I was born in the Philippines, but my dad works for the Foreign Service. So I actually moved around a bunch of times during my childhood. When I was around two or three, we moved to China. We lived in Beijing for a couple of years. And then when I was six, we moved to London in the UK. That's where we stayed until I was around 12. We moved back to the Philippines, because it was like a break between diplomatic missions. I lived there until I was 15. And then I came to Canada.

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Should I be going somewhere right now?

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We moved to Vancouver when I was around 15 or 16. And I've pretty much stayed here. My family has since left… and I chose to stay here for grad school for university for work. 

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And I still have that feeling of like I should be moving. Which I've talked to some other friends who for various reasons have moved around a lot as well as a child. It's a common feeling apparently, of just like, I feel like I should be going somewhere right now. But it feels really weird to now have my own apartment and be like: 

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I should decorate it.

‍I'm gonna be here for a really long time.

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I still find it hard to put things up on the wall, because I think there's something in the back of my head that I'm like: 

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I'm gonna need to pack up soon.

There's no point to doing all of this.

There's not even a point to putting things away in cabinets… which is really bad because my place is messy. 

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At the same time, living in Vancouver for a long time… meeting different people and communities, every year I'm learning something new about the history of Vancouver and who lives here. So yeah, it's a very weird feeling…  

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Where’s home for you? 

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What do you mean by that? It depends on which setting I guess. 

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Shorthand, I just say I'm from the Philippines. Or that I’m from Vancouver. 

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I was traveling in Asia recently, and when people asked, I found it easier to say that I was from the Philippines, because they would immediately go like, Oh, yeah, okay, that's close to here, kind of thing. And it felt like a little bit more… intimate. 

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But other times, I would say, Oh, I'm from Canada, because they can tell like from the way that I talk and things like that.

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I haven’t been here in a long time

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By definition, I am a first generation migrant here. I use English more than I use Tagalog. I still like to celebrate [cultural festivities], but perhaps not as much. So the longer that I'm here, and when I go back, it really feels like:

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Oh, I'm not from here anymore… 

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I'm going to see family in the summer. And I'm surprised that I'm feeling a little bit nervous. I'm realizing that I haven't been here in a really long time. Can I still call myself as being from the Philippines if that's the case, which is also weird, because like, I'm a permanent resident in Canada. I'm not a Canadian citizen. So I'm still Filipino in legal terms. So how the legal mixes with the personal is very interesting.

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