a relative world

If there's one thing I learned about time, it will be the ebb and flow of life. Although winter was not as hard this year, my spring is momentarily greeted again by bouts of summer souvenirs. Some posts ago, I was being pensive about finding home but these days, it almost feels like one. A premature summer lunch at Cathy's terrace.
It is so amazing how a simple detail of our everyday routine can actually make us fly back to a certain memory, or more to a particular feeling. And being transplanted literally means to temporarily put aside habits along that isolated part of your past life. To form new ones & embrace change. But somehow we inertly revert to old habits, only in a new environement, assuring us of that somewhat sense of belongingness.

I still sometimes wake up in awe, asking myself if I am really here in France. But there are moments before going to sleep, when the music from our room's clock-radio brings me back to my childhood room. The soft rain these days remind me of bed-weathers. Scooters of our barrio's kids roaring like tricycles. The car's open windows in the highway like those many roadtrips back home. Summer will always be my favorite season.
And who would have thought that our little barrio will have a total of

four Filipinas? Two here in Carry & the other two in our neighboring barrio, Ensues la Redonne. Even if Cathy was already living in Carry for 3 years & 6 for me, we only met last year, doing different paths & meeting through Malou. As early as March, we have been speaking about barbeques & picnics at the beach. Having them around is such a comfort. Great grocery shopping at the Asian store, great meals & even after a hefty Filipino meal, we always end up speaking about food. There's really something about Filipinos & food, and the conversation that goes around with it. With Malou, Cathy & Lani at Malou's.

So it also means tennis. Cathy & I played for 40 minutes, 20 minutes each under a scorching hot 2pm sun. It felt so good & I could have sworn that if there weren't so many pine trees around the tennis court, I could be back home in our village. But after 6 years of not playing, a year of hyperthyroid medications & yes, of getting old, I ended up on the couch all pale, chilling cold for a damn 40 minutes of tennis. But did it feel good & I already bought a tennis racquet finally. That was important for me.
The ebb & flow of life. Time is an absolute everything. In time, the time I have here will slowly become like the time I had back home, reforming habits of summers so familiar.

Once a beer drinker, ask me about wine & I'll say they all taste the same to me. Although amid family & friends who appreciate good wine, my interest never went beyond drinking it as if it was water on the table. So what better time to be more curious & to scratch the surface a little bit more by spending a weekend of degustation in the Route des Grands Vins de Bourgogne, or Burgandy's Fine Wines Route. In Vino Veritas, Chateau de Pommard

Well, it was not so much the ones that you will easily find online or from a Burgandy map from the tourist office. We are not guided by people in suits or white aprons but of farmers with a permanent tan & strong working hands. We considered ourselves privileged for wine tasting in the local wine merchants home is by invitation. Although a bit remote from the tourist's route, they produce great wines for generations & are known by mere word of mouth (Côte de Beaune & Chalonnaise). The region is not only known for its great wines but is likewise gastronomically splendid.

Our wonderful hotel Fontaine de Baranges, Buxy is a 19th century restored religious school. Surprisingly, their rate is reasonable compared to your common hotels. There is not one same room in the 17 rooms. The Reception area, our Suite, the terrace outside our room facing a quiet garden.

Since degustation is done in the wine merchant's home, we prepared cheese, saucissons (sausages) & bread. One thing about wine tasting, the appetizers you choose greatly affect your palate then how the wine will react to it in your taste. My buying olives & saucissons au poivre (peppered sausages) was not a good idea. Bourgogne sign, preparing the appetizers, view outside one of the wine merchant's cave - Bertillon, Côte d'Or.

Like every home is different, so are the caves. These wine merchants do not produce as much bottles from their 5 to 8 hectares of vineyard making their bottles quite unique & hard to find. Wines are as complicated as women. The soil, the sun, the weather, things we cannot really control, considerably affect the grapes. With global warming, this year the grape vines have started early to blossom, making harvest as early as July-August (September normally), which will surely affect the quality of the wine. At Bouillien-Guilloux, Mercurey - a stack of aging wine bottles, an 84 year old grape vine, a cave of wine barrels.

