“Go back To Day One Of Your Arrival," Says Philippino Jesuit

Theresa "Gang" Badoy

Gravitating to media after college, Gang Badoy landed an ABS-CBN assignment to interview a hundred Filipinos in America for the Philippine Centennial Celebration in ’98. Exciting at first, eighteen interviews with Fil Ams considered successes saw her attention wandering to “ordinary Filipinos" struggling for survival. The network wasn’t interested in such stories. So she quit and lived on odd jobs until a lucky break at WTHR-NBC’s Eyewitness News in Indianapolis. Starting as an intern, she worked her way up to desk editor. That took care of her work visa. In six years she had a condo, a BMW and an Italian fiancé. But still restless, she woke up terrified one morning. “Is this it?" she asked.   

“Go back to Day One of your arrival," advised her long-standing best friend, the young Jesuit priest Joey Fermin. 

Gang returned to the first entry in her travel diary and read: “I’m leaving RP so I can come back braver." 

Link (here) to the full article at the Philippine GMA-NEWS.TV