A look Over the Shoulder: a blog on finding yourself while being yourself.
What does it mean to live as a teen, trying to figure out more about yourself and being at the receiving end of glares and pointed fingers of adults saying: you’re flinching away from your home country by doing this?
What does it mean to search for yourself without actually uprooting your origin?
It’s scary to be born in a generation of pixels and wires that you suddenly forget what it actually means to be seen and be alive. To be someone on his/her/their teens with a perception of running through abandoned train tracks, embarking on quests and saving the world and then boom… borders are closed, you’re facing a screen with equally anxious teens and an exhausted middle-aged teacher. You have no social life and no chance of saving the world, much more yourself.
So, can we really blame the youth for looking away from real life and resorting to staring at screens? Should we raise our voices at them while they watch twelve episodes of a Korean drama with red eyes and pajamas long due? Is there really anyone to blame?
This is where nationality squeezes through the screen. While teens try to survive their lives (or the lack thereof), they start making trail tracks away from their homes.
I, myself, is a testament to this. My early junior years were spent reading Percy Jackson series just so there’s someone I can identify with. The big textbook would be positioned upright to hide the thick Mark of Athena book I was actually reading.
So, when the world shut down, I spent most (if not all) of my time in my room reading and reading and well… reading.
It was clear to me that the only way to associate to myself is to dissociate from the rest of the world. And so, nationality wasn’t the priority during those times, it was survival.
The older generations aren’t mad at seeing the back of their kids fade across the distance, they’re upset and sad to see that what they fought so hard for, got left in the dust. That, they used literature as a form of activism, risked their lives for freedom and their kids willingly let themselves be colonized by the west and sometimes even other countries in Asia. But just like those generations before whose purpose was to fight, our purpose now is to find who we actually are.
Now how do we find ourselves without abandoning where it all started. Well it’s actually quite simple: bring a part of your home wherever you go.
One time, in a camping trip, I brought books. A big, heavy bag of books were clasped in my fragile hands the whole time making marks in my palms and grunts as I lift them again and again and again. The reason for this is just because I wanted to.
Another one is that I always wear my bead bracelet. There were kaleidoscopes form inside the beads when the light strikes and I love it so dearly. It was a gift from my grandmother and it being wrapped around my wrist feels like it is her hand: warm, tender and gentle.
A fragment of your home sometimes is all you have and all you need and so, bring it wherever you venture into.
Sing songs of how beautiful and ethereal Pamulinawen was that everyone fell in love with her in an instant. Brag about Lam-ang’s extreme power and bravery to fight against a whole battalion of enemies and end with a victorious cry. Wear the towering shoulders of a Filipiñana with pride and flaunt the golden skin of a Filipino that is a testament to their hard work and love for nature.
Bring a piece of your home, a piece of the Philippines in your search for yourself as it will be your pillar of survival and your navigator in the strange allies of the world. The cross of the Lord clasped within your palm will be your companion when you seemed to know no one, not even yourself.
Nurture yourself and reach your full bloom without breaking the pot where you started your life and remember, a flower doesn’t have to leave the soil to reach its full form.
by 11 – HUMSS – Almario – s. y. 2021-2022
Badua • Blanco • De Jesus • Melchor • Agorilla • Ballesteros • Dela Cruz • Gapuz • Trillanes
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