TBK @ Sixty Three

Birthday greetings from South Africa

Firstly many thanks to everyone who sent Birthday Greetings. I have a theory that the older you get and the longer you live away from your place of birth the less Birthday Greetings you get. " Out of Sight, Out of Mind"

The Birthday card Chester designed for Elay, one of 30 I sent last year

My dear friends the Gregories always used to joke about the fact I always sent Birthday cards, Christmas cards and Thank you cards to them and their Kids, Zak and Ria. For a couple of years , as post to the UK got more expensive , I had Chester ( the Hooman) design cards for me which I would email and put on Facebook but that was very expensive. Here in the Philippines no one sends cards. Instead they reuse the previous years greetings on Facebook and maybe add a new message and picture. I have had to learn a whole new Language like MBTC ( Many Birthdays to come)

The award winning author Mohammed Isa from Bahrain

He wrote:

"Mohamed Isa

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I am filled with gratitude for the experiences and lessons the past year has offered me. Each birthday is not just a new age, but a new stage of wisdom and maturity.

This past year, with its mix of challenges and triumphs, has shaped my personal and professional journey, teaching me resilience, adaptability, and positivity

On this occasion, I am thankful for my family, friends, and you. Your support and insights have been instrumental in my growth.

As I step into my new year, I am reminded of a quote by Alan Cohen:

"Do not wait until the conditions are perfect to begin. Beginning makes the conditions perfect."

To your success "

I saw a nice photo and thank you on Facebook from my dear friend Mohammed Isa in Bahrain . He thanked everyone for their wishes and looked back on his year and wished everyone success for the future. So I decided to build on that with this Birthday Blog.

So what have I achieved in the last year?

Much of October to December ( they call them the BER Months here ) were spend preparing for my First Christmas in the Philippines. I invited the students I sponsor , their Brother/ sister/ partner to tell me one dish they would like to eat. We had Monito Monita ( Secret Santa) and party games. Luis filmed the event and edited the Vlog below and my houseboys Fry, Noel and Joven helped me prepare the food. We tested each dish in the run up to Christmas and even a power cut ( brown out) on the day did not stop us having everything ready on time. Only the guests were late ( Philippine time)

For the new year- 2023, I set myself and both Chester's the challenge of producing an online calendar with monthly online calendar pages appearing online on the first of each month. We had a lot of fun coming up with costumes and themes and taking the photos all around Palawan. For example this month Chester helped me celebrate my 63rd Birthday with a special lunch at Sunmai on Nacpan beach.

We also produced an online recipe book adding 6 recipes each month, all of which I cooked and photographed before handing over to Chester to complete the graphic design work and upload them on the 15th of each month. So far they have been viewed over 500 times. You can download each recipe free of Charge.

This is one of our favourites which I made for my birthday:

If you have not seen the recipe book ( my third) then click the link below:

https://thebritishkabayan.blogspot.com/p/the-2023-recipe-book.html

Each month we also have a Vlog of one of that months dishes online from the first of the month- Here is another of my favourites from this year:

As always such superb work is a team effort and I am especially grateful for Elay for sourcing Chester's costumes for the calendar, Fry, Noel and Darwen for taking the photos, and Chester the Human for doing the graphic design. The Recipe book saw a variety of guest chefs from around the world contribute their favourite dishes so thanks to Chefs Poochie, Arnel and Mama Jam from Palawan, Elizabeth from Marikina, Barbara from South Africa , Frythy, Noel , Kevin and Joven here in Palawan. Miss Andrea in Bahrain contributed 2 dishes from Colombia and Bazz in Dubai gave us a dish from his native Macedonia. Jeboy, also in Dubai shared with us how to make his Cheesy cakes! Thanks also to Chester for doing the graphic design and uploading everything on time.

Our newest member of the TBK team joined us- Luis, who has been training me how to edit the vlogs, producing cartoons to advertise the Blog and Vlog ( see below) and helping us with some new projects for 2024 when we will have a drone, a new more powerful camera lens , and some new stickers to promote TBK.

