"There are some teachers you remember fondly. Then there are teachers you liked so much they made you want to be a teacher too."
This is how broadcast journalist Howie Severino remembers his late English teacher who recently passed away at the age of 81.
In an essay published on GMA Regional TV's website on November 1, 2025, and shared on his Facebook page, Howie paid tribute to Esperanza “Ching” Chee Kee, affectionately known to her students and colleagues at Ateneo High School, where she dedicated 41 years of her life to teaching.
Read: Back Under One Roof: The Housemates' Stylish Holiday Reunion
Howie remembers Ching as someone who always kept her composure, even when faced with boisterous students — a constant presence throughout her long teaching career.
"She’d just roll her eyes and mutter, 'Crazy guys…' That was one of her favorite words, crazy. And she had many occasions to use it," Howie reminisced.
To Howie, Ching was a whirlwind of energy — like someone who’d had one cup of coffee too many before every class.
"She’d get so excited, she’d toss chalk in the air and miss when she tried to catch it," shared Howie.
"She wrote so fast on the blackboard we could barely read her scribbling.
"Her laugh was more of a cackle, and she always cackled at her own corny jokes.
"She was cheeky, pun intended. I had to look up 'cheeky' when I first heard it.
"It’s been one of my favorite words ever since, to remind me of Mrs. Chee Kee."
Read: Julia Montes on sleepless nights, what’s worth losing sleep over, and her sleep gummy business.
LOVE FOR READING AND WRITING
Beyond Ching’s vibrant personality, Howie fondly credits his former teacher for nurturing his love of reading and inspiring him and his classmates to express their thoughts and ideas with honesty and confidence.
"She taught us that a love for reading and writing was one of the greatest blessings you could carry around in life," shared the veteran Kapuso broadcaster.
In the beginning, Howie confessed that he struggled to connect with the books he read — their voices, he said, felt distant and unfamiliar to a boy his age.
Howie explains: "It was all this fancy, flowery stuff that made you feel stupid if you didn’t get it.
"Florante at Laura used words no dude would ever say in real life; Rizal’s novels were so complicated I just pretended I understood them; and Shakespeare — don’t even get me started — made English sound like an alien language.
"It all seemed phony as hell, you know? Like those dead writers were trying to impress people who said things like 'juxtapose' and 'existential.'"
But Ching was different.
"She made us read all sorts of literature, from tough classics to stories that spoke directly to our pimply angst," Howie remarked.
Nothing illustrated this better than the time Ching required her class to read The Catcher in the Rye, the coming-of-age classic by American author J.D. Salinger.
It wasn’t surprising that she chose The Catcher in the Rye for her students.
Since its publication in 1951, the novel — and its restless, truth-seeking protagonist, Holden Caulfield — has been considered essential reading for young people, capturing the timeless struggles of adolescence and the search for identity.
"What I liked most was how the book didn’t try to tell you what you should be. It just showed you what you already were: confused, trying hard, sometimes sad, other times giddy — the whole roller-coaster teen thing," reflected Howie.
He continued: "Holden could also be a real jerk, sure, but he also wanted the world to be better. Not richer or cooler. Just more honest. That hit us hard.
"Maybe that could be our wish too, even if we were pretentious fools ourselves in wanting to wear the same pricey, branded clothes our wealthiest classmates wore."
Read: Anne Curtis reveals secret to a stress-free life: “Number one, find the right partner.”
IMPARTING A VALUABLE LESSON
By making the class read The Catcher in the Rye, Ching was imparting a valuable lesson to her students, as Howie would later realize: "We didn’t have to sound like Shakespeare or Rizal or any of those guys with big vocabularies. We could just be us."
By telling her students, “Don’t need to be perfect. Just sound true,” Ching was egging them to be their authentic selves.
Ching, said Howie, "didn't bother to grade or judge" their written report, but "simply acknowledged the effort with a word or two of encouragement."
He continued, "As we matured, we built on that, and I realized what authenticity really is: it’s more about sincerity and not pretending, digging deep without having to sound deep, even if it comes out messy and full of slang and rambling sentences, like this one.
"No one else has to see it. Just know that writing true can somehow make you a better person."
Although he didn’t realize it at the time, this lesson would later prove invaluable to Howie as he pursued a career in journalism.
Howie’s accomplishments as a media practitioner include co-founding the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, creating award-winning documentaries, and holding various positions at GMA Network, where he was among its pioneering bloggers.
Interestingly, Howie and Ching became colleagues and even seatmates in the English Department office for two years when Howie briefly taught at his alma mater.
Meanwhile, veteran music journalist Rick Olivares also paid tribute to the late English teacher, crediting her for believing in him and recognizing his potential when no one else — not even he himself — could see it.
"I thought of Mrs. Ching and how she helped me overcome this fear of talking and presenting in front of people," acknowledged Rick.
"Thanks po. Always, always grateful and thankful."
Read: What is preauricular pit, the small hole in some people’s ear?