Like cheese, wines are named by region like Bourgogne as an appelation or label & the grape variety may be mentioned like Bourgogne Aligoté. Wines can also be named by the village or communal appelations such as the world renowned Chateau de Pommard. Of course we took the opportunity to visit its caves but this time, we didn't buy their luxuriously priced wonderful bottles. Everytime you eat French cheese & drink French wine, you also learn France geography. Entering the village of Pommard, Chateau de Pommard entrance & a part of its 20 hectare vineyard.

Don't be fooled by the wine bottles up there, they are very good aged wines. It is because fermenting & preserving wine requires a cave with a 13° temperature & 80% humidity. The constant change of temperature affects wine quality & so is movement. The wines we bought from the local wine merchants can evolve in 10 years but one advice we kept in mind is not to keep wines too long, say by drinking one bottle a year. We have to take the pleasure of drinking good wine because preserved for so many years, how would we know if it's good or not? Pleasure is taking risks. Years old bottles & wine barrels in Bertillon's amazing cave, stack of wine bottles at Chateau de Pommard cave.

With a preference only for white & rosé, red wines make my lips & tongue numb. But our first degustation of the weekend chez Barberet completely changed my opinion on red wines. At first it was difficult to distinguish one wine from another when wine tasting is one bottle after another & if you're tasting 12 different kinds in one sitting. Tasting wine is likewise a thing to learn especially for this debutant - smelling makes a difference, the first taste is always violent & warming your glass with your hands helps bring out the true flavor. We had a super time chez Barberet not only because he makes excellent wine but this wine maker is a 61 year old tending (trimming & culturing) his own 5 hectare-vineyard alone - each & every vine by hand (of course he hires grape pickers in harvest time) - his face & nape have been sun kissed a million times. A two generation vineyard, he might retire without the next generation to continue the patrimony. After tasting more than 20 bottles over the weekend, and although still having a hard time to differentiate one wine from another, Barbaret's red wine is now a favorite. Red wine of Barberet (wine etiquette/label glued by french fry with milk) - 1er Cru is a class of wine where it was grown (richness of soil) & the 1er cru & grand cru is few in number & in small quantities that is why they are special, Monsieur Jacques Barberet himself - telling me he's not photogenic after taking this photo, a 1997 Aloxe-Corton Blanc from his own personal stock he shared with us.

After 5 places of degustation in one the best wine growers in the

world made me wonder why the hell it took me so long to take a little more interest in this wonderful culture of wines. But even if I try to, I wouldn't know where to start. "What is the best wine in France?" I always ask. "The best wine is the one you like the best," was the reply I got. Foie gras poelé with Balsamique sauce chez Brasserie Mercurey - so yummy plate of our friend.

Merci mon mari de ne pas arrêter me faire découvrir des bonnes choses de France.

And finally it came in the mail - the Wine Tasters.
Merci Tof pour les photos super sympas!

A friend named G is a typical Frenchman, married to a typical Filipina & have atypical experiences in the Philippines. After spending 10 years in France, G & his Filipina wife moved to the Philippines where wife comes from, where spicy gata* based food, fishing & mining are the specialty. Where G is the seul puti*.

So G endeavored to make a living from fishing, building a house facing the sea with a nifty garden. His humble home became a full house of 17 residents made up of wife's family of several generations. Tending to his fishponds, G needed people to guard it at nights for he quickly learned that in this small town, business can be sabotaged easily. Afterall, there is help within the family. But despite G's seemingly good management & family help, fish & shrimps were being stolen, largely compromising profit. One incident with one of his guards was when the townies came to his post, equiped with gin & a bagful of stories, got dead drunk for he is not a drinker, wakes up to soon find out that he was robbed under his nose. Whatever other instances for losing his harvest, G thought fishing might not be a good idea.

