36. Brand Work

We had some very successful brands in our toilet soaps portfolio. Lifebuoy was the market leader in the health soaps although a P&G brand was posing a strong challenge with a comer brand, Safeguard. We had Lux, an international brand that was pitted against the major beauty toilet soap brands of P&G and Colgate. I was handling Ever, a local brand that had quite a following and a developmental international deodorant brand, Reward.


Front: Vic de la Torre, Hank Nijk,Tony Tolentino, Ato Manigat Back: Ed Roa, Gus Villanueva, Ding Camua, Jes Dinglasan, Gilbert de los Reyes, Frankie Gonzales, Joe Feliciano

 The total share of the company in the toilet soaps market was the bigger than all of the competing companies taken together. We had more than 60% of the market at the height of our dominance. At that time we were relentlessly being besieged by the P&G entries in all segments of the toilet soap market. Lux, being an international brand was given development priority to strengthen the defense of our total market leadership. It was waging an intense war against P&G’s Camay. Lifebuoy although a stalwart brand at that time needed to be modernized and given a less masculine and workman’s utilitarian image. Its carbolic soap reputation that was associated with soaps used by kids with scabies and as a dog’s soap also needed to be addressed. It was beleaguered by the aggressive onslaughts of Safeguard, a heavily supported brand from P&G.

I had two brands. Ever toilet soap was positioned as a fragrance soap and had a sizeable share but was losing shares for lack of logistical support. The other brand was a developmental one. Reward was a premium deodorant soap that unabashedly promised social acceptance through freedom from body odor. Body odor was considered a touchy subject and was never directly addressed by any antibacterial brand of soap except for those highly specialized medicinal ones.

I inherited Ever from Boy Feliciano. Boy was a promising manager who was recently assigned to handle Breeze detergent one of the premier brands in PRC. Later on he would become the head of the big international courier service company, DHL, for the Philippine operations. Ever had a reasonable share of 11% of the toilet soaps market. Its platform was that of a perfumed soap. Among its users it had the image of being young and with an attractive scent and was used by university coeds but not of colegialas. On the negative side its image among the toilet soap users was that of having a strong scent, the kind of scent preferred by the “bellas” or the taxi dancers and hostesses of nightclubs. Ever could have been successfully restaged. An 11 % market share was a good enough franchise level to build on. The decision to let the international brands play the role of staving off the P&G onslaught meant concentrating the support budgets on the international brands Lux and Lifefuoy and this was to the detriment of Ever.



Seated: Gat Maggay  Back: Barry Mason, Ed R,Tony Tol, Yener Tugay, angie Lacson,Freddie Lozano, Tony Lorenzana



I took over an ongoing promotion involving coupon redemption. Printed at the backside of the box wrapper was a coupon with a ten-centavo value. I was told by Boy Feliciano, that the promo redemption was recently launched and was well on its way to becoming a successful one. The redemption rate was steadily increasing and this was mostly in the national capital region, a heavily populated area with the highest disposable income. Despite the success of the promotion I wondered why this was not being reflected in the sales results. The more experienced guys in brand told me that there is usually a time lag of about two to three weeks since distribution took that long to get completed. I could not buy that explanation because these were in specially printed packs and a redeemed pack should correspond to a bought and used soap. I initiated an investigation. A close examination of the redeemed packs revealed fake coupons and further probing unmasked one of the sales managers as a collaborator of the perpetrator of the scam. Before we could stop the fraud the redemption rate stood at 80%, an ignominious record of sorts.




Ed Roa,Meckoy Quiogue, Willy Ocampo, Frankie Gonzales



Despite Ever’s limited funds I was able to mount a promotion that was tied up with Max Factor. Apart from being a schematic effort the Ever Beauty Box Bingo was also intended to help upgrade its image by association with Max Factor an upmarket name in cosmetics. The reason I was able to get my Marketing Manager to approve the promotions proposal was it did not commit the brand to a fixed expense because the deal with Max Factor was that payment will only be made on the actual redemption of their products. The promotion was a flop. From the start it was saddled by trade resistance. Despite the accompanying trade incentives some of the big wholesalers were reluctant to stock up on the promoted brand because they still had high inventories of the regular packs in their bodegas. Besides, the dealers felt that there wasn’t enough media support behind the promo launch. The brand had slid to a low level that even a strong temporary added value like Max Factor products could not win over new triers or bring back the users who have abandoned the brand.

Every month we had a sales cycle meeting wherein each brand manager was allowed to talk about the immediate initiatives of the brand to the sales managers. Ever was seldom highlighted because it could only afford a few promotional activities. The Beauty Box Bingo promotion didn’t have enough media money supporting it. Our General Sales Manager Coke del Villar, a grizzled veteran of the sales wars against P&G and Colgate, likened my brand’s effort to that of Admiral Montojo’s cannons in the Battle of Manila Bay during the Spanish American War. The guns were big, well aimed and made loud booming sounds but the cannon balls ended up as splashes in front of Admiral Dewey’s battleships for the lack of gun powder. The best-laid plans end up as splashes in the watery vastness without financial fodder to propel them.

app. Unilever Unisearch Who's Who (Sixties to 1999)

This post is a break from the serialized autobio. There are more about Unisearch in the later chapters. This entry is just a recounting of names of those who have been with me in Unisearch either as a Unilever, SRG or as an ACnielsen company.

In PRC, market research was the backdoor to getting into brand management. There have been quite a number of research analysts who made the leap to brand management after gaining two to three years experience in market research work. They become attractive to marketing managers because their experience in the markets they service become extensive and in depth. Presentations of research results were the showcases of their talents and the extent of knowledge they have of markets. The outstanding research executives invariably get tapped to go to marketing.

The people who have made the move to brand and to subsequent upward appointments outside PRC were Angie Lacson who at present is a Vice President of Ayala Land; Maricelle Narciso, who applied for a management trainee position in Personnel but was rejected in favor of a male candidate. She was persuaded to join market research but eventually transferred to brand management. She is now Marketing Director of Pepsi Cola. Other success stories are Jun Alcantara, Vice President for Marketing, Asia Breweries; Nena Barredo, Managing Director of Millward Brown; and Issa Baron, research consultant. Ed Cruz joined Mang Bert Timbol in Masscom, the media buying company that was set up exclusively for Unilever where he is EVP. Other successful Unisearch alumnae were Evelyn Gancayco, who occupied a senior research position in San Miguel and later on as marketing executive of Goldilocks. Other alumnae who have made their marks in the industry are Dedette Gamboa, Senior Executive, MBL Trends; Joy Isla, Senior Manager, Unilever; Marivic Azuelo, became General Manager of Kraft Foods; Joy Mangahas, with Manufacturer’s Life and others like Margot Balderas who specialized in the telecoms industry. Meng Estrada, Lulu Samson, Leila Tolentino went on to handle responsible marketing positions in multinational companies. Some of the guys who have had short stints in Unisearch were the super successful Ding Salvador who became the Asean President of Johnson and Johnson; Luvi Lim, who was the marketing director of Wander Philippines who now is in the US and Tony Castro, a marketing executive. The success stories of Unisearch alumni are plentiful.

