Breakfast at Tiffany's - Dinner at Jana's

Pizza: 1,100P. Salad ingredients: 900P. Wine: 700P. Time spent preparing food and washing dishes: 3,000P (German labor is expensive :-) ). A great dinner with friends: priceless.

So there we are, 7 people (a total of 5 nationalities and 4 different languages!) squeezing around my dinner table. Hardly any of the dishes or cutlery is matching. Long drink glasses are filled with wine (Mon dieu! Quelle faux pas!). The Yellow Cab pizza box in the middle of the table is the final statement: this is not a fancy dinner! And true enough, it wasn't. It was a spur of the moment idea to bring together interesting people to meet each other. And an interesting bunch we were!

There are my neighbors M. and T. An American-Filipino couple (interesting already for the mere fact the SHE is American and HE is pinoy) running a production company. Media people always have interesting stories to tell!

Then there are my friends and project partners B. and V. They are the funniest and smartest pinoy couple I've ever met! With a great idea and a passion for coffee they are revolutionizing the Philippine coffee industry. You bet they have stories to tell!

My new colleague L. and her boyfriend G. were definitely the sweetest couple on the table (which we figured might have to do with the fact that they are not married yet :-) ). An Austrian-Argentinian perfect match with a hiking record longer than my credit card bill.

And then there is me. The German host. Bow.

While stuffing our faces with greasy pizza we climb Mt. Matutum in Mindanao to visit coffee farmers, join an expedition in Eastern Nepal to talk to indigenous people, go skiing in the Alps to cool down, plan a joint trip to Sagada, listen to the wisdom of the married ("Do not get married!"), get carried away by some cheap magic tricks, discuss politics and corruption, learn a lot about coffee and civet cats, listen to "how we met" and "covering Iraqi" stories... and at midnight were stunned how time flew by without noticing!

Alright, I can't cook so do not expect a fancy dinner with silverware and crystal at my place... but a warm welcome to anyone who wants to share an interesting story!

reposted, April 2009