Being A Kid (Stop Being One).pdf

KRISTEN ANGEL B. PAYANG
A NONFICTION PORTFOLIO

I. Introduction to Soft Kid Brave 3-4
5-6
SSoofftt KKiidd BBrraavvee 7
8
II. Waiting Rooms 9-10
III. Introduction to Body of Water
11
BBooddyy ooff WWaatteerr 12
13
IV. Introduction to Someone I Know: My 14-15
Sister 16


SSoommeeoonnee II KKnnooww:: MMyy SSiisstteerr 17

V. Introduction to 1 Thing That I'm Not 18-19
20-21
11 TThhiinngg TThhaatt II''mm NNoott 22

VI. Before I Graduate
VII. Introduction to Kulang na Silya:
More Student Adventures to Come

KKuullaanngg nnaa SSiillyyaa:: MMoorree SSttuuddeenntt
AAddvveennttuurreess ttoo CCoommee

VIII. This Calls for Banana Bread
IX. About the Author

3


In late celebration of Mother's Day, the first
Ip'iveecewgroitetsenouatbtooumt yhemr
ostihnecrewGhroadheas4n, osoifdtelya
and mindlessly.

4

5


SSoofftt KKiidd BBrraavvee

When I first heard of bravery, my mother and I stood watery still on the grass
green floors underneath the kitchen light, shrinking like dwarves as furious
whispers emerged from her face, and I watched as the child of my brain
digested her healthy fervor; the meaning of a new word, brave. She landed in
my ears, rogue-like, edgy, and brusque, nowhere close to the teachers whose
love tolerated our afternoon classes. “No one is above you, no one can step on you.” I
barely understood what it meant to be strong, let alone dust off the embers of
her fire, but life transpired just as she’d hoped for: brave conspired the ruse of
my shadows, brave glared at the subtle laughs left stifled, brave told me to cure
the slightest symptoms of insecurity, brave injected the silence in a classroom
for I’d be the murderer to harm it, slicing the wound in every soul that wasn’t…
brave.

In the cafeteria, a boy would kiss the stench in the room standing facelessly,
stuffing himself warmly with mush while I, unperturbed, sat in wait as my
mother’s child. He began to run on one foot as one does when in Grade 3, and
in the flash of a camera, food started to spill at the side of his arm and onto the
chest of my twin sister. The few minutes after remained unknown and
sandwiched foggily in my memory. Before I could comprehend everything,
my flimsy hands plant angry craters on his petty, blue jacket. I murmur a
breath of anger along the words of “How dare you?” and “...my sister,” while the
only logic in my mind was that of my mother’s, that passion of hers
underneath the kitchen light.

6


SSoofftt KKiidd BBrraavvee

Bravery must be inherent, however, as I held onto the intimacy of fiction
displayed through cartoons. Courage the Cowardly Dog, in particular,
showered me with grittiness and cowardice when faced with trouble. I
watched Courage as it shook with fear of the unknown, how it permeated all
its four senses and mutated like a virus in his body. Its pink arse would freeze in
icy, blue waters yet the terror forced a smile on Courage’s teeth. I told myself if
I were to ever smile with teeth, I’d only do so out of happiness and away from
those pathetic, blue waters. Bravery, however, ages carelessly and waveringly.

When we acquire bravery, it is an asset gained for abstract living; an asset
generating me to be self-conscious because I’ve wished to be wild and soft, in
the past, like an earthly scent from the ground; because it has made me lack
affection and blurred the lines of me wanting to receive it. A few summers
have blunted the blades of bravery, now this bravery manifests as a thirst for
growth. It is a product of insecurity yet introspection. It is a yearning for
comfort yet the strength of my emotional needs. It is a balance of structure and
passion, of war and peace just as the solemn one we’ve made – my mother and
I on the grass green floors underneath the kitchen light, a few years back
when I listened intently in my school uniform.

7


WWaaiittiinngg RRoooommss

Towards waiting rooms, I walk towards waiting rooms – their almosts, and could-
have-beens.

