an archive of longings

mikhaela, mid 20s, from the philippines but in mexico city for now. this is where i make occasional stabs at sincerity.

[madasalin]

a self-indulgent eulogy for a non-relationship

well, it’s over. A is now in georgia, 3000 km away from mexico city. i cried the entire day today.

we’ve said goodbye before. in december, when he left for the states and i left for the philippines during the holidays with no guarantee that we would both return. in january, when he went to the taxco campus and wouldn’t give me the verbal assurance that i needed to feel secure in whatever this was. in february, when he said he wasn’t ready to see me because i had started seeing someone else immediately after we agreed to end things.

this feels different, more final. yesterday, he told me that i seemed sadder when we parted ways in december. this time we both tried to play it cool until he caught me crying in bed when i thought he was asleep. i told him i was just mourning the upcoming end of this... thing. we both know that we’ll see each other again, somewhere, some other time. but still, the thought that it would never be in this capacity again made my heart hurt.

before he got into his uber to the airport this morning, he told me, “you’ve been so good to me.” i told him likewise.

i bought myself flowers, a truffle cake, strawberries. these made me feel better but i still feel so alone. we started spending time with each other almost as soon as i got here in october. it feels strange being here knowing that he is not, at most, a bus ride away. my plan was to stay until the end of june since my rent is paid for until then. maybe i should go home sooner but i don’t know, flights from here to the philippines are so pricey right now. in the meantime, i need to focus on my work, attend my online spanish classes, and stop crying so damn much.

[madasalin]

snippets of mexico city in film (oct - dec 2019)

[madasalin]

I haven’t talked here in a long time, but hi. Many things have happened since I last posted. I went to Hong Kong for a week, shelled out a lot of money because I missed my flight, lived in Mexico City for two glorious months, made many friends over there, studied Spanish intensively, neglected work so much, and now I am back in the Philippines for the holidays. It is so warm over here and I am so much more unpleasant in Manila than when I am anywhere else in the world. I think it’s the sheer stress of just getting from one place to another over here. Glad to be home, but can’t wait to return to Mexico in less than two weeks!

[madasalin]

should be on a flight from beijing to tijuana right now, but i’m still in hong kong. for the first time in my life, i missed a flight. all’s good, though it does sting that i had to pay so. much. for a new one. here are the things i tell myself to convince me that it was worth it:

i heard that the beijing airport sucks (to be fair, this is a bit of a reach since the airport i use the most is the godawful manila airport).

not very enthusiastic about going to beijing in this political climate anyway.

my new flight will only stop at tokyo for less than two hours instead of going through beijing and then tijuana before finally arriving at mexico city.

i got a new tattoo yesterday, so i can look after it and give it time to heal!

hong kong is at its most beautiful this time of the year and i’m glad to be in it for a little while longer than planned.

i’m just so very tired and this will hopefully let me get some downtime.

mostly i’m glad that i can afford it because i would have thrown a hissy fit at the airport otherwise. all things considered, i’m impressed that i used to travel without any extra money at all. i used to be so confident that nothing would go wrong, haha. getting shot down for my hubris, you hate to see it.

[madasalin]

to be completely honest, i mostly just people watched in japan. these photos were all taken in osaka, a city i adored. i can’t wait to get my film developed!

[madasalin]

on traveling on a weak passport

japan was fun. it was the first ✨developed✨ country i have been to in quite some time. despite its proximity to my country, in some ways it seemed more foreign to me than morocco did. among others, the expansive train system blew me away as did the fact that i actually got to see a gustav klimt exhibit in person.

it was the first country i applied a visa for, and i’d be lying if i said i don’t want to apply for more now. i’m having trouble with the “rootedness” aspect of the applications, however. i’m not sure how i can prove i’ll come back to the philippines without land titles, car registrations, or dependents to my name. i’m 23, give me a break.

i remember an afternoon in tangier spent smoking and talking to a turkish guy and a chinese woman. we were all convinced our passport was the weakest in the group, so we looked it up. turns out we all have shit-tier passports, but the philippine passport was even worse than theirs.

