SECRETS & SILOG 001: Pop Girls and Self-Confidence with Sammy(ft Talia)

For the launch of Secrets & Silog, Sammy opens up to me about self-confidence, true friendships, and the influence of music on his career path.

Hello and welcome to the first ever SECRETS & SILOG—a series where I interview my friends, peers, and whoever else may feel inclined over Filipino breakfast (commonly known as silog)!

I always knew when I started I <3 2 Yap that I wanted to not only use this as a channel to share my own thoughts, but to eventually share interviews with people I feel inspired by—anyone from my friends, family members, coworkers, maybe one day my favourite artists. It’s also the best way to combine my love for cooking and writing through connecting with the people around me. Silog is one of my favourite meals to introduce people to, especially those who aren’t as familiar with Filipino cuisine (not to brag but I’ve never gotten a bad review).

I’ve always loved meeting and talking to new people, and I found so much joy in connecting with artists through interviews I’d conduct for music outlets that I write for. My favourite parts of the interviews however, are usually the parts that don’t always make the final published article—the parts where we start to stray from the questions and share more about our own personal interests, hobbies, and stories. I constantly learn and find so much inspiration from conversations with my own circle of people, and starting this series felt like the perfect way to showcase that.

Sammy—my sweet friend who, at 19, has already kickstarted his career in the music industry through creating content for large audiences across all social platforms, sat down with me for the first ever Secrets & Silog. Talia—a friend of ours and fellow music lover, joined in for parts of our interview (something of a special guest) to discuss our Pop Girl Mount Rushmore, how we discovered music growing up, and how the two formed a forever-friendship after bonding over shared love for Melanie Martinez. I’ve found so much admiration in the way they both carry themselves, their confidence, passion, and relationships with the degree of maturity I wish I could’ve had at 19. I always feel like a proud big sister watching them navigate their lives, and this interview was the perfect way to share the ways they do so.

IZZY: My first question for you relates to how you turned 19 a few months ago. I personally found 17 to 19 to be the worst years of my fucking life. I'm not saying that to scare you, but I was just not okay. I was really insecure and did not like myself at all. Coming out of high school was really hard, but when I see you [Sammy] and I see Talia, I always admire that at such a young age you guys have found so much confidence. You seem to know yourself but you're still allowing yourself to figure things out and feel what you need to feel, negative or positive. That's one thing I've always admired about you guys. What do you find is it that's helped you gain comfort in yourself at such a young age?

SAMMY: I'm still figuring it out, to be honest. I feel like I'm not fully there yet because I feel like I'm more confident on the internet versus in real life. I get really insecure actual IRL situations, especially with people at school and stuff. I’m actually a really shy person when you first meet me—like when I’m going to school parties or things like that. I feel like I'm still figuring it out just because its easier for me to be confident online versus in person because growing up I always found comfort in making videos and doing stuff like that. Versus in person, I was the most unconfident person ever.

IZZY: When I was younger, I was so self-deprecating online. If I showed you my old close friends stories in my archive from 2019, even 2020, you would actually be like, who is that? I was out here calling myself ugly every two business days. I never really see that from you. I know sometimes you'll post little rants and stuff, but I’ve never seen you fully down bad, putting yourself down.

SAMMY: I did that a lot in high school. I feel like sometimes I still think like that, but I keep it to myself a lot of the time. I keep my feelings on stuff like that to myself. My friends that I talk to all the time, they know that I feel that way sometimes. But yeah, in high school and middle school I did that a lot, way more than now, you know? So I get it.

IZZY: It's hard because when I was growing up/in high school, the internet was obviously completely different. We didn't have TikTok when I was in high school, and I think that honestly contributed a lot to my confidence by just getting myself to stop telling myself I was ugly. Mostly because, as silly as it sounds, I would see those affirmations posts. I think what got me out of my head was, and this is so humiliating to admit, I can't believe I'm saying this out loud—you know the manifestation era of TikTok?

SAMMY: Mhm yeah.

IZZY: I was trying to manifest to this man to like me and [when I would do the affirmations] I realized I needed to stop telling myself I was ugly.

SAMMY: Wait I did that too. I did that too.

IZZY: That was literally why I started fixing up, and then it just kind of stuck. So, I guess the whole fake it till you make it thing—

SAMMY: It works.

IZZY: It works. The next question goes in hand with the previous one. What do you think is your greatest piece of advice for people that are younger than you? If you were your middle school/high school self how would you talk to yourself, what advice would you give for your younger self to find the comfort that you have now and that you aspire to have in the future?

SAMMY: That's hard, because when I was younger I didn't really—Talia and I had friends, I guess, but they weren't real friends, you know what I mean? Talia and I were the only people in high school that made it out of the shackles.

IZZY: Lowkey, I feel like if you have an ENTIRE group of friends from high school, you're still mentally in high school.

