Departure area eating and tambayan at NAIA Terminal 3

I just want to share here the photos I took of the newly renovated spaces at NAIA Terminal 3. These include the eating/dining areas where one can also use as a waiting area prior to boarding their planes. There are more spaces now where you can squeeze in some work or perhaps chill while waiting for your flight. I took these months ago so now I assume there would be more eating options aside from what you will see in the photos.

There are also many new concessionaires and I assume that many shops have opened or reopened. I hope NAIA's terminals continue to improve. They are, after all, our gateways to other countries.

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Musings on a Sunday evening - Ma Mon Luk's closure

I learned this morning that Ma Mon Luk, the old restaurant along Quezon Avenue that was famous (or to some, infamous) for their noodles. Mami as we commonly call the noodles with the soup is somewhat a comfort food to many people especially during the cold or wet seasons. "Masarap humigop ng sabaw at kumain ng mami pag tag-ulan." Sanitation and conditions of the interiors of the restaurant were cited in the various reports and write-ups circulating on the internet especially social media. There was even mention about the smell at the place. 

I wrote about Ma Mon Luk a while back after we had lunch there one time we were in the area. I shared photos and mentioned how dated the place looked like. I, the wife and my daughter certainly didn't notice anything pungent or repulsing about the place. Was it perhaps partly because in our travels, we've tried similar restos or eateries in other countries? The only comment by our daughter was that it wasn't airconditioned. She certainly enjoyed her food and we went home with full stomachs. We didn't get sick though we shared the tales about their food to our amused daughter.

Did they offend someone? Was there a case of food poisoning? Were some entitled person, some self styled influencer decide to throw their weight around? Hopefully, this is indeed a temporary closure and the owners treats this as a challenge to upgrade and make their restaurant better in terms of their interiors and even service. As for the food? I think it should stay the way it is and how people remember it to be. It certainly is not your regular noodle house like the ramen shops that now dot the city. You go there for sentimental if not heritage reasons. You go there for the regular food that the place transforms into something remarkable.

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Tuna melt on regular monay bread

"Monay" is a popular bread in the country. It has several if not so many variants including the size of the monay. It can be a small piece or a whole loaf that can be sliced like the regular bread used for sandwiches. You can buy the large monay loaves (usually sliced) in supermarkets, groceries or bakeries. The bread can be soft on the sweet side or it can be hard/firm and on the neutral side as breads go. I tried the monay to make a tuna melt sandwich for my daughter and the result was good.

Monay slices in the toaster oven with the usual tuna flakes and cheese slice. One slice has butter on it.

The slices out of the oven and before I bring them together.

Tuna melt sandwich for breakfast and baon.

I got the monay loaf from a bakery near the site of a project we are working on somewhere in Balintawak. I like checking out the local tinapayan (bakery) wherever I go; when it is possible.

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