Next stop: Thailand

you missed us ,didn't you???

well,let the countdown begins…12 days to go before we start a journey together with my partner in an exotic land..a land flaming hot,you'd burn your tongue when you lick its soil; a land of rich cultural heritage; a land that is diverse as the fishes in the ocean….a land once called Siam…the land of the free...sawasdee ka Thailand!!!!

image from photo atlas -a buddhist temple,one of the many temples scattered across Thailand

Yes,in less than two weeks,we will invade Thailand….exploring its beauty; enjoying its natural wonders; experiencing Thai culture and of course, diving into Thai gastronomic delights….ooh,the thai foods..my taste buds are too excited, i could feel them doing somersaults….

Oooh….pattaya,phuket,chiang mai…..where to go???where to begin????what to do???where to start???...the elephants..the floating market,the temples….we are not sure yet,but for the first few days,we would be staying along the legendary Chao Phraya river…then we'll take it from there where we would be heading next...

So stay tuned in the coming weeks to take a peek into the chronicles of our adventure in Thailand...

...eat well,live well and be merry!!!!!...cheers!!!!

Food, fashion and losing some weight

Pardon us dear readers for Tet and I have been very busy. As I am typing this entry, Tet is somewhere up in the stratosphere on his way back to Dubai after a much-needed vacation in Holland. So, what happened during our literary hiatus??? Well,as for me I have been gaining a lot of weight eating my mom's meal every single day, so I decided to go on a strict "JUNK FOOD and Vogue diet"…you might be wondering what the hell is that??? well….

when hunger strikes, i open a bag of chips and munch on it,for breakfast,lunch and dinner, and when the craving for real foods strike, I grab the nearest issue of vogue and look at the skinny people on the magazine,a reminder that I should stick to my diet…hahaha…how's that for motivation???..so there, i guess i'll be doing my junk food and vogue diet for a while until I lose this extra weight….

A start in FashionVille

Last week I did my first steps in the world of fashion. Jay is planning to conquer the world with his great designs, it was about time for me to do a more in depth study of this phenomena. Personally I have not much with fashion; I don’t follow trends, don’t know which celebrities matters today and still wear clothes till they get fashionable again... No, I am more a gadget man, but that will be another blog. 

The Emirate Towers

The event was to take place opposite of the Emirate towers, another luxury place which I never visited before in the Shopping Metropole. And this place was even more exclusive in high end fashionable boutiques then I saw before. The show took off a bit too late, and meanwhile the guests were entertained with drinks and snacks - high end snacks of course. 

It was all about a contest between young designers who had to design a summer dress inspired on the Mercedes Benz Cabriolet including five other less concrete conditions. The speaker lady started to read out loud a text from a piece of paper while a cool trip hop beat build up some tension. Nineteen models were about to pass and turn in front of a four headed jury from the Dubai fashion world. 

The winning dress in blue

None of the 19 finalists dresses - but that’s just my opinion - did look like a Mercedes Benz Cabriolet. I would send my model in a cabriolet on the catwalk I think, with a summer dress (flower motive) of course. The judges were looking puzzled to the models, while sucking on legs of their glasses and making rejecting notes on their pads or whispering mysteriously in each others ears. 

Mr. and Mrs. Tet

After the last model left the ramp and without any communication with the judges, the speaker lady announced all winners in an embarrassing speed. Prices were going in the wrong sequence and to the wrong people. During this chaos trendy drinks were coming down the stairs and due to the heat - it felt like a hot air oven - everybody stormed towards the waiters to cool down a bit. 

And so I had reported this event live to Jay via twitter, and I made contact to a couple of future customers - or at least I hope they will - and so the success of this evening is yet to be seen.  And for me personally? I think I have done it well and was promoted to level two of FashionVille - (tailor assistant!)  

A tower to the moon...

One book you have to read if you are in Dubai is The Sands from Wilfred Thesiger. Besides his great skill in travel narrative, he has seen The Sands without the forest of skyscrapers which now dominates the skyline in Dubai. Since Thesiger travelled here in 1950, this piece of the world has dramatically changed. Let me quote Thesiger at page 88: 

'[...] the Arabs had no traditions of civilizations behind them. To arrange three stones as a fireplace on which to set a pot was the only architecture that many of them required.' 