But then G was not turned-off easily & this time ventured into mining, complete with the right equipement. He employed men to mine everyday with him until the day he had to go back to France, mining business continued without him. After a year, he received news that his men finally tapped a wall where gold can be found. With this good news, he comes home to his men declaring that they will now only work as partners & as partners they want a part of the treasure rather than their usual daily wage. G didn't argue, allowed them to use his equipement despite the odd turn of events but insisted the deal will only be closed under his command on how to continue with the mining. The men didn't listen to his instructions & they ended up filling the tunnel with water, one almost lost his life & his pump now under water. The gold had the wait & so did G for he now has a mental map of the mountain tunnels & even if a lot of his good equipement were stolen, stolen with a well-guarded area, dogs were poisoned & a guard was threatened, he just puts mining aside for now.

Ignoring how G finally went back to a more typical life in France, one of his mental pictures of this apparently quite little town is the one main road where the locals are all in line by the sidewalk, watching the daily road activities of passers-by. A town where he caught a 5 year glimpse of a pocketful of characters. His obliged generosity for people who come to him for help in the form of utang* ends up being a gift. His pakikisama* around the table with a gin & pulutan* for relationships are built with it, or broken when he witnessed drunken brawls of machetes. The sungit puti* when he yells at the household to close the gates to defend his nifty garden from people crossing it to reach the beach. You could say that G might have really been in the heart of an apparently typical village in the Philippines.

Now after around 6 years, give or take a day, G revisits the Philippines with a big welcome. On arrival in Manila with his wife, he decides to have his euros changed & changed in a bank. Oddly, the bank does not accept changes in euro & points G across the bank where a money changer is located. They marched to the money changer & marched back to the bank with their pesos to be deposited. The teller then mentions after counting that there must be a mistake for it misses a large amount. With this, they called two policemen to go with G to the money changer to claim the missing sum, with the policemen, all three of them, individually counted the money rigorously. They marched back to the bank only to again find out that they still have the same amount, a sum still missing. And for the third time, the money changer now closed & the lady was gone. G could have sworn he saw the bills & counted them correctly. He swore the lady had burning red eyes like a serious case of sore eyes. G & his wife lost 80Kphp, according to them, under this art of hypnotizing.

Chalking that up to experience, G finds his house facing the sea with a nifty garden, enclosed by other houses, literally houses were built around his house, some houses were built from his own walls & fence, he lost his view of the beach & his entrance to where he can only access by passing through these houses around his humble home, where electric cables are like grape vines & the clothes line like paintings in a museum.

"Are you still going back to the Philippines?" I asked G to which he replied, "Anything is possible. The Philippines will take centuries to make a good change." Yes, G is a typical person with atypical experiences in the Philippines. You think you know but you don't know when it happens to you. Anything is possible, there are hundred sides of what can happen. If this is not a question of culture, then G has a damn case of bad luck.

*gata - coconut milk sauce; seul puti - only white person; utang - credit; pulutan - appetizers; sungit puti- grumpy white person

As the churchbells reminded the practicing Catholics yesterday of the Sunday morning mass, I hurried putting life on my sluggish face that only had 6 hours of sleep. I couldn't even remember the last time I went to mass but yesterday was Palm Sunday & I thought it's a good start to redemonstrate my faith. I know my mother would be overjoyed to know that I did. Then I am reminded again of my non-participation from my once religious practice just after I moved to France. Photo of my Palaspas in France - an olive tree branch. Thanks so much Cathy!

No, I was not a nun but a devout Catholic - like anyone in the Philippines. Sunday masses, wednesdays & fridays included, yearly confessions, regular communions, prayer rooms, novenas & religiously observing the Holy Week. But like a lot of us, my devoutness has its age & phase. My daily prayers at church before & after playing at the park & middle seats inside church in between my parents have become a short prayer before dozing off in bed at nights & going to church by staying beside a fishball stand, eating while chatting with friends, close enough to hear the priest's homily. The personal sacrifices & denial during Holy Week have become a holiday at the beach. But as we move on in life, we create a special relationship with our faith. An age & phase of spirituality.

