Welcome to the Philippines

I was born in the Philippines. I stayed there till I was a year old and then moved to Hong Kong. Ever since I was eleven, I’ve been going to The Philippines every summer. The problem was, it always rained. It rains for days in the summer, and it doesn’t leave you with much to do.

So like, I went to the Philippines this year in February, which happens to be my birth month. Yes, I’m spending my birthday here. . But we also wanted to do other things.

I was on the plane from Hong Kong, and I was looking out through the window. I remember that every time I got on the plane, I ended up throwing up. There was this one summer when I got sick on the plane and recovered about two weeks later. The day after that, I was on my way back to Hong Kong. On a plane. Yes, life is tough, I know.

Then, one summer, I found something that saved me. Music. It’s amazing, it’s like, the whole journey I didn’t feel a thing, and ever since then, I’ve been listening to a lot of music.

I remember my sister’s first flight. It was hilarious, it was like, you know that thing where you’re descending and then you can’t hear anything, and people always say things like “you gotta chew gum, you gotta chew gum” and all that? Yeah, and so we’re descending and my sister was new to that feeling and she was screaming at the top of her voice saying “I cannot hear! I cannot hear!” and my parents were either telling her it’s ok, and grinning apologetically at the neighbouring passengers. I was laughing all the way. God, that was funny.

But that was a long time ago. This time, I was staring out the window, my sunglasses on, my earphones plugged in, my sister chewing gum. I say to her mockingly, “I cannot hear!” She rolls her eyes and turns her head to the other side and she chews faster. As if I didn’t see that.

About fifteen minutes before we landed, the captain addressed us. I did not realize this until I took off my earphones and heard, “We are now flying over Pampanga. Thank you, that is all”. For some reason, I thought about epitaphs. Those words engraved on tombstones. I saw my name, and I saw “Died February 5, 2010. Crashed 30,000 feet into the province of Pampanga.” I did not like it. Worse yet, they’d be suing me for damages to their streets.

I had conversations with my mom involving car accidents. She says that if you’re going to get hit by a car, you’d better get hit by something cool.
“Who wants to have “Hit by a taxi” as their epitaph?” she says with a look of horror. “It’s only worth it if you get hit by a Lexus.”

And I remembered my sister and I one day. We were walking on the street when she stopped and said, “Look it’s Naruto!” and started to walk in the middle of the road. I've never watched Naruto before. Her epitaph would have been something like “Died looking for Naruto”.

So anyway, we finally touched ground. We entered the open air. Charming locals. The smell of burning leaves to drive away the endless onslaught of mosquitoes and flies. My mom really loves that smell. This was the Philippines. Mmhm.

-J