I Love Bonchon Chicken

One of the things I love about the Philippines is that I am able to eat rice whenever I want, wherever I want. All restaurants serve it and even fastfood chains like McDonald's, Shakey's Pizza, Pizza Hut, and KFC to name a few have rice in some of their combo meals. Great isn't it?

The very happy me! Mommy granted me my wish to eat at Bonchon Chicken!

Enjoying my crispy squid rice.. I love eating with my bare hands!

There's this one restaurant that serves really good chicken in soy garlic flavor. I really love going to this place almost everyday if my Mommy can help it. But ironically, what I love in this place is not the chicken but the crispy squid rice. I could most of the time eat the entire serving!

My favorite crispy squid rice in soy garlic flavor.
Photo: bonchon.com.ph

I guess you could say that I am always hungry as far as crispy squid rice is okay. I love the sweet garlic glaze on the squid rings. Now that I am back here in Germany, the closest thing I can have to crispy squid rice is the frozen calamari that my Mom deep fries for me. Perhaps she can look for a recipe for the soy garlic sauce that she can pour on top to make it the crispy squid rice that I so dearly love. Now that's one great idea! :)

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Water Fun!

Hello everyone! I am back from my summer vacation and baked at that! I had a wonderful time with my family. We went on a five-day vacation in Lake Garda in Italy, about six and a half hours drive from where we live. The long drive was worth it though! You'll find out why from the photos.

As you may all well know, I love water. We go swimming at the swimming hall near our place at least twice a week. Maybe because I was born in the month of the water sign? Or maybe because of the summer heat... who wouldn't want to dip in the pool in these warm days right? Whatever the reason, I just love having fun in the water. I feel so free whenever I am in, near or surrounded by water.

With my Mommy... :)

He will always catch me when I fall... The slide was great!

"Mommy let me steer the boat this time. You pedal... "

The water is really good! Not so warm and not so cold either!

Swimming with daddy while mommy steers the pedal boat in our direction. 

Swimming in the lake... it was so much fun!

"Can I go for another round in the slide?"

Going up and ready to slide again!

Pretending I were a pirate! Ahoy pirates!

Trying to build a sand castle to no avail... Hehe! :)

So there, I hope you enjoyed my photos as much as I enjoyed being in the water.

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Strawberry Picking

Last July, during our camping trip in Südsee Camp, I was able to experience another FIRST: Strawberry picking. It was my first time to go and I really enjoyed it, even though I was accompanied by a friend of Mommy's and the camp caretaker. And that's when I really enjoyed eating strawberries so much.

Mommy asked her friend to take some photos of me while picking strawberries. It was my first time after all, something that is worth documenting, at least according to my Mommy. We went to this strawberry farm just near the camping resort. And the strawberries were really sweet and you can eat as many as you want, FREE. You will need to pay for what's in your basket though. Hihi!

Here are some of the photos that Auntie Nora took:

At the strawberry field. Reminds me of the cartoon series Emily Erdbeer.

You see some of the strawberries are not yet ripe. 

You are only allowed to harvest the red ones and I guess I was doing pretty good at it!

Picking up strawberries can be very tiring. Time to take a break and taste the strawberries for myself! I was more busy eating than filling the basket. Hihi!

Finally filled the basket with strawberries! Of course, Auntie Nora helped me fill it!

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Enjoying the Märchengarten with Mommy's New Friends

Last October 6, Mommy let me come along with her on their class excursion to Ludwigsburg Palace in Ludwigsburg. There I met my Mommy's friends from her Intensive German Language Course class and I can say that I liked and enjoyed the attention that I received from them. They thought I was adorable, sweet, pretty and nice and I was flattered. Really. And I was at my best behavior the entire duration of the activity. I did not cry or insist on eating and drinking while we did the tour inside the palace. Eating and drinking is not allowed inside the palace because of the many old and antique things that date back to the 1700's. Although I was hungry, I waited patiently for the tour to end and it lasted for almost three hours! Could you imagine?

  

After the tour, we went to see the Märchengarten and the Pumpkin Exhibit. The Pumpkin Exhibit is also a very interesting thing to see because you can see various shapes, colors and sizes of pumpkins being formed into different creatures. This year, the theme was seawater creatures and I saw mermaids, whales, turtle, octopus and waves, and there was an owl and other bird species too.

The best part of the tour was our visit to the Märchengarten where we got to see many of Germany's folk stories and fairy tales being played. I saw Hansel and Gretel, Rumplestiltskin, Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf, 1001 Arabian Nights and many others. It was a very interesting place and I would definitely love to come back because I haven't seen Rapunzel or Cinderella or Snow White that day. Maybe next time, when the weather is good, we can go back as a family and enjoy the Märchengarten.

