Professional Documents
Culture Documents
De Claro Singles
De Claro Singles
Portrait of a Man
Boy with granddaughter Aria
Introduction
Through this book, we share with you Boy, God’s greatest gift to
our family. We hope it captures the various ways in which we know
him—as a kind and loving family man, a trailblazing professional,
an exacting boss and mentor, a loyal and generous friend, and
a passionate civic leader. We also hope it reveals to Boy certain
things that he doesn’t know about himself.
Boy has always said that the measure of success lies not in the
awards or riches you have earned but in a happy family life. He
has consistently been able to live by this mantra. He has also been
able to give of himself to people other than his family. This book
is a testament to the many lives he’s touched. It is also our little
way of showing our appreciation for all the love and support he
has given us.
Corito de Claro
Contents
When Boy de Claro decided on a rare whim to skip work and head
to Punta Fuego in Batangas with his wife Corito one morning—
“let’s play hooky,” she said—he hadn’t the slightest idea he was
in for a big surprise. It was a treat in itself to take his Sunday
car—a sports car he used only on weekends—out on a weekday
morning with his wife on an impromptu trip. They sped down
South Expressway, stopped for breakfast in Tagaytay, and finally,
made their way to Punta Fuego to visit the beach house of Corito’s
cousin, a gorgeous place that, according to his wife, Boy really
ought to see.
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Portrait of a Man
That is, until they arrived at a room where a Peck Piñon painting
of a sailboat was on display. It was a dead giveaway. Boy stared at
the piece, clearly befuddled, and hesitantly stated a fact—“This is
my favorite painting.”
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A Family Man
the Piñon painting, she turned to her husband and said, “This is
your house!”
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Portrait of a Man
The Boy with the thunderous voice and sharp tongue is a far
cry from the grandfather who dozes and does crosswords beside
his sleeping months-old granddaughter Aria. The calculating
professional is hardly like the homebody who prefers to spend
most of his free time in what Jill calls his “horizontal position,”
lying in bed or on the couch and watching sitcoms or movies.
The Boy of the brash and brazen nature, never one to shy away
from controversy at work, barely resembles the man who turns
childlike with anticipation over the prospect of a mahjong session
with friends, or the man who exclaims melodramatically—“I died
a thousand deaths”—upon entering a store filled with what he
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A Family Man
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Portrait of a Man
In the early 1980s, when Boy moved his wife and two small
daughters (Rammy, who is ten years younger than Maia, wasn’t
born yet) to the United States for his stint in New York as Associate
Director for Colgate-Palmolive Philippines, Maia remembers the
long days and late nights her father would spend at the office. “It
was a game with me, my mom, and Jill: ‘Guess what time daddy
will be home?’ He’d come home late and we’d pick him up at the
train station because he would commute to work. He was really a
workaholic then. He was still building his career.”
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A Family Man
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Portrait of a Man
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A Family Man
9
Boy and Corito with grandchildren Nico, Aria, and Marco
A Family Man
Although it took some time for Boy to warm up to both Dave and
King, as is typical of fathers with the men dating their daughters,
King recalls an incident when Boy treated his first boo-boo without
much fuss, and even a bit of humor. The family was going to watch
a show at Music Museum in Greenhills, and since there was no
driver available, Maia volunteered King, then her boyfriend, to
drive for the family. It was a simple enough task, but King was
nervous anyway. “I was probably doing 30 km/hr on Ortigas,” he
narrates.
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Portrait of a Man
“It took me about thirty minutes to figure out what to do and say
to Mr. de Claro,” King continues. “He said never mind, he’ll be
the one to drive na lang. And thankfully he still allowed this now
dirty and sweaty guy to ride beside him. He was cool about the
whole thing. He would even joke about it but you cannot imagine
what I was feeling the whole time!”
To his kids, Boy is confidante and champion. “He says to us, ‘There’s
never a problem too big that you can’t tell me,’” Jill recounts. When
in need of advice, he is the one they turn to, without fail. He is
also matanong, says Maia. “He always wants to know what we’ve
been doing. You feel special when you talk to him.” He likes to
reminisce about his own childhood, how much things cost back
then, the simple life of his family when he was growing up. Boy
is a dog lover who would’ve taken care of German Shepherds if
it weren’t for Corito’s objections, and Jill recalls, “When dad was
young, his dogs were always named Rex.” Rammy, who shares
Boy’s interest in basketball, chuckles as he remembers his dad
saying, “Nagbabasketball raw siya dati tapos sobrang dungis kapag
natutulog kaya raw ata siya nagkapimples.”