SAMMY: Yeah, I agree. Because I really did not have that many friends growing up, I'd honestly just tell myself that friends don't really matter and determine your self-worth. You're good, because you're gonna meet those people in the future. I didn't believe it, but my parents knew how much I struggled with making friends and they always told me when you graduate high school that's when you're gonna meet the people that actually matter. People that will stay in your life. So, I feel like I would tell my younger self, you're gonna meet your people eventually and that you shouldn't determine your whole self-worth on friends—and male validation, too.

IZZY: I think there's always an element to wanting that in some sort of way, just because it's conditioned in so many environments you're in. Even if you don't personally feel like you need male validation, it's still everywhere. It just becomes easier to notice who wants to get that and I honestly just feel bad for them because why care about what a man thinks?

SAMMY: Yeah literally, I agree. I would also tell my younger self, you're only in middle school/high school, why are you so worried about dating? You're literally a child, that’s not important. When I was in high school and middle school, I was friends with all these straight girls that were just dating all these guys all the time, they're in a new relationship every month. So then obviously that gets to your head, but also I lived in a small town and there's no gay people there. I’d just tell myself to stop depending on other people to give you self-worth if that makes sense.

IZZY: That's the tea right there. The next thing I wanted to talk about, is how you do have a larger platform on social media and how that kind of goes in hand the relationships you foster. We've obviously talked about this one-on-one a lot more, but when fostering true meaningful relationships, especially with friends, how do you differentiate between genuine friendship versus people who are trying to only get close to you for your platform?

SAMMY: I'm still honestly figuring that out. As soon as I moved to Toronto, that's when things started to become big for me. When I lived in Kitchener, no one really cared, I was starting to gain followers, but it wasn't a big thing. But when I moved to Toronto, I started going to all these events, doing things, and started to gain more followers. Then it became harder, especially since I just started going to a new school. It was harder to meet new friends. But the people that I met in the beginning of university, I feel like they're the people who I know are genuine. It's kind of just harder to differentiate now. But if I'm meeting someone new now, um, but I feel like I could tell a vibe you know? My real friends won't ask me to come to events that I'm going to or or I feel like my real friends will ask me about things that are going on in my career and my life but not try to—

IZZY: Insert themselves.

SAMMY: Exactly. Or they’ll just act like it’s a regular/normal part of my life versus someone saying “that’s so different.” You know what I mean? I feel like I can just tell a vibe from people, and a lot of my friends I have now I knew them before as well.

IZZY: You can just tell the vibe from the questions they're asking you, like “how do you know this person?” or “What are you doing for that [event]?” It's crazy work and I don't know why people care so much about that shit. It's also just so transparent. I've talked about this with a lot of different people, other creator friends, and the common thread is everyone saying it's the most transparent thing ever. Some people I feel are better at hiding it, but not everyone.

SAMMY: And some people will open up the conversation with “oh my god, I know you from TikTok, I want to be your friend” then you know.

IZZY: Your Hinge messages…

SAMMY: I get so many of those messages on Hinge and on different dating apps being like “you're so cool, I only want to be your friend,” and I'm like okay, well, then I don't want to talk to you.

IZZY: Like, this is a dating app. We're on a dating app, why are you trying to be my friend? Have some decorum.

SAMMY: It's weird. You can also just tell when people come up to me, and they're, like “I want to be your friend and I love your videos,” even in person, I really appreciate it, but also, I don't see myself having a friendship with you.

IZZY: I don't think we ever planned on becoming friends.

SAMMY: No, we were mutuals for a long time.

IZZY: I feel like we were just in each other's comments, cousin on my Harry [Styles] side type shit. It wasn't until more recently we started hanging out more—I feel like after Beyonce last year, that was the canon event. That's when I missed meeting Talia.

TALIA: I remember you having Sonique!

IZZY: Well yes! But yeah our friendship wasn't planned. I remember when we met at Harry in Toronto, and we bumped into each other at The Forum.

SAMMY: Yeah I don't know, I was talking with my friend about this too, like if someone does come up to me and I feel like I see genuine friendship in them, like, the way that they go about it is different than saying just “I love your videos I wanna be your friend.” They’ll usually just try to talk.

IZZY: There's a difference between someone going up to you and saying, “I love your videos, I want to be your friend,” versus someone acknowledging they know you from your videos but then actually starting a conversation over a common interest or showing an effort in wanting to talk to you.

SAMMY: That's exactly what it is.

TALIA: I even get that sometimes, where people will come up to me and be like “Oh, you're friends with Sammy.”

IZZY: That’s actually something I was gonna ask you, because I feel like that's another thing, just the association.

TALIA: Yeah or they'll be like “Oh my god, I love your friends Sammy and Nadia’s videos,” and I don't know what to say to that because it's not a compliment to me. I didn’t do anything they’re just my friends.

