Keep Your Head Up,

and your Faith strong.

I'm slightly hesitant to blog about this, because I intended for my blog to be public after talking to Sonya last week. We both were supposed to blog last week (still waiting on you, Sonya) but so much has happened in the past few weeks I really just need to get this out there.

A few weeks ago my mom asked me if I could go home for Indigenous People's Day (Columbus Day) weekend because my sister has been "seeing and hearing" things. She told me that my sister has been having disturbing thoughts and it would be nice if I watched over her while they visited lola (my grandma) for her 90th birthday. I was pretty hesitant because I was supposed to have D1 lock-in and audition for UPro's set, but at the end of the day, I realized the situation was serious and family comes first.

Fast forward to today, and I've been stressed out after returning to Boston. I feel as if I've been smacked in the face with work and responsibilities--forgetting about meetings, running late to an extra practice for a piece I didn't learn, and a ton of school work/volunteer work. To make matters worse, I barely got any sleep last night (slept at 3:00AM), just lazying around to unwind from all the stress (terrible idea).

I was able to get through the first half of the day well, though! I finished my work for my class, ate a healthy, sustaining lunch to help get me through the day, learned a KPop dance to teach for my volunteer thing in Chinatown, and learning some set pieces.

However, after I finished volunteering...I saw a text in my family group chat that my sister would be going to the ER. Yesterday, my sister saw a therapist who said she may have mild schizophrenia, but I was shocked to learn that things may have escalated that much in the matter of a day. I texted and called my mom, who I could tell was holding back her emotions whilst at work, saying that in order for my sister to see an appropriate doctor, she must first check into the ER and be monitored. It was difficult, because my parents were both at work still and my sister couldn't just be placed in an ambulance alone. My mom was telling me how anxious she was, because of what has began transpiring, and asked me if I could pray. I texted a few close Antioch friends, so as to not spread the news too quickly if they could pray and received a ton of support. I'm endlessly thankful.

This was all right before I had to do my makeup auditions for UPro, as well as audition the rest of the set. On my way to BU, I could feel the anxiety welling up inside me, and tried to eat some food to sustain me for the night and practice some pieces. I knew though that my heart wasn't in it and told e-board and Stephen if I could skip his audition, to give myself a little bit of a mental break. Forcing myself to be there, at that moment in time was so difficult, but I hate to back out of a commitment.

Well...the anxiety and emotions got the best of me and I ended up going to the bathroom to cry for like 20-30 minutes. I hate showing these kinds of emotions sometimes, especially because everyone on the team thinks of me as some funny, stupid, dork. I just needed to tell myself that it's okay to cry and it's okay to feel a certain way. If you know me and my background...I've been through so much with my sister. From being close friends, to bullying and hurting her (more than I ever knew), to her first therapy sessions, to going away to Boston...it's been an extremely difficult journey. Sometimes, I ask God why it feels as if I've been blessed with so much and He decided to give her the shorter end of the stick. She's had more than her fair share of health issues (bodily, mental, hormonal, etc.) and her fair share of hardships. Everything just sort of came back...and to have something like schizophrenia happen really hit home.

My thoughts earlier: "Schizophrenia. That disease people always associate crazy people to have...people who hear voices and go out violent rampages. The disease John Nash had in the movie, A Beautiful Mind where he's shown to go insane after a successful life. I googled earlier, "Schizophrenia" in hopes of find out what the symptoms were. 'Maybe she didn't have schizophrenia. Maybe this was just a one time thing. Maybe things were really okay, after all.' No...all the symptoms line up. Voices? Check. Sees weird things? Check. Lack of social activity/changed mood? I mean...she's always been a bit anti-social, but is this another sign? Maybe...no...I think she does have schizophrenia."

I went through the rest of the night feeling pretty down. I even told Charmaine off a bit because she was giving me an attitude that I was just not having today. Normally, I'll put comments to the side. The lack of sleep, emotional stress, physical wear, and overall just crap really hit me and I felt like I did really, really bad at auditions.

Thankfully though, I have some really awesome friends (especially the Antiochers) who have given my sister, myself, and my family endless support throughout all of this. It's really sad and I can't say that I'm happy, but at this point in time I think I just need to really keep my head up, and my Faith strong. God has a plan, and I just need to trust that He'll be taking care of my sister. I just need to have Faith, that she's in good hands.

As an update, she's leaving the ER tonight, thankfully and will go home. She'll have to be monitored by my parents, however. To anyone who reads this, please keep her in your thoughts and prayers. I love my sister so much and would really appreciate the support.

Thank you.

Update: I'm really hard on myself for writing, but I just needed to keep this even more informal. It's just really hard to breathe right now, I feel like I'm gasping for breaths my anxiety is so high. Just need to eat and sleep. The rest will follow.

NOT YET ALL SUMMER 16

This was written in August. I'm posting it now unfinished cause I'm tired of seeing it in my already existing tabs.