And spirituality is essential in a culture where religion or even beliefs are so personal & delicate. Where everybody can be of different faith. Where religion is more uncommon than we think after being born into one that is unified. It was more difficult for this sporadic practicer of faith, who still experiences a flicker of guilt missing a Sunday mass, especially when back home there are 10 masses on sundays & twice for the rest of the week. On how stubborn I can get with the French way of religious habits which are not so different from what I am used to. Where the religious community is like an open secret society you have to know. Where there is always an excuse not to go to mass because there is only one held every sunday morning. "The ambiance is just not the same," I would always say because spirituality around here is likewise an individual experience. Where it's a parent's choice to give their children an opinion & choice on their beliefs at 6 years old (Le Catéchisme).

Being now more spiritual than religious, I couldn't say that my environment didn't have a bearing on it. But yesterday at mass, as doubly focused as I should be to listen & understand it in French & most of the time distracted to tickle Daniel's ear with my palaspas, I ended up silently trying to stop the tears from rolling down my cheeks when I decided to participate in the communion, arms crossed on my chest signifying that I come not to take one but just to be blessed. We have a special connection with our faith. A faith of knowing that there is something bigger out there.

Miss the Visita Iglesias with you, Manks.
*#@# you all on holiday at the beach during the Holy Week, the hottest time back home!

Carry le Rouet's center town by the port.*

When the apartment's sink is the kind that will survive a nuclear bomb & the bathroom & toilet are a bit questionable, it was the sea that enchanted my husband to settle in this now more than 30 year old building with his eyes closed. And I just had to shrug my shoulders & give a tiny sigh. But he chose right & I was compelled to unravel any secret "domestic" flair I may have, filling in the blanks with my own expression of style in home decor. A struggling minimalist at heart, I now look at our 5 year old's worth of residence & you just can't help but accumulate - to clump - and you wonder how just two people require more space for necessary stuff in a span of a few years. Then we breed familiarity, warming our own little space but when does a space become significant, a place becomes home?

I wondered where I'd be if not here, or anywhere else & if I'd have the strength to be moved by my tickling feet to somewhere new. But being where I am now propels me to seek that sense of home, whatever that is. Although, having an effective escape plan is still in our minds, I guess the pursuit of a home can wait. Like the old people sitting by the port of Carry, watching under the sun what is beyond the sea, knowing in their hearts that they have finally found home. Someway or the other, we'll have to choose sometime in our life where we want to stay put.

But most of us will probably have more than two zipcodes in our lives, for whatever reason that may be, before we find our home. The world has never moved as much that it has become smaller. Old people in Carry some who never lived anywhere else & see people come. Malou, who's been here in Ensues for 17 years. The Filipino seamen we bumped into in Martigues who spend 3 to 6 months at sea. With the moving world, can the old adage, "home is where the heart is" still describe home the best? But how come we still crave for the boxes of our childhood memories in our parent's place? Isit your innate culture or adopted country you were raised in you truly associate to home? There is really so much more in building & making a home.

When I look at our apartment's balcony, I see the four seasons of France. Looking out the window, I see the boulangerie where my unsconscious smile is often appreciated & for that I often get free croissants. I see the pressing (dry cleaning) who sincerely made me feel welcomed when I still couldn't yet construct a whole sentence in French. And Pierre, the hairdresser, who informed me about Malou just three months after we moved in. Random kindness from around the place we call home.

But thoughts of back home & wandering around made me think about being somewhere else. Something convinces me that I can leave our lovely barrio without hesitation. I guess home is much more than where your heart is, or more than your childhood memories. Home will be the place where you can say, "this is where I want to grow old." It is kind of a lovestory, isn't it?

*Carry Port photo enhanced by Kala.

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