Point Loma (cont'd) - Noodles & Company and Salvation Army

TC found a cool camouflage print three ring-binder with a zipper at Goodwill while I found a few interesting plates. I saw Noodles and Company across the street...There used to be a Noodles on the corner of Eastlake Parkways and Otay Lakes Road. It closed about a few years ago and is now a Wings-n-Things. It's right next to Mariscos Hector, a Mexican seafood place. It's in the same strip mall with the big Kohl's. Not that I shop there...because I don't. Anyways, I spied Noodles so that's where we went...


We saw their trio special - a side salad, a small entree with your protein of choice for $7.50...

I had my eye on the Japanese Pan Noodles while Bert wanted the Pad Thai.

TC wasn't that hungry since she had some of the mango smoothie and the tomato cheddar twist from Jamba Juice earlier.

While it was kind of dead when we got there (11:30'ish), it started filling up by the time we left. Plus many customers were also choosing to sit outside because the weather was so nice.

I liked the lighting in here. I also liked that there weren't a lot of people around so I could freely take my photographs, ha ha.

This place looked just like the one did in Chula Vista, but this was much bigger. I guess business wasn't so good in that location so they closed.


Here is Bert's Caesar salad and his (wanna-be) Pad Thai. The sauce was really weak. The bean sprouts were nice and fresh tho'. He had shrimp in his Pad Thai as well.

Here was my entree - the Japanese Pan Noodles which were udon noodles in a soy based glaze with stir fried vegetables. I also chose beef. The sauce was a bit too salty and sweet for me, but I really liked the noodles.

If you ever go here, look for this sign:

Since I was on a vintage plate and candlestick mission, our next stop was the Salvation Army on Sports Aroma Arena Blvd; this is right next to a Pier 1. Too bad it wasn't Labor Day because everything was going to be half off. I ended up only getting 1 small plate ($1.00) for my future craft project.

With lunch out of the way, it was time to head up North to ice skate!

Point Loma - Jamba Juice and Goodwill

I'm totally posting these out of order. We actually did this before our first Oasis post, but I was too excited to have the Oasis post go first.

While making a U-turn on Rosecrans to get to Jamba Juice (I had a gift card), I noticed the Loma Lodge changed their signage. Here's the new one:

Here's an older pic of the Loma Lodge from a post I did from July 2007. I miss the Gilligan's Island-like font! WTF Loma Lodge???! It had been like that for practically forever and now it's got this newfangled electronic marquee! (shakes fist upwards in anger)

Here's my former elementary school, George Dewey. Ironically, Dewey was US Navy Admiral at the turn of the century known as the "Hero of Manila." if you go by the pre-Howard Zinn U.S. History books. Dewey is best known for his victory (without the loss of a single life of his own forces due to combat; one man died of heat stroke) at the Battle of Manila Bay during the Spanish-American War.  In the American version of the history books, that's what they want you to believe. They conveniently leave out the part that the Americans kept out the native Filipinos from their walled city (Intramuros), thus preventing them from fighting during this "mock battle".

Of course, there was no loss of life. Unbeknownst to the Filipinos, the Spanish colonizers had an agreement with the Americans to shoot a few cannons at each other's ships, make a "show" of it (without killing anyone, of course), and then quietly hand over their island possessions (Philippines, Puerto Rico and Guam) to a new colonizer, the United States, for the sum of $20 million. The battle of Manila Bay was a sham.  The Spaniards would rather hand over their possessions to the white Americans whom they considered more superior than the native Filipinos. Shining examples of colonial mentality and racism....

So, as I always tell my daughter, history always has two sides of the story. Try to get both sides and realize that our story, as Filipino Americans is usually marginalized, excised, distorted and triviliazed in American history books. Dewey was a hero? Not to the Filipinos.

Here's another example...Magellan discovered the Philippines? Not to the Filipinos - In fact, Magellan's quest to circumnavigate the world was cut short in the Philippine island of Mactan (in the Visayas) by Chieftan Lapu Lapu and his men. In the American history books, Magellan was killed "in a skirmish with the natives". In the Philippines, Lapu Lapu is hailed as a Filipino hero and there is even a status in Cebu to commemorate him and honor him as the first Filipino to successfully repel a foreign invader. You won't see that version in the history books, eh.