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Heidelberg and Me

We went to Heidelberg last September 4th for some sightseeing. It was a very fine day and although the air was a bit cold, it didn't bother us so much. Our first stop: the place where our national hero wrote the last chapters of his novel Noli Me Tangere. It was quite a long from Heidelberg city center, but it didn't matter because we drove all the way there. We were directed by our navigation to a residential area. There was nothing special though except for the fact that a street name was named after our national hero. And that is something that any Filipino would be proud of. 

After our brief visit, we went back to Heidelberg city center and visited the Heidelberg Castle. We got up though the Bergbahn (mountain train). History tells us that the castle was burned down three times and that plans to restore everything to its original grandeur were never carried out. There are a few areas of the castle though that have been restored and used as museums, shops and restaurant. 

From the castle, one can get a breathtaking view of the Altstadt below, with the Alte Brücke and the other old structures that make Heidelberg a very romantic and charming city.

I immensely enjoyed Heidelberg castle especially the bergbahn ride and the grounds. There was so much space to run around at the gardens and grounds without fearing of breaking anything.The giant wine barrel was also an interesting piece.

There was also a fireworks display that evening and we waited for night to come. We sat on the bank of the River Neckar and while waiting, enjoyed some of the picnic food that we brought with us. It was a very dramatic and awesome fireworks display. Before the actual fireworks, there was a re-enactment of the burning down of the castle and one would think that it was really on fire.

I wish we could visit Heidelberg this Autumn for the fall foliage. We saw lots of greenery when we visited and it would be interesting to see them in various shades of reds, orangers and yellows.

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A Boating Adventure

I haven't experienced going on a camping trip yet nor have I gone on a fishing trip but I surely would love to experience them both. Perhaps when I am a bit older, me and my family could go on an outdoor trip: camping, hiking, fishing and doing other outdoor stuff. For now, I am happy and delighted to be sitting on a small boat pedalled by my Dad while eating ice cream and doing a little cruise around a lake. 

I have tried doing the scenario mentioned above and it was indeed lots of fun. I couldn't even wait to get on the small boat so that I insisted on sitting on a defective boat that was docked on the port while waiting for our turn to board the boat. I was able to ride one when we were driving through the Schwarzwaldhochstrasse along the Black Forest in July.

This was one of my summer adventures with my family and I was really happy to be out in the great outdoors. I got some more photos to show and more stories to tell but those are for some other blog entries. Hope you all stay tuned. 

Thanks for the visit!

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Schwimm, Schwamm, Schwamm

I have always loved the water. Maybe because I was born under the fish sign. I love to bathe in a bad tub, in the sea or in the swimming pool. Unfortunately, I can only go swimming in big bodies of water when we are able to travel because we live in the heart of Europe, where the ocean is hundreds of miles away.

I just got back from a recent vacation in Rome, Italy, together with my family. We had a family reunion there because my grandparents and my uncle (Daddy's brother) and his family were there to share the days with us. We stayed at a camping resort near the Tiber River in Rome and it was a whole new experience for all of us. We lived in mobile homes and it was quiet and relaxing and a good place to be after a day or two of sightseeing in Vatican City and Rome.

There was a swimming pool at the camping resort. The weather was so fine one day that we decided to take a dip. Mommy, however wasn't able to pack my swim suit in my luggage so that I had to go in my onesies. I still looked cute in it but it felt really cold when I got off the water.

My Daddy was the one who swam with me and gave me some swimming lessons. I was so delighted to be in the water that I didn't want to get off. But some good things never last. Especially for a little girl like me who is prone to colds. So after a few laps, we went back to our rooms, showered and changed.

I wish we could go swimming again. And this time, wearing a proper swim suit and be able to stay longer in the pool.

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As Tall As The Cathedral

I still haven't seen the movie, "The Hunchback of Notre Dame", the movie that popularized the great cathedral in Paris but I have already seen the real thing, the Notre Dame de Paris. It was one of the must-see sights that was listed on our itinerary when we visited there last month.

 Here's a little history of the Notre Dame of Paris and why it is so popular the world over:

The Notre Dame Cathedral is arguably the most stunning gothic cathedral in the world-- and is undoubtedly the most famous. Conceived in the 12th century and completed in the 14th, Notre Dame Cathedral was the very heartbeat of medieval Paris. After a period of neglect, it recaptured the popular imagination when 19th-century writer Victor Hugo immortalized it in "The Hunchback of Notre Dame". 

The gargoyles of Notre Dame.

And what of the flying buttresses? It has a story too!

View of the Notre Dame from the south.

The flying buttresses are external arched supports and the Notre Dame is one of the first buildings in the world to use this style. The building was not originally designed to include the flying buttresses around the choir and nave. After the construction began and the thinner walls (popularized in the Gothic style) grew ever higher, stress fractures began to occur as the walls pushed outward. In response, the cathedral's architects built supports around the outside walls, and later additions continued the pattern.

A view of the Notre Dame Cathedral from the Seine River.

And this is me with the cathedral, standing tall and proud. I was standing on one of the concrete stands that's why I look as tall as the cathedral. Hihi!

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