Possibilities & Tales

Just because it's something you've always wanted doesn't mean it wouldn't be scary, but some dreams are bigger than fear. This was the someday I've been waiting for and it's here now. I've always wanted to try life elsewhere and although I didn't really have an exact place in mind to begin with, I was never really too picky because there's beauty everywhere especially if you look close enough. I'd go anywhere in a heartbeat. I will always love Manila and it will always be home, but there's still so much out there to see and love and my heart can take it. Somehow I kept being drawn towards this city and had all the reasons to go. I knew I had to experience something different and well, looks like I'm in for such a treat. I have just U-hauled my life up to the north. The decision is easy, it's everything else that's difficult. For most of us at home, it's not just a pack up and go kind of thing. There are so many things to consider and many requirements to fulfill, and I thought it was impossible, until I wanted it bad enough and discovered otherwise.

I was a big dreamer growing up, but I’ve become a bigger go-getter. I have an ever-growing bucket list but I cross off things as I go along too so it doesn’t look that daunting to complete. I am now currently working on bucket list #59. I have no idea which item I’ll get to cross out next, but over the course of my lifetime, I will go on a cross-country roadtrip. I will travel to a random destination with just my clothes on, passport, wallet, mobile phone, and a small bag to hold them in. No extra pair of undies (I will buy them there on my destination!), no extra clothes, and definitely no plans. I will experience snowfall, write a children’s book, and skydive even if I can already hardly breathe just at the thought of it. I will make it to Antarctica. Sometime, I will take a break from falling in love with places and fall in love with a boy for the first time, perhaps even a second, third, or fourth time. I will be a mother, maybe to a little girl who will grow up just as fascinated with the world as I am. I will show her what kind of magical things there are in this world and conquer the terrifying things with her.

During the beginning of every year, I always enthusiastically talk with my friends about wondering what the year holds for us. The years always sneak up on you with lovely surprises if you leave the door open. In late 2011, I remember discussing with my friend my dream of visiting all the Disneyland locations. She told me she knew someone who had visited all 5 locations at age 22, and I remember my amazed, wide-eyed self, thinking it would probably take me much longer because I had 2 more (Tokyo and Paris) left, and those 2 aren’t easy places to go to due to visa requirements. Somehow, I gathered up the guts to apply for a visa to Japan in 2012 so I could spend my birthday in Tokyo Disneysea. It was my first visa application without my parents’ help and I can’t even begin to tell you about how nervous I was, but I made it to my happy birthday. In 2013, I'm beyond grateful to have received a free flight and ended up in Paris on my birthday. Had my January selves known any of this, they might not have believed it, but here’s the secret – it’s putting yourself out there as much as possible because it’s the only way you  can create roads, bridges, and pathways so that the it that you’re wishing will find its way to you.

If you ask me if I had known I'd be here 5 years ago, I'd say not at all. I didn't even know that I'd be here now this time last year. People say there's nothing here but there's so much to see. Everyone's free to be different and there's no place for hate, and I like that I can call it home now. Last year I'd hoped to finally live the elsewhere I've always wanted real soon yes, but I knew nothing. I don't even know what tomorrow holds and so i'm learning to trust the unknown no matter how daunting it seems because where's the fun in knowing everything? It's up to you to create the life you want to live but always leave room for surprises. Let life surprise you every once in a while. Make room for the unimaginable. Let life be better than planned. Nobody ever said it was easy, just worth it.

I didn't know it would be thanksgiving here but it's just so fitting. No words can explain how grateful I am for every little thing and for everyone. Although I'm doing this on my own, everyone's been so kind giving advice or helping me out in whatever way they can, giving me letters and presents and sweet messages, and making time for me before I left. Thank you guys, I really appreciate everything! Time flew by so fast I didn't even have enough time to meet up with everyone I wanted to see but it won't be long til next time. I honestly could not have asked for a better set of people in my life. Special thanks to my 3 best friends for flying in and not letting me spend my birthday alone! And thanks to everyone who sent me greetings, it means a lot to me and I really really appreciate it! 

