| Wanderings by alli

A letter to my 19 year old self

Monday, August 19, 2019

Dear 19-year-old me,

You’re probably wondering why I’m writing to you at this age and why not when you were 16 or 17, figuring out what course to take and what college to go to, because those times were a little horrible, too. But the 19-year-old Alliza is slowly learning to choose what she really wants and taking a step to getting rid of those people continuously made her feel worthless and made her feel like she was no more than her mistakes in the past.

This year would be pretty awkward because you’re adjusting to an all-girls school and you’ll be wearing those uniform every day, but trust me, you couldn’t be any more right in choosing to go to AC and live the next 4 years of your college life there. It will still be tough, it will still hurt sometimes, and days that you’ll want to give up will be coming every once in a week. Especially, when you can’t figure out how to be a nice daughter, a good student and most importantly a great mother your daughter will love and respect in the years to come.

And you’ll meet people, people you’ll love, adore and some you’ll dislike. But the end of the day, you’ll gradually realize that it’s life teaching you how big the world can be and how people can be so different from what you have known but still be lovable in their own little ways.

And I know it will be hard to believe now, but after you turn nineteen, I promise you, you’ll learn to love yourself more and more each day.

Insecurities won’t bother you every time you don’t feel like your beautiful self.

Self-doubt won’t be that clingy, annoying and toxic boyfriend that will make you question your capacity to be better than you were yesterday.

And it will make you realize, that life is more than just a relationship with that particular someone. Life is about all your relationships—family, friends, classmates and all those individuals around you that are hard to love.

Life is about learning to forgive yourself when you feel like you have nothing but your mistakes and the failures you keep on making along the way. Life is about the things you do that makes you happy, that relaxes you on the days that you can’t keep your productive self up, and life is about living and trusting God loves you so much and He’s doing everything He can to lead you to the right way.

In the years to come, you’ll learn that complete surrender to God is like giving birth—scared to the point of a life and death situation, worried if you can do it or not and excited because a new amazing individual is being born and you know that all the people who love you, will love that new “you” even more.

This letter is a way to tell you that you should stop worrying if you’ll make it or not, because the 25-year-old Alli is nowhere near her dreams but she’s happy. Just keep living and you’ll find your way.

Sincerely yours,

25-year-old, Alli.

Movie Review: To All The Boys I've Loved Before

Tuesday, August 21, 2018

Image result for to all the boys i loved before

"Love and dating, I love to read about it, it's fun to write about but when it's real, it's scary"

One of Netflix's originals, To All the Boys I've Loved Before movie screams, teen drama, cliche and shallow love stories, but you can't deny that it's terribly relatable whether you like it or not. I'm a 'in-the-moment' kind of person, so I'm already writing this fifteen minutes after I watched it.

The movie, based off from Jenny Han's novel looks so sweet, something you'd definitely watch again and it would take all your worries away or as I can say, it makes me want to love again. Ugh, sappy as it is, it's nothing but the truth! I'm guilty, okay!

To All the Boys I've Loved Before is probably something out of Wattpad inspirations and is one of the oldest story plots I've been reading before I even started reading: The fake dating story.

In this story though, it starts with Lara Jean Covey, aka LJ, played by Lana Condor, who undeniably loves to read about romance and writes about them but is never the one to experience them, has to fake date Peter Kavinsky, Lara Jean's seventh grade crush, and one of the jock's in school.

It starts after Lara Jean's letters were sent out and the person she's in love with, her sister's ex-boyfriend gets a hold of her letter. And so thus, Peter. Both had other plans in mind, Lara goes with the plan to move on from Josh and for Peter, it's make her ex-girlfriend jealous.

But, those great laid out plans like your summer beach outings just wouldn't stay that way, right? Same way with these two characters who just had to feel the real deal with the fake relationship situation. Though in all honesty, I wasn't expecting Peter to be the one she'll be ending out with. (Hey, Josh was way good looking!)

With those light banters, and Lara Jean's mind set that she's in love with Josh, I wouldn't have thought at first. We see them bonding over different things like talking about the people they liked, their families, and I was really waiting for the Josh confrontation. Their relationship was light, friendly and definitely relatable. Its not the "tension-y" feeling, it was the comfortable one.

As Lara Jean portrays the worries of the awful situation of living in a fantasy in the letters she wrote, her quirkiness behind her being introverted takes the story smoothly. Peter on the other hand seems to be the easy, nice and nothing but sweet.

Who can even miss the way the film looks? You see the suburb feeling out of Lara Jean's neighborhood, and even their outfits, something near to Lizze Mcguire's. Though the film looks so homey and nostalgic of the past, their actions are far from what's happening now. Teen dating is prominently shown when Peter posts photos of him and Lara Jean on his Instagram or when they decided to put each other's picture on their phone wallpaper.

And the film moves away from the typical white centric characters but we are faced with an Asian girl and to see something so rare is a major step up to film representation. At least Jenny Han was keen on keeping her heroine an Asian American.