Somewhere in the seventies the Dubai tribe decided suddenly to put more then three stones on top of each other  and in no time the skyscrapers grew from The Sands with the Burj Khalifa as the ultimate achievement as the highest building in the world with 828 meters. 

Last week I read my daily expat newspaper and took - a bit embarrassed -  knowledge from the latest achievement in Holland. In good old Rotterdam was an office building opened and with 44 floors, or 165 meters, the highest building in the country... I live in an ordinary Dubai Marina tower of 50 floors high. And only this block - Jumeirah Beach Residence - I counted 48 towers of this size. 

Now the number and height of towers does not say a lot about what the people of a country have achieved. The French had many kings  and at least one emperor. They made the Arch de Triumph for Napoleon and put it in the middle of Paris. In Dubai they have build a BIGGER arch which leads to the Ibn Batuta mall (a discoverer from 14th century Morocco) and will be not known to many residents in the city as its a bit out of the way. 

No emperor ever passed this arch, it was just me with my car who passed it on a Friday morning. And so the history of Dubai is not that interesting, it is more a city of the future. Even the national heritage, like the camels , are rode by Indian expats on the beach, and the new Arab is driving around in the latest fashionable car or bike. 

Traditional food has been replaced by a tremendous amount of Starbucks, McDonald's and other fancy fast food outlets. The number of obese people (locals) is the highest on earth and indeed, many of the Emirati people are walking around with XXXL traditional attire, even the kids are alarmingly fat. The government is now setting up programs for healthy food on schools since diabetes is the new serial killer in the country. 

Anyhow, Dubai has had its blow from the credit crunch, but in its effort to become the city with the biggest, highest, tallest and weirdest structures, the most unbelievable plan is still on the drawing tables, but not cancelled yet. It is this amazing project called Dubai City Tower. 

Just for the record, number 9 from the left is Burj Khalifa, currently the highest building in the world. One positive thing: if you are a bit suicidal and decide to jump from the City Towers, there might be a chance that you don't fall down, but upwards...

Evil Hard Rock Cafe Dubai

When I was just about a couple of months in Dubai, I once visited the Hard Rock Cafe Dubai, along Sheik Zayed road, not far away from the Dubai Marina. It's an obvious landmark and - so I experienced - not easy to reach through that labyrinth of highways curling around it. I passed it several times from close by but not able to reach it. A bit later I found out you can only reach it one way off the highway in direction Jebel Ali. Once inside I heard why.

An early image, no highway nearby...

The Hard Rock cafe was among the first buildings around Marina and in the early days one had to drive for nearly an hour to reach it from downtown Burj Dubai. The Hard Rock cafe was nearly in the middle of the dessert since about 1998. Pre-historic times for Dubai...

Now the first plot of the mystical Dubai Thriller is in the making, we need symbolic if not dramatic landmarks for the story, and what would do it better than this now deserted iconic building which hundreds of thousands residents have seen and visited in the last decade. Its true, the Hard Rock cafe closed just a few weeks after my visit. I ordered a Hard Rock burger and a cola, yep, alcohol was banned since the adjacent Palm Hotel had been closed down. 'That's how we lost our license', a depressed waiter told me.

Save the planet? Better read the thriller once written!

Our thriller will contain quite some supernatural features which will hassle our heroes, and it might be very possible that a part of the evil powers will hide away within the deserted Hard Rock Cafe, with its Globe on the top of the tower, symbolizing world domination. Interesting facts by the way are the words 'Amnesia' on the side of the building. And what to say about this site stating that the Atlantis club was once right beside the Hard Rock cafe. That's how it goes more often, that things are coming way beyond coincidence... I better hurry up writing before someone else taps this story out of the current zeitgeist...

Parsley is my fave herb of the moment!

since my mother bought a bunch of parsley the other day, i have been playing around its fresh, distinct taste to create some recipes of my own version. Yesterday, I sauteed jackfruit seeds then plated it with some scrambled eggs. And today, with some inspiration from what we  -tet and I-  ate back in april in boracay @ ARIA restaurant, I made my own version of prosciutto…

here's what we had @ ARIA:

and here's what I made. 