Those mentioned were those who went to brand management after Unisearch. The success list goes on to include those who did not pass through brand management. Leading this group is Efren Samonte who became the commercial director of PRC; Peachy Badilla, Marketing Director of Marketing group selling high-end products; Pete Bernardo, became Research Manager of CocaCola, now a retired resort owner in Pangasinan. Slim Quiambao, owner of Business Workshop, Inc. a research company who was a major manpower resource to Unisearch and later to ACNielsen; Benjie Encarnacion, Vice President for Research in Nestle, Philippines; Ching Lacson became an official of Central Colleges of the Philippines, Cely Corpuz completed a successful career in Unilever as a manager in marketing services and later on as consultant; Chiqui Lara, Vice President, Basic Advertising, George Sison, distributor of Unilever Products, the late Meng Lim who at her time occupied important positions in various research organizations; Reena Murga became Research Manager of Unilever, Abby Limqueco joined Citibank as a manager in research: Nelia Fabie who held a senior position at ACNielsen, the largest research organization worldwide, now a director of Unisolutions' branch in Vietnam. Unisolutions is a research company founded by Gerry Soleminio together with Ed Sanchez, Dodie Santamaria and Jun Rafael. The presidency of this company was offered to me at its inception but I chose not to be involved since I had a commitment to ACNielsen to inhibit myself from doing market research work as a business for a period of two years after retirement.

The former heads of the PRC research unit who have had illustrious and successful careers after Unilever research would include Bert Timbol who organized and ran Masscom, the media buying company who bought media exclusively for Unilever; the late Ato Maningat who became the commissioner of the Public Estates Authority; Nonoy Reyes had a stint as managing director of Lintas, Indonesia and is now a successful businessman and Ding Malvar who migrated to the US in the late seventies and joined a utilities company doing load management. There would be other names that I have failed to include who might more than deserve a mention in our list of Unisearch success stories due to my limited range of contacts and unfamiliarity with those who were ahead of me in Unisearch.

The Unisearch trade name ceased to exist upon the unification of ACNielsen, Unisearch and ACNielsen, Pulse to become ACNielsen, Philippines in 1999.It would be impractial to make an account of every associate in the merged company which I became head of in 1999 to 2002. I have limited the list to the associates whom I worked with in my years with Unisearch, first as General Manager of the division of the Unilever company and later as Managing Director of an independent company when it became a part of the SRG network and later as a unit of ACNielsen. I have listed hereunder the list of associates who have been with Unisearch both as Unilever and as non-Unilever. The list ends in 1999 when we finally had to drop the Unisearch name in favor of a more appropriate corporate appellation ACNielsen, Philippines. The bulk of the names in the Unilever Unisearch listing were generated in 1997 when we celebrated the golden anniversary of Unisearch, the initial unit being organized in 1947. The list covering the years 1990 to 1999 are fairly accurate because of current existing records. I hope these lists will make up for any omission that I might have made in the manuscript.

List of Unisearch (Unilever) associates from late sixties to 1989

• ABDULLAH, LINDA • CHAVES de, RODEL • LAVINGCO, LINDA • RADAZA, ANGEL

• ACOMPANADO, AGUSTIN • CIFRA, ELVIE • LEON de, ADORA • RAMA dela, RUTH

• ACOSTA, FELY • COMETA, VIRGIE • LIM, LULU (Samson) • RANIN, WENA

• AGBAYANI, VICKY • CORPUZ, CELY • LIM, LUVI • REGNER, ALMA

• AGUILAR, JOHN • CRUZ, ARIS • LIM, MENG+ • REYES, NONOY

• AGUINALDO, PATSY • CRUZ, ED • LIM, MILA • REYES, NORI

• ALBANO, GLADYS • CUQUECO, LORETO • LIMQUECO, ABBY • ROA, ED

• ALCANTARA, JUN • DIAZ, LINA • LONGAKIT, BETH+ • RODRIGUEZ, JOSE+

• ALCID, RUBEN • DIZON, CITA • LONTOC, BUTCH • ROMERO, VIRGIE

• ALETA, VIOLY • DIZON, PRISCILLA • LUMBRES, MEDING • ROQUE, BAY

• ALLEGO, MATHESSA • DOMINGO, PAT • MACANDOG, LILIA • ROSARIO, del JULIUS

• ALONSO, MARMI • EMMANUEL, MARLU • MALICDEM, GRACE • SALES, PATROCINIA

• ANDALIO, OMPONG • ENCARNACION, BENJIE • MALUBAG, GRETA • SALVADOR, DING

• ANG, NANETTE • ESGUERRA, FRANKIE • MALVAR, DING • SAMONTE, EFREN

• ANZURES, RUDY • ESPIRITU, MARISSA • MANGAHAS, JOY(Fernando) • SAN JUAN, EDEM(CARAYO)

• AQUINO, LULU • ESTRADA, MENG • MANINGAT, ATO+ • SARTHOU, ROSALIE

• AZUELO, AIDA • FABIE, NELIA • MANZANO, CLARISSA • SECOQUIAN, RACKIE

• AZUELO, MARIVIC • FELICIO, GRACE(Paulino) • MARASIGAN, OLIVE • SEGADOR, JIMMY

• BADILLA, PEACHY • FRANCIA, BOBBY • MARTINEZ, OLIVE • SIPIN, MONIQUE(Carale)

