Maine Mendoza For MEGA November 2022
Maine Mendoza talks about the challenges of building relationships with people, contentment in her career, and plans of starting her own family
Maine Mendoza likes to keep her circle small. In fact, those 10 friends she laughingly mentioned have been in her life since she was a teenager. They do go out sometimes, but on random Saturday nights, they prefer being in a quiet restaurant than in a bar, sharing stories over cocktails—Mendoza loves amaretto sour. When she’s not doing that, she writes, and is barely active on social media.
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“I did not give in to what they wanted me to become,” she says about the people who tried to fabricate a version of her that doesn’t exist. At the start of her career, she was viewed as someone who was always bubbly and beaming, like YayaDub, the fictional character she used to play during one of the segments in the noontime variety show Eat Bulaga!—the one that made her famous. While that character is long gone, the expectations did not fade. In the end, it was a matter of acceptance for her fans.
“It was hard for them to adjust kasi they’ve always thought I was this kind of person who is very sunny and very perky, and you know, loud,” she says. “But when they meet me in person, they ask, ‘Why is she quiet? Why is she there in the corner? Why is she not talking?’ I do not adjust because it’s important in keeping my individuality.”
And this truthfulness has worked for her. In fact, designers and brands have continued to collaborate with Mendoza because she is believable and relatable. One of her biggest collaborations was with M.A.C. Cosmetics, making her the only Filipina to have worked with the international makeup brand.
“I cannot recall a single moment where I had to adjust to someone just because they had this certain expectation of me,” she says. “For as long as I am able to deliver and do my job well, I don’t see a reason for me to change myself.” (READ MORE HERE)
