Dear me ( 24/11/2014),

I just came back from The Philippines yesterday, went up to pick up my Mum. She was there almost 2 months.  She was okay as per say but lately I found her to be very quiet. I am  not sure if the quiet is because she was tired from the long ordeal in Philippines or because she misses her sister.

She spend a lot of time inside her room and since Saturday she hardly watches tv.  I hope .. whether its missing or tired, she would soon get over it. Sometimes I feel sad knowing that , the time when she really can visit her as frequent but it was too soon and Aunty Enida falls sick and now gone.

I know even if deep inside me I feel that they are not that close as sisters but deep inside my heart I know that my aunt really misses my mum. Have u ever felt there is a hole deep inside your heard that is not filled, because u misses someone.. knowing that that person is around but its just impossible to meet. I know both the sisters misses each other very much but to connect both places general santos and tawau is just impossible and there is also the cost constrain. My mother have been wishing to go back to Philippines for as long as I can remember but we have no idea how to go there.. and part of it is her to blame because she hardly talk about her birthplace.

When, we arrange to visit her hometown this year, she was so excited ,. I think the mere excitement is to visit her parents and siblings graveyard but most of all to visit her only remaining siblings. Funny when they meet there was an weird feeling.. both of the seems like different people..  Maybe it was me but I felt that they we so long and far apart that they hardly know how to connect at first.  After a while Nanay felt at home but still the food remains the biggest thing ever. I notice that their food is far different from ours.. Nanay use to tell us when we were a kid how they use to catch the catfish in the paddy field and how they cook it with guava leaves.  How the very traditional food nanay use to make and we grew up eathing all this Filipino traditional dish.

Then when we reach there ,.. THE FOOD IS TOTALLY DIFFERENT. The pinaksiu and adobo is not the way they prepare for us ..it taste different , it looks different and most of all the way they cook it almost alien to me. haha . I read once that The Chinese in Malaysia is more Chinese than the Chinese in China in terms of tradition and food,. because the Malaysian Chinese wants to preserve the traditional Chinese cooking but the Chinese in the Big Island sway themselves to a new way of cooking. I guess same goes with my parents and all my aunty and uncle. We including the second and third generation are paying close intention to keep the traditional taste even how hard it may be but in the Philipines they no longer know that traditional taste because the taste has been altered and altered many times hehehe. I doubt my nephew and nieces knows the original taste or even how to make pinaksiu and adobo.

So, that's my experience in the Great Adventure in The Philippines, my cousin say to me that maybe next year they want to make a reunion .. we'll see how it goes. But someday i hope to visit Philippines again , maybe this time its for a happy occasion.