• BALDERAS, MARGOT (Torres) • GALIAN, VIGING • MILAN, LYNETTE • SISON, GEORGE+

• BANCOLITA, ANGEL • GAMBOA, DEDETTE • MOLINA, JOSIE •

• BARANDA, LILY+ • GANADEN, JESS • MOMBAY, SANDY • SUNIO, EDITH

• BARANGAN, ERNIE • GANCAYCO, EVELYN • MONTERON, BERT • TABADA, JOE

• BARON, Issa (Abadsantos) • GENEROSO, AGGIE • MONTINOLA, APPLE • TAMAYO, BETTY

• BARREDO, FLORA • GENEROSO, BOMBI • MURGA, REENA • TILLAH, CHARMAINE+

• BARREDO, NENA • GIMENA, VICKY • NARCISO, MARICELLE • TIMBOL, BERT

• BAUTISTA, CECILLE • GUANCO, PRIMA • NAVARETTE, ABET+ • TOLENTINO, LEILA

• BAUTISTA, CHERRY • GUERRERO, BILL • NOGOY, LISA • TORRE, FELNA +

• BAUTISTA, VIOLETA • GUZMAN de, MANNY • NUGUID, ELVIE • TORRES, RUBY

• BELTRAN, JANE • GUZMAN de, MARISSA • OCAMPO, LUCY • TUMANENG, LEX

• BERNABE, LOLET • HAWKINS, BETH • OPPUS, BONG • USISON, ROSALIE

• BERNARDO, PETE • HEREDIA, IMELDA • ORUGA, DO + • VALENCIA, JULIE

• BERTIS, PETE • HERNAEZ, MARY • OSIN, JUN • VALENZUELA, TESS C.

• BONDOC, ROLLY • HERNAEZ, NENA • PAJAS, MALOU(Vinzon) • VEGA, dela RUDY

• BRAVO, BETH • HIPOLITO, JAMES • PANGILINAN, LEN • VERACRUZ, BETH

• BUENAVENTURA, PEN+ • ISLA, JOY • PASCUAL, LILIAN • VICQUIERRA, AVELINA

• CABRIETO, HELEN • JALOCON, AIDA • PASION, RUBY • VICTORIA, NITTO

• CALDERON, ROSE • JALOCON, OGIE+ • PEREY, BABY • VILLAR, JOJO

• CANTILLEPS, ANGIE • JUGO, MARIVI

• PEREZ, CARMEN • VILARBA, EFREN

• CANTOR, RAMON • LACSON, ANGIE • PEREZ, DOMING • VILLEGAS, RIC

• CAPUNONG, FLORENCE • LACSON, CHING • PILAPIL, CARINA • VITUG, VIC

• CASTILLO del, ERNIE • LAGDAMEO, MIA • QUIAMBAO, SLIM • YLAGAN, ESTRELLA

• CASTRO, TONY • LARA, CHIQUI • QUINONES, BABY

• CEBRERO,CECILLE • LAT, ERROL • QUINTOS, BELLA

a.

2.

List of associates who joined Unisearch as an SRG & ACNielsen company (1990 to 1999)

3.

AGUILERA, GRACE ENGUERRA, LILIA C. MONTECLARO, MAE SANGA, DYRA

ALAMIL, MAYBELLE ESCOBER, HARRIET NOLAN, MICHELLE SOLEMINIO, GERRY

ALMADEN, ELSA EVANGELISTA, RHONNEL PAJAS, MALOU(Vinzon) SORNILLO, MARICEL

ALMONTE, BERNICE FLORES, TINA PALACIOS, AVELYN SURIA, SARITA

ALTAMIRA, PRINCESS GADOR, KAREN(SISON) PALMA, KAREN SY, GLENDA

ANG, NELLIE GALICIA, MYRIAN PARCON, JASON TALENS, OLIVE

ASONG, MARJO GASPAR, ERWIN PASTORIZA, ARLENE TANQUERIDO, GIRLIE

BALDERAMA, NINI GAVIOLA, MILETTE PINEDA, ISABELITA TAYAO, AGNES

BAUTISTA, DIONETTE GUEVARRA, YET RAFAEL, ER TOLENTINO, REGGIE

BELIZARIO, MIMI HOFER, ELAINE RAS, GRACE TULIPAT, MARITES

BERMUDEZ, NENET IGAYA, GRACIE RAVASCO, GRACE TURINGAN, RINA

BLANCO, KARLA IWAKAWA, LYNA REFUERZO, BELEN UBONGEN, GLADYS

BUENAVENTURA, CES LABIDA, ARIEL RESARI, JEANETTE URUBIO, PETE

CABADING, LILIA LABIT, MAAN RESURECCION, GIA VALENCIA, JENNIFER

CABALLERO, ROSANNA LAQUIAN, JACQUELINE REYES delos, MIKE VALES, TISH

CACANINDIN, GERRY LAROYA, LOTH REYES, AMBO VICTORIANO, BENG

CHAN, INTANG LEMEN, GREGORY REYES, JUNE VILLAREAL, RAQUEL

CRUZ dela ED LEONARDO, ROBERT REYES, MIEL VIRAY,TONTON

DAVID, ED LIAMPO, PEGGY RICAMARA, LISA VIRTUCIO, ELLEN

DEGUZMAN,CLAIRE LIM, BERNIE RIVERA, DEL YANGO, PEPITO

DELA PAZ, ANGGE MAGBAG, TWINKLE ROSARIO del, NICEY YAP,PAMELA

DELFIN, DAISY MAGPANTAY, FEDDIE ROSARIO, del JULIUS YU, LEAH

DELOS SANTOS, GAY MALONG, GEMMA SAAVEDRA, ALBY YUIPCO, LINDA

DENOPRA, JEANNETTE MANIO, PETE SALVINO, KAI

DIAZ, MELISSA MAYUGA, JEN SAN AGUSTIN, JENNY

DIZON, LITO MIRANDA, JOJO SANBENITO, DINA

35. Familiarization or Initiation?

My first week was spent touring the departments as part of my familiarization with their functions and the people who ran them. The familiarization was generally a pleasant experience except for a few instances when the department or the manager in charge was feeling playful and would want to have his version of an initiation on the seemingly helpless young greenhorn.

The rivalry that existed between marketing and manufacturing was as old as “Estero de Paco”, the canal that separated most of the departments of these two divisions. This rivalry was heightened by the intense intramural athletic competitions raging at the time that I came in.

My visits to the production areas were

not exactly congenial. I had detergent powder falling from above as I passed by…a ticker tape parade of sorts to welcome me. My signature necktie and white shirt, newly bought to create a good impression, was squirted with shampoo as I passed by the filling line and I was warned about the existence of a monstrous machine which swallowed and regurgitated neckties of nosy marketing trainees. Heaven knows what other monster machines were there and those still at blue print stage designed to intimidate the marketing cadets who were passing through.

The men on the production floor were a playful lot. I knew I had to go through all these as an initiation of sorts. The guys in the technical division were much more professional than what these incidents may tend to portray them. I learned this later on as I experienced working with them through product development projects and brand maintenance work. Some of the friendships that I cultivated were from the guys in technical division and they still are among the better friends that I have up to now.

