Table 4: Starting the Interview with Connie and Friends 🌸
When I set my smartphone down in the middle of our table to record our conversation, Connie stared at the screen as though I had just placed an unspun stat crossmatch in front of her. She was wearing a t-shirt (merch of the Pine Green school), smiling, and giggling with that exact pitch of self-effacing humor you find in every medical technology intern who has not slept eight hours in three months.
She did not come alone. Sitting shoulder to shoulder with her were her closest friends: Chenby, Kaycee, and EJ. They were never duty partners in the hospital, just close friends sharing the everyday journey and chaos of student life at the Pine Green school. Today, their individual paths are already taking shape: Chenby and EJ are now in medical school, while Kaycee is already a licensed Registered Medical Technologist (RMT). Connie, graduating a year after them, is the next in line to take her board exam in March 2027. They sat by her side during our interview like personal bodyguards, cheering her on, teasing her, and filling the room with familiar laughter.
Before we even started, I couldn’t help teasing her: “Sit properly! So you can feel confident!” She giggled, smiling as her friends cheered her on from across the table.
Admin: Okay Kiana, let’s start. Sit properly! So you can feel confident. Good evening, I’m the Admin of your fans club, your interviewer. Mag-interview ko nimo about simple questions and also about sa imong papalapit na boards. First question: can you tell me what’s your age?
Connie 💕: 23. October...
Admin: Sige, I’ll redact that. Somewhere in October. Scorpio. As a Scorpio, unsa man nga qualities imong ma-relate sa pagka-Scorpio?
Connie 💕: I’m not sure. I think quite the opposite! Usually Scorpios are lowkey mysterious. Ako kay medyo outgoing, just enough. Very chill lang. INFP ko.
Admin: (Smiles) Sige, showbiz question sa ta una before boards: do you want to disclose your orientation? Unsa man gyung type nimo?
Connie 💕: Portrait! [Explodes into laughter as Chenby, Kaycee, and EJ crack up in the background]
Her spontaneous reply, “Portrait!”, brought the entire table to tears. It was pure Connie: razor-sharp, unexpected, and utterly unpretentious. In that single moment, the formal awkwardness of a recorded interview disappeared.
The Manila Trip: Enrolling in Morayta and Choosing Online Review ✈️
After walking the stage in the white uniform, taking pictures with family, and celebrating graduation, the next big milestone quickly comes into view: securing enrollment for the board exam review. There is little pause before you have to plan the next phase.
In the world of Philippine MedTech licensure, one name reigns supreme: that review center in Morayta. It has an idiosyncratic institutional policy: even if you plan to enroll in their digital stream from hundreds of kilometers away in the Visayas or Mindanao, enrollment cannot be completed over the internet. They strictly require face-to-face registration in Manila. You either have to fly to Manila in person to verify your documents and register, or coordinate with a friend heading there to submit your papers alongside theirs. After graduating last July, Connie took that flight to Manila to handle her enrollment in person.
They offer two primary modalities: Hybrid or Online. Connie made a deliberate decision: the online review track. Rather than dealing with Manila dorm life and living expenses, she opted to review from her desk at home in Cebu, targeting the upcoming March 2027 Medical Technology Licensure Examination. But right now, she hasn’t actually dived into the heavy review yet. She is literally just about to start studying after weeks of constantly catching up with friends, hopping between cafes, and being on the move.
Admin: You graduated last July from the Pine Green school, and now you’re enrolled in that review center in Morayta for online review here in Cebu. But you’re really just about to start studying. Before you officially open your reviewers, what is going through your head right now? Excited? Scared?
Connie 💕: [Exhales] Tired.
Admin: Tired? Why tired?
Connie 💕: Since graduation, everything has been in this waiting state. You know that feeling when you just finished five years of intense schooling and duty, and before you even catch your breath, the board exam review is already waiting? Add to that always going out with friends, hopping between cafes, and now you have to sit down and face the reviewers. I just feel tired, but I know I have to show up.
When Connie uttered that single word, “Tired,” there was zero drama in it. It was the honest, exhausted reality of someone who had survived five years of undergraduate science, only to spend her post-graduation weeks constantly on the go with friends, hopping between cafes, and running around until her physical energy was completely drained.
She is literally just about to sit down and begin studying in earnest. But before the first lecture video even plays, she is already tired from always being on the move. The board exam doesn’t wait for your legs to stop aching or your mind to fully detox from the post-grad whirlwind. It simply sits on your desk, waiting for you to turn the first page.
The Connie Coping Mechanism: “Gaslighting Myself” 💡
During our conversation, I waited for the moment Connie would drop the polite answers and reveal her real survival mechanism. That moment came when I asked how she handled moments of hopelessness during her MedTech journey.