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A Family Man
Boy is so easy with his kids that he rarely asks them to do anything
for him. It was back when he was around seven years old that
Rammy was made to do something regular with his dad—go
out for breakfast during weekends, just father and son. The ritual
lasted until Rammy was around Grade 6. They would go to Ima
or Jollibee, and Rammy would listen as his dad talked about, of
all things, the birds and the bees. As for Jill and Maia, Boy takes
pride in the fact that his married daughters, their husbands in tow,
continue to indulge their dad by spending Valentine’s Day dinners
at home with him and Corito. Little does he know that his sons-
in-law—who get to save rather than spend money on Valentine’s
Day—are only too happy to oblige.
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Portrait of a Man
To his wife, Boy is and continues to be the ideal husband and family
man. “Life with Boy is never dull,” says Corito. As newlyweds they
spent each evening after dinner playing cards, and so competitive
were they with each other that many times, the games would end
with tampuhan, with Boy getting on Corito’s nerves especially
when he introduced new ideas into the game that were hard to
refute. Their married life is filled with laughter because of his great
sense of humor. He is also always the first to say sorry and make
peace after a fight. Corito and the kids bask in the comfort of
knowing that whenever they need Boy, he will always be there. He
even tells them that anyone can call a “family council meeting,”
where they can sit down, talk, and help each other through any
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A Family Man
“One of the stories mum used to tell,” recounts his sister Cora,
“was that when she told Boy off for some misdemeanor, this
would usually involve a long and detailed discussion about said
misdemeanor and Boy’s attempt to explain himself and defend
his actions. In mum’s words: naka-isang salita ka, naka-100 na si
Boy. But the end result was he would end up doing what she tells
him to do—granted of course that she was right. One of Boy’s
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Portrait of a Man
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A Family Man
when angry, Maia notes. “He spits out his words. He enunciates
every word so you know it’s really serious.”
When choosing restaurants, Jill and Rammy say they prefer going
to places they know their dad already likes, except their mother
and Maia like to suggest new places. “Recently we had lunch
at an Italian restaurant,” Rammy recalls, “and the moment we
entered the restaurant, I knew it wasn’t his type. I had a feeling
magkakaproblem. I think he didn’t like the food that much, pero
di na rin siya nagcomment. I think he knows we get scared. Ang
nangyari dun, we were trying to pay pero ang tagal. He tries to
mellow, pero pag di na niya kaya…” Rammy drifts off but it is
easy to imagine the outburst that is the inevitable end of the story.
“If I get the chance, I’d tell my dad, ‘please, relax lang,’” Rammy
says. “Let it go sometimes.”
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Portrait of a Man
The flip side of Boy’s rage is his passionate nature. Corito describes
his passion as very physical, evident in his every gesture—the
way he speaks, laughs, drives, eats. Boy looms large, literally
and figuratively. When he enters a room, he becomes its center
of gravity—he of the boisterous laughter, the booming voice, the
stinging retort, the impressive repartee. Passion for passion fits Boy
to a T, and whether it be steering a company toward success, or
uplifting the poor, or tending to his family, Boy is unshakable and
wholehearted in pursuing endeavors that matter most to him.
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Chapter Two
The Midas Touch
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Portrait of a Man
into a world-class facility. “He devoted his first thirty minutes each
day being the unofficial foreman, architect, and project manager
all rolled into one,” says Elvie Guzman, former Chief Financial
Officer of Wyeth. “No job is too small for him to get passionately
involved.”
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The Midas Touch
rallying his people to hit their sales targets and overcoming the
skepticism of HQ over the effectiveness of NASCON as a tool
to reach corporate targets. When PMC finally touched down in
Bangkok, it was in the company of some 300 employees, majority
of whom had never set foot in a foreign country prior to the trip.
From initiating the annual half-day workday, aptly dubbed “Work-
Life Balance Day,” to engaging in a three-year battle to update
an otherwise obsolete hospitalization plan for Wyeth employees,
it is beyond question that PMC never misses an opportunity to
safeguard the well-being of the company’s greatest asset.