Familiarization with the Sales Department took me to the sales route of the van salesman who covered the sari-sari stores and the small groceries. The role we played during the stint with sales is that of the “pajinante” or the one who unloads the bought merchandise and brings them over to the store’s stocking area. I tried my hand at selling the line of PRC products to the storeowner. It gave me a chance to experience the first contact of our products after leaving the bodega and at the same time empathize with the salesman’s rigors of the job in the field. One motherly sari-sari storeowner after seeing me load up the heavy merchandise on her counter said… “look for another job, son. You’re too frail for this”.

Another ordeal in familiarization was going through the Purchasing Department whose big boss, Noli Fragante, seemed to spend nights thinking of ways to bedevil new marketing recruits. There were two memorable incidents with Noli that the marketing guys find difficult to forget. One was with Boy Trillana who during his familiarization went to Noli’s room and immediately sat down on the visitor’s chair. Noli berated him for having sat down without his permission. Boy spent the day moping and mumbling profanities, I guess. The other incident with Noli involved Gus Villanueva who was marketing manager at that time. I don’t remember exactly what the furor was all about but it had something to do with packaging materials. He was coequal to Noli in the organization but this did not inhibit Noli from being obnoxious during their argument. As told, Gus got so riled up and in his anger he pulled a gun on Noli.

Somehow you begin to understand that these animosities build up and become conditioned reactions to the sometimes overbearing and arrogant stance the more senior marketing guys take when dealing with the service departments. However, brand managers take the brunt of failed launches, promotions, product development, ad campaigns and almost any undertaking that involved the brand. While we were responsible for all these we did not have real authority over the service departments who had to implement the requirements of the brand. Responsibility without authority can oftentimes be frustrating. Friendly persuasion works but not all the time. During crisis situations civility is set aside and working styles become overly assertive and imperious.

34. Keeping Pace

The work ethic that I cultivated when I struggled in my earlier jobs served me well. A determined effort to learn through readings and serious participation in training seminars allowed me to be in stride with the rest of the brand group. I feel utterly beholden to PRC for their having been unstinting in providing training.

They have provided the young managers with the wherewithal to perform at the best that they can muster. While the training on management techniques would have been refresher courses to some of my fellow brand managers who were graduates of business schools, to me they were all new and exciting ideas to be learned and to be applied with a resolute determination to make them work. The management techniques you learned and had immediately applied in your work are deeply seared in you. They become an important addition to your management armory.

Tony Tolentino, Ed Roa, Angie Lacson, Freddie Lozano, Tony Lorenzana

I have heard some say that my achievement, despite a checkered scholastic record, can be attributed to my being street smart. I cannot accept that. The phrase smacked of illegitimacy. It was as if I got my way through sleight of hand and subterfuge. People who have this to say about other people’s gains may just want to soften the sting of their own failures. Although I would grant that for some it may not have been meant to be anything but just a thoughtless use of a hackneyed phrase.

33. Former Schoolmates

I had lunch at the company canteen together with Boy Trillana. He introduced me to the rest of the brand group who joined us in one long table. I was pleasantly surprised to find four of my former classmates and batchmates in the Ateneo grade school and high school were in the marketing department. They were already brand managers since they started as management trainees directly out of college at about the same time I began my advertising apprenticeship.

The brand management group was quite large. In addition to the toilet soaps group the company had interests in personal products, detergents and a foods business as well. If I was surprised to see my former schoolmates they seemed to be even more surprised to see me there. There was Butch Unson (Butch outstripped us all when he was promoted to Marketing Manager of the Foods Group, a senior management position, but this was short lived as he migrated to the US soon after), Nilo “Ambo” Santos, Tony Bautista, and Ding Camua. Nonoy Reyes, another classmate was to join later.



Front: Flor Santos, Pet Asor, Tony Marquez, Tony Castro,Cely Corpuz,Sandy Mombay,Jun Alcantara, Ronie Montelibano, Tony Bautista, Ed R  Back:Tonytol, Angie Lacson, Alex Buenaventura, Bert Timbol, Carmen Lim, Bob Quevedo, Chiqui Xeres Burgos, Freddie Lozano, Ben Sanchez,Bert Laconico,Willie Ocampo, Nilo Santos











Because of my long absence from their kind of milieu, some of them thought that I studied abroad but some who knew that I went on to FEU were puzzled as to how I could, a reject in Ateneo high school manage to get a job in PRC marketing. PRC was looked at as one of the few multinational companies that every member of the crème de la crème graduating batch of the elite universities and colleges aspired joining. The competition for the few available slots in the management trainee program was so intense that even those graduating with honors were not assured of entry into the company. To the credit of the group their reaction did not go beyond that of being surprised. I felt accepted by the brand group and this seemed to be without any reservations. My former classmates even put in some effort to make me feel welcome. I was doing my job and that to them was what was important.

32. My First Brand Group

The brand group that I was assigned to was Toilet Soaps. My new boss, Ato Maningat, was probably three years older than I was. He was a product of one of the better-known business schools in the US, the Wharton School of Business. His undergraduate schooling was with the Jesuits and he remembered one of my brothers in school as being his classmate. He struck me as being on the serious side and slightly aloof. Despite his fine academic credentials he didn’t seem eager to flaunt it and had a rather unassuming quality about him that was reassuring. I was beginning to feel out of place because everyone here seemed to have awesome academic backgrounds.



Joe Montemayor, Ato Maningat, Peter Bachelor, Tony Marquez, Ed Roa



There were two other guys in the group; Boy Trillana, a brand supervisor just like me and a newly hired management trainee, Joe Montemayor. Another brand supervisor, Tony Marquez, whom I would discover to be my cousin would join us a month later. My cousin was a graduate of Denver University while our marketing assistant graduated from New York University. When Joe left the company Fredrick Dael replaced him. Fred, a graduate of Silliman University in the Visayas was the loquacious sort and would volunteer an opinion on just about anything if you allowed him to. This earned him the sobriquet “The Dumaguete Lip”. As it turned out he really did have something to say. He became an executive of Pepsi Cola International as regional head of Asia and of the latest account he headed IslaCom, a telecommunications company.

Boy Trillana, who was there ahead of us all, though not from a stateside university, was a product of De Lasalle University. Lifebuoy was his brand. He had his hands full thwarting the relentless offensives of a major entry by P&G. He was the right man for the job. Determined and aggressive he staved off their swamping efforts and gave competition a run for their money. He had a curiosity about advertising and knowing that I have had experience in it he kept asking me about it every time he had the opportunity.

