Lourdes Kho Samson, chair of the Humanities Department of Miriam College, Batch ’64 (and my high school stenography teacher);
Teresita "Tessie" Sy Coson, vice chairman of SM Investments Corporation, Batch ’66; Josephine "Joji" Gotianun Yap, president of Filinvest Development Corporation, Batch ’71; and Queena Lee Chua, newspaper columnist and math professor at Ateneo University, Batch ’83.
They are all graduates of Immaculate Conception Academy (ICA), arguably the most cosmopolitan Chinoy girls’ school in the country today. There are many other successful ICAns, of course; however, these five represent their respective fields. This year, ICA celebrates its 70th anniversary. The school was founded in 1936 and moved seven times before it found its permanent home in Greenhills, San Juan. What was supposed to be a serious discussion on the advantages of an ICA education turned into a no-holds-barred discussion that had everyone in stitches. I will not even bother to indicate the word "laughter" anymore after every statement. Or I would repeat it 50 times.
The discussion had Sr. Dina Ang, School Directress, and Sr. Teresita Canivel, Finance and Development Administrator and School Directress for 19 years, in attendance. If there is one person on earth who can still scold these women up to this day and age, it’s Sr. Canivel. "Hey, where are you? We’re all waiting for you!" she chided the latecomers on her cell phone.
Jullie Yap Daza walked in and immediately asked, "Who’s paying for dinner?"
"God will provide," answered Sr. Canivel.
I told Sr. Canivel that she would be part of the interview, and she said, "No, I will just sit here and listen. You talk."
Let’s start the interview. Please state your marital status.
QUEENA LEE CHUA: Married with one son.
Married, as in, how married?
Queena: Contentedly married.
JOJI GOTIANUN YAP: Passionately married with two sons and one daughter in ICA.
LOURDES KHO SAMSON: Mysteriously married. One son.
JULLIE YAP DAZA: Merrily widowed with two sons and two daughters.
Merrily widowed?!
Jullie: Yes, like that operetta.
Are you dating?
Jullie: If someone applies I will allow myself to date him. If you have someone in mind, tell him to call you for my phone number. I will give you 10-percent commission if it works.
TESSIE SY COSON: Just say I am simply widowed with one son and two daughters.
Are you dating?
Tessie: Not dating. No incentive to date. I no longer believe in fantasy.
SR. TERESITA CANIVEL: Hey, girls, I thought we were going to talk about ICA!
Sister, I thought you would just sit down and listen. What did all of you do today?
Queena: Students. Tons of stuff.
Joji: My usual stuff. Meetings. Planning. Family dinner.
Lourdes: I think I drank too much coffee. I don’t remember.
Jullie: My God, dami!
Tessie: I forgot.
Let’s talk about your ICA education. Did it prepare you for the outside world?
Joji: Definitely. When we went to college, a lot of ICAns excelled. Even those who didn’t do well in ICA excelled in college.
Queena: Oh, yes, even those who got C-pluses in ICA did very well. The best thing about ICA is that you are idealistic. But the foundation is strong enough that even if you’re faced with a challenge, you know what’s right and what’s wrong.
Lourdes: We know our priorities. We know how to focus. There’s no compromise for excellence.
Joji: The ICA girls are very simple, down-to-earth.
All: Yes, yes, yes!
Lourdes: We didn’t make life complicated.
Sr. Canivel: Grabe ang self-confidence. Sobra.
Jullie: ICA prepared me to be a shining star in UST that had 22,000 students.
Tessie: Give me a few minutes. My brain is not working tonight.
How did you survive under the nuns?
Joji: You mean, how did the nuns survive under us?
Sr. Canivel: Correct. How did the nuns survive under you people?
Lourdes: Our batch was more well-behaved.
Joji: The batch of Lourdes, they were really more well-behaved. Kami naman, mabait, pero mischievous.
Queena: Robina, you have to say our batch is mabait!
Sister, how did you survive under the ICAns?
Sr. Canivel: By the grace of God! How will you not survive? They push you to the wall so that you have to survive. Seriously speaking, ICAns are a challenge and they get the best of you.
SR. DINA ANG: ICAns make things happen.
Queena: They have a lot of initiative.
Lourdes: Very enterprising.
Queena: Not passive.
Joji: Innovative. They don’t do things halfway. Too much energy.
Queena: We don’t like mediocrity.
Sr. Canivel: When they have a project, they don’t just depend on the ICA library. They go further than that.
Lourdes: Sr. Canivel, you pushed us to the wall also!
Joji: During our time, the sisters – quiet presence lang. They didn’t really nag us.
