Now a days, it is wiser to have a  catered wedding reception than cook at home for the guests. A week ago was my older cousin’s wedding and after the wedding ceremony the reception follows at Hiland Beach Resort. It was my first time to visit the place but I have heard already that the resort is quite small to accommodate a lot of people and it was indeed very small for hundreds of guests but quite big enough for more than 50 people; the reception hall wasn’t well ventilated  there were only few stand fan around that the guest can’t eat properly and enjoys the cold food in the table,that’s right the food in the table were already cold because I guess they were served in the table before the guests arrives since the serving of sweet and sour meat balls was already being feasted by black ants who are known to infest sugar jar in most homeowner’s table, we have to return that particular food to the food server.

The groom family was the one responsible for the reception venue since the bride was the one responsible for other wedding details, church and etc. Anyway, Hiland Beach Resort reception hall was too  narrow to move around freely, the tables and chairs were too near into each other that it was even hard to get out if you seated in the middle of the long table. I think their yard and car park was more spacious than the reception hall.

The more I look at it the hall looks like a bigger breakfast hall for a hotel. Anyway, there was plenty of food left in the table I think because it was too uncomfortable to eat, it was quite hot and it is hard to move around with their table arrangement shown above and below.

What is also disturbing is the column in the middle of the reception hall that if you are seated farther back you can’t see what’s happening at the front where the groom and bride and their respective parents were seating. There’s not much space for the newly wed to make the first toast and traditional cake cutting.

Hiland Beach Resort has a longer hall but not spacious enough, it is a good wedding reception venue if you only have a small guests but if you are planning to invite 200 guests think twice about it. The lightning wasn’t that great too where the newly wed couple was seated, it is quite dim I wasn’t sure if it was because of wedding theme or simply because there was no enough light coming from the outside. The food was nice and tasted good the only down side they were not warm when we have them.

Wedding reception wasn’t the only one being catered at Hiland Beach Resort, they also accept bookings for birthday, school acquaintance, reunion parties and other special event you would like to be celebrated with your friends and families, their beach shore is ideal for beach wedding as well. You can reserve a booking at –

HILAND BEACH RESORT
Brgy. Budiong, Odiongan, Romblon
Facebook page – https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100005710756471
Mobile No. –  09395477009 or 09219908806.

Disclosure: This is NOT a sponsored post. Above written post was my own personal opinion and experience and might be different from yours.

Pets are like family members; we cared and love them unconditionally. So when they get sick and hurt we also felt worried and disturbed. It was just less than a month ago when we brought two kittens home from Manila, they are slightly bred compare to local cats.

It was very heart breaking to see your pet lying in the ground of a private road after being hit and smashed by a heartless truck driver. It hurts to see how the life of your pet being robbed in front of your eyes. What is more disturbing is when you confront the driver and instead of being sorry, he just treats it as nothing happened with a smile on his face as in there is no remorse at all. How conceited!

Our house is situated in a lot owned by my grandfather; it was divided into 8 siblings. Few of my aunts build their house at the back which is a vacant and unproductive field before houses were built.

When construction materials are being delivered, the trucks go inside since the road is wider to accommodate a truck; the front lot was not yet fully occupied unlike the field part. It was the construction delivery people’s responsibility to check if there’s dog, cat or kids around because it was a private property where kids sometimes play and run and dogs rest and sleep but they failed to do it that day, was informed by a young cousin once removed that happened to be in our house after being sent to have a documents to be photocopied that one of their delivery team went down and only removed the ball in site but didn’t seen our black kitten on the way and it happened. I couldn’t say it was an accident because it happened because of their carelessness.

Seeing my kitten lying in the ground, with stomach parts out made me shiver, I felt like crying but there is no tears flowing in my eyes. I was shocked, it was just minutes ago when I fed him with other kittens, it was only few minutes ago when I saw him alive trying to get well, he is a bit sick after I fed them with sardines in can since we are not able to buy them fish. Yeah, right our cats has separate viand from us, they have their own fish. I also bought milk for my kittens and even feed them pellets since they eat it as well and seeing your kitten died because of someone’s carelessness is not easy to bear.

