The budding artist

CEBU, Philippines - Good day, kids! February is National Arts Month. As promised, we are featuring blossoming artists, like Franzel Kaye Gesman Tolentino of Lutac Elementary School, Naga City, Cebu.

Ate Kakay - as family, close classmates and friends call her - is 11 years old. She is in Grade 5 yet, but she has already decided to pursue an Engineering course when she gets to college. It's still seven years to go, though, because of the senior high school in line with K to 12 Program.

She is into some boyish stuff, she says. That's why she likes Engineering. As to what specific field of engineering, she has to grow some more first to be able to decide.

Kakay is trained by her parents, Joy and Avelino Jr., to manage her time well. This is because she also loves to draw and play the guitar as well as the piano. She dabbles on being vocalist and instrumentalist of the school band. She is into dancing, too. She really is a star performer in the making. And yet Kakay has also her studies to take seriously as she is consistently on the Honors Roll. So she has to divide her time properly.

She mentioned that the influences in her creative and artistic pursuits are big names in the music industry like Rihanna, Yeng Constantino, Sarah Geronimo, Adele, Boyce Avenue, Beyonce, Madi Jane, Tiffany, Danielle, and Miley Cyrus.

Kakay learned strumming the guitar at six years old. She started performing for a big audience in Grade 2. While she was in Third Grade, she began taking efforts to improve her drawings. Then, she was soon participating in drawing contests, like in Editorial Cartooning when the school held a Journalism Workshop or a School Press Conference.

As for her interest in drawing, she takes inspiration from cartoon characters. "We are allowed to watch Cartoon Network. I like Naruto," the shy girl says. Showing a sample of her sketch on the environment, Kakay shares that the other subjects of her drawings are "about the world around me."

Kakay is the eldest of three children, and the only girl. Her mother is a public elementary school teacher, while her father an overseas contract worker in Malaysia. (FREEMAN)