... until you clean your room.
True story.
Ten billion years ago, when the earth cooled and my parents bought their new home, I thought it was time to move out. My parents - and a parade of relatives - threatened, pleaded and bribed. Because they had bought two identical houses and knocked down some walls to turn it into one big house, my parents offered me the second master's bedroom. And because I wasn't really prepared to run my own household (- one of the threats was that I couldn't drop off my laundry at my folks' and had to do it myself), I accepted.
For years, I lived happily in one of the two biggest rooms in the house, until my parents realized that I was never really home and merely used their house as a changing room between travels. I was summarily kicked out of the master's bedroom into the smallest room in the house, our equivalent of Harry Potter's "cupboard under the stairs".
Which was fine, had I not been lugging home various stuff from my travels all over the world. Souvenirs and knickknacks were lodged under the bed, at the foot of the bed, under the dressers, crammed into and onto shelves and cabinets, and piled high in corners.
My mother often peeked into my room with a disapproving frown. It had long been cordoned off as a hazard area. Maids were instructed (by me) not to enter, although they usually made an attempt at cleaning whenever they'd hear of my impending return.
Last year, my parents finally issued a decree: I must clear the premises post haste. They were kicking me out - temporarily. They were having the house renovated.
As I write this, the ceiling is being torn up, walls are being repainted, bathrooms are being retiled. The house is covered in a thick layer of dust and, consequently, so are we.
The timing couldn't have been more perfect actually. I was going away to India for a month-and-a-half anyway. But there was still that unpleasant business of clearing out my room that had to be taken care of.
So, since the beginning of the year, I've done almost nothing but pack my life into boxes. I'd start packing late in the afternoon, after the workers had gone for the day, and keep going until one, two, three in the morning. Then thoughts of everything that still had to be done, especially this last week, would wake me up at around 6:30 and I'd go at it again until the workers arrived or I had to be somewhere. So, yes, I am pretty much knackered. Especially since I still have that throat thing going.
It's unbelievable how much stuff I have. How many hats, hoodies, shawls and bags can one possibly have? (The correct answer to that, if you are a girl, is "Not enough.")
I finally decided to ship most of my stuff to Siargao. While the house Nicolas and I are building there isn't ready yet, at the very least, we have storage space.
I dragged out the Thai cushions from Koh Samui underneath my bed. To my disappointment, most of the artwork that I acquired in Lagos had crumbled to dust inside an old suitcase. But I did find the bronze sculptures that cost me close to £200 in excess luggage charges to bring back to the Philippines.
Thai cushions. (Internet file photo)
The tapestries sewn together from old saris that I haggled for for hours from a merchant in Jaiselmer and the bed runners that I bought from a hotel in Tashkent are intact. As is the wall art that my mom gave me from Ulan Bator. Although my prized wooden backgammon set from Athens looks shabbier and a lot less impressive than I remember it to be.
I already brought the bowls I bought from Hanoi and Shanghai to Siargao, but the underbelly of my bed did spew out cups and pitchers from artist, Ugu Bigyan in Quezon, and unknown potters in Sagada and small towns in France. I wrapped them in silk and cotton material from Luang Prabang and Siem Reap, and saris, sarongs and shawls from all over India.
Into boxes went wood carvings made by inmates in Palau, masks from Bali and Venice, and miniature paintings from Udaipur. I unfurled beautiful banigs (woven mats) and rugs from Zamboanga, Bohol, Baler and Mindoro that I oohed and aahed at all over again. I rolled them together with etchings from the bas reliefs of the ancient city of Angkor.
Banigs. (Internet file photo)
I decided to let the professionals handle the dragon-shaped sungka I got from Davao, the 3.5-foot wooden bulol (rice god) from Banaue, and my grandmother's antique bed.
This is a typical sungka set. Mine is more elaborate. (Internet file photo)
My bulol is similar to this. (Internet file photo)
I threw away outdated books, pirated DVDs, old cassette tapes, and unread magazines. I even tossed an old film camera that still works. With everything I threw away, I felt lighter. Things that I had clung on to for years, I tossed into a bin without a care.
And, still, there was too much. I hauled boxes and boxes from my room, yet it wasn't until this week that it seemed like I was finally clearing some space.
The hardest to deal with was the paperwork. Old cards and letters, maps and notes from past travels, faded photographs and their negatives... I have a box full of airline tickets and boarding passes accumulated from the first ten years of wanderlust. (I since discontinued collecting these but kept the box of old mementos underneath my bed.) All these, including stuff I don't know what to do with like strange traditional hats from Kyrgyzstan and a miniature voodoo doll that was a gift, I chucked into several boxes marked "For sorting". I'll deal with it when I get back.
Kyrgyz men wearing traditional Kalpak hats. (Internet file photo)
As I packed everything into boxes, every piece, every scrap of paper brought back stories of where I had been and what I had done. Even old cassette tapes brought back memories of old friends and happy times. Even if the details were sometimes fuzzy, everything evoked a feeling associated with a distant memory.
So many wonderful things that had been hidden away for so long. It was actually a fear of mine that I would pass away without any of these things ever seeing the light of day. I wondered, when they were eventually found, if they would end up in the trash or some curio shop? Would they be split up and go to different people, or would maybe my mom or Nicolas want to keep them?
Yesterday, as I was leaving my parents' home in the early hours of the morning to board a plane for Bangkok, for a moment, I could feel the winds of change blow through the strangely empty room and prickle the hairs on my arms. All the closets, drawers and shelves were bare, and the bed was stripped. Everything that I owned was in boxes downstairs. As I stretched the final strip of packing tape over a cardboard box, sealing in the last pieces of my so-called life "for sorting", I wondered, if I lost it all, would I care? I know that nobody else would. Did I really need all this to prove that I existed?
Last night, I roamed Bangkok's busy street market. I looked at all the pretty things that, once upon a time, I would have haggled for and brought home as trophies. But I remembered all the boxes of similar pretty things that were hidden away for a very long time, and still remained in boxes, and I walked away.
I did buy myself some very lovely beach dresses.
What???
"Out with the old and in with the new", right? And what do you think I underpacked for? (14 kilos at the Manila check in, and 15-point-something upon departure from Bangkok.)
I touch down in Mumbai in half an hour. While the past holds many treasures, so does the present and the imminent future. The wonderful thing about life is that it keeps going on.
6:24 PM
Jet Airways
Bangkok to Mumbai
Flight 9w-0069
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