Expats and Re-pats will inevitably encounter this experience one way or another. While scanning the grocery aisles while settling down and nesting in your new home, you experience a wave of homesickness, longing for the products that you have grown accustomed to from your home country or from the place you've stayed in for a long time. 

When I came back to the Philippines, having lived abroad for more than a decade, I've realised my palate has changed as well.  Everything that I was used to growing up suddenly tasted too sweet. I never really fancied mayonnaise before leaving my home country, so when I tried the French mayo for the first time, I saw mayonnaise in a new light and fell in love with it. 

Though it took a long time for my husband to convince me which mustard is better since I have been an advocate of the American yellow mustard, while he proudly defended his authentic Dijon,  I eventually caved in and developed the taste buds for Moutarde de Dijon. (Though I still like my yellow mustard in a hotdog sandwich - yum!)

To all Philippine passport holders, are you by any chance planning to renew your passport and change your surname to your foreign husband's?

We have been married for almost 10 years and I have been using my maiden name the entire time in all of my local and international identification cards.  Since I won't be traveling outside the country very soon,  I found it the perfect time to do it.

Living abroad, there wasn't really any urgent need to change my name. Within the span of my expat life, I have changed my passport thrice and the thought of the long bureaucratic procedure made me cringe. Waiting for an online appointment schedule at my country's consulate in Dubai and the whole process of name changing deemed to be a nightmare. My then tight business trip schedules when I was working in the Middle East didn't have any window to accommodate this long wait. Additionally, I wanted to avoid my previous employers paying additional fees to renew my resident visas and to steer clear from all of the administrative hassles of name changing in all of my identification cards such as my driver's license, Emirates ID and etc. 

If I had a choice, I would still keep my maiden name.

As per the civil code, the woman can still continue using her legal name when she was single. It may not be mandatory to use my husband's surname in the Philippines, but in reality, the change makes everything a tad less complicated.   

Do you know that you can convert your existing Driver's License abroad for less than Php 650? Yes it is possible and you can get your brand new Non-professional driver's license ID,  hot and fresh, the same day of your application.

I went to Land Transportation Office (LTO) in Paranaque, and I found out they were not doing conversions there.  The nearest one for me was the LTO Office along Domestic MIA Road in Pasay City. 

Is it just me or the days seem to be running like enthusiastic athletes in a triathlon?  We're in the second quarter of 2015 already.  This brings me to evaluate where I am in my goals for this year. 

"Purge the unncessary and decrease clutter."

Yes and yes to that! Evaluating and letting go of things we have to part ways with before leaving Dubai was such a therapeutic experience. It feels so light! So many things can be accumulated without us realising it. We are presently in Manila for a temporary stay at my Mom's while we wait for the shipment of our stuff to be cleared and stored.  The sorted items have been painstakingly thought through which we will need, once we find a permanent base.

I am extremely excited to share this beautiful home here. Owned by a dear friend, Monique whom you might have met and read here.  She's an expat who has been living in Dubai for more than ten years, working as a Design Manager for a prestigious mall in this energetic city. I am truly inspired by what she has accomplished as she completed one of her goals, construction of her family home in the Philippines.

This is my first post for 2015.  I spent the year end and the beginning of the year doing inventory of items we want to keep and sell.  It was difficult, liberating and nostalgic. Difficult, because each furniture has a story to tell. Each of these black and white photo frames has my personal shots of specific destinations that mean something to us. They are usually conversation starters with guests and each time I look at them, they make me smile.  

The above dining furniture, we are taking with us.  The photo frames, we plan to sell soon as well as my paintings.  The below furniture will go as well as the rest of our appliances.  So what will you be expecting from Travel Gourmande this year?

Remember last year when we started planning setting up something in the Philippines? That plan was indefinitely put on hold when I found a job and got pregnant.  After the recent trip home, we are going to kick start this project. Mind you, it's going to be a 1-2 year plan  setting it up, I will document  preparations here on the blog.  I will call this series "Island Home Blue Print"

"Sometimes, despite all the careful planning we have prepared well ahead, life will throw a curve ball." 

Remember in my previous post, I sent a box of baby items several weeks in advance before our trip? Well, that box never made it.


A package of this size usually arrives within a month or 45 days at the most.  Unfortunately, while we were in Manila, the shipping company informed us that this box of milk, diapers, crib, clothes and presents for the family were stuck somewhere in a ship in Singapore.  The failed idea of a declared truck ban in Manila that was recently lifted caused shipping congestion that didn't help either.  Large containers queued for days in the narrow streets of Manila port. It was a huge logistics mess.

On our second day in Manila, after the first phone call of tracking the box, I had a gut feeling, we will leave the Philippines and we will never set sight on this package.

I've learned that no matter how much planning or managing we do, we simply can't control everything in life.