After PRC, he and his wife, Sonjie de Ocampo, also a former brand manager in the company, embarked on marketing ventures with Chris Barber-Lomax, our marketing director who stayed in the Philippines after his retirement from Unilever. Boy and Sonjie had other successful business investments one of which was the ownership of Lintas (post Hemisphere affiliation) one of the largest agencies locally. A fairly recent venture of theirs, Go nuts Donuts seem to be off to a good start. Other achievement of sorts is his stable of fine race horses and his appointment as the head of the Philippine Racing Commission at one time.

Manoling de Leon succeeded Hank Nijk as Advertising Manager of PRC. He had within his group the Media, marketing intelligence and Advertising Budget sections. Tito Claudio was the Media Manager, Nilo Santos was in charge of marketing intelligence while Mel Lagman was the budget supervisor. Rene Ranjo was in charge of marketing services which at that time was limited to field promotions. Some of the marketing trainees at that time were Bong de Guzman, whose dad was the mayor of Baguio City at that time, Jes Asuncion, Hernan Reyes, whose family owned the popular UFC banana ketchup and joining later, Josie Gregorio, one of the few female marketing recruits then.

31. Day one In Unilever

It was towards the end of the first week of January, on a Monday, that I drove my tiny Italian job, a Fiat 600, a small excuse for a car that was even smaller than a Volkswagen Beetle, to my new appointment in Philippine Refining Company. At the parking lot I asked the security guard if I could park in any of the vacant spaces at the yard fronting the main building. Eager to start I was quite early in coming and there were still a lot of empty parking spaces. I knew that in companies like PRC parking spaces were reserved for the company biggies and I didn’t want to get into scrapes no matter how trivial on my first day. The guard pointed out, rather harshly, a space where I could park. I was to find out later that his name was Sgt. Marcelo and was the head of the security guards in the company. He was a gaunt faced elderly man with a wiry frame, bow-legged and with a comic looking squared moustache that partly hid a jutting solitary front tooth. Being used to the bigger cars of the PRC managers the tiny little car might have seemed incongruous to him. Still, I was thankful to him for finding a space for me to park.

Vic Ferriols, Ed Roa, Chris Barber-Lomax, Peter Bachelor, Frankie Gonzales,Tony Tolentino, Joe Feliciano, Ray Harrison, Tony Uy & Ato Maningat

My first stop was the Corporate Affairs Directors office where I was given my familiarization program. Rey Alejandro, the Corporate Affairs Director gave a quick overview of the company’s organization and also the range of products in the company’s business portfolio. He apologized for the scantiness of the information he was able to give but he said that the various departments that I will be visiting in the course of my familiarization program would amply fill in the gaps of the cursory briefing he just gave me.

Before being led into my new boss’ office I had to do the obligatory stop at the Marketing Director’s room to say that I am now here and reporting for duty. Chris Barber-Lomax was on his way out and said that he will catch up with me in the afternoon but for now he had to leave for a meeting with the ad agency. I was eager to impress him and was mildly disappointed that I could not talk to him on day one. I would find out later on that he was a demanding taskmaster and it was not easy to get into his favor. In an effort to make a good impression, I remember having bought a book on increasing one’s facility for mental calculations, the Trachtenberg method, because he was one to get impatient during financial discussions. He was quick to snap at brand managers whenever responses lagged, despite their trusty Monroe calculators, to his queries on costs and margins. With this I might have gained an inch towards his looking kindly at me.

30. The Interviews

Rey Alejandro, Ed Roa

After the preliminaries I was scheduled to talk with Dr. Rey Alejandro, the Corporate Affairs Director. I was told that if I hurdled this I still had to be grilled by the Marketing Director, and then, as proforma, the Advertising Manager. The Corporate Affairs Director was Filipino. My first impression of him was that he seemed a bit stiff and exuded a rather studied air. In the course of the interview his being a Yalie with a Doctorates degree in Law just happened to come up. He spoke well but in a somewhat stilted manner. Later on I would discover that he was truly sincere and would offer support to those under his aegis. His mannerisms were just a question of preferred style that his detractors took to mean as arrogance. Naturally he asked me about my experiences in advertising. He seemed amused with the way I earned my spurs on the job. When asked about the campaigns I worked on I was quite effusive talking about the high profile brands I worked on. The brands in my portfolio of experiences were household names…Suki Soy sauce, Philip Morris, Sarsi, Volkswagen, Papa Piccolino, Sola cooking oil and Solacreme margarine White King cake mixes, Radiowealth appliances, Ajinomoto plus a few others that I was involved in either solely or part of a team in the two ad agencies I worked with in my three-year advertising career. I talked about them with the enthusiasm and exuberance of a winner.

Of particular interest to him was the additional competence I had in media work. I was not sure if I made a positive impression. Sometimes glibness turned off people, but I felt good having been able to cram my short career into twenty minutes of interview time. After the interview I had a sinking feeling that I won’t make it. I knew that recruitment practices tend to create a fraternal circle of like minds because the decision-makers’ criteria were based on qualities that more or less typified their own personalities and backgrounds. An ivy leaguer with a doctorate degree would epitomize such a decision-maker and may be the least sympathetic to someone with a spotty academic background like mine. Some form of perpetuation of the species dynamics could be at work here.

My interview was a success. A day later I received a phone call making arrangements for two more consecutive interviews towards the end of that week. This was it. I felt even more anxious this time because the possibility of being taken in was so real and the fact that the next two interviews would be from expats added to my apprehension. I have never been interviewed by expats nor have I ever had interactions with foreigners. Deep within me the “the hewers of wood and carriers of water” mentality that was at rest was stirred.

The interview with Chris Barber-Lomax, the Marketing Director, was a repeat of the things that I talked about in the interview with the Corporate Affairs Director. He struck me as someone who was hard to impress. While he allowed me to talk uninterruptedly, he had put on a mien that made me feel that he was disinterested and somewhat indifferent to what I was saying. Perhaps it was I who was at fault. I couldn’t muster the same kind of verve in my tone of voice as in the earlier interview with the Corporate Director. When he turned to more personal things his demeanor changed abruptly. It was fascinating how he could have turned friendly and fatherly almost, segued without a transition device as it were. He asked about my family, wife, children, siblings and preferences in entertainment and how I spent my leisure time. It amused him to find out that I had media celebrity brothers and a famous movie star as sister in law. Finally he asked me if I played soccer and basketball. I said I played a little soccer in early high school but I did play a lot of basketball. He was glad that I had athletic inclinations because they were trying to put together a team to play in the company intramurals. That was the other surprising thing in my having qualified for the position. I could have played the center position in a basketball team of midgets and I had a scrawny frame that “athletic” would seem to be a farfetched description.

