When you were little, they might have secretly let you stay up late and sneaked you some sweets under the table. As a teenager, they might have helped you negotiate your weekend curfew and padded your allowance. And as an adult, perhaps you’ve found yourself where your lola and lolo once were, understanding what life had taught, gaining a deeper appreciation for the nuggets of wisdom and advice they have always willingly shared with you.
Give your grandpa call, your grandma a hug and celebrate National Grandparents Day today with these proud, awesome grandparents of PeopleAsia.Â
Criselda Lontok: Fashion and retailing legend
Fashion never gets old for Criselda even as she has retired from managing everyday operations and instead, now focuses solely on designing. She is as excited today, watching fashion shows by young designers, being inspired by nature, TV shows and movies, as she was in her younger years. It’s just as she imagined life as a young girl who devoured every page of Vogue magazine, or as a former model for the greats in local couture, such as Pitoy Moreno, Ben Farrales and Aureo Alonzo.
It was a very different time, Criselda reflects, though she isn’t much different today as the girl who grew up in Lipa, Batangas with her businessman father Gaudencio (who died when she was 12) and mother Isabel. “My father was a disciplinarian, but he didn’t spank us or raise his voice. He just had to look at us and we knew well enough to go to our room.â€Â It was that kind of discipline that she passed on to her twin children Carlo Mari and Maria Carla, and son John, and one that she teaches her eight grandchildren.
(Photography by SARA BLACK)
“Similarly, it was this discipline that endeared her to Rustan’s founder Glecy Tantoco, who took her on as merchandising manager in 1974. Before the Rustan’s matriarch hired her, she told her twice: “Criselda, here we work, we really work.â€Â It was fair comment on Glecy’s part. ‘I was socializing then, attending parties all over. When she called me up herself and said I had passed the exam, I said, ‘When it’s time for work, I work’, she shares.” –  Tanya T. Lara
Nora Aunor: National treasure
Once upon a time, life was hard for her and her family that there was one Christmas Eve that she and her four other siblings (she is fourth in the brood) just shared a piece of pork adobo, which her father Eustacio, a stevedore at the train station, brought home, for Noche Buena. Her mother Antonia was a seamstress. “My parents taught me to always be respectful, not to say bad words about other people,â€Â Nora says of the wisdom she learned from her parents. Silently, they taught the young Nora to always be there for her family. “I became giving, very giving in fact, because I learned it from poverty.â€
(Photography by Mau Mauricio MAU MAURICIO)
“Always, always, it is her eyes that would always be noticed when she acts. Those eyes run a gamut of emotions. Dialogues, many times, do not do her justice. Nora is loudly heard when she is silent, when she just conveys her feelings of joy, despair, envy, hatred and loneliness through her eyes. Does she still know how many best actress awards she has received from the local award-giving bodies? ‘I lost count,†she says. “It must be age. But I really don’t keep a record of it,’ Nora shares with humility.” -  BÃœm D. Tenorio
Socorro Ramos: National Bookstore’s founder
From its first “mom and pop†shop in the 1940s, National Book Store has since raised a generation of children; and their children’s children are now filling up the aisles of National Book Store. Today, as evidence of Nanay Coring’s hard work and determination, National Book Store boasts over 150 branches, over 4,500 employees and has expanded into an empire that includes publishing companies like the Cacho-Hermanos printing press, Anvil Books, Capitol-Atlas Publishing and a department store. And even after 70 years of business, Nanay Coring promptly reports to work every day, waking up 7 a.m. on the dot, as excited and energetic as the first day she opened up shop when she was in her twenties.
(Photography by MAU MAURICIO)
 “When I pray at night, I thank God. If He were to call me now, I’d be willing to go. But I hope (He doesn’t come for me) just yet. I have so many things to do. Like, I want to see my great grandchildren (all 11 of them) grow up and see how they will fare. I want to open up more branches in every corner of the Philippines. Children still need that.† - Nanay Coring
Lucio Tan:Â Business magnate
Lucio, valued at $4.1 billion by Forbes, has always been described by his peers as simple. But he was never small.He wasn’t small even when he was earning about P120 a day for him and his family as a college student at the Far Eastern University (half went to his father, the other half for all his expenses). He wasn’t small, even when all he could afford to enjoy back then was a meal of pan de sal with condensed milk (later including bihon when he could afford it). He wasn’t small because he always had vision.
