i really only meant to step out for a moment. i didn't expect to come back almost a full year later.

many things have changed, but i'll be brief.

i'm older, of course. i moved out of my beautiful childhood home and into an apartment in makati. i cried buckets before i left, but when i actually got here, this little room with the tinier kitchen, my own view of the street, the korean grocer around the corner, and my crate of books beside the bed, it wasn't as bad as i thought it would be. i know how to cook a little now, and have continued baking, yes in the tiny kitchen which i think i'm beginning to love quite fiercely.

i got out of a relationship that was poorly put together. enough said.

i'm slowly dipping my toe back into singing. well, actually, i've been doing more than dipping. and i'm trying to do it now for the right reasons, and hopefully it'll come together nicely. but, yes, i am a mike whore, and i do so admit it with much gusto.

my sister and i won the first Philippine graphic/fiction awards for the comics category. Neil Gaiman said our names aloud and said we were sisters and announced that our little asthmatic fairytale "The Mad, Sad, Incredible, but True Adventures of Hika Girl" was the first prize winner. which is just fantastic, because it just brings everything together so nicely. he came and blew us all away, and we blew him away, and he left us this wonderful opportunity to see what strange stuffs we're made of, and if we'd only made it to the awards, and if i'd been allowed to speak, i'd thank neil, but i'd also thank kitch who lived out that gaiman weekend with me, luis for lending me my very first sandman, to my mother who didn't allow me to give up on hika girl, to all those people in that wall of sound that screamed at neil, , all of us not quite believing he was there in front of us, you could hear it in our voices as we yelled at mr. gaiman, knowing this might never happen again. we were starving and you came.

i don't want to forget that weekend, so i'm glad i wrote all my weepy worship words down in this blog, glad it floated around her in space for a year, glad i could come back to it, and maybe, now, stay a little longer than two days.