interestingly, i met lots of immigrants in japan. some of them asked me if i wanted to migrate in the future. almost automatically i told them i might live in another country for a bit but i’ll always come back. in the philippines, everyone is always leaving for a better life somewhere else. who can blame them? i’m both sad and glad that my university has instilled such a fierce loyalty to this country in me. a sense of duty that begs the question: if we don’t fix this, who will?

in osaka, i met a swedish boy who works as a border officer. i always find it touching when people ask me to come visit them, even though there are times when you can tell they don’t really mean it. i think he did, so i told him getting a schengen visa is a real bitch. he grinned and told me he’ll just stamp me in. what a sweet thing to say, but only if it were that easy.

i am amazed that i have to explain the hoops we have to go through to travel. we have to convince our own immigration officers we won’t stay abroad illegally. we have to show embassies thousands of dollars in the bank. we have to shell out money for visas we are not sure will even be granted. and still there are people who begpack on our streets. and still there are old foreign men getting a pass after taking advantage of our girls and young women. it makes me so angry.

on the road, it is incredibly easy to pretend that you are all cut from the same cloth. it’s not entirely untrue but, god, some people just don’t know.

[madasalin]

it’s graduation season again and i’m surprised by how miffed i am this time. it’s probably because a number of my peers at the department are finally done, with one of them even bagging the coveted best thesis award. in my uni, it’s normal not to graduate on time. in my department, it’s normal to agonize over one’s undergraduate thesis for several years.

i am really happy for my friends because god knows they worked really hard for their degrees. but it is also making me think very hard about how i want to proceed with life in the next few years. assuming that i don’t mess anything up, i only have another year left when i go back. i decided to take some time off to work and to mentally ready myself for all the academic anxiety but i still feel wholly unprepared, two years later.

on another note, my japan visa got approved so i’ll be there next week! my invoice for a sizable amount of money has also gotten paid just now. in the past week, i got to spend time with my siblings and have a lovely picnic with my friends. a boy who made me so miserable in the past also apologized out of the blue. life is going fine, actually, but i can’t help but feel like something’s amiss.

[madasalin]

life lately

confession: i’ve been getting a bit stir-crazy after all this time in my hometown. it’s been about six months now, which is the longest amount of time i have been around since i moved to manila for college and then cebu for work. i thought it would be nice to live in the family home alone, but the thing is that nearly no one is around! i have had to confront seven years’ worth of grievances with this place by myself and it has not been fun. it’s so ironic and frustrating that i moved back just as my peers decided to work or pursue love and higher studies elsewhere, mostly in the capital.

on the bright side, it is officially midterm break and a good friend has come home from med school. i appreciate him a lot, mostly because he is a reminder that i am actually capable of being friends with guys without it turning into anything sexual or romantic. he’s also someone very eager to do things, which is refreshing. one morning, he let me know he’s in town and, hey, do i want to hit the gym with him for the next two months? before the end of the day, we already checked out the gyms in the area and signed up for the best place we found.

we have been working out on most days in the past two weeks. i hate talking about exercise, or any form of bettering myself for that matter, since it’s not very Effortless French Chic ™ but it has been a great way to get me out of my dazed work-and-sleep depression routine. we meet up at the gym in the morning, share an illicit cigarette afterward and then head to my house for a shower, food and conversation. sometimes he’ll stick around while i work, but he always knows when to speak and when to stay silent. it’s hard to get that kind of thing right but i am honestly unable to come up with a better measure of true companionship.

[madasalin]

the monsoon season has rolled in and all the rain sucks, but i sure adore the dramatic sunsets.

[madasalin]

i’m currently working at my local starbucks. a couple of minutes ago, a cute guy walked into the store and my hand reached up to fix my hair pretty much on its own. the baristas caught me doing this and started to laugh from behind the counter. it was so embarrassing but i love how intimate the moment felt. it reminded me of our train ride to meknes when my friend maria and i saw this elderly lady in a chador fanning herself when rafa (an admittedly gorgeous white boy) took off his jacket and the three of us burst out laughing. i live for moments like these, though i would always prefer to be the one who catches it and starts giggling first.

