Kwentuhan (My First Blog Post!!!)

Hello everyone! Or no one, as I'm not expecting many people to read this, haha. But anyway, I decided that I wanted to start blogging to get into the swing of writing again. I used to really love writing, but never ended up finishing anything even though I enjoyed the process. Drawing was always my number one passion, and writing was just kind of a hobby I took on whenever the inspiration struck. But I'd like to change that a little.

I'm not exactly sure what this blog will look like as it grows, but I know that I want to talk about topics that are important to me like art, mental health, books/reading, culture, and maybe some current events and social climate stuff. And I'll probably throw in personal anecdotes and experiences along the way. (By the way, I don't consider myself an expert in any of the listed topics. Maybe just art, since it is my profession. This blog will solely be a reflection of these topics through my lens and also somewhat of a public diary for me.)

With all that being said, let me introduce myself:

My name is Nia and I love stories. My name “Nia” comes from the first two letters of my legal first name “Nicolette” and the first letter of my passed grandma's name “Aurora.” My family comes from the Philippines, but I was born here in the US. The vast majority of Filipinxs have nicknames, many of them don't have a real reason for the nickname they have. Sometimes it's just the whim of another family member. In my case, I was named after my dad's sister. Her name is Nicolette too, but she also went by Nikki and Cricket. So those were off the table for me.

Probably all children are raised on stories, but I feel that coming from a Filipinx family, stories are especially important. I remember when I went to the Philippines as a kid, I wanted to go play outside. My family didn't want me to stray too far, so they told me, “Hoy, you see that tree over there? There's a giant that lives in that tree. He's very smelly and smokes a lot. If you get too close he might scoop you up and take you away to the mountains! You don't want that do you? He might try to marry you!”

Now, they could have just said, “don't go too far, ha?” or “don't go past that tree, okay?” But they didn't. They told me a story. A story that truly terrified me as a kid, and a story that I took as truth. And although I don't like being scared, I don't think I would have remembered that time if it weren't for that tale. Also, in retrospect it's pretty fun to think about. I learned in more recent years that the “giant in the tree” was actually based on Filipino mythology. There's a creature called a kapre , also known as a tree giant, that is usually dark-skinned and terrifying, but will sometimes try to make a love connection with human women. They are usually invisible, but will become visible to those it befriends.

This myth actually inspired one of my illustrations. I thought, what if Kapre aren't actually invisible, but just able to camouflage to the trees really well? What if they're actually just guardian spirits of the trees?

I love stories. I love to read them, I love to tell them, I love to draw them.