21
Boy at a dinner with former President Corazon Aquino
during his stint with Colgate in Jakarta
The Midas Touch
The facts are staggeringly impressive. PMC seems to have the Midas
touch. An AIM case study notes that “during de Claro’s watch
as Colgate Marketing Manager, they overtook their two largest
rivals, Procter & Gamble (P&G) and Unilever, in toilet soaps
and detergents—categories where the two had been the perennial
leaders. These two categories joined toothpaste, shampoos,
toothbrushes, scouring cleansers, deodorants, and other products
where Colgate was already number one.”
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Portrait of a Man
Fred and Boy were not only leaders; they were visionaries. Together,
they steered J&J toward new directions and uncharted territories,
at times provoking the ire of regional management. The risks, as
the results proved, were well worth the trouble. “Some of the stuff
we pulled off in J&J were world-class,” Jem says. “They were never
done anywhere else in the J&J world. Modess with wings first
came out of here. Johnson’s Isopropyl Alcohol first came out of
here. Those happened under Boy’s watch.” The tandem of Fred and
Boy managed to come up with a machine to manufacture Modess
with wings for P300,000—a pittance compared to the USD 3
million they were told they needed to spend for a machine that
could do the job. Under their leadership, the company survived
a drive to become worth USD 100 million; it also survived what
could’ve been a crippling six-week internal strike. In plain and
simple terms, says Jem, “It was a really good time to be in J&J.”
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The Midas Touch
Based on the trajectory of his career, to say that Boy has evolved is
an understatement. He goes down in history as the first Filipino
General Manager of a multinational, one among the top 100 largest
companies in the Philippines—a feat that is testament to his taking
to heart the arête—the quintessence, the excellence—that his Jesuit
education sought to inculcate in him. This achievement and many
others cannot go unnoticed. In 2006, he was the recipient of the
Alumni Achievement Award (Triple A) from the AIM, where he
received his MBA in 1973. A year later, the Philippine Marketing
Association honored him with the Outstanding Achievement in
Marketing Management Agora Award.
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The recipient of the 2007 Agora Award for Outstanding
Achievement in Marketing Management
The Midas Touch
PMC does not have a crystal ball; however, his capacity for coming
up with fresh ideas and being two, three, five steps ahead of everyone
else, combined with marketing instincts he can count on, make
for far superior substitutes. “Boy is brilliant, to begin with,” says
Pinky Laurena, who worked with PMC at J&J, working her way
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Portrait of a Man
And while each member of the staff is expected to hold his or her
own in the workplace, working as a team is equally important.
“Boy has that uncanny way of making people work towards a
common goal and steer them to action, difficult as it may be,”
notes Elvie. He gets his people to support rather than outdo
each other. “His basic philosophy was, ‘If you have an enemy, a
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The Midas Touch
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Portrait of a Man
says Neri. “This became more evident when the company had to
face numerous issues last year and survived it with good numbers
and the continued respect of people in government, healthcare
professionals, and the consumers.”
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The Midas Touch
One story that got to Jem had to do with the launching of Ovaltine
Smart, when PMC was still working in Novartis. The word out
was that all the preparations for the launch were done—except for
the product. The launch was going to push through with no stock
available, obviously a no-no. “The product manager was updating
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Portrait of a Man
Boy. This is Boy very subdued,” narrates Jem. “He says, ‘You know,
your product is Ovaltine Smart, which means the advertising has
to be smart, the execution has to be smart, the packaging has
to be smart, the delivery has to be smart, the promos have to be
smart… even the product manager has to be smart.’” Jem pauses
and laughs. “That’s tame de Claro.”
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The Midas Touch
Right before Boy ended his acceptance speech during the Triple
A Awards, he did the unexpected: he pledged a million pesos to
the AIM alumni scholarship fund. It was his way of giving back
to the school that played an instrumental role in making him
the marketing legend that he is today. Boy knows he owes much
of his smarts to his education, and although he is tough on his
subordinates, at the same time, he makes sure they’re equipped
with the necessary tools to face up to his grueling demands.
“His passion for work excellence gave birth to the emphasis placed
on training and made WAP (Wyeth Academy Philippines) what it
is today—a hub for the development of its employees and business
partners, and later, a regional training facility,” says Elvie. “He is
a staunch believer in training that improves the employees and
strengthens the company.”
