A decade later, we still miss 2016

By the mid 2020s, nostalgia has become the internet’s favorite language. And in the Philippines, one year keeps resurfacing with quiet persistence: 2016.

On TikTok and Facebook, Filipinos post throwback clips with captions like, “Iba talaga ang 2016” and “Last good year.” Grainy selfies taken on keypad phones reappear. Old class photos beside chalkboards flood timelines. Someone uploads a shaky video of children chasing Pokémon near the town plaza. The comments quickly fill with the same line: “Ang saya noon.”

For many who grew up in the provinces, this longing is not abstract. It is tied to school bells, town fiestas, slow internet, and a country that was just beginning to change.

Politics in the background of childhood

In 2016, national politics entered even the smallest towns. In a fishing village in Cagayan, Micah B. Tungol was in Grade 6 when campaign posters began covering electric posts.

“I remember Duterte tarpaulins everywhere on the way to school,” she said. “My parents argued about the election at night. But in the morning, I still worried more about my spelling quiz.”

Her family watched the results on a small television powered by an antenna.

“When Duterte won, my father said crime would finally stop,” Micah recalled. “I did not understand any of it. After the news, I went outside to play Chinese garter with my cousins.”

Cesar Ian E. Inay was in his first year of high school that year, and he remembers learning about the 2016 election in his Araling Panlipunan class.

“Our teacher explained the election in Araling Panlipunan,” he said. “Some classmates repeated what their parents said about drugs and discipline. But after class, we forgot. We played basketball until sunset.”

Culture in small town classrooms

Away from Manila, culture moved at its own pace. In Cagayan province, Jaybel and her classmates shared one phone during lunch breaks.

“We listened to ‘Dahil Sa’yo’ on repeat,” she said. “Every classroom had someone singing Iñigo Pascual.”

Memes arrived slowly, often passing from one phone to another through Bluetooth or shared memory cards, taking days before the same joke finally reached the whole class.

“We had only one computer shop,” said Hannah. “Thirty pesos for one hour. We opened Facebook, saved funny pictures, and shared them through Bluetooth in school.”

There were no influencers yet in their feeds. No filters to perfect faces.

Lifestyle before life became heavy

For many students, 2016 was the last full year of simple routine. Lance, who was then in Grade 5, remembers days that followed the same gentle pattern of school in the morning, games in the afternoon, and home before dark, with little else to worry about beyond homework and chores.

“After class, we went straight to the river,” he said. “We swam in our uniforms and ate green mango with salt. My only fear was my mother scolding me for coming home wet.”

Life changed quickly after that. Senior high school arrived. Some families sent children to cities. Money became a worry. Then came the pandemic.

The year they are really asking for

When Filipinos say they want to go back to 2016, they are not asking for an election year. They are asking for afternoons beside basketball courts and rivers. For friendships that lived next door. For a country that had not yet taught them how heavy the world could be.

2016 was not perfect. But for children who grew up under mango trees while a new president took power and history quietly shifted, it was the last year when time felt kind.

And that is why, nearly a decade later, they keep returning to it.

“Ang saya noon.”