I love the contemporary furniture the fast foods are sporting nowadays. I noticed when I went back home to Zamboanga last month that Jollibee/Greenwich/Chowking/etc were newly renovated or undergoing renovation. Greenwich is now full of sofas instead of hard chairs! Love! ♥

Check it out – Max’s Restaurant is already in Zamboanga! Yay! It’s about time we got some new family-friendly restaurants in town. Would you categorize Max’s as a fast food restaurant? I think for Zamboanga it would already be considered upscale, since we seriously lack good restaurants back home.

Like, if you were to celebrate the graduation of a family member, where would you go? Off the top of my head I would say Palmeras, Greenfields or Alavar’s. A good place to eat is Aristocrat, however I think the service/ambiance is a bit lousy (same goes for former Sunburst, renamed Zacky’s Chicken, where I prefer take-out). Lantaka is a hit-or-miss (do NOT try their steak!) and the service is really bad. There are many other restaurants in Zamboanga, but I’ve dismissed most of them since I don’t think their food is up to par, or they don’t have enough space to host a big group. Well – correct me if I am wrong, since I haven’t spent that much time home in the last few years already. For example, I heard that Country Chicken has a new owner and already upgraded their menu, but I didn’t know that so I wasn’t able to eat there before I left (next time!). And how about Hai San (not sure if I’m correct), the last time I ate there the food was really good, but I didn’t like the ambiance – too many old men.

Anyway, the point is, Max’s is a welcome and much-awaited addition to Zamboanga! Everytime we passed by there was always a line! The first few days of opening, the line was so long. And it seemed everyone I knew was there. One time, I told Gim we should go somewhere else because I didn’t want to talk to a certain acquaintance, haha. The next time, there was again another acquaintance I didn’t want to chitchat with, but I stayed and bore it because I really wanted to eat at Max’s already! Haha. For such a big city, we have such a small town… it’s next to impossible to not bump into someone you know when you’re out and about. One time I had dessert with friends in Catribo, it seemed my entire high school showed up. Haha!

Ah, but I miss Zamboanga. ♥

I spent Christmas in Zamboanga, as I always do, because that’s my hometown. ♥

On one of those days I had a dinner with my old debate friends Jeff and Ruth. I wish Chu and Jen were there so it would be complete, but Chu is in Australia and Jen was too effin’ busy (hmp!) so it was just the four of us including Gim of course (whom I met through debate! Double ♥).

We had a nice dinner in Lantaka Hotel, then went to look at the lights in City Hall and then had smoothies in Catribo. Zamboanga is so small, we kept bumping into old friends. We saw Julius, Joey, King, Raul, my old students and so many others. December is truly homecoming month. :)

I love this picture. :)

It was taken by Jeff, haha. We had a hard time getting a pic because all the waiters seemed so harried, running from one table to the other. We could hardly keep their attention for more than a minute, and almost all the waiter’s photos were a blurry fail. LOL. So. Sariling sikap, yo! Hahaha.

Here is a photo taken by Ruth of my favorite Lantaka dish. It’s pasta marisco – fettucini swimming in seafood sauce and yummy clams and squid. Mmmm!!! I miss!!!

Here is me and Gim, ooh, parang we just had a dinner date, hahahah!

Here is our fully lighted City Hall. Amazing, yeah? It was even more lighted up than last year, if you can believe that!!

And here are our other pictures, just browse through them all. :)