She didn’t cite study planners or motivational quotes. She giggled, looked me straight in the eye, and said: “Gaslight. Gaslighting myself.”
Admin: Was there ever a moment during your MedTech journey when you thought, ‘Kaya ko pa ba ’to?’ Kanang morag losing hope na gyud ka?
Connie 💕: [Giggles] I’m already losing hope right now, so no need! By being indifferent! Out of sight, out of mind.
Admin: Unsaon man nimo pag-get through sa maong moment?
Connie 💕: Gaslight. Gaslighting myself.
Admin: Gaslighting yourself? Is that healthy?
Connie 💕: [Bursts into laughter] Yes! For me, yes!
Admin: You spent years studying microscopic cells and bacteria that normal people will never understand. What is one thing you learned in MedTech that changed you outside the classroom?
Connie 💕: Need ko makat-on magpabaga sa nawong! You need to get out of your comfort zone and be brave. Sa MedTech, whether extracting blood from difficult patients or running emergency lab tests, you don’t have the option to be shy. Wala kay choice kundi mo-step up gyud.
Her phrase, “Makat-on magpabaga sa nawong” (learning to have thick skin), explains the quiet transformation every health sciences student undergoes. You start out as an introverted teenager terrified of awkward social interactions, and within three years, you are in an emergency room holding a 21-gauge needle in front of an agitated adult whose veins have collapsed. You cannot hesitate. You anchor the vein, enter smoothly at fifteen degrees, collect the tube, and walk away. That quiet, unvarnished courage is what Connie takes into March 2027.
TWICE, Yoo Jeongyeon, and the Sinking Lifeboat 🚢
Every healthcare student has an emotional valve: an obsession entirely separated from blood banking and diagnostic algorithms that keeps their brain from frying. For Connie, that lifeline is TWICE. She has been a passionate ONCE since high school, stanning the group through every comeback.
When the relentless quizzes and exams at the Pine Green school pushed her to the brink, she didn’t listen to self-help podcasts. She watched Yoo Jeongyeon fancams. To an outsider, that might sound humorous, but in the brutal monotony of reviewers, having an uncomplicated source of pure dopamine is essential.
Admin: What part of the MTLE scares you the most? Not necessarily the test itself, but the thought of what this means in your life?
Connie 💕: [Tone softens into quiet vulnerability] Beyond the exam... the fear of disappointment. Kanang mahadlok ka nga ma-disappoint nimo ang mga tawo nga nag-support nimo, imong family, and imong kaugalingon. Sa among school, grabe gyud ang expectations.
Admin: If TWICE announces an exclusive fan meeting in Cebu in February 2027, one month before your March MTLE, will you go?
Connie 💕: [Gasps, hands over heart] Mo-adto gyud! Adto gyud ko! Bahala na! Si Jeongyeon gud na! [The table erupts into laughter]
Admin: Last moral dilemma before Fast Talk: You are on an overloaded lifeboat in the middle of the sea. The boat will sink unless one person jumps off. On the boat with you are: Chenby, Kaycee, EJ, and Yoo Jeongyeon of TWICE. Who are you throwing overboard?
Connie 💕: [Laughs out loud, looks at Chenby, Kaycee, and EJ sitting beside her] Ako na lang mo-ambak! Ako na lay ihulog! Dili nako kaya mo-pili! Kay kung si Jeongyeon ako itambog, mamatay akong kasingkasing. Pero kung silang Chenby, Kaycee, or EJ... patyon pud ko nila pagkahuman! So ako na lang! [Loud cheers and giggles from the squad]
Her answer, choosing to jump overboard herself rather than sacrifice her friends or her K-pop idol, reveals everything about Connie. Underneath her self-deprecating humor is a deep, instinctive loyalty. She would rather take the hit herself than watch anyone she cares about sink.
Looking Ahead to March 2027: “Dili Matulog During the Exam” 🎓
As the evening wound down, I asked her for one final message to the people who believe in her, and to herself seven months from now when she walks into the testing center.
“Believe in yourself, and in me. Dapat mag-serious sa pag-answer, dili mag-complacent, ug dili matulog during the exam! And trust in the Lord our God.”
Next week, the browser tab for her online review from Morayta will open. The review materials for the six board subjects will cover her study desk in Cebu: Clinical Chemistry, Microbiology and Parasitology, Hematology, Blood Banking, Clinical Microscopy, and Histopath with MT Laws. But she will not walk into March 2027 alone. She carries the grit of five years at the Pine Green school, the fierce loyalty of her closest friends, and the unstoppable humor of someone who knows how to laugh at the hardest moments.