Okay, now that I dropped that history bomb on you all, here's where we went next. Divalicious had given TC a Jamba Juice gift card for Christmas last year. I still had some $$$ on it, so off we went to get a smoothie for TC. This in in that strip mall that used to have Crown Books. There's also a Henry's here.

TC's Mango Smoothie along with a Tomato Cheddar Twist in the bag. Note TC's raglan sleeve shirt (used to be mine but now it's way too tight for me; it used to fit 10 years/15 lbs ago; the word "Maganda" means "Beautiful" in Tagalog. I bought it from Superman's friend J who used to have a clothing company, Malakas at Maganda)

Here's that tomato cheddar twist, which kind of tastes like a plain cheese pizza. Mmm...

We were here in Point Loma to check out a few thrift stores and also have lunch before heading up to ice skate at UTC.

Here's the strip mall sign - this is off Rosecrans.

Our next destination...Goodwill. I was on a quest to find vintage plates and candlestick holders to make homemade cake plate/dessert stands.

Here's the view of Goodwill across the street (taken while in the car because we were going to have lunch across the street at Noodles and Company).

Up next...lunch at Noodles.

"Filipinos in San Diego" Book Launch at Balboa Park, HOP

This post is about last month's book launch for the newly released, "Filipinos in San Diego" by Dr. Judy Patacsil, Prof. Felix Tuyay and Dr. Rudy Guevarra, Jr. The launch was Saturday, August 21 at the House of the Philippines in Balboa Park's International Cottages.  

The cottage for the House of the Philippines, which is shared with House of France...

Display boards courtesy of Prof. Tuyay's Filipino American Studies' classes (student projects):



Mingling...

Here are 2 of the co-authors, Dr. Judy Patacsil (Counselor and Professor at Miramar College and daughter of a WWII vet/Pensionado/Alaskero/Manong and War Bride) and Prof. Felix Tuyay (Professor of History and Ethnic Studies at Southwestern Community College; son of a WWII vet and War Bride). Both authors' parents came to San Diego post WWII via the US Navy and both of their mother's came to the U.S. under the War Brides Act of 1945.

Another shot of the HOP:

This is Rom Sarno, president of the HOP, welcoming guests and making the first introduction:

Judy Patacsil thanking the audience for their support and for the photo contributions made to the book.

Lastly, here's Felix talking a little more about the book...

Here is a gentleman named Rick who talked about living in Hillcrest in the 1950's when there were no other Filipino families around in that area. He talked about how the community has changed over the years and how back then, all the Filipinos in San Diego pretty much knew each other.

This is Marlene Tuyay (standing), older sister of Felix (co-author of book) talking about the book and her mother's pioneer role as a War Bride in San Diego in the late 1940's. Their mother, Mrs. Serquina is shown seated (wearing the red hat) behind Marlene; she is in her 90's. Many of the photos in the book come from her collection.

Here's a cool story:
In the early 1970's, Marlene, along with several other 2nd generation Filipina Americans infiltrated the Miss Philippines contest and used it as a platform to bring up hot issues like civil rights, the plight of Filipino farmworkers, and the Vietnam War. There is a photo in the book of her and the other women in fancy traditional Philippine outfits on stage. She actually had a scowl on her face in that photo. According to Felix, her younger brother and escort that evening, he considered his sister and the other women quite brave for taking openly taking a stand and talking about what many older folks in the community wanted to hide or ignore. The Miss Philippines contest was considered a prestigious event at the time and for a young person to come up and talk about the Farm Workers Movement was revolutionary.

Felix remembered walking her back to her seat after her speech and thinking that their parents would disown her but instead, they supported her. There was even another contestant (a Filipina Mexican) who wasn't in on the other girls' plan but also had the same agenda. As a result of these young Pinays and their concerns, the  older generation listened and a few years later, the Council of Pilipino American Organizations (COPAO), an umbrella organzation, was formed and many programs were formed to cater to the needs of the elderly and the youth in the Filipino American community.

In this book are many photos that tell so many stories. That photo is just one of them...

The other two women in the front are Patricia Justiniani McReynolds, author of "Almost Americans - A Quest for Dignity". She is a mestiza of Norwegian and Filipino heritage. Her father came to the US in the late 1910's and married her mother, a Norwegian in the 1920's. Patricia's first marriage had to be done out of state (out of California) because prior to 1948, there were anti-miscegenation laws that prevents whites from marrying non-whites.  In the blue shirt is Shirley Flor (Sal's wife; she is a counselor at Mesa College).

