There's dignity in labor

I have better respect for most kids of today’s affluent. Not all, but mostly.

There is now a growing generation of kids who were raised in comfort, but are performing what were once deemed to be lowly chores. The responsible ones no longer wait for their inheritance. They work and work hard.

For instance, Celeste Tuviera, the daughter of the very successful and highly-esteemed Eat, Bulaga! producer Tony Tuviera deals with the hair and scalp of celebrities even if she can be appointed to a white collar position in her father’s production company. But she waits on stars and models during day-long shoots and pictorials.

Last Sunday, I discovered another responsible citizen of the comfortable world. It all started when I had to do a pre-wedding interview with Ogie Alcasid and Regine Velasquez.

Since nobody sleeps during this season of stress (instead of the supposed joy), I came to work with raccoon eyes. Before the shoot, I asked segment producer MJ Santos if she could produce an eye concealer to cover the tracks of the previous night’s sleeplessness. She did better than that. She went down to one of the studios and came back with a makeup artist in tow.

But the makeup artist was not just any makeup artist. She was 1995 Binibining Pilipinas-Universe and 1997 Miss Tourism International Joanne Quintas. I didn’t even know she had also become a professional makeup artist like other beauty title-holders like her: Abby Arenas and Nina Ricci Alagao.

As she would tell me later, she had been at this job since 1999 and had gone through intensive makeup seminars here and abroad.

Joanne didn’t actually come from humble beginnings the way Venus Raj did. While she didn’t grow up a Zobel de Ayala, I knew her family to be very comfortable. Her mother had a beauty shop and I knew this since good friend Ali Sotto was one of its celebrity clients.

The beauty business, therefore, isn’t alien to Joanne. In fact, even on her father’s side, her relatives also had beauty salons. It’s a job she enjoys — although I can imagine it to be difficult. 

 That day of my Ogie-Regine interview, she happened to be in one of the studios to work on Frencheska Farr for a pictorial. Joanne also works in the series Beauty Queen where she prettifies even more the cast members. Actually, it’s not a bad idea to also put her on-cam in the show since Joanne had also developed into a fine actress since she joined showbiz after her reign. Besides, she still looks very beautiful and her body is still in shape and remains statuesque looking at 5’10”. But she is very focused on her work as a professional makeup artist and is happy with the job.

The word professional is very apt to describe her work ethics. Initially, I felt uncomfortable having a titled beauty work on me. Aside from concealing the dark circles under my eyes, she also slapped light powder on my face since she was already there anyway. Since we were just borrowing her from another shoot, she stayed with me for only less than five minutes.

But all throughout, she tried to ease my discomfort (hey, that was the first time a beauty queen worked on my face) by not making such a fuss about her being a former Miss Philippines and Miss Tourism International. (I remember that because I was the one who announced her victory in Showbiz Lingo after her coronation in China.)

To her it was a job and she went through it like a pro. No big deal. She even swapped jokes with the staff and definitely had no beauty queen airs about her. She truly was just one of the boys that time. Thank you, Joanne for saving the day for me.

As I write this, I take comfort in the fact that we now have a generation of young Filipinos who knows that there is dignity in labor. With Joanne, Celeste Tuviera and other kids from wealthy families, I know that that we are headed for a better, progressive and more responsible Philippines.