Balot!!!!
Friday, November 17, 2006
"Baloooooot!!!"
Like a resounding toll of bells, this familiar call of "balooooot!" can be heard every night in most Philippine streets. Balot is it? Online encyclopedia Wikipedia would describe it as "a fertilized duck egg with a nearly-developed embryo inside that is boiled and eaten in the shell." Indeed it is. Peddled at night by (who else but...) balot vendors, it has become a favorite midnight snack and beer companion to Filipinos.
Upon coming home one midnight, I heard once more the now-endangered balot call and reminded me of my long-overdue post about balot. Balot has managed to remind me a couple of important things about life, one of which is climate change and its wrath on the future. See, eating balot is basically eating an aborted duck. Balot is cooked by submerging the egg in boiling water, which consequently cooks the developing duck inside the egg shell. (Heat is the key in producing this Pinoy delicacy). And our future would most likely suffer the same fate as balot if we continue to ignore climate change. No shell can spare us (and the future) from climate change. Aborted futures, that is what the balot is reminding us.
And however annoyingly rousing the balot vendor's midnight call may be, in light of the pressing issue of climate change, a call of its kind is very important. We need a constant reminder of why we need to be involved and why we need to act now!
Only when we've embraced climate change solutions will the balot vendor's call bear a different meaning and sound (at least to me). For now, let "Baloooooot!!!" be a reminder of what we stand to lose if we continue ignoring our climate's yelp for help.
Edited to mention: Thanks to Wikipedia for the picture, don't know whose hand is on the picture but just focus on the balot. Worth a try, especially with a pinch of salt. Yummy.
posted by The No Show @ 1:04 PM,
13 Comments:
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At 7:36 PM,
said...
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who ate the egg?
and whose hand is that? -
At 9:32 PM,
said...
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that looks real tasty. If it weren't for cholesterol, I'd be pigging out on balut!!! *slurp*
At the rate we're going, we'd be a desert in no time. And then, we'd be hearing politicians blabbering "don't blame us!! we're just sitting pretty here!!"...
My Environmental Science prof was right: "politicans have the final say in solving environmental problems." I say we blow up the government, blow up the oil cartel, and have it our way... -
At 11:46 PM,
The No Show said...
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that's exactly the problem, politicians "are just sitting pretty" which reminds me of the recent (or decades-long) de-prioritization of the renewable energy bill in the Philippines. Let the bill remain a bill for another decade, tough luck if we'll still all be alive by then!
to Anonymous: edited the post to include an answer to one of your questions. don't know the answer to the first question, though. -
At 8:36 PM,
Unknown said...
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wierd na nga talaga ang weather. mahirap lumabas pag tanghali.
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At 3:43 PM,
said...
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We, Karla S. Morden and Ro-anne Salinas, 4th year
Behavioral Sciences students of the University of the
Philippines Manila, are conducting a research about
Blogs, in partial fulfillment of our course requirements
for BS200 (Thesis). We would like to know about you
as a blogger. We have posted a questionnaire- 'Blog'
on web. If your age is twenty and above, please help
us by answering the questionnaire.
The link is:
http://www.my3q.com/home2/125/karlabulalakaw/weblogs.phtml
Thank you. Please help! God bLess.
Delete -
At 7:23 PM,
said...
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i just like the yolk and the sabaw. can't stomach eating the chick.
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At 12:29 AM,
The No Show said...
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Used to dislike the chick when I was a kid but eventually "stomached" eating the chick :) Now.. the abortion issue brings back my "disliking" for it. still, tasty balot :)
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At 6:51 PM,
said...
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Easting "aborted chicks" are a lot better (and tastier) than an aborted fetus. I've seen one, and it looked like a piece of overcooked tocino!!! No kidding!!! I couldn't eat tocino for weeks!!!
And densio, how'd you know it was me? -
At 4:26 PM,
The No Show said...
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How'd I know it was you?! Teka, baka tsamba lang, hindi ko maalala. ES Classmate ba kita? With initials M.A.L?
Aborted baby? How many months old yun nakita mo? Paano yun abortion? Gamit saline solution? Parang magandang medical study kung ano physiological effect ng global warming.. Direct effect, hindi lang indirect like yun increased sweating brought about by surging temperatures etc.
Napapaisip lang :) -
At 10:52 PM,
said...
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M.A.L? Sorry, I'm just a freshie!! I had a nasty run in with physics, that's why I chose ES for this sem!! If you were looking closely at my profile... Waitasec, you already did! ;)
Teka, ikaw ba ung nag-recruit sa kin sa LRT Cubao? -
At 12:38 AM,
The No Show said...
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Oohhhhh I know you already! You're now going to my former university hehe. Hi, hi. So what're you taking up? Maybe you'd want to consider joining SolarGeneration KATIPUNAN hehehe, that's the youth group of Greenpeace. Right now , the Manila arm has students from UPD and ADMU. But most are from ADMU. Okay, maybe we should chat outside this blog. But yeah, if you want to be actively involved in the fight against climate change, you should join SolarGen! :)
At hindi ako yun nag-recruit sa iyo sa LRT Cubao! Online recruiter ako ng SolarGeneration wehehe :) -
At 9:01 AM,
said...
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Who knows where to download XRumer 5.0 Palladium?
Help, please. All recommend this program to effectively advertise on the Internet, this is the best program! -
At 12:23 AM,
said...
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That "aborted duck embryo" is just days away from being a hatchling. Hardly an aborted duck, more like a boiled alive hatchling. Certainly fresh! Rather slow and painful way to kill an animal or bird. Not unlike puppies kicked in a bag to shake the flesh off the bones before cooking. Asia!
