A TAIL OF TWO CITIES (with apologies to Charles Dickens)

"It was the best of times..." [Despite the PR 529 purser's best efforts to shut down an unconscious loud mouth, the call for transition from declaration to action was delivered in Kuala Lumpur].

 

"It was the age of wisdom..." [The current house was built on unreliable commitments so a smaller house by the beach in Rayong was reimagined for the tougher days ahead].

"It was the epoch of belief..." [A new frontier in the care economy unfolded like boxed roast lamb in a co-working space before the online check-in portal for TG 146 collapsed].

"It was the season of light..." [A horde of tourists chase the silhouettes of the Petronas Towers; Merdeka 118 pointed to the heavens from the 19th floor of the Grand Millenium].

"It was the spring of hope..."[Smuggled shawarma from the kitchen of Damascus were hauled as pilfered tote bags into a monorail that  passed undetected through the Habab Gate at the speed of KLIA Ekspres, then loaded into an elevator for two airport train transfers to the 5th floor of the Royal Princess where the pita wrap revealed pieces of crispy pork and an omelette].  

"We had everything before us..." [A squid infestation at the 3rd floor of the Kantary Bay Hotel in Rayong was overloaded with another omelette and cubes of a fried sea bass that got snared in the plastic chairs and tables littering Saeng Chan Beach].

"We were all going direct to Heaven..." [Fleets of krathongs from the Festival of Lights conveyed prayers to the Buddha of Wat Sunthon Thammathan and the statue of Phisuea Samut, an ogress that has been venerated as the patron and guardian of the sea]. 

ASEAN 2025 is at its tail end and in tribute, the Phantom Biker found a corner aboard PR 733 where he tapped a ballad about two cities:

"I see hibiscus blossoms all over Kuala Lumpur's trains

I see temples adorning the Bangkok landscape 

I see high team spirits despite an annual reaping..."

Back in Bakal 2, a boxed hooter from Baloc serenaded a 69th birthday that, in lieu of the anticipated onslaught of Fung-wong, intentionally under-salted the dinakdakan and tiim na pata. 

NIGHTS OF THE KAI JEOW

A monkey sleeps soundly by the Chatrium's pool. 

Inside the Autumn Room, chieftains debated on what they already knew but pretend not to. 

The time allocated for a private sector engagement to mobilize money for renewable energy solutions was not enough.

A fish bowl overflowed with denunciations of a sadomasochistic bureaucracy.

Reimagining a rainbow coalition will restore the normative framework in shifting a prevalent "no because" culture to a "yes if" approach.

In a penthouse bar somewhere, inequality was eclipsed by a billiard game between an erstwhile country director who stayed and the program manager who moved on. 

The frying pan hissed with flavors of Thai omelette.

Eggs vigorously beaten into a a quick PMU meeting, seasoned with nam pla to liberate an embargoed impact measurement, then toasted in boiling oil at a poolside caucus. 

The monkey woke up, asked that his kai jeow be stuffed with crab meat and ground pork instead of an over-sized pla pao, a shared pad kra pao, and chewy yum nua. 

An extended procurement for Kuala Lumpur required 4 days of working out to prep for a risk assessment of the Bangkok airport and Manila's harrowing halloween traffic.

Sign-off in the time of simulatenous birthday celebrations.

A bottle of gold-infused sparkling wine instigated a duel between a delicate kalderatang kambing and wind-burned dinakdakan for the dead of Bakal 2 and Almaguer. 

Matured in sherry casks, The Macallan M Single Malt evoked wood spices but it was reheated leftovers that carried the weekend's sign-off 

The Phantom Biker's siopao from San Jose is filled with Starbucks' cheesecake at the lounge of the Ramen Butcher in anticipation of PR 529 (not 509). 

THE SAINTs

William McKinley is the 25th president of the United States, progenitor of Donald Trump's tarriff madness, executor of the  American expansionism era that included the annexation of the Philippines, and presiding officer of the usual Monday meetings. 

He was elected as president in March 1897, almost two months before the murder of Andres Bonifacio who should have been the first president of the Philippines and possibly a vehicle insurance assesor.

Thus was the name behind Fort McKinley, home of the "Polar Bears" of Asia which is one of only 3 infrantry regiments created and deployed outside mainland USA, later renamed to Fort Bonifacio after World War 2, once the headquarters the Philippines' army and naval forces. 

But Pochok only cares about anethesizing a nasoendoscopy biopsy with its famous grilled bangus, oblivious to the lights of High Street in what is now the Bonifacio Global City, the 43rd most expensive piece of real estate in the world that got it converted fom a military base into an integrated business hub. 

McKinley may be a prominent American politician and Bonifacio a venerated a national hero but neither are saints like the blessed server at Souv by Cyma who preached on the virtues of a Chilean sauvignon blanc for the starters (salad and bread) and entrees (clam and solomos pasta), and why Chilean merlot, in the absence of a Greek wine in a Greek restaurant, is best for the main course (beef kalamaki) specially while responding to a regional retreat survey. 

It was St. John the Baptist's divine intervention that spared the lives of men who were about to be executed by vengeful Japanese occupiers in 1944 to spawn the legend of Bibiclat's Taong Putik.

 

Prayers to St. Jerome ended a cholera outbreak in 1866 that led to the veneration of both its images at the Roman Catholic and the Iglesia Filipina Independiente shrines in Baloc. 

St. Luke once again delivered on Cigna to usher the triumph of the Kuala Lumpur procurement over bureaucracy, and to finally conclude a chase for foreign exchange after Tuesday's catch up where Melbourne agreed on a status quo for the First Quarter report.  

Amidst the din of emails and a top-up, the distraction of a possible inception workshop in Bali, and a preview of Belem after Rayong, the Phantom Biker entreated the Sacred Heart of Jesus who is also known as Christ the Worker, and the martyred St. Sebastian to interecede for a favorable outcome beyond a succesful thesis presentation and reclassification, beyond the confirmation of a meeting in Tulat.

Finally, a brunch of smoked kielbasa sausage, fatty pork belly, a rack of ribs, and beef briskets were entrusted to the patronage of St. Lawrence to ensure PR 736's safe flight to Bangkok after two nights of reheated sinigang na talakitok and tokwa't baboy in Bakal 2 bookended a cheap ramen lunch in Cabanatuan.