My Autobiography

Carlota Valino and Jose Ramos first met at a high school pageant that Carlota was participating in, which was held at the campus of Naguilian National High School. Jose was completely mesmerized by Carlota’s natural beauty from the moment he saw her on stage. Once the pageant finally came to an end, Jose gathered the courage to approach her and say, “Congratulations on winning the queen of NNHS.” From that brief encounter, the days continued to pass by until they eventually fell deeply in love with each other. One night, however, they made a massive life mistake by not practicing safe sex. Afterward, Carlota and Jose tried to ask permission from both of their parents to stay together and build a life with each other, but fate was simply not on their side, and they were ultimately forced to separate.

Fast forward to March 1, 2006, I was born in the municipality of Bayombong, Nueva Vizcaya. I came into this world inside a small kubo located right beside the restaurant where both my mother and my grandmother were working at the time. I grew up hearing the dramatic story from my mother about how I was born. She was in labor and I didn’t come out for almost two long hours while she was giving birth to me. The very moment my aunt finally returned home and came into the room, I finally emerged. My aunt jokingly told everyone that I stubbornly refused to come out until she was present. Hearing this story later on made me laugh, but at the same time, it made me feel worried because my mother and I might not have survived if my aunt hadn’t made it back home in time. We stayed in that place until I was two years old. I still vividly remember being told that my grandparents spent a massive amount of money and spared no expense for my binyag at the St. Louis Beltran Church in Solano, Nueva Vizcaya.

After that chapter of our lives, we packed up and moved over to Naguilian, Isabela. Our very first house was located in Barangay Magsaysay, but we encountered a lot of structural and land issues there. Our neighbor, who happened to be our relative, suddenly evicted us from the property because they claimed they needed to use the land for themselves. Because of that conflict, we relocated to Barangay Roxas, which eventually became our permanent family residence. Since we were entirely new to the area, my grandfather initially constructed a temporary kubo for us to sleep in while he single-handedly worked on building our actual house. One day, while my cousins and I were playing in the backyard with some crayons and a sharp knife, I accidentally chopped my own fingernail. I still remember that they quickly used coffee grounds as emergency medicine on my bleeding nail so that my hand wouldn’t get infected or require amputation. Surprisingly, the remedy worked and it healed completely. Another time, I was bathing outside and soaking happily in the water when I suddenly suffered a severe convulsion. My mother had to rush back home immediately in the middle of her job hunt. They brought me inside the house, bought a bag of ice, and placed it directly under my armpits to help shock my body and make me wake up.

When I reached five years old, I spent most of my time playing outside with my childhood cousins. We would gather stones, sticks, dirt, and matches to create an outdoor fire, pretending to “cook” wild leaves inside an old tin can. This imaginative outdoor play continued consistently until I entered kindergarten. One of my absolute core memories from kindergarten was when my classmates would try to teach me how to do kung fu moves during recess. Another unforgettable memory was when some of my kind classmates would willingly lend me their colored pencils because I didn’t have any art supplies of my own.

Moving on to Grade 1, I remember that I was quite a mischievous and stubborn kid back then. I used to publicly and loudly proclaim to everyone that my classroom seatmate was my girlfriend, which is honestly the most embarrassing and cringeworthy thing I have ever done in my life. Around that same time, everyone in school became completely obsessed with playing Beyblades. We could only afford the cheap, 10-peso knockoff toys, while some of my wealthier classmates proudly bought the original, expensive brands. Even though we couldn’t afford the real ones, we happily kept playing with our cheap toys anyway. Eventually, that era came to a sudden end and a massive spider-fighting craze hit the campus. It was like a storm that completely consumed every kid’s daily allowance. I got hooked on catching spiders too. We would let the spiders fight each other on thin sticks while we placed monetary bets on who was going to win. This lucrative trend continued until our strict guidance counselor caught us in the act, confiscated our spiders, and stepped on them right in front of us. Sadly, during my Grade 1 year, my mother made the painful decision to leave us and work abroad as an OFW. It was easily the saddest thing that had ever happened to my sister and me. It was incredibly painful for my mother as well; she later told us that she cried constantly while working in Malaysia because she was so incredibly homesick and missed us terribly.

In Grade 2, I transformed into a real troublemaker, or a basagulero. I was always ready to pick a fight with absolutely anyone who dared to make fun of me. One day, a classmate accidentally stepped on my toy. I got incredibly angry, and during our heated confrontation, he punched me straight in the face. My nose started bleeding heavily, and a messy mix of blood and snot came pouring out all at once. In my mind, I was completely fueled by a desire for revenge. Because of all these behavioral distractions, I did not take my studies seriously at all. It got so bad that my grandmother actually had to beg my teacher just to let me pass the school year.

Then came Grade 3. One unforgettable and hilarious memory from that year was when a classmate actually pooped right on his classroom chair, and the rest of us had to help clean up the entire mess. As for the guy who had punched me in the nose in Grade 2, I never did get my revenge because we never ended up being sectioned in the same class again. Grade 2 and Grade 3 seemed to pass by in a total flash, and I don’t remember much else from that period.

Currently, we were in Grade 4. The absolute most vivid thing I remember from Grade 4 was a day when my stomach started acting funny. I rushed to the classroom comfort room (CR) to relieve myself, but the flush wasn’t working and the poop wouldn’t go down. Panic set in, so I did what I had to do: I manually picked up my own poop and threw it into the plastic trash bin! At the end of the day, while some of my classmates were assigned to clean the bathroom, someone noticed the poop in the trash. They immediately reported it to our teacher, who asked the entire class, “Who pooped in the trash bin?” I genuinely thought my life was over and I was done for. Luckily, another classmate somehow got blamed for the whole thing! Inside my head, I was secretly celebrating and screaming, “Hell yeah!” The poor classmate who took the blame actually ended up transferring to a different school later on.

