The Weekend I Robbed Myself

I don't know how I managed to do it, but I actually had money at the end of the week - enough to go on food trips with friends. It was a lucky thing, too, because this weekend was probably the last time we'd see each other until 2013. If we make it to 2013, of course.

I went to these places with some of my favorite people, and because eating in each place made me inexplicably happy, I made reviews for each. [Yey!] I'd never been to any of these places before, by the way. They're listed in the order we visited them.

Ramen X, Trinoma
Fresh Selections, UP Teachers' Village
Ariake, Tomas Morato corner Scout Rallos
Baang Coffee, Tomas Morato
Bubble Tea, Tomas Morato

Christmas~

Bubble Tea

Tokyo Bubble Tea 
Tomas Morato 
Quezon City 

For almost two weeks, M had been craving for Mango Cake. It couldn’t even be a Mango Roll – it had to be legit Mango Cake. So for the same period of time, we’ve been entering cake shops all around Quezon City, searching for her salvation in the form of Mango Cake. Finally, after traversing a considerable stretch of Tomas Morato, we found Bubble Tea. We were so comfortable with the place and the food we decided to stay there for hours.

Baang Coffee

Baang Coffee 
Tomas Morato 
Quezon City 

After a heavy dinner, I wanted to wash down the food with coffee or tea, but didn’t want to go someplace over-the-top like Starbucks. In my head, I wanted to seek temporary caffeinated refuge in a hole-in-the-wall restaurant, preferably with quaint mismatched tables and ivy vines creeping up the iron-wrought windows. But I don’t think there are any affordable cafes like that in the Tomas Morato area. Baang Coffee, seeming strangely welcoming and non-judgmental, was our final destination for coffee then.

Ariake

Ariake 
Tomas Morato corner Scout Rallos
Quezon City

M and I have long been planning to visit this shop, mainly because in the Jdorama Ryuusei no Kizuna, Ninomiya Kazunari’s and Nishikido Ryo’s and Erika Toda’s characters own a shop with the same name. We were admittedly intimidated by the setup of the restaurant though, because it looks too sophisticated and respectable for a pair of poor and perpetually hungry college students like the two of us. In any case, several months after we first heard of the place, we went. Because fangirls will be fangirls.

Fresh Selections

Fresh Selections 
Maginhawa corner Magiting Street 
In front of Mini Stop 
UP Teacher’s Village, Quezon City 

R and T and I met for lunch today, and since R hadn’t been around the QC area so much after the Boards, T suggested that we try the new restaurant that popped up at Teacher’s Vill. None of us had ever eaten there before, by the way. It was a safe experiment then, because there was almost zero possibility that any of us would feel over-exposed to the food.

Ramen X

Ramen X 
Space 2087, Level 2
Trinoma, Quezon City 

D and I wandered here because she Googled the restaurant’s menu online, and decided she wanted to try their ramen. I don’t know how she first heard of it, or if anyone she knows had ever eaten there before we got to, but it was a remarkably no-fuss experience even with both of us clueless about what the place had to offer. Even though Ramen X is technically a high-level restaurant given it’s in a mall, the whole space had a laid back atmosphere that made it almost inevitable for customers to just relax and to enjoy the food.

Food for Thought

I find that several of the most lucid, lingering pieces of contemporary literature and film have some form of food attached to them. Take Eat Pray Love. Like Water for Chocolate. Kitchen. All three feature life and the human experience as a main dish to a major selling point of each book, which is food. The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach. The worst things in this world are being alone, and being hungry. Perhaps it’s because of the need to feed ourselves that we’re so intoxicated over the idea of eating well. Or maybe I only think this way because I love to eat?

True to my resolution to reach out to people more, I haphazardly hailed an old acquaintance that I had bumped into at a local UP haunt today. I go to Mashitta often because it serves interesting food, and she said she was craving for Ramyun, that’s why she was there. About two years older than me, four months into her present job, she might have found me imprudent for compelling her to share my table. But I was determined to become more extroverted, and she happened to be the first friend I had shared a 1 meter radius with, the day after I had decided on that.

We talked about Nickolodeon’s Avatar, her friends from college, her Makati job, and the pretty girl in the booth next to ours. I had always known, through the short conversations we had when she was still in our org, that we shared the same interests, the same dislikes. We both don’t understand why our peers like 500 Days of Summer and One More Chance so much. We both think Zuko’s great. We both watched Sherlock Holmes, and found Season1’s ending irritating. But tonight, though it had been undeniably fun, I felt I had not really gotten to know her better. Why is it that I keep talking about what I think, when I only want to get to know someone more?

She said someone from her office has offered to share copies of Game of Thrones. I told her it was a heavy series, and she said yes, she saw the first two episodes on HBO last summer. I’m not sure if we’ll ever get past the point in our relationship where we can only talk about entertainment and mutual friends. But if that will ever happen, it would be nice. It might have been great, watching Inception for the first time with her somewhere along the line.