Living in Phnom Penh: Randomeness #3
Hey, how was your Chinese New Year celebrations? Ours was really fun and merry with lots of food involved. Lol. Khmer-Chinese really celebrate the lunar new year with much fervor. Even local Khmers are now joining in with the festivities! While this is not an official holiday, well, people do take a break. Lots of shops and businesses are closed for three days. So the cities empty out and a lot of people go to provinces to just relax and have a bit of downtime.
Chinese lanterns @ Koh Pich (Diamond Island) Park
As for us, we observed the usual Chinese rituals, offering food, incense and prayers to departed ancestors. Then the next few days were spent eating, playing cards, spending time with the whole clan and it was capped with a road trip.
Now, I’m pretty much tired but revved up. I feel like I’m all in good mood and hearing good music. I guess that little break has done wonders to my mind set.
The food and celebration though has wreaked havoc on my diet so I started today doing vigorous high impact aerobic exercises. I feel really good afterwards and its like my own body metronomes are all in tune and working! And the good news is that when I checked the weighing scale..I didn’t gain any weight. Uh, thank God for healthy Chinese food and the workouts. Lol.
Read MoreGong Xi Fa Cai From Phnom Penh!
Everybody (well, almost everybody that is, hehe) is in a frenzy. The streets are getting clogged, the markets are getting more jampacked (if they could get more jampacked) and I keep seeing those pretty red lanterns on a lot of houses and shops. Well, Cambodia is celebrating along with Chinese! The Chinese New Year is one of the biggest festive events here in Cambodia, and while its not an official holiday, the rest of the Khmers are all celebrating this. I think this comes second to Khmer New Year in terms of their celebratory fervor. So now, we’re all getting ready to usher in the year of the dragon!
As for me, I’m leaving all the cooking to my mother-in-law. Hahaha. I’m a lucky, lucky girl! So it’ll all just be eating, offerings, leisure time for the weekend. On another note, I dread the havoc the holidays will wreak on my diet. I guess it’s time to bring out the plus size dresses or maybe I should be doing more intense exercises now to counter the effect of too much eating? Or maybe I should just stick to this particular favorite of mine…sesame seed snacks! Hahaha.
Enough of my blabbing. I just wanna wish everyone, good health and wealth for the coming new year! Gong Xi Fa Cai!
Read MoreRandom New Year Ramblings
Ha! It’s already the 5th day of the first month of 2012 and here I am just greeting everyone a Happy New Year! But then…were still on the first week, right? So I’m sure its ok. Hahaha. As much as I love blogging, I have more important priorities. I’ve been beat and tired so I figured I needed a few days rest from being ‘online’. It was a good call coz now I feel energized, motivated and ready to give blogging for 2012 a big go!
I have tons of plans. And I think its high time I move to other things aside from blogging. I manage multiple blogs, mostly personal blogs with niche topics like fashion and beauty (where I write about fashion finds, things I find pretty etc). I also have a thrift shopping blog, a ‘mom blog’, and a few more. And of course this one, my personal-lifestyle-living in Cambodia blog. And these blogs had been a great journey and a fabulous past time for me (not to mention the shopping money it earns me lol!) and I’ll carry on updating them.
But I’ll be implementing a teeny weeny bit of change here. I’m adding in some recommended products you guys might be interested in. I know I already have a few ads scattered on the blog, but I’m hoping this would make a good addition and would add some more value to each posting. You’ll be seeing ‘featured products’ at the bottom of each post. At least it could help me earn my hosting and domain fees. 
I’m also doing a category clean-up on this site. It’s driving me nuts that a few years of disorganized posting habit made this site an almost mess. I need to streamline my categories and re-organize the posts, so if you see something weird around here in the next few days, please bear with me. I intend to come up with a better looking Pinaywifespeaks.
Since its a new year, I’ve decided to pursue another ‘project’. This time I’ll be building niche websites and experimenting with it, trying out different monetizing strategies. Hmm, its going to be a trial and error project, I know the big probability of me failing but I also know its gonna keep me occupied and I’m really really excited since I know this time I’ll be learning more. But whatever the outcome, I don’t intend to quit until I discover what works for me.
Hmm, see I’m pretty much motivated. I must have eaten something really good during the New Years. Lol. Have a great weekend everyone!
Read More
Living in Phnom Penh: Bliss, Places and More Random-ness
Hey. I’ve been out and about so I didn’t have much time to blog. It’s almost Christmas but I’m not really feeling the season since Cambodia is not really much into it. But the breeze and the weather is just great. Very cool and dry. I could just spend days just lazing around, drinking my espresso and doing nothing. I wish. Lol.
But we’ve been taking advantage of the cool weather to do our bit of gallivanting. For the past three weekends, we’ve been out and about. Our Saturdays usually start with jogging at the parks, drive around and end up having lunch somewhere. Just last week we discovered a great lunch place popular with Khmers. The one with hammocks, raised platforms and nipa huts. We had a hearty Khmer lunch and napped on hammocks. I keep thinking this is what life is about. Heh.
Another weekend we visited a farm belong to Hi-ace’s friend. It was a totally lazy day with us just eating non-stop, lazing around in floating huts like this and trying our best to catch some fish.
Sigh. This is one of the best things I love about living in Cambodia. I really get to stop, relax and have a look around. And what I see, I really really like.
Next week is back to reality for me. I’m in an ‘almost panic mode’ now coz I haven’t really done any planning for Christmas and New Years. We were supposed to go to some beach for New Year’s Eve but that would cancelled since most hotels we want are now fully booked. We’ll probably be having a party with family and friends instead. So now I’m on hunt for pressies, so spyder jackets here I come! And thankfully, markets and malls here are not as crowded as in Manila. My friend tells me malls in Manila are danger zones now. I know too well how the Christmas rush there goes.
Read MoreFood Trip Friday: Boran’s Pad Thai
I’ve been passing by this little restaurant called Boran, along St. 51 and I keep telling myself I wanna try the food there. The place looks homey, the food they offer looks home cooked and they are always packed full during lunch hours. So I figured they probably have good food. So Sreisaat and I went over there yesterday and my hunch was right on. Affordable (most items on the menu were priced below $3) and sooo yummy Khmer-Thai food. They also have unlimited rice servings.
I had Pad Thai. Love the big serving, how its arranged on the platter. You get to mix it yourself which is a great way to serve it coz say some don’t want bean sprouts or peanuts.. But I do love everything on my Pad Thai and this one exceeds expectations. I love the subtle flavor, its not too overwhelming. Just yummy. Were definitely going back to this place and try out their other offerings.
Recommended:
Blog Networks
Follow Me :)!