My sister cried her heart out, and cannot control her feelings especially when she saw the driver smiling his heart contents after the truck went out in the main road. I felt the same way upon hearing it while digging for my kitten’s resting place. We may be at fault for letting the kittens out but it was a private property where not every day a truck or car passed by and the dirt road was situated between two houses. It was unnecessary and heartless of the truck driver to ask us to talk to the person were construction materials were delivered. It sounds like he wanted us to blame their customer, isn’t it? It is their own responsibility; they should inform us or home owners that they are coming in to deliver something so at least their’ pets could be put kept to safety. He should at least felt sorry and show a remorse for what happened but he didn’t not, such a heartless person indeed!

With this incident, I hope other people are considerate of pet owner’s feelings; pets are like kids too and should not be treated as just a plain animal without feelings. They might be just an animal to their eyes but it was someone we cared so much, a pet we love. +

What you do to others comes around; life is like a wheel after all!

The other day, while busy into something I overheard my mother and sister talking about finding two little birds in my shoes and planning to give them to my 3 year old second cousin once removed. I immediately finished what I am doing before my sister can go out to hand the birds, I disagree with my mother’s plan and reasoned a lot that birds has family too; it has parents, brothers and sisters. It was not a good idea to play with the birds because it has feelings too and they should be freed and not to be put in cage.

I was told that they are pest in the rice field and there are a lot of them, I could free them but I have to take charge of looking after the birds in the rice fields or even so I freed them our cat will eventually catch and killed these tiny birds. I am firmed with my decision so I didn’t hand them to my sister; I took them to take photos. I put them in our window but as the stronger bird trying to fly, it fell outside so I went out to pick it that’s where my father saw me and I told him my ordeal, he disagree too of giving them to a little kid to play or to be caged, he also want to free the birds.

After a while, I went to our roof top and put them in a place where our cat couldn’t reach and then closed the door that goes upstairs, when I returned to check the birds a bird fly away and one bird was left so I went down to bring water and rice to feed the remaining bird. Hoping the second bird can learn how to fly sooner and be safe.

Chicken curry is one the Filipino food I missed living abroad, when you live in a country which is not tropical like Philippines, coconut is not easy to find. Although there is some coconut milk in can but the effect and result isn’t the same of fresh coconut milk. They are tending to be more oily and sweeter, it looks like they are more appropriate to use in cooking sweetened rice or rice cakes.

The other day, my mother asked us what we would like to eat so I suggest chicken cooked in coconut milk or chicken curry. It was been a long time since I had it, so we bought chicken and a piece of coconut.

Chicken curry can be cooked in variety of ways or with different ingredients but normally in the province chicken curry is cooked with raw papaya.

We travel to the nearest city so my younger sister can take an exam for work purposes. After the exam we headed to Manila, we stayed in a relative’s house for few days. They have large cats and kittens since they have happened to have a breed from their former cats, and we are given kittens to bring home. We choose to bring the two black kittens because the third kitten is still untamed and it might create trouble when it is accidentally gone out of the box.

I was able to bring the kittens without problem in the bus and ferry; I made sure they are well ventilated and feed. They are so adorable, I have to tie one of them on their first day at home because they might wander around and the surrounding is still unfamiliar to them and I am afraid to lost them both.

One of the popular snack foods in the Philippines that you can also find being sold in the street during the afternoon is Camote cue, deep fried sweet potatoes with caramelized sugar which is either white or brown sugar.

During the afternoon, there is someone selling snacks around the neighbourhood but there are days that she failed to show up so we decided to prepare our own afternoon snack. We bought sweet potatoes in the public market when it was market day; it is a day where most farmers are selling their fresh crops and vegetables in cheap prices.

Sweet potatoes are sold per heap or pile, each pile cost P20.00. So much cheaper than being sold in Korea eh, when we are living in Korea we always buy sweet potatoes when we shopped because it is part of my husband’s diet food and it normally cost around P200-300 pesos per small bag.

Ingredients:

Sweet potatoes, brown or white sugar and oil

Cooking camote is very simple like how simple the ingredients are, you just need to peel the sweet potatoes and cut them into small round pieces and deep fried them and when they are little brown add some sugar and mixed them carefully and cooked them until the sugar is caramelized. It was best to serve with cold soft drinks to drink.

Tip: Banana Cue is cooked the same way!

It is already summer months in Philippines and barbecue and such are becoming popular in the streets. It was been a week ago since a neighbour sells barbecue, it was hit among everybody. We bought few sticks the other day since we are craving for something savoury.