Snacks served included sweet bread...

Turon (fried banana fritters):

and Shanghai lumpia...

Items sold as a fundraiser for the FANHS, San Diego Chapter...

The next scheduled book signing will be :

"Filipinos in San Diego"
Book Signing

Friday, September 17th

7:00 pm

at Southwestern College

Chula Vista 

Bldg 600 - Student Activities Center

Blog readers are welcome to come to the event, meet the authors, mingle with other folks and own a part of history. Hope to see you there!

Back so soon? Return to Oasis...

After last week's visit, we stopped by again this weekend. Ha, you can see my foot in the windshield reflection! Nice.

This time, we all got doubles....At the top is TC's Canteloupe and Mango. You can only see the canteloupe flavor at the top though.  The canteloupe flavor was really intense and quite refreshing. She has a thing for fruity flavors and oh yeah, the colors are quiet pretty too. Quite attractive to tweens.

At the bottom left corner is my cup - A tiny scoop of Banana on top (a freebie!), then Trail Mix underneath that with Double Chocolate Chip on the bottom. I was debating whether to get another flavor I hadn't tried, but dammit, I really like that Double Chocolate Chip.  The Trail Mix was just Vanilla with trail mix added in. I don't think I'll be getting that again because, while I like raisins, I just don't like them in my ice cream. And oats too. Hey, you live and learn, eh?

At the right is Bert's choice - he got a double of just the Butterscotch which seems to be his favorite flavor. No mixing with another flavor, just pure and unsullied Butterscotch which made Bert happy.

We also were lucky enough to see the owner, Mr. Juan Andrade that day. He was busy that day. We saw people eating ice cream outside several shops down, plus more at his front table and inside his store. He was a pretty happy fellow and when he handed TC's cup to her, he said, "Here you go, my friend!" which I thought was really sweet.

When he was scooping my two flavors, he hesitated a tiny bit, then placed a tiny scoop of banana on top of my cup even though I didn't ask for banana. As he was doing so, he said in a soft voice, "Saah-geeng" while smiling at me. I had to ask him again what he said and he repeated it, "Saah-geeng". I heard Bert snicker in recognition of the word. I then realized he was trying to make a "Filipino Connection" with me - you see, "Saging" (pronounced "saah-geeng", accent on the first syllable) is Tagalog for "banana". I smiled and said, "Yes, saging! Salamat!". He laughed and smiled once he realized I understood him. 

I'm sure he's picked up a bit of Tagalog especially since there's a lot of Filipinos living down South. It's cool that Mr. Andrade uses the words and phrases as ice-breakers too. While we were sitting at a table enjoying our ice cream, an elderly Filipina lady with a walker came in. Her back was stooped and she walked really slow. She also talked quite slowly and asked him what his flavors were. Even though he had a big board with the flavors and despite the flavors being labeled in the freezer cases, he was kind enough to name all the flavors to her.

As he was naming the flavors, he threw in the Tagalog word for tamarind, which is "Sampaloc". When he mentioned that he had the "Sampaloc" flavor, I noticed the lady perk up in recognition. She took a while to decide and then she took even longer to count out her $1.35 in change to the owner. In fact, he stood at her table, instead of behind the counter, patiently waiting for her without getting pissed off like some people might have. He was kind and gracious to her and thanked her in Tagalog too. Now that's service!

In my last post, I said we'd get some paletas next time. Well, next time was NOW. We each picked out two flavors.  Although we didn't have a cooler or dry ice with us, Mr. Andrade said it would be fine since we live in nearby Chula Vista. He also told me that his daughter lives in Oceanside and brings boxes of these home every week and they don't melt. I tell you, he is seriously a super nice guy. He seems very sincere in wanting to please his customers. He also knows his regulars, greeting them as they come in and chatting with them in Spanish or English.  Or in my case,  in Tagalog, even though I don't speak it (I understand it more than I speak it) and known mainly the bad words!

So, here are half of the paletas on our beautiful rug with dirt stains from the past 12 years...from left to right: Chocolate Chip (my choice), Lime and Strawberry (TC's):

Here's the other half (L to R): Coffee along with Peanut Butter (Bert's choice) and lastly, Walnut (my choice).   And I put the paletas on the cleaner part of the rug. Hey, they were wrapped, all right?

