Binondo Girl for a Day.

Binondo - where Chinatown in Manila is located.

Girl - Me? Well not exactly. A woman, yes. :)

Binondo girl came from a drama series here in the Philippines and this is about a Chinese girl whom I'm not really certain what exactly happened to her, but since a damn good portion of filipinos watching it, whatever happened to her must be really really interesting.  I don't really watch tv these days and I just heard about the drama series from people who follow it.  And since it kinda fits my experience,  I used it! HAHA to that!

Ladies and gentlemen. 

Welcome to Binondo.  The land of chinese people, the home of amazing siomais, sio paos, and all the delecacies the chinese had blessed us pinoys with.

Going there was a challenge.  You needed to pass by very narrow and broken down streets.  Alongside of which are small stalls selling just about anything -- pirated cds, fruits, street food, clothes, belts, caps, dildos. And it's a known place for snatchers and some hoodlums, so as much as possible, dress down and keep it simple.  The poorer you look, the better!  Minutes after passing along the streets, I had to remove my silver hoop earrings.  I know those weren't really expensive, but who knows right?  I might spend thousands for an ear operation if those were just pulled off from my ear by some desperate thief.  I know.  Bloody.  But hey, you can never omit that possibility, especially when you're in Binondo.

So we headed on to Cafe Mezzanine, which is a famous place popular for its food and for the fact that it's ode to firefighters in Manila, that's why you would see pictures exhibited on the walls.  On the ground part you'll see a typical ambiance of a karinderya, but if you'll go upstairs, you'll be surprised that it's really decent and classy looking.  The walls on one side are imposed with slabs of glasses that show the Binondo streets directly in front of the shop.  And you'll see how thick the electrical wires had become.  Such an organized mess, makes you wonder how electricians from Meralco work with these chaos.

We finally got ourselves some stir fried tofu and black soup, downing it up with chrysanthimum tea and raspberry tea.  The taste was really superb, especially the sizzling stir fried tofu, which I got for myself.  It's sweet, and you would taste the star anise in it.  I think it would be fun to play around with spice.  Yep, in the near future! hehehe

Just few blocks away from Cafe Mezzanine, is the very ancient and historical,  Binondo church, which has been said to have existed during the Spanish times.  Now, different modern buildings have been rooted around it, making it one of the few remnant of the spanish era. 

Binondo Church.

Outside the siomai shop.

After eating, we head on to walk for a few meters, in the attempt to "burn" off some calories.  And hopefully would rid us of the guilt of gluttony and we would have an excuse to eat some more! :) 

And after roughly 50 footsteps away, we got into a shop, and did just that! 

My sister was trying to look for xiao long pao, which is not your typical siomao.  It is a siomao with a soup in it! 

Black algae.

Xioa Long Bao

After eating so much siopaos and siomais in just a day, we decided to hit home.  Today was a homerun for my belly.  Tomorrow?  What else would be in store for me.  That's the thrill with life.  Planned or unplanned, it's always better to just get out there, head on and take in a lot of experience.  

Unto the next adventure everyone!