My interview with Hank Nijk, the Advertising Manager, was brief. I learned from him that he was about to leave Unilever in a few days. He was among the many Jewish people who have volunteered to work in the kibbutz in the young Israeli nation then. Jews like him who were successful businessmen, executives, scientists and others left behind their lucrative practices and comfortable lives heeded the call to help in building their nation. I was very impressed at such nobility of heart.

Immediately after the interview I was asked to go to the Personnel Department building where I was informed by Ted Teodoro, the Personnel Manager that I will be taken in at the start of the New Year, but before then, I was to undergo medical examinations to make sure that I was fit to work.

Oh what a glorious day it was! As I stepped out of the portals of the PRC main building the sun outshone itself for me and the people in the cars out there in the traffic of United Nations Avenue seemed to be cheering…Bravo! Well done, Ed!”

29. Going Through the Gauntlet

It was on a day in early December that I had a scheduled second interview in PRC. This was a few days after my first appearance. I had taken the preliminary interview with a supervisor in Personnel and was administered the usual routine of filling up information about myself and the basic tests prior to being interviewed by the higher ups.. I told my wife to say a prayer to help me make a good account of myself with the interviewer. This interview would be one among the many that I went through in addition to the IQ tests and other tests that the Personnel Department subjected all applicants to.

From what I heard the selection process was a rigorous one. I was not worried about the IQ tests. I knew from previous tests that my level was way above average. I remember that a lot of the questions asked were easy and I guess they were more a gauge of comprehension more than anything else. The semantics and the spatial relations portions of the tests were a cinch. The numeracy portion proved to be a challenge but somewhere embedded in the shirrings of my brain my father’s genes stirred and came to the fore and got me through the tests. I got this interview by answering an ad in the newspaper that said that they were looking for aggressive young people who have had experience in advertising to handle the marketing of consumer brands. The position was supervisory, a grade prior to becoming a manager. My advertising experience was extensive. The absence of a job description in the small ad agencies that I worked in contributed to my well-rounded advertising savvy. I would never have had this opportunity had I applied for a management trainee position, which was the usual entry point of would be brand managers in a multinational marketing company. A management trainee position in PRC was one of the most coveted jobs among the best and the brightest graduates in the country. They said that the whole screening process is summed up by just two screening questions. After answering the question”… Ateneo, Lasalle or UP?” this would be followed by… Summa, Magna or Cum?” Although this was said in jest the response to this is taken with more than just a grain of salt. I was kicked out from a premiere learning institution and completed my education in a downtown university. The only qualification I had was my advertising experience. This was why prayers had to be in earnest and answers desperately and urgently sought for.

28. Career Change

With the arrival of our first baby, Eric, exactly nine months after the wedding, I began to seriously consider other career options. Irregular hours and frequent production work nights will be terribly unfair to my young family. I also found out that my earnings were not enough to give my wife and my son what I would consider a secure and sheltered place under the sun. It was something that I could not talk about with the people in the office because there were no immediate prospects. Some friends in media advised me that marketing would be a good alternative. I was young and already had considerable advertising experience in fast moving consumer goods.


Youth and experience was what most marketing companies would pay a premium for. As an almost instinctive reaction I started reading up on marketing. To my surprise I seemed to have enough knowledge of the subject. Attendance in client meetings during my earlier employment, the exposure to the product launch preparations of seasoned marketing men and later, the discussions with clients and the digest of their advertising briefs were pragmatic sources which contributed to the extent of my knowledge of marketing.

The opportunity presented itself in a want ad that Philippine Refining Company, a Unilevcr subsidiary, posted in a leading daily. The company was looking for brand supervisors to handle the numerous brands in Detergents, Personal Products and Foods marketing areas. I composed my application letter and sent it to PRC. It contained a resume that played down my educational background but loaded up on my advertising experience. After two days of no response I began to doubt that I would even get to an initial interview. I found out that one of the guys in the office, Ely our guy in film production, also sent his application to PRC. When I told him that I too sent an application he was quick to tell me to kiss my application goodbye because he was sure to be taken in. Although said in jest it made me a bit anxious. At that stage any form of discouragement could shatter my self-confidence and increase my anxiety level.

On the fourth day I received a wired summons to be in PRC on a certain date and time.

27. The Plunge

I didn’t mind the late hours and the frenetic schedule that marked our typical livelong day. The late hours seemed to be the time that we collected back our sanity. Manila was full of nightclubs that could offer our frazzled minds and bodies a restorative balm. This lifestyle, as I found out, was subject to the law of diminishing returns. The rate of restoration was progressively slower than the rate of diminution. I asked Lucky for a rest before I completely got burned out.

I made use of the period of respite to make plans to wed my girl friend of more than three years. The object of my endless fascination…that lovely girl in the once upon a time magical wonderland that was the radio room, have now agreed to share my future. She was finally mine. She was mine to share my accomplishments with…and to be an inspiration for glories to come. Emboldened by the good progress of my career I felt that I could now afford to start a family of my own. Besides, the lifestyle that I was then enjoying was breakdown-bound not only in my health but also in my love life.

We were wed in simple rites in the Saint Francis Church in Shaw Boulevard, Mandaluyong with my cousin Ric Roa standing as best man, two copywriters Ronnie and Gary and my media assistant, Dennis Corpuz, as secondary sponsors. The General Manager of Cosmos Bottling Company, Pabling Tolentino, and some rich relatives from both families acted as principal sponsors. The reception was not lavish. We were working on a budget that was not princely and so the venue and the food were just… right. My father did not tell me until the last minute that he would pay for the reception. Had I known this, this event could have been a bit more memorable. My wife remembers it well but not with enthusiasm. Anyway, it was good to be budget conscious as a first step into married life.

26. TV Bloopers

I was happy with my life. I had a satisfying and fulfilling career. The agency was humming with activity. A stark contrast from the time I joined. My boss did not renege on his promise to make the place jumpier and noisier. The noise level was up as the account wins started to come. Also, existing accounts were persuaded to resume their advertising activities through continuous proposals for restages and relaunches.