(Photo taken from the book Taipan: Stories about Lucio Tan)
“These days, Lucio’s heart continues to evolve as a husband, father, grandfather, golfer, avid reader and history buff. He also loves to travel, meet people and make new friends. Ever addicted to knowledge, he confesses that he aims to learn at least 10 percent of anything that interests him, whether it’s medicine, astronomy or geography.” – Jose Paolo Dela Cruz
Johnny Litton: A-list host and writer
Family is his number one. “The Johnny you see on TV is only one facet of me. I like to read books, I have 15,000 at home. I like going to places where I can enjoy anonymity. Most importantly, I am a family man. I have a Johnny Litton Law where children, in-laws and grandchildren — of which I have 13 — have dinner at my house every Sunday,” he says.
(Photography by Cholo Dela Vega)
“People now are so obsessed with gaining more wealth. I think that should only be third. First should be family, then health, then wealth. I mean, how many cars can you ride at one time? Family should be a priority.†- Johnny Litton
Jeannie Goulbourn: Founder of the Natasha Goulbourn Foundation
Jeannie never forgot to celebrate her successes with her husband Cid. They were blessed with two girls, Natasha and Katrina, until one day, 27-year-old Natasha took her own life. She suffered from depression.“Is one ever prepared to lose a child? They say a circle is closed if someone is able to say goodbye to a loved one with lingering illness. But I never expected that Tasha’s life would slip out of my hand — quick and unexpected. She was so involved with life, followed US politics passionately the way she followed her favorite soccer and basketball celebrities,†she discloses. “Were Cid and I not parenting well? What happened? Was I too busy a mother? I questioned God.â€Â She found the answers when she founded the Natasha Goulbourn Foundation (NGF) in 2003. The foundation, populated by volunteer psychiatrists and psychologists, helps give advice and guidance to those undergoing clinical depression and their families.
(Photography by DAN YUSAY HARVEY)
She has found new joy now in the arms and lilting voice of her three-and-a-half-year-old granddaughter Karine, daughter of Katrina. They play at the park. They sing together. They horse around the house. She dresses her up. Karine lights Jeannie’s world anew. Jeannie is a child again.As she holds tight to the child in her, Jeannie cocoons in her dreams of making life better — not anymore for herself but for others. - BÜm D. Tenorio Jr.
King Rodrigo & Boots Anson-Roa: Seasoned lawyer and veteran actress
Meeting Maria Elisa “Boots†Anson-Roa and lawyer Francisco “King†Rodrigo Jr. is like watching those super kilig’50s Nida Blanca-Nestor de Villa romantic comedies with modern-day Kathryn Bernardo-Daniel Padilla twists. Think saccharine sweet, deep Tagalog poetry in this modern-day age of texting. How their story unfolds, you’d think there was a great mastermind behind it, because everything happened in its perfect time—he at 74, she at 68. “It was a fiasco,†King describes the first attempt of their siblings and relatives (he calls them “the incurable matchmakersâ€) to bring him and Boots Anson-Roa together, on the 96th birthday of his mother a few years ago. Apparently, both were clueless about the “conspiracy.â€
(Photography by MAU AGUASIN)
“I love everything about him. He is a decent man. Makikita mo ang kadisentehan at kabaitan ng isang tao (You would see how kind and gentle a person is) in the way he treats his mother, his children, his grandchildren, and the people working for him. Nagdadala yan ng breakfast sa opisina niya (He brings breakfast to his office) in the morning to share with his staff. He visits and calls his mom. He’s a loving dad and lolo. That says a lot. He’s resolute — from the beginning, it was marriage. Of course, his battlecry is, in the interest of time, he might not reach…he’s 74!â€Â – Boots Anson-Roa
