Diego Lingad

Honors 345
6 February 2017
Midterm Paper
Altitude
30,000 ft.

The plane speeds up, wheels gently leaving the ground, leaving the only place Ive ever

called home. As we ascend, I chew on my bubblegum furiously, heeding my moms advice that it

would help me adjust to the pressure change. As the plane soars higher, it tilts to the side,

revealing the dense collage of buildings, subdivisions, and shantytowns that make up Manila.

The urban sprawl of the Metro shrinks, fading into a grey patch in a quilt of green farmland, as I

leave the Philippines for the first time.

I am six years old and little do I know that I would say both goodbye and hello to the

Philippines many more times in the future. Little do I know that the quilt of green, grey, and

brown would make up the tapestry of my experiences in the Philippines, with each little patch

holding some of my most vivid memories.

One such patch, a long strip of flat land in between a volcano and a mountain, is Angeles

City. A small farm town established 1796, it gradually grew. In 1899, it temporarily become the

seat of the First Philippine Republic. In 1908, Angeles housed an American airbase, which

remained despite years of protest, until a volcanic eruption forced the troops out in 1991. This

city has seen and held millions of stories, mine included.

295 ft.

After living in the US for seven years, my family and I move back to Angeles. I look

forward to restarting my life there. I am ready to start high school and be a part of the vibrant

school life Ive seen portrayed in Filipino teen shows.

 On the first day of school, I make my way to the building of the second-year students.

Each class stays together for the whole day, and each class is named after a Bible book. The top

three sections, made up of the top-ranked students, are in sections Samuel, Kings, and

Chronicles. One teacher leads me to my class, section Kings. I stay outside the room as the

teacher, who also serves as the head disciplinary coordinator, walks into the room. Class, youre

going to have a new classmate. Please welcome him. Standing at less than five-feet tall, Maam

Naluz, has been teaching at the school for years, instilling fear in students with her stern eyes and

razor-sharp bangs. All is silent as she talks, but the moment I walk in, the girls, which make up

the majority of the class, scream as if they had just seen their favorite matinee idol.

I step on the raised wooden platform at the front of the room, regulation black leather

shoes knocking with each step on the wood. Hello, my name is Diego Andreas Lingad. I go by

Diego or Andreas. I actually just go by Diego; I never actually respond when someone calls me

Andreas. My mom just suggested that I start using Andreas at this new school, the part of my

name that she chose.

The voice I use to present myself is a lot deeper than my conversational voice.

Apparently, my American accent makes some of the students kilig, which is a feeling of light

romantic giddiness. Some students put their hands up to their nose and say nosebleed, which

jokingly means that someones accent or way of speaking is so difficult that ones nose bleeds.

This reaction to my accent frustrates me as the year progresses. I want to yell out in

frustration, Sometimes I feel like no one listens what I say! They only listen to how I say it.

But of course I would never yell that out I would be too conscious of my accent to say

anything.
 Midway through the year, I find myself looking around. The amber light flows through

the lightly rusted window bars and into the classroom. The school day is coming to a close, but

the last periods teacher does not show up, as usual. Since the school security guards do not let

students off the campus until the day is officially done, the students have to stay. Some groups go

to the canteen for an afternoon snack. Some go to a corner of the room to listen to One

Directions latest single. Some form a circle to listen to the class muse play the guitar. Then

there is me.

My classmates are friendly and welcoming, but despite this, I still often find myself

watching everyone as if they arent real. The golden light, the wooden furniture, and the

uniform-clad students feel more like a nostalgic vignette described by a romantic writer, rather

than my reality. I am not a character in the story where I expected to fit in so well. Instead, I am

an observer, reading a book on Philippine high school life.

30,000 ft.

Ladies and gentlemen, we are now making our initial descent into Manila. I look out

the window, annoyed that the flight announcement keeps making the movie pause. My mom is

next to me, making friends with the person next to her as she usually does. As the plane

approaches the ground, the city lights become clearer. The headlights and brakelights of cars on

the congested highway look like strings of shining diamonds and rubies. The other dots of lights

take on dimension, with the shapes and heights of buildings becoming clearer. The Pasig River,

which runs through the width of the city, looks like a dark dragon slithering in between the flecks

of light. Near the dragons mouth is the walled district of Intramuros, the center of government

during Spanish colonization. Across river is another district, Binondo, the worlds oldest

Chinatown.
 52 ft.

The bus makes its way through the small, crowded road, somehow managing to reverse

into the bus terminal. I sat in the bus for over three hours, breathing in the sweet, artificial smell

of air conditioning as we inched our way through the notorious Manila traffic. My dad, sister,

and I went on this trip from Angeles to Manila to look for authentic dim sum in Binondo.

We get off the bus and my dad leads the way. Born and raised in Manila, my dad knows

the ins and outs of the city. From the dodgiest shantytowns to the poshest subdivisions, he

navigates the streets with ease. His tales of all his misadventures in the Metro filled my

childhood. He never seemed to run out of stories. His adeptness at storytelling, and the

fantastical vastness of the Metro itself, made all the stories possible.

We exit the bus terminal and step onto the street. The multicolored collage of buildings

and billboards are framed by the web of telephone lines. The sound of students talking, vendors

hawking their wares, and cars honking seem to fill the little bit of empty space left.

That way is the University Belt, that way is where you can get fake IDs, and that way is

where were heading, my dad explains.

Ah, okay, I respond.

After walking through a street market that seemed to go on forever, the street opens up to

a big roundabout with a grand colonial fountain situated in the middle. To the side of the

eighteenth-century Carriedo Fountain stands the sixteenth-century Binondo Church. Across these

remnants of Spanish colonial rule stands a Chinese gate. In this melting pot of cultures, my dad

leads us to the gold shops selling obscene amounts of Saudi gold. The garish displays of gold

chains, buddhas, and jewelry, though random at first glance, make perfect sense here.
 Looking around at the variety of sights and sounds make us hungry, and we remember the

reason why we came to Binondo in the first place dim sum. We wander around as the sun sets

and nighttime blankets the streets. Finally, we arrive in the dim sum place we came all the way to

Manila for. The restaurant is narrow. The walls are bright blue. The kitchen, takeout window, and

cashier are all in a steel island that runs along the right side of the restaurant. It looks nothing like

the Michelin-starred Din Tai Fung which tells me there is going to be some great food. We

order mami, a Filipino-Chinese noodle soup, siomai, har gao, and a few other dimsum standards.

Sitting here eating good food, I start to like Manila a little better. I find Manila messy,

dangerous, and overwhelming. I usually prefer it confined to my dads stories. Trips like this,

though, make me appreciate all the city has to offer. Its a place of contradictions. The citys

energy is both exhausting and invigorating. The citys heritage is an intersection of East and

West. The city is both dislikeable and lovable. It invites me to bask in its complexity, and accept

that contradictions dont always need to be solved.

30,000 ft

The plane speeds up, wheels gently leaving the ground, leaving one of the places I call

home. I look out the window as the plane soars higher, tilting to the side, revealing the

patchwork of colors that make up the Philippines. No matter how much change occurs on the

ground, from this high up, it always looks the same. Even so, I feel a tinge of sentimentality

knowing that Im leaving a place that holds so many of my stories. The plane breaks through the

clouds and the land is no longer in sight. I close the window shade, eagerly awaiting my return.