Of lato-lato and vlogging: How a poor beauty titlist from Oriental Mindoro made it in Dubai

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – A Filipina who has regularly joined pageants in her province to help bring food on the table now counts among the Filipino community’s popular vloggers here, with themes ranging from the typical Pinoy expat life, as well as the city’s touristy places and diverse cuisines.

Rechel Hoco, 23 of Bongabong, Oriental Mindoro and the youngest of four siblings, said she routinely joined the beauty contests to earn money and help with the family’s expenses.

“Noong mga panahon po na ‘yun, yung pagsali sa barangay pageant, para sa iba, ay parang katuwaan lang po. Pero sa akin, sa murang edad na 13, naging trabaho na po sya,” she said.

(Back in those days, many joined pageants for fun. Not me, at a young age of 13, it was a job.)

Vlog

Hoco has been vlogging back in the Philippines. It took her a while, she said, for Filipinos in Dubai to notice her work.

“Yung mga contents ko hindi pumapatok nuong una. May mga views naman po. Pero galing sa Pilipinas po madalas, at hindi sa local audience ng mga Pinoy dito sa Dubai,” said Hoco, who arrived in 2022 and whose first day job was at an events company.

(My contents were not making good hits at first. I got views but mostly from the Philippines, not among the local audience of Filipinos here in Dubai.)

She finally cracked it in July last year when she featured the use of clackers, or lato-lato in Filipino, which was trending in the Philippines at the time.

“I bought one and used it for the first time. I began posting contents showing me playing the lato-lato at tourist attractions like Burj Khalifa, Burj Al Arab and Clock Tower,” Hoco said.

Doing the lato against the backdrop of iconic sites in Dubai sent the message of this Filipino craze having reached the international expat city, and went viral.

Hoco had 38,000 followers on Facebook before she went to Dubai. These days, she has one million on the platform, another 1.2 million on TikTok and about 18,000 YouTube subscribers.

Life has changed

Hoco, who now works as a sales staff at a travel agency and is a licensed vlogger, said her life has turned around after going to Dubai, mainly because of her day job and her vlogs.

“Masasabi ko po na malaki na rin po ang nabago mula nung pumunta po ako ng Dubai. Yung nanay ko po, na dati ay nagtatrabaho sa iba’t ibang bahay bilang  kasambahay, ngayon ay sa aming sariling bahay na lang po. At pinatigil na po namin magtrabaho. Sa kabutihang palad po, hindi na rin kami namomroblema sa kakainin kinabukasan. Ang sarap po pala ng pakiramdam nun. Masasabi ko po na unti-unti na po naming nakakamit yung mga pangarap namin,” she said.     

(I can say that a lot has changed since I went to Dubai. My mother, who used to work as domestic help at different houses, now just stays at home. We also don’t have problems anymore about whether we’ll have something to eat the following day. It feels good that way. I can say that slowly, we are making our dreams come true.)

Hoco said she has also been able to buy a house and lot next to their old place. Likewise, her two sisters are with her already in Dubai for work.  

Beginnings

Hoco said they were so dirt-poor, they used to live in a “pigeonhole,” as she preferred to call it.

“Walang kuwarto. Lahat kami ay sama-samang natutulog sa isang sahig na gawa sa kawayan. Konting ulan lang, lahat ng lugar sa loob ng bahay ay may naka-abang na planggana’t timba dahil tumutulo talaga sa dami ng butas ng bubong. Konting hangin, nililipad na ang agad ang yero ng bubong ng bahay namin,” she said.

(There was no room. We slept together on the bamboo floor. We’d put basins and buckets all over the place when the rain comes as water would be dripping from the roof riddled with holes. A slight wind blows and our roof flies away.)

“Nabuhay kami ng isang kahig, isang tuka. Bilang na bilang yung araw na nakakakain kami ng maayos. Malaking tulong ang saging at kamoteng-kahoy dahil pangtawid gutom. Dumaraan ang araw na tanging kamoteng kahoy lang ang nakakain namin sa buong maghapon dahil noong mga panahong yun, kahit pambili ng bigas at ulam ay hindi na namin ma-afford. Minsan may bigas naman ngunit ang ulam lang namin ay asin, mantika at toyo para magkalasa lang ang kanin,” Hoco said.

(We lived a hand-to-mouth existence. We could count the days when we had a decent meal. Bananas and cassavas would save the day. There were days when all we had on the table were cassavas because we didn’t have money to buy rice and viand. Sometimes we’d have rice and our viand would be a mix of salt, cooking oil and soy sauce to pass for a meal.)

Going to school, Hoco would not have breakfast and would pretend to be busy with something during lunch breaks just so her classmates wouldn’t notice she actually had nothing to eat, she said.

Pageants

This at hand, Hoco banked on her model features to help bring food on the table, having joined over 100 beauty contests from the barangay level and on to the neighboring provinces of Occidental Mindoro, Romblon, Marinduque, Aklan and Batangas before hitting it in Manila. Testament to this are the rows upon rows of sashes lined up across the walls of their old house.

A young Rechel Hoco and the rows upon rows of sashes lined up across the walls of their old house. 'Pumapasok po ako ng high school sa araw, then pageant po sa gabi.' Contributed photo

“Uso po kasi dati yung pageant sa kada barangay sa aming probinsya. Nariyang kada gabi, iba’t ibang barangay ang sinasalihan ko, at kadalasan ako pa po ang pinaka-bata. Pumapasok po ako ng high school sa araw, then pageant po sa gabi, ganun po. At nung time na ‘yun, nakatutulong na ako sa mga magulang ko sa mga gastusin kahit papaano,” said Hoco.

(Beauty pageants were the thing at every barangay in our province in those days. Every night I would join at different barangays and usually, I was the youngest contestant. I went to high school during the day then joined pageant competitions at night. Doing this enabled me to help in our family’s expenses.)

Winning at beauty contest in those days meant bringing home P5,000 to P7,000 for the barangay levels; and up to P15,000 for town or city competitions. This was around 2014 to 2017. The pageants were usually held during the fiesta months of May and June. Hoco made it a point to join in as many so she could save money for the upcoming school year.

Hoco was “Miss Oriental Mindoro 2019” and won last year’s “Mutya ng Kasarinlan” title during the Philippine Independence Day celebrations in the UAE

She finished K 12 Humanities and Social Sciences strand. She tried to take up tourism in college but unfortunately her father fell seriously ill and she had to look after him.

Hoco’s father was a farmer, who did not have a plot of his own, making money only when someone needs an extra hand. He died in 2021 of a serious medical condition. —KBK, GMA Integrated News