For Paw, life’s not a box of chocolates

She’s being paired with Mikel Campos, but Paw Diaz is the first to deny there’s something more than friendship going on between them. It’s all work, no play for her and her Qpids co-star.

"I’m not the type who attracts suitors, even when I was younger," the 19-year-old Star Magic talent says. Maybe because Paw has been tomboyish even as the middle child growing up in a family of six boys (five on the side of her father before he got widowed and remarried Paw’s mom, and one on her mother’s side).

To top it off, the bedimpled Paw happens to be her father’s first daughter and he felt incredulous at first that a girl was finally born to him.

"He thought it was a mistake and that I was a boy," the AB Mass Communication junior student laughs.

Bottles of lotion or beauty creams on her dresser are not Paw’s style. But pistol shooting is. In fact, she tops in the sport.

Paw’s concerned mother decided to develop her daughter’s feminine side by making her join beauty contests at 16. Paw won the Hiyas ng San Pedro (Laguna) tilt in 2003. The P15,000 cash prize she brought home went straight to the family coffers. One beauty tilt led to another. Paw joined Miss Laguna next and emerged first runner-up.

Bb. Pilipinas followed, but Paw was underage when she applied.

The beauty contest stints may not have been her cup of tea at first, but Paw soon learned how to enjoy them.

"I’m like that. I may not like to do things at first. But I later find a way of putting my heart in it," she admits.

Besides, she can’t say no to her mom, who also prodded Paw to join showbiz. Insiders know the studious Paw was hesitant. But the family could use the extra income so she finally said yes.

Now, she’s taking wu shu lessons and exercising regularly to prepare for her role as an Amazon girl in the Panday series with Jericho Rosales and Heart Evangelista. Star Cinema is also lining up a movie for her and Mikel.

Paw may not have landed the role of Eden in Panday (it went to Heart Evangelista). But the audition did not go to waste. ABS-CBN executives who saw Paw decided her built and agile frame fit the role of the Amazon woman just fine.

As it is, Paw is a regular on ASAP Fanatic. Before classes were called off a week ago, she was reporting straight to the set of her TV guestings even if she had to proceed there right after school.

It’s not easy, especially when yours is a regular load of 28 units like Paw’s.

Stress and lack of sleep are her enemies. She does assignments in-between taping breaks and can’t catch a nap in school because all eyes are on her.

Her teachers at the University of Perpetual Help in Biñan make sure their celebrity student is treated like anyone else. When Paw misses a class, they give her extra work. She queues up in the library to borrow books and lines up again to return them like all the others.

That’s all right with Paw, who plans to take up summer classes to make up for the years she was out of school as a member of Star Circle National Teen Quest’s Fab Five.

"I want to graduate on time," this young woman in a hurry explains.

Earning her keep for the family is no walk in the park, but a dutiful Paw has learned to accept this. She has never been the flighty, frivolous type in the first place.

Gimmicks and night-outs leave her bored and raring to go home.

"I’m such a killjoy," she admits.

It could be because she need not go far to beat stress. Her means of relaxation is at her beck and call, in the most convenient place of all: Home.

"I love hanging around with my siblings. That’s all I need to drive the tension away," says Paw.

She’d also rather take up crochet needle and yarn and fashion a cellphone holder for herself. Paw learned the skill from her dressmaker-mom, who also made this one favorite dress she (Paw) loves to wear.

Life may not be a box of chocolates for Paw Diaz. But she has learned to take the good with the bad. In the process, she’s stumbling upon pleasant surprises and a handful of intrigues that shock and strengthen her, all in one power-packed blow.