This is not the Easter I know.

My mom spent an Easter with us once in New Zealand and we were looking for fish or seafood and we found squid at Pan N Save that still had ink- they forgot to clean it- and we had to beg and explain to the person at the counter that we wanted it that way.

I remember the long, quiet days when we were little which I didn’t mind; and when we were older, the purely social excursions to church for the Stations of the Cross, where you dressed up and checked out (and judged) everyone you saw. I think I was 13 or 14 and I got obsessed with penny-loafer shoes which I wore with no socks and pegged jeans. I did get them though how, I cannot remember (nor why I was obsessed with them in the first place) and wore them (with a white shirt ) to church to do the Stations of the Cross.

I was looking at my feet the entire time and to this day I can remember their satisfying click on the stone floors and how the new, stiff leather chaffed at my feet but which I didn't mind.

I bought the lamb online- butterflied and boneless South Island grass-fed lamb. For dessert, I thought of making the hot-cross buns we’ve been keeping in the freezer into a bread and butter pudding.

The stuff I would swap for lamb- charcoal-grilled bangus with squid cooked in its ink and vinegar; pan-fried tilapia with a squash flower salad dressed in calamansi and fish-sauce; steamed river shrimps with an egg omelet. And the best Easter Sunday lunch? Lechon.

But this is the Easter I now celebrate so…