It is worst to walk in places where I’m nothing but humbled through hotness and
tears as it prolongs the day’s walk. Although I identify with thrill, I land in shunned
areas where other thrill-seekers cease to exist and fail to breathe. Humbling places are
metal rust in the form of common, old shelters like a hospital waiting room or the
queue for a pending restaurant reservation; if within mundanity, then perhaps the
space alongside that queue itself. In a hospital waiting room, the stench of whiteness
will breathe, by default, the boastful stench of existence. When I walk in, I’d enter
with a pure soul inside and pause my breathing, my limbs, my hollowness — it swells
— and then there is no one. My mother argues that there’s a head on the wall and a
body in the corner yet to me there is no one. When I talk of waiting rooms, I talk of
existence, where earth owns places of limbo and offers you some phases of life, or lack
thereof.
The cramp in our legs equates to an eruption of humility as no other act is more
painstakingly human than to walk and walk to a hospital for medication, to a
restaurant for hunger or temptation, to thicken a boring queue and acknowledge
other humble persons. For this very reason, it fazes not a single, defeatist bone within
my body to believe in blabbering mouths that chew food from marvelous places. As
long as waiting rooms smell of existence, the acquisition of most beautiful things will
prompt little reality to my senses. Prior to a walk, I can brush teeth and gurgle water,
but still be ruined by the urge to explode for I’ve done nothing but walk towards
humility.

8





Me in Grade 9 shooting for a poster for Greek Dionysia

To those of us who own
a physical appearance
and wonder why:

9


BBooddyy ooff WWaatteerr

I wore the body of a kid, giving shape to the white silk hugging my small
torso and moist imitation pearls pooled the sweat above my collarbones. I wore
sticky rouge lipstick and tight plastic products clutched my hair strands; if
squeak was a feeling, I was feeling ultimate squeak. I raised my head amidst the
grip of everything on me only to lock eyes briefly with a few adults, mothers
in particular. At the corner of the classroom, they turned their heads to my
direction and peered down on my body.

When the eyes of adults are on a kid, they usually glisten with the charm of a
superhero, the twinkle of a savior. They take a peek at our spirit to maximize
innocence and talk straight to our face, not behind it, not beside it, but in front
to shower the young in movements of adult mouths, their blossoms of
laughter, and the story-telling of adult hands. To my naivety, the opposite
transpired right there under the glow of the classroom’s fluorescent lights. It
was a look of mischief, a newfound train of thought I learned, filled with
disclosure and speculation on my body as a kid.

Our bodies, however, might find romance in emptiness similar to how a
river captures the love of civilization once it is dried out and lifeless to all. For
this reason, I feel the need to hollow out my insides. I feel that a river was only
made to turn empty from neglect, to lose water and life, and replace itself with
paint, cement, and metal. Such materials are solid, tangible, and clear… like a
body must be; it must fit in the hand of an onlooker and stay in the middle of
the pupil quenching thirst and hunger.

10


BBooddyy ooff WWaatteerr

It must be digestible and palpable but from the stealthy heat of those
snickering mothers, I felt that I flowed too much, that from the shape of my
body, I swelled from the soul a drowning amount of my essence, I expanded
from within, and that I must calm it down.

I still think up to this day – a body must therefore be diluted to make sense
because any part of me can grow larger except the essence which we embody
like a body of water. I think to myself, “May I be perceived based on my
essence, to be fathomed as a mist of air, each particle an element of the psyche
that whoever passes through can do so repeatedly, and take with them a
souvenir – the vapor and steam of my soul, dampened in orange, blue, and
yellow?” Must I own a physical appearance?

11

12


SSoommeeoonnee II KKnnooww:: MMyy SSiisstteerr

Christianne Angel B. Payang was born a fidgety bubble of wonder. My sister
grew up loving a handful of different things than me but always expressed
them the way I did. At times I thought my imagination ran wilder as I filled up
Al-Thogan diaries with lead and black ink, contorted mother’s abaya (I started a
fashion show from my bed), and sang like my favorite Disney stars, but my
sister manipulated imagination as well. I bet we were mysteries to each other,
growing up in childhood, but she took interest in the adventures of her hands.
Chen, as we call her, had a phase for collecting Bakugans. Chen played more
PSP games than I did; I loved my Gameboy. She devoted time to the snap of
her wrists when Loom Bands became a thing; I was one of those kids who
watched her. Chen loved drawing realistically; I only drew when my mind
couldn’t think or when I didn’t want it to. In a sensible way, Chen had talents
of reality; I had talents of dreams. Chen took interest in videography; I
commented on cinema. I killed the insects while she yelled and gripped my
shoulders from behind me. I familiarized places we were both unfamiliar with
although we both hated walking in new public rooms. Chen made people
know she was a fidgety bubble of wonder and converted the mess into reality.

