Maryana | Hillcrest, Waikato

“Powerful influences in my life are my grandparents and my parents. They taught me about being open, and taught me how to treat life like a learning experience. I think in particular they did that by telling me stories.

My grandma taught me to read, because it was one of those things that you needed to do before primary school where I’m from, and she used to hold up these little flash cards, and sound out what the letters meant, or were meant to sound like. I really enjoyed that, and so I really enjoyed reading and my parents used to read us all kinds of different stories. My dad would open up this big box that he had, and he would read us comic books. All sorts of different comic books from Ironman to Classics Illustrated and my mum would bring these giant collections of fairy tales form all over the world, and she’d read those to us, until we knew them all by heart. We just got a feel for what stories were, and how exciting they could be, and between all of that, I think that’s really shaped who I am, and how I approach life, and how I approach people, and my pathway into the future, which is really exciting. It’s something that I’ll never be able to repay them for, but they know that I really appreciate it. 

So, what I feel they’ve taught me is to really value freedom, and to value the freedom of others. They always encouraged me and my sisters to think independently, to talk with each other, to have open and honest discussions, and to tell them everything and anything. That has really helped me to understand what good free discussion and conversations can be like, and I think that’s really important. They also taught me how to value family, and through valuing family, how to value the people around me that I’ve met, and that I have befriended. I remember that when we were younger, in summer we used to be encouraged to go on service projects. So, we took part in a lot of volunteering opportunities all over the place, we went to places like Monte Cecelia House in South Auckland. I remember doing some building service projects in Paeroa, and all different projects like that. It’s always been exciting and interesting to be able to contribute to making other people happy. They’ve always encouraged us, and me personally, to do that. I reckon that between those two, between freedom and love, you can kind of live a pretty good life, if you’ve got those two things fixed in your understanding.

I was born in Manilla, in the Philippines, and we moved to New Zealand. Myself, my parents and my three sisters in 2006 when I was 13.  I went to primary school in the Philippines, in the, I suppose more strict Asian system, and then I went to high school in New Zealand, which was, for me, a lot of fun. When I was in high school in New Zealand I feel that creativity was really encouraged, and that really helped me to decide to explore different possibilities of what I could do with my talents and I felt that was a really valuable experience education-wise.

Now I’m training to be a journalist, and I also do some volunteer work with young women in the Waikato. Between that, I also work part-time, for Coastline Markers at Fulton Hogan, and between all of those different occupations, I get really busy, but it’s part of the fun, and keeps life interesting, and I’d rather be busy than have nothing to do. 

I think that even after moving to New Zealand, my family has really retained our Filipino identity, and we’ve really kept up with the food, and the traditions of family. We’ve also kept an emphasis and value on our faith, as Catholics, and that’s been really important to us, as we’ve grown up in New Zealand.”