The Global Filipino Magazine TGFM Issue 4 - July 2020

FOR Froilan Albaracin Imatong, helping the sick and touching the lives of many people has always his dream since he was a child. Today, he is now playing a huge chunk of role in Covid-19 situation in UAE, the country he has been serving since he was 23. A graduate of Nursing at Lyceum Northwestern University in Dagupan City in 2005, he became a registered nurse in the Philippines the same year. Imatong, who is also a registered nurse in the UAE, was a ward nurse in a government hospital in the capital, primarily handling Covid-19 confirmed patients. Currently, he is one of the team leaders of the government’s vaccine mission, 4Humanity, to find the cure for the virus. Before curating his fate overseas, he was a nursing educator in…

MOST superheroes featured by contemporary media typically use their powers to help the world become better and are dedicated to protecting the public. And in today’s generation, superheroes are no longer wearing capes. They are the medical workers who continue to curtail the spread of the deadly respiratory disease, Covid-19. Abu-Dhabi-based Filipino Jacquelyn Merano Adormeo, 28, is one of them. She arrived in UAE some five years ago as a make-up artist and a trainer of make-up courses. But no one has ever predicted that she will be part of UAE’s Covid-19 nurse responders as she has always been working in the cosmetic industry, a work that is far different from the medical field. How it all started When she finished studying high school, she was offered a four-year scholarship…

LIKE any person who works abroad, Shelfred Canaveras Surdilla’s ambition is to provide the best life for his family and to have a career and personal growth. Creating dreams and setting goals are his goals to challenge himself in life. True to his words, Surdillas is now working as a chief fashion designer for a very influential family in the UAE, however, stepping on this position wasn’t trouble-free. After graduating high school, at the age of 18, he started to work in Darussalam, Brunei as a waiter for a fast food restaurant while her mother was working as a domestic worker from one country to another. A year after, he has decided to follow his mother in Dubai and worked in an haute couture atelier as a helper finisher. He…

FOR Prof. Dr. Erwin Martinez Faller, working abroad was a lifetime journey. Faller, real pride of the Philippines as an outstanding international academician and researcher, was not really planning to work overseas since he had a decent job in the Philippines as a Dean of Pharmacy at a higher educational institute in Tagum, Davao del Norte. He then decided to work in Malaysia as he wanted to develop himself and return to the Philippines in an effort to help Filipinos in uplifting the profession in the country. For years, he devoted his time to the academe teaching students in pharmaceutical sciences, clinical pharmacy, and pharmacy practice while working as a senior lecturer in a university. As a person with a high degree of enthusiasm, he became passionate about advancing himself…

A FILIPINO expat based in Dubai who won AED166,666 from Emirates Loto in May is using the prize to help his family and kabayans who are affected by Covid-19 crisis abroad. Thirty-eight-year-old William Aniana opted to stay in the emirate instead of settling in the Philippines and continued working as a document controller. Aside from helping his family, Aniana, who works in Dubai for 13 years now, also used his prize to buy grocery items for his neighbors in his hometown. Anianas, who is also a balloon artist, has recently launched his own YouTube channel called ‘Yayam’s TV’ that is designed to help people in need. “From the moment I was lucky enough to win Emirates Lotto, my life totally changed both financially and in terms of opportunity. I became…

JEFFERSON Manalo Rivera always understands that achieving one’s goal may be difficult but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible. For the last 13 years, he is living and working in Dubai clearly because of better opportunities and salary package. For nine years, Rivera has been immersing himself in the beauty industry as a make-up artist and magnifying the beauty of his clients that already exist. Today, the 33-year-old Filipino, is now the managing director of his company called JhaJha Make-Up Artist which is registered under the Dubai Creative Clusters Authority. In 2011, he attended a series of training at the London College of Fashion. “I decided to work in Dubai because my father worked here as well as other relatives and I learned that opportunities and salaries were way better than…