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11 TThhiinngg TThhaatt II’’mm NNoott

1. 1 Thing That I’m Not
Is a peaceful person. I personify the storms I used to marvel at from the car

window when I was a kid. I implode paler than the loss of love in the hearts of
strangers weeping on the highway. I’m a thunderstorm dying while sad
weather seeks refuge in my cocoon, and soil is to the earth as storms are to me
- volatile in nature with a yearning for disorder. We breathe chaos like second
air, planting songs in my throat and skull. And when I cry, there’s a stiffness so
kind; I am humbled by the sadness. I’m dizzy after a long day of loving
someone.

2. I’ve never let anyone into my storms, yet I’ve danced in them, designed
them in ways that make them less of a storm.

But you know, the worst places for storms to dress up are the parties held at
my father’s workplace, fifty minutes away from American money. Veteran
souls drain their young lovers’ pollen in fruitless climax. The collapse of life’s
meaning in a cold room sullen with the priest’s homily and time would be
spent with people older than me. Stories of a veteran’s divorce from his
Japanese wife, how he learned to peel off his shoes before stepping anywhere
indoors - the smallest debris of her floating within him forever.

3. And yet, as a storm, there are people whom we treat as places such that we
look for them – they become our dwelling place – and perhaps in a heartbeat,
we walk them through the eye of our storms. So what about other people, you

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11 TThhiinngg TThhaatt II’’mm NNoott

might ask. What about someone else? Well, here’s a few things that you are.
You’re the water I absorb when everything fails to permeate the skeleton of

my longing, beneath the layers of my body, beneath the body of the ceiling. I
absorb you, after all, the premise of love is absorbing. I can’t tell if you faded
away or blew through the wind, but either way I still see you. You're a
phantom. I see your eyes - the speed at which they look away after a bolt of
laughter erupts from your stomach then you stand there with a soft grin to
delay the darkness, to drink the dew of my fears.

How full of mischief your pupils are like no one should ever take them
seriously, but at the same time, the deafening pulses of your heart echo echo
echo through them achingly, I fall victim to the violent waves of silence, and
mind you, I once belonged here before you spread through it. Now, the only
remnant of you left is the air in which you occupied – if I bathe in it enough I
feel your hand melting into mine. So the air talks to me, my dear, until the
very next time I see you again.

We all have little monologues in our heads, some of mine I talked about today.
‘Twas a decadent platter of life through military bases, thunderstorms, and
people whom we treat as places. ‘Twas a mosaic of a few things about me,
about someone, and 1 thing that I’m not.

16


BBeeffoorree II GGrraadduuaattee

How boring my life must be, I thought. Last week, I realized how generously my
mind can obsess over something. The consuming thoughts in my head piled
up like homework. I thought about parts of my life I could suck inspiration
from such as people whose paths have crossed mine but me failing to walk
beside them – it was a lot to unpack. Moreover, this brainstorming led me to
write a thing or two for the Open Mic piece. I believe I’m in an era of
attempting romanticization like applying a band-aid on all the things I’ve
taken for granted so that before I enter college, I’ve stabilized most of my
identity. Junior High was a time of restriction for me. Yes, it’s high school, but
I was one of those kids who took themselves way too seriously and never fell
into any sort of peer pressure except for the seductive world of Kpop. I thought
about how tight my circle of friends has always been, the many self-destructive
transformations I’ve gone through, the suppressed feelings of a teenager I
refused to give into, and how this year, I’ve decided to let loose.

17





Team Bluetot during the bonfire in SHS Camp 2022

18


KKuullaanngg nnaa SSiillyyaa::
MMoorree SSttuuddeenntt AAddvveennttuurreess ttoo CCoommee

An average student like me spends only half of their time in the classroom
devoted to these devices: pen and paper. As much as the two are associated
with academics, learning involves the unpredictable, something similar to an
adventure. It entails more than the act of doing the word itself – this I realized
in retrospect upon skimming at the bold, capital letters printed on the borders
of Kulang na Silya. I see myself in the little notes of Ricky Lee as he writes
down the thoughts of a typical student like me. While the chair in his
apartment signified the little image of success he could afford, it conveyed to
me the unwavering sense of lack I feel in my life, that there’s always
something missing until time arrives for this feeling to dissipate. I have to say
that I’ve only ever danced in the palm of patience; I’m familiar with the
miracles it can bring.

