Pages

Friday, July 06, 2012

Seven Oh Six: Picking Up the Dead Hand

"I do a lot of curiosity buying; I buy it if I like the album cover, I buy it if I like the name of the band, anything that sparks my imagination."
- Bruce Springsteen

So I had a couple of hours to burn today. I was supposed to pick up something from Etsy, but the mall doesn't open until ten in the morning and I happened to be in the area so I decided to wait it out.

I stopped by a stall at MRT Ayala to grab a quick bite. As always, I got myself some takoyaki before boarding for Ortigas.

Luckily, the train ride wasn't in its usual unpleasant state. I arrived in Ortigas before eight, so I took a walk towards Emerald Avenue as I've been craving for a decent cold cuts sandwich for the longest time. Usually, I won't go near my previous workplace. It's not that I'm antisocial, but there are some people I'd rather no longer meet. Times have changed though and I figured that there was very little chance that I'd bump into someone familiar. Also, I was hungry, so there's that.

Anyway, I finally visited Earle's again after more than a year and a half. I had to choose between their roast beef or three-meat sandwich, and I settled for the former. Don't get me wrong, both are equally good in their own rights.

I'm a sucker for anything cold cuts. I'm pretty sure it's because my folks introduced us to these types of food at an early age. Apart from the western variety (which are mostly cured hams and different kinds of sausages), we are no stranger to the more interesting Asian varieties. These range from the more common asado and duck/chicken pieces to sliced century eggs and pig intestine. Throw in the occasional jellyfish seaweed and you can call it a feast.

It's sad that people quickly judge these types of food and settle for the bland crap they eat everyday. I once read somewhere that the best way to get to know other cultures is through what they eat. I believe this is true.

My next stop was CBTL in Ortigas Park. I always found this place eerily peaceful in the morning, especially when no one has the balls to make out on the park benches yet. For some reason, I prefer CBTL over Starbucks even if their coffee is more expensive. There's also the fact that Internet access is free if you have one of their Swirl cards (I have my brother's) whereas Starbucks sells consumable prepaid cards to their customers. Capitalist scum. Anyway, it was too late when I remembered that I should not be taking coffee, as I intended to sleep until early evening.

By around quarter to ten, I headed back to Megamall for my last two stops. I headed for Powerbooks first to check if they had anything good in their Sale section. I ended up picking up some book from a local author anyway, as those come cheap and the author has some decent reviews. It's been a quiet year for video games, so I'm pretty sure that's why I've been haunting book shops more often lately.

Afterwards, I finally headed to Johnny Air to pick up my shipment before heading home. Internet shopping is probably one of the best things about globalization. It is also a very effective money sink, so one has to be careful not to get carried away when browsing for things.

What I picked up, however, is a story for another time. I'm not usually cryptic, but I promise it will be an interesting one.

No comments:

Post a Comment