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There's always something wonderful about summer time. Ever since I was a kid I've always admired the 95+ degree weather and sunshine like no other. This summer, I've been taking the time to really appreciate the things that I love in life. With the recent hate crimes, shootings, and negative energy in the world, AJ Delgra at The commVENTION put it very simply: "With all of this fucking hate in the world, this--this, right here [us dancing, doing what we love] is what matters."

 When I heard that statement, I had to let it marinate for a little bit. A part of me was thinking, "Does that mean for us to do selfishly what we love while the rest of the world crumbles?" However, what I ended up coming to was this: With so much hate in this world, why waste time contributing to that hate? There are so many things in this world to love, I should not embody such a hateful spirit.

 This past school year, I've self-admittedly done a lot of hating. Yes, I am/was a "hater." Somewhere down the road, I let myself swell with endless amounts of negative energy that slowly seeped forth into my daily life. Occurrences when I'd have normally been very understanding, I instead became bitter and judgmental. This affected everything--like relationships with Alexis, my close friends at NEU, family, God, etc. Overall, I was just not a happy person. Letting myself accumulate this negative energy was destructive and harmful not only to those around me, but to myself as well.

So, this summer I've been focusing on trying to be a more loving person. Grudges which I've let myself build up, I've began to let go. Old friendships which I've let fade away, I've started to try and re-kindle. While it's difficult, things have been progressing forward!

1) I've been dancing more. A lot more.

I've been going to workshops hosted by Kinematix and Revolve when I can/when I'm in Boston and went to Green Street here and there (tough when you're always in NJ). I also attended commVENTION, The Wannabes' first ever dance intensive. 10 class in 2 days--crazy tiring, but extremely inspiring! If there were a team I'd want to join in NJ off a first glance, I'd want to join Wannabes. I also went to my first House of Movement class with Jane Yoon (and Mike Myung/Patricia) to attend classes taught by Company members/alum, Alfred Remulla and Matt Montenegro. Those classes were...really hard. I also taught my first Kinematix workshop, which was AMAZING. I'll probably write a separate post on that at another point because I'll be teaching again tomorrow for summerPRO (probably the same choreo...got sick and couldn't make a new one).

Dancing helps me feel full--it helps me feel a bit more whole. I love the sense of community it brings and I myself feel I am getting better as a dancer. Yay for doing things you love, amirite?!

2) I've been making new friends/reconnecting with old ones.

Need To Sleep And Rambling Thoughts

Caught my mind wandering again when I need to wake up in a few hours for work. Is it sad/weird to say sleeping takes me away from the dreams I have in the day? Sometimes when I dream and think about things my heart gets so full it starts to hurt and I need to let things out or just take a break. That's where the sleep comes in or the blogging comes in.

Whenever I feel weird or something I try to just lay down and sleep on it or write about it. Often times I don't remember my dreams. When I do, it's just tiny little fragments that conclusively don't really mean much. Other times (when I used to be a bit more spiritual) I would close my eyes and pray...but that's to be saved for another post. (Yes, I'm still Catholic and yes, I still practice my Faith, but spirituality is a post on it's own for another time). It's weird because I used to write on my Tumblr almost everyday and do stupid things like have code names to ensure people who followed me don't read it. Now, I blog on something no one reads and I don't even have my real full name on it so no one can Google it, either. Hopefully.

But anyways, since I've started blogging, re-reading blogs, etc. again, I've had this re-occurring, slightly fleeting feeling like my head and my heart are up in the clouds. It's of course difficult to deal with because not only am I a student, I'm also a full-time worker now for the next 6 months. Even in that avenue though, sometimes I think to myself if I'm committing myself enough fully to the things I want to do. I currently co-op at a start up company within the food and beverage field as a sales manager (lol manager already), but if I want to own a restaurant or really work in that industry, am I doing the right thing? Sometimes I think to myself, "What would have happened should I not have gotten this co-op?" Because, if I hadn't gotten the co-op that I currently have, I would have tried to make my own co-op at Joanne Chang's Flour Bakery and Cafe working in the pastry kitchen. It was almost perfect too--exactly 6 months in total...but it unfortunately would've started in February and would only have been 24 hours/week. 

I don't know too much about Joanne Chang cause I don't read her books (or read in general), but I do know that she left a job most older people would say was pretty good to enter the restaurant/bakery industry. I think it's cool because she symbolizes someone who followed her dreams to do what she wanted to do. For the longest time I told myself, "You need to do ______ first before you own a restaurant" because it's hard to just start out doing that. It's honestly very true. But when I've worked with food trucks like Bon Me started by Alison Fong, worked within the AAC to hear about Joanne Chang, and have two bosses who are in my grade at Northeastern and started a continually successful business I can't help but think, "Do I really need to do that?" All my past co-ops were upsetting because I had been trying to avoid something that I've always loved--food (LOL). This year I told myself "It's time to work in the industry you want to be in. Or at least get close." Now, I'm close and while I know it's not the perfect fit as to where I want to be, it's a huge start.

