“I used to break plates so I wouldn’t have so much to wash.”
Yasmien Kurdi recalls how she managed to get back at her Teyta (her Lebanese grandmother) for making her wash dishes and scrub greasy pots and pans back in Kuwait.
She admits that discrimination was something she learned to understand at a very young age. Born in Kuwait to a Lebanese father and a Filipino mother, Yasmien grew up in her Teyta’s home and lived with the old woman’s spite for her being half-Filipino. “It was obvious because she wasn’t as harsh with my cousins,” she shares.
Now that Yasmien topbills the newest Sharon Cuneta remake Babangon Ako’t Dudurugin Kita, which will replace Marimar on GMA Network’s weeknight primetime block starting on March 24, she is asked if she deems her new show’s title an apt line for her Teyta.
“That’s such a cruel line,” she laughs. “My grandmother is very old now. Among Arabs, people are too old when they reach 60 or 70 — it’s the prime age to die. But, honestly, I hold no grudge against Teyta now. I even plan to visit her when I find the time.”
At 19, Yasmien believes that she has become mature enough to understand what she went through as a child and what happened to her family. “I used to hate my father because I couldn’t understand why he and Mom always fought, why my mother always cried,” she discloses. “When Mom and I left him to live in the Philippines, I still harbored that hate for him. It was too hard for me to understand their differences. But now I’ve realized why my parents can never be together. It’s a matter of religion. I shouldn’t impose anything that will complicate things for us. We’re all doing well now. I know that there’s no way for my parents to get back together again, but I’m happy that they are friends now. Dad and I are also the closest we’ve ever been. We are always communicating now, and he says he’ll come visit me here soon.”
She adds that her Dad is still not too keen on her being an actress and that he keeps on telling her “no kissing.” Asked how her Dad will react when he finds out that she’s not only kissing different guys on TV but also doing bed scenes and rape scenes, she briefly replies, “He doesn’t know yet and he really hasn’t watched any of my projects.”
In Babangon Ako’t Dudurugin Kita, Yasmien plays the role of Salve, originally portrayed by Sharon Cuneta in the movie, who marries Alfred (Marvin Agustin), gets raped under the orders of Via (Angelika dela Cruz), and is trained to be a hired killer by Derek (JC De Vera) and Mona Lisa (Dina Bonnevie).
Although her new show is a primetime program and will be replacing the hugely successful Marimar, Yasmien does not want to think of the pressure and high expectations from viewers and her home network. “I just want to do my job and enjoy it while praying for God to guide me along the way,” she says.
Asked if she is ready to shed her teeny bopper roles and concentrate on more serious projects like Babangon Ako’t Dudurugin Kita, Yasmien says that she will still be doing light roles such as that of Tasya Fantasya, a remake of the Kris Aquino movie which will soon air as a weekly series on GMA.
“Babangon may be a serious show but we have fun doing it,” she adds. “In fact, Kuya Marvin and I had a laughing fit when we shot our love scene as husband and wife. I found it weird to be doing a bed scene with him. I mean, I used to watch him and Ate Jolens (Jolina Magdangal) as a loveteam and now I’m the one getting intimate with him. It’s just so funny that we couldn’t get the scene right, that we always ended up laughing whenever we tried to be serious. Direk Joel (Lamangan) had to get down for us to finally do it right.”
According to Yasmien, she can honestly say that she has never been this happy in her life. “I really couldn’t ask for more. My career is doing well. Both my Mom and my Dad are healthy and though they’re apart, they’re friends and I’m close to both of them. I feel loved by my fans. In fact, I just met my US fans when I did a show there with Ate Jolens and Kuya Dennis (Trillo) recently. I was received warmly by my fans there; they toured me and I didn’t even spend a single cent. They shouldered all the expenses and even gave me so much pasalubong. I had excess baggage on my trip back to the Philippines, but most of the stuff were the fans’ pasalubong for JC (De Vera). They are big fans of our love team.”
Yasmien also plans to pursue a college education and will be taking her exams this April. “I want to take up International Studies because I want to work in the UN or the embassies in the future. I want to be able to help the Filipinos working and living abroad. I also want to be the one working for my parents so that they’ll just enjoy their lives and not have to worry about earning money — I will be the one earning for them.”
In the same breath, she adds that she wants both her parents to find their respective partners in life. “I might upload their profiles in Match.Com one day to start the search,” she quips.