A City Called Naperville

Naperville, Illinois. A city found 30 minutes west of Chicago. Once voted as the second best place to live in the United States. It has one of the best public libraries in the nation and Naperville is where you’ll find the majestic Moser Tower and Millenium Carillon.

We never saw any of these. Instead, we hit the shopping areas and restaurants.

We visited our curly haired friend CheChe who works near Naperville. Jaye and I took the train from Chicago to Naperville then from there, CheChe picked us up with her Nissan Sentra. Since this was the first time I left Chicago since I arrived in the US, I immediately felt the difference between being in downtown and being in the suburbs. There were less people on the road. There were no taxis, no buses. There were just a few tall buildings and between them are wide open spaces. There are big ponds with geese munching on… whatever they usually munched on. No subway noises. No trains. No ambulance sirens. Just the noise of the tires against the pavement and the chattering of your curly haired friend. Our first stop was Cracker Barrel. I had no idea what it was.


Waiting for the train to Naperville

Ok, turns out it was a restaurant. It has a nostalgic aura which again is a welcome change from where we usually eat. We all ordered the usual all-American meal consisting of sausages, hash, grits, biscuits, jam, gravy and coffee. Food was better than we expected. Expensive, but good. We’re never eating there again anymore though... I forgot to tip the waitress.


Our curly haired friend


Jaye and me at Cracker Barrel


Jaye and CheChe outside Cracker Barrel

Our next stop was the Chicago Premium Outlets. Yep, it’s the same outlet mall as before. Unlike before though, their stock was not impressive and their “sales” were fake so we ended up buying virtually nothing. Check this winter cap I saw at Reebok:




Walking along the Chicago Premium Outlet

We left Aurora, went back to Naperville and had lunch at Olive Garden. I loved the stuffed mushrooms. I loved it so much that the next day, I went to Jewel and bought a pack of fresh mushrooms and replicated the recipe. Jaye says it tasted the same but mine cost a couple of dollars cheaper. Take THAT Olive Garden!


Outside Olive Garden. Jaye's all bundled up while I have a spring jacket on. :P

We next went to Burlington Coat Factory (where I bought a cheap running jacket), Old Navy (where I bought cheap gloves and Jaye bought a cheap jacket) and Walmart (where one section smelled like dog pee). After doing all our shopping, CheChe drove us back to the train station where we had 10 minutes before our train leaves for Chicago.
We had lots of time but while driving there, Jaye and I can’t shake the feeling that we might miss the train. What if the train left early? What if the car’s clock was late? What if CheChe got lost along the way? (which almost happened)

When we got off the car, we had a quick hug with CheChe then it was a 5 minute walk to the other side of the rail. The train hasn't arrived yet but Jaye suddenly ran because she said she didn’t want to get left behind. I ran behind because well, that’s what good hubbies do. Little did we know that there were a few people behind us that were also catching the train and when they saw us burst into a sprint, they sprinted too causing a mini panic at the train station.

The train arrived 20 minutes later. :P

Goodbye Singha :(

Singha is this Thai restaurant along Clark street and yes, it’s now closed. They lost their lease to the location and now it’s an empty space and the two statues up front are now gone.

I know I’ll only get two reactions from the statements above. Either you’ll be completely nonchalant or like me, you’ll go through the 5 stages of grief:

Denial: "Nooooo! They can't close Singha!"

Anger: "P*%#$@na nila! Bakit nila sinara Singha?!"

Bargaining: "Maybe it moved! Maybe they just changed the name to something more appealing to Pinoys!"

Depression: You start sharing Singha stories with friends like your favorite dish or who you ate there with.

Acceptance: "Hooters!"

So what's the big deal about a Thai restaurant closing down? For one thing, it's located on the same block where a magical building called "The Sterling apartments" was located. Click here if you want to view it in Google Maps. Back in the good old days, everyone sent onshore from Chicago to Manila by my previous IT company were set to live in Sterling for a couple of months. Since Singha was literally a few steps away from the apartment, it was the place we most frequently ate out at. In the winter when the temperature drops to -20c, if you go out, you'll end up frozen once you walk past Singha so you might as well eat there. Convenience is just one reason though.

Price. Compared to other restos in Chicago, Singha is cheap. If you factor in how frequent you eat out (or how lazy you are to cook), you'll have no idea how important this is.

Rice. Being Pinoys, we can't live on burgers, fries, pasta and sandwiches. We need to eat rice at least once a day (or else you get weird cravings like microwave mac and cheese).

Plastic containers. If you order take out from Singha, they place it in these sealable and reusable plastic containers and if you were like me, you have one cabinet almost dedicated to a big stack of singha containers. These are extremely useful for storing leftovers, coins and other stuff plus, they come with the food and anything free is good.

Food. Of course it wouldn't be special if the food didn't taste good right? My personal favorite is the pad see ew which is Thai flat noodles with Chinese broccoli and beef cooked in a dark soy sauce. The 2 dishes in a close second are crab rangoon which is deep fried wonton stuffed with cream cheese (yeah, as if you'll ever taste the crab there) and the basil chicken which I've been trying to cook in Manila. There's also the beef fried rice and the tom yum soup but we rarely order them.