We had neck and head barbecue, it cost P10.00 per stick. She also has some other stuff like chicken feet, pork belly, hot dogs and etc. But when I showed my husband a pic of what we have bought and eaten, he said it was the food they feed to dogs and cats (lol). It must be to Western countries but to Asia they are the type of foods that are gastronomically delicious to empty stomach.

Barbecues sold in the stick are most like by Filipinos when they are drinking with friends, or eating them in the streets.

Wandering around Calatrava didn’t take that long we are still up for adventure so we decided to stop in town of San Andres to look around; I have been in this town long time ago during a summer camp of Baptist Youths and San Andres is one of the town you have to pass by going to San Agustin.

We went around the town and took some rest in their bay area below the eagle statue, and then headed to their town hall. Since it was weekend nobody is around, we are all starving. Instead of looking for a restaurant to eat we have decided to go home quickly and cooked. Eating out might be a good idea but kind of expensive and we can’t eat all we wanted on the same price if we bought something in the market to cook.

The day is perfect for travelling, the sky is blue and the sun is not showing so my mother asked us again if we want to do road trip. It seems I influenced her for being a traveller huh?

We decided to visit Calatrava, a fifth class municipality in Romblon, we already passed this town when we went to San Agustin. We first stopped at their Municipal Fishport, went inside and took some pictures. We can clearly see the shoe island inside the port which is quite nice, I have been hearing about this island from my classmate’s long time ago, how they swim and have fun. The port is quite different from the port I have remembered when I am still in secondary high school where we had a field trip in this town and had a lunch in Lapus-Lapus Beach. If you will ask me when that was, well it was 14 years ago, over a decade. Hehe

We really didn’t take long, we headed to the nearby sea wall where there’s a marble statue of fisherman’s family and their town name in marble stone as well and then headed up to their town hall. As it was Saturday, non-school and office day, town was half empty. I was glad when I found the concrete boat I have been looking for, it was different from I remember over a decade ago maybe because it was painted now and the park around it changed a lot. It was one of the highlight of our field trip those days because of the love team that had been developed and non-stop teasing for our gay classmate involved.

Calatrava is a quite a beautiful and clean town despite of being a small one and I won’t mind coming back again, hopefully next time I could visit their water falls and beaches, since it was only a short visit and the sun is starting to come out we headed to another town nearby.

Visiting Ferrol didn’t take long as we expected, we are still looking for adventure. It is still early to go home so we decided to continue our road trip to Sta. Fe, a 5^th class municipality in Romblon, my mother and sister has been there many times when our father is working at one of its islets. They will tell me endless stories how beautiful was it, how they rode a banca or pump boat to cross the water and etc.

Listening to their stories made me excited, so despite the fact that some of the road is rough I didn’t agree with them going back to Odiongan when the road already felt endless. My reason is we are already there and why not continue further, it turns out they have never been to downtown Sta. Fe just a part of it. Some of the roads are not just rough; it is also an endless curve going up and down in short mountainous.

We only met few bikes along the way including a foreigner who is in between of smiling and not, I was startled why, it turns out the two people in front of me didn’t bother to smile or nod because the sun is toward us, the loose soil and the truck that is just behind him, well I don’t know if I smile either since my attention was focus in snapping photos along the way. Sorry, maybe next time!

Anyway my companions don’t want to continue again after we passed the intersection going to Mati not only because of the rough road but because we didn’t see people or bike along the away, it was a very silent trip all we can hear is our bike and birds. It is sort of secluded area if you will asked me, but I am already decided to continue and follow where the road will take us, after some time we saw two kids walking home from school so we stopped and asked how far is it to town of Sta. Fe, the kids told us it is still far like going back to Brgy. Manhac of Looc, my mother was so decided to return home so my sister turn around the bike and went back where we came from, I felt very disappointed. I told them that distance for kids are not the same as the distance for an adult, along the way going back to Brgy. Manhac we met a local in a motorbike and we asked how far it is to downtown Sta. Fe, we are told it is not that far, it is already downtown after we descended in the mountains so we turn around and decided to continue our trip.

It was the right decision; the view at the foot of the mountain wowed me. It was very scenic, the sea is marvellous. We passed by their port where a boat just arrived, it probably came from Boracay. We drive around the small town and stopped by at their park and town hall. We didn’t take long because my companions are on a hurry, it is like we came and then go.

We stopped by in Looc town before heading home; we went to their public market to look for smoked fish which is cheaper compare to those you can buy in Odiongan market.