Manila's Best Shawarma

According to Boyd and Jake, Manila's best shawarma can be found not in Mister Kebab's but in Uncle Moe's Shawarma Hub.

This little restaurant in the City Golf arcade has maintained a faithful following because of their damn good tasting Beef and Chicken Shawarma. Best eaten with a bottle of Coors Light.

City Golf arcade can be found along Julia Vargas Avenue, across Valle Verde III and beside Ortigas Home Depot. There's also a Brooklyn's Pizza, a Domino's Pizza and a Razon's of Guagua (for the best halo-halo's) in the same arcade.

Weird Massage

On one of our wanderlust weekends, Jake and I decided to head out to Malate, a.k.a. Manila's gay mecca. I like having Jake as a backride on my motorcycle especially when he hugs me tight when he gets cold with the breeze or when he rests his chin on my shoulders when we're on stoplights.

After browsing through the video collection of Top & Bottom and getting a couple of DVD's, we didn't have anything to do anymore. The people at O bar were being weird and they were staring at us. I doubt if it was because we were holding hands because for RuPaul's sake, this is Malate. So we walked to the far end of Nakpil and back and decided to get a massage instead from Asian Massage.

They have the least helpful attendants, even rude at some point. They were good in massages though. The funny thing was that they were inconsistent with their routine. My therapist was massaging my member. Of course I had an erection since he kept at it for a while. And he was also tickling my tummy and flicking my nipples, which of course hardened with the stimulation. Is this really how they do Swedish massages these days? Oh, in case you need the name of that excellent masseur, just ask me.

Enfants Terribles

A faghag of the olden days, on the way to the baptism of a recent godchild, asked me if I ever wanted children.

My own child - nice thought - I've never really thought about it deeply and intimately; maybe in passing, but not seriously.

I've kidded that maybe for tax purposes I could adopt children. With the amount of money that the BIR is getting from me, I can put four kids through grade school and still have enough money left to go on a weekend trip to Hong Kong. Or maybe I could have kids to get even with my friends who seem to be having fun getting married and making us godparents of the kids they made and letting us organize bridal showers, weddings, baby showers, baptisms and first birthdays, all in the name of friendship. I've told them not to get married and have babies every year because we homosexuals are in the losing end. We can't married (legally) and have babies (naturally, by accident, planned, or otherwise).

I don't really have any emotional reasons to have my own child. I think for many people - and I'm not saying all - their reasons for having children is partly emotional, and in a way selfish. They want a child to carry their name, they want a child that they can call their own, a child that came from their own flesh and blood, who bears a striking resemblance to them, and who will be obliged - by law, morals, social expectations, human compassion and debt of gratitude - to take care of them when they grow old. But as for me, I really don't have any pressing reasons to have a child. If I do, maybe I'll do an Angelina Jolie and adopt a Cambodian orphan. I don't want to bring another child in this world to let him experience or witness human suffering as it happens. We have far too many poor and sick children to add to the burden on the human race. I'm not saying that having your own child is morally wrong. I guess I just brought it upon myself that it is my responsibility to keep the population increase in check.

I posit the theory that homosexuals are an evolutionary tool to keep the human population in check. My girl friends (of the single sort) have asked me at least one hundred times how homosexuals multiply when they don't bear children, and if homosexuality is genetic, then we would have died out because the homosexual gene rarely gets passed on to the next generation (i hate to think this would make you doubt about your parents' orientation). I guess it's a case of nature AND nurture. Maybe the homosexual gene is a later-stage mutation caused by the food we eat or the season when we were conceived. And with most societies starting to be more tolerant of homosexuals, maybe it's actually a repressed norm. There might be more or us than you think there actually is.

I digress. When we reached church 45 minutes later, and 45 minutes late for the baptismal rites, I realized that I, along with my friends, are of marrying and parenting age. Two of my friends have children, three are either married or engaged. I have Jake. I somehow feel the need to be scared that I'm losing out my friends to the family way. But that last sentence was more than reassuring. Yes. I have Jake.

Dropping Our Pants

Jake was joking about me getting a rich gay American as a husband to pay for our lifestyle and I'll just "tag him along" as my assistant. "I'm sure he wouldn't mind getting two for one", I quipped.

Maybe, says Jake, we should put up a website about us, post pictures, the works... like Tiggah and Pooh, our favorite Internet gay couple!

I laughed inside. Well Jake, there IS a website. It's just that I haven't told you about it.

I don't know yet about showing our pictures. I'm not ashamed of it or anything but I want to at least keep parts of our lives private. Also, sometimes, as I have done before, I write stuff about me and Jake that can get quite too sensitive that I might not be too comfortable in sharing once our faces are out there.

But I guess there's really no need for now to show the world how we look like. I'll think about that sometime soon.

Valentine's Day, Anniversary and Welcome-Back Date of Sorts

As I have already mentioned, I was elsewhere in Asia for the past two weeks and I didn't get to spend Valentine's Day with Jake. People say it's cliché (they're usually single when they say so) but it would have been nice to take Jake out for dinner like all couples in love do. So that's exactly what we did when I got back yesterday. And guess what; it was also our anniversary! So it was a triple celebration that deserved special arrangements.

Although I was tired from my trip and Jake had training in the evening, I managed to convince him to skip training and spend the rest of his day with me. We spent the later part of the afternoon doing something that I missed doing during the past two weeks. You know what that is.

And then we went out for dinner. Jake and I are big gourmands (but we're very much fit) and we enjoy eating at good restaurants, fine dining if we have the resources, and this is something that we like doing together. We also don't mind hole in the wall restaurants as long as they come recommended. That night we were choosing between Crustasia and all time favorite Cyma. In the end, both of us were craving for salad and Cyma won.

We had their much hyped spinach and potato (or was it cheese) fondue which the waitress famously recommended. I'd say it wasn't really exquisite but it was great tasting nonetheless.

And then we shared a solo serving of Roka Salata which is officially Boyd and Jake's Favorite Salad Dish Ever. The dressing was fantastic.

Jake got Bifteka a.k.a. Greek wagyu beef hamburger. The beef was good. The feta cheese with basil was divinely inspired. Anything with feta for me is delicious.

I got the "Greek Chicken Adobo". It didn't start out well but when you get to the center of this half-a-chicken, it was yummy. But really, I expected more oomph out of it. Next time I'll stick to Moussaka.

We dropped by Secret Recipes to check out the cake. It was funny because I was just in KL the day before and we saw about half a dozen Secret Recipes stores and we didn't even bother checking them out. Well they're in Manila anyway!

It was a fun night and I'm happy to be able to spend time with Jake again. And since I'm getting a raise, a bonus and a promotion, there's another reason to celebrate this weekend! Maybe a relaxing massage for two? :)

Back from Blogging Hiatus

I guess I should have anounced here that I would go on a 18-day blogging hiatus for my 11-city Southeast Asian tour (parang Beyoncé lang!) but I really didn't have much time to do everything. But anyway, I'm back from my 18-day 11-city Southeast Asian tour (Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Malaysia) and it was so much fun! Jake couldn't go with me though because he has class. Awwww.....

What was I thinking! 18 days sans Jake. It got a bit lonely at night sometimes and I always thought about him. But we e-mailed a lot so it was OK. And now I'm back so it's all good!!!

I will blog again as soon as I get enough sleep. So ciao for now!