Memories. I've eaten here with my closest friends during my onshore assignments. I've ordered take out here alone. I've eaten here to celebrate a recent milestone. I've eaten here to console myself. I've eaten here when I'm bored. We've eaten Singha for lunch especially when you wake up really late on weekends you have absolutely no desire to cook and wash dishes. We've eaten it for dinner especially when you've used up much of your cash and you want to eat something decent for less than 10 bucks. We've eaten it for lunch since it's just nice to wake up munching on a piece of crab rangoon. Jaye and I have eaten here when we were still friends.

(deep sigh)

I do have good news though. All is not completely lost. If we go back to the 5 stages of grief earlier, it turns out the third one (bargaining) is true. The same person who owns Singha also owns the "Star of Siam" which is just 2 blocks away from Jewel. For my birthday, I asked Jaye to have dinner there so we can check it out. I think you already know what we ordered.

Is it the same? Close. Pad see ew is almost identical. The basil chicken is still close but the spices are a little stronger this time. The beef fried rice is the same. The crab rangoon is a little disappointing though since when you try to slice it with the side of a fork, it flattens like a burst balloon and you find a very small amount of cheese inside. Now you're left with just a flat dumpling on a pile of white goo.

Eating at the Star of Siam is like using your friend's laptop. The keyboards are the same, the screen is the same, the applications are the same but there's a great deal of unfamiliarity and you can't stop thinking about your own laptop. Eventhough the food's the same and they even have the same weird enclosed seats, I guess nothing can still replace the original thing.

I miss Singha.

(Sigh)

The Trip to Chicago

I’ve flown to Chicago before but it’s always been with Northwest Airlines. It always leaves NAIA around 8 then goes to Narita or Nagoya then from there it goes to Detroit then Chicago. This time I was flying to Hong Kong via Cathay Pacific then straight to Chicago via United Airlines and this is the first time I’m flying with them.

Like before I never sleep the night before the flight. This means from Manila to Hong Kong, I was asleep. After I checked in, paid the terminal fee (ugh), went through customs, waited at the gate, boarded and took my seat, I was immediately out like a light. I even forgot to place my carry on baggage to the overhead bin. I don’t even remember the plane taking off. When I woke up, we just landed in Hong Kong. Time elapsed: 2 hours. Wow, it was like time traveling but without the damage to the fabric of time.

In Hong Kong I was still woozy and was very thirsty. After getting a boarding pass for my connecting ticket, I immediately went online to get in touch with Jaye so she knows we landed safely. Fortunately, I had some US dollars with me. Unfortunately, I didn’t know any restaurants in HKIA other than Popeyes and Burger King. When I reached Popeyes, it was already closed. I ended up eating in this Italian restaurant serving sandwiches. It was like a cross between Subway and Potbelly.

No more Popeyes =(

It's cool that they have these plugs where you can charge your stuff. The problem is they only have the HK type plugs and the converters cost an arm and a leg.

Free Duty?

Next was the long and boring flight to Chicago. It was forgettable since I was seated beside Mr. Smells like an Old Man with Flowers and in front of Ms Laughs at Everything (on te onboard flight movies). The flight itself wasn’t bumpy and they showed more movies here than in Northwest flights. They first showed Toy Story 3 then The Grown Ups then Letters to Juliet and another movie where I was asleep already by the time they were showing the opening titles.

First glimpse of Chicago... or maybe this was Detroit. :S

We arrived in Chicago and immigration was fast. The luggage carousel was also super friendly as it spitted out Crispin and Basilio (my two luggages) almost immediately. Then came the scene I’ve been playing and writing for the past two months: how I’m going to meet Jaye at O’Hare. I’ve always had this romantic scene where Jaye meets me at the gate then I rush to her with a hug. Did that happen? Of course Jaye and I always write our stories with a twist – I came out of the immigration area with my luggages but no Jaye in sight. I checked the other gates and she wasn’t there. I sat down and just rested in one of the chairs instead. A couple of minutes later, she arrived THEN I got my hug. It turns out O’Hare is bigger than we thought and she got lost in the maze of terminals.

We took the cab back to downtown and seeing everything again brings back a lot of memories, good and bad. I saw a sidewalk where I slipped and hurt my arm which was bad. I saw Jewel-Osco which was good. I saw La Salle St which was…uh… boring.

Either way, it’s good to be back. When I stepped down the cab and brought down my luggages, I couldn’t really believe that I’m actually here again in Chicago. Then the wind picked up, blew my luggages down and frazzled my hair. Yep, it’s Chicago’s way of telling me welcome back too.

Our first picture at the airport

The Big Move

It’s the big elephant in the room so I guess I need to write about my recent resignation from this IT company. Also, people have changed my name from “Arn” to “Arn! Congrats! Bakit ka nagresign?” since that’s how I’ve been greeted since October 22.

I’ll keep it short and simple, I answered this question:

“What would you do if you weren’t afraid?”

My answer was: “I would quit my job to be with my wife and pay more attention to her, my health, my family, my photography, plan Jaye and I’s future together and make things happen.“

The key word is the word that I didn’t use: “wait”.

People have called me brave. People have called me romantic. People have called me a boneheaded idiot.

I’ll tell you one thing though – it feels better than I imagined. There’s a difference between pressing the pause button and the stop button. There’s a huge difference if you press the off button and this is me now – off. At last my mind is working the way it’s supposed to be and have my priorities in check. I’ve also started thinking differently, have a longer patience and I see things a lot happier now. BP has changed from poor to healthy. Life just got a lot brighter and more interesting. I know there’s nothing coming in yet through my bank account but I couldn’t really care less. Life has been too happy for me to notice.

So what would you do if you weren’t afraid?