Yet as a thrill-seeker whose little victories fuel my vehicle for transformation,
the experiences I long to have contradict my family’s culture at home in which
a haven for security rides above all desires. It became increasingly difficult
growing up to fathom how a student, by essence, is a member of society - and
that under the means of learning, I must devote myself to the earliest groups of
togetherness. For example, in instances where school clubs condense the
individual talents of 30+ students, I’ve done nothing much - either standing in
the corner of the room or camouflaged into the arms of my tallest classmates.
In comparison to the decay of the system in such briefness of time, my
misfortunes shrink rather small; they only come from within, but more
significantly, within the restrictions of my upbringing. Moreover, it seems

19


KKuullaanngg nnaa SSiillyyaa::
MMoorree SSttuuddeenntt AAddvveennttuurreess ttoo CCoommee

unsettlingly shameful that the morals emanating from our home corridors
easily corrode as I fail to nurture them within me yet the selfish security that
silences me persists in the worst way possible. Perhaps who I am changes much
slower than the beliefs I grew up learning. I’ve yet to catch up with myself.

Overall, Kulang na Silya enlivens me to start seeing the world as it is from
the eyes of a scholar unafraid to get their hands dirty, to ask what I can do in
this lifetime. Perhaps the road to youthful survival doesn’t have to be lonely
nor selfish. The path of a student is a series of saying “yes” instead of “no.”
They say youth is all about experience and it is. Oh, how it truthfully,
undeniably is – and I must start acting like I understand the graveness of this
truth.

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TThhiiss CCaallllss ffoorr BBaannaannaa BBrreeaadd

Despair-ate times call for banana bread - this I realized only recently at home.
Our family never bakes banana bread or any other baked goods for that matter
so when one of us sees banana bread sitting atop the dining table, they best
presume it was I who made it. Banana bread sold in bakeries and supermarkets
are either too sugary with a mysterious glazing of syrup on top or strangely
dry; some are fluffy or crumbly indeed but with no proof of using the spottiest,
most neglected pile of bananas at the bottom of their fruit supplies. Everyone
knows those are the best ones.

At home, when I approach my dainty loaf of banana bread, I get a whiff of
cinnamon, nutmeg, and ground cloves knocking me on the face while a wind
of mixed spices surrounded the dining table. It was there before I saw it, sweet
before I could even taste it. The golden-brown peak plumped up the edges of
the baking dish, thrilling to poke like pillow to the fingertips, tearing like
cotton, and if you flip onto your fingernail, you could hear its perfect crust
gliding beneath. It sat like a block of dark, vignette filter contrasting the warm
hazel brown color in its core. I would do a few more pats on the middle of its
golden-brown crown as if alerting myself a heads-up before my sharp, steel
knife would cut into it, knowing how soft and delicate it would be on the
inside, “Get ready, it’s gonna be good.”

In a few minutes, either my sister or mother would walk in and they’d ask me
when I made it, but I’d rather they inquire the reason why I made it

21


TThhiiss CCaallllss ffoorr BBaannaannaa BBrreeaadd

instead. See, baking banana bread is a kind of stop-over. I make banana bread
when I realize a part of our kitchen has been neglected. When a vital item on
our past week’s grocery list has been lonely, it would always be the brightest
bunch of bananas nestled in a basket with the same vibrant yellow color. Our
banana bread at home didn’t mean anything special; it meant the same to any
other humble abodes. Banana bread is a staple for homes of the ordinary, bored
families in waste-excessive neighborhood dynamics. It only differed when it
came down to the family member who baked it, the recipe, and personal
preferences.

It meant to me that there was nothing better left to do, that I’d rather not sit in
my feelings when I could easily bake them into the bread batter. So when the
bread was crumbly, I might’ve added too little milk; when it’s a little rough on
the sides, I perhaps lousily measured the baking soda or baking powder. If I
added dried cranberries or prunes, surely I was feeling experimental, I must’ve
been ecstatic over something and same goes for walnuts, almonds, and pecans.
So when times call for banana bread, I call it despair-ate for baking is a desperate
release of waste excessiveness but also a remedy for our hungry stomachs.

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AAbboouutt tthhe
e AAuutthhoorr

Kristen Angel B. Payang is a young
student-writer born in Quezon City,
Manila, Philippines and raised in



Riyadh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
She writes more towards a dreamy
retelling of reality superimposed on
subtle details while mixing along the
bluntness of human thoughts.