Joan Malaca

Assumption Antipolo, West Visayas State University

Nursing Student

reading books, listening to music, watching movies, writing poems, playing volleyball/badminton/basketball/softball/soccer/table tennis, making scrapbooks

The Da Vinci Code, Angels & Demons, The Notebook, Message in a Bottle, Sloppy Firsts, Samurai Girl

Raising Helen, The Emperor's Club, Pay It Forward, Cinderella Story, The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, Memoirs of a Geisha, She's the Man, Raise your Voice, The Lakehouse

Taurus

I am a young lady living in two different worlds, leading two separate lives.

For 15 years or so, I have lived in Rizal. There, I experienced a series of "firsts" in my life - First set of friends, first bestfriend, 1st barkada, 1st tambayan, 1st gimik, 1st studio pic, and 1st promise to remain friends for life. First day of school, 1st line-of-seven mark, 1st perfect score, 1st medal, 1st field trip, 1st prom, and 1st sighs of relief as I proceed from one level to the next. First crush, 1st kilig moment, 1st late-night phone call, 1st love letter, 1st heartbreak, and 1st firm resolution to forget the guy who just seems too ignorant of my existence.
In this fast-paced world where I have resided for more than a decade, I am either Christine or Tintin, & nothing more.

For about a year now, I have stayed in Iloilo - an ocean away from the people who have been so much a part of my 18-year-old self - far away from the busy streets of Manila, where heavy traffic is but a normal occurrence, and where LRT's, tall buildings, and flyovers aren't just figments of my imagination.
I cried on the day I left for this city. I had so much to leave behind, and I was uncertain of what lay here for me. I always thought I'd never be as happy here as I was back there. But now, I'm learning how wrong I was to have thought that way. I am proud to say that I have earned quite a number of friends here already. And surprising as it seems to me, here in Iloilo, I was faced with yet another "first" in my life.
In this faraway world which I have grown to love, I am known as Joan.

Again, I am a young lady torn between two different & separated worlds. I am two different persons. And I cannot escape both. I cannot completely live in the present & not look back at the past, nor can I dwell on the past whereas the present is clearly before me. If I cannot be in both worlds at the same time, I have to at least feel both worlds, for me to be who I fully am - Joan Christine A. Malaca

jcmalaca@yahoo.com
jcmalaca@gmail.com