Jem recalls that at some point during his stay in J&J, sales and
marketing were integrated under Boy. Jem was then asked to cross
over to sales from marketing. “The sales side had evolved so much
in terms of its technologies so what Boy wanted me to do was
go over to the sales side and help define what those technologies
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Portrait of a Man
34
Chapter Three
A Teacher By Example
If you work for PMC, then there are two words that surely send
shivers down your spine: business review.
Hear those two words and your heart skips a beat, or beats a little
faster. Suddenly, what you know yourself to be—a confident,
intelligent individual with respectable marketing abilities and
more than a couple of years’ worth of experience on the job—
comes into question, and you squirm in your seat, oddly feeling a
little unsure of yourself. Exhausted from a busy day at work, you
still find it hard to sleep at night. You think of calling your mother
to request for a novena. You might even drop by the neighborhood
church to say a novena yourself.
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Portrait of a Man
projects for the balance period, and to determine whether you can
meet your targets or not. A fifteen-minute presentation is all you
need to prepare for the occasion. Fifteen minutes is half the time
you spend eating lunch, a quarter of the time you spend driving to
work, an eighth of the time you spend watching a movie. And yet,
no matter how many times you’ve gone through a business review,
those presentations always feel like the longest fifteen minutes of
your life.
“You knew he wasn’t pleased when his ears turned red and he
started breaking pencils with one hand,” says Jojo Ocampo, one
of PMC’s top three marketing lieutenants at J&J. “He could get
really temperamental, especially when your brands weren’t doing
well,” adds Pinky Laurena, also a former J&J employee. In such
cases, the reasons for falling short of targets had better be good,
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A Teacher By Example
Keeping up with a man whose mind can work faster than anyone
else’s is what PMC’s staff members always attempt to do, putting
37
The J&J and Lintas staff, including Pinky (seated, far left) with Boy
A Teacher By Example
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Portrait of a Man
In business reviews, notes Andrew, “even if one does not know the
solution to the issues he faces, PMC is more than happy to roll
up his sleeves to help work on a solution. However, he provides
just the right amount of inputs, providing the right level of ‘space’
to people.” This space, of course, is filled with high expectations,
one that a brilliant boss demands of what ought to be an equally
brilliant staff. “One thing he didn’t like was if you had no position,”
Pinky points out. “He’d say, ‘Do you think you can hit this’ and if
you say, ‘It depends,’ naku, patay ka na talaga. You can either say,
‘No I cannot hit it because it’s like this’ or ‘Yes, I can do it because
I’m going to do these things.’ Ayaw niya ng fencesitter.”
When Jem arrived at the J&J office for a job interview with PMC,
he wasn’t nervous at all. The year was 1992 and he knew he could
easily impress, what with his newly acquired AIM education. It
helped that he was fifteen minutes early for his 1 pm interview. It
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A Teacher By Example
For some reason or another, Jem was made to wait in the lobby
until a little after 1 before being ushered into the office. When he
finally came face to face with PMC, who was sitting at his desk,
Jem extended his hand. PMC stood up, walked past Jem—frozen
in an awkward pose with his hand in the air—and toward the
sitting area, where he settled on the couch. “You’re late,” he said.
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A Teacher By Example
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A Teacher By Example
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Portrait of a Man
think? And if you do this, do you think it’ll be this way?’ He can
be convinced.”
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A Teacher By Example
There was some hemming and hawing on her team’s part as they
were presenting the ad. They were clearly not confident enough and
PMC was getting impatient. Finally, they showed the ad. “PMC
sees it and asks Clients A, B, C to J for their comments. Then he
asks me, ‘What do you think?’ I didn’t know what to say!” Tessa
recounts. She herself could no longer see the vision behind the
material they created. PMC then said to her, “Man, they’ve really
worked on you.”
The experience was an eye-opener to Tessa, who got the message loud
and clear. Compromise is a reality, but too much compromise isn’t
worth it, not when you yourself no longer believe in the material.
Although pleasing the client is part of the job, it shouldn’t prevent
the team from defending what they believe to be a good concept
against a skeptical client. After all, they weren’t hired to agree with
the client, but to provide their expertise.
Tessa considers PMC her best client in her many years of advertising
because he knows what he wants and he will fight for an idea. The
agency, as she points out, is only as good as its client lets it, and
some of her team’s best work is the fruit of their efforts to meet
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Portrait of a Man
PMC’s demands.