IZZY: I don't know, coming up to someone and only associating that person with their friend is crazy. It’s like when people will come up to someone you’re with and only talk to them, completely ignoring your existence.

SAMMY: It's weird, yeah.

IZZY: I'm gonna ask both of you this one, because all of us kind of became friends because of music—we all love our pop girls, of course. How has music influenced forming your sense of self and how you choose to express yourselves?

SAMMY: For me, it's my whole life. Growing up music was everything to me, not even just pop culture and stuff, but singing too. Music was always in my life growing up. It’s not my whole personality, but it's a big part of my personality, just because it's something that I love so much and I feel like I can bond with people so much easier when I'm talking about music or doing something in music. I'm really grateful because music actually brought me practically all my friends—my good friends. From going to concerts and shit like that. It's also helped me have a career, too. I just started showing my love for music on social media and now it's my career. So, it's had a huge impact on my life, I love it so much. I don't even know how to explain it.

TALIA: I feel like the pop girly-ism of it all and looking up to female artists especially, has kind of helped me gain confidence. I was an Ariana Grande STAN.

IZZY: Well, yes!

TALIA: And even, it sounds stupid, but Melanie Martinez used to be my queen when I was 11 and 12. I was fucking weird as hell, and she really helped me lean into my weird girl-ism.

SAMMY: That's how me and Talia connected.

IZZY: Period.

TALIA: Nobody else knew her, but I felt so seen by her.

IZZY: I feel like my Melanie Martinez was Marina and the Diamonds.

TALIA: Hell yeah. The weird girl artists I feel especially seen by them. I only very recently got into Björk, and now I'm stanning hard. I knew who she was, obviously, but I never really tapped in until a few weeks ago and she literally blew my mind.

IZZY: That’s actually the fucking queen.

TALIA: I was like, where has she been all my life?

IZZY: When you were younger and growing up before social media, before Spotify, how did you guys discover music? I was asked this the other day, and I actually had to really think about it.

SAMMY: My parents. Hannah Montana when I was four. It was serious to me, I knew every single song. Honestly, Disney as a whole. I watched cartoons, of course, but I really grew up watching Hannah Montana, and Selena Gomez was my fucking queen too. I fucking love that hoe, l’ll always have a fucking soft spot in my heart for her. She was my idol growing up, her and Miley, when I was literally four and five. So young, I didn't even have brain cells but I was streaming. Also my dad, for some reason, me and him have really similar music tastes. He loved Beyonce, and Shakira, and all the pop girls so he would make CDs and play them in the car. I feel like that's how I found my love for the pop girls. Demi [Lovato] was also my queen. Selena was my first concert, I remember it was the day before my birthday and I was literally turning five. I was all the way in the back—like last row in the nosebleeds, and I knew every single word to every single song, even the deep cuts. All the moms went up to my mom and were like “How does he know every single word to every single song?” You just have to get it, I don't know, sorry, your daughter's only here for ‘Who Says’— I'm here for the deep cuts!

IZZY: No you knew the hits! I would have killed to see Selena Gomez in her prime.

TALIA: She was also my first concert actually.

IZZY: Wait both of your first concerts was Selena?

SAMMY: I feel like if you ask most people born in 2005’s first concert they’ll say Selena.

TALIA: She used to be tea!

IZZY: She did used to be tea, ‘Naturally’ was the best song ever. My first concert was the Rolling Stones.

TALIA: That’s fierce.

IZZY: For me music discovery was listening to my parents’ CDs and watching the MuchMusic video countdowns.

TALIA: Oh my god the MuchMusic end of year CDs.

IZZY: I would literally watch the countdown every night, I was so tuned into MuchMusic. That was a big part of music discovery for me, my mom was also a pop girl and she put me onto a lot of 80s music. My dad was more of the classic rock sort of guy. I'm not gonna lie, I learned so much about music discovery from Glee. Music discovery is so different now. We used to literally just know what our parents listened to.

SAMMY: When Family Channel used to play music videos, that's how I found ‘Put Your Hearts Up’ by Ariana.

IZZY: That's how I discovered Justin Bieber! On Family Channel, they played ‘One Time’.

TALIA: I used to go to the Big Ticket Summer Concerts! They brought me on stage once.

IZZY: Oh my god, I forgot those were a thing. I never went. Who is on your pop girl Mount Rushmore?

SAMMY: Hmm. Do they all have to be ‘pop’ girls?

IZZY: It can just be your Queen Mount Rushmore.

SAMMY: Ariana, duh. Billie Eilish, duh. Sabrina Carpenter. And I’m gonna put her on here because she needs to be on here—Jade [Thirlwall] is my queen.

IZZY: Well yes Queen Jade! I’m happy you gave it to her.

SAMMY: No, Jade is gonna be that girl. Let her album come out, and I know that she's gonna be the queen.

