Rice Krispies...

Wednesday, 19 September 2012

We’ve had a fairly regular routine here the past few days without too much to report. There were major thunderstorms and lots of rain over the past few days, so that was fairly exciting. On Monday night, one particularly spectacular flash of lightning elicited a round of “oohs” and “aahs” from people in our neighborhood, just like they were watching a show of fireworks. The swimming pool is open but covered with some sort of plastic/metal roof that roars when raindrops hit it. This afternoon the rain was so loud before we got in that we practically had to shout to be heard.

Long-tailed Shrike (can't see the tail here) on Ateneo's campus

There isn’t a lot of animal life that we see here in the city besides stray cats, but there are two animals that seem to have carved out a nice little niche for themselves. The first of these are the long-tailed shrikes on Ateneo campus. We normally see several of these every day catching insects and other small animals. They like to perch out in the open and wag their tails around. We were able to identify them after we purchased a guide book to birds in the Philippines at a National Bookstore. I think not too many people ask for bird books because it took some time for them to understand what I was asking for and even then they weren’t sure such things existed. But, we did find one that is actually pretty terrible. Instead of nice, clear drawings of birds, there are photographs of them in the wild. Many of the photos are blurry, dark, at weird angles, etc. We can still ID some birds with it, though. 

Along with the shrikes, there are lots of big snails that come out in the evening and show up smashed on the sidewalks in the morning. We’ve seen several that are a few inches long so we’re keeping our eyes peeled for one that’s four to five inches since I’m guessing they have to exist. We’ll send a photo when we find one (don’t hold your breath). 

We’ve been swimming most weekdays during the practice time of the Ateneo college swim team (they give us a lane to use while they’re doing dryland). Their big end-of-season meet is coming up on September 27 so as a thank you and a good luck gesture we made a big batch of Rice Krispie treats. Since our initial hunt for Rice Krispies was not successful we compromised with a mixture of corn flakes and cocoa krispies. We also had two types of sprinkles to make them an Ateneo blue. We lacked the correct tools to make these treats so it ended up being a big production, with hot, sticky marshmallow goo spread over much of the kitchen and ourselves. But the team seemed appreciative of our gifts and the treats ended up tasting quite delicious. If we ever make these again we’re going to purchase a few other kitchen items (like a big wooden spoon…) to make it easier. 

wrapped and ready to share

Other random thoughts: new fruit for the day was guyabano. This spiky-green fruit is about the size of a papaya and has white flesh with big brown seeds. The texture is kind of a mix between pineapple, apple, and cotton, with a taste that leaves us satisfied to keep on with our diet of mangos and papayas. Guyabano is said to be an alternative to chemo for cancer patients, but since we’re in good health I think the next new thing we try might be puso ng saging.