July 25, 1999. I remember waking up to the soft pitter-patter of raindrops outside my room, with my mom gently shaking me. I sat up, only to see several swollen faces, all tinted red. My cousins, together with my brother, stood by the door across my bed. “He’s waiting for us…” my mom whispered.

Suddenly, random emotions swelled up inside me, and I couldn’t help but release them through tears.

The next week was a blur of hectic planning, activities and confusion. People flew in from all over the world to follow the casket of a great leader, a freedom fighter, a legend. I didn’t pay heed to those who would come up to me to narrate brief experiences they had shared with him. Raul S. Manglapus, the senator, didn’t matter to me; he was just some figure I was always being linked to. My grandfather, however, did.

Having a famous politician for a grandfather had its ups and downs. My fondest memories of Lolo Raul include watching “Jeopardy” every night with him and listening to him play the piano. He was a noted composer and an excellent speech writer and speaker. To me he served as an inspiration, a role model, someone to look up to, but at the same time, the pressure of being constantly compared to him was heavy.

I hated being expected to have his same set of strengths. I hated the level of achievement I had to live up to. I hated living in his shadow. I wanted to be recognized as I was, without having to conform to everyone’s expectations. I wanted to be accepted, and something pushed me to rebel.

As I grew up, topping the class or being anywhere near it was never important to me. I was content with being average, and I preferred to excel at things I already knew I was good at and do things I enjoyed. What was important was being comfortable with myself, with my own strengths and weaknesses. People told me I could do better, that I had the potential to be just as great as my grandfather, all I had to do was try harder. Of course, I had heard that said many time before. I simply chose not to comply.

Nonconformity is an unexplainable phenomenon noticeable in almost all young people. I guess that is because we are still in our “trial stage.” We don’t want to find our place in this world, we want to make it. That’s what makes rebellion so attractive. We want to create our own rules, make ourselves stand out in institutions that have been around for decades—a discovery of self-worth, so to speak. Youth is golden because of its limitless prospects. And as we grow, the rules we developed will then set the norm for the coming generations, who will most probably follow the same cycle of rebellion.

Several years after “Lolo” [Grandfather] Raul’s passing, my family decided to sort out some of the junk that had accumulated over the years. It was then when I stumbled upon one of the books my grandfather had written. As I read it, I found myself particularly attracted to a part of one of his speeches. He had written:

“The cry of youth is no longer the cry of the crib. The cry of youth is the summons to act, to build, to labor, to dream—if you will—but it is a cry that will be heard.

“I am youth. I am he who dreams, but who shall make your dreams come true. I am he who shall take the green of your pastures, the gold of your hills, the might of your rivers, fashion them with my hands, my heart, my mind, and transform them into life and power. I am he who has a passion to build, who will take this structure which you will someday bequeath to me, breathe into it the warmth of my ideals, build it firm and higher into the stars until the universe shall know of its strength. I am he who shall think, work, act until that figure on the rice field, that erect and fearless form of dignity, shall be found on every field and every valley of this land.

“I am a laborer. I am a builder. I am a dreamer. I am youth. Heed me, for the future is mine.”

I am still young, but I feel as if I have already let countless opportunities pass me by. I regret not taking things seriously; at one point in my life, I almost put a stop to my schooling. Together with my experiences, these words made me realize that I was not only jeopardizing my future but disappointing everyone who believed in me. Since then I have started fresh, putting more effort into school work, not necessarily in order to live up to other people’s expectations, but rather, for my own sake. My grandfather didn’t mean to overshadow me, he meant to set me in the right direction, armed with the right tools to cut my own path. He showed me that I, too, am a laborer, a builder, and a dreamer. I am youth. Heed me, for the future is mine.

Carina Amelia G. Manglapus, 21, is a senior majoring in Creative Writing at the Ateneo de Manila University. She wrote this piece when she was 16.