By KIMBERLY ROSE L. PILLO AND HAZEL P. VILLA
ACCORDING to elders of Lampaya, no one in their in the southwestern town of Leon in Iloilo, central Philippines, has successfully finished college to become a teacher, a doctor or an engineer.
In this mountainous village of clear skies and cool air known as the Little Baguio of Iloilo, farming is the way of life. Thus, it is already considered an honor for anyone here to be able to graduate from high school.
All that has changed when one of them dared to dream and in the process becoming an inspiration to villagers for whom ambitions and time seemed to have given up on.
“Our parents’ only dream was to get us into high school and after that, they won’t care anymore,” says 21-year-old Leonisa Calimotan. “There was a time when my father told me that right after I graduate (from high school), I should just get myself a husband.”
Leonisa’s mother, Celedonia, 65, works as a househelp while her father George, 60, is a farmer. She has four brothers –Anacito, 38; Belardo, 34; Leandro, 31; and Francisco, 18. (Her elder siblings already have their own families while the youngest has yet to finish his schooling with Leonisa’s help.)
All Leonisa ever wanted was to finish her studies so that she could give her family a brighter future.
So, she didn’t mind walking almost eight kilometers every day to reach Bucari National High School to finish her secondary education.
After high school, she was forced to stop schooling for a year because her parents had no plans of sending her to college. She also had appendicitis that compelled her father to sell their carabao (water buffalo, the Filipino beast of burden) to pay for the required operation.
She recalls: “One of the many experiences that I will never forget is when I felt the sharp pain of the needle during my second operation. My fresh scar swelled and opened, so we needed a second operation. My wound was sewn without anesthesia. That time I was so numb to pain, and I was able to apply that numbness to all my sufferings and hardships.”
Her favorite teacher then offered to send her to college. In exchange, Leonisa would work as a housemaid for her family. This teacher was the one who encouraged her to take the entrance exam at the West Visayas State University College of Education (WVSU-COE).
Leonisa passed and enrolled in a course in teacher education, major in Filipino, with the help of that same teacher, who paid for all her expenses on her first year in college. On her second year, she became a university student assistant.
Leonisa found many ways to make both ends meet while in college. Aside from being a student assistant, she sold products of AVON, Natasha, Marikina Shoe Exchange, Tupperware, among others. Knowing her financial state, many of her teachers and schoolmates patronized her goods.
There were many times in the past when she blamed God for all her hardships and had wanted to quit. She recounts her tumultuous state of mind as she went through her ordeals: “There were problems in my life that no matter what I did, there seemed to be no solution. Sometimes, I thought of giving up. But then, (I asked myself,) ‘What will happen to my family? What will happen to my mother? She’s so old but she continues working so she can help me with my weekly financial needs. What will happen to my father who stays alone at home and who is supposed to be with my mother? What will happen to my brother and nephews if I don’t graduate?’”
So she went on to live her dream. Last March 19, Leonisa received her Proficiency Award from the WVSU-COE —which symbolizes all her hard work to master Filipino as a subject she plans to teach high school students after she passes the Licensure Exam for Teachers this year. She was also chosen one of the Most Outstanding University Student Assistants.
On graduation day last March 26 held at the iconic Quezon Hall of WVSU, Leonisa tightly held on to her diploma as she walked down the stage to the applause of her classmates, teachers, friends, and family led by her very proud parents.
She was after all, the first to break tradition in Lampaya village. She finished college. She is now a teacher.