IZZY: Wait, when is her album dropping?

SAMMY: She said May, hopefully. Stop, like,

IZZY: A spring awakening, for sure.

SAMMY:And then we go to the tour and we peach!

IZZY: No respectfully, if there's anyone that you need to collab with—

SAMMY: It’s Queen Jade!

IZZY: You’re the only person I know who’s stanning hard.

TALIA: I love an oomf that stans the most random girl DOWN.

IZZY: Me with Gwen Stefani.

TALIA: I stan Carly Rae Jepsen.

SAMMY: I was a Little Mix stan and Jade was my favourite. When they opened for Ariana, that’s when I really learned I loved them and Jade was my queen.

IZZY: Ariana always had the tea with openers. Who's on your pop girl/queen Mount Rushmore, Talia?

TALIA: I think Clairo, Ariana Grande, Billie Eilish, and Phoebe Bridgers—that’s my queen.

IZZY: I honestly feel like I would’ve been able to guess that for both of you. Mine are hard I don’t know.

SAMMY: Gracie Abrams would also probably be on mine.

TALIA: Yeah lowkey Gracie Abrams.

IZZY: The crowd goes mild.

TALIA: No we’re like very aware—I be liking the Gracie Abrams hate tweets but I still stream.

IZZY: I don’t get it personally but you guys are OG Gracie stans. I feel like everyone I know who likes her is too. I don’t have any valid reason to dislike her I just do.

TALIA: Yeah I don’t really understand people who are newer fans as much because this album wasn’t even her best one. We’ve just been fans for so long that we can’t not like her.

SAMMY: Yeah we both just love her old music so much. I listen to a few songs off the new album but it’s not my favourite—I want her to start making music that makes me feel suicidal again.

TALIA: Izzy who’s on your Mount Rushmore?

IZZY: Hmm. For me I’d say Hayley Williams of course, I love that woman down. Gwen Stefani, Miley Cyrus, and Shakira. I grew up on all of them, I especially didn’t play about Shakira.

TALIA: Wait I just realized none of us listed Beyonce.

IZZY: Oh my god. Wait that’s because Beyonce is bigger than Mount Rushmore. She’s God.

SAMMY: Beyonce is the building in Dubai!

TALIA: The Burj Khalifa!

IZZY: Beyonce is the biggest landmark in every city. She’s the CN Tower in Toronto. The Empire State Building in New York. The Space Needle in Seattle. Pop Girl/Queen Mount Rushmore aside, what is an interest, talent, or hobby you have that you feel like nobody knows about or would expect from you?

SAMMY: A talent I feel like nobody knows I have—not that I believe I’m THAT talented—but I’ve always been singing, acting and dancing. I was a theatre kid growing up, doing singing and acting classes, theatre camps, and stuff like that. I was in a glee group for years with kids around my town—we would literally sing pop songs. It was a huge thing, like we would sell out concerts. I loved doing it, it was my favourite thing in the world and I did it until I moved [to Toronto]. If I was still living in the same town. I’d still be doing it today. I feel like nobody knows that I sing. Sometimes I’d post videos once in a while and people will be like “you don’t sing”—but I do sing, I act, and I went to an arts high school. I feel like people don’t know that about me, music has always been my life. I get scared to post about it now because I grew up with trauma from posting videos of me singing on social media and the boys from middle school would make fun of me in my comments. The posts are archived now but the comments are still there. I’d go to the mall and boys from other, random middle schools would come and make fun of me to my face. So that trauma I have from posting videos of me singing online, I feel like I can’t move on or it just scares me to post myself singing now. Once in a while I do, but it scares me to. I need to start doing it though, I really want to make music. I sing and song write and I want to share that with the world. from people bullying me in middle school and high school when I would post singing videos.

IZZY: Theatre kids UP! Middle school boys are horrifying. But trust and believe everyone will be sat for Sammy music debut. That being said, now that you’ve talked a bit about your future, with wanting to share music, it brings me to my last question. To wrap things up, I wanted to talk about the silly 12 hour TikTok ban. It had me thinking a lot about of the future of social media, how it’s in a really strange place with a lot of uncertainty. When you hear that, how does it make you feel with regards to your personal use of social media, with the platform you have and your future?

SAMMY: The TikTok ban was definitely scary because my platform is growing as we speak, but at any time it can be taken away from me. I realized this when my account got banned during that 12 hours, and it also made me realize I should branch out a little bit more and not just focus on posting on TikTok but post YouTube videos again—which was where I started posting on social media anyways. I used to love doing YouTube. I also wanna DJ and do sets and stuff like that. I wanna make music—I'm in school for music production so I wanna start making music so I have other options for me to get my creativity out and still love what I do. I still want to be on social media, but I want to do other stuff as well.

FOLLOW SAMMY: @sammy.talukder

FOLLOW TALIA: @talialowell_