The movie is like a blanket to my cold, old and cranky heart. It made it feel the warmth, the sweetness and the humor it needed. And for that, a replay with a cup of chocolate instead of a cold beer seems about right.

YOU NEVER REALLY KNOW

Monday, March 05, 2018

Most of the people who know me, probably know the story. From the very start, I share my life experiences so easily like it was a mundane thing. But now that I'm putting it out not just for my friends to read but for the whole world to see.

This move of my mine was inspired by a video of Jennie Willoughby, who was verbally and physically abused by her ex-husband, a former White House aide. In the video she shared how the media wanted to know what happened, when it happened and how it happened but never how she was able to move on from the abuse.

I may not give enough justice to the details I'm about to share to you but I want to make this move and reach out to those people who have experienced the same thing to tell you that moving forward exists in a world who only wants to know the gruesome details of how you were hurt and not ask you how you moved on from it because it's much worse than the abuse itself. Why? Because you didn't deserve it, I didn't deserve and no one deserves to suffer that way.

In 2008, I met someone who I thought loved me and accepted me for who I am. And as a typical teenager who was having this stage of rebellion and creating distant relationship with her family, I became more open to my relationships outside such as my friends and yes eventually, having an intimate relationship with someone who was a little older than me. It angered my family but I never listened to them.

But as time passed by, that person manipulated me, took advantage of my young mind and continued to poison my mind to make myself more distant not only to the ones I loved but also to knowing myself. That individual restricted me from doing things and as teenager who was easily swayed, or stupid like some others say, I just followed him.

Came in early 2010, when the abuse started from gripping too tightly in my arms that resulted in bruises, pushing me off the motorcycle while it was moving and even elbowing me in the stomach (By this time, I was already carrying Mae). It was so hard, but I was prideful to tell someone even my friends. I acted like nothing was wrong and continued to hold onto that relationship because I was afraid of accepting my mistakes. Then came Mae, it all went away for awhile because you know how babies keep us on our feet, make our hearts warmer and forget all those bad things in life? She did it. My family did it. They were the ones who picked me up from it.

By 2011, as I was starting to go to College. The abuse started again. That individual was so scared that I'll be able to walk out from the relationship but hope's of my daughter having a complete family stopped me. June 2011, a week before that incident, my mom asked me "anak, ginugulo ka ba niya? sabihin mo lang, I'll do anything." (Is he bothering you? Tell me, I'll do anything." And I hoped that then there, I told her everything.

I can still remember how I was so glad that prelims was done but when I opened my phone, I started getting messages saying "Bitch, mamatay ka na" (Bitch, you should just die). I got 200 copies of that message that morning. And I replied with one, "Okay, ayoko na sayo. Wag ka na pupunta dito." I thought I was safe in my own home, having my parents just working two houses away, I thought he'll be scared to even set foot in this house because my papa hated him, everyone did. But they just respected me and my idiotic ways.

And then it happened, 15 minutes just after that text message, I thought I was going to die. I was stabbed and the only thing that I wished that moment was for me not to go blind.

Thankfully, my eyes are well now. But after all the hospitalization and the inevitable process of healing not just my physical scars but also my emotional baggage, I was a mess.

And a person with extremely bad luck, I met another individual who also physically and verbally abused me again that lasted for a very long time, and those moments that many people witnessed who comforted me, one person stood out and that Kuya said, "I don't know what happened and I'm not gonna ask you any details anymore but I know you know you're already in a bad place. And I'll be praying that you'll do the right thing." He didn't want the gruesome details, one look was enough for him to tell me that I don't deserve it and labeled me as someone stupid for staying in a situation that I can control.

Control? When you have so much to carry, do you think you have control? When you're struggling to grasp that self-love, dwindling self-esteem and trying to keep up a brave face, do you really think you have control?

Because I knew I didn't have the control to leave that situation. Because when you're battling a situation only you can win, it's an unexplainable feeling and you just have to pray that one day you'll snap and move on from it.

That's the process. It's hoping and praying for the better even when you don't know how you'll move on from it. It's when you try to hold onto something to keep you sane but the people around you asks you what happened but never asks you how are you coping now? Because the process of moving on is realizing that no matter how much the people around you supports you, the only thing that can heal you is yourself.

Some would say, "oh you tell it so casually, your story." Why? Because I want to prove everyone else that these type of abuse, it happens casually. It happens in the moments when you don't realize it until its too late. It happens in times that we choose to ignore it and just try to live with it.

But the story I've written are pointless. Because those abusive moments are over. But the process and moving on from that is timeless, unending even and that's what we should focus on. I'm not sharing this to tell you that I've been abused but to tell you that it is possible to stand up from it even if it takes you a long time, it will come.

The next time you meet someone that was in a really really bad relationship, please don't ask them why didn't they leave early or why didn't they do something about it? Because don't you think they didn't want that? To leave that abusive relationship, to stop it and move on from it like nothing happened? I pretty sure did, but I was there, it still happened and it was traumatizing.

Let's not just focus on what happened to them but how they moved forward from it because that's what's going to help other to move on as well.