That Star ad, high school days & teachers

I can’t figure out where or how this article fits in – is it about graduation (where as usual, I’m months behind when I write about special occasions), or is it about school opening (for once, I am on time), or is it simply another press release of my high school homecoming this November? I have already written about my high school days in the February 9 issue of the STAR and felt that it was bitin. Well, when I wrote that in February, my timing was clearly off again. I was supposed to write about Valentine’s Day but my romantic side is as cold as a rock. I asked my husband for help but he said that everyday was Valentine’s Day for him so he had nothing to contribute. As if.

But before I talk about school, I’d like to give my own thoughts on the Philippine STAR TV commercial, where I made some very weird comments that could easily land me in jail. My apologies to Tita Tingting Cojuangco who first wrote about it in the April 27 issue of this paper. I asked her permission to be gaya-gaya because I had also wanted to write about the ad but never got around to doing it (as usual).

I always feel like passing out when I appear on TV, but this time I couldn’t refuse my bosses at the STAR since it was this paper that first gave me the break to write my own column. I wish I were more disciplined so that my articles don’t come out in now-you-see-them-now-you-don’t intervals, but it’s easy to lose your sense of humor nowadays. Imagine being bombarded with the Iraq war, SARS, the MILF threat, terrorists, kidnappers, floods, traffic, garbage, ship collisions, business reversals, and it’s not even the end of the year. In fact, some diplomats even lose their sense of diplomacy.

It was Tita Millet Mananquil, Lifestyle editor of this paper, who first gave me a break to write in a national publication when she was still editor of Expressweek, the Sunday magazine of the now-defunct Daily Express. And the one who introduced me to Tita Millet was Lani Ablaza, wife of Globe Telecom president Gerry Ablaza. Lani was then an advertising executive in our group and knew that I could use some of my free time to attempt some writing. I am beginning to sound like an actress who just accepted an award and is thanking everyone, but someone told me once never to be embarrassed to thank people.

The Day Of The Star Ad Shoot

Back to the ad, I think there were two days of shooting and we were asked to choose which slot we wanted. Immediately I chose the first slot on the first day so that I didn’t get to see the person before me do an excellent job as most of the columnists who were invited are so used to facing the TV. I didn’t want to die of inferiority complex. I was nervous, but it was my driver/bodyguard who was excited. He made a wrong turn and got caught in traffic in a very narrow road. It was terrible timing because I was dying to go to the restroom. At one point I couldn’t stand it anymore that I knocked on the door of a liquor store that wasn’t opened yet and asked them if I could use their restroom. They were kind enough to let me in.

When I got to the production house, I met Yeyey Yatco, the talented director of the TV commercial. With his booming voice, Yeyey could command a batallion anytime. He told me that I would be asked seven questions and I would have to answer only either "yes" or "no." And no, he could not give me the questions in advance. Yikes. I asked the hairdresser if he could possibly steal the list of questions for me or take a peek at them, but he said that he didn’t even know who had them. I told myself, please, any question except about politics. After all, there’s a difference between a full-time writer who runs a business part-time, and a part-time writer who runs a business full-time. You don’t play the same roles on earth. For those who’ve seen the ad, obviously, I spoke too soon.

That All-Girls’ School Across Xavier

The question that really knocked me down was "Would you vote for FPJ as president?" I wanted to say that I would be biased because he’s my kumpare. Really. We were both godparents at a wedding many years ago, when I was still in my 30s. I sat beside him at the reception and got so kilig sitting beside such a good movie actor, no less than the king of Philippine movies! I think I was under a spell, because I had the guts to tell him straight to his face that I always liked his movies and admired the way he punched all his enemies to a pulp. After I said that, I felt so embarrassed. My stomach turned upside down and I ended up in the restroom with LBM. Anyway, the question on FPJ caught me by surprise, and it reminded me immediately of the wedding reception, so I only repeated what I told him before I landed in the restroom with LBM.

I’ve said enough about the STAR ad. Let me talk now about my school, Immaculate Conception Academy (ICA), where I spent 12 years of my student life before I moved on to college. It is our 25th anniversary this year, and school is starting in a week or two, and I cannot help but talk about our dear old school again. So please forgive me since our celebration is year-long.

During our time, ICA was always known as "that all girls’ school across Xavier School." No one knew what or where ICA was, and no one knew that it was run by the Canadian-based Missionaries of the Immaculate Conception (MIC). Mention ICA now, and everyone knows where it is. In fact, I can consider it a preferred school among parents today.