Jullie: During our time, the nuns were French-Canadian. They didn’t understand us so they ignored us. My favorite was Sr. Saint Jean.
Tessie: I think I was very timid so the nuns had no problem with me. But Sister didn’t like our class because we were not studying. We were the first ICAn class that held our prom outside the school grounds. A lot of my classmates were indifferent to studying.
Sr. Canivel: Tessie was very, very quiet.
Tessie: I was one of the few who studied. When I was in third year, the best student in our class had an average of 88. I was in Section B. Section A was the diligent class. Section B had the lazy ones. The principal was not happy. The next year the principal put some of the Section A students into our section hoping we would improve, but we did not.
Sr. Canivel: A few in the class of Tessie already had boyfriends!
How has the stereotype of the Chinoy girl changed from your time?
Tessie: Most of them don’t speak Chinese anymore.
All: Right!
Joji: The word to describe the ICAns before was the Hokkien word "yu siu," meaning "prim and proper." Now I don’t think you hear that word anymore. But all of us were given equal opportunity to work even if we were girls.
Jullie: Before, walang tambayan, kasi walang SM. Ang tambayan before was the Narra Buddhist Temple when ICA was still in Intramuros. They were selling bananas at 30 cents apiece.
Lourdes: Before, walang tambayan ang ICA at Xavier, kasi wala pang Mary the Queen Parish (the church is located between the two schools). Ngayon doon pa ang tambayan.
What is the image of the ICAn now?
Jullie: We don’t know what our image is. There was one time in the history of the Philippines that we had a Vicky Toh and Mary "Rosebud" Ong sharing the limelight.
Sr. Canivel: Oy!
ALL: Di ba ICAns din sila?
Sr. Canivel: Kayo talaga.
Take two: What is the image of the ICAn now?
Tessie: Feisty Filipino-Chinese woman.
Jullie: I’m very saintly, submissive, prayerful.
Joji: "I am a woman of faith and service," sabi ni Sr. Dina. That’s what we’re supposed to be.
Sr. Dina: There are other ways of showing your faith.
Jullie: We don’t only survive, we kick ass.
Tessie: Independent.
Sr. Canivel: You ICAns are too independent and self-confident.
Tessie: In the academe, there’s nothing about how to live a life as a wife.
Jullie: They don’t teach you how to make money and have sex.
Lourdes: Women now are more assertive and they try to make a presence. If the girl makes more money than her man, it’s accepted.
Tessie: It’s a growing trend.
Joji: I think it’s because women are given more opportunities now.
Speaking of sex, how did you learn about sex?
Sr. Canivel: Bakit tayo napunta sa sex?
Jullie: I read Lady Chatterley’s Lover when I was 13.
Lourdes: The sisters outsourced our sex education to a clinic. We were shown slides of reproductive organs.
Jullie: We had sex education lectures during a retreat one month before graduation and the nuns got a teacher. Looking at her, you would not think of having sex ever.
Tessie: We had no sex education. That’s why I had my first kid after 10 years.
Queena: From books.
Joji: We had sex education. Bakit kayo wala?
Why did you send your daughters to ICA?
Jullie: To be like me. To be siga in UST. I gave the commencement speech at UST. It was my Chineseness that made me stand out in the university.
Tessie: I sent my daughters to ICA because it is a conservative school and the Catholic education is good.
Joji: Catholic and Chinese education. At the same time, it’s not super Chinese. It’s more balanced. The girls are more well-rounded. Other Chinese schools are more structured.
Jullie: Chinese na, Filipino pa, French- Canadian pa. That made me more global.
Lourdes: You’re part of a global universe but you can keep your Chinese identity.
Who was the teacher who influenced you the most?
Jullie: My piano teacher. I gave up piano after 12 years.
Joji: Miss Sia. Because I was rebellious and she disciplined me. I was always told to stand outside the classroom.
Jullie: Sr. Canivel, because she taught me math and physics. She opened my eyes to understanding physics and the natural world. And for the first time I understood math. And Sr. Saint Jean, she would read all my compositions.
Sr. Canivel, you taught math and physics and not religion?
Sr. Canivel: Because when I was a layperson, I was not "religious" yet.
All: Ha, ha, ha…
Lourdes: My Chinese teachers like Mrs. Rosita Sy and Mrs. Antonia Tan. They encouraged me to work on my calligraphy.
Queena: All my teachers influenced me. I loved my math and science teachers. If I have ICAns in my class and they complain that they didn’t understand a subject, I say, "I know your teachers and I know that you learned this subject matter from them."
Tessie: My favorite teacher is Sr. Canivel because up to now she’s still teaching me.