After nine years, Tina Santos- Wahl is briefly?back in town to be with her siblings during the holiday season.? Dancing was her first love, not modeling. In fact, she was only seven years old when she started ballet lessons under Joji Felix Velarde and Sony Lopez Gonzalez — thriving with the arabesques and pirouettes on pointe (toe) shoes.?Poised and graceful, the young adolescent joined the?prestigious Aguinaldo’s Department Store Teen Board and was an asset, showing off the latest styles for teenyboppers.
Soon after, fashion maestro Ramon Valera invited her to join his models and the other designers followed suit.
Conchita Sunico made sure that Tina would also join her roster of Karilagan models that were exclusively handpicked for their looks, breeding, and intelligence. Since Tina was not only a classical ballerina but was also versatile with jazz and modern dance, she would star onstage in the special musicals that Tita Conching would regularly put up to the delight of the movers and shakers of Manila’s society and diplomatic corps.?In 1970, Tina bid Manila — and her best friends from the dancing world that included Nini and Pinky Mendoza, Bonnie Weinstein, Marilou Kahn and Nancy Howell to the modeling industry’s Conchitina Sevilla, Trina Yujuico, Cherry Pie Villonco, Tina Artillaga, Dinty Barredo, Pearlie Arcache, Maita Gomez, Toni Serrano and Baby Santiago — goodbye when she got a scholarship to the Joffrey Ballet.
The 20-year-old danseuse was determined to pursue a?career in the US because she knew that her height was an impediment in Manila’s ballet world since almost all the local male dancers were shorter than her.?Proving her worth, Tina soon became a soloist in New?York’s Harkness Ballet and a principal dancer of the San Francisco Ballet. Meeting and marrying Gary Wahl was the bonus she received since they were both from the Harkness Ballet.
Dance is in the blood of the Santos-Wahl family because even?their beautiful 31-year-old daughter Nikka has been with the popular Jersey Boys musical (Las Vegas) for the last eight years.?Currently retired, Tina continues to teach ballet in Ft.?Lauderdale, Florida and while in Manila, she taught special classes with Ballet Philippines and the Philippine Ballet Theatre.?
During our reunion dinner with some of the Karilagan ladies,?Tina enthused, “According to my mom (Tessie Revilla Santos), I was dancing since I was born. I loved rhythm and beats, and would move along at any time. As I learned technique, I was passionate about it all — ballet, ballroom with Chito Feliciano, flamenco with Ruben Nieto, jazz with Julie and Rosie Borromeo. I was blessed and lucky because I?was hired in all the dancing jobs I applied for; not for my technique, but for my sheer love and enjoyment of dance.”
* * *?
For comments and ideas, email the author at jacinto.fa@gmail.com.