She wanted to be a teacher, from the very beginning. She had no other dream. The fortune or misfortune of an early marriage did not deter her to pursue her dream. She had a rather unusual way of attending her classes at the Trinity College of Quezon City (now Trinity University of Asia), where she was taking the course Bachelor of Secondary Education, major in Guidance Counseling. After her husband had fetched her five-year old daughter at a nursery school, he will leave her at the College, where the girl joins all the classes of her mother, sometimes playing, sleeping, making jokes or scribbling. The way home is a two-hour bus ride where mother and daughter were standing amidst the foulest of all human scents.

Well, I was the daughter. And the soon-to-be-teacher was my mother. We endured the same trials and difficulties during the next three years, until my mother reached her dream, graduating cum laude. I could remember her bright smiles full of hope and promise for a dream fulfilled that would make a difference in her life and the life of her family.

While reviewing for her licensure examinations, my mother was actually pregnant with my little brother. It was a difficult pregnancy, but, with God's help, she was able to pass the examinations.

Her first stint at the corridors of the teaching profession was very traumatic, in a way. She was also already actually reporting as a Guidance Counselor of a High School in Quezon City when the Division Superintendent called her and threw in her presence her documents saying that she did not authorize her appointment. Since then, my mother never ever dared entertaining the thought that she will ever become a teacher.

But necessity and fate often conspire. Back in South Cotabato, the time came when my mother, in dire need of an employment, had hold on to what she had: her teaching profession. And so, having been convinced by my father she tried her luck in a high school in Surallah. At the onset, it seems everything was going well. But later, she gradually discovered the ugly face that lurks in every nook and cranny of the Department of Education. Torn between her sense of decency and her desperate need for some earnings to augment the family income, she agonized for the right decision.

In the end, she decided where her heart truly belongs: the side of decency, honesty, honor and integrity. She refused to tow the line, despite the fact that the bets position that must be taken under the circumstances is to beg for mercy from the powers that be. She sided with truth, and all hell turned loose.

At the ranking, she established that one of the two interviewees gave her a score either of zero or one out of twenty. It was meant to bring her down the overall ranking ladder, because the powers that be promised to give the first three regular items to the first three. However, with God's providence, my mother still ranked number three in the overall ranking, which left the powerful ones in a quandary. They have to change their declarations and reasons again and again in order to exclude my mother.

Of course, they had their way. And when classes for school year 2002-2003 began, my mother lost all hopes that she may become a part of the teaching staff of the school.

A fighting woman that she is, she brought her struggle to the division office. There, she discovered that the higher officials did not really know what was happening at the school, that they have received distorted facts about the problems in the school. She explained everything to proper authorities, who in the end, worked for a slot at the Provincial School Board for my mother.

My mother then became a PSB-paid teacher at that school. She accepted the PSB slot although she had, by right, a claim on the third regular national item. Of course, the higher authorities promised the fourth item would automatically be given to her.

Things changed. After waiting for months, she had learned that some people again manipulated the items and that the next regular item was not given to her as promised. They gave reasons that appear to be illogical.

Dismayed, there were several nights when she could help but pray and cry. A spark of hope appeared just in time when she heard that the Guidance Counselor at SUNAS has just retired and that there is vacancy for the position she had. My mother immediately applied for the position upon hearing the news. It was her who got the position out of the three people who applied.

Today is my mother's fifth year as a Guidance Counselor at Surallah National Agricultural School. Who said that more tears are shed for prayers that were answered? It may be true now for my mother.

I admire my mother. She could go on fighting for her rights, specifically, for her right to be a teacher. She believes that she could be a teacher, and remains to be one, even without compromising her principles, her dignity and her self-respect. She could proudly proclaim to the whole world that she became the Guidance Counselor at SUNAS without having to make sipsip, bootlick, bribe, or impress the powers that be. She walks the school grounds with head high.