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A Teacher By Example
sake of accepting it. I think it’s a trait you find sorely lacking in
today’s managers.”
One thing PMC would never admit and may not even be conscious
of, according to Jem, is he is harder on the men than the women in
the workplace. “Boy has two daughters,” Jem speculates, which to
him is reason enough for the boss to go easier on the women in the
team. Whether this is true or not, some of the women who have
worked for PMC—Pinky and Tessa, to name a few—undoubtedly
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Portrait of a Man
have a soft spot for him. Both of them speak of PMC with fondness
and view him not just as a mentor but a father figure.
Pinky agrees. She recalls how PMC once told her, “With my kids,
when they were growing up, if they decide to eat out together,
then it’s on me, even if I’m not there.” When she asked him why,
he explained that it was his way of encouraging his children to
bond, to know each other and be together. Pinky pauses upon this
recollection, visibly moved. When she speaks up again, she says, “I
think I’ll do that too. When my kids get bigger, I’ll tell them.”
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Chapter Four
Friendly Fire
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Portrait of a Man
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Friendly Fire
Boy can easily be the life of the party, and certainly, on more than
a few occasions, he is. People are drawn to his confidence and his
engaging manner of storytelling, but this is not to say he is the
center of attention. “For all of his being sociable, he’s a very private
person,” notes Tony Lorenzana. “You will know enough of Boy
on a need-to-know basis. He lets you know only what you have to
know about him.”
Put Boy in a room with another person and he would be far more
interested in getting to know him or her than talking about himself.
Oh, he’s going to do some talking—a lot of it, even—but it is
talk geared toward getting the other person to feel comfortable.
At work, he may easily forget that minutes earlier, he gave you a
hard time over a less-than-satisfactory presentation, but he won’t
forget to ask how you are if he’s heard you’re feeling under the
weather. “He has very strong EQ,” says Ed. “He’s very good with
53
The de Claros often play mahjong with friends Ed and Ting Mañalac,
and Gus (not in photo) and Vicky Nilo
Friendly Fire
people.” Adds Tony, “He would make you feel that he enjoys your
company. He’s a very good listener. He empathizes very well.”
”Many people think Boy is an extrovert, but really, he’s not,” says
Corito. He is genuinely interested in and deeply sensitive to other
people. He is curious about the ideas of others—how they think,
what they believe in, and why. It is unusual to find a man so
accustomed to power who still treats people as individuals rather
than audience. But then again, Boy has never really been less than
unusual in many aspects of his life.
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Portrait of a Man
good an opportunity to pass up. Such was their love for food—
something Fr. Lennie and Boy share to this day—that they would
even opt to spend their ten-centavo bus fares from school to home
on canteen food instead. And then, they would walk the distance
home—Kamias for Boy, and Cubao for Lennie.
In high school, Boy was part of 4-F, the semi-honors class, which,
former class moderator Joe Guerrero quickly clarifies, has students
of practically the same IQ as those in honors class. Those in semi-
honors class tended to glide along in their schoolwork because they
weren’t under the same pressure as their counterparts in honors
class to make it to the dean’s list and graduate with honors. Joe told
his students they were just as bright and talented, and encouraged
them to compete in the arena of excellence. “Even if you try to
motivate people, they may not be able to respond,” notes Joe. “But
Boy had the capacity to lead. The important thing is not to depend
very much on the moderator but to do the planning with the class
and for the class.”
Boy wasn’t the smartest guy in class. He didn’t get the best grades.
He didn’t win prizes in literary or oratory contests. He wasn’t
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Friendly Fire
57
Boy with a former teacher and Buddy Braganza
Friendly Fire
such activity was going over to Joe’s house to eat. “As a matter
of fact I got to know some people from the other schools better
because they were friends of his. He had a friendliness which was
infectious.”
“The most memorable time of his life I would imagine was when
he met Corito through our caroling group,” says Tony. They—
together with fellows like Pompey Adamos, Jun Africa, Ernie Co,
Peping Mallari, Felipe Diego, Toti Tanchoco, Bert dela Cruz, Tito
Santos, Perry Cecilio, Dom Aspillera, Bernie Violago, and Buddy
Braganza—were members of Student Catholic Action (SCA), and
the caroling group was made up of SCA students of various schools.
“Medyo sintunado si Boy. He was part of the caroling but that
doesn’t mean he could sing. Pero marunong siyang makisama.”
