I’ve been thinking. I’ve been learning. Thinking and learning need to be implemented to be of any use, otherwise, the two are as futile as having two hands tied together. Action is wiggling out of that knot and clenching your hands into fists.

But I was brittle back then; born in a treacherous country on the other side of the world. I wanted to fight but didn’t know who to fight, or what to fight for. A strange rage grew in places reserved for love and affection. Breakdowns, arguments, and fits ransacked my rooms, leaving behind bruised knuckles and dents in the walls as souvenirs. I had no one to share this rage with, sitting alone in a big, empty cage with my hands tied together. Look outside and there’s a cage above the cage.

Everything felt restricted. Censored. Convoluted. Manipulated. I couldn’t wrap my head around this world I was living in. The rules didn’t make sense, the paths were filled with potholes, the clock moved lethargically, and the wind gave no respite. It didn’t feel like hell, it didn’t feel like heaven. It didn’t feel awful, it didn’t feel great. It felt… stuck. Stagnant. I’ve always had an affinity for movement; I could never sit still. Maybe it was the ADHD pressing buttons in my person or just the excitement of action that always kept it moving. Tales from my mother can corroborate how transient my being was back in the day. She loves telling one particular story to boast about my seemingly harmless, adorable behavior when I ran across an auditorium at one of the shows my father was hosting. Apparently, five-year-old me did not sit in his seat for more than a minute and had my mother running up and down the gangways of this humongous hall for over two hours. Ask her about this story and she’ll narrate it to you with the same gusto she narrated it the first time. Or about the ones where I did choreographed performances in front of strangers (strangers to me, friends and relatives for my parents).

The movement wasn’t always harmless and adorable, though. In the years to come, it paved the way for all that pent-up rage. I yearned to venture out and explore, but my expeditions were stopped in their tracks before reaching any checkpoint. Not allowed to walk out of bounds, reprimanded for returning late, struck for petting friendly beasts on the streets; excruciating experiences, excruciatingly annoying experiences. I had kids around me growing up that were clueless about their situation. Or rather, they were clueless about mine. They thought it was normal, I thought they were crazy. I wondered how they could comply with castrating their characters with no care. They blindly followed the rules and regulations their higher-ups gave them, no questions asked. I asked too many questions. Why? How? Where? When? My favorite one is Why? It always moves to a deeper layer of the question it precedes.

Why did the chicken cross the road? To get to the other side. Why did it want to get to the other side?

Adolescence managed the rage. Coming of age came with experiences that paved the way for more movement. I was moved into a bigger school; more kids, more subjects, more objects. I found like-minded kids with similar afflictions. They obviously came from different walks of life, so they had their own reasons for their miseries, but at least I could share mine now. We reveled in the nonchalance of primary and secondary education, where I evolved from an average student to an exceptional class clown (and a below-average student). My humor got me humans I hung out with, lived games with, and played life with. I always wanted siblings; friends became family. We watched films, sang songs, and told each other stupid stories with haphazard endings, but I loved every minute of it. Maybe a bit too much.

Failing in school obviously came as a stinging shock to the two who raised me; spending too much time with friends and not enough with books. Technically, the school didn’t fail me, it decided to push me to the next grade; the teachers and coordinators decided that that needed to be done to save grace. Schools boast of their passing rate and teaching prowess by displaying students as data variables with assigned numbers to the masses that wish to make their kids data variables too. In my country, top students get their faces painted on posters screaming their examination scores to attract other unassuming students in the hopes of getting their faces on these posters. It was a bizarre bazaar. Failed again a couple of years later, academics were definitely giving me the finger this time. Although I failed conventional competitions of memorization, I learned a lot about the world I was in and the people around me. I started noticing the cracks and crevices in the system, the lies, and the excuses in conversations. Mix that in with some substances and death and you get a brand new SadBoy™️

Sadness latched on soon after, seeing death up close made the world bleaker, made me weaker. A couple of years grazed past, rushing in a blur. I wish I remembered moments, but I only recall instances and occurrences. Those years were spent in another annoying academic institution where full-fledged courses were distilled down to week-long classes bereft of any freshness. I wasted away hours of education with minutes of medication. This led to failing another grade (third time’s the charm). I had had enough, I needed to disconnect and dissociate from this dire world.

A trip to the mountains took me places I’d never thought I’d witness. All the questions that I asked others, I asked myself.

Why am I here? Where do I need to be? How will I get there? When do I begin? I’m here to create and tell stories. I need to be away from “home”. I will get there by telling stories. Now. Then came What? Films. Videos with movement.

I jumped off and never looked back. Flew thousands of miles across deep oceans, above tall mountains, through murmuring clouds, and landed in the Promised Land. A strange whiff of hope in the air as I step onto the warm, loud ground.

I’m home.

