The Road to 40 Day 63/365: Date night and celebrations

It’s going to be date night on this day, but new information came to light that was a cause for celebration.

As expected, the day before was a tiring one for all of us. For the first time during this stay, I woke up past 8am. I panicked a bit that it’s already 8:44am and there is still no sign of Che getting prepared. 

I went to the room and saw her tucked inside the blanket. She said she will get up at 9am and she was aware that she needs to get up soon.

I cooked the remaining bacon in the fridge. We needed to finish the stuff we bought for the week as it is already check out day tomorrow. Che already packed away some of our things, and I loaded some of them in the car the night before.

The plan was to take Vino to Ten’s place so that Che and I can have a date. However, Vino expressed that he didn’t want to sleep over at Ate Tia’s house for the simple reason of “I just don’t want to.” The difference with his first sleepover and this time is that Ate Tia was with us for six days, while last time, they missed each other a lot. 

As I got ready to take the kids to Manila, I got takeout food for Che to make sure she was going to have lunch when we leave. 

The drive was surprisingly quick from BGC to Manila, as we passed by a familiar route from when I was still working. It’s one that made sense, it’s not at the top of my list if it were only me. 

During this time, we learned that Kathreen got an academic excellence award from her school back in Canada. We thought about celebrating it late in the evening for some drinks, ideally when traffic dies down. 

I had lunch with Ten and the kids before I left. I was going to drop off our bags in Cainta and get some winter clothes for Che for her trip on Saturday, so it was going to be a long drive. I at least had a companion.

This thing is a magnet mount, a Shoppee find for Che. We had one before, but the suction mechanism broke. She got a couple more when we got back to SG because it was really effective otherwise. 

This helped with navigation at first, but after I saw the familiar route, it helped me watch our K-Drama in traffic. 

It took about an hour to get to our house, then I went back to the hotel. Che apparently went to the office, and she was just getting back. The timing was just right, as she just got her order from the bakery when I arrived. 

We went up to eat the bread while watching our K-Drama. While we were going to have a date, we didn’t really plan it ahead. She just asked if I wanted to try the Japanese restaurant she tried with her friends last week. Good thing there was a reservation available. 

We still had about 40minutes left on our K-Drama, but we had to move because our reservation was at 6:15.

We started off with cocktails, since we weren’t that hungry after the yummy bread we had earlier. I had the mezcal-based signature cocktail, while Che had a berry-flavored one.

We had oysters, a sushi and sashimi set, a cauliflower dish, and some greens. We had meat as our main. 

The oysters were nice and fresh, and we were pleasantly surprised that they had green tabasco available. It’s been our go-to oyster condiment, but it’s not always available in places where we eat oysters. 

The sashimi set was incredible. The sushi rice had a smoky feel to it, while the sashimi was firm and flavorful. It was kind of expensive, but I guess acceptable with the presentation and quality. 

For the cauliflower, I was really curious about it. It’s been one of my favorite vegetables to mess around with. I had the fried cauliflower dish, but I want to explore what else I could do with it. For this, I learned that they spread the sauce on aluminum foil and wrap the cauliflower in it. It then gets baked and later served on a bed of vegetarian sauces. I’d probably try to recreate it once I figure out the sauces. 

Nothing stood out with the greens, but it was good. The yakiniku beef short ribs was served on a hot stone. It was smoky, sweet, and the meat was tender. Sauce wasn’t overpowering, so you still get to appreciate the flavor of the meat. 

We had a second round of cocktails. Che got a cachaca-based drink while I got a margarita-type drink called Red Flag. They took an Instax photo of us and served it with the drink. It’s a nice touch until you realize the drink is called “Red Flag” and the picture is effectively the flag. 

We decided to walk around since it was a bit early. The sisters were going to start their BGC journey at around 10pm. Ten and Chiro were going to take Vino back and did not have plans of staying late because they had things to do the next day. 

She wanted to check out a dress she could take for the trip, so we looked at several options. Later, we got some macarons to share with everyone. 

It was an open invitation, but the logistics made it difficult to invite Verge and Angge as well as Momshie and Caleb. 

We always talk about random things – memories shared or not, and some of our recent experiences. During this time, we also learned that it’s Chi and Ten’s “monthsary,” which was another cause for celebration. 

Chi and Ten planned on leaving by 2am, but ended up leaving closer to 3am. The others left shortly after. 

Vino was still awake when Chi, Ten, and Tia left, and said he didn’t want to sleep yet. But when Che called him in, he apparently slept almost immediately. 

We’re leaving the hotel tomorrow and taking Che to the airport late in the afternoon. Hopefully, this doesn’t cause a hangover tomorrow. 

Related Content