A Different Kind of Butcher

Last Monday, I was able to sneak in a few shots with Marie, a vegan chef I mentioned in a previous post here on the blog. My friendship with Marie has led me to an curiosity for people that, for lack of a better phrase, have one rung off from the rest of the ladder. Not crazies - although crazy people are interesting in their own right - but rather people in unique circumstances, whether by choice or not, like maybe a blind pianist or a missionary to North Korea.

The shot above plays on the central tenet of veganism which believes that killing animals for food is immoral. Marie is shown to be a murderer as well, for food, albeit with much less mobile victims -- a different kind of butcher, if you will.

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Street Vendors - Buko Juice

Meet John Lee. It is debatable if that's his full name, or his first name which happens to be a compound name, but that was how he introduced himself. This initially timid man with slightly jaundiced eyes is a street vendor, peddling coconuts (buko in Filipino) along the corner of General Luna Street and Makati Avenue.

He's not your noisy type of vendor, broadcasting presence with a horn or booming voice like the more ambulant ones. John stands unassuming by the street corner, waiting for customers he know will come. His strong piercing eyes foreshadow a confidence brought about by a sense of business savvy not normally expected from one with that office address.

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On Our Own Interesting City

When I last visited Vietnam, I like any other budget-conscious adventurer stayed in the aptly named backpacker district of Saigon. I instantly fell in love with the locale, waxing poetic about its compact semi-grungy charm, and how amazingly tasty street food was available at every corner, at a price cheaper than your budget McDonald's meal back home. For the two to three weeks that I was there I subsisted mostly on Banh Mi, Pho and iced coffee and loving every moment of it. I'd think to myself, why do we not have all these romantic little conveniences back home? What did we do differently?

Flash forward to about a year later, I'm walking along Makati Avenue headed toward a meeting. I cross Buendia which to me seems like a borderline between two totally different cities. There is a marked difference between the size, style and even nature of the buildings and establishments on either side. Whereas on one side, majestic glass-walled edifices rise, the opposite's are notably stockier and stunted. One is full of corporate offices and shopping centers, the other caters to restaurants, bars and...other entertainment-oriented businesses.

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Next In Line

If I had my way, this would be my Asian travel list. Green represents those which I've already visited, yellow would be those next in line, and orange after that. The past two years have seen me blaze a backpacking trail through the Indochina Peninsula, with the exception of Laos which somehow got squeezed off the itenerary at the last minute.

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