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Portrait of a Man
Away from the girls, Boy and his friends hung out at Buddy’s house,
where they sang and played guitar, called up their girlfriends on
Buddy’s phone—even listening in on each other’s conversations—
patched up strained relations with their girlfriends, or strategized
on how to patch up strained relations. But unlike some people, who
were more than eager to spill on the details of their love lives, Boy’s
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Friendly Fire
lips were sealed when it came to his romance with the “dignified,
well-behaved, and mysterious” Corito. They were a sociable pair
who enjoyed attending parties with their friends, some of whom
were also couples. But, Tony notes, “They kept their romance very
private.”
It was in college that the makings of the man Boy is today became
evident. In the way he expressed his thoughts and accomplished his
academic work, he was clearly an intellectual, although he didn’t
parade himself as such. His persuasive skills also grew in sharpness
and prominence. “He could convince people,” says Fr. Lennie,
“and not convince just to convince but convince people that there
was something to be done, a mission to be accomplished, that
there were higher objectives.”
It seemed, also, that Boy recognized then the role his education
would play in charting his life. He wanted certain things—to
make his parents proud, to have a successful career, to drive fast
cars—and he knew that if there was one place that could serve as a
laboratory from which he could emerge more capable of achieving
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Portrait of a Man
his goals, it was school. “He worked hard,” says Fr. Lennie. “All
that he had in his life was his brains. Some people sit on their
brains. It’s a good thing he didn’t sit on it.” Boy milked his Ateneo
education to the fullest.
“And then, of course, if you get married to a girl like Corito, there’s
no way but to excel because Corito comes from a well-heeled
family,” says Fr. Lennie. There was double the pressure to prove
himself, but the fact is, Boy was his own toughest critic and fierce
motivator. Any external source of pressure was simply subsumed
under the already enormous expectations he had of himself.
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Friendly Fire
“When he speaks to you, it’s almost like he’ll nail you first to the
wall so you’ll listen to him. That’s how engaging he is,” explains
Fr. Lennie. “He’d stare at you, say ‘ganito ’yan pare, ganyan.’
Literally, if he had big thumb tacks, he’d pin you on the wall so
you won’t move and then he’ll talk to you and convince you.”
Boy is persistent in seeing an idea through its articulation, and
seeing that it is communicated effectively, convincingly. He won’t
tire until what he has in mind is translated into concrete terms,
whether it be in the form of more clarity in the curriculum of his
children’s school or understanding—better yet, agreement—in a
person he is trying to convince.
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Portrait of a Man
career very well, to his satisfaction,” adds Tony. “He never lost
focus. He never pretended to be what he was not. He never also
bragged about what he was.”
“He loves to eat,” says Pet. “His girth is proof of that.” He devours
desserts—despite being diabetic. He and Corito throw the most
spectacular parties at home, where the food always lives up to the
couple’s exquisite culinary tastes. Fred Dael, a former colleague of
Boy and a friend for over forty years, notes that Boy and Corito
are amazing hosts with such a passion for food that they would
go to extraordinary lengths to indulge their friends’ dining needs.
“When I returned to the Philippines the first time, I missed Pinoy
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Friendly Fire
food very badly that Boy went out of his way to pick me up and
drive me to Santo Tomas, Batangas—at lunch—just so I could
have the best bulalo. And this happened about twice a week for
three months!” A true-blue Atenean, Boy is a huge basketball fan.
He can shout himself hoarse watching UAAP games with son
Rammy. His zest for life is irrepressible.
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Portrait of a Man
“As a priest, if I need help, I know who to go to for help,” says Fr.
Lennie. “I’ve never been disappointed. Even if I don’t need help,
he’d sidle up to me and ask me if I needed help. Sometimes I’d
say no. He’d just get something out of his pocket and put it in
my hand or my pocket. He says you might need something in the
future even if you don’t have any needs now. He’s always been like
that. He doesn’t want to be seen doing it.”
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Friendly Fire
Now that he’s moving toward retirement, Boy has more time to
spare, and he is more than willing to spend this time on worthy
causes, which are educational in bent. Fr. Lennie has tapped
Boy to be part of the Board of Advisers of the Xavier Institute
of Technology, knowing fully well that he can contribute greatly
to revitalizing and marketing the program. His work with Ed as
one of the members of the Professional Schools Committee in the
Ateneo is valuable in pushing the university’s already excellent
programs to greater heights.
