Fab Event: BB Gandanghari Met With Bloggers

Yesterday I was reminded of a great lesson and that is to fully understand a person, you must really have to walk in their shoes. If you have not then you have no right to say what is wrong and what is right. Everyone is entitled to their own opinion and after this fruitful meeting I think maybe they should keep their opinion.

BB Gandanghari made me look back at the times when I was in a similar internal struggle where I was caught between doing what I want because it makes me happy or doing what others dictates because that is the norm and that makes them happy. It’s really easy for other people to tell you what to do than actually do it. It’s easier to see the dirt on other people’s face than the dirt on yours.

After yesterday, let me take this opportunity to apologize to BB Gandanghari for the slightly nasty post I made couple months ago after BB came out in the open. I’m sorry and I hope you understand that it was instinct talking at that time. It was the most common reaction anyone could have surprised by the big change you decided for yourself. But after meeting you and that fun question and answer you gamely answered without apprehension, I say Go BB! “Be all that you can be!”

Yesterday was the Bloggers Meet and Greet With BB Gandanghari organized by www.thepoc.net with the help of Noemi Dado and Dine Racoma, the two of the first bloggers BB met in person.

I can understand why BB’s mom could not accept that she now has a “5th daughter” according to BB. Being a mom myself, I think it’s very heart breaking to see your child (son or daughter) deviates from what God gave them. If BB went through a long process I think BB’s mom is going through the same process right now and at the moment she is at the denial stage. BB understands that and hopes one day her mother would accept whoever BB is like other people already have. “Not as a woman not as a man, but a human.” “I don’t need psychological help, I am perfectly fine.”

The very casual question and answer went on for more than an hour and these were my three questions for BB:

1) Do you have any plans to go through some other major changes in your body like go under-the-knife?
2) Do you have a love life?
3) Why did you burry Rustom?

Going under-the-knife?
BB said at the moment there is no plans to go beyond what she already did for herself. She is already satisfied with what she is and what she have and going under the knife is out of the question. All the changes in her physical attributes you see in her now was a product of mind power. “You become what you think,” BB said.

“You know, I’m actually very comfortable with my body. I’ve stopped referring to myself as a man or a woman, and I consider myself simply as a human being. I have nothing against those who choose to go under the knife but at the moment I have no plans of doing so. When I was in the US, I realized that I am a lady. That was where it started. From 31 inches (I was slim for a man) my waistline became 25 inches and even I don’t really know how that happened. I think it’s the power of the mind. It’s really all in the mind.”

Rustom Padilla was one of the Philippine showbiz matinee idol, he had the most gorgeous face as a male actor, he married one of the prettiest face in Philippine showbiz , Carmina Villaroel. As a man he got the perfect built, not so muscular but not too slim. BB recalled that as a male Rustom used to have a 33 inches waistline but now as BB she can’t believe it herself but she got 25 inches. Her shoulders were wide when she was a man, now it slimmed down miraculously. BB is towering at 5’11.

BB’s change was a big shock for everyone although there was a hint in October 1, 2008 that BB is coming out of her shell when Rustom sashayed as BB Gandanghari in the 31st Gawad Urian Awards being the presenter of the Best Actor Award. It was a shock for everyone. I was a fan of Rustom and so were some of the others present.

“I don’t know if you will believe me but the moment I decided that I am a woman, the physical changes followed. I believe my thinking helped a lot with what has transpired and I am happy with what God has gifted me so I don’t have plans of changing them,” she said.

Love life?
She giggles before she answered. “”No, I don’t at the moment… but like all human beings of course I also long to be with someone,” then giggles again.

BB Gandanghari indicated her support for the same-sex marriage if such a bill will be passed here in the country someday although she thinks its too pre-mature to assume.

Love life is out of the picture right now as she is busy grooming and “parenting” herself because having a new identity takes a lot of responsibility. “I want her [BB] to become a God-fearing, loving lady.”

[Maybe my mother feels that] when you’re in this kind of life you tend to be promiscuous. You tend to be sexually active. That’s not the case. I value relationships and I value the connection [between people]. And I don’t think it’s bad.” BB said.

Burrying Rustom
“Because I believe there is resurrection.” “When someone dies somebody else lives.” BB said the days when Rustom was “alive” it was the darkest moments in her life. “It is dark in the closet,” BB recalls.

BB explained that her situation is not a choice.” God made me this way. I have been struggling all my life until 2002 to live up to the expectations of being male. It was difficult. I felt something within that I was constantly denying until the day I decided to be myself.”

“You know, when the time came that I realized, or Rustom realized, the he was gay, he outed himself not to man but to God. When he did that, it doesn’t really matter anymore what other people say or what the industry says, what the society says.” she expounded.

BB said there is no use in hiding before men because God sees you anyway. “{Being out} is more. It is being able to stand naked before God. Being able to be yourself before God.”

The last 41 year of Rustom Padilla’s existence was of role playing BB recants. “BB Gandanghari is the real me. I am not playing roles anymore,” she said.

She said she will still gladly take roles as a man but that is because its a role that shows her versatility as an “actress”. Although the “late” Rustom studied Film Making in U.S. in 2003 BB Gandanghari will not pursue the same career as Rustom and BB are two different persons.

BB Gandanghari is the “babaeng hinugot sa tadyang ni Rustom” like the Christian doctrine of creation where Eve came from the ribs of Adam as she puts it.

BB Gandanghari shares beauty secret. (press play button to watch)

BB asked the last question to the bloggers who were present in the event: “Why did you came (to meet me)?”

Like me, everyone was curious and finally want to get the answer straight from the horses mouth. BB’s answers put an end to the many question in my mind and an end to my personal preference. Kudos BB Gandanghari! May you serve as an inspiration to everyone who lacks courage and belief in themselves.