Practically raised alone, I spent most of my life learning things. My idea of a typical school day would be being picked up by my mom’s students to hang out with her at the multi-level school just behind ours during lunch and go back for an afternoon of ballet and/or ethnic dances. My weekends would be spent in front of the TV, eating the mashed potato I learned to cook on my own, waiting for my parents to go home wondering whatever pasalubong they had for me. Sometimes, it’s singing the karaoke, while blocking out my old yayas from my parents’ room, aircon blasting and simply waiting for them to arrive. Sundays would be mall days.
My idea of sport: playing outside for any street game that will allow me to exercise my infantile muscles and have my legs wounded. My mom hated it so I would always wear jogging pants or pyjamas outside. Most of them became torn on the knee part. I became good at running. I never knew I developed it there. I would hang out with boys because I thought them to be mature. I never knew I got it there as well. We moved houses and I left my old playmates. I learned street volleyball in our new community, back when my eyes could still see the ball. I taught children dances, made dance numbers. Made it a career. I never learned how to ride a bike.
Then I spent less and less time outside and chess became a challenge when one day, the school had a tournament, and known to be kind of intelligent, I begged my father to teach me. I learned overnight having registered that afternoon and fought. I made it to the semis and got kicked out by the sister of my former crush. It was a feat, but I never fought again.
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