Jelly - The woman behind the Ink

Written by: Ely S. 

We continue from where we left of in our series:
Jelly - Confessions from a not so typical Filipina 

Are tattoos on women in the Philippines socially acceptable?  

The year is 2018 and this question is still difficult to answer. Only about a decade ago the answer would have been a clear "no" with a few exceptions, but the majority mainly agreed on the general consensus. Today the answer is unclear because now it really depends on who you ask. There is clearly still a negative social stigma surrounding tattoos in general. This comes from the common belief that people with tattoos are often associated with criminals, prisoners, drug dealers and even prostitution. 

Tattoos as we know it today are mostly a western culture influence popularized by celebrities and famous on-screen personalities. And through the internet and social media, it has become increasingly popular particularly with men. When it comes to women however, visible ink remains a grey area (pun unintended). Although the younger generation are more accepting of the idea, most will still take the slightly conservative route of getting a small, almost negligible piece of script or symbol in hidden parts of the body or somewhere inconspicuous. 

Jelly's exposure to tattoos

Jelly had her first tattoo when she was just in High School at the age of only 15 years old. She was probably the only person in the entire school to have one. It was of a cat over a  crescent moon. She likened herself to the personality of a cat. And at that point in her life, she felt the illustration represented how she saw herself. Cats were independent, spontaneous, friendly yet snobbish. This was soon replaced with a much larger piece (flower) 6 months later. The reason for the cover up work she explained, was simply because she was no longer satisfied with the way it looked.

She didn't do it to be rebellious or to stand out from the crowd. Although it gave her a sense of pride and strength, there really wasn't much thought that went into decision making process. It was more out of curiosity and the need to express her creativity. Each piece had its own story and represented something meaningful at different points in her life. I go in detail about each one in another post.

When she fell pregnant and gave birth to her daughter at the age of 16 she held off on tattoos to focus on parenthood. It was not until she turned 18 when she finally continued her passion for ink and was able to add new artwork to her canvas up until the age of 21 where she has not added new tattoos since.

Young entrepreneur

At the age of 19, following her passion, she opened a small tattoo parlor. Starting out in a small rented room with only one artist. Unfortunately it was closed down not long after because of the artist's erratic emotional condition. He was suffering from emotional breakdowns that adversely affected his ability to carry out his work.

But being a strong woman, she was not the type to give up that easily and went on to open another shop. And although this time it was showing promising signs of growth with steady streams of new and regular customers, she now faced yet another obstacle. Her controlling, drug addicted partner. At that point in her life she explained, she was young and naive and was easily manipulated and taken advantage of by her partner. He used her loyalty towards him to control all aspects of her life and soon forced her to shut down the shop because of his own insecurities. He felt intimidated and jealous with customers who were predominantly males that they may attempt to hit on her.

Criticism and judgement

Jelly faced constant criticism and judgment from most people around her including her own family. On top of everything she already had to deal with... family, destructive relationship, a baby and failing business, it is difficult to imagine the amount of courage and humility one must have to live in a environment who already condemns you for simply doing what you love or by expressing yourself the only way you know how. 

I wondered and sympathies for the amount of emotional stress and mental burden she had to endure just to carry out her day to day life as a young, single mother. While most girls her age were worrying about how they can buy the latest iPhone or how many likes they were getting on facebook or instagram. 

The tattoo culture in the Philippines when it comes to women are still very conservative, although it is opening up a lot more, the older generation and the old fashion ways remains a strong influence on our society so it is still rare to see women with visible tattoos. 

I neither agree or disagree with these traditional ideas. Every society has their own and we should learn to respect and accept it. Although at the same time, we should also learn to stop criticizing and judging others if they chose a path thats not necessarily in line with our own. Everybody is different. As individuals, we are all influenced directly or indirectly by our unique environments. We all deal with situations differently and we should be able to express ourselves without anybody's approval or assessment.

Jelly's love for tattoos was not out of rebelliousness against a conservative society, it was coming from an innocent place with a pure desire to express herself the best way she knew how. Judging someone for being different is what creates rebelliousness. 

Lets just learn to accept each other for who we are and who we choose to be. We will have a better world for it :)

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Join us as we go on this journey of discovery about what it takes to find strength in adversity. In what may become an ongoing series of posts about her life, Jelly opens up to me about her past and shares with me in intricate detail about her experiences and how she managed to survive the many challenges she faced.

If you missed the first post in the series, go here: Jelly - Confessions from a not so typical Filipina

Next on Jelly - Confessions from a not so typical Filipina...We ask Jelly about her current life status and her outlook on the future. Stay tuned for the post in the next few days.

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