Home At Last! / (A Filipina Returns After Two Years Away)

Pea celebrates the one-year anniversary of her YouTube channel by fulfilling a promise to introduce her family and show her childhood home on the island of Leyte. The video is an intimate, emotionally raw home tour that documents her family's modest living conditions alongside genuine warmth, humor, and a surprise Mother's Day gift. It's one of the most personal videos in her catalog.

What's Covered ​

• Getting to the house

  • The family home is accessed through a narrow alleyway that becomes extremely muddy when it rains
  • The family owns no vehicle — no car, no motorbike, not even a bicycle
  • They walk to the road and catch a trike or jeepney for transportation
  • On this visit, yesterday's rain left a stream of water across the path; the family improvised a small bridge to cross it

• Meeting the family

  • Chan — Pea's brother, 20 years old (viewers already know him from previous videos)
  • Youngest brother — 17, turning 18 in December; currently in Grade 11, about to enter Grade 12
  • Gia (niece) — 2 years old, daughter of another brother who is away at work; learning English, loves Peppa Pig, very shy on camera
  • Mother — stay-at-home mom, doesn't speak English
  • Father (stepfather) — fisherman, carpenter, and coconut tree climber ("coconut pilot"); has been Pea's dad since she was three years old after her biological father died

• Parents' relationship

  • Married 26 years
  • When Pea asks her dad if he's happily married, he jokes "no choice, because there's no divorce here in the Philippines"
  • Mom's secret to a happy marriage: essentially, keep the peace (with an implied threat — Pea jokes about the machete)
  • The famous machete: Pea shows the actual machete her dad used to chase her boyfriends away and that her mom has chased him with; she makes her dad put it away before asking if he's afraid of mom (answer: yes, very afraid)

• Pea as a child — her mom's testimony and old photos

  • Mom confirms Pea was a handful and a "super" pain in the butt as a kid
  • Pea admits to having a rebellious phase where she dyed her hair red and "got an attitude"
  • Old photos shown:
    • Age 3 with a yellow umbrella she loved — her mom used to cut her hair (resulting in that bangs style)
    • The only surviving photo of her biological father — Pea says she got her looks from him (the smile and eyes) and is preserving this last photo
    • A photo from someone else's birthday party where young Pea looks hilariously surprised
    • Age 5 in a pink gown — won second runner-up in a kids' pageant (the Philippines is famous for pageants)
    • Receiving an award at high school graduation — she believes it was "best in English"
  • Mom kept all of Pea's school medals from elementary through graduation — they're heavy enough to use as weights; Pea jokes about pawning them but then says "the gold is the knowledge I accumulated"

• Tribute to her stepfather

  • He's been her dad since she was three (biological father died)
  • He taught her survival skills: climbing coconut trees, building shelters (referenced in her "Dare to Pea" episode), catching fish, opening coconuts with a machete
  • Pea gives an emotional on-camera thank-you in front of her 70,000 subscribers, saying she's never said thank you enough or told him how much he means to her

• Tribute to her mother (with a joke twist)

  • Mom taught her to cook, clean, sew, and raise children
  • Pea jokes: "I'm not going to say thank you for that, mother, because I know you only trained me to do that so you could stick me with the chores"
  • Then sincerely tells her she loves her; mom gets emotional on camera

• The outdoor bathroom

  • Filipino bathrooms are typically outside the main house
  • No toilet seat or lid — they use the bucket system: dump water from a bucket to flush waste into the septic tank
  • No public sewer system
  • Shower area is in the same space: dump water on yourself, lather with soap and shampoo, rinse
  • The space has a door for privacy
  • Alternative: bathing outside at the laundry area with clothes on — Pea acknowledges foreigners find this confusing but says "somehow we Filipinos manage"

• Water and laundry

  • The family does not have government water service
  • They collect rainwater via a gutter into a water tank — this is their entire water supply
  • Laundry is done by hand at an outdoor station with a faucet connected to the rainwater tank

• Outdoor kitchen

  • Called a "pugon" — they cook outside on firewood during sunny days
  • Light the wood, put pots and pans on top, wait for food to cook

• House tour — the structure itself

  • Materials: Coconut wood (1x2 pieces), walls of woven bamboo, some walls of corrugated tin
  • Security: The bamboo walls have holes you can stick your finger through to the outside; "not very secure"
  • Ventilation: The holes do allow air circulation, which is the upside
  • Heat: The tin walls make the house very hot during sunny days
  • Roof: Also tin, with holes that leak during rainy days; dad has tried to patch them but it's "a losing battle"
  • Floor: Plywood that rocks when you walk on it — Pea jokes that they'll always know when there's an earthquake
  • Sleeping arrangements:
    • Dad sleeps in the receiving area
    • Mom and youngest brother share one bedroom area
    • Chan sleeps in an elevated spot
    • Pea sleeps on a mat she lays on the floor — "Pea's Pod"
  • Clothes storage: Boxes in the bedroom
  • The brothers' study area: Also in the bedroom, used for online classes
  • The house survived three typhoons, though some parts are now rotten (Pea steps into a sinkhole in the floor during filming)

• Pea's emotional conclusion

  • This is her humble beginning; the family has created wonderful memories in this house
  • Coming home after two years made her realize she needs to make a difference in her family's living situation
  • She is the first person in her family line to earn a college degree
  • She declares her intention to build a permanent shelter for her family before building her own house
  • Visibly emotional about the challenge: "Gosh, it's very hard"

• Mother's Day surprise

  • Pea notes her parents don't have a TV and her mother doesn't understand YouTube — mom thinks Pea is "on TV"
  • Since it's Mother's Day, Pea surprises her mother with a smart TV and internet connection so mom can watch her daughter "on TV" (YouTube)
  • Mom is emotional and grateful receiving the gift

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