I could barely keep my eyes open. It was the second day of my weekend and I waa still running on around 6 hours of sleep (collectively). I couldn’t even remember if I got to kiss my boyfriend goodbye as he walked me to the waiting Uber car.

My body’s giving out but my brain is still working possibilities, ideas, strategies. What would I do with this opportunity I’ve been presented? Would I be any good? Would i actually use it well, because i’ve wasted these opportunities before.

But shouldn’t we always be a little nervous about new things?If if doesn’t make you worry while your inner self is jumping up and down in joy, what are you doing it for anyway? Life is too short for “meh.”

That sunset is pretty. Even with that worrying blanket of smog on the skyline, orange sky is lighting up the highway, always a bit more idyllic after a couple of hours of rain. ‘

I really should have had more sleep for this, but life happens and I work too hard not to enjoy life after work.

Should I make jokes? Take more notes? Make a little more effort to connect? I’m the only one here to not really be in the mix of an actual group, and I want to not rub anyone the wrong way.

Maybe I should just enjoy it and be myself.

Myself has been fine for me so far. Let’s try that.

Family. In Filipino culture, the most important relationship we may ever have. Working with BPO companies for the past 9 years, it’s not unusual to hear the common “I need to take my aunt/grandma/uncle to the ER”, “My mom’s aunt just passed and I need to go to the funeral”, “I have to take care of my mother” as usual reasons for absences, even resignations. I’ve heard surprise, even disbelief from my bosses across the pond at hearing these from us, when mostly these reasons are usually accurate. We Filipinos still have a tribe mentality. We take care of each other. Grandparents live with their grandchildren all the time. We’ve taken years off from work just being someone’s primary caregiver when the rest of the world will tell you that hiring someone else would be more practical.

I’d like to tell you it’s just cheaper for us to personally do it, but I think it’s ingrained in us to do these things ourselves. It may be guilt, personal loyalty, or cultural expectations, but we do it. Because for us, family is everything. They are the people that raised us to be who we are as adults. The voices in our heads when we make big decisions. They are both our most loyal supporters but also our harshest critics at the same time.

Without (hopefully) airing any dirty laundry out, I’ve seen personally how my loved ones support each other. We may discuss at length the errors in judgment, irresponsibility, wrong choices that a family member/s made to cause us to have to help out, but we do it. No matter how badly the people we love have lied to us, screwed us over, make us want to just pack up and leave, we still find a way to bail them out at the last second.

It’s a vicious cycle. How do you find the balance of helping out versus being their bailout option? How do you make someone realize they’re going towards a downward spiral but not alienate them enough that they hide their problems from you and make it worse? How do you wake a person up without involving other, sketchier personalities or worse, the law?

I guess it’s enough to know them and love them enough to figure it out. Loving someone unconditionally doesn’t mean being their personal parachute. It’s making sure you equip them enough to be able to make the right choices, cheering them on when they need the encouragement, and kicking them in the butt when they need to get up off theirs.

I guess that’s what I think. Then again, I’m still figuring things out.

What’s your family like?

Sometimes when I feel really horrible about the state the country is in, how unsafe it feels to be here, the incredibly wasteful traffic, rampant corruption and all the other ails we’re plagued with, I try to find the good in where we’re living in. I feel like we’re blessed with our natural resources, being a collection of several thousand islands of different beaches.

It’s hard to argue with a view like that, and even if I know it’s not entirely natural as it’s part of an island resort, I can’t help but still stare in awe at it. The beach is so white, there’s no trash, the water is so clear that when we took a dip for less than an hour, I know we almost all burned under the clarity of the water.

And right now, with the rain beating down on the metro for the past week and weather forecasts saying it’s still going to keep beating down for the rest of the week, it’s hard to remember the brightness of the sun and the feeling of just being dry. However when I think about the warning that the water reservoir in dams were dangerously low, I am thankful for the replenishment, and the beauty it will lend to the greenery that was previously brown and cracked.

