A night in Elbi
Stomping on the dream of becoming a doctor at the last year of Junior High School, it was not easy for Shanniah Aubrey G. Peralta to find another profession to set her eyes on. Setting aside a life-long dream because of the impracticality of it- as she is the firstborn of her family, and due to financial constraints, was a bitter and hard pill to swallow. All the plans she had made for her supposed future was gone in a snap. Her excitement and passion, gone. Maneuvering 4th year High School without a career in mind was heavy, but the light that carried away the rock on her gut soon came. And when it did, it was like a smack on the face. Why did she need to look so far, when the answer for all her woes was right there, in front of her face?
She first spoke in front of a large crowd when she was in Grade 1. It was a storytelling contest, and even if she did not win, it has awakened her love for reading stories. The first book she owned was an almanac, and when she read it, she started collecting since. The first time she ever joined a writing contest was when she was in Grade 6, in a public school where her mom graduated. She did not even know that it was a contest back then, thought it a workshop until she had been announced a winner. It was something she thought she could not do before, and she was hooked. Her time for writing had come to a halt, though. As when she entered Junior High School in an institution that prioritizes Science and Mathematics, her adoration for writing has no place but on the four walls of the classroom for a single subject of English. She was confined for years, and almost forgot her love for writing until she was allowed to write again. But this time, she was also able to use her voice. Being recruited to be a part of a Broadcasting team to represent their school for the PressCon was a huge honor, if not quite a bit scary. Come Senior High School, she took on the Strand HUMSS, the track for the students who wanted a career on Humanities and the Social Sciences. It opened her eyes to the problems beyond herself, and that experience marked the path she wanted, and eventually did take.
Currently studying at the University of the Philippines Los Banos with the program BS Development Communication, she was once again given the chance to pursue what should have been her track long ago. Even if it was hard to be parted with her family for the first time in her life, she had taken the risk and sacrificed to take a step in the future she wanted for herself. She might have stopped before, but it must have been for the better, as now, she has gained something more: a purpose. And she writes before, yes, but now, she was not only writing and speaking for the contests she wanted to win and at the classes she wanted to pass, but for actually the most important judge: the masses.
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