A trip to reclaim my own.

A week before I went to you, I was a wreckage.

I was challenged to pour my thoughts into a single paper and be as honest as possible.

It’s supposed to be a piece of cake, as I’ve already practiced for almost 2 years straight to be none other than honest towards myself.

But then I found myself walking around eggshells within my words,

and I became…

a coward.

Gratitude was the theme of the conversation. I pondered over things I’ve done in the past to help me feel grateful. But do I feel it now?

A sense of gratitude?

And if yes, is it natural to feel grateful yet still feel somehow

.

.

lost?

But I’m now standing in front of the platform in Gambir Station, ready to embark on a journey to reclaim my own.

Towards you, a place I once disliked the most, a place where I felt a raging hotpot like how you’ve always been infamous for, in the daytime.

I poured my imagination once of this day.

The day I’ll finally face you.

I imagined myself holding my headstrong, driven by a sense of hatred circled at the center of my heart.

I wanted to prove to you that I’m able to walk straight toward you. Hence the memory of how pitiful I was when I left, could be erased.

11 hours passed, now I arrived at your place.

How snob are you that your name now is everywhere, imprinted in a big sign “Surabaya”, as I set foot at your place.

I know, I know it so well that it is you. My body tingled as the aura of yours heated my body.

It’s indeed you, the one who scared the clouds away to torture the inhabitants. At 10 am now, it’s already swept people away from the road, and your light putting a stern to my eyebrows.

But it flexed right away as I looked in awe toward the Dharmahusada road as if I was pulled down memory lane,

towards the gelato parlor that I visited often still stands tall there and doesn’t look any different,

through Mulyosari road, and see how McD, a place that stayed awake while I spent a sleepless night putting work to all the assignments of engineering school, has now changed its whole structure,

at the front alley of the complex blocks where I stayed during my university years,

at the roundabouts neared my university complex area, where now it’s standing a large statue of god-knows-what, where laid the name of the university as if it was some type of a dynasty,

through the road, I couldn’t name, but somehow still got the hunch to tell where to turn.

Memory is a special thing, indeed.

I closed the chapter of us at the time that I left and swept all the crumbs away. I thought I had forgotten about you already, every side and corner, but it turns out it has never been erased somewhere on my mind.

As if you’re an old friend,

it felt easy for my memories to be opened to you,

Were there actually good days before the storms hit us?

One of the reasons I put you on distance was due to the people I met through you.

I was once so afraid of facing them on my own, but I know better now than to not put any trust towards fear.

So now I’m standing in the middle of the mall, with my punching heart, meeting a friend I once disappointed.

This would be our first real interaction after a year of exchanging emails that started with me putting a list of words of sorry, telling her that I was an asshole to her and that I would get it if she wouldn’t forgive me.

Instead, she replied: “I get what you’ve gone through Bil, and you shouldn’t say sorry at all, you did nothing wrong”. I bawled my eyes out for a night before replying to her the next day.

But here I am, with her twisting her hand on mine, telling me the stage of her life now and in the upcoming years. Though we are heading in different directions, I’m extremely elated about the plan and glad to know that it won’t change what’s in the core; our little feminist spirit that once brought us together.

The other person I met, now has a baby and committed herself fully to her family. It’s a wonderful thing to see a dear friend of mine becoming a mom. As she caresses her little one with a full lengthy smile, as if I witnessed one of the heavens on earth with her attentive nature, embracing her frail creature, and suddenly,

I feel safe too.

The other had a wedding where she was gleaming in her dress. Sometimes a person can’t tell how much they means to others until one says,

“Thanks, I could cry now seeing you here”,

that’s what she told me that day and I was bewildered seeing my presence could spark joy in a person.

Surabaya, I thought there were various reasons I should despise you,

but in you, there are people that I love, and there are places that brought me bliss.

Amidst all of those, days spent with you, recalled a memory of who I was years ago.

Every day spent each reflection fell, and looking at me now, I was even surprised at how things turned out for me eventually.

Do you remember the disastrous days when voices shouting in my head awakened me from sleep?

I cried and pleaded with them to stop,

or the caged lungs, where I couldn’t breathe, as if a clot of crumpled feelings stuck in my throat,

I wanted to throw up but I couldn’t, and I didn’t,

and the room that I left in a mess after a week of not setting foot outside, with no person I talked to aside from the heated debate I had in my mind, and the demon that sometimes lurked inside there.

//

I told a friend on the top of a low-elevated mountain on the outskirts of Surabaya — that I wouldn’t even bothered to think to come to, 3 years ago — telling her that this whole trip had me reflect on who I was and who I eventually become now.

Oh, life updates to you, Surabaya:

I weigh 20 kg lighter than I was the last time I met you, with a better relationship with my body that birthed a photo project I had with a friend about this whole topic.

Oh, it turns out I love sports too! Remember how I was running out of breath when I jogged merely 2 rounds of Koni tracking field or the time when I threw up a freaking bowl of Soto Lamongan after one PT session? Now I’m able to juggle between one another, exploring various sports that lurked my curiosity; cycling, fitness, yoga, squash, tennis, wall climbing, and hiking. And guess what? I ended up working at a sports company too!

I resolved things on my own, which I am incredibly proud of, and even better with my family, now I could even talk with Mom on a daily basis, which we both know that I wasn’t able to when I was still living with you.

I told you once that people hated me, but turns out now, that one of the strongest bonds I shared with friends is with the people I met through you.

There’s this certain trust that could only be attained by evolving together, knowing them at their best while aware of the possibility of how they are at their worst.

These friends see right through me, and if nothing lasts forever, I would exchange my life,

so then, it could be forever.

But Surabaya,

I know I couldn’t stay too long, and somehow I can’t fit in with you anymore.

I might’ve outgrown you and also the people I once shared a life with once, here. I’m cheering on them but the life we’re heading now is on the opposite of the polar.

Though I’m lost now, and oftentimes I feel like I don’t know what I’m doing,

But I’m grateful for the life that I lived.

Of how things started to untangle before they started to entangle together again when I arrived at the next stage of my life.

But I’ve been through it once, and I believe I will always find a way to make it work somehow.

And I’ll be okay.

I’ll survive through any other storms that hit me like I had once with you.

And Surabaya,

I won’t reclaim my own past here.

I love who she was then, and all of her; in all shades, shapes, and phases of hers, as I love her/myself today.

It turns out hatred doesn’t work well with me. Therefore, I’ll keep on forgiving the life that I led.

Hence, I put my highest gratitude for all the lessons you’ve given me thus far.

Once again,

Surabaya,

thank you.