I am not blowing my own horn, but I could say this might actually topple the ARIA version, I used the freshest of mangos and the earthiest potatoes, although I didn't use parma ham, our local version isn't bad at all. Then i drizzled it with herbed and melted butter, spiced with just the right amount of bite courtesy of some chopped red chilies….et voila!… mango prosciutto ala jay served with herbed potatoes and over filling with tender-loving care…too bad Tet is not here to try it, but it's always nice to eat with your love ones, hence, I made three beautiful plates of my dish to share with my dear daddy and my loving mommy…

cheers everyone!!! And always enjoy a good meal with your love ones.

-eat well,live well and be merry!

Preview on a Dubai thriller

Already a couple of weeks we - Tet Paxon - are active on this blog in writing about food, entertainment, traveling and all you can consume. Although its too early (and too complex) to explain the full concept of Romantica Incognita, a part of the truth is that this site is being created as a warming up for writing a novel, more precise, a thriller.

This idea is already dating back as early as half December 2009, and since then not a lot has been done to materialize the book. In fact, nothing has been done besides a couple of meetings, one in Dubai and one in Philippines, to explore the plot and a handful of pages with notes. That now has to change, and today I stood suddenly once again face to face with the object that triggered the thriller initiative late last year...

This morning I was downstairs at The Walk, to buy a newspaper and a coffee, when my attention was grabbed again by this awesome and thrilling car which can be spotted sometimes at the streets of Dubai. It was not just excitement, but also a deeper mysterious thought about who is inside the car. This intrigued me from the first moment, as the windows are tanned darker than any other car in town. You are simply not able to see through it.

The other fact is that it is not a regular limousine, but a weird one, as the model is a Hummer, very odd, would this car be able to drive off road? What kind of special features would be inside it? Was it just one person, a whole family or... was it something else that was hidden in this extraordinary vehicle?

And so a story was growing around the Hummer limo, and later the limo became part of a wider plot, which is taking place in modern day Dubai. Now we can't say a lot yet, as the story is about to be written in the remaining part of the year, but on this blog the early birds who can find it, will be able to learn more about the coming book and find some of the backgrounds of the story.

Now, to make it all a bit more interesting, we will hand-out to the the first five person who put a supportive comment on this blog - or any blog regarding the novel -  a signed copy of this thriller which title is not yet known. The release date is scheduled somewhere in the year 2011.

The next five signed copies, with a personal message, will be sent to those who will be the most active contributor at this blog (and our facebook and twitter account) to help this project moving forward. Yes, we will be definitely more productive when support is kicking in!

Finally, there will be another 15 signed copies to be sent to our supporters for reasons yet unknown, and to be announced during the coming year, but the fact remains, 25/25 signed copies will be handed out ultimately.

With the publication in a few minutes of this first blog regarding the 'yet-to-be-written-thriller' we are happy to have started the project publicly, and besides a natural motivator, we hope that the public pressure following on the blogs comments (!) will push us at the keyboard as a daily routine.

With regards,

Tet Paxon

CHi the spa

after spending hours running around SM cebu searching for an xd card- as most shops sell only sd- and picking-up our laundry, we got back in our hotel dead tired. So we- tet and I- decided that we needed/deserved some pampering. So we decided to book an appointment to the in-house spa of Shangri La...CHi.







The whole place is “tranquility” translated into architecture. It’s a village composed of small garden suites with individual changing rooms and massage rooms. We opted for a traditional Philippine “hilot” package. It’s an hour and a half full body pampering. And boy-oh-boy, it was truly a bliss!!!... After the “hilot” we were both smelling good enough to eat because of the coconut oil used, and since we can’t eat each other in CHi, we just decided to eat @ CHi as they also have an in-house chef that serves “tranquil foods”.








We both ordered the set menus, Tet’s was “elements of fire”, while I ordered for “elements of water”. We were first served with vegetable crudités with some garlic/lemon dip...(i’m not a big veggie fun, but the veggies are just so fresh, they’re very sweet that I actually liked them..)








then we were served with our main dishes: Tet’s dish was thin tuna slices on a bed of veggies, and mine was spiced sea bass on a bed of pineapple salad...my dish was a perfect marriage of the spiciness of the sea bass and the freshness of the pineapple-every bite the pineapple just bursted in my mouth, it’s the gastronomical equivalent of a cool breeze in a summer afternoon...the sea bass was so fresh it was as if the sea was put on a plate.













To clench our thirst we had a concoction of watermelon and kiwi shake..it’s summer in a glass...totally refreshing!!!!and a perfect ending in a totally relaxing and rejuvenating CHi experience ...


and so we decided to walk back to our room...so I could finally have my coconut flavored dessert....(*naughty wink, slurp!)...


cheers!!!

