“Sino sa inyo ang may piso?”
Just one peso. That’s all.
It may seem like loose change, something you’d barely notice falling from your pocket. But to the 12-year-old me, a single peso was a lifeline. It meant a piece of bread that I would divide into 3 parts for a day’s worth of meal; a moment of hope, for it meant I had a reason to stay alive.
Back then, I didn’t look like someone who would enter Ateneo. I was the boy at the stoplight you didn’t want to look at. I was the kid sleeping at the dark alleyways of Tondo, pretending I wasn’t invisible. I had no mother to run to. No father to call.
No home to return to. Only the cracked pavement and a hunger that made me ask God, not for food, but for a reason to stay on this earth. But even then, I carried something I didn’t fully understand: hope. And a refusal to die quietly.
So I taught myself. Tutored other street kids. Bartered knowledge for coins. For bread. For a pillow made of newspaper. I never had the luxury to “dream big.” I just wanted to make it through the day.
But four years ago, Ateneo came. I was just a boy with trembling hands and tears in his eyes, seeing an Ateneo acceptance letter via email like it was the very first “yes” the world had ever given him. But let me tell you what hit harder than the acceptance: the tuition. I saw that receipt, closed my eyes, and whispered: “Lord, kahit magtrabaho po ako habang-buhay… di ko po kaya ‘to.” And I was right. I couldn’t.
But then you showed up.
You, the donors, the believers, the silent champions. You, who didn’t know my name but decided that a boy without a home was still worth sending to one of the best universities in the country. Because of you, I didn’t just survive Ateneo. I thrived.
Because of you, I represented the Philippines in a business case competition in Singapore, on my birthday. My first time on a plane, my first time feeling like I belonged on a global stage. Because of you, I won 3rd place in the Best Undergraduate Thesis in Economics.
A boy who once begged for coins… now writing policy that could change lives.
Because of you, I found my voice, my strength, my purpose. But today is not just about me.
Let me tell you what your generosity truly looks like:
It looks like a scholar eating quietly so no one sees their empty lunchbox.
It looks like someone arriving soaked from walking in the rain, because they saved their pamasahe for printing readings. It looks like a classmate who works three rakets between exams, and still shows up on time. It looks like a dorm light flickering at 3AM because someone is still awake, chasing excellence with bloodshot eyes and borrowed time.
And yet… we never gave up. Because you made sure we never had to fight alone.
I know you give quietly. Humbly. Without asking for recognition.
But today, allow me to say this, on behalf of every scholar who made it to this stage:
Thank you for being the reason we could dream.
Thank you for proving that compassion is stronger than circumstance.
Thank you for saying yes to strangers, and for loving us into becoming more than our pain.
As I step out of Ateneo, I carry no inheritance. No famous last name. No safety net. But I carry something far more powerful: your belief in me.
And I promise, with every breath I take from here on, I will pay that belief forward.
Until another child, homeless, nameless, forgotten, finds their way to a stage like this.
Until someone else can say, “Because of you, I made it.”
You saw us when the world refused to look.
You believed in us when all we had was grit.
You reminded us that even if we came from pavements, we could rise and help others rise, too.
This is not just a graduation.
This is a tribute to shared grace, to quiet sacrifices, to the profound truth that hope, when shared, multiplies.
Maraming salamat po, and I warmly welcome you all to this celebration—your celebration. Because behind every scholar’s success, there is a generous heart that dared to believe in the impossible.
