The Road to 40 Day 264/365: Walks and Stopovers

Vino is back to school for the first time this week, so I it was back to our normal days.

Back in Manila, Che made him this peanut butter and banana sandwich that he loves so much, so I figured it would be a good breakfast for him to start the day with.

He needs the energy. I can’t send it to him for school because the school is supposed to be “nut-free.” I know that peanut allergies could be fatal, but I didn’t really grow up in an environment where it’s so common that the whole institution bans it.

It makes thinking about snacks for him a bit challenging. I would love to send him peanut butter sandwich for a quick fix, but instead, I have to do ham and cheese (another favorite of his) which would require a bit more work to prepare.

We were almost late, as he took his sweet time to move in the morning.

As I headed back, I thought about making tinola for dinner. I went to the nearby Fairprice to get my ingredients, but since I couldn’t get everything, I decided to just buy it in the market.

In Fairprice, they had a Toto outlet, which is the local lottery. It’s got a SGD10 Million prize pool for Thursday, so why not try our luck?

If we win this, I probably won’t share it here, but I assure you, there will be signs.

I got my stuff from the market and passed by the hawker stall. I thought about eating, but since I ate the leftover adobo while preparing Vino’s lunch, I decided to just get iced Milo.

Iced Milo is available practically anywhere, but unlike chicken rice, there are levels to it. There are prepared ones, that is most common, to lesssen the prep time for peak hours. There are machine-dispensed, which is common for fast food chains.

The best is always the freshly-made ones from an Indian-owned stall. Those guys know how to best make it. It’s prepared hot, then poured over a cup filled with ice. I tell you, you’ve never had good iced Milo until you’ve tried a freshly-made cup from an Indian-owned stall.

I went back home for some chores, as well as some prep for tinola. In the Philippines, we use chili leaves or malunggay. Here, neither is common enough to be available in supermarkets. However, I saw some malunggay in the Indian-owned vegetable stall, so I was picking the leaves for my tinola.

I went to pick up Vino from school, and he asked to play with his friends. He went back just in time – right before the exit gate was closed.

When we reached our bus stop, we found that the next bus was coming in 20 minutes which we didn’t want to wait for. As such, we started walking up. Unfortunately, the bus we were supposed to ride already arrived, and we couldn’t reach it.

I asked Vino if he was up for a walk, and he just held my hand and went forward.

We took a bit of a scenic route, passing through the market, then the covered court. He said he remembered the path, and that we took the wrong turn once before.

As we closed in to the house, we passed by one of the playgrounds, which he asked to play at for a bit.

We talk about the most random things while we’re walking. I remember my dad took us for night walks when I was around this age and I really enjoyed it. Then it was just gone. Personally, I do love walking, so I’m hoping that Vino would go on more walks with me in the future.

I prepared the tinola when we got home and folded some clothes off the dryer. Sometimes, I would want Vino to help with the chores, but I was a kid once, so I understand why he would want to play a lot.

He does ask me to play with him, but I usually tell him I need to finish the chores first, which he understands.

Anyway, with the kind of life Vino is getting now, I’m going to be very disappointed (if not mad) if he would want to “heal his inner child” when he’s an adult because his “inner child” has gotten it really good.

I got him to watch Hancock on Netflix because I saw that it’s PG, but I realized while watching it that “PG” was very loose back in the day.

We got him to sleep while Che and I watched Singles Inferno. It was supposed to be something to put on TV while we try to sleep, but we’re kinda invested in their drama now.

It still put me to sleep eventually, which is fine, because I think it was well past 1am already and I need to prep things early tomorrow.