I inhaled ate the Chocolate Chip one yesterday - Man, these bars are so dense with no air whipped into them. They are heavy in your hand and worth every penny.

Fk those shitty artificially flavored Popsicles - these are the real deal. The Chocolate Chip, Peanut Butter, Coffee and Walnut were Cream based while TC's choices, the Strawberry and Lime were just plain fruit and sugar. She just had her lime one tonight and it was a mix of very tart with a tiny bit of sweet. I thought it was too sour for me, but she digs that stuff, so yeah...

Can you see the Chocolate Chip on the far left? I should have taken a photo and unpeeled that bad boy. All the big chips were at the top of the bar! I kind of wished they were dispersed more evenly throughout the bar, but I'm not complaining...that much! Seriously, this was really good. I think next time we go here, we will be prepared and bring a small ice filled cooler with us.

South Bay (cont'd) - Oasis Ice Cream Parlor

Finally, the money shot!  The post you've all been waiting for, Oasis Ice Cream Parlor!

Oasis is nestled between a pizza place and a hair salon in a strip mall housing a Rite Aid and Albertsons. It's on the corner of Coronado Ave and Saturn. Oh, by the way, I was wrong about the t-shirt place. It's still there, just a few doors down so if you want to get your "Don't Eat the Yellow Snow" t-shirts, you know where it is!

 Back to Oasis...Step right inside and get ready to taste some good-ass homemade ice cream...

Oasis has been a fixture in San Diego since 1978. It is owned by husband and wife team, Juan and Juanita Andrade. According to an older SD Union Trib article (link is at the end of this post), Juan hails from a small town in Michoacan which originated these fresh fruit and cream based paletas (ice cream bars). In fact, his great-aunt and great-uncle first opened Michoacan-style ice cream parlors in the 1940's in Mexico.

Mr. Andrade was not there that day but a younger woman was. Since this is family owned, I'm assuming that she was his daughter. There are several freezers full of homemade ice cream. The mango looked pretty good, but I had my eye on blueberry because that was a new flavor.

Look at that intense pink swirly ice cream (strawberry and cream). It's right next to coffee, cookies and cream and another flavor I think might be caramel. There were also flavors like rice, guayaba (guava), tamarind, banana and your regular flavors (chocolate, vanilla strawberry). There was another freezer stacked full of paletas too. Like MEGA STACKED!

There's Bert trying to decide on his flavors.

Although we both got three flavors each, you can only see the top flavor. I had Cookies and Cream, Double Chocolate Chip (oh my gosh, there were so many chips in there! awesome), and their newest flavor Blueberry at the bottom. Bert had Coffee, Butterscotch and Walnut. The scoops aren't that huge or anything, but the flavors were very true and intense.

The only problem with getting three flavors is that the bottom flavor got drowned out by the top flavors. Bert couldn't really taste his Butterscotch when he got to it. On the other hand, I eat faster than him so I didn't really have that problem with discerning between the flavors. The Cookies and Cream was really rich and thick. I loved the Double Chocolate Chip because there were chips in every spoonful! And the Blueberry! There were real bits and pieces of blueberry in there and the color was this really nice creamy bluish purple.

TC chose to have her ice cream on a cone. She liked the fruit flavors more than we do so she got Orange at the bottom topped by Watermelon. The watermelon was so refreshing and you can tell this is handmade because there were real bits of the black seed in there.

Click photo of menu below to make larger...

Since Bert and I got triple scoops, our cups cost $3.60 while TC's double cone was $2.20. I think this is a bargain compared to the chain ice cream places which charge $3 or more for one measly scoop.
As you can see, the place is pretty small (seats maybe 6-8 inside with a table for 3 outside), but their business was brisk with families popping in, couples, and so on.  We'll have to come back again to get some paletas.

Until our next visit!

Other articles/reviews on Oasis can be found here:
May 2004 from City Beat
June 2005 SD Union-Tribune
July 2010 article from Sign on San Diego
and the overwhelmingly postive reviews from yelp here
San Diego CitySearch
and
the sdinsider pages
and lastly, Darlene's nostalgic post from My Burning Kitchen which spurred me to finally try this place.

Many of the articles talk about how nice the folks are who run this place, how friendly the owner is and how happy he is to see people enjoying his ice cream. I'm so glad that we finally went here after all these years. I think we will be going here every week now!