Ecstasy finds a face in Alma Concepcion

When Alma Concepcion decided to go on television recently to denounce the use of Ecstasy now sweeping show business, and admitting to once having been a user, not a few marveled at her guts and gumption.

Why was she surfacing now and opening herself up to public scrutiny? Her sensationalized Guam bust involving shabu long forgotten; why bring up memories of it now? Why face possible accusations of riding on the Ecstasy issue for publicity purposes, of imagery, of projecting herself as a princess in shining armor out to save the showbiz world?

When Alma told us of her decision to appear on TV on the drug issue, we asked her if she knew of the repercussions. She replied, "I am ready for anything, any accusation of ulterior motives. This is something I have been doing all along. The only difference is that it was being done quietly."

But drug use needed a face, a rehabilitated celebrity to speak on it and on its dangers. Alma was encouraged by friends in various anti-drug NGOs she had been active in for five years after her traumatic Guam experience.

When Alma was apprehended at the Guam Airport and found to be carrying shabu paraphernalia and some amount of the drug in her handbag, the incident reverberated throughout the entertainment world. She was barely 20 then, had just celebrated her birthday some two weeks before and was actively part of the Manila party scene.

"My non-showbiz friends who had been experimenting in various drugs gave me the shabu which I hid in my bag. When I left for Guam two weeks later, I picked that particular bag to bring, completely forgetting I had placed the items there," she explains.

But she was not on shabu then, she says. What she had been taking for the past four months previous to the incident was Ecstasy, and even then in small quantities at the frequency of once a week. Alma is a known epileptic and any dose of alcohol or any drug could trigger an attack.

"Ecstasy makes you feel happy and strong. I wanted to prove to myself that I was not sick. I was in denial of my sickness. It wasn’t called Ecstasy then, simply the party drug.

One could dance away all night and not feel tired. There didn’t seem to be any negative side effects," she continues.

One didn’t know, of course, of the negative effects of its prolonged use, she says. That it would eat away at the brain cells and eventually make one lose his memory. It also causes depression, is bad for anyone with heart ailments, and causes paranoia.

"In fact, when I returned home, I explained to the media that I had not been taking shabu. That it was Ecstasy I was experimenting on. But no one listened. Ecstasy was not yet known then."

In Guam, Alma was given a drug test which proved negative, her exposure to Ecstasy having been two weeks before that. The paraphernalia and shabu caught with her was also below the minimum level to classify her as a drug pusher. She pleaded guilty to what was termed "misprision of a felony," a misdemeanor for which she was put on parole, made to do an anti-drug commercial, her US visa put on hold, and allowed to return home after 27 days of grueling court proceedings.

"I was acquitted of any drug charge. I was not found guilty. Less than a year later, my US visa was reactivated. But the 27 days in Guam were the loneliest I ever spent in my entire life. Those days made me realize what a danger drugs could be. The experience made me swear never to get involved in anything like that again," she recalls.

Soon after, Alma decided to volunteer for anti-drug campaigns waged by various organizations among them the Dangerous Drugs Board, Mamamayang Ayaw sa Droga or MAD with which Richard Gomez is identified, Youth on Fire, and Kill Droga. They would go on provincial trips explaining to the youth the dangers of involvement in the various drugs. Recently, on Game K N B? Alma donated the P100,000 she won to the Kill Droga campaign.

After Guam, Alma shied away from the party crowd and became a virtual homebody. She went back to school and got a diploma in International Business at Southville International School, got involved in business ventures, found a sponsor Planet Fitness and started working out, got into volleyball and badminton as a sport (she was champion together with Marjorie Barretto of the JVC-YONEX Badminton Tournament last year and will compete again on June 8 at the Glorietta), gave birth to now two-year-old love child Cobie, separated amicably from the father, and quietly continued her anti-drug activities.

The accusing finger once again pointed at showbiz personalities saddens her. "We have to realize that we are all victims. Instead of castigating the users, why don’t we go after the source and ask ourselves questions? How do these drugs get into the country? How can we patrol our ports of entry to prevent this?"

The Kill Droga organizers are inviting members of the Actors Guild under German Moreno to a one-day seminar on the dangers of various drugs. Alma is convincing members to attend once announcements are made.

"Exposure to any drug however harmless opens one up to the drug world. When we start out on an experiment, telling ourselves it is only because we want to feel good, it doesn’t stop there. It could go on to heavier drugs," she says, admitting that her exposure to Ecstasy could have led to other dangerous drugs had not the Guam incident occurred and opened her eyes.

"In effect, that was the most positive lesson I learned from Guam," she ends. Alma can be reached on any drug problem through e-mail: [email protected].