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cweemsun
warm greetings, humans.

5/12/2025 memories of going home
Something has been happening to me and I’m not quite sure what to name it. It’s a mix of melancholia, of nostalgia, of words seeping into my mind as if trying to ascertain whether it should let me remember it or speak of it. There’s a hit of joy that I was able to experience something but also an attached sadness that it is forever gone.

It usually happens when I cannot write it down. I’m not sure if I feared my own self, my own memories in writing because I know she is flawed and all the things might say may be wrong or confusing and not at all comprehensively artistic in flow.

It’s when I ride motors across the new city I live in, a sizable city I always knew I would live in but sometimes I feel its world it is small even when I’m crushed by the knowledge that I have absolutely no one to rely on in this wretched city that has its own rules and faults.

There are more times where I let myself stare into nothingness and have thoughts swirling in my head, like blood rushing until I am almost pumping myself into an anxiety attack and when I reach for the pen, it is gone.

Today though, I went through with travelling back to my hometown. Just an hour away from where I live now. I wasn’t sure when I was gonna travel back and in my head I wanted to go by monday since that’s when the elections is, possibly meet my family and also a friend that I made from book club, B. Then go back home and come back again on a Saturday where a possible showdown from my first book club would go down since I basically got kicked out from that one (I know, who knew book clubs were insanely dramatic?) and it’s going to be an end of an era from there on out.

I went through cleaning the house which something I’ve been figuring out a lot more these past few months. How to use certain products, that cleaning agents is not one fits all, as is the state of my bathroom which I just figured out which one to clean out the grout and the grime (oh and muriatic brings miracles in the bathroom i swear to it) and how much better I feel if I clean up more often.

Even this reminds me so much of those times when I was a kid and I wake up the radio and it’s a little colder at 7AM, I can hear my grandfather raking the leaves and my grandmother making a cup of coffee for lolo clinking teaspoon on the small mug in one spoon of everything but two spoonfuls of cream, just like how I like now (plus about 1 and a half cream). The cleaning always starts each day without fail.

On my way to the bus station when I finally finished putting all my fresh laundry from a day ago into my makeshift cabinet that is also where my books are and my makeup as well as skincare and art materials, the trash is also taken down the first floor as I wait for my maxim to come.

I tend to have conversations with the drivers most of the time. Much like I always do when I started going to Manila when I was looking for a job and where I thought I belonged. Conversations usually starts when I say an observation or just ask anything on my mind. I never noticed how human I was even then, how fearless I had become, always asking and never having to overthink about it. This time though since it’s an event that affects people, Halalan 2025.

The driver shared how his mother is now 76 and only received pension for a year then nothing. And how both his parents are retired but no pension because they are not impartial with the person seating in a government seat in charge of the money being released. I may not know if that is true but I can believe that it is highly likely that it is.

We also talked about how I said that it’s ridiculous that there are separate police stations for americans and koreans in this area, because, I know those are filipino taxpayers money.

It’s weird, it was like being in equal footing with every single filipinos at that point. That we’re all mutually suffering under the same things but we’re braving the conversations out loud. It was relieving.

As I got into the bus station, of course, there’s a flood of people. My legs are soaked in sweat waiting for the next bus to come since the bus I usually ride to got suspended for causing one of the huge traffic disasters this month. I would also want to ditch them by endorsing a partylist I don’t support but it’s just less convenient to me.

I went through the motions of letting my body get pitted in between more bodies to squeeze into the small doors of a bus where atleast 30 people are trying to climb into. I barely made it through the inside of the bus when I heard the bus driver and conductor begging some people to come down because it’s fuller than full and they cannot drive with that many people considering we’re already squeezed in the aisle, standing for the whole duration of the trip.

To this, a thought entered my mind about how normalized it is that this is what it takes to go home to vote, maybe celebrate mother’s day and that I am lucky enough not to wait hours to get to another bus for hours. Aside from that, I know it can’t be easy for the driver to have so many souls to think about while driving, and a conductor squeezing through the aisle with packed bodies trying to do their jobs.

“Filipinos does not realize how exploited they are when the system normalized resiliency under unfair conditions” is what I wrote when I was in college, getting to know who I am and the people and systems placed around my life. It is cruel, it still is.

The spirit and feelings of dreaming that a better life would be achievable in the last halalan was different. Something was in the air that time, it was the glimmering hope I had with the kabataan and adults who has been trying to fight through the rotten systems shackling us. But the results broke a lot of hearts and now, there’s no such thing anymore. It’s a lot more casual to me now, to leave disappointment in my heart and a tiny smidge of hope so they can’t dash all of it like last time.

Coming back to my surroundings, I passed by so many places where I point out where I used to walk one night with one of my then friends, a reader, G. It was late into the night and we spent so much time talking about books and I couldn’t find a way home.

A military base on the other side where I remembered where I practiced dancing with my highschool classmates for a group project. A jeep ride to practice tennis for intramurals that never happened for me. I had so many memories of this place that I keep remembering.

I hope to remember more and be able to write them out like today.