I hope you’ll always remember this. How this feels like. When you’re at your lowest lows and you’re rising above, like you’re making things happen, and it’s you. Like for the first time, you’re not disappointing yourself. Like you’re on your way to somewhere really good. Like maybe it can happen.

Life doesn't always go as planned but they say that if plan A doesn't work, the alphabet has 25 more letters... And if I may add, even an Excel spreadsheet has more than 16 thousand columns going all the way to XFD. 

Gratefulness

Note: These film photos are not mine. Click through the photos to be directed.

There's something about Finland that I can't quite put my finger on, but it makes me want to explore it because here I am from afar, already adoring it. 

Some Finnish things:

Santa Claus. According to Finnish folklore, Korvatunturi is believed to be the home of his secret workshop.

Christmas. Their biggest holiday that goes on for 3 days. Everything is closed! Just family and holiday cheer all around.

Midnight Sun. The sun never sets during the night on some days in northern Finland. But there's also the Arctic Night when the sun never comes up.

Finnish Lapland. I'm half polar bear so anything related to dog-sledding, skiing, and reindeers makes my heart beat a little faster.

Safety and punctuality. People talk about how safe it is to go around all the time. Finns also value time so it's considered rude to even be a few minutes late. Definitely scrapping off my concept of Filipino time when I finally get to visit!

Sauna. Nothing like it.

Education. Zero tuition fees and top caliber. You know for sure the government cares about its people. Mothers who just gave birth even get gift boxes for their newborn. How awesome is that?

Other cities, especially Tampere. There is so much more to Finland than just Helsinki. I am looking forward to visiting the university towns and have fallen in love with the idea of experiencing Tampere because it's bursting with culture -- quaint shops, festivals and music, museums and art. The whole package!

Nokia. I have always been loyal to Nokia (even until now). Finland basically nailed it when they changed the world through the brand's humble beginnings. 

There were nights I felt invincible. I would brave the city and mingle with friends I had yet to make. I would miss the buses. I would walk along empty, chilly streets. I would have nowhere to go. I would have nothing but a mobile phone drained of battery and the London Underground's ticking clock staring at me, reminding me that it's not yet time, that I can't go home just yet. I would deliberately miss the last train home in exchange for beer bottles and conversations by the somber 3AM Thames. I would stare blankly at how the Tower Bridge lights up the way it does, sprawled against the dark blanket of London midnight. I would choose to wait for the first train home, for the Tube gates to welcome me back after a whole night's sojourn. 

I would feel free, because at last for once, there's no roof tying me down. I would not have a home so I can make a home out of anywhere. I would decide at that very moment and stay the night over a friend's place, make my way back in the morning fog wearing the same clothes as I did the night before. 

I would sit alone in a noisy bar right across a university, and have a glass of Chardonnay, maybe even two, and feel like it's the first time I have meant loneliness like this. I would walk along empty train platforms to board a night train to far down south and disappoint a kid looking to bum a cigarette. I would choose an almost empty car, take two seats for myself and give into glorious, glorious sleep. Even then, there would be magic.

I would wake up in a different city, miles away from where I began with my eyes closed. I would think how in spite of stillness, the world moves without your permission, and it takes you with it. 

I would, I would, but thing is, I already did.

Everyday, I wake up to this wonderful chaos that is the world, and it's full of chance, possibility, and life. I would be grateful for the shots at turning things around, for taking crazy chances and believing in long shots, for trying and finding out that it's 99% of it.

Truth is, you're almost always there. I can breathe a little easier knowing that.

It’s not only cities out there. Sometimes you can take a car out and venture off the beaten path, go into the woods, seek solace in nature. So that’s what we did.

