Land of sorbetes 🍦 and kalesas 🐴
Hi friends,
Do you have memories from your first trip to the Philippines?
The few memories I have of that time period are sparse. I remember roosters and the man yelling "balut" in the early hours of the morning. I remember running to the corner sari-sari store with my cousins and getting soda in a bag with a straw. I remember going to the shopping malls with my tita. I remember being very excited for the small tower of green tea and ube flavored sorbetes sold by the vendors with colorful street carts. I remember riding in these horse drawn carriages called kalesas .
It's interesting what memories stay and leave an imprint. I also remember my parents encouraging me to leave all my toys behind for my cousins. Though unspoken, I understood even at that young age that they weren't as well off as we were. They had very few toys, which seemed strange to my 6-year-old self, considering the abundance of toys scattered throughout our house in New Jersey. So, I parted ways with my play-doh shape-making machine without much protest.
We didn’t go back to the Philippines as a family after that trip. When I asked my parents why, they said it wasn't really something they could do after my ailing grandmother moved in and lived with us for many years. And then not long after my grandmother passed, my parents adopted my younger brothers from the Ukraine. Our family vacations were modest, domestic, and usually within driving distance. My dad, a postal clerk, and my mom, a nurse — international travel just wasn't in the budget and hard to do with the additional family members they cared for.
Do you remember your first trip to the Philippines? What memories stand out to you?
I also acknowledge that not everyone had the privilege to travel as children, particularly across the world, depending on their family's immigration status or financial circumstances. Working immigrant parents often juggled multiple jobs and financial responsibilities, sometimes sending money back to support relatives in the Philippines.
If you didn't visit the Philippines as a child, do you remember stories shared by your parents or grandparents about their lives there? What impact did those stories have on you?
Sometimes, older generations may not readily share about their past or may not understand our curiosity about it. If that was the case, what was that like for you?
The process of decolonization involves piecing together our family's stories, reflecting on our relationship to our ancestral land, and making meaning on how it all impacts us. This is the work we do in Chrysalis Kali, so I hope you can join me for the free masterclass that I'll be hosting called:
✨ Become the Warrior your Ancestors Dreamed of✨
Learn how to connect with your ancestors and the power in your body through the practice of Kali, Filipino Martial Arts
Date: Tuesday, April 2nd
Time: 6:30pm EST / 3:30pm EST
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