Anak ng Puto at Dinuguan

"Grade  1 lang ang inabot ko 

No read, no write pa ako

Paano na lang ang buhay ko?"

Karlee wanted coconut juice from Trader Joe's. Before she texted me to pick her up from the Sandberg's residence after a sleep-over, I was ready to enter Orient Valley, a Filipino cuisine place at Carmel Mountain. I aborted the plan to pick her up from the Sandberg's and thought she might want a tall glass of Halo-Halo at Manila Sunset. She declined the tall glass of Halo-Halo and wanted to leave the place. She seemed disappointed about not going to Trader Joe's. Stuck-up snot!

"Isang kahig, isang tuka

Ganyan kaming mga dukha!"

I enjoyed the song more than anything else. In an enclosed area came  the sound of a screaming child  throwing a fit. 

It's the Manila Sunset, alright. A young Filipino girl took my order. She repeated my order in a no-accent English without the suffix "po". 

Puto at dinuguan!

The  steamed rice muffin which is more of my translation of puto is mushy and more of the son of a male prostitute that I thought it was in the first place. 

The vampire soup is good enough for this fucking hand-to-mouth nomad that I would always be.