As for Grade 5 and Grade 6, nothing particularly special happened that stands out in my memory. All I remember is that I was doing quite well in my classes, but I didn’t quite make it to the final honor roll—which was perfectly okay with me. Before I knew it, I graduated from elementary school.

When I entered high school as a Grade 7 student, my core personality hadn’t changed very much. I was still a natural troublemaker, which eventually landed me a serious trip to the guidance office, and my grandmother had to be called in as my guardian. That was pretty much the main highlight of that entire year.

Then Grade 8 came around. I decided to try getting an ear piercing using an unsafe, DIY method with a needle. When my grandfather found out about it, he was absolutely furious and threatened me, saying, “Kung hindi mo tatanggalin ‘yan, ipapa-lunok ko sa’yo ‘yan!” I was scared as shit by his anger, so I removed the earring quickly and never tried doing it ever again. Later that school year, right after the Christmas season, I was sleeping over at my cousin’s place and ended up being the unluckiest kid alive. I caught a severe case of dengue. It was so critical that my mother had to break her employment contract and fly home early from Malaysia. I nearly needed an emergency blood transfusion, which was terrifying because my blood type is a rare AB positive. Luckily, I didn’t end up needing the transfusion after all. My mother and grandmother constantly fed me a lot of quail eggs and tinolang kalapati, which miraculously helped increase my platelet count. We ended up spending two full weeks in the hospital, even celebrating the New Year inside the hospital ward before I fully recovered.

The global COVID-19 pandemic hit right after. At first, I didn’t understand the severity of the virus and was just incredibly happy that classes were suspended for two weeks. However, those two weeks quickly turned into two months, and those two months eventually stretched into three long years of modular learning. In Grade 9, I managed the adjustment quite well, completing my academic modules daily and hitting my deadlines. By Grade 10, intense burnout set in. I became heavily addicted to online gaming and completely neglected my studies unlike before.

Sensing my extreme academic stress, my father suddenly called and asked if I wanted to take a vacation to visit my aunt in Manila. I immediately said yes because I needed a break. My cousin and I traveled together toward Caloocan, Manila. I fully expected that our mode of transportation would be a regular car or a public bus, so I was completely shocked to discover that we were traveling via a real helicopter! We were actually flying alongside the vice governor of Cauayan at the time. Despite my intense fear of heights, a dropping stomach from the heavy turbulence, and sleeping through most of the journey, we safely landed at NAIA. We then took a Grab car straight to our aunt’s place in Caloocan. Unfortunately, our vacation took a bad turn when the entire household caught COVID-19. I suffered through two miserable weeks of sickness before recovering. When it was finally time to go back home to Isabela, I hitched a ride back with the older brother of my uncle’s ex-girlfriend.

Once I got back home, life quieted down. My father bought me a PC, and I spent time helping my grandfather renovate our house. However, having a new computer only fueled my gaming addiction, causing me to completely neglect my school modules. I had to go to Naguilian National High School to comply with my requirements. Fortunately, I was given a second chance, and I spent several intense weeks catching up on all my backlogs just to move up to Grade 11. Grades 11 and 12 turned out to be a totally normal, typical high school life. I finally turned things around and ended up graduating With Honors.

When college finally came around, I knew exactly what I wanted and officially enrolled in the BSIT (Bachelor of Science in Information Technology) program. However, it did not turn out exactly as smoothly as I had expected. During my first year, I unfortunately made a certain professor angry. He held a deep grudge against me, which ultimately pushed a Dean’s Lister spot completely out of my reach. That major academic setback caused me to lose my inspiration to excel. While I still wanted to pass my courses, I just couldn’t bring myself to perform as exceptionally well as I did during my first semester.

After that stressful period, the summer vacation came by, and my mother was also able to take a vacation from working abroad. Our family finally got together for a short but meaningful time. During her stay, my mother got upset with me because she thought I looked too thin and wasn’t eating enough. She strictly forced me to eat three huge meals a day, which honestly made me gain a lot of weight and got me fatter!

During the first semester of my second year, our section participated in a massive culminating event for our Physical Education class. All the students were fiercely competing to make it into the top ten ranking. To prepare us, our PE professor assigned student instructors to teach us the choreography. It was during these intense rehearsals that I fell completely in love with Rein, one of the student instructors who was teaching us the dance. Having developed a huge crush, I decided to add her on Facebook. After one of our practice sessions, I built up the courage to give her a bracelet. I told myself, “Take the risk or lose the chance.” That small gesture worked, and we started chatting online. Eventually, I asked her if I could formally court her, and she happily said yes. Fast forward to today, and we are still happily together, with her standing by my side through all of life’s ups and downs. After going through endless rounds of incredibly difficult and exhausting practices to prepare for the big competition, all of our hard work finally paid off when our section actually managed to secure tenth place overall.

Later in my second year, we dove deep into application development. We created a fully functional mobile app and were encouraged to publish it on the Google Play Store. However, doing so required additional registration fees, so I chose not to publish mine. Now, here we are in the midyear. I am continuing to navigate my student life, and this very autobiography is one of the modular tasks assigned to us to complete. Looking back at everything, from the chaotic games to the hospital scares and finding love, I am proud of how far I’ve come.

Despite the many challenges that came into my life, I learned how to fight, stay strong, and continue working hard. My family, friends, and experiences became my inspiration to continue pursuing my dreams.

John Carl S. Valino

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