The inspiring story of Klaudia Koronel

Curtain-raisers:

H Like everybody else, I’ve been receiving lots of inspiring text messages during the past days. Here are some which you may forward to your friends and loved ones:

• From Albert Martinez – Life is too ironic to understand fully. It takes sadness to know what happiness is, noise to appreciate silence and a cross to get to paradise.

• From Nap Gutierrez – Like birds, let us leave behind what we don’t need to carry — grudges, sadness, pain, fear and regrets. Fly light.

• From Tony Molina (of Warner Music) – God has no cellphone but He is Smart. He is all over the Globe. In fact, He is brighter than the Sun. Even without a load, you can reach Him — just Talk, no Text.

• From Bibsy Carballo – A little boy, being asked what forgiveness is, gave this beautiful answer: "It is the fragrance that flowers breathe when they are trampled upon."

News briefs during the Holy Week:

• Jodi Santamaria reportedly got married to Junjun (Pampi) Lacson, son of Sen. Ping Lacson, in Las Vegas, with senators among the principal sponsors, including Bong Revilla, Lito Lapid and Loi Ejercito.

• Also in Las Vegas, could it be true that an actor-singer(?) had a solo concert but was able to fill up barely one half of the venue and that most of those who were in the audience were his relatives?

• Ruffa Gutierrez has just texted to Funfare the latest on her husband Yilmaz Bektas who took two bullets from an ex-convict last Tuesday in Istanbul, hitting his kidney and liver. Ruffa said that Yilmaz is recovering fast at an Istanbul hospital but his friend (unidentified) is still in coma. Ruffa’s dad, Eddie Gutierrez, has just arrived in Istanbul to give Ruffa and Yilmaz moral support. So far, added Ruffa, Yilmaz has received more than 3,650 visitors and well-wishers.

• Angel Locsin, the new Darna, and Oyo Boy Sotto spent the Holy Week in Palawan. She was with her mom while Oyo was with his mom, Dina Bonnevie, and a male friend. At the Legend Hotel in Puerto Princesa, Angel shared a room with her mom and Oyo Boy with his barkada.

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And while we are into inspiring news and messages, I might as well relate the inspiring story of bold star Klaudia Koronel who temporarily turned her back on showbiz to concentrate on her studies. It was hard, said Klaudia, but worth it. On April 4, she will mount the stage at the Tabernacle Temple Central (where Gladys Reyes and Christopher Roxas were married) as one of the more than 300 Computer Science graduates of New Era College (located just beside the Temple).

"It’s a four-year course but I finished it in three years," Klaudia proudly said. "I took up summer classes kasi, eh."

The eldest of five children (three girls and two boys), Klaudia finished elementary school at Bago Bantay and high school in San Francisco del Monte (Quezon City). It’s public knowledge that she was a battered child (by her own father), an experience that made her develop a phobia for men.

"You know," she said, "mabulyawan lang ako ng konti, nanginginig na ako."

That’s why she prefers men who are "bading-bading na formal, pero hindi naman talaga bading." (Clue: Her favorite actor is Cesar Montano and her favorite hero is Apolinario Mabini, The Sublime Paralytic.)

Even when she was earning her keep as a bold star, starring in more than 16 skin flicks (the last one having been the controversial Joey Javier Reyes movie Live Show which led to a revamp of the MTRCB then headed by Nic Tiongson), Klaudia put on hold her own happiness and plans, first helping her siblings (one of her brothers is detained at Camp Bagong Diwa in Bicutan for a crime which Klaudia doesn’t even know).

"All the while," she said, "I was saving so I could enroll in college."

She admitted that she would have regrets every now and then, especially when money was hard and she would see on TV her fellow boldies talk about their profitable stints in Japan.

"I simply turned off the TV set para hindi ako malungkot."

But now that she has tucked up a college diploma, Klaudia doesn’t regret having temporarily quit showbiz at all. In August last year, she put up her own Internet Cafe called Simfera Computer Inc. (at No. 18-A Sitio Maqbilog, Central Culiat, Quezon City, with telephone 426-3399). She’s often there these days while taking a break after graduating.

As a graduation gift to herself, Klaudia plans to take a holiday in Europe.

Asked if she would resume her showbiz career, Klaudia said, "Why not? But I don’t think I’d be doing bold roles again."

Incidentally, another bold star who recently finished college was Daniella (an honor student, I heard), wife of Rodel Velayo who asked her to quit showbiz when they got married.

More Pinoy sightings in foreign pics, TV shows

Here are more additions to Funfare’s broken roster of Pinoy talents (not in starring roles) in foreign films and TV shows:

• From Miss D – Ramon de Ocampo, son of former Finance Secretary Roberto "Bobby" de Ocampo, appeared in a recent episode of the hit series CSI, shown locally on AXN, playing the role of Danny Perez, the cancer-stricken brother who killed his younger sister to spare her from the pain and trauma of donating her kidney to him. Ramon also appears in the action movie XXX: State of the Union, starring Samuel L. Jackson, Willem Dafoe and Ice Cube, which is opening in the US on April 29.

Ramon last appeared in Manila in 1998 in the Obie Award-winning play The Romance of Magno Rubio, based upon Carlos Bulosan’s novel America is in the Heart (which is about Filipino migrant farm workers in the US in the 1930s). The play was staged at the CCP by the Mayi Theater Company and directed by Obie Award-winning Loy Arcenas who is also a multi-awarded set designer.

• From Jun Viterbo – There’s a Filipino actor in My Favorite Year (l982) starring Peter O’Toole and Marc Linn Baker (Larry Appleton in the ’80s TV series Perfect Strangers). Baker’s character has a stepfather named Rookie Carroca, a Filipino boxer. He was portrayed by Ramon Sison, born in Ilocos and a doctor by profession (from UP). Ramon dabbles in acting from time to time. He has also appeared in an episode of Will & Grace. He’s the older brother of Joma Sison.

• From Liezl Artacho – I have a three-year-old son who used to watch a TV show titled HI-5 on the Nickelodeon Channel. I believe that one of the girls named Katlene de Leon is a Filipina. Sometime on the show, they wore a shirt with different flags of different countries. Katlene wore a Philippine flag.