 Front: Pablo Tolentino, Sal (Mafinco), Lucky Borbon back: Wainwright Rivera. MFCO Mgr, MFCO Mgr, Ed Roa

In the meantime Lucky was able to recruit more people into the agency. There was Ely Mansor who was also an FEU drama student during the time of my older brothers. He was taken in by Lucky because he seemed handy with a 35 mm camera and could help develop a commercial film production capability for the agency. Ging Montealegre, a friend from radio room days together with Ding Pasaylon came in as client service executives. Jing would become a vice president of Advertising and Marketing Associates, Tony de Joya’s ad agency (AMA would be headed by Greg Makabenta, another habitue of the FEU radio room during our college days). I was becoming very busy on both media and client servicing. Lucky recruited Wainwright Rivera to assist me in client service. Wainwright later on became the commissioner of Public Estates.

Sarsi

One of the major wins was that of the Cosmos Bottling Company the maker of Cosmos Sarsaparilla the leading entry in the low price end of the softdrink market. It was operating in a niche market where there were really no serious contenders to the Cosmos leadership. We renamed the brand “Sarsi” and waged a vigorous television campaign using “live” TV commercials featuring Caucasian male presentors. For the placements in Channel 2 (ABS-CBN) our talent was Hal Bowie, a well-known newscaster and anchorman of special media events. The very popular Uncle Bob Stewart, the owner of Channel 7 did the Sarsi “live” commercials in his station. We had a certain Reverend Williams, a long necked pastor from a Protestant ministry doing the commercials in TV stations other than Channel 7 and Channel 2 (ABS-CBN). I could picture an effervescent Sarsi cascading through his long esophagus. The imagery tempted me to use the line, “Sarsi, a long, long refreshing drink” but Lucky groaned.

Uncle Bob's Lucky 7 club

Bob Stewart

“Live” TV commercials were something I would wish on my enemies. Anybody doing this kind of commercial production would have a severely shortened life expectancy from the devastating effects of bloopers committed on air. A slightly inebriated Hal Bowie coming from his usual “one drink” at the MOPC before going to the studio once ended the Sarsi commercial with “…so why don’t you reward yourself with a tall glass of San Miguel beer”. Bob Stewart almost always did not require a script. I just told him the message I wanted conveyed and sometimes a story line and he took it from there. I cannot forget the time when Bob Stewart in an inspired moment, took a cute little girl from the studio audience and asked what her favorite softdrink was. “Coke” she said, “You mean Sarsi, sweetheart”, “Nope…Coke!!” and no amount of enticement and pleas by Bob could make her renounce her loyalty to Coke…on air. I aged five years when Hal did the Sarsi with egg commercial and had inadvertently used a rotten egg. You can’t tell an egg’s goodness from the outside. Some inventive camera movements were employed to allow Hal to throw away the contents of his glass out of frame to save the situation.

Sarsi with egg

There were other prized bloopers with lessons to be learned. Bob Stewart singed his hand when a fireproof paint burst into flames upon applying a lighted match to a plywood board that he just brushed the paint on (Lesson: it becomes fireproof when the paint has dried), an Olympia typewriter boasting of sturdiness was dropped atop a table to show that it can take rough handling. As soon as the typewriter touched ground its carriage was sent flying like a Scud missile (lesson: the carriage had to be locked before you drop). There was the case of the “live” demo of a fogger appliance that refused to fog because we used water instead of an oil-based liquid. We couldn’t use insecticide unless we were ready to die of toxification or asphyxiation. The visual effect I wanted was to fill the small promo booth with fog and have Freddie Cochran groping around, then emerging like the monster from the Black Lagoon while he did his spiel. The fogger did not fog. All it did was spray water on the wet and hapless Freddie who was not making sense with his spiel (lesson: oil based liquid fogged while water just sprayed). I don’t recall how Freddie and I got out of that one. The commercial slot must have been on a hardly watched program and our client did not see the blooper. In another occasion I asked Freddie to do a Papa Piccolino “live” commercial. The adhesive that held his false moustache gave up and he ended up doing the commercial with only half a moustache. The other half fell on the pasta plate while he was demonstrating how “al dente” the macaroni was (lesson: sew the false moustache on the talent’s skin). I did a regular “live” commercial for Mafinco’s Mystique, a hair spray brand. Mystique had one placement a week in the Wild, Wild West the first colored program on television. The commercial required a different model each time. We had some of the loveliest girls in Manila as models in these commercials. As amateurs in TV commercial modeling they needed intensive personal coaching (lesson: be patient, “live” commercial production has its moments).

I distinctly remember Hilda Garchitorena as one of the models for Mystique. It was not so much her loveliness, though she was truly attractive, that made her stick in my mind, it was the rumored relationship she had with the late Banjo Laurel that would not go away from my mind. Although Banjo was my classmate in the Ateneo Grade school it did not give assurance that he would look kindly at guys who are engaged in a night job with his girl.

Scratch Pad II (Pete Roa)

I would like to have a break from the serializing of Look Back in Joy and do some reminiscing of the exploits of a young Pete Roa, my brother.

Senador Endong Roa

Pete is the sixth child in our family of eight. There is no special significance in the position of being the sixth child of eight children and yet he stood out as a self assured boy even at an early age. You would expect strong personalities developing from the eldest of families or a special caring for the youngest who in their development get used to having their way leaving all the other middle children disgruntled over the small but numerous advantages that the Kuya or Ate and the bunso usually get. As the seventh in the family I was next to Pete. An unenviable position I can assure you. There was hardly any sibling rivalry between the two of us for I was quick to concede his being better in so many ways. I, in fact idolized him in the same manner that I idolized Dado, another brother who was older than Pete.

I remember when we were small boys Pete would be the favorite of our vacationing tios and tias from Cagayan de Oro. They fondly called him Endong and would always have something special as pasalubong on their arrival from the province. On their departure they would give us a few pesos but Pete would always get a peso more than the rest of us kids.

Pete was the favorite of Tio Anton Cosin, a Chinese mestizo, who was married to Papa’s older sister, Tia Iling. He was the Mayor of Tagoloan, a town west of Cagayan de Oro. He had an adopted son, Dongkoy who later on would become a congressman in Misamis Oriental and at present is the Mayor of the much expanded city of Cagayan de Oro. Dongkoy Emano comes from a well to do family in Tagoloan. It was just the whim of the old man Tio Anton who took a liking to the young boy that persuaded Dongkoy’s mother, Tia Mamen, his close kin, to agree to the adoption. I am not sure if it was really a legal adoption. In the province a young child can easily be taken in by a close relative stay with the “adoptive” parents without the necessary documentation.

