Vienna

Pinoy Bistro in Vienna

By: Yoko Ramos-Vingno

This writer has always thought of February as synonymous to love - a month when the hopelessly romantics are sucked into their perennial attacks of reminiscing from day one of courtship to marriage with resolute conviction. They think about flowers, hearts and cupid that all symbolize love. For this writer, though, thoughts of Vienna would insist themselves into her mind during February, not that she does not like it or does it get to the point that these thoughts could become quite annoying; on the contrary, these reminiscing had refreshed and invigorated her particularly when she remembers that she and her significant half spent their honeymoon in this lovely place many years ago.

Austria’s capital Vienna adopts the city slogan “Vienna is different”. For truly, as the avant garde in me takes over, Vienna is a recommended place where you would want yourself to be if you want to satisfy your yearning for culture, the arts, music, architecture, food and romance. This is where grand antiquity and sophisticated modernity co-exist at the same time. Churches, palaces, government buildings, apartments have different types of architecture – some are Gothic, Baroque, others are more Art Nouveau and the new ones are of modern 20^th century type. With the United Nation’s headquarters situated here and the OPEC, this city with a low crime rate proved to be politically important in the world. Vienna is haven for the artistic and the lovers of art – the Opera (is grand), theaters (impressive), museums (over 50 kinds are fantastic) and the architecture (historical and magnificently striking).

Vienna, being located in the heart of Europe, is a really a lover’s paradise. Parks are full of lovely and wonderful flowers especially in summer. What a splendid and picturesque sight for a romantic like me to see and feel.

Vienna, known to us by its famous Vienna coffee, the classical music of Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert and Johann Strauss, the waltz, Sigmund Freud and the Vienna Boys Choir, is actually second home to about 30,000 Filipino expatriates, according to the Deputy Chief of Mission Charlie Manangan of the Philippine Embassy in Vienna. Most of them are in the medical field like nurses and caregivers, professionals in the United Nations in Vienna and some others are working in fast food restaurants and a few are working in the house. Majority of them have lived in Vienna for the past 30 years or so.

Hubby and I spent our New Year in Vienna and while re-tracing the steps we took during our sojourn there years ago, we revisited the building owned by the post office where the Philippine Embassy is housed as well as the other shops located there including the Asian Bakery/Bistro owned by Malou Santos, a Filipino old-timer entrepreneur that has survived the economic ups and downs in the last 11 years including the most recent global economic crisis. Malou’s store offers interesting varieties of Filipino food. Her store sells hopia, siopao, growers, itlog na maalat as well as various viands of pancit, adobo, kare-kare, menudo, dinuguan and the like. She serves her mostly pinoy clientele lunch and dinner. She also has her steady flow of foreign citizens who have started to acquire and like the taste of Filipino food.

Mary Lou Lagon Santos, performs an all around work in her Bistro. Apart from being the owner, she’s the cashier, cleaner, servidora – all rolled into one. The only thing she cannot do she said is to cook. Avelino ‘Bhong’Santos, Malou’s husband, does the cooking.

When I met her she was busy preparing food for the New Year’s celebration which according to her was for the Filipinos living alone in Vienna who had requested her to organize a gathering, since living alone, they were looking for company to spend time with to welcome and greet the New Year. Her regular customers requested her to open the Bistro so they can have a place to celebrate the coming of the New Year with Pinoy friends and with pinoy food. It made sense as it was a freezing minus six in Vienna on New Year’s Eve!

Malou is looking forward to celebrating the Bistro’s 11^th year in the business. “It was hard work all the way. We survived through prayers and perseverance”. This, she explained was the reason why she and her husband are surviving the world economic crunch where credit is hard to come by. She proudly tells me that the Bistro is the only one in Vienna. Other Filipino restaurants some of which used to be in the same building all closed down.

Malou is a Commerce graduate, who majored in Business Management at the University of the East. Her educational background allowed her to discern and address business’ problems. Like in any other business ventures, Malou experienced several hardships and setbacks before getting to where she is today. After college, she enrolled herself again at Cora Doloroso and took up Computer Secretarial. Malou found work at Philippine Long Distance and Telephone Company. At about the same time, her sister who was working as a nurse in one of the hospital’s in Vienna invited her to visit and stay with her having in mind the thought of Malou possibly and eventually finding a job in Vienna.

She arrived in Vienna with a three month visa. Lucky as she could get, Malou found a babysitting job and when her visa was about to expire, she found someone at the United Nation who sponsored her stay so she could stay longer. Consequently she cleaned house for her benefactor for three hours on Saturdays and continued with her babysitting job on weekdays. For some time life was a routine but Malou is the person who is not wont to complain as she loved and continues to love Vienna. After doing other odd jobs, Malou got her initial big break after she was hired to work at the American embassy residence, a job she was well paid for, and she did not mind having to do extra hours of work in the residence as they meant an additional pay. The good working conditions gave her the opportunity to save.

Shortly thereafter, Malou was offered a business opportunity that required her to invest her money and be part owner the Asian Bakery. Sounding like a good deal, she invested her savings of 304 thousand schillings (almost a million pesos that time) and became part owner of the Asian Bakery.

Meanwhile, Malou continued to work at the American embassy residence and would occasionally visit the bakery in her free time until one of her partners confided that something was amiss in the accounting side of the business. Malou asked for the books and discovered irregularities. Malou filed a case against the partner handling the finances. After spending time, effort and money, Malou won her case gained sole ownership of the establishment. She was supposed to have filed another case against the same person but she decided to let it go as she felt a new case would bring her again lots of stress, endless tears and sleepless nights which she had endured in the previous case.

Malou met her husband, Bhong, in Vienna during her turbulent years in the business. Bhong offered to help her in the Bistro and suddenly they found themselves in love and got married. Now, they own apartments in Nueva Ecija and Caloocan which they are renting out. They bought an 850 square meter land in Antique, which they plan to develop into a resort house. Malou has also invested a large amount of money in the research project of her scientist brother on developing waste management.

After all the adversity, hard work and perseverance plus with a loving support from her husband and partner, says Malou, the Bistro will continue to sell the same Pinoy food that we love and grew up with as long as they can.