And then, as Gus points out, “Boy is concerned about the poor,
the country, and the future of both.” He is proof that a person can
make a difference, as shown by Boy’s current passion, Operation
Big Brother, a project that makes quality high school education
accessible to the brightest underprivileged students. “One has to
have an advocacy that will somehow, no matter how small, change
people’s lives for the better,” explains Pet. “Boy attacked his
Operation Big Brother with so much zeal that people around him
couldn’t help but join in the crusade. OBB took a lot of his time
but he didn’t care—too much was at stake. During the course of
its execution, when corrections had to be made, he made them,
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The young Boy and Corito
Friendly Fire
When Rammy wonders if his father does have a best friend, he’s
looking outward at the members of Boy’s various social circles.
Maybe he is simply so used to their closeness that it doesn’t occur
to Rammy to look for the answer closer to home—inside it, in fact.
After all, when Boy found his best friend, he married her. Even as
a young woman, Corito believed she and Boy were destined to
spend their lives together. There were convergences so uncanny,
she couldn’t help but read them as signs. “First of all, he’s Perpetuo
and I’m Socorro. His birthday is July 20 and mine is July 21. I met
Boy the year my brother died. The birthday of my brother is the
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Portrait of a Man
70
Chapter Five
The Lives of Others
Ruby Capulong knows she has it good. She has a stable job as a
medical representative at Wyeth Philippines. She drives her own
car, a luxury she never dreamed she would enjoy when, just a few
years earlier, she could barely afford the pamasahe to and from
school. She is a spirited young woman with many dreams ahead
of her. She knows it’s tough to make a living, let alone emerge
successful in her career, but with a good education under her
belt—Ruby graduated with honors with a degree in Biology from
De La Salle University—she is confident that the odds are in her
favor.
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Portrait of a Man
72
The Lives Of Others
OBB may very well be the first of its kind in the country, says
Marshall Valencia, DLSU professor and Project Director of OBB.
Other programs typically focus on a single facet of education—
teacher training or facilities, for example—but OBB, which follows
an “adopt-a-school” concept, is far more ambitious in scope and
covers all bases necessary to simulate private school education in
public schools. Offered in cooperation with La Salle, OBB takes
the top 40 students of a public school and places them in a special
honors section beginning freshman year. Throughout their stay in
high school, these students are taught the same curriculum, given
the same facilities, and provided the same materials and resources
as students from La Salle Greenhills, on whose curriculum the
OBB program is based. “Kung anong meron sa La Salle, linalagay
namin dun sa public school,” Marshall explains. The students even
attend a weekly values-formation class, and are sent to youth and
discovery camps.
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Portrait of a Man
The best teachers from the public school are made to take their
master’s degrees in La Salle and trained to administer the program.
They undergo an intensive training each summer, and their
teaching is overseen by the OBB staff. Everything, down to the
exams they give, is monitored closely for quality control.
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The Lives Of Others
This year, Leo Sarion of Arellano High School made victory for
OBB so much sweeter. He graduated summa cum laude from
DLSU with a degree in Biology. His honor proves that there really
is no glass ceiling; with some assistance and their own drive to
help themselves, underprivileged students can compete with the
best of them and make it to the top.
There is a book whose hero, a man named Gideon, is very much like
Boy, says Ting Mañalac, a good friend of the de Claros. “Gideon
was an ordinary bloke who one day had an extraordinary vision of
the path to heaven as a huge river flowing toward its source instead
of away from it. You could jump in any time, but you could also
stay back on shore or get hold of overhanging branches to linger
where you were. Needless to say, the vision changed Gideon’s life
in many unexpected ways.”
“Boy knows where he’s going,” continues Ting, “and it’s to the
source of that river of life. He may not see the end, or rather, the
beginning of the river yet, but he’s made a decision to get there.
And getting there he is. He’s in that river, paddling as fast as he
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The young members of Gawad Kalinga mentored by Boy
The Lives Of Others
can and he’s shouting to everyone who can hear him—this is the
right way! I’m shining the light, he’s saying, watch and listen, and
we’ll get there together!”
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Portrait of a Man
it. “Honestly, when I started, it was simply a project for me,” says
Marshall of beginning his stint with OBB. “But it altered even my
own personal vision. My life aim became different sa kakakausap
ko kay Mr. de Claro. I realized that there’s something bigger there
that we can all contribute to.”
