My life started at a remote fishing village on a tiny island in the Pacific. My grandfather was an illiterate fisherman who raised seven children. All took advantage of the free primary education in the barrio. My father went further, far beyond the local grade school in the village. He eventually became a professor at the university in the big city across the channel.

Burdened by the history of four hundred years of Spanish colonial domination that relegated Filipinos to servitude, the fearsome years of Japanese occupation, the turmoil of World War II, established society’s biases, prejudices and taboos are the bridges I had to cross. Like my father, I took advantage of the new way of life American democracy brought. Education was the key.

I faced the new world, conscious of my humble beginnings. Coming out of the village, I wondered, will I fit in in the city? Coming out of four hundred years of serfdom that created a mentality of self-doubt, I questioned, am I good enough to be a doctor? Coming out of a third world country, I worried, am I good enough for the big world? As a foreign medical graduate now in the United States, I was anxious, will I be accepted?

Through the strength in my upbringing and my faith in the Almighty, all I needed was my grandfather’s admonition when I left the island for college. The world out there is like a mirror. You smile at it; it smiles back.