-eat well; live well and be merry!!!

Over serving in Tecom

This afternoon I had a brief lunch and decided not to walk to The Greens, where I usually go, but the other way into Tecom, the new office quarter which is halfway to be completed. Its an area with quite a few hotels and plenty of towers for residents and offices. Sometimes you ask yourself, will it all be filled in Dubai? Will this all be used? It looks like, cause any finished building seem to be occupied in no time.



Right around the corner where I work is a hotel - sorry, forgot the name - finished and there is an 'all day open restaurant' so good to have a brief visit for a simple lunch. It is not a fancy 5 star hotel, more a sober business hotel for the average visitor. The restaurant looked quite plain and even before I entered the doors I heard the well known Dubai phrase 'Hello sir, welcome' from an Asian lady.

There were only two other tables occupied where servers where posting and it was directly clear to me, that this lady would not let me unserved during my stay. That is what happens in hotels which are just opened, those irritating over motivated waiters who just hit the ground in Dubai and totally excited by their new job. This enthusiasm will be tempered over the months, and I decided to speed up the process a little but...

I wanted to sit - the chair was shifted under my bottom, I did not want to read anything and a newspaper was handed over. I read the menu, and the lady was reading with me over my shoulder. I ordered a drink, and questions were fired 'with or without ice, lemon? Water as well, still, sparkling, room temperature?' I ordered a caesar salad as well and she was running. In no time I had the salad, which was excellent by the way, and when the lady sensed that, I got every three minutes a question.

'Is the salad nice? Anything I can do for you? You want another drink? Are you sure you don't want the menu?' And in between these questions she was marching around the table and when the first glass was finished it disappeared in a flash and same happened when I still had the fork with the last piece of chicken in my hand, the empty plate was gone, and a menu on the same place. So I did put the fork and chicken on the menu... panic.

I decided at last not to break the high motivation, she better enjoys the time she still likes it, so I left the restaurant over served with a wink and a smile when the door was opened and from beneath a deep bow I heard, Thank you sir see you next time bye bye!'

A small story about the sisha

After more than two years in Egypt, I have learned to appreciate the sisha. Even since I stopped smoking cigarettes - now more than a year ago - I still do smoke a couple of sishas a week. Now, at the THCE THCE outlet just down stairs where I live, is a great place to do so. It also comes along with the lovely evenings here in Dubai, though its slowly getting too hot to sit outside...

To give you an of idea what I am talking about, a very brief history lesson:

In India in the court of the Mughal emperor Akbar (1542 - 1605 CE) Following the European introduction of tobacco to India, Hakim Abul Fateh Gilani a descendant of Abdul Qadir Al-Gilani came from Baghdad to India who was later a physician in the court of Mughal raised concerns after smoking tobacco became popular among Indian noblemen, and subsequently envisaged a system which allowed smoke to be passed through water. in order to be 'purified'. Gilani introduced the Hookah after Asad Beg, then ambassador of Bijapur, encouraged Akbar to take up smoking. Following popularity among noblemen, this new device from Arabia for smoking soon became a status symbol for the Indian aristocracy and gentry. The Indian Hookah was designed differently from the Arabian Hookah or Shisha which was invented during the Abbasid Empire in Baghdad. They were different in shape and design.

I realize that smoking a sisha is not a very healthy activity, and though I stopped smoking, it seems that a couple of sisha is equal to 200 hundred cigarettes!

"The World Health Organisation has quashed the sisha myth, suggesting that smoking a sisha is more dangerous than smoking cigarettes. It also said that more research is needed into the link between the use of the waterpipe and several fatal illnesses.
An advisory note from the WHO says that smoking a sisha may expose the smoker to more smoke over a longer period of time than occurs when smoking cigarettes.Because smoking a hookah may take up to 80 minutes, the report suggests that the smoker is subjecting himself to as much smoke as somebody dragging on 100 cigarettes."

So what can I say about it? Basically everything is dangerous if you check your hobby+health in google. In fact life itself is dangerous, because from living, ultimately, you die. And so I really don't mind that much about all those researchers and scientists who make a living from telling us what to do and what not to do. How would the world look like if we all would follow their advises. I still like my sisha and so be it!