I’ve been thinking. I’ve been learning. Thinking and learning need to be implemented to be of any use, otherwise, the two are as futile as having two hands tied together. Action is wiggling out of that knot and clenching your hands into fists.

But I was brittle back then; born in a treacherous country on the other side of the world. I wanted to fight but didn’t know who to fight, or what to fight for. A strange rage grew in places reserved for love and affection. Breakdowns, arguments, and fits ransacked my rooms, leaving behind bruised knuckles and dents in the walls as souvenirs. I had no one to share this rage with, sitting alone in a big, empty cage with my hands tied together. Look outside and there’s a cage above the cage.

Everything felt restricted. Censored. Convoluted. Manipulated. I couldn’t wrap my head around this world I was living in. The rules didn’t make sense, the paths were filled with potholes, the clock moved lethargically, and the wind gave no respite. It didn’t feel like hell, it didn’t feel like heaven. It didn’t feel awful, it didn’t feel great. It felt… stuck. Stagnant. I’ve always had an affinity for movement; I could never sit still. Maybe it was the ADHD pressing buttons in my person or just the excitement of action that always kept it moving. Tales from my mother can corroborate how transient my being was back in the day. She loves telling one particular story to boast about my seemingly harmless, adorable behavior when I ran across an auditorium at one of the shows my father was hosting. Apparently, five-year-old me did not sit in his seat for more than a minute and had my mother running up and down the gangways of this humongous hall for over two hours. Ask her about this story and she’ll narrate it to you with the same gusto she narrated it the first time. Or about the ones where I did choreographed performances in front of strangers (strangers to me, friends and relatives for my parents).

The movement wasn’t always harmless and adorable, though. In the years to come, it paved the way for all that pent-up rage. I yearned to venture out and explore, but my expeditions were stopped in their tracks before reaching any checkpoint. Not allowed to walk out of bounds, reprimanded for returning late, struck for petting friendly beasts on the streets; excruciating experiences, excruciatingly annoying experiences. I had kids around me growing up that were clueless about their situation. Or rather, they were clueless about mine. They thought it was normal, I thought they were crazy. I wondered how they could comply with castrating their characters with no care. They blindly followed the rules and regulations their higher-ups gave them, no questions asked. I asked too many questions. Why? How? Where? When? My favorite one is Why? It always moves to a deeper layer of the question it precedes.

Why did the chicken cross the road? To get to the other side. Why did it want to get to the other side?

Adolescence managed the rage. Coming of age came with experiences that paved the way for more movement. I was moved into a bigger school; more kids, more subjects, more objects. I found like-minded kids with similar afflictions. They obviously came from different walks of life, so they had their own reasons for their miseries, but at least I could share mine now. We reveled in the nonchalance of primary and secondary education, where I evolved from an average student to an exceptional class clown (and a below-average student). My humor got me humans I hung out with, lived games with, and played life with. I always wanted siblings; friends became family. We watched films, sang songs, and told each other stupid stories with haphazard endings, but I loved every minute of it. Maybe a bit too much.

Failing in school obviously came as a stinging shock to the two who raised me; spending too much time with friends and not enough with books. Technically, the school didn’t fail me, it decided to push me to the next grade; the teachers and coordinators decided that that needed to be done to save grace. Schools boast of their passing rate and teaching prowess by displaying students as data variables with assigned numbers to the masses that wish to make their kids data variables too. In my country, top students get their faces painted on posters screaming their examination scores to attract other unassuming students in the hopes of getting their faces on these posters. It was a bizarre bazaar. Failed again a couple of years later, academics were definitely giving me the finger this time. Although I failed conventional competitions of memorization, I learned a lot about the world I was in and the people around me. I started noticing the cracks and crevices in the system, the lies, and the excuses in conversations. Mix that in with some substances and death and you get a brand new SadBoy™️

Sadness latched on soon after, seeing death up close made the world bleaker, made me weaker. A couple of years grazed past, rushing in a blur. I wish I remembered moments, but I only recall instances and occurrences. Those years were spent in another annoying academic institution where full-fledged courses were distilled down to week-long classes bereft of any freshness. I wasted away hours of education with minutes of medication. This led to failing another grade (third time’s the charm). I had had enough, I needed to disconnect and dissociate from this dire world.

A trip to the mountains took me places I’d never thought I’d witness. All the questions that I asked others, I asked myself.

Why am I here? Where do I need to be? How will I get there? When do I begin? I’m here to create and tell stories. I need to be away from “home”. I will get there by telling stories. Now. Then came What? Films. Videos with movement.

I jumped off and never looked back. Flew thousands of miles across deep oceans, above tall mountains, through murmuring clouds, and landed in the Promised Land. A strange whiff of hope in the air as I step onto the warm, loud ground.

I’m home.