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JA
Jelo Andes

I came to Cambridge hoping to become a better software engineer.

Somehow, we built a life instead.

Not the polished kind. Not the one you post about. The other kind — the one made of ordinary Wednesdays that quietly turned into things I'll remember for the rest of my life.

What I'll remember has almost nothing to do with the work. It's the moments between it. After the meetings. Around the lunch tables. In the elevator. Over coffee that somehow became two hours. During conversations that lasted much longer than they were supposed to.

Somewhere along the way, without any of us really noticing, we started finding excuses to spend five more minutes together.

And that, it turns out, was the whole thing.

So before I return my laptop to EUS, I wanted to leave behind something a little more personal.

Not a goodbye.

Just a love letter.

Chapter One

When Does a New Place Start Feeling Like Home?

I arrived in Manila quietly hoping this city would hold something for me. I didn't quite know what. Just — something.

New office. New city. New routines. A career I was still trying to figure out. An adulthood I hadn't quite settled into.

It took me a while to notice how belonging actually happens. It isn't announced. Nobody waves a flag. It doesn't begin with a grand gesture or a defining moment.

It begins with someone asking if you'd like a coffee. Someone saving you a seat at lunch. Someone sending a message to check if you got home safely. Someone including you in a plan they'd already made. Someone making room.

None of those moments felt significant at the time. They seemed ordinary. Fleeting. The kinds of things that disappear into the everyday without leaving a mark.

But they were building something. Quietly. Consistently. Without anyone deciding to.

It doesn't feel like belonging while it's happening. It just feels like Wednesday.

Chapter Two

The Odds of Finding Each Other

Looking back, it's funny how none of us had any business becoming this close.

Some friendships started at a Pride event. Some began with old teammates introducing me to their favourite people. Some started with an Instagram follow or a mutual friend saying, "You two should meet." Some began with an invitation to a random lunch potluck, a shared conference booth, or simply sitting at the same table at the right time. Some started because someone reached out for the most random reason imaginable, and others because someone took the time to say hello.

There was never one big moment. No grand introduction. Just people making room for one another in wonderfully ordinary ways.

I don't think I realised it at the time, but none of us knew we were saying yes to friendships that would come to mean so much.

We were just saying yes to lunch.

Funny how that's all it took.

Chapter Three

Somewhere Along the Way

We were never supposed to know each other like this.

On paper, we belonged to different teams, different projects, and different corners of the office. Some of us would've probably never crossed paths if someone hadn't said, "Come join us for lunch" on one random Wednesday.

And yet, somehow, we kept finding one another.

One invitation became another. One coffee break became dinner plans. One introduction became a friendship. There was always room for one more person at the table, one more seat in the meeting room, one more name added to the group chat.

The truth is, I don't think our friendships were built through grand moments. They were built through being included in one another's ordinary days.

Nobody made a conscious decision to build a community. We simply kept making room for one another—through lunch invitations, coffee runs, shared meals, random conversations, and small moments that didn't seem important at the time.

Funny how a simple "come join us" changed more than any of us realised.

Chapter Four

The Things We Did Just to Spend Five More Minutes Together

We were all figuring life out in our own ways.

Some of us were burned out. Some of us were figuring out what we actually wanted from our careers, or our lives, or ourselves. Some of us were quietly holding things we didn't talk about at work. Nobody would have called it a difficult season out loud. We just knew.

And somehow, without ever really deciding to, we became each other's soft place to land.

The older I get, the more I realise that love isn't always grand gestures.

Sometimes it's booking a meeting room because your favourite people happen to be in the office that day.

We'd ask, "Sino papasok sa office bukas?" more often than we'd ask what meetings we had that day.

We planned our office days around each other. We'd somehow convince ourselves to go to the office just because everyone else was going. We'd walk to the café instead of the pantry because the walk itself was the point (and tbh walang matcha sa coffee maker natin at di naman masarap yung kape)

We booked meeting rooms with no agenda. We created calendar invites titled "Trip to Indonesia" when we were really just eating at an Indonesian restaurant. Somehow, our onsite days became 20% work and 80% chismisan, sayawan, at kantahan sa meeting rooms.

We took elevator selfies for no reason. We sang karaoke through the internet, kahit di sabay-sabay. We somehow always found something to send in the group chat - memes, reels, mga kalokohan at bangayan with Meta AI. We gave each other random gifts. We shared snacks at our desks and somehow everyone's lunch became everyone's lunch.

Looking back, we weren't particularly good at leaving.

We'd finish work on time. Leaving the office was a completely different story.

We'd say goodbye at 6 PM and somehow still be having dinner at 9. We'd pack our bags and immediately start discussing where to eat, who was still around, and whether we had time for one more round of chikahan.

We were always finding ways to stay a little longer.

Now I think that was the whole point.

The People Who Made Cambridge Feel Like Home

I thought I was building a career. Turns out, I was building a life alongside some really wonderful people. Funny how nobody puts that in the job description.

I tucked a letter behind each photo — pull one out. →

Kate

Kate

Hazel

Hazel

Ken

Ken

Chris

Chris

Imee

Imee

Beige

Beige

Nica

Nica

Paul

Paul

Krissy

Krissy

The Guides team

Guides

Final Chapter

We Never Were Good at Leaving

It's funny. We never were particularly good at leaving.

We'd stay a little longer after work. We'd stretch our lunch breaks into two hours. We'd somehow find reasons to see each other outside of our own teams and our own schedules.

Somewhere between the coffees, lunch breaks, meeting room tambays, elevator selfies, spontaneous dinner plans, and conversations that somehow lasted much longer than they were supposed to, Cambridge became much more than a place I worked at.

It became a place filled with people I'd willingly book an Angkas for—kahit na di namin anchor day.

I don't think the important parts are changing anytime soon.

The group chats stay makalat. The trips are still half-planned. At yung tennis at dance class, please lang sana ituloy na!

I have a feeling we'll still find ways to stay a little longer.

End Credits

With endless gratitude,

Jelo

PS.

Mag-set naman tayo ng monthly catchup!