Serendra on a rainy night

Wednesday night, as soon as my husband could cross the street in the color-coded car to our home (yes, it's just across the street where he works but he has to wait for 7 pm to go home because of the hare-brained color-coding policy), we hied off to Serendra to view the works of his student in Grade 7 several years back, who's now an architect and a cartoonist/painter/artist, JoMike Tejido.

The entrance to the parking area at the basement was barred, as usual, by a FULL sign but we patiently waited for the security guard so my husband could ask if we could go in, pointing to the disabled sticker on the car windshield. The guard grudgingly lifted the sign away so we could go in.

We parked in the disabled slot and proceeded to the elevator. There a notice was hung: Sorry for the inconvenience, but please use the other elevator. This other elevator was in the other side of the world. Okay, that's an exaggeration, but it was quite a distance. thankfully, however, the elevator was spacious and so we rode up to the second floor where the gallery 1of was. Quaint name, no? When I saw that in the text of JoMike to my husband, I thought it was a text short-cut for something.

The gallery is small, maybe two meters wide. It wasn't too deep either. But on its walls hung JoMike's acrylic works on banig. They told a story which was printed and perched on an easel near the paintings. I didn't finish reading the story because I was constantly editing it in my mind and grew tired. Not that the English was bad, it's just I. (I used to add the digits on a plate number when I was in grade school and practicing for a Math contest. OC?)

The gallery curator was very competent. She regaled us with stories about the sale of the paintings. Half of those marked sold were bought by foreigners, she said. Good for JoMike who's a nice boy, er, young man. He has a comic strip in the Inquirer. Mikrosmos or something. He also occasionally (or regularly) appears on TV teaching art stuff. I'm not sure what channel, though. An aside: the curator was very articulate but nice, she had this huge gap in her front teeth but rather than detract from her looks, the gap enhanced them because she wasn't at all conscious about it. Galing.

After viewing the paintings, we went back to the elevator to go down for dinner at FU's, just my husband and I. Now, Serendra has a lot of open spaces. The roofed areas fronting the restaurants have tables so finding shelter in them as one negotiates the place can be a challenge where one is defeated a lot. Worse, crossing to the other side if one is in a wheelchair means having to use the unroofed ramp. So, without an umbrella on hand, we braved the drizzle for dinner at Fu's, where only one table was occupied. Soon after, a man in a wheelchair and his wife entered. Somehow, I think he was my brother-in-law's friend. His face looked familiar.

Anyway, dinner at FU's was okay, but not as exciting as the first time. We ordered the suckling pig, 3 ways. no, it's not like Peking duck done 3 ways where one gets 3 variations of peking duck: as soup, cooked with vegetables, and served with pita and hoisin sauce. Here 3 ways meant a combination of suckling pig and two other dishes, choices being soy chicken, pork asado and seaweeds. we ordered soy chicken and pork asado with the suckling pig, a decision I regretted as we labored through the dish which seemed redundant after the first few bites. On the side we also ordered hakaw (shrimp siomai) and asado siopao, plus the FU special fried rice which the waitress said had roast duck slices (I barely tasted them). The hoisin sauce that came with the combination plate tasted lame; it didn't have the kick of other hoisin sauces I've tried. The asado was all right, the soy chicken looked frail, the skin of the suckling pig looked a tad overcooked. The siomai was okay, I gave my share of the siopao to my husband who was craving for it, but took 2 of the three pieces of siomai.

Before paying our bill, I asked the waiter to compute as on the door I saw the poster of Citibank which had been there months before: a minimum food bill of something entitled diners who paid using Citibank to free dessert. Same dessert as months back, but good, nonetheless. Remember what it was? Three colored balls atop the white ceramic spoon given when one orders soup. One ball was green, another was orange, and yet another was a dark hue-- ube. The green, I think, was pandan rolled in dessicated coconut and stuffed with sweet mango. The orange one was carrot (Vitamin A!), while the dark-hued one was ube. All were rolled in dessicated coconut and stuffed with mango. Served on the side was a small bowl of mango-sago, the mango liquid in consistency, not pureed but juice-like. Floating on it aside from sago were orange peel. Very refreshing if one takes it on a hot summer day as it was cold. Except that I guess I have an acidic tummy so . . .

After dinner, we promptly went back to the car. Believe it or not, we didn't stop by any store, not even A Different Bookstore which we passed.