I'm usually the one looking for food.
For almost three years in Cebu, that's basically what I've been doing.
I look for the food.
Then I look for the person behind it.
The person behind the tradition.
The person who knows the story nobody wrote down.
Sometimes I take a jeepney somewhere with almost no plan.
Sometimes I get completely lost.
Sometimes I ask the wrong question.
And sometimes, I find something I wasn't even looking for.
So when Melvin contacted me, I was confused.
Melvin is a young farmer from Catmon who runs his own local food brand.
We started talking, and eventually I asked him:
“That's why you contacted me?”
“Yeah.”
He had seen one of my videos.
The one about Budbud Kabog.
That honestly stopped me for a second.
Because I'm usually the one doing the searching.
I go into barangays.
I ask strangers questions.
I follow random clues.
I try to understand stories that existed long before I arrived here.
But this time...
someone from Cebu had seen what I was doing.
And he came looking for me.
Maybe that's what happens when you keep looking long enough.
At some point, the stories start looking back.
Almost three years in Cebu.
Still learning.
Still exploring.
And apparently...
sometimes, getting found too.
Daghang salamat, Melvin🙏
Me — "What do you mean?"
Melvin — "I don't think that I can connect to people that um I just watching like before."
I've spent almost three years in Cebu training myself to be the one who looks. I check jeepney routes I don't fully understand, walk into barangays without an appointment, and ask questions that sometimes come out wrong in Bisaya before they come out right. Being the searcher is a habit by now — maybe even part of how I see myself here.
So when Melvin messaged me, the confusion wasn't really about him. It was about the direction the search had suddenly gone. He'd watched the video about Budbud Kabog, the same kind of story I go looking for every week, and for once, someone had followed my trail back to me instead of the other way around.
The real discovery wasn't Melvin's brand at all — it was realizing that after years of being the one who searches, I could also be the one who gets found.
| Date | August 13, 2026 |
|---|---|
| Location | Corazon, Catmon, Cebu |
| Event Type | Unexpected Reconnection, Initiated by a Local Contact |
| Access Method | Invited back by a local contact, Melvin |
| Food Featured | None — this visit was about being contacted, not a specific food |
| Cost to Attend | Free (by arrangement) |
| Rarity | 🟨🟨🟨⬜⬜ — An uncommon reversal of the usual search |
| Bayanihan Index | 🟨🟨⬜⬜⬜ — A one-on-one reconnection rather than a wider community event |
Whether that was a rare, one-time moment or something that quietly happens more often the longer I stay here is still something I don't know.