Whenever Tio Anton would be in Manila the first thing he would do was to look for “Endong” and talk to him about what he wanted to do during his stay. Pete was just about twelve years old at that time but you could see how much confidence Tio Anton had on him.He would ask for suggestions from Pete and somehow Pete always had the right thing to say and would invariably know what to do, where to go. The old man would sit back on the old sulihiya chair and would caress Pete’s head and say “Endong, you will become a senator someday.”

Being a photography buff he took a picture of Pete and typed a caption on the lower part of the picture “Senator Pedro Roa”. Whatever favors that Pete would get from the old man would really be deserved ones. Pete acted as overall guide and factotum. There were some things that Pete and Tio Anton did that was beyond the ken of Pete’s young and inexperienced mind which led to disastrous consequences …disastrous yet really funny in retrospect.

During one of his visits, Tio Anton requested Pete to accompany him to the Inday theater, a sleazy, smelly bedbug infested place for stage productions of girlie shows which at that time was referred to as “burlesk”. I don’t think they had these extravaganzas in Tagoloan. He must have heard of these forbidden delights from friends coming home from Manila. Being a photography buff he planned on taking pictures of the stage performance. It was a no-no to take pictures of “burlesk” performances. Even at that time the producers of these showx knew that photos of their shows could be used as evidence against them during a raid by the police.

I don’t know how Pete was able to get through the “takilyera”. Even in long pants he definitely looked like a preteener. But then again this was Pete. He always had a way of getting things done. So the dynamic duo went into the cinema hall, squeezing through a lot of sweaty and redolent male crowd to get to a photo vantage point. I think Tio Anton was already past sixty at that time but he had the agility and strength to haul himself up to an elevated portion on a wooden overhang about three rows of seats away from the stage. As soon as he gained a comfortable footing on his perch he took out his camera from his jacket and started making the necessary adjustments for aperture openings, shutter speed and fixing the flashbulb and was soon poised to record the anticipated spectacle. At that juncture one of the theater “bouncers” now euphemistically referred to as crowd control staff, saw the old man with a camera at ready. He was shouting at Tio Anton as he weaved through the throng of a restless and agitated crowd, getting nearer and nearer his perch. He was a dark and burly man who didn’t have to frown to look menacing. As he was nearing arms length to Tio Anton the stage curtains suddenly parted. It took everyone by surprise because there was no usual drums and trumpet fanfare to accompany the grand entrance of the show. Instead of skimpy clad dancers there was this big man at the center of stage wearing a bright red shirt with hands on his hips and in a booming voice roared, “this is a raid”!

I suppose Tio Anton’s guardian angel although aged was still as vigilant as before in keeping his ward from harm’s way. He was about to be grabbed by the”bouncer” when the feisty mayor of Manila, “Arsenic” Arsenio Lacson made his appearance a’la deus ex machina emergence. As soon as that happened there was pandemonium as everyone in the hall made a mad dash for the exits, audience and theater staff alike. Many made good their escapes but the very young and the aged could not break through the police cordon.

I am sure my uncle was really disappointed with the way things turned out. He was not able to get a memento, in his mind or in print of the leggy performance of the famed Inday “Burlesk” dancers. But I guess we should be thankful that nothing untoward happened to him, a close call with the bouncer or a night in jail which was the usual penalty for the audience of these shows to discourage them from patronizing these shows. I don’t really know what happened to Pete while all this was going on. He brought Tio Anton home and that was all that really mattered.

Pete, the Melancholy Dane

Theater was one of Pete’s earlier passion. He was into a wide range of performing arts. Dramatics was his forte but he also excelled in the terpsichorean arts. As a high school student in Far Eastern University he choreographed a full length musical staged by the Girl’s High School of the university. It is not too well known that he once danced with a modern dance group and was a prodigy of the master Lucio Sandoval. Even before getting under the tutelage of Sarah K. Joaquin, one of the leading lights of Philippine theater in the sixties, Pete had already acted in stage plays in High School and had stints with the Barangay Theater Guild and the Tambuli Playhouse and other theater groups I cannot now recall.

Pete was never the ideal student. This was something I still cannot understand up to now. My mother was a stickler for discipline and expected good scholastic performance from her children. In the Ateneo Grade School I struggled from year to year and I know that Dado treaded the edge too. But Pete was something different. He was the one who made my mother proud. He had medals for outstanding scholastic performance and my mother walked proudly as she went up the stage to pin these on his precious one. But that is history, Pete never made good in his studies from High School onward. Pete had to leave the Ateneo in High School and like myself transferred to FEU. All throughout his post Ateneo schooling he hardly stepped into a classroom. His home was the auditorium and the Radio Room of the university. His drama skills were honed during this time but since his academic life was almost nonexistent even a lenient Far Eastern University could not condone this behavior and soon he had to leave the university. It was fortunate that my father was among the founding members of the National Teachers College in the Quiapo district. The National Teachers College was a venerable and respected institution of learning for education. It has a heritage of imparting to its students the nobility and the importance of the teaching profession. Pete enrolled in NTC and as before neglected his academic responsibilities and again busied himself with school dramatics and the school’s radio station. Despite the disregard for academics Pete was able to complete his High School in NTC and would soon move back to FEU as a Speech and Drama student.

Pete, as he was wont to do, would leave an indelible mark on the school. This little lark to my surprise was still being talked about by the board members of the school after the passing of decades. After several years I represented my father during board meetings and some of the older members still recall the memorable event and would ask about Pete.

Now what did Pete do that could be so memorable? I was not a first hand witness of this and may not be able to supply as much detail as I would want to. From stories coming from his friends and those related to me by Dado it seems that on that day Pete had too much to drink while manning the radio booth of the school's radio station. It may have coincided with some girl problems but knowing Pete, girl problems would be the least suspect to get him into a depressed mood. In his drunken state he mounted the NTC clock tower, as Hamlet would mount the Elsinore Castle ramparts all the while delivering the soliloquy of the melancholic Dane…”To be or not to be, that is the question, whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrow of outrageous fortunes…the heartache and the thousand natural shocks…for in that sleep of death what dreams may come…” he went on to finish unerringly every word and spoken trippingly in the tongue as Shakespearian lines should be spoken.

A crowd of students began to gather in front of the tower and soon joined by the firemen of the Tanduay Fire Station whose handball game was interrupted by oratory of my brother. Since he was drunk and dangerously flirting a fall from the tower window the school security had to end the performance, even if it was a tour de force one. There was no applause, the students dispersed and merrily wended their way back to their classrooms and the firemen resumed their game of handball. Truly a waste of genius. It is, as the apostle Matthew said, casting pearls before swine.