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| Dr. Dollie H. Sison with magician Erik Mana |
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The great globetrotting magician Erik Mana was there as special guest of the celebrator, a very rare entertainment fare for thousands of adoring well-wishers on her natal day on October 2 who attended the celebration at UNC and at Avenue Square at Magsaysay Avenue. But the celebrator, an ageless lady they call Dollie, was in reality the wonder of wonders herself, one phenomenon of human durability, the epitome of astounding, impregnable spirit. In fact, the Guinness Book of Records must have reserved a page for Dr. Dolores Hernandez Sison.
Her life is more than mere magic; it is a miracle.
Reacting to a column item of this writer in one local newspaper in 1994 during her birthday that year, she wrote me in long hand: “You mentioned age. I am only two years old…”. With her characteristic wit and pleasant disposition, she recounted how in 1992 her doctor in New York gave up on her and frankly told her a surgical operation would be futile; it meant her days were numbered. Mrs. Sison today, 15 years later, could write once more to say she had a prankster for a doctor.
But no, she possesses no magical prowess like the inimitable Erik Mana who could tell what Archbishop Leonardo Z. Legaspi, O.P., D.D.. one of the guests, was writing or exactly predict his age even when he did not know who he really was.
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| At 18, garbed in piña terno which was the vogue before the war, she was the Intercollegiate Girl of the College Editors’ Guild of the Philippines. |
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Her deep religiosity and devotion to God obviously had reversed the trend established by medical science; her doctor in New York who she said raised both hands in despair and abject surrender was among the best in the world. But indeed, the best doctor is the Lord.
To be in the Guinness in the Book of Records is really no joke at all for Mrs. Sison. No one in this planet probably has been at the helm of a great educational institution as the University of Nueva Caceres for as long as she has been. Even if she formally assumed as university president only on March 5, 1977 when her father, the illustrious Dr. Jaime Hernandez, bequeathed the position to her, she had actually been running the first university in the Bicol Region for decades as executive vice president, which meant about half a century and that is definitely unbeatable. More importantly, throughout all those years UNC has chalked up a scintillating record of topnotchers in every course the school offered, especially in the bar, CPA, engineering and nursing examinations.
The greater mystery about Mrs. Sison is that for all those long years that she has associated with thousands of changing personalities in the so-called UNC family everyone speaks of her with unparalleled reverence and affection. They say that she has been endeared to people around her not just because she is bright, articulate and beautiful but because she genuinely loves people, too. She has her unique way of touching the lives of people around her.
That must be the reason why she easily won when she ran for the Batasan Pambansa as Assemblywoman for Bicol Region in 1978. She was also the potent factor when her husband, the late Dean Antonio Moran Sison, won as delegate to the Constitutional Convention in 1971.
UNC is Mrs. Sison’s turf but she made waves everywhere, not just in the defunct Batasan during which time she was also Minister of State for Tourism. She was Philippine delegate to the 33rd and 34th UN General Assembly in 1978 and 1979 and to the World Tourism Organization Conference in India in 1983; Mexico, 1982; Italy, 1981; Manila, 1980; Spain, 1979. In 1982 she was speaker at the Asian women Parliamentary Seminar in Seoul, South Korea.
In the November, 1996 issue of the VANGUARD magazine we wrote of Mrs. Sison: “She is there embedded deeply in the hearts and minds of legions who look up to her as idol and inspiration and nurture memories of her flawless, heartwarming rapport with people, not just within the academe but wherever she treads…
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| At 22, she married a dashing, debonaire lawyer from one of the best known families in Luzon, Antonio Moran Sison who became Dean of the UNC College of Law and delegate to the 1971 Constitutional Convention. |
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Mrs. Sison must have been really meant to be a woman for all seasons. She finished high school as valedictorian at the Philippine Women’s University where she also graduated cum laude in both A.B. and B.S.E. courses. While at the PWU she was president of the student council both in high school and college and editor of the PhilWomenian and PWU annual. Her crowning glory as student was her being chosen the Intercollegiate Girl of the College Editors Guild of the Philippines, considered then as now as the epitome of beauty and brains.
When it became imminent that the stewardship of the UNC was to fall squarely on her shoulders she took up M.A. in Administration of Higher Education at Columbia University in New York City. On March 25, 1977 the PWU conferred upon her the degree of Doctor of Education, honoris causa.”
Yes, for a long, long time yet, Mrs. Dollie Sison will continue to weave her own magic in the tradition of her parents. Dr. Jaime Hernandez who served under three Philippine Presidents as cabinet member was 94 then when he died on July 11, 1986 exactly on his date of birth. Her mother, Anita Jaucian Hernandez who died only on March 30, 1999 was more than a hundred years old.
Make it 200, Madam, because you are sunshine to many people including those you don’t even know. ---- DCAjr.
