- A Birthday, a Fire, and a Swim

A Birthday Party

Lyn and I got an invitation from our landlady Sarah, a cultured and distinguished Filipina, to the 75^th birthday celebration for her husband Eric, a lawyer originally from Switzerland. Their elegant home is off the national highway a few kilometers past Zamboanguita on a narrow concrete road about one kilometer and then follow more like a footpath for another kilometer to their mansion. Right beside the ocean, it was an elaborately catered event for about 70 guests with lechon baboy (whole roasted pig—the ultimate in feasting) and other traditional Filipino cuisine served outdoors. There was a 7 person professional band with an elaborate sound system for entertainment. Sarah asked us to sit at her table and treated us like royalty. There were a number of guests from Europe, but we were the only ones from America. 

Setting up the tables

Almost ready

I think my favorite part of the evening was when the band played and sang an old love song, and Eric and Sarah danced alone on the tiled dance floor under the stars and the swaying coconut trees.

Sarah told us the story of one time when they were living in Switzerland, and she was home cooking dried fish. The local police came to their home and arrested her. The neighbors had smelled the dried fish and complained to the police that she had a dead body in her apartment. When they released her, they told her she could never do that again.

A Fire in the Neighborhood

A few days later we had a huge fire in our neighborhood. Apparently someone left something cooking when they went to visit a neighbor. The firemen came and rerouted all the traffic from the Valencia Highway through our narrow street, but there was very little water available to put out the fire. Nobody died, but thirteen houses were destroyed; thirteen families were left homeless, most with just the clothes on their backs. Everything else was destroyed.

From the highway side the next day
with Boy, who is also barangay tanod (police)

We took what money we could and bought outfits and underwear for some of the victims. It will be a long recovery road for most of those families.

Swimming with Friends

One day we decided to invite our next door neighbor Ariel and his family, and our friends Boy and Lourdes from down the street to go with us. When Lourdes first introduced her youngest daughter to us, Ludy, at first glance appeared to me to be a typical high school teenager until I found out that she had four daughters, the oldest of which were 14 year old twins.

Boy in the hot pool at Lo Kadyo's with
Lyn and Lourdes in the background

Boy and Lourdes with the twins and the youngest, Princess,
in the hot pool

We rented a shelter for the fifteen of us, and Lyn, Wendie, and Lourdes prepared a magnificent lunch for us. We enjoyed a memorable time for over four hours there.