[madasalin]

pros of moving to tangier for a little while:

the atlantic & the mediterranean

a boy

amazing weather

cheap and fresh fruits!

the magical quality of light!

not having to deal with my family in such close proximity

not having to deal with philippine politics in such close proximity

as much mint tea as i want

fulfilling my desire to do something drastic

much easier to get to places even farther away

being a ghost

great hash 

all the lovely green spaces and public parks

chance to pick up some spanish before i head on to south america

cons of moving to tangier for a little while:

hilly terrain is bad for my smoker lungs

boy might think i'm more serious than i actually am

flights are expensive on such short notice!

can be difficult to find alcohol

repetitive food

no pda (as an extremely physically affectionate person)

leering and staring men

missing out on local stage performances i had been looking forward to

no places to get film developed

[madasalin]

the midterm elections were an absolute shitshow. the dirtiest one i’ve seen yet. there were non-functional voting machines, names that appeared on the receipt despite being unshaded on the ballot, a 6-hour delay with the transmission... though i didn’t have much hope for the opposition, i was still upset none of them won. but tbf even without the suspected cheating, their strategy was terrible. such a piss-poor decision to make a big deal of university mock election results when the overwhelming bulk of the voting population come from the masses!

with president duterte’s claws on the judiciary and legislative, the government is now well on its way to falling under authoritarian rule. fun times.

the bright side to all this? at least lots of political dynasties lost on the local level. numerous provinces, cities, and municipalities that powerful families previously had a stranglehold on voted for new faces. so, there is some hope. i am on my knees begging for this momentum to keep going. we’re going to need it when the time comes to depose this would-be dictator. it’s going to be hard and brutal but we can’t give up now. padayon lang, we’re overdue for a revolution anyway.

[madasalin]

freelancing is great because i can work whenever i want, manage my workload, travel anytime, yada yada yada but it sure gets lonely sometimes. i have been going to starbucks a lot as i cannot get any work done at home. i’m a weak person who can’t resist the temptation of a nap or playtime with my cat! the people who write those “why millennials are broke” articles will jeer at me, but my productivity offsets what i spend on the coffee anyway.

the crew knows me by name now and even gave me a free drink earlier. i also like how they have been playing a lot of chet baker recently. i find myself observing their interactions and get jealous about the everyday intimacies of working as a team. it’s the looks exchanged when a customer is being difficult, the subtle touches to signal small requests. nothing needs to be said because this has happened before, they’ve gone through this in the past, this is routine.

i would never go back to my retail job, but i always look back on those three years with such fondness. well, for my coworkers at least - upper management can choke. we made such a good team together and there’s something unbearably tender about getting to know one another while working. negotiating shifts, knowing who’ll come in late, instinctively figuring out who did what, vowing not to rat each other out... it is all incredibly intimate and i wish i had it still.

[puppetwithapistol-deactivated20]

The Romance Of Nightlife by Karel Chladek

[sunbathe]

Chiangmai Lantern Festival

[madasalin]

have i gotten around to talking about how amazing tangier was? there, i broke my phone, saw the most unbelievable sunset over the atlantic, fell in love with the mediterranean, ate so many tangerines, and had a dizzying romance with a beautiful boy i would’ve otherwise hated. it was glorious and my favorite city in morocco, though fez is close at its heel. initially distraught about my phone, i am now glad i had to rely on a disposable camera to capture it in images because this is how i think about it in my head, exactly in this coloring and lighting.

[madasalin]

i have been so terrible with my finances lately. not only did i exceed the budget i set for my trip, but i have also been indulging in all kinds of unnecessary stuff since i got back. i keep buying starbucks, going to the spa, and eating out for no good reason. aside from that, i set an appointment for a tattoo and paid for a new pair of glasses. yikes. (but to be fair that last one is a necessity!)

being financially comfortable is making me feel so complacent. rationally, i know it was only a stroke of good luck that got me here in the first place and it could disappear just as easily. and i don’t even have a fortune in my bank account - i feel like the money i have made is only impressive to me because i never thought i’d ever stop living paycheck-to-paycheck. i should curb my spending soon, god, especially if i want to follow through on my travel plans for the year. hopefully i’ll do away with wasteful spending as i say goodbye to april. i’m sure my wallet would agree that it was the cruelest month!