the soup and the hot chocolate drink were beautifully suitable to warm also our hearts.  Praise be to God for our parents who made our Christmases memorable and beautiful for us year after year!


Truly, I miss the simplicity of the Christmas foods we had in the past back in our own country of origin.  Now,  that we all have migrated to an affluent country, it is truly amazing that our Noche Buena table has been like those pictured in magazines....however, I still miss the old, golden days of halaya, chicken salad and Christmas chocolate.   I am not complaining!!! What I am trying to get across here is there is nothing wrong to have all the festive and elaborate Noche Buena but I really believe, it is always beautiful to go back to your beginnings---once in awhile. 

Below are some photos of our Christmas season's celebration here in Sydney.

Finally, and it is worth mentioning, the most important feature and symbolic of our Christmas celebrations from time immemorial has always been the cake with the inscription on it  "Happy Birthday Jesus." 

After all, Christmas is not about food but about Jesus--God's Greatest Gift to mankind and the Bread of Life.

Life was beautiful then....and I miss it!

Am sitting in this floral chair by the glass door that opens to the courtyard.  This is now my favourite part in my house. Here I can relax and reflect, and sometimes step back in time...

 

Yes, I had found rest--finally from the hustle and bustle of my many roles in life.  This began when I looked after my elderly and sick mother on a full time basis and somewhat seemed to have ended  since she passed away.

 

No more striving. No more frustration. No more tension. No more drama.  Why? When I migrated to Australia, I found it not an easy road to establish my science career. No, had it not been through God's grace.

 

I was ready then to start again at the bottom when I got called to work as a clerk at the Maritime Services Board. Just as I was about to accept this job offer, however,  I was offered a scholarship to do a Ph D.

 

There was tenure in the clerk position compared with the scholarship offer.  My brother Nimrod, however, put strongly to me the options:1) would I want to start at the bottom as clerk 1 and go my way up to senior clerk position or 2) wouldn't I want to continue my way up to my already established science career.

 

I certainly chose what was closer to my heart...and the rest was history.

 

As I have learned over the years, however, life is constantly changing.

 

I left my science career and became a carer of my mother and at the same time became a contractor court and health care interpreter,  besides doing at times translation and voice over taping jobs.

 

I was happy then---to subsume my academic ambition in the priceless privilege of looking after THE one person, aside my father, who put me in the first place, to go up in the ladder of academic success.

 

Now I am alone in this chair where I feel sad and  at the same time find solace.

 

The sun's about to die.  Around me is peace and quiet.  I am listening, yes to the sound of silence...

 

I wish I could hear once more my mother's loving voice.  I wish I could hear her sweetly call me "Anak,"  just like she did one time when I snoozed in the two-seater sofa while she sat on the armchair next to it.  She said in the vernacular, "It's good you had a snooze...were you comfortable lying on that sofa?" Her voice sounded satisfied and happy.  She knew I was a one-man band. She knew I was working nonstop around the house and garden. She knew also I always slept late.  Yes, it was good for me to have a snooze then.

 

As I slid the door along the track to close it before the sun finally goes down, I could still feel on my skin the summer-scented air through the screen door. I settled once more on the chair and looked outside in a meditation mood...

 

I used to be inspired greatly by the various textures and colours of my garden. In my vivid imagination, I tried to picture the rustic romance of countryside I was hoping to achieve ultimately as I continued to garden.  I reminisced the simplicity of the past summers my Mum and I had.

 

Ah, I didn't realise my coffee had gone cold. Suddenly it came to my mind the hot pancakes I used to make for Mum and I as we sipped the time away.  It was like ages ago since I had not made pancakes. I have just been eating cereals if not sandwiches or fruits.  I lost the interest in cooking. I do not have to cook so much now. My medical conditions are not as critical and complicated as Mum's.  Whatever nutrients  I lack from what I eat  now, I supplement by drinking up two glasses of  hospital grade Sustagen I buy from the chemist.

 

Just as I about to go up the four steps to go the kitchen to make pumpkin flower patties with beaten eggs to bring to work tomorrow, I spotted the different colours of geranium which I snipped from the garden early in the morning.  I used to bring inside the house single or massive blooms from the garden for Mum to enjoy in the night. I still do it now in my loving memory of her.

 

Yes, life was beautiful then.. and I miss it!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Memoirs--Friday Sunsets and Tatang

(The following is  a page in my record of Our Life Together as Blanco Family  which I started to write in the early 1990s.  It is my pleasure to share and write about my beloved grandfather who was a vital influence to me in reading the Bible regularly. The image of him reading the Bible day in and day out has been permanently imprinted in my mind).

O

n Friday sunsets, Tatang, my maternal grandfather,  usually gathered all of us in the spacious living room of my aunt whom my siblings and I fondly called Ima.  There we all prayed and sang hymns before and after Tatang's exposition on the Bible. After the closing prayer, we all kissed the hands of my grandparents, uncles, aunties and our respective parents.

Tatang and Inang

 

This gathering was always followed by feasting on the long white covered dulang [table] of native foods and cakes and lengthy talks by all the adults.
 

We could not appreciate then the beauty of this gathering.  It was only when Daisy and I became SDA in the later years that we were able to understand its meaning.  Tatang was observing the seventh day Sabbath, the day which is meant to be a memorial between God and mankind during Creation.

Tatang was a devout SDA.  He believed in Jesus Christ as Saviour and Lord, whom we now know to be the prime reason for our celebrations. He read the Bible day and night.  This was a common knowledge to all of us.  We always saw him on the rocking chair at the balcony of Ima’s house reading the Bible.  He had done this while his hair was black till it became salt and pepper and then all grey.  He went to church every Saturday.
 

Tatang abounded in good works.  He healed people with asthma, muscular pain and pilay [dislocated joints] by his gift of hilot [this term sort of equivalent to physiotherapy].  This good deed became known from people within or outside the neighbourhood.  Not surprisingly thence, people came to his house to seek healing.
 

Tatang did not accept payment from any of the people who came to him.  He always quoted in the vernacular the Bible verse “freely you have received, freely give.” However, these people came back, oftentimes, with fruits and vegetables to give Tatang.  It was funny, though, a few of them also came to ask Tatang for our home-grown vegetables and fruits.

Tatang actively served God then as elder in SDA church in Lerma. Caloocan City.  This church also had a school where few of my siblings and I went at some stage. 
 

Tatang was also the foreman during the building of the Philippine Union College at Baesa, Novaliches [now called Adventist University of the Philippines but relocated in Silang Cavite].
 

Unlike the overly fanatic SDAs, however Tatang was not absolutely an Ellen G. White enthusiast.  As his English skills was not as fluent as his Spanish, he asked Kapatid na Kiko {Brother Kiko] to translate parts of the writings of Ellen G. White.
 

To other people in the neighbourhood, Tatang was a man with exemplary character.  He and Inang begot Tata ⁴⁴Doming, Kaka⁴⁵ Pacing, Tata Pepe, Tata Berting, my mother, Tata Juan and Ima.  To their children, Tatang was a godly, loving, caring and respectable father. For us his grandchildren, he was simply our loving grandfather.  Rarely did we see him get angry.  Instead of getting angry, he read the appropriate Bible verse in disciplining us.