What views in the Philippines are hard for you to shake your head at?

I am not a fashionable person. 90% of my clothes are chosen due to their comfort and ability to come out of the laundry and not need to be ironed. My mother follows fashion a lot more than I do, telling us the trends of the month from her Vogue magazine (which I read for their food editorials). I work from home so 75% of the time I am in shorts, a loose shirt or wifebeater, and flip flops with with bits chewed off them because of my rabbits.

That is to say I’m not entirely devoid caring about how I look. I believe in looking professional when conducting business. I would never wear white, black or something completely loud to a wedding. I follow dress codes and party themes when the occasion arises.

 

I am a fan of ukay clothes shopping however, and I’ve been a patron of a few since I started working in 2007.

 

You see I’ve always worn a uniform to school, from nursery school to college. When I started to work, it baffled me to have to wear something different every day. from what I remember, I ran out of my collection of sarcastic message shirts the first month in my office job, and I was definitely not making enough to sustain my biggest vice (eating and drinking), and to also have a decent wardrobe around the space.

 

It was my mon who first went. I remember cringing a little as my only idea of these places were that they were old castoffs from other countries that were resold to ours (which is still true, I still find shirts with The Salvation Army tags on them). The variety is great though, and you’ll have less chance running into someone wearing the exact same thing. Plus, it’s significantly cheaper, which allows me to allot more of my budget towards food.

 

I regularly go now to a few different places, and it’s become like an adventure to pick out fun things (that are age appropriate) while not being too insane. I do have a few limits though. No shoes (can’t wash then), no underwear (COME ON), no bathing suits, no hats, nothing with stains or smells. Things have to be washed thoroughly with warm water and soaked thoroughly by me or professionally before they’re worn, and the basics, bought somewhere else. Ironically, my plain shirts and jeans, not from ukays but mall stores to make sure I don’t look like I’m in costume, dresses, mostly sewn by my mom.

 

While I admire snappy dressers and those who can follow fashion trends, I neither have the body or the wallet for it. The ukay gives me options that make me smile (like the four skirts I just bought for the price of one from SM), and leave me enough money for the obligatory meal afterward.

 

Don’t tell my grandma though, she doesn’t approve of the concept.

Have you bought anything from the ukay?

Lately, I’ve been in the kitchen. The thing about working at night and at home, there are days when you just want to get out of the house, and sometimes it makes it even harder to dress up and face the Metro Manila traffic. In those days, I turn to food.

For me, cooking is soothing. It helps that there is an actual end product to enjoy, and not just by you, but the others in your space. It gives back, and even if you’ve cleaned out your wallet paying for the ingredients, it’s not like it’s just going to run away from you, there is an experience to share, and depending on how much you make, it lasts for some time.

I actually have a list of things I want to learn how to cook, and mostly it’s been Filipino dishes. I realized, while thinking about what to make the significant other’s parents, that I have no Filipino specialty. All I make are American, Italian inspired things. And I get it, because those are easier to make and less pressure. Because Filipino dishes are personal. Everyone and their mother have their own sensory memories of Filipino dishes that they’ve tasted over the years and turn to for comfort when they tire of restaurant dishes.

I myself have a few Filipino dishes that make me happy every time I have them. Goto (tripe porridge), Kare kare (satay-like sauce with tripe and veggie) and nilagang baka (beef soup). All I can’t make worth a dang and I have to wait for someone else to make, as I don’t want to waste ingredients. (Precious cleaned tripe!) I have resolved to learn how to make these the next time ingredients are available. I find myself a little ashamed I still have not perfected these, as when I try to cook for others, I find myself at a loss for a repertoire that’s decent enough for a week. For someone who says she has a penchant for food, I really should be able to make more of a variety.

