If my life was a book, it would be a cookbook entitled: A Filipino Fiesta [feast] of Food, Friends & Family. On the right page would be each recipe, with doodles and drawings on the side and on the left page – a story. It can be a story of how that recipe came about, memories that food brings or a totally unrelated anecdote.
We Filipinos love a good meal…specially when it is shared among family and friends. This is why the Filipino dinner is usually the highlight of each day. This is when good meals are cooked because the family would dine together, telling each other stories on how their days went. Special meals that require more time to prepare would be reserved for Sunday lunches. Lunches that would never be complete without an anecdote or two, the week’s latest gossip or those old stories that would be told again and again. Filipinos also make sure that you do not eat alone. I remember taking my lunch in the office alone. In less than 3 minutes the guys and gals would be sitting beside me, chatting away or eating their meals as I would savour mine.
Yes that would be my life. A life filled with pockets of stories. Why the food? Because I love cooking. Cooking is the simplest form of creating. It brings joy to the creator and to those who partake in its creation.
And oh! Sorry…how will my story end? It doesn’t. For like each dish, we create variations upon variations – possibilities are endless. Like an old family heirloom, these recipes shall be given from one family generation to another and they will be free to create their own variation…their own cookbooks with their unique flavors if they wish.
If your life was a novel, what would be the title be, what part of your life will you tell and how would your story end?
