The New Kid in Candy

In October 2004, around the same time Ines first assigned me to write for Candy, she told me they had an opening for the position of editorial assistant. I was really interested in the job but since I was still studying in Singapore at the time, I told her that if the position was still open by the time I got back to Manila, then I would apply.

As luck would have it, the position was still open when I returned home in January and I got the job! I had also applied for other jobs at the time but after a period of discernment where I weighed the pros and cons and listed my strengths and weaknesses, I knew I had to work for Candy—and I've had no regrets since.

I started in March of 2005. When I came in, they were almost done working on the May issue and were starting to layout the June issue with Katie Holmes on the cover.

This was also the issue where Ines introduced me to the readers in her Ed's Scrapbook. She wrote, "Meet the new girl in school, Candy school that is! Say hi to Angel, our new editorial assistant. Here she is with Hale's Champ Lui-Pio. Just a few days on the job and she's already hobnobbing with the stars!" Of course I was thrilled to have my picture in the magazine for the first time—and my name in the staff box!

Since they had already assigned the articles for this issue, I was put in charge of Caught on Candy, the section where readers' letters are published. 

I wrote about my first few weeks at work in my old blog—about my first (and last) Candy Rap Awards, attending press conferences, helping out at shoots, and doing my first celebrity interviews with popular Pinoy bands Sandwich and Hale.

A few months later, as I was browsing through my old files in high school, I found a project my friends and I did for homeroom class where we imagined our visions for the future. I wrote, "I always imagined myself to be the editor of Seventeen magazine, or to go local, Candy magazine."

I guess I already knew what I wanted even then. Visioning really does work! :)