“I can’t wait to get out of here.”
It’s a common conversation between me and my friends, lamenting our need to escape to New York from our prison that is Utah.

For them it may just be a romantic daydream, but for me it means so much more. Moving to New York would mean finally abandoning the hardships Utah has brought me. Looking back, I can’t help but feel like my life was perfect until I moved to Salt Lake (which prompted the falling apart of... well, everything to me). It can be argued that this “falling apart of everything I ever knew and loved” can simply be accredited to part of growing up, but, hey, let me entertain this perfect New York fantasy and use this as an excuse to trash talk SLC. And for my SLC lovers - please remember to take everything I say with a grain of salt and try to understand where I’m coming from. To best communicate my strong feelings and what caused them, let’s zoom in on my first day of school here.

If I were forced to describe my first experience living here in one word, it would be “confusing”. When I moved here, I didn’t even know what a Utah was. I had just barely grasped the concept of moving states, so when my disoriented younger self was suddenly placed in a whole new school with all new people, yeah, I was a little confused. On my first day I was afraid of everyone and everything in that classroom, so like a turtle retreating into its shell, I retreated into my cubby. While in there, only one thought occupied my mind:
“I can’t wait to get out of here”.

Eventually my concerned teacher lured me out with promises that my classmates would be kind and welcoming. This gleam of hope pushed me out of my safe haven, and I ventured into the jungle. I can confidently say that I enjoyed myself for a couple of minutes, probably distracting myself by working on puzzles or some other preschool works while in the company of my new peers. Maybe this day wouldn’t be as bad as I thought. I wish I could’ve held on to this positivity longer, for it was rudely snatched away from me once I grabbed a pack of crayons and started coloring a flag of the Philippines.

The Philippines was what I held dear in my heart as my heritage; it made me feel at home. However, as soon as a girl started laughing at me, that homely feeling shattered. It was like a scene out of a movie, as soon as that girl started laughing, more people gathered around me. I sank into my chair, confusion growing larger as to what was so funny. I looked up only to be met with hundreds (okay maybe more like five but it felt like hundreds to me) of faces of white children pointing at my masterpiece and giggling. I was the odd one out. Not only did they know something that I didn’t, but they looked differently than I did - with their light skin that I’d prayed for and their light hair that I’d always see on the TV. On top of that, I assumed they were laughing at my Filipino flag; laughing at my heritage and the only thing that brought me comfort in this strange place.

Eventually, one of them decided to let me in on the joke and all the while scold me. “Scribbling isn’t allowed in this school,” they remarked. Huh? I didn’t even know what scribbling was, but apparently it was a crime – a crime that I had the audacity to commit. How dare I? I should be disgusted, revolted even! Scribbling in this school? Tsk, tsk, tsk... bad Solana!

Yeah, I cried all the way home from school on that day.

The saddest part is that I’ve never been able to shake that feeling. The feeling that I was the odd one out. The feeling that my mere existence was a crime. This feeling haunts me again and again. At this point, I feel as though all I can do is outrun it by escaping to New York: the last place everything was perfect.

Utah, I’m sorry that you must take the blame for everything that I endured. We’ve had our moments, good and bad, but frankly, I can’t wait to get out of here.