Joana and I took a day trip out of Seattle to see Mount Rainier and we stopped over this creepy iron museum, complete with creepy music straight out of a psycho-thriller movie.

They say nature is a force to be reckoned with. It is. You look at it, sweeping in its vastness, and it makes you think and feel and wonder. My fateful encounter with nature in the form of Mount Rainier was moving.

I suddenly realized how everything I see is the ecosystem at work. The melting snow on the ground, the unpredictable and rapid change in weather, the chaos in fallen trees, foundations eroding from beavers gnawing through them. You see nature and suddenly it hits you that the world is at work.

Although there was no snowfall, I got to touch and play with snow for the first time. And find refuge in a hot bowl of clam chowder over lunch while marveling at the snow-laden ground outside.

Mount Rainier is beautiful. Nature is. Now I know better to take the time to go outside because there’s a beautiful world out there. Just like this.

I think about Seattle and think about that odd look on the receptionist's face when we checked out at 2AM. I think about the dark freeway drive, my best friend on the wheel and I on the passenger seat, when we were rubbing our bleary eyes to wakefulness, leaving everything to Google yet still missing exits while we tell stories old and new. I think about finding myself breaking down and simultaneously laughing hysterically like a mad woman.

I think about surviving the drive that felt neither too fast nor slow, and arriving at that ghost town of a parking lot, as if zombies were to appear any moment. We searched levels for any sign of humanity, but we found all posts deserted, and found a lone woman by the exit who asked us to just park our rental car and leave the key in the ignition. I think about how trusting her was our only choice, and how we did exactly as she'd told, and how we called the rental car company afterwards to confirm.

I think about 5AM and the empty airport, carts rolling, employees seemingly sleepwalking, and how my best friend and I stared at each other and looked for the people we met in high school 8 years ago and found that we were merely carrying their ghosts. I think about the stupidity of leaving my passport in a house several cities away. Although I was only traveling domestically, I was an alien without a state ID. I think about how they let it pass, and how grateful I was, and how hopeful I was that other airports will be the same. 

I think about how far we've come, having our first trip out of state together, and exhaustion -- falling asleep before taking off for the first time after approximately 51 flights, and waking up after we have landed.

I think about the shuttle that took forever to arrive, of measly fights and silence, of tiny naps and the tremors from my eyes for its first glimpse of the Space Needle. 

I think about buses to everywhere, to Pike Place Market, home of the very first Starbucks.

I think about walking to the Oceanfront to have a delightful bowl of Clam Chowder, and that awful unhappy hour.

I think about receiving that e-mail that changed my life, of how bad days turn into good days. I think about the Sleepless in Seattle, how people like Jonah Baldwin toss and turn at night, but that night, I slept soundly.

I think about things we do that we do despite not knowing if they will be worth it, and knowing in the end that they were. I think about the half-unfinished pizza, one too many drinks, annoying my best friend, and waking up alone in a room in last night's clothes and bruises and broken shoes and scratches all over my camera, and fortunately, a note from my best friend saying she will be back soon. I think about freezing, chattering teeth, finding photos I don't remember taking, feeling sick over the fact that I had a photo touching Seattle's infamous gum wall, and laughing over everything that happened.

I think about eating brunch at Rudy's, the Filipino diner near Pike Place, finding drunken refuge in rice and eggs, walking to Pioneer Square, and going to what felt like a Sims world: Capitol Hill... local vibe, unique characters all around, best for people watching.

I think about going to church and being overwhelmed, and that visit to Kerry Park when it felt like we were watching Seattle be Seattle.

I think about wanting to experience a student's life in University of Washington. I think about wanting to study in such a beautiful library, of how many minutes I wanted to waste there. I think about Hogwarts. 

I think about things ending, and beginning, of things I planned and having to come back home, and that moment when plans were becoming, when I chose to be left behind in a city I didn't know, when I waved goodbye to my bestfriend as she rode the Downtown Airporter on her way back to California, way back home.