One of the cartoons created by Just Luis

Another of our challenges for 2023 was to make a blog called an A- Z of the best beaches in Palawan. We started with Alimanguan and have so far visited 11 out of 26 beaches ( some are on islands adjoining Palawan like Cuyo, Coron and the Balabac Islands which we will cover next year.) Many of them have an accompanying "Chester goes to ..." Vlog like the one below which Frythy and Noel shot at Surya Beach.

Noel and Chester at Surya by Frythy

When I left Bahrain everyone was asking " But what will you do in the Philippines?"

Hopefully you will see from this blog I have been keeping pretty busy. I have had lots of friends to stay like Rhoda, Jhoann and Jovan, Rica Mae, Jhoanna, Jullymar and Elay, Mark and Mike. We have done lots of Island Tours taking in Brookes Point, Port Barton, Alimanguan, Sabang , Roxas, Taytay, El Nido , Lio, Nacpan and Sibaltan . I have just returned from a lovely relaxing weekend at Surya beach. Next week I will be setting off again around the Island with Mike and you will be able to read all about it in a future Blog.

Add to that cooking hundreds of dishes from around the world , many of which you will find in my blogs and Vlogs- I have given the link to one of my favourites below as an example:

https://thebritishkabayan.blogspot.com/2023/08/tbk-cooks-inihaw.html

We have also tried to cover a variety of local events like Kaniyog'n - Brookes Point Fiesta , Barotuan Fiesta and Puerto Princesa's annual Eat on the street event

So all in all its been a pretty eventful year. I always wonder how I found time for work before! We still have big plans for 2024- like filming Palawan from above with our new drone, visiting Coron, Cuyo and the Balabac Islands and going diving again.

So stay tuned to the TBK social media channels by clicking in the links below and follow our progress.

My first Birthday greeting came from Matilda, Zia and Rhoda:

Then I had a message from Keanna who sang happy birthday to me:

Also thanks for the ecard from Jim McDermott in the UK and the emails from my brothers and Jane Frost. Richard Atkinson, Neil 1, Peter Conway and Debbie also sent messages from the UK. Over in Bahrain I had messages from Beshy, Joe, Wendy , Awali hospital, Gilbert, Sayed, Vincent, Makulit Patrick and Gherda( and her cats sang happy Birthday to me). Jeanine sent the lovely picture at the top of the Blog from South Africa ( and several other pictures with a Chester theme) and I also had a messages from Barbara, Denise and Glenda in South Africa. I had a message from Abhi in Bangladesh, Carl Max in India, Pav in Canada and Robin in Italy. Here in the Philippines there were messages from the scholars I sponsor- Aimae, Elay, Kit and Chalsee and the now graduated Jhoanna. Up in El Nido/ Barutaan/ Nacpan I had messages from Jethro, Ran, Geralyn, Love Cueca, May Ann, Rica Mae , Rodel, Jing, Edelyn, Daniel and from Gracia and Chester in Manila:

Special thanks to Rustic Cafe , Mie Ling , Maggie, Benny, Chris ,Andy and Lilly here at the M & M compound for their messages too. The two Patricks also sent messages ( one in Bahrain and one on vacation in the UK). Mr G wrote from Paris and Mrs G from the UK and Alfredo sent pictures from the Secret beach. Mike wrote from Angeles, and two of my houseboys, Joven and Fry remembered my birthday ( no more Birthday cake for Noel!) . Wanchai sent a message from Thailand and Chefs Arnel and Gracie from Palawan. Alvin wrote to ask when the party was and Thang sent greetings from Dubai, and Rosemary from Port Barton. Barry sent greetings from his vacation in France !

For lunch I made my favourite Tupa chops with red peppers and aubergines ( and enough for Noel and Fry on Tuesday and Joven on Weds!)

Once again thanks to everyone who sent a message for my birthday- its great to know that although I have gone I am not forgotten after all! Over 60 greetings- wow. I hope I did not miss anyone off my list! Maybe I have not been forgotten after all.

The day ended with the delivery of my one and only birthday card from Andy and Lily and some BBQ food and cake from Benny. The next day I had a greeting from Mama Jam in Austria:

Thanks Benny- I had the Chicken for lunch on Tuesday!

Then on Tuesday my houseboys, Noel and Frythy, arrived with a wonderful Ube Birthday cake. Thanks guys! We also did a birthday photoshoot with Chester. Our favourite photo is at the end of the Blog.