My daughter, Angel, found out how to lose someone she loves yesterday. No, its not a person. Its her pet mynah bird, Ak-ak. We went to her mother's home town in Laguna last Saturday, Nov. 1 to visit her dead relatives in the cemetery and returned home yesterday afternoon, November 2 to find my daughter's bird dead in her cage. Apparently, someone placed her cage outside and forgot to put her under the shade in the afternoon. I guess she died of heat stroke.
When we got home, she immediately went to check on Ak-ak and we were startled when she started crying aloud. She ran to us and said that her pet is already dead. This was the first time I saw her crying this hard and for so long. She went to our room and just sat on the bed and continued crying. Her mom cried along with her.
I promised Angel that we would just buy her another Mynah and she replied that she doesn't want to have a pet anymore because it will just die as Ak-ak did.
We explained to her that death is inevitable and that she will just have to accept that her pet is now in heaven.
Ak-ak was already learning how to speak and her first word was "hello" together with the usual whistle.
Later in the evening, Angel was supposed to sleep with her grandmother and in fact already brought her toys and pillows there. But when it was already time to sleep, she went back to our room and told us that she missed us and her pet. So, she just lied there between her mom and me and we talked some more about her pet until she went to sleep.
I think that the whole experience, although sad, was good for my daughter in that it taught her how to handle losing someone she loves.
Ever since we had a taste of chicken tikka masala (CTM) in Australia, we're always on the lookout for a good one here in Manila. We had it in the foodcourt in Glorietta and lately at the Kebab Factory in SM Megamall. We usually have it with either plain or buttered naan (a flat bread cooked in a tandoori oven).
