“Out of the sea, wish I could be part of that world.”
As Halle Bailey’s Ariel belts out the climax of the classic Disney song “Part of Your World” in the live-action remake of “The Little Mermaid,” I take my 3D glasses off to wipe a tear. Despite knowing how the story ends, I still find myself awash in emotions I have long kept at bay. Perhaps the IMAX theater’s sound system is partly to blame. But the real reason runs deep.
Before I even learned of their symbolic meaning to a community that I would eventually identify with, I was already fascinated with mermaids. As a young boy, I would wrap a pillowcase around my legs until they resembled Claudine Barretto’s tail in “Marina.” In first grade, I would habitually spend my daily allowance on 10-peso Tagalog folklore books sold in the school canteen. When my mother took notice, she brought me to the mall to buy a picture book of the timeless Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale.
A mermaid’s life, I discovered, wasn’t always easy. In most iterations of her story, when humans struggled to explain the wrath of the rain or find out what causes a drought, they pinned the blame on her — a harbinger of doom with the appearance of half-woman half-fish. But her dreams far outweighed her fears. Against her family’s wishes, she set out on a tempestuous journey, swam against the tide of hatred, and even gave up parts of herself, most notably her voice, in the pursuit of living on land. By a stroke of luck and with the help of true love, she ultimately made it. And as she walked toward a new life, the world learned to walk toward acceptance.
I knew from a young age that I was different from other boys. From being the subject of hushed conversations between concerned adults to being on the receiving end of taunts and jeers from my rowdy playmates, I grew up believing that there was something wrong with me. And although jokes about abusive fathers drowning their gay sons in a barrel of water were already becoming passé, being labeled “bakla” or “sirena” in the 2000s still felt like a scathing indictment of one’s potential. There just weren’t many publicly known examples of gay men who found success outside of beauty parlors or comedy bars. During a lesson in synonyms in my sixth grade English class, our teacher opined that maybe gays were called such because their jokes made people happy.
Although the next decade saw a sea change in societal attitudes toward the community, I found myself plunging into an abyss of darkness. Spending my formative years in a Catholic all-boys high school led me to believe that my tail was a curse. Even when I subsequently attended what was arguably the most liberal college in the country, I just flailed around whenever I tried to swim toward the light. Like many mermaids who had only known darkness, I thought I had to trade the best parts of myself for permission to exist.
It took a long time before hearing the words “bakla” and “sirena” stopped reopening old wounds, and an even longer time before I could proudly use these words to refer to myself. In fact, it had to take a global pandemic for me to finally sit with my feelings and take the first step toward healing. As I sank deeper into introspection, I realized that the shore up above was no longer as scary as it was when I was little. From lobbying for progressive reforms to normalizing the discourse on sexual orientation, gender identity, and expression (Sogie), a thriving community of mermaids has been putting in the work to ensure a safer world for all of us. The world is seeing a new generation of mermaids who are not afraid to flaunt the many colors of their fins and tails as they swim with the pride of a major demographic force. In fact, as I write this, the Quezon City government officially confirmed that the attendance at the recently concluded Pride Festival breached the 100,000 mark.
At 25, I am still learning. But I know now that while legs are useful for walking, there is more than one way to move forward. We no longer have to lose our tails when we can reach the light faster by swimming together.
And so to all the mermaids who are still struggling in the dark, trust me when I say that when you are ready to come out of the sea, you will no longer have to lose your voice to walk the earth. You will never again have to question the fact that you are — and have always been — part of this world.
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Erwin B. Agapay, 25, is an associate in a financial services company.