Fruit Trees and Neighbors

Avocados from a friend's tree down the street...

Rambutan from next door neighbor's tree...

  A mango tree I planted five years ago bore its first fruits; a ten year old pomelo tree I brought along in a drum finally has fruit growing; a guyabano also hanging from the tree; finally tasted the atis before the bats beat me to them (they're sweet!); and a papaya tree is bearing lots of red lady papayas.

  Cooked Thai Tom Kha Gai for the first time with the galangal and lemongrass from my garden. Galangal/lengkwas/langkawas/kha which came from my Indonesian neighbor's garden, and originally from her tutor's Bicol hometown. 

   It doesn't take much, really, the soil here keeps us happy.

   On a sad note, I am mourning, I am delayed in mourning the loss of a lady I befriended three years ago. She who sold me my poinsettia three Christmases ago; from whom I purchased pots of Gynura Precumbens (they call it Ashitaba though that's different) to give as Christmas presents.  She was a cancer survivor, and she was not only a retailer of herbs and plants, but also an advocate of natural food, raw diet.  She not only sold the plants, she made friends with her customers and was sincere in her efforts.  She and her sister sold plants at Solenad, as a test for the future area of the mall. She was looking forward to the opening of the "Market" area of Solenad, where they were offered space.  Now, that space is open, and I looked for her but she was not there.  I was happy to have had a good conversation with her sister. But allowed myself a moment to remember her.

   

Paseo

     So this is what they've done to that first, original row of buildings in what is now Paseo de Santa Rosa...

     I had wrongly assumed another building would rise in this spot, after its tenants were moved to other parts of the center.  Instead, I found grass, sky...and a good playground set.

    Perhaps management realized people were skipping this area for Nuvali?

    I got a little bit sentimental. On this spot stood the original strip with the Safari car rental office, Japanese restaurants, and a few offices. I really wish I had photos of the place almost twenty years ago.

    This was where we would stop for breakfast, brunch or lunch, on the way to Tagaytay. This was back when--and I am sure I have said this before--we would take this route up, but not down if it was too late in the evening.  The Japanese restaurants served the Japanese men from the surrounding Japanese companies. They still are around--Umenoya and Ippon Yari, but in other locations.  Pancake House is still there, in the building pictured on the right.

     By the time we moved here, the center of this strip was occupied by bars...it was pretty seedy actually, especially when they opened by twilight and on Wednesday and Friday and Saturday evenings.  It was actually a relief that they knocked this down.    

    Frankly, I find that this commercial area is confused, confusing, and really, not maximized. Well, I don't know about their profits, but from a customers' standpoint...it could be better.  It is too late in the evening for me to expound on this. I'll just leave it at that.  

     

Last of the land

May I selfishly say that I hope they (the owners) never do anything with that grassland? Ah but it is inevitable.

I do keep repeating this.

What a depressing blog!

Houses Robbed in the Area Again

These were taken last month, when the PNP, the Fire Department, Emergency and Rescue Services were stationed for about a week or maybe more at the intersection of the Sta. Rosa Tagaytay Road and Nuvali blvd.

They even set up white emergency tents behind these canopies.  Maybe they conducted demonstrations, I don't know.

It was a bit of a comfort back then, to know they existed "in the neighborhood".

Interestingly, on the same week of their presence, that road where you see cars coming from the south (Tagaytay), saw the same type of accident on different days.  Specifically, I saw on different days, cars at the front of the line, bumped from behind.  

My theory is that they were trying to beat the light, but made sudden stops upon seeing the many policemen and women under the tents, thus getting bumped from behind by the next cars.  Quite plausible, considering the mentality of most drivers here huh?

Seriously,  there have been numerous and varied vehicular accidents within this intersection and until a few meters away.  Many involved were motorcycles.

But my title talks about recent crimes, as in this week.  A new house in Santierra in Nuvali was robbed and the robbers shot at security guards.   The news as well as our own village's circular states nearby villages have had robbery incidents as well.  Again.  

Still on Silang

I stopped between mountains to admire this bridge. Nothing special except this road from the bayan ng Silang to bgy. Inchican's Cardiac Trail, goes up and down hills and through forests. 

Along the Sta. Rosa-Tagaytay highway, just past Sta. Rosa Heights, is Malaga Tiles' very attractive, simple, almost easy to miss Spanish storefront.  And these boys were setting up the crab stall.  Where do these crabs come from?

To the Hills of Silang I Go

Just in the next province, but still with more of that provincial character, many orchards, farms and hills...is Silang. 

The Alta Veranda de Tibig in bgy. Tibig, is an event (mostly weddings) venue in the middle of fields along the road from bgy. Inchican's Cardiac Trail.  See the wires?  Those are power lines, and to the immediate right stands an electric transmission tower.  Pretty house, ugly power tower.

An aside...it's a good thing this is just an event venue, and not a permanent residence.  There are studies that have linked residing (sleeping, living) next to such transmission towers to cancer cases, and even autism.

The left is a big church being constructed.  Very enterprising, indeed.

Alta Veranda de Tibig

Another road toward the Silang town proper but from bgy. Lumil, has the Saint Anthony de Padua church, which I blogged about when it was new around two or three years ago

I passed that church again and the area around it has come alive. That church has seen many weddings by now.  The idea has caught on...

Still on the Cardiac Trail/Alcalde road

View of Westgrove homes and Santa Rosa from the peak of the trail.

Here is the church of Silang.  It is right next to the Municipal Hall, in what is the town's plaza.  Locals along the road point to the corner Jollibee as the landmark.

Locals, especially tricycle drivers, point to Bgy. Tibig's Alcalde road to Cardiac Trail as "the road to Nuvali". This is mainly because this does lead out to the South Forbes and Westgrove's shared road, which turns right to Nuvali blvd and left to the Laguna blvd.  That road crosses a river, a real border separating Silang from Sta. Rosa.  

  

There Goes The Sky...

   Bitterly saying goodbye to my wide expanse of sky, with all the buildings being constructed.  Electric poles and wires are ugly enough. Shall this, the Sta. Rosa-Tagaytay road, become the next Alabang-Zapote road?  ...and I mean that in a negative way. 

That shop..the big guys, with cheap China furniture. Killer of quaint little village shops that sell local craft. 

   To be fair, I shall try to take photos of the opposite side to these, the new cinema building at the Solenad, Nuvali, and express sadness as well.

So it is another shopping mall.  This will no longer be a place that will interest balikbayans from the US.

    So much for open air shopping.  Anyway, the shops are nothing special. Just more of the same from Metro Manila.  The famed "outlets" in Paseo de Santa Rosa are no longer a draw, either.  New ones have opened, some have closed.


    As for restaurants...still a bit tricky out here, to gauge what will make it and what won't. Sadly, not many special places to eat as inside BF Homes Paranaque's holes-in-the-wall joints and new interiors.  Still the same old fast food joints raking it in.

   

M for Mt. Makiling, the view from here. That view will soon be covered, for sure.
That M (or the bee), in anytown, Philippines...anytown, Asia. No place is sacred.

   Apologies for sounding like Eeyore. Too depressing. That I am.  All because I am losing sky.