Eh, to be honest I think maybe one day I'll take that internship. I don't know how, but it'll be a cool experience. I wish I heard about it earlier and that the timing was better...but I'm happy where I am now, for now. I just need to get to freaking sleep cause it's 2:10AM, I'm yawning and tears are rolling down my face, and I need to sell some DAMN product. Let's goooooooo.

^^ That started out as a post on some dreams I had, traversed into some almost regrets, and then ended with some slightly inspirational piece on how I'm starting to do things I want to do. Honestly, what am I doing with my life lol...just pay me to freaking blog about myself while I eat food.

Cultural Student Organization Leadership Woes (Microaggressions Galore)

^ That's a pretty lengthy title. Well, today I encountered for the first time, honest to God genuine ignorance from a faculty member at Northeastern. Even worse, it was when myself and my peers were doing a presentation to get funds for two cultural events--one of which we hold annually and is a hit every single year. 

To give some background, we had originally planned to only present for one of our annual shows, Bahay Kubo. For Bahay Kubo, we wanted to get a headliner, Joseph Vincent (who came to Northeastern last year for a different show). Unfortunately, he was a little pricier than we had anticipated, but we did not have any other options for a headliner as he was the cheaper option of those who could commit. Then, we were asked to present on behalf of an organization that does not receive funding to bring in a Filipino American speaker, Geena Rocero, to talk about her life story as a Filipina transgender woman. She is a prominent social justice activist, primarily within the LGBTQA community. Again, though, she was also very expensive.

When it came to presenting, I had already known that we would most likely get asked why we were having two expensive events only three days apart. I even suggested beforehand that another group pick up the Geena event because I had foretold we would run into this problem. However, I did not anticipate to get asked questions from a faculty member and some peers such as:

"What does being transgender have to do with your mission statement" <-- i.e. celebrating and spreading Filipino culture and heritage

"Why does this Filipino artist have primarily only American songs on his YouTube?"

Now, to be completely honest out of context these are seemingly innocent questions. Honestly, they're legitimate questions! However, the tone and manner in which these questions were asked made all of us presenting feel very uncomfortable. Personally, my nerves were so shaken that I had another spasmatic episode in my seat (of course I tried controlling it) while defending our organization and our cause. Of course I cannot expect non-Filipino people to understand how historically, religiously, and politically the Philippines is very conservative, influenced by it's predominantly Catholic culture. And of course, if I told someone was a Filipino artist, someone's first assumption might be (he must sing in Filipino [which is technically incorrect to say]). However, we had stated many times that this was a Filipino American artist we were trying to bring in. Growing up in America, it would be natural that many of the songs he performs are American. Moreover, in many countries, including the Philippines, English is slowly becoming the primary language as Americanism, globalism, and past colonialism combine to slowly erode the cultural aspects of many independent countries. Moreover, a Filipino American artist based in America probably has most of his popular songs be in English since /sarcasm more Americans probably speak English vs. Filipino.

Naturally though, we retorted. We tried to explain the impact of religion towards Filipino culture and lifestyle. We explained that while many Filipino American artists sing American songs, when we invite people they typically understand the cause and offer to sing a traditional Filipino song.  I don't know, we were desperate. We negotiated to try and sell tickets instead of have the event be free, but we couldn't budge from going our suggest $5 to a whopping $13 for what normally is a free event. 

I felt so terrible because I reassured everyone after having been through so many proposals with different groups that we would be fine. In the end, I figured that PAAC, the group bringing in Geena, absolutely needed her and I offered we cut our headliner for Bahay Kubo. Without Geena there would be no speaker event, but without Joseph Vincent we could still host Bahay Kubo. It was definitely a sad decision, but negotiations had to be made and we were in such a tight bind--something had to be said. Even then, it's still not known whether or not we will be funded for these events. All we can do now is hope and pray that things may turn out alright.

So, what's the lesson here?

1) Don't be too hurt by these microaggressions. As I wrote this post, I realized that from their perspective, they obviously just didn't understand. Of course, it does not mean ignorance is acceptable, but rather, I always believe education is the key to mitigate ignorance. 

2) The decision wasn't personal. The majority of this vent session was about the woes and misunderstandings between the group in regards to the cultural aspect. However, it would have been unfair for Barkada, our student group, to be funded for two expensive events in the month of April when so many other groups are vying for funding for just one. In the end, that's the main reason why we were turned down (from my perspective).

3) I write a lot and probably really poorly. Hahaha, I haven't wrote anything quite substantial in such a long time--maybe it's something I should get back into?

4) Blogging feels good. I feel better writing this out!

4.5) I blog late at night. I should sleep. Oh well. GG work.

Trying This Out

For the past 6 years I've used Tumblr as my main blogging platform. Recently, Sonya, a new friend of mine introduced me to BlogSpot (well I guess I've always known about it) and I decided to try it out. Here's my first post! Happy New Year!

Edit: BlogSpot (and Blogger) looks and feels a lot simpler than Tumblr, as well as being more personable. I'm having way too much fun playing around with this, I need to go to sleep. I have work soon!