Foot and Fire

What else compares to the beauty of the sun setting down? Sunrise of course. What else can cap a Jogger's afternoon walk but a gorgeous sundown. Here are our takes... *** *** *** *** *** *** A little sweat is a lot. *** Oh boy, who needs to sweat if you are this slim??? ***

The French Gardener Santa Montefiore Fiction 407 pages paperback The novel started pretty slow as it necessarily exposes the main characters of the present time. I was almost ready to give up the book as a wrong choice when suddenly the time came for the exposure of the main characters of the past. From then on, the shift from present and past became a warm reading. This is understandable anyway because the author started the story in autumn. From there, the reading is ever-flowing like seasons indeed. Expect for summer endings for both past and present characters. Aside from the cottage garden which gives us insights as to the English flower culture with exploding colors of flowers as well as vegetation, the novel also led us to various explosions involving many shades of love, from mere lust to true love, from familial love to honoring love of one's self coming from the main characters up to the minute characters in the novel. Love indeed springs up from many wells.

Behind me is the seat of the provincial government of Negros Occidental,  the Provincial Capitol, located at Bacolod City.  Before reaching the capitol grounds from Lacson Street, one has to set foot to the Capital lagoon and children's playground park. At the lagoon, one can feed volumes of tilapia which must be overfed, i guess.  For freeloaders, one can bring her children to the park to enjoy ball games  and the park slides, seesaw, swing and trellis.  And for adults, it is a must to at least look up and admire the sculpture, the gold carabao, among them. *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** *** ***

Like water for chocolate Laura Esquivel After reading this magical realism novel, I was not swept away by the plot unlike when I read the same when I was in my teens. All I think about when I read it this time is whether the recipes are indeed for real. After finishing the novel, I was unable to pick out one recipe to try out of the monthly installments. In the end, I did not mind at all. Now that I am into cooking, I most understand why the novel was given the title. To melt a solid chocolate for baking, water is not directly poured over it. Instead, the chocolate is placed on a stainless bowl and placed on top of a boiling water. The steam slowly and steadily melts the chocolate. This is indeed the case when Pedro married a sister of Tita just to be near her. Pedro is the hot water that melted Tita. I have not seen the movie made out of this novel but that must be an interesting watch. But while many see this novel as a a story of lust, I just could not agree