As for baking, I’ve checked off my one thing I wanted to learn how to bake successfully, which is cheesecake. It’s a crowd favorite, my favorite. My favorite one comes from the Calea bakery in Bacolod City, they have a white chocolate cranberry cheesecake that is thick and creamy with the tang from the cranberry sauce, it is so good. My dream is to hack the topping and to make it at home, because as it is, I’ve only had this cake a few times in my life, and I can’t fly to Bacolod just for a cake (It would be fun to, but not practical, not at all).  My next project is an iced cake, I just have to decide what kind of cake it is, before I break out the baking ingredients, as in our house, I’m primary cake eater, and I can’t keep eating all of my goods, I wouldn’t fit in my chair after a week.

What is your favorite food to make? Any recipes you want to share?

 

A couple of months ago, we babysat a friend’s toddler for a weekend. It was a responsibility I was not ready for at the time, and I was mostly running on panic adrenaline. Since this was someone else’s child, their world, it wasn’t something I wanted to take lightly.

And boy, it wasn’t a weekend that was light. A toddler is a test of will and smarts. They absorb everything. They try to test every limit and are strong willed. Once you give in once, they will remember and test how much you’ll give in next time. It was emotionally and physically difficult, and with having lost my baby bunny five days before, I was, admittedly, wanting to wave the white flag. Take note, this took five people (my sister, mother, brother, boyfriend) 48 hours and unending french fries (long story) to get through.

So I will admit this now and get it out of the way. I am not ready for children yet. Children will be the death of me, as until now I still sob at the memory of losing my rabbit. I know that I will love mine truly and fully and will be the most paranoid I’ll ever be about the world. I won’t be able to sleep. Or worse, I’ll just throw up my hands and ask someone else to deal with it. They say when it’s your own child, it’s different (That’s what my mother says, and she keeps saying it, I think she got spooked that none of her kids want children now).

I applaud those who choose to raise kids, as it is such an unselfish thing, to put your heart and mind on something that has its own mind and decisions to make. it’s so risky and will break your heart a thousand times over, and it will drain you of your finances, patience and all else you can give.

So I’m not ready now, please don’t shoot me. But I also know I change my mind a thousand times a day, so I’ll let you know when that changes.

Two Sundays ago, I got told I was beautiful. It was such a shocking thing. I remember shaking my head and saying thank you to the family friend that said it twice to my parents. Not because I think I’m a beast (and not because I think I’m a ravishing beauty either). My theory is because us Filipinos as a culture don’t expect the compliment. We’re so used to “Antaba mo na! (you’ve gotten fat!)” or at my age “O, kelan na? (When are you getting married?)” It just reminded me how negative our usual banter is and that we should change this culture on its head when we can. Because we are the future titas (aunts/older family friends) that will comment to children on how they’ve been. We can, as a generation, find better ways to start a conversation rather than asking why our quiet niece is still single, and instead go for the positive instead of the usual critique we hear about someone’s weight or failure to fulfill traditional cultural timelines.

 

You never know how much you’ll affect someone’s day, heck someone’s life even. I’d like you to think about things people have said to you that’s affected you, most of the time simple statements really resonate with people, you never know when, or how much, because words matter, and people listen to you, no matter how you little you think your impact is on others. When you say it one on one, it may make the difference in how a person approaches the next day, week or month.

 

(Or maybe this is just me reacting to the questions I usually get 99% of the time that I’ve had to bounce back with a shy “When we’re ready!””, or “Just enjoying the time right now”, or when I’m not feeling so great “I just want to be sure this time, this IS forever.”)

 

So go for the compliment today, my fellow future titos and titas. I’m sure you’ll find something good in the person you run into or meet with. Try to focus on that. I’m not saying sarcastically point out the bracelet you find hideous Regina George style, but find something you really like and if an opportunity presents itself, point it out. Right now, even when I’m mindlessly people watching, I look for at least one thing I like on every single person. It helps reinforce that thinking that there will always be something good about someone, even if your reflex is to look for the bad.

 

What were you told lately that shocked and awed you?