This beauteous Lola, fought and earned her diploma
AND there she was! Wow!
At 68, this amazing lola gracefully, tottering on her high heels, walked up the stage to receive her diploma as graduate of Bachelor of Science in Criminology at the Lyceum Northwestern University in Dagupan City recently. And her classmates cheered!
Ma. Sabina Calica Borgeaud from Barangay Tiblong, San Fabian finished high school in 1965. It took her 45 years later to go back to school and pursue a college degree.
Married to a French pilot, Frederic Louis Borgeaud, Lola Sabina trained for several months with the Philippine Army, Philippine Navy, Coast Guard and Air Force as a woman auxiliary in self-defense and first aid. This explains in part her choice of studies.
In 1970, she landed a job at the National Statistics Office (now Philippine Statistics Authority) in Manila, doing odd jobs.
BORGEAUD
She and Frederic were blessed with three children, seven grandchildren and one great-grandchild. She met her beloved Frederic while riding a bus in Carmen, Rosales when he helped her carry a sack of rice she was bringing to Manila with her. That started the courtship.
She was 34 and he was 41 when they got married in Manila.
When her husband passed away in 2004, she found it hard to cope with his loss.
“Age does not matter. You have to step forward, never backward,” she said when she realized that life must move on.
She decided to enroll in BS Criminology at the LNU initially for few units only as she was still employed then at the NSO office in Calasiao town. She became a full-time student after she retired as administrative officer.
She was called “Madam” by her teachers while her fellow students addressed her as “Tita,” “Nanay,” “Mama Sita” or “Lola.”
“I’m very happy, I have many friends in school,” she said.
She excelled in school and notched impressive grades as high as 95. But she could not make it to the dean’s list because there were years that she took on few units per semester due to her workload as an employee and as a dutiful mother.
She said she has a retentive memory and was very active in oral recitation. She said her ability to speak well in English language gave her big edge in school performance. She also speaks French, Spanish, Chavacano, Filipino and Bisaya. Lola Sabina grew up in Zamboanga City.
The campus knew her as the only student in Criminology “who comes to the library almost every day”.
She did not get special attention and she loved it. She did her on-the-job training as a future policeman, manning the traffic and learning other skills the way ordinary students were to do.
When her graduation came and she finally got her diploma, she said she felt she “was in heaven, on top of the mountain”.
“I fought and had my victory at last,” she said.
She said she would advise others undergoing difficulties in their studies that, “Life is a sacrifice, no matter how hard it may seem, you have to fight”.
On her graduation day, she was joined by her children, and like most graduates, she “was nervous, felt cold I might slip and fall because I was wearing seven-inch high heels”.
At her age, she said she does not intend to get employed anymore but would continue to work on voluntary basis only. In fact, she is busy giving lessons on self-defense and dance lessons being a good dancer.
This summer, Lola Sabina plans to enroll for a master’s degree in Public Administration.
“I want to learn more about life,” she added. (Tita Roces)
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