I think about how finally, I was traveling alone and feeling anxious in freedom, of thinking how necessary it was for things that have yet to come. I think about that quarrel I witnessed in the bus, a secret world of beautiful underground bus bays, of getting lost and wandering around a whole block, only to go back right where I started and finding my way from there in the International District of Seattle. 

I think about Seattle and think about a delicate blend of San Francisco and New York. I think about how they say it's always raining in Seattle, and of how blessed we were to have not even a drop of rain touch our cheeks. I think about how I chose Seattle as my starting point. On that afternoon, I spent hours moving along in that strangely beautiful city. And when I boarded that bus to Portland to cross the line between the two states of Washington and Oregon, I knew right then and there that it is my birthright to move, to never stay still, to keep crossing lines, and keep finding bits and pieces of myself everywhere on the road.

I think there always comes a point when you feel stuck, limited, like some sort of doomsday is hovering above your head, and as you wade along that horrible uncertainty, there goes that flick. The light goes out.

4 years past graduation, I remember all the ways I have grown and realize that they are in part because of how I fought the battle between settling and achieving, and how the people in my life have played an important role in that. It’s lost on me how I worked through the determination of making things I wanted happen, but all I was just really doing was hanging on, winging it with faith, and doing what I knew to be best, all under the shelter of warmth built by the people who always had my back in all things.

Everything I did before started with passion… to write, to learn, to give, to explore. And so that was just it. I was just doing the things I loved doing, and aiming for dreams that allowed me to spend my days doing those very things.

Growing up, I had a little bit of athletics, a bit of music here and there but one thing I carried from infancy were thoughts and ideas and stories. I have always had words with me. Be it reading them, or writing them, they lit me up. 

Passion is intrepid. It keeps you driven and going, but when you lose it, it’s scary. It leaves you empty, quite lost, and constantly searching. And somehow, I find myself missing the years when I could just lose myself in writing. When I translated my thoughts into words and wrote them on paper, I was at ease… whereas these days, it feels like I have to dig into the rubble inside my head and search for the words. Perhaps it’s because growing up is complicated and sometimes it just leaves you speechless and hanging, perhaps it’s because life is happening. It’s a pause, but I believe in Kerouac.

One day I will find the right words, and they will be simple.

When I go back to how it all was, I always go back to Candy Magazine. There will always be key people and things that mold you into who you are, and Candy will always be at my core. Because before Candy, I was unsure, off-track, needing some sort of push to get me started. When I was granted the opportunity to become a part of Council of Cool, they gave me the courage I needed to pursue my dreams and never stop. They believed I can contribute something and that I had a voice worth hearing, which is innate in everyone, but sometimes we get distracted and wait for other people to remind us. And Candy was that for me.

I was the kind of person who needed that little nudge. My days with Candy allowed me to see through the side of me that’s stubbornly hiding under its shell, the part of me that was scared to try, and speak, until I was finally convinced. Candy lives for inspiring us, but it never meant to stand alone. It always just pulls out the very thing that you needed — your best ally, yourself.

Thing is, you only need a single push to get you going, and if that’s yourself, then you’re unstoppable. 

Years after, I am amazed by how far everyone I’ve ever known has changed, in ways marvelously magical. The people I met during my council stint remind me of how much we can all bring to the table, if only we choose to pursue passion and never settle. I have been blessed to have known a creative bunch of people who are now making their marks on the world, shining in their individuality. They got their own thing going on in different fields, and they make it new, they make it them.  

The editors believed in us, and empowered us to believe in ourselves. They have been nothing short of inspiring. They continue to write and share because they believe in their readers, in us, in what you can do, in the powers you have yet to know and use. They write because of you and for you, out of faith in you because you are destined for great things, if you can only see all these signs and take them wholeheartedly. You don’t have to be in the council for that.

It has been 15 years since they started. And I am just so so grateful so here’s one way of celebrating that.