A day off from work…

I was on leave today to run a personal errand for my mom. I needed to accompany her to have her passport renewed at the DFA in Pasay.

Well, my mom’s passport is valid until 2011. So, I don’t have any plans of getting her’s renewed this year. I was thinking of having it renewed after our Thailand-Vietnam trip this October. But some days back, as I was cleaning up my inbox, I came across a colleague’s email sent early this year about regulations on new slash maroon-colored machine readable passports.  The email said that all green-colored passport will no longer be accepted starting January 2010. And so, I panicked! Last Wednesday, I booked an online appointment for my mom’s passport renewal. I was suprised to get immediate response from DFA and they reserved her a slot today, just 2 days from my online booking, We were scheduled between 10 to 11 a.m. Special note to readers: I found out just now from dfa.gov.ph and pinoymoneytalk.com that the green-colored passport will be valid until the stated date of expiry. Well, maybe I should have researched first before making such appointments online. Panic galore kasi agad eh! Hehehe! Anyways, it’s better though as I wont have to be bothered by it next year. At least, pag nagBKK kami ni Mommy, parehong maroon ang passport namin! *palusot* Hehehe!

Mommy’s passport renewal was way easier than my renewal experience last year. The online appointment system is really one heck of an advantage as we went straight to the processing window (read: no long lines). But my Mom has an additional advantage because there’s a special window for senior citizen applicants. We need not transfer from one location to another just to complete the processing. After paying the P500 renewal fee, I went back to the same window and we were given a stub indicating the claim date of her new maroon-colored machine readable passport. My Mom and I just spent 30 minutes inside the DFA office for that. Ok di ba?

So, my Mom said goodbye to her green passport. Her new copy will be delivered 2 weeks from now.

Since it was nearing lunch time (at ang nag-aaklas na ang mga alaga ko sa tiyan), I opted to have lunch at the nearest mall. Where else? But MOA! I saw my Mom’s face smiled with gladness when I mentioned MOA. Prima lakwatsera talaga! Mana sa anak!!! Hehehe!

I was really starving to death when we reached MOA so we did not go through the hassle of looking for a nice resto or foodchoin. We opted to have lunch at the first resto that we saw… Kalye Juan. It was our first time to eat there. Well obviously, based on the resto’s name, it’s something Filipino. And this is what we ordered:

That’s Green Mango Salad (Ensaladang Mangga). Lechon Kawali with Adobong Kangkong and Lumpiang Ubod. Looks like a nice lunch, eh?! The food was fine alright. Not too extravangant tasting though. And the prices are somewhat affordable. Well, this simple cost me P500. Expensive yan sa amin ng Mom ko kasi usually P250 to P300 lang ang meal namin when we dine out for lunch or dinner. Hehehe!

The entire afternoon was spent inside MOA, strolling back and forth. I tried not to shop for anything for myself. But as always, I failed.  I failed big time as lots of stores were on sale. I ended up buying this nice pullover from Terranova,

Quite a steal at P450. LOL.

Hay, ang mga sale talaga! Pasakit sa buhay!!! Hehehe!

 

Photo credits: pinoymoneytalk.com and Winkie’s mobile phone cam 😛