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The Lives Of Others
Tony Meloto, founder of Gawad Kalinga, first met Boy and Corito
as members of Couples for Christ. In 1996, the couple took a great
interest in the work Tony and some others were doing for the out-
of-school youth and the rehabilitation of gang members in Bagong
Silang, Caloocan City. After a short visit in which they met the
young people being helped and heard their stories, Boy and Corito
responded in a manner that amazed Tony. “They asked to meet
with me the following day, gave me a check with zeroes that I
couldn’t count in one hand,” he recalls. At the time, the work they
were doing with the poor was still informal, and this prompted
Tony to return the check, saying he didn’t want to receive money
he didn’t know yet how to spend. He expressed hope that once
the project’s needs were clarified, the donation of Boy and Corito
would still be available.
“What was important to me,” notes Tony upon telling the story,”
“was not the money but the sincerity of Boy and his wife to help.
Not just help by giving charity but by investing a significant amount
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Gawad Kalinga aims to build 700,000 homes
in 7,000 communities in 7 years
The Lives Of Others
81
Portrait of a Man
“The impact of GK that Boy saw first of all was that when you
do social engineering and you restore human dignity, you have
peace,” explains Tony. True social justice means the squatters
will have land and decent homes, which in turn allow them the
space to have dreams and aspirations for their children that would
motivate them to work. “The beautiful environment is an antidote
to crime. From ugly communities, we turn them into beautiful
GK communities. From the dangerous areas, we are now building
safe communities. GK paints houses, landscapes gardens, puts
pavers because we want the impact that the squatters are no longer
squatters, the barong-barongs are now beautiful homes, former
drug addicts are now in school, gang members are now working
and becoming peaceful citizens of their own communities.”
Tony sees in Boy a sincere and loyal friend, one whose remarkable
generosity he has experienced personally. “He offered me, several
times, because he knows my limited means, to send my daughter
to Ateneo. He also offered to buy me a car because he saw how
much time I was putting into GK,” says Tony. He refused both
offers; his daughter was already on scholarship and he himself had
long ago made the decision to live a simple life.
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The Lives Of Others
Aside from his generosity, Tony admires Boy’s vision. The two have
in common a passion for and dedication to the dream of a better
Philippines, and they often exchange ideas and formulate plans to
achieve this ideal. “As a CEO Boy understands vision. We click
because we’re both marketing people. And we also both believe
that we have the best marketing product in the world, that’s the
Filipino. And that we also have the most beautiful country in the
world, and that’s the Philippines. It’s all a question now of coming
up with the right product formulation and better packaging.”
83
To Boy, boats represent collaboration—teaming up with others on a
journey out to sea, where the conditions are unpredictable and challenging
The Lives Of Others
85
Portrait of a Man
86
The Lives Of Others
And when Boy plays the game, these are the staples: integrity,
vision, and passion. As he begins his 60th year, there are bound to
be significant changes in his game, particularly in the way he spends
his time and the amount of time he can spend on various interests.
The thought and energy he used to expend in the workplace, where
he developed the career he loved to the fullest, can now be devoted
to other matters close to his heart. Now there are hours spent at
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The de Claro family today
Standing (left to right): Marco, Rammy, Dave, Jill, Maia, King
Seated (left to right): Boy, Aria, Nico, Corito
The Lives Of Others
his own leisure, building his model boats or driving around alone.
There are days consumed by playing mahjong with friends or
enjoying the company of his children and grandchildren. There
are weeks to spare for extended trips abroad with Corito, meeting
up with family and old friends, or taking in the many sights the
world has to offer.
But there are things about him that remain the same, and rightly
so. Boy is still the man who practices what he preaches. He is still
the man who walks his talk. He is still the man who will pursue
what he believes to be important fervently and single-mindedly,
regardless of the inconvenience it may cause, controversy it may
stir, or disapproval it may elicit. He is still the man who recognizes
in his life both the fruits of his hard work and the luck of his
fortune. And each day, as he gives back what he has gained, he is
constantly reminded that it is simply not enough to thank God for
his beautiful life.
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Acknowledgments
We would also like to thank Jojo Gisbert and Ting Mañalac for
their valuable comments and suggestions during the writing of
this book.
Text by Conchitina Cruz * Layout by Adam David * Cover Photograph by Levi Lacandula