IN MEMORIAM: DIREK PAT PEREZ (1958-2018), PROJECT SAYSAY BENEFACTOR
AT the time ProjectSaysay team had nothing even a single peso to continue its advocacy of spreading the ideals and values of great Filipinos, it was Direk Pat Perez who provided the team a budget.
Direk Pat, then the Vice-President for Creatives of LeGIT Entertainment + Media, Co., came to know ProjectSaysay in an event organized by the team on 3 August 2016 previewing “Mabini: Talino at Paninindigan,” a history documentary directed by Direk Pat and produced by the National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP). Since then, she became fascinated of ProjectSaysay.
Unfortunately, Direk Pat was diagnosed with Stage 2 breast cancer in 2015. The cancer cells were too invasive, that these had reached her brain already. In December 2016, the magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) procedure to her yielded two brain tumors in addition to the three bigger tumors previously detected. With more unseen, on 21 December 2016, she decided to underwent a whole brain radiation therapy for twelve Sessions. But before she underwent the therapy, she sent her staff to ProjectSaysay Executive Director Ian Christopher Alfonso to inform him she was interested to join the benefactors program of ProjectSaysay. The team produces the ProjectSaysay posters (which are distributed for free) through the generosity of the benefactors.
On 19 January 2017, Direk Pat’s staff presented the team a check worth PhP 78,660.00—biggest amount ProjectSaysay had ever received then for its sole use. Her conditions were simple: utilized the money not only for the poster production but for the modest allowance to each and every volunteer of ProjectSaysay until May 2017.
Fulfilling her expectations, ProjectSaysay turned over posters in select schools in Cagayan, Cavite, Pampanga, and Valenzuela City, mounted exhibit at CASA San Miguel in San Antonio, Zambales featuring the new format of posters in 12”x18” matte-laminated sticker on 3mm sintra, sponsored a free Baybayin workshop, and gathered the volunteers, benefactors, and partners of ProjectSaysay for the first time to celebrate its fourth founding anniversary held at Rizal Shrine Fort Santiago.
Also through the budget endowed by Direk Pat, ProjectSaysay had its official website, www.psaysay.org.
As a tribute, ProjectSaysay conferred to Direk Pat the title “Natatanging Tagapagsulong” (Honorary Advocate). She wrote back to Project Saysay: “now that Father Time may run a shorter lease on my life, one of the things I really want to do is help you #MakeThingsHappen for #pSaysay... Yet now, you accord me with different ways of recognition, I am so deeply honored & humbled—coming from… Project Saysay Team whom I have so much respect for.”
“Perhaps far greater than any TV award is this humble recognition from #pSaysay that endeavors to bring Words of Wisdom of Great Filipino Minds into every classroom in the form of posters,” Direk Pat furthered. She continued: “Thank you to these young but substantive doers… who forms a reason why I have hope for a Better Philippines.” “READ… what MABINI had said of our ‘political leaders’ way back then in the 1890s! A Sad Truth haunting us up to the present day,” referring to the quote Mabini, “Sincere, honest, and loyal politics is, in truth, very hard to find these days because interest and ambition unfortunately overpower individuals and blind governments,” from the article “La Verdad en su Lugar" (The Truth in its Place) written in Rosales, Pangasinan on 15 October 1899.
In the evening of 23 November 2018, Direk Pat joined the Creator at the age of 60.
Direk Pat was a television shows director. Among the shows she directed was Digital LG Quiz, a popular quiz show on TV from 1999 to 2003 every Saturday on GMA 7. Dr. Maria Corazon Tapang-Lopez, Executive Vice-President of Centro Escolar University Las Piñas and former colleague of Direk Pat on Digital LG Quiz, acknowledged Direk Pat as “the life of the GMA 7 LG Digital Quiz Show that brought in to the homes of the late 1990s young students a great mix of KNOWLEDGE AND FUN every weekend.”
The ProjectSaysay Creatives’ Team and Board of Directors deeply mourn the passing of our beloved benefactor, Direk Pat Perez—she who blazed the trail to make ProjectSaysay known. We are grateful to you always, Direk.
“I'd rather have a shorter lifespan but in full capacity, than a longer life but unproductive and brain-damaged!” –Direk Pat Perez