During our time, and maybe up to this time, the ICAns had a love-hate relationship with the Xavierians and vice-versa. During our rare dance parties, we would invite guys from La Salle, Aquinas and Lourdes School – but hardly the Xavierians. We just wanted to break away from the norm. "It was an act of rebellion," as a former batchmate describes it. But in the end, it was the Xavierians and ICAns who would marry each other. I remember our dance parties then and how baduy we were. We had to hold it in someone’s home under the noses of the nuns, and the parties usually ended by 10 p.m. at the latest. We served punch in punch bowls (where else?) and it was such a rare treat to have pineapple juice with a tinge of vodka. It was even a rarer treat seeing boys and girls together. The boys sat on the one row while the girls sat on another row across the boys. When the music started, the boys would stand up and ask a girl for a dance. It wasn’t exactly like a massage parlor where the curtains would open and in front of you were 30 very pretty masahistas to choose from. Woe to the girl that no boy would want to dance with. But with me, I felt the opposite. I was hoping no boy would approach me, not only because I didn’t know how to dance, but because I didn’t want him to see that I was wearing the same boys’ shoes I wore in school. Gregg pa mandin.

In high school, we were four sections in all, all named after a precious stone – Agate, Beryl, Jasper and Opal. In grade school, the sections were named after a flower. I will sound like a florist naming them all, so I will skip this part... I love collecting old things, and so on page F-2 are our high school photos with our respective class advisers. Unfortunately, some of the photos are blurred and I don’t have the photos of the other three sections, although the colored photo shows the entire graduating class of 1978. Don’t even look at the costume of our musical conductor. Way back in 1978, that was the fashion. Now, that would be considered curtain fabric. We had some classmates who moved to other schools or moved abroad or joined the Youth for Understanding student-exchange program before we graduated, but still, we consider them our batchmates.

Our class adviser when we were in first year was Mrs. Linda Fornoles, who was one of my favorite teachers. She taught us English Literature and Composition. If not for her, I would not be writing in the Philippine STAR today. She taught me how to write when I was 13. She is now teaching Shakespeare at a public school in Oxnard, California. Mrs. Fornoles was so good I knew she would teach Shakespeare one day to the Americans.

Our class adviser in our sophomore year was Mrs. Briones, who also taught English, focusing on mythology. I can swear that Mrs. Briones knew all the Roman gods by heart, along with their Greek counterparts. She was the one who stirred my imagination so that I was hoping to be Venus, the Roman goddess of love (Greek counterpart – Aphrodite) and that I would meet my Mars, Roman god of war (Greek counterpart – Ares) one day. Well, I never met my Mars, and my husband never met his Venus. We were just two boring moons who gravitated towards each other.

On our third year, our class adviser was Mrs. Anastacia Tan, who taught Chinese. As I keep telling people, if we only knew that China would become an economic powerhouse in 25 years, we would have taken our Chinese lessons seriously. Mrs. Tan, how about some remedial classes?

And on our final year, it was Mrs. Linda de Lara who was our class adviser. Mrs. De Lara taught Pilipino (now Filipino), and it was in her class that we read Rizal’s classics, Noli Me Tangere and El Filibusterismo. At the age of 16, we woke up to the real world and discovered that friars could also father children. Twenty-five years after, we discover that some priests can be pedophiles too, but I won’t dwell on this any longer. I don’t want to get excommunicated, especially after I said in the STAR TV commercial that I believe in divorce.

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RAUL LOCSIN: A GREAT TEACHER

Before I end this piece, I would like to give my own thoughts on the passing away of Raul Locsin, publisher of Business World. I used to call him all the time whenever The Manila Times was giving me a headache, the biggest one of all was when former president Erap sued me for this "unwitting ninong" story. He gave me a lot of useful advice, like a dad would give his daughter (after all, he was exactly 30 years older than me). A lot of what I could learn from newspapering I learned from him, except that I didn’t know how to make money and he did. Not that he didn’t teach me how to make money, but he told me that it wouldn’t be easy.

When Erap sued, he said that he would certainly write an editorial denouncing the lawsuit, and that he would write it himself. And he did. It was a beautifully written editorial, and not only because he was defending the Times, but because it was an eloquent piece on how a newspaper should be run and how a government should behave. Tito Raul was also a stickler for accuracy, as his staff very well knows. When a report came out in Business World that the Times had lost P100 million the previous year, I gave him a call to ask for a correction please. I joked and said, "Tito Raul, we didn’t lose P100 million; we lost P1 billion. Kulang ng zeroes. But seriously, pakibawas naman ang zeroes. Sobra ng dalawa. P1 million lang ang lugi, Tito."

He laughed and said, "Oo ba, basta ikaw."

The following day, a correction was made on page one.

During the wake, his wife, Tita Letty, told me, "Go see your Tito Raul. See how handsome he is."

Yes, I